Angie fought the urge to fan herself. What was wrong with her? She hadn’t fantasized about sex with Trey since she was a hormonal teenager. One who had a major crush on her best friend’s older brother. Never a good thing.
Much to her embarrassment, her nipples pressed against the flimsy confines of her white satin bra, zeroing in on Trey from behind her too thin, pale pink metallic tank.
Down girls, Angie silently commanded of her uncooperative breasts.
The girls weren’t listening.
She sank down in her chair, just far enough to hide her overzealous body parts from Trey’s visual access. Then she tried to refocus on their conversation.
“I have to say my dreams are a little more exciting than wishing you were vocally impaired,” he teased.
She had no doubt.
Trey’s whole life was a lot more exciting than hers. Not only was he a hot commodity on the date market, he had realized his dream about starting up his own company. He had done it and quite successfully. Having a business of her own was something she had always wanted. Only her dream business would be to own her very own travel agency someday, one that specialized in cruises. Of all the traveling she had done, she loved cruising the most.
Angel sighed. Maybe someday.
“You’re frowning.”
“What?” she said, his deep voice pulling her from her musing.
“Please tell me you aren’t thinking about Rick.”
Far from.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “Just about life in general.”
And you.
He eyed her skeptically. “Seeing as how life has you frowning, what do you say we leave life at the door and just enjoy ourselves tonight?”
“Sounds great to me.”
“Care to dance?”
Angie glanced toward the empty floor. “But no one’s dancing.”
Trey stood and rounded the table, taking her by the hand. “We are.”
She allowed him to lead her to the dimly lit area where soft music played overhead. She even allowed herself to be drawn into his arms, but that was the point where her reservations kicked in.
“Trey, we shouldn’t be doing this.”
“Dancing?”
“Yes. We’re the only ones out here.” And it’s only making me want you more.
“Relax, Angel.”
“But this is crazy.” Ignore how good his
hands feel gliding over your back.
“No more so than your request for lessons in seduction.” The warmth of his breath now caressed the sensitive area just behind her ear, making Angie shudder again.
Another rush of heat assailed her. Only this one bypassed her cheeks and headed south. Below the belly button, between the thighs kind of south.
Angel looked up, trying not to dwell on the very large, male hands resting low on her back. Instead, she focused on Trey’s face with careful avoidance of his mouth which she kept thinking about kissing.
Trey lowered his head to nuzzle her curls. “Mmm. You smell good enough to eat.”
Please, God, let there be fire extinguishers nearby, because she was about to go up in flames. Rick had never said anything that had affected her this way. Mentally or physically.
Angie managed a nervous smile. “It’s my new shampoo. Rose lips.”
His mouth moved into a grin. “Lips?”
“Hips! Rosehips.” This would be the perfect time for the floor to open up and swallow her whole.
Trey gave another throaty chuckle, then reached up to run his thumb along the fleshy part of her bottom lip. “Oh, I don’t know,” he said with a mischievous spark in his eyes. “Rose lips pretty much describes yours perfectly.”
She nearly tripped over her own feet. “We’re talking about my hair, not my lips.” At least she hoped so. She didn’t think she could handle much more than hair talk right now.
“Do your lips taste as good as your hair smells?”
Her heart skittered. “Dance is over. Here comes our waitress,” Angie blurted out, pulling away.
He reached out for her and missed. “Angie?”
“Sorry, Trey. Time to order,” she tossed back over her shoulder as she flew off the dance floor toward the safety of their dinner table.
She watched him from her seat as Trey returned to the table in long, unhurried strides, his eyes holding more than a glint of humor.
“I didn’t realize a woman could move so fast in heels,” he told her as he settled back into his seat.
“You’d be amazed at what we women can do in heels when we put our minds to it.”
His dark brows lifted. “That so?”
But it was the twitch in the corner of his mouth that told Angie her words hadn’t come out the way she had meant them to. She grabbed for her menu. She was supposed to be the one in control here. It was her plan after all. Only it wasn’t supposed to start until they got to Vegas.
Angie flipped open the menu. “Let’s see what they have here. I’m starving.”
“For food?”
The menu slipped from her hands, clattering onto the empty bread plate in front of her. Trey’s deep, rich laughter followed.
“Come on, Angel. Sexy is in the way a woman reacts to the things a man says. You can’t get all flustered over the slightest mention of something sexual.”
She knew that. She just couldn’t help it.
His smile widened. “Don’t worry. It’s nothing a little practice can’t fix. That’s why I’ve been testing you tonight.”
Testing her?
Shouldn’t that come with some kind of warning like they give on TV? THIS IS ONLY A TEST. Disappointment slid through her. She wanted it to be real. Wanted him to really want her.
What had she gotten herself into? They hadn’t even made it out of Pittsburgh and she was already turning into a big pile of lust induced mush. Not a good start.
“I wasn’t aware we had started the lessons.”
“No time like the present,” Trey replied, opening his menu with casual air.
He was right. Time for her to stop growing weak-kneed over his words and practice being the siren she needed to be to keep a man.
Angie reached for her water glass with renewed determination. She could do this. “Good idea. The sooner, the better.”
Trey hid his grin behind the list of Today’s Specials. “I suppose we do have to eat first.” Angel’s reaction to the sexual innuendoes he had put out to her gave him hope. She might just back out of this crazy plan of hers yet, he thought with a mental grin.
He thought too soon.
This time it was his menu falling onto the table, clattering silverware, as Angel’s bare foot glided unexpectedly up his pant leg. Heads turned their direction at the commotion, forcing him to smile and act as casual as a man could with a sexy female’s foot stroking his leg beneath his pants.
“What are you doing?” he asked with a raised brow. His breath caught as her foot pulled out and then returned to bury itself intimately between his thighs.
Her brown eyes twinkled with mischief. “Taking your advice.” Her reply was followed by a teasing wriggle of her nylon covered toes.
Trey forced himself to keep his voice down, even if another part of him was doing the complete opposite. Thankfully, the linen tablecloth hung low enough to cover Angel’s foot pressed against his telltale arousal.
He sat stock still, wondering what had just happened. One minute he was in control, purposely using an in-your-face type of seduction to make Angel rethink her decision to have him go with her to Vegas. Suddenly, the shoe was on the other foot. Or in Angel’s case, not on her foot, which was placed strategically against his crotch.
“Funny, but I don’t recall telling you to pretend my groin was a shoe,” he managed, his voice strained. He couldn’t remember a time in his life when a woman had him this hot and bothered.
Angel dropped her foot away with a giggle. “Sorry, just trying out my seduction techniques. You know what they say,
‘practice makes perfect’.”
No, practice makes hard. Very hard.
Trey bit back a groan. They weren’t even to Vegas and he was already a goner. One look in Angel’s mischievously glinting eyes and he knew he was in big trouble.
*
Angie smiled as she watched Trey, taking in the spectacular view outside the plane’s window. He seemed almost mesmerized, not that she could blame him. She’d reacted the same way the first time she’d flown to Vegas.
She leaned across him for a quick glimpse of the landmark below. “That’s the Grand Canyon,” she announced with a smile.
“Pictures don’t do it justice.”
His aftershave drifted up to tease her senses. Unable to help herself she leaned in a little closer. Damn he smelled good. “No, they don’t.”
“Thanks for insisting I take the window seat.”
“Now you see why I did,” she said as she shared the incredible view with her best friend. The flight into Vegas, if Mother Nature was cooperating, was breathtaking. And today, thankfully, Mother Nature was feeling very agreeable. Not a cloud in the sky.
“I’ve been told that it was something to see, but I never imagined…” He blew out a breath that caressed the flesh at her neck.
The effect of it had Angie pulling away from the window and retreating back into her own seat. “There’s a lot of the world out there just waiting to be seen.” She turned to him. “Trey, I know how much your company means to you, but, and please don’t take this wrong, sometimes I think it consumes you.”
He turned from the window, not with the warning glance she had expected, but with a grin. “Watch it, Angel, you’re beginning to sound like my sister.”
She returned his smile. “Well, someone has to watch after you. You certainly don’t.”
A dark brow lifted. “I need watched after?”
“Yes. You do.” She reclined her seat, then reached up to adjust the flow of the air conditioning vent above her.
Just when she would have thought it impossible, that dark brow edged up even further. “If anyone needs watching over, Angel, it’s you. Not me. Need I remind you about the year’s supply of beef you bought because the guy selling it looked like he needed the money?”
“It was cheaper to buy it that way.”
“Not when your freezer is the size of a shoe box?
“That’s what I have your freezer for.” Flashing him a sweet smile, she reached for the travel magazine tucked inside the pocket on the back of the seat in front of hers.
He gave a husky chuckle. “I suppose I should be thankful the guy wasn’t selling a truckload of girly products.”
Smiling, she began flipping through the pages. “Oh, did I forget to tell you? My girly order should be arriving sometime next week. It’s a good thing you have a bachelor’s bathroom with near empty cabinets.”
He reached and cupped her chin, turning her face to his. “You are kidding, right?”
Angie fought the urge to laugh at Trey’s playfully exaggerated expression of distress. “Yes, I’m kidding.”
He dropped his hand away, releasing her chin, and blew out a breath. “Thank goodness. You had me sweating it out there for a moment.”
“Come on,” she said, finding it hard to look at anything but that sexy grin of his, “I’m not that bad.”
“I know better, remember? In fact, sometimes I think I know you better than you know yourself.”
She couldn’t argue with that. Trey had always been pretty good at reading her. And he was always there to rescue her whenever her act now think later actions got her into trouble. As did Kathy, but with her friend away on business more often than not, Angie found herself turning more and more to Trey when she had a problem. She trusted him and trust was not something she gave easily.
“If you think that view of the Grand Canyon is something, wait until you see it up close,” she said, not wanting to delve too deeply into emotional issues.
“We aren’t parachuting in are we?” he teased. “Because I have to tell you I’m not into extreme sports.”
She laughed. “Me either. I was thinking that you and I could take a bus tour out to see it while we’re in Vegas. The Grand Canyon is one of those places you have to see. Not in pictures. Not just from a plane. But up close and personal. I’m telling you, Trey, it literally takes your breath away.”
He shifted in his seat to look at her. “I love seeing you this way. So excited. So passionate.” His Hollywood hunk-blue eyes moved over her. “So sexy.”
Sexy. A thrill of delight went through her. Her body reacted to his word, to his thoroughly assessing gaze. Her nipples peaked eagerly beneath her demi-cup bra, begging for his attention. Why hadn’t she left her jacket on?
Angie bit her bottom lip to keep from groaning aloud. Then, as if her failure to control her own sexually starved body wasn’t enough of an embarrassment, the girls caught his attention.
Trey smiled.
Not a full mouth, nice to see you kind of smile. It was one of those lopsided, devil-may-care kind of grins she imagined said I’m ready for ‘dessert’. She’d never been at the receiving end of one of those before. At least not that she was aware of.
“Cold?”
“No,” she blurted out as she hurried to fold her arms across her breasts, shielding them from his view.
“No?”
He had her there. If she wasn’t cold, she was aroused with clear proof. “Maybe a little cold,” she lied. Because at that moment she was anything but cold. Who would have ever guessed the changes one little request like ‘pretend to be my lover’ would bring about?
He reached over her to shut off her air vent. “I’m guessing there are going to be a lot of things out here that take one’s breath away.”
Too late. Hers was already gone.
Angie looked down, focusing on the magazine in her hands. She tried very hard not to think about the little curl of warmth growing in the pit of her stomach. The same one that had flickered to life during dinner with Trey the night before, when he’d ‘tested’ her.
Mentally, she tried to convince herself that it had nothing to do with Trey. That she had simply picked up a bug at work. Only this unsettling ribbon of heat wasn’t content to remain in her stomach. Instead, it traveled downward, centering itself between her thighs.
She crossed her legs, hoping to suppress the unfurling sensation. She might have succeeded had Trey not chosen that particular moment to place a hand on her thigh. A gesture he had done countless times before without any sexual intent. And though she was certain this time was no different, but her body seemed to be having trouble comprehending that. If only she had worn pants instead of a jean skirt, one that was suddenly too short for comfort.
Where was toss-the-plane-about turbulence when one desperately needed it?
At this point, she’d settle for sudden decompression in the cabin. Anything to get his hand off her bare thigh and bring her temperature back down before she internally combusted.
“You feeling all right?”
“I’m fine.” Angie shoved the magazine back into the pouch on the back of the seat in front of her and shot to her feet, successfully removing herself from the heat of his touch.
His expression turned to one of concern. “Angie?”
“Just taking a trip to the little girls room.”
“You look flushed. Can I order you something while you’re gone? Maybe some ginger ale?”
“Ginger ale sounds good. Thanks.”
Slipping past the woman in the aisle seat next to her, Angie raced for the bathroom, wondering what her jump-before-you-look nature had gotten her into this time.
Trey stood halfway up, debating on whether or not to go after Angel and make sure she was all right. It wasn’t like her to get air sickness. Hell, she flew several times a year on travel agent ‘fam’ trips to all sorts of destinations, and not once did he ever recall her mentioning that flying bothered her. But her face had been undeniably flu
shed when she’d darted out of their row.
Angel’s abrupt departure and his near departure from their seats had the elderly woman in the aisle seat staring his direction. The book she’d been reading when the plane took off was now lying in her lap.
“She’s not quite herself today,” he explained with a smile as he lowered himself back into his seat to await Angel’s return.
A couple of minutes later, he cast a worried glance back over his seat. No sign of her yet. A worried frown tugged at his mouth.
He motioned for the flight.
“Can I get you something?” she asked.
“Could we have a couple of ginger ales, please?”
The attendant left and then returned a few moments later with their drinks.
“Thank you.” Trey lowered his lap tray and placed their glasses on it.
“Honeymooners?” the elderly woman beside him asked when the flight attendant walked away.
“Excuse me?”
She motioned toward Angel’s empty seat, then to him. “You two. Are you kids on your honeymoon?”
Kids?
“No, we’re not.”
“Oh, wait, let me guess. I’ll bet you two are flying to Vegas to get married? Am I right?”
He laughed at her assumption. “Afraid not. Angel and I are just friends.”
Speaking of which, Trey cast another glance in the direction of the restrooms at the back of the plane. He really should go check on her.
“Honey, I’ve been around more years than I care to admit, and I know the spark of romance when I see it. You two definitely have it.”
It appeared the poor woman’s eyesight was going. Trey shook his head. “Angel’s—”
“Just the prettiest little thing,” she finished for him, and then patted at her blue-grey, fresh-from-the-beauty-salon do. “What I wouldn’t give to have hair like hers. Mine used to be long in my younger days. Men have a thing for long hair. But then I guess you already know that.”
He nodded.
“And those eyes. Are they real?”
“Real?”
“As opposed to those newfangled colored contacts,” she clarified.
“Oh, yeah, they’re real.” He twisted around to get a better view of the aisle way behind them.
Only in Vegas Page 5
