by Cindy Dees
“I’ll fake it if you will,” he muttered.
“Right. Fake it.” But fake what? As if she had any idea how to do a lap dance. The subject had not been covered in any of her art history classes in college. Scowling, she scooted forward until her knees bumped against his shins.
He smiled. “Go for it, baby.”
“You’re going to hell for this,” she grumbled.
His grin widened, and he leaned back in the chair a little. “Ahh, but what a way to go. I dare you. Give me your best shot.”
Oh, a dare, was it? That changed things. Glaring fiercely at him, she threw her leg across his hips and plopped down on his lap. He tensed beneath her as her lady parts passed across the zipper of his jeans.
Crud. Now what? She was undoubtedly supposed to engage in some sort of bump-and-grind routine next. After all, it was called a lap dance. But that left a whole lot to the imagination by way of technical details.
Experimentally she tilted her hips forward and then back. Oh, my. That felt rather nice. She tried it again. Her nervous tension eased a little, and this time it felt even better.
“That all you got?” Ashe murmured in obvious amusement.
Concentrating intensely, she tried circling her hips to the left. Ooh, that was interesting. And better, unwilling heat flared in Ashe’s eyes. Quite a bit of heat, in fact. If she wasn’t mistaken, the region behind his zipper was getting harder. More enthusiastically, she circled back to the right.
“This may not be the right moment to mention it, but most lap dancers do it facing away from the guy. It costs extra to get a full frontal. I expect the girls don’t want to get their chests grabbed, nor do they want to be tongued or kissed.”
She sprang to her feet, outraged. “You let me writhe all over your lap the wrong way?”
“I didn’t say it was wrong. Just more suggestive than usual.”
“You are such. A. Jerk.”
His voice dropped so low she could barely hear it over the Jamaican music blaring from hidden speakers overhead. “No, baby. It’s called protecting your cover. Vitaly’s going to be watching us when we leave here. And I’d better have a hard-on and you’d better be embarrassed all to hell when we walk out of here if you want either of us to make it out of this club alive.”
Of course he was right. Darn it. “How in the heck do you know so much about this stuff, anyway?” she demanded, chagrined.
The corner of his mouth quirked up. “I’m not exactly a teenaged virgin. Of course, I don’t generally have to pay for what I want from women, either.”
She glared at him a moment more, then whirled around and backed onto his lap. Her toes barely reached the floor, and she overbalanced slightly. His hands came up to clasp her hips. He didn’t do anything crude like pull her down onto his male parts, but he did steady her until she regained her balance.
Ashe shifted beneath her. Abruptly, warm breath caressed her neck. He must have taken pity on her because he murmured, “Most girls squat over the guy and keep their weight on their feet, which is why this chair is so low and has no arms. That way, the girl can pull away if the guy gets fresh with her. Then the girls twerk a little.”
“I don’t know how to twerk,” she wailed under her breath.
“It basically involves relaxing your rear end and shaking it up and down. Don’t worry about it. The view I’m getting is fine just the way it is.”
Thank God she had a skirt on. And stockings. And panties. This was embarrassing enough without her having her rear end hanging out of a skimpy thong.
“My thighs are burning.”
“Then sit down on me, silly.” He gave a little tug, and her tired legs gave out. She plopped down unceremoniously on his lap. She lurched, but he held her in place with that easy, overwhelming strength of his.
“I cannot believe you’re making me do this.” Her mouth was saying one thing, but her body was starting to say something else entirely. It wasn’t all bad having her hips nestled in his lap. His zipper bulged against parts of her she’d never...rubbed...against anyone before. The intimacy of it was staggering.
She’d had sex, of course. She was twenty-five, after all. But never like this. She’d never been the type blatantly to take control of the sex, or to be...naughty...about it. Okay, so she was a prude. There. She’d said it. Or at least thought it very loudly.
Ashe relaxed beneath her, seemingly completely at ease with having a woman squirming around on his lap. But she felt vulnerable. Terribly exposed. Even though her miniskirt flared around both of their hips, hiding most of what was going on underneath it.
“Move your hips like this,” he instructed, guiding her hips through a slow figure eight. “You can rock like before or do those circles you were doing, too.”
“This is hard,” she complained.
A low chuckle rumbled behind her. “I believe hard is the point.”
She looked over her shoulder to roll her eyes at him.
He grinned. “Just sayin’.”
“Behave.”
He shrugged. “It’s not like either of us has any choice here. If I don’t have a grin on my face or a pronounced limp, Vitaly’s going to try to hurt you. And since I’m not about to let him do that, all hell will break loose.”
“So you’re not enjoying this?” She didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed.
“Well, now, I didn’t say that,” he drawled. “I think if you put a little enthusiasm into it, maybe pretended I was your boyfriend, you might have a future in the profession.”
Imagine him as her boyfriend, huh? That wasn’t much of a stretch. The memory of his magnificent naked chest in her apartment last night popped into her head. Nope. Not a stretch at all. Let alone the steamy dreams of him that had disrupted her sleep.
She realized with a start that she was moving more sensuously against him, enjoying the feel of him growing restless beneath her. Tense. Hungry.
He was faking it, of course, which was really sweet of him. Warming up to the ruse a little more, she let her mind wander into a pleasant fantasy of the two of them together.
They would be in a beautiful old room with antique furniture, hardwood floors and white gauze curtains. The big four-poster bed would have fat pillows and white linen sheets. A fan would turn lazily overhead, stirring the sultry air. They would make love slowly. Easily. With aching tenderness that gradually turned into raging, sweaty passion...
“Okay, then,” Ashe ground out. “That should be enough to shut up your boss.”
She stilled abruptly. Ohmigosh. Her hips had been undulating all over the place. She’d been riding him like a total hussy.
“I’m sorry—” she started.
“Hush,” he muttered, cutting her off. “Vitaly will be delighted.” A pause, and then he added wryly, “Too delighted. Bastard’s gonna want to put you to work back here after that performance.” He swore quietly as he lifted her off his lap.
She turned to face him, surprised that he hadn’t stood up already. But a quick, unwilling glance at his lap revealed the source of his delay. His zipper strained to contain the raging erection behind it. He’d been genuinely turned on by her lap dance? “I didn’t suck, then?” she blurted.
A short bark of laughter slipped out of him. “You did not suck.”
He gritted his teeth and visibly reached for self-control. Sympathetically she suggested, “Think about your grandmother. Church. An ice-cold shower.”
Another laugh, this time a little pained. “I’ve got this, thanks. Just give me a second.”
She turned her back to give him a little privacy to get his body under control. It was more like a minute, but he eventually rose to his feet behind her. He leaned close, his big body radiating heat against her spine. “Don’t argue with me when I talk to Vitaly. I have a plan.”
Now what on earth did that mean?
Chapter 5
Ashe’s head reeled as he escorted Hank out of the back room. What in the hell had just happened between
them? Sure, he’d been turned on by her innocent little dance that had reeked of sensuality. But that wasn’t what had him reeling. The violence that had bubbled up in his gut at the idea of Vitaly witnessing her performance was what had him thrown.
When it had occurred to him that the bastard would no doubt be watching Hank’s dance, a real urge to toss her off his lap, find the Russian and choke him to death had roared through him. His entire life was about discipline. Self-control. No emotion got the best of him. Ever.
Sure enough, Vitaly emerged from his office as Ashe and Hank stepped out of the lap dance lounge. And the guy was grinning from ear to ear.
Ashe’s grip on Hank’s arm tightened until she sucked in a sharp breath. “Sorry,” he mumbled, loosening his grasp.
“Told you she would have a talent for being a slut,” Vitaly boomed in Russian.
The man’s choice of a language only a few people currently in the club would understand saved his life in that moment. Ashe ground a couple of his back molars into dust, though, before responding in rapid Russian, “If we’re going to do business, I want the girl.”
“What does that mean?” Vitaly challenged him, startled.
“You own the girls around here, right?”
“Well, yes. Of course,” the Russian blustered.
“I want exclusive use of this one for the duration of our business dealings.”
Hank tensed under Ashe’s hand. Did she understand enough Russian to know what he just demanded of Vitaly? Clever little minx, to have played dumb around her boss.
Vitaly glanced back and forth between him and Hank for a few seconds. “I need to speak with her. Alone.”
“Sure thing.” But before he passed her arm to Vitaly, Ashe said to her in English, “If you want more of what you just tasted, agree to the offer he’s about to make you. I promise you won’t regret it.”
Vitaly grinned and took her arm, dragging her unceremoniously into the back office. Ashe didn’t like it when the door closed behind the pair, and he checked the time grimly. Sixty seconds. That was all the Russian got with her before Ashe broke down the door.
At second fifty-two, the door opened. “She’s yours. And she understands that if she pisses you off, she answers to me.”
Ashe drawled back in Russian, “I can keep my own women in line, thanks. If she pisses me off, I’ll take care of it myself.”
A knowing grin spread across Vitaly’s features.
Ass. He got off on roughing up helpless, weaker women, huh? Ashe made a mental note to make the guy pay for that someday.
“C’mon, kitten. You’ve got a dance to finish for me.”
“Where are we going?” she asked in an appropriately quavering tone.
“My place. Get your purse.”
She nodded and disappeared into the storeroom, emerging in just a few seconds. Although his natural tendency was to put an arm around her and use his body to shield her from the drunks, he refrained and merely strode toward the exit, leaving her to trail along behind him.
But the second they hit the street, he turned and placed a protective hand in the small of her back. Her slender frame trembled beneath his palm. “This way,” he murmured gently.
He guided her quickly away from the club and the prying eyes of Vitaly’s potential flunkies. If the guy was as paranoid as Ashe suspected he was, there could be a sniper hidden somewhere on this street. The shooter was probably upstairs over the club, but given what he already knew of Vitaly’s caution, it was entirely possible the hypothetical sniper had a hideout somewhere else along the street.
Early in their drinking spree tonight, a text had come from Jennie alerting Ashe that his fake identity had been probed online. The timing of it corresponded exactly with when Vitaly had excused himself briefly to go into his office to check on “club business.”
“Where are we actually going?” Hank asked, panting a little to keep up with him as he hustled along the dark street.
“Save your breath and keep moving.”
“What’s going on?”
Civilians. Couldn’t take an order to save their lives. Always asking questions and wanting to know why. He replied without moving his lips. “Possible gunman out here.” He added sharply when she drew breath again, “Don’t ask questions. Just walk faster.”
“If you want me to walk faster, I’ll need to take off these shoes.”
He glanced down at her stupidly high platform heels and mentally shook his head in disgust. Not that he didn’t appreciate how they shaped her calves or made her legs seem even longer and sexier than they already were. But women should be allowed to wear comfortable shoes that they could freaking run in if they had to.
The two of them ducked around a corner and out of sight of the Who Do Voodoo, and he slowed his pace a little.
Where was he going to take her? He couldn’t take her back to her place. At least not until they’d talked in a secure location and he’d explained the risks she faced in going back to her apartment. He would bet his next paycheck the place would be bugged shortly. Vitaly would want to know everything he could about Ashe before they actually did any business.
He could take her to the home he’d grown up in, which was now his. But he hadn’t been back there since his father died, and he wasn’t interested in dealing with all of that baggage in the middle of an op.
For surely this had just become an op. Vitaly had leaped all over the hint he’d thrown out that he was an arms dealer. It had been a test to find out how Vitaly would react to a suggestion of illegal activity. Instead, the guy had jumped on it like a starving dog on a bone. Was Vitaly trying to prove himself by bringing in a big fish to impress his bosses?
Ashe needed someplace safe and neutral to talk with Hank. To find out exactly what she knew of her former lover’s activities before his disappearance and to learn everything she knew about Vitaly’s organization. A hotel. And he knew exactly the one.
There were no cabs in this part of town, let alone at this time of night. It was well past midnight. They were going to have to walk to the French Quarter if they wanted to catch a ride anywhere.
A light mist started to fall, and he shrugged out of his jacket and draped it over Hank’s shoulders.
“You don’t have to do that,” she protested.
“Actually, I do. My mother would haunt me from the grave if I didn’t.”
“Scary woman, your mother?”
“A saint. She put up with my old man for nearly forty years before he drove her to an early grave.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
He shrugged. He appreciated the sentiment, but no words would ever lessen the pain of losing his mother.
“What’s your father like?”
He detected a wistful note in her voice. Didn’t grow up with her father, huh? Turning his attention to her question, he answered reluctantly, “Dyed-in-the-wool sonofabitch. A marine. Volunteered for every tour in Vietnam they would let him serve until they finally forced him to come home. He was pissed off for years afterward that he couldn’t keep killing commies.”
Of course, that was only the tip of the iceberg regarding his father. The man had been incapable of expressing love. Hell, Ashe was fairly sure the man wasn’t capable of feeling a “sissy” emotion like love. Walt Konig had been an OCD perfectionist and harried his mother constantly to keep the house neater, cleaner. Shipshape. He’d had a short temper. Suffered from flashbacks and nightmares. Had been a harsh disciplinarian. All in all, a deeply unpleasant human being.
Ashe knew in his head that the man had suffered from serious post-traumatic stress. But the little boy who still peeked out of his gut from time to time hadn’t much cared for the reasons why he’d never been good enough for his dad.
Maybe without Walt for a parent, he wouldn’t have pushed himself so hard. Maybe he wouldn’t have become a SEAL. Maybe he wouldn’t have pulled crazy, suicidal stunts to be a hero all the damned time. The same stunts that had his boss sending him on exten
ded leave and telling him to power down before he got his team killed.
With a start, he realized they’d stepped out into the carnival atmosphere of Bourbon Street. The mist had stopped temporarily, and the street was full of people. This late on a Saturday night, the party was in full swing. Folks danced and drank and shouted with laughter as couples hung all over each other. Guys on balconies overlooking the street exhorted passing women to flash their breasts in return for plastic bead necklaces.
He sighed. The tourists seemed to think Mardi Gras was a year-round event down here. Or maybe it was, nowadays.
He led Hank to the nearest high-end restaurant and tipped the maître d’ a twenty to call them a cab. In a few minutes, he’d handed Hank into the relative quiet of a taxi and named a small, upscale hotel in the Metairie district as their destination.
They pulled up in front of the elegant mansion, and he caught Hank’s wince as she tugged at her miniskirt. “They’re going to think I’m a hooker you’ve brought back to your room. Will they even let me in there?”
Ashe grinned. “My aunt owns the place. They’ll let you in.”
“Your father’s sister?”
“No,” he replied a tad sharply. “My mother’s sister, Eloise. Nice lady.”
“Not fond of your father, are you?”
“Past tense. He died a few months ago.” Not too long before her boyfriend had disappeared. Apparently, the two of them were leading somewhat parallel lives.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” He tipped the cabbie and handed her out of the car. She paused to take in the hotel’s classical semicircle portico, Grecian columns and lush landscaping. He glanced at the tableau briefly, long accustomed to its old-world grace. His father had always hated the place. Called it snooty and prissy.
As for him, he’d snuck over here as often as he could without getting caught to hang out in the kitchen or in Aunt Eloise’s office.
“C’mon,” he muttered.
Hank’s steps dragged reluctantly until she saw the lobby was deserted. The Hotel Fontenac’s usual clientele would be long abed by now.
