Contingency Plan

by Marie James

  I let my eyes fall closed, pushing all thoughts and comparisons to that man out of my head. When I open them back up, the guy is watching me with glazed eyes and an endearingly crooked smile.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Not interested?”

  “I don’t think you could be gentle if you tried.”

  “If I can get a dame like you under me, I’d sure give it one hell of a try.”

  “Maybe you’d have better control of yourself if I tied you to the bed.”

  “I like where your head is at.”

  My head isn’t even remotely in this room, but I’ve become an expert at multitasking.

  “Think you can still show me a good time if you were tied up?”

  “Baby.” His eyes skirt the length of my body, and as cute as he is, it makes my skin crawl. “Tie my hands and sit on my face. It’ll be the most fun you’ve ever experienced.”

  “That so?” I turn to face him.

  “Why don’t we get out of here and you can find out.” He winks, a creepy action that makes me want to take a step back. “What do you say?”

  I cringe away when he lifts his hand to trail a finger down the bare skin of my arm.

  “Do you wanna?”

  “Do you wanna go to jail?”

  Another set of chills run down my spine with the growl, but I don’t turn around.

  “She’s sixteen.”

  I roll my eyes as the guy in front of me lets his eyes fall to my chest before he looks up and searches my eyes for the truth.

  “Dad!” I hiss, spinning around to face him.

  Flynn doesn’t look impressed with my old man joke.

  “Sorry, man,” the guy that was flirting with me says. “This is a twenty-one and up bar.”

  I literally feel the wind of his escape at my back when he scurries off.

  This is the first time with him chasing me that I didn’t actually want to be found. I just wanted a little time away, a little time to myself, hoping it would help me not feel so hurt by the words I heard him say. None of it makes any sense. We haven’t expressed any feelings for each other. We haven’t spent time together in a romantic way, and I think it plays to the part of me that needs something more than I’m getting from everyone in my life that seeing him here—frown and all—that makes me a little happy.

  “I’m fine,” I say, spinning back toward the bar. “You can leave.”

  I pick up the glass of seltzer that I ordered, straw to my mouth only for it to be slapped away, the glass skidding down the bar before falling to the floor and shattering into a hundred shards.

  “What the hell was that for?”

  “Are you fucking serious?” he seethes.

  “I’m twenty-one in less than two weeks, you stupid jerk. And that was seltzer not alcohol.”

  “This,” he says pushing against my side. “This is why you need a fucking babysitter. Did you not see him drug your damn drink?”

  “He didn’t,” I assure him.

  “I saw it from across the room, Remington.” Oh, how I’ve grown to hate the sound of my full name from his dumb lips. “What would you have done if I wasn’t here?”

  “Probably gone home with him,” I snap back, even though the thought of getting drugged and raped makes my hands literally begin to shake. “Stay the hell away from me.”

  Pushing away from the bar, I turn to head out the front door. He’s right on my damn heels, the warmth of his body a constant reminder that no matter how often I run, he’s going to be right there. At least until he gets to go back to St. Louis and is replaced by the next flunky tasked with ruining my damn life.

  “How did you find me anyway?” I hiss once we get outside.

  Sweat that formed in the humid bar chills my damp skin, forcing me to wrap my arms around myself.

  “It’s my damn job to find you. You promised you wouldn’t take off.”

  “When you were sick,” I clarify. “Besides, you hate chasing after me, so just go back home.”

  “And leave you out here so someone can hurt you?”

  He grabs my arm, spinning me around to face him before I can get too far down the sidewalk.

  “I’m a damn job, a fucking paycheck for you. Don’t start acting like you care what happens to me.”

  He inches in so close I can feel his breath on my lips when he speaks. “I won’t have a job if you end up raped, murdered, and on the evening news.”

  “Just perfect. You should just—”

  His lips are on mine, his hand at my waist, fingers flexing into the thin fabric of my dress. When did his body get so close to mine?

  I groan into the kiss, hating that it feels so good but unable to pull my face back.

  His tongue swipes over mine aggressively, a bid to regain whatever power he feels like he’s lost. He groans a rough growl when I angle my head to deepen it. With his body flush against mine, I can feel every inch of him—every lying, deceitful inch. If he ever breathes a word that he doesn’t want me, I’ll remind him just how hard it was to resist me.

  I cup his jaw, slowing the kiss, forcing him to transform from forceful into something a little calmer.

  I whimper at the roll of his hips, ready to throw it all out the window and risk getting arrested for indecent exposure just to feel more of his body against mine.

  “Stop,” he hisses, his feet and head jerking away, carrying him several feet from me.

  He’s not unaffected, the evidence in his panting breaths and the erection straining behind his slacks.

  “Don’t do that.”

  “Don’t do that?” I mock. “You’re the one who kissed me. Tell me you aren’t so delusional that you think I started that.”

  “Can’t happen,” he mutters, looking away and swiping at his mouth with the back of his hand, the act more insulting than refusing a kiss in the first place.

  “Still. You kissed me.”

  “You kissed me back,” he argues like a kid in trouble.

  “Very mature.”

  “Never again,” he says quietly. “That can’t ever happen again.”

  “Fine by me,” I lie, turning around and walking away.

  Chapter 13

  Flynn

  I stare at the ringing phone in my hand, wondering how much it would cost just to hop on a plane to Mexico for a few weeks. I know why he’s calling, just like I know what I did last night was wrong.

  I also know I can’t avoid him forever. What does scare me is that he’s going to tell me to come home, and even with as much complaining as I did to Wren yesterday before he transferred me to Ignacio, I know I don’t want to leave. Hell, I don’t think I can leave. But maybe it’s for the best because how the hell do I keep my hands off of her now that I know what her tongue feels like against mine. How do I walk away knowing what that little whimper of hers did to my body?

  I press the answer button. “Flynn Coleman.”

  A snort of laughter. “It’s a little late to start acting professional now isn’t it.”

  “Are you alone?” I ask my boss.

  The last thing I need are witnesses to my downfall.

  “Were you alone last night on the street while you were making out with your client?”

  Fuck, did more photos hit the paper? And here I was thinking Wren spilled the beans.

  “Charles and Carla Blair are the clients.”

  “Are you really splitting hairs right now?”

  “You don’t sound as angry as I thought you would.”

  “She’s pregnant.”

  My blood stops flowing. “I didn’t sleep with her.”

  But I’ll kill the man who did.

  “Anna,” he says with a laugh.

  “I didn’t sleep with her either.”

  His growl brings a smile to my face.

  “I’m going to be a father.”

  “Fathers show compassion and understanding. Any chance you’re going to start practicing that today?”

  “Both Wren and Ignacio
told me you want to come back.”

  I’d jab him in the throat if I could. “I told you I didn’t want to come in the first place,” I remind him.

  “Do you want to come home?” I wait because he doesn’t sound like he’s finished. “After last night, do you still want to come home?”

  “I need to be more professional.”

  “I always want you to be professional, Flynn.”

  “So, no kissing the clients.” I say it more for my benefit than his.

  “Correct.”

  “Anything else?” I ask as I watch Remington descend the stairs in workout clothes so tight it’s almost like she’s naked.

  “Just one reminder,” Deacon says.

  “Yeah?”

  “Charles and Carla Blair are your clients.” The fucker hangs up, but honestly, it’s for the best because I wouldn’t be able to hold a conversation right now anyway.

  Is she purposefully swaying her hips with that much attitude or am I imagining it?

  Her sports bra isn’t thick enough to do much, and my mouth waters to trace the outline of her nipple pushing against the fabric. Her hair is in the typical bun, but her face is completely made up, notifying me that she isn’t going to be working out today in the home gym.

  “I have an exercise class,” she says as she breezes past me without bothering to look me in the eye.

  She waits by the rear passenger door of her car for me to open it up, and it’s easy to see she’s put me in a much different box than the one I was in last night. It’s probably for the best though. Despite practically having permission from my boss to kiss her, tainting a job with emotion never worked out well for me in the past.

  The only words she gives to me include the address to her exercise class, but that doesn’t stop me from watching her in the rearview mirror more than I actually watch the road in front of me.

  She waits when we arrive, and I know she’s trying to act like a diva, but I like opening the door for her, so I think it’s a win-win situation. I breathe deep when she slips past me again, planning to compare the scent of her skin now versus after she’s done exercising. It’s not the first time I’ve been around to witness the event, but at home she’s always in slouchy sweats and an oversized t-shirt, never second-skin spandex.

  With her nose halfway tilted to the sky, Remington breezes into the building, another skyscraper that looks more like the hub for Fortune 500 companies than a gym, but lo-and-behold, the third floor houses a very swanky one.

  “You can wait in the lobby if you like,” Remington says with more professionalism than she’s shown since the day I met her.

  Ignoring her, I follow her into the room, realizing my mistake the second I walk in. If I thought pulling away from the taste of her lips was hard last night, it’s got nothing on what’s about to go down.

  The room, surrounded by mirrors is lit with several strobe lights with soft, sultry music playing through hidden speakers. All of that is fine, but it’s the half dozen gleaming poles scattered throughout the room that have the potential to give me a fucking heart attack. I’m not an idiot. I know pole dancing is a very good way to get a full-body workout, but I just wish I had time to prepare for this.

  Nothing, and I mean nothing prepares me for the sight of Remington crossing the room and kissing either side of some dude’s face. His hand rests familiarly on her hips and I could make diamonds out of coal with the tension in my muscles. I watch, angry with the world even though it makes no sense as they laugh and joke. Several other women enter, two of them eyeing me up and down before they pull away from each other.

  My mouth literally hangs open when Remington steps to the side and tugs down her athletic leggings. More ass than was revealed in her bikini that first day is visible, her tan legs going on for what seems like miles. She looks fucking stunning. I wouldn’t tell her that out loud, but my dick doesn’t seem too concerned with any attention he might get. I groan, rubbing my face with both hands and stand to the side, arms clasped in front of course, in an attempt to conceal my problem.

  Controlling my erections have never been a damn problem for me. I’ve always had the ability to remain stoic, keeping my thoughts, fantasies, and reactions to myself. It’s one of the good traits of an FBI agent, but all my skills, all the things that made me a great agent once upon a time mean absolutely nothing when I’m around this woman.

  She’s driving me nuts. I told Wren as much yesterday, but it has much less to do with her running and everything to do with how spiked my adrenaline is when I catch her. I was thrilled last night when I noticed her gone, having Wren tap into cameras all over the city when the signals started bouncing off one another due to the close proximity of the buildings. Knowing exactly which bar she went into last night is also why he was witness to the kiss we shared. Clearly, there’s no honor among men who break the rules. He’s the fucking champ at it.

  Her disrobing was bad but witnessing her stretch. God help me.

  Her stomach muscles flex and roll as she bends, her ass pointed directly at me. I stand appreciating the view until I see the man she was talking to—by this point I realize he’s the instructor—watching the front part of her. I know what her perfect damn tits look like in that sports bra, but I haven’t been privileged to seeing her bend over. I swear if she falls out of that damn flimsy thing, I’m going to end up in jail for assault.

  My focus is on her, and I don’t imagine there’s anything short of an explosion or gunfire that could make me pull my eyes from her body when she lifts herself up and swings around that damn pole. The song changes, pulsing out a rhythm built to seduce. A song so sexual, I can feel the throb of it in my lower abdomen.

  I’m tortured by the sight of her for over an hour, my eyes never drifting from her exquisite form. I no longer notice the instructor except when he gets close to critique her. I don’t notice the other women swinging around. She’s all I fucking see, and when she’s done, pressing kisses to that asshole’s face twice again, all I can focus on is the rivulets of sweat dripping down her neck, teasing the swells of her breasts, and disappearing into the fabric. I want to lick it away. I want to clean her entire body, top to bottom, with my tongue. I want to press a hand between her shoulders, lean her against one of those shiny poles and shove myself so damn deep inside of her that she—

  “I’m ready to go.”

  I swallow, dragging my eyes from the exposed skin on her abdomen to her face. Sweeping a hand to the side with an overexaggerated bow, I indicate that I’ll follow her out. I throw an I’ll-kill-you-if-you-watch-her-leave look over my shoulder at the instructor, but find him talking to another woman. Does he even know how close he came to having his face rearranged?

  And that’s the crux of the situation, isn’t it?

  I’m jealous. Hell, I’m a trained professional. I know what I’m feeling. I also know that it’s unjustified. One kiss doesn’t give me the right to get pissed when she talks to another man. Hell, I told her it couldn’t happen again, and I mostly meant it.

  I don’t own her. I don’t want to own her. Just the thought makes my lip curl up because I can admit that I don’t want anyone else to have her either. How fucked up is that?

  I should’ve answered Deacon when he asked me again if I wanted to come home. I avoided the question, and by doing so gave him my answer. No, I don’t want to go home, but I don’t see how I can keep my sanity by staying.

  Some would say to get it out of my system, to do with her exactly what we both want, but there’s the trouble. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that having her that way once won’t be enough. I’m damn near rabid, salivating at the mouth after one damn kiss. Feeling myself inside of her? Hearing her moan my name? I’d never survive if once was all I got.

  Once inside the car, she insists on another milkshake from the place she drove us to the first night I arrived. We go, although I know watching her wrap those perfect lips around another straw is going to drive me mad. Thankfully, the shake shop is
nearly empty when we arrive, so I sit at a small table at her back, keeping an eye on the door and sneering at every man who walks in and looks at her. None are brave enough to stop and chat, so that keeps me out of jail just a little while longer.

  Chapter 14

  Remington

  “I said no.”

  My head snaps back as if I’ve been smacked in the face.

  “Excuse me?” I heard the words perfectly clear, but I’m in a generous mood by giving him the opportunity to rephrase.

  “You heard me, Remington.”

  Not once since the hotel has he called me Remi. I hate that it makes me a little crazy.

  “You can do something here at the house. It’ll be safer.”

  “It’s my twenty-first birthday. I don’t want to celebrate at the house.”

  “I don’t need to be chasing drunk girls all over the city.”

  “I’ll get drunk no matter where I celebrate.” I won’t, but he doesn’t need to know that.

  “Would you just—” He growls, rubbing his hands over his face. “Can you put some clothes on while we discuss this?”

  You heard right. I’m back to acting like a brat. When he came out here after I dropped the bomb that I’m planning my birthday party at a swanky club in Manhattan, he wouldn’t listen to me, but he sure as hell shut up when I whipped my bikini top off and tossed it to the side. I don’t know what it means that he didn’t immediately turn away, but it’s clear to see he’s avoiding the sight of my tits as best he can while still facing me and arguing about the damn location of a party.

  “Do you not like my tits, Flynn?” My cheeks heat with embarrassment, but I keep my eyes glued on his.

  “Your tits are perfect, Remi. You know they are, but can you cover up? This isn’t the way to act when you don’t get your way.”

  “Perfect?” I prod, my nipples furling further, the tightness begging to be touched and relieved.

  “Goddammit, cover yourself.” I’m hit mostly in the face with a fluffy towel, and I bury my face in it long enough to chuckle before resting the thing over the top half of me. “I thought you were over these stupid games?”