by Maggie Wells
He opened his eyes and stared down at the dark screen. But he wasn’t necessarily a good man. Oh, he was an okay guy most of the time. He wasn’t out to hurt anyone. He wanted…something new. Wanted to be someone different, if only for a while. Somebody a bit reckless, but not too much. He’d get this itch out of his system, and after, he’d go back to trying to live the life he’d always wanted. Maybe he’d meet a nice woman, they could get married, and he’d find a way to superglue his dreams back together. If he kept his eyes open and played his cards right, he could get back on track within a couple of years. Maybe one, if fate was done fucking him over.
Without giving himself a chance to second-guess himself, he accessed her contact information. He had a new client to service, and he was determined to do a more thorough inventory of her needs.
Chapter 4
“Coming!” Georgie called, though she knew damn good and well Mike probably wouldn’t hear her.
She pulled the skirt of her dress lower as she rumbled down the back steps. This was another one of those short numbers. Totally not her usual style, but the one she’d worn on Friday had been so effective she bought a new one over the weekend. A virginal white, the dress had a plunging neckline edged in red rickrack. Instead of heels, she paired the dress with bright red patent leather ballerina flats.
She hadn’t bothered glancing in the mirror. He’d called, she’d flipped the sign on the door from open to closed, and she’d whipped out something to wear. Another rap of knuckles against thick glass greeted her as she burst through the door to the storefront. She smiled at his impatience and wiped her damp palms over the slinky fabric of the dress.
Her heart began to hammer the minute she saw Trident Security’s phone number appear on her screen. She’d waited all weekend for him to make his move. As frustrated as she was, the anticipation had her keyed up. She felt odd. Half-dressed. Slightly apprehensive. Wholly aroused.
Flipping the lock, she smiled a wide welcome as she swung the door open. “Mr. Simmons.”
Mike’s eyebrows rose, but his expression remained otherwise nonplussed. She liked his attempts at a poker face. The unflappable expression he tried so hard to hang on to, when no one knew better than she how utterly flappable the man was. She also liked his boy-next-door looks. Something about the buttoned-down shirts coupled with a down-and-dirty smile really revved her engine.
“Ms. Walters,” he replied with a grave nod. “I brought the schematics for the layout I proposed.”
Tickled by his precise word choice, she reached out, grabbed him by his striped tie, and pulled him toward her. “Thank God, I’ve been waiting days for a good layout.”
She grinned as he stumbled over the threshold into her lair. He caught his balance, then tossed the folder he held on to the tiny café table she used for client consultations in one fluid move.
Georgie released his tie long enough to close and lock the door behind him. “I bet your schematics are something to see, too.”
The second their eyes met, he launched himself at her. Georgie rocked back on her heels, thankful she’d opted to forgo the stilettos for flats. If she hadn’t, she’d be flat on her ass right now. Instead, she was pressed against a wall of lean, solid man. Warm man. She could feel it wafting off him like the waves of heat trapped in Arizona asphalt. He framed her face in both hands and his fingers slipped into her hair.
“Tell me I didn’t get my signals crossed,” he urged.
“You didn’t.”
“Good, because if I had, this would be really embarrassing.”
She tipped a challenging smile at him, tantalized by the very nearness of him. “Well, you haven’t really crossed any lines yet. We can pretend you accidentally bumped into me.”
“You want me to pretend?” he asked, sounding gratifyingly breathless.
“Not in the least.”
He kissed her. Not one of those tentative, testing kisses one expects at the end of a date, but a real kiss. Hard. Hungry. The kiss tasted of confession. He’d been thinking about her as much as she’d been thinking about him. His mouth was soft, despite his enthusiasm. He angled his head to take the kiss deeper, and she sighed. His lips were dry, his tongue wet and demanding. In truth, she’d had better first kisses, but she’d also had far worse. And she liked the way Mike Simmons kissed. He was…sincere. An underrated attribute if ever there was one.
Wrapping her arms around his neck, she leaned into the kiss, meeting his tongue stroke for stroke. She hadn’t put a bra on under the dress—or panties. What was the point? If she had her way, she wouldn’t be wearing the dress for very much longer, either.
He broke the kiss with obvious reluctance, but he needed to pull back enough to look her in the eye. “Still on the right side of the line?”
“Yes.” Georgie let her hand slide down his neck and glide down his arm. She touched the center of his palm, his hand closed reflexively over hers. “If I take you upstairs to look at my…layout, will you promise to cross the line?”
He stared back at her, his eyes blazing with intensity. “I have to tell you, this isn’t a thing for me.”
“No?”
“I mean, doing this. I don’t do this. The, uh, sex thing. With clients. Or with anyone,” he babbled.
The man was definitely flapped. And she liked knowing she’d ruffled him. Unable to resist, she let the line play out before reeling him in. “You don’t? Seems I saw evidence to the contrary the other night. No need for a paternity test there. They look exactly like you.”
“Funny. What I’m trying to say is, I don’t do this. Meet women and hop into bed with them. At least, I haven’t in a very long time.”
Cocking her head, she flashed a coy smile. “I’m willing to bet not much has changed as far as the mechanics.”
“I have,” he said soberly. “I can’t jump into things… I have to be careful. My life isn’t all about me anymore.”
Suddenly, Georgie didn’t feel so sure about where this was heading. “So, you were serious about showing me your schematics?”
To her surprise and pleasure, his arms tightened around her. “I seriously want you.”
A tingle of triumph pulsed through her. Gripping his hand snug in hers, she made a beeline toward the back of the store, pulling him along behind her. “Stop thinking so hard. I want you. You want me. Pretty simple equation.”
“I think all the time,” he confessed, but he didn’t resist. “I don’t know if I can stop.”
“How about you try to let your mind coast for now?” She smiled as she pushed aside the batik-print curtain hiding the staircase to her apartment. Folding her arm behind her, she held his hand firmly in the small of her back. “Baby steps.”
“You have no idea how good I’ve become at letting things go for now.”
“Great. We can circle back later. After I give you something to worry about for real.”
“I’ve been thinking about you nonstop since the day I walked through your door.”
Georgie cast a winsome smile over her shoulder. “See, now you’re using the kind of talk that goes to a girl’s head. Hold off if you don’t want me getting too attached.”
“Gotcha.”
At the top of the steps, she untangled her fingers from his and stepped aside to usher him into the apartment. He frowned at the open door, glancing back down the narrow staircase before proceeding. “Do you always leave your door open?” he asked, head swiveling from side to side as he stepped into her living space.
“Never. There was some guy pounding my door down, and I was in a hurry to get to him.” Georgie swung the door closed behind her and leaned against it.
A thoughtful scowl pulled at Mike’s mouth. “Is your back door alarmed?”
She stared back at him wide-eyed. “Seriously? We’re going to talk security now?”
“I’m concerned.”
; Smiling, she kicked off her flats and pushed away from the door. “And I appreciate your concern.”
He must not have been feeding her a line about it being a while for him, because he seemed to grow more and more nervous with each step she took in his direction. When he made a point of inspecting what was essentially her large studio apartment, she stopped and gave him the time to take in her domain. They didn’t know each other any better than two people who met in a bar. And while she wasn’t one to stifle her sexuality, every vibe Mike gave off screamed repression.
“This was a private investigator’s office at one time. I knocked out a wall to open the room, but sometimes I like to put on a veiled hat and storm through the door like a woman on a mission.”
He chuckled but pursed his lips as he surveyed the bank of windows overlooking the street. She didn’t need a secret decoder ring to figure out what he thought of them.
“They’re all locked.”
His startled expression quickly melted into sheepish chagrin. “You’d be surprised at how many people don’t.”
“I am three stories above the ground,” she pointed out. “And on a major thoroughfare. I think someone would notice if a burglar tried to scale the building.” She shrugged off his skeptical glance. “Unless the burglar was wearing a bat suit. Or a spider costume. People never seem to notice those guys.”
“Three stories don’t make you safe.”
“Standing with my feet flat on the ground doesn’t make me safe,” she retorted without missing a beat. She regretted the words the instant she spoke them. The frown bisecting his brows made it clear he didn’t believe in abstracts. Determined to head him off before the questions could form, she placed a staying hand on his arm. “I’m not actually as flighty as I look.”
He looked into her eyes. “Funny, flighty is not at all the word I would have chosen.”
Pleasantly surprised, she looked at him from under her lashes. “No?”
“No. You’re sharp. Shrewd.” When she laughed at the descriptor, he plowed ahead. “I mean, I did some more research on the place over the weekend. After you said you wanted to…work with me.”
Alarm bells clanged in her head, but Georgie kept her gaze steady. “Did you?”
“You’ve done more than carve out a niche,” he said gruffly. “I can’t find a pissy review anywhere online. Hell, we had one schmuck slam us because he thought we should have run twenty-four-hour stakeouts to figure out who stole his cat.”
“Aw, poor guy.”
Mike shrugged. “The cat was already gone. What good would surveillance do?”
“Shrewd,” she repeated as if tasting the word for the first time. The adjective wasn’t as sharp on her tongue as it had been to her ears. “I think I like being called shrewd.”
“You would,” he said with a lopsided grin.
“I get a lot of ‘quirky’ and ‘offbeat,’” she mused. “‘Difficult’ and ‘headstrong’ have been mainstays since my teen years, but I don’t often get sharp and shrewd. Thank you. Always nice to add a few more adjectives.”
“You like to blaze your own trail.”
Georgie grinned. “Fine, I’ll give you one. How about ‘astute’?”
“I’ll take astute.” He turned away from the windows. “So…” He exhaled loudly. Too loud. He was nervous. “Do you usually close at three in the afternoon?”
Keeping a straight face was hard, but somehow she managed. He was fishing for information. She liked him enough to give the line another tug. “Not unusual.”
Shocked wasn’t a strong enough word for the look on his face. Aghast, maybe? Stunned? Whatever. Georgie decided she needed to start reeling him in. If she wanted to land this man, she needed to stop playing around and get things moving in the right direction.
“I start baking at four and open at six. Unless I have pick-ups scheduled, I rarely stay open past two. Keeps the schoolkids from trying to sneak in, too.”
“Ah, smart.” He nodded as he digested this information.
“Another good adjective. You must have a whole thesaurus stored in there.” Before he could steer the conversation in any other direction, she made a direct advance. “How about desirable? You said you wanted me. Can I add desirable?”
“I thought it went without saying.”
“Those words can never be said enough.”
Before she could draw her next breath, he had her pressed against him again. Georgie had to admit, the man of action he had going on did things for her. Which was surprising, because normally, she preferred to be the aggressor. His movements were as abrupt and graceless as they’d been downstairs, but no less appealing for their clumsiness. She smiled, cupped his cheek as he lowered his head, and angled her mouth to receive his kiss. To her chagrin, he stopped shy of the mark.
“Sexy. Intriguing.” He paused. “Beautiful.”
She lowered her lashes. “All excellent words.”
Georgie jumped when she felt the brush of his lips on her ear, then on her throat. She sighed and slid her hand into the thick, soft hair at the back of his head, holding him there.
“Dangerous,” he whispered into her skin.
She tipped her head back to grant him better access, and a breathy chuckle escaped her. “Me?”
He licked the spot where her pulse throbbed beneath her jaw. “You.”
“How?”
“Want,” he said in a hoarse voice.
Thrilled to have the conversation boiled down to single syllables, she egged him on. “Naked.”
Mike groaned and slid his hand down to caress her ass. “Please.”
“Now,” she ordered, ducking out from under the onslaught of marauding kisses. He answered with a thwarted growl that made her shiver. Grasping his head in both hands, she pressed her mouth to his. This time, there was nothing awkward in his ardor. Not one bit of hesitation. Cool air tickled the backs of her thighs. He made a low, keening sort of noise when he discovered her bottom was bare. She swayed as they continued to kiss, their tongues tangling as they fought for dominance. Thrust. Parry. Feint. Attack.
Clinging to his shoulders, Georgie swayed back and forth. Her bare breasts moved against the slinky fabric of her dress. The material caught on the rougher weave of his shirt. Mike trailed his fingertips along the crevice of her ass, and she rubbed against him like a cat.
His discovery of her lack of undergarments seemed to strike him like an anvil to the head. He started hard enough to break the kiss. His breathing, already ragged, became the barest rasp as he slid both hands down her back. When he made it to her shoulder unimpeded by undergarments, he moved back enough to peel the dress over her head.
Just like that, she was naked.
“Holy shit,” he breathed in a rough, reverent tone.
Emboldened by his obvious approval, she stepped out of his embrace and walked to the corner alcove she used for a bedroom, adding extra sway to her step for good measure. When she reached the bed, she glanced back over her shoulder. “Coming?”
He released a puff of a laugh as he yanked the tails of his shirt from his pants and started for her. “Probably sooner and not later.”
She hooked a hand in his belt and jerked him to her. “Don’t worry. I’m a big believer in second chances.”
* * * *
Mike pulled his shirt over his head and threw the damn thing as far as he could. If she was going to be naked, he wanted to be, too. He dipped his chin and watched as her nimble fingers quickly opened his belt. Seconds later, his pants were loose and she was shucking him out of them like an ear of corn. Needing to feel at least a bit in charge, he backed off a step under the pretense of toeing off his shoes, then undressed himself.
The faint squeak of bedsprings caught his attention as he kicked the last of his clothing aside. Georgie sat perched on the edge of the bed with her legs primly crossed. When
he looked up, she fell back, catching her weight on hands stretched behind her. The pose was something straight out of one of those fancy foreign films that aren’t supposed to be porn, but deliver most of the essentials. Afternoon light slanted through the windows, but the corner with the bed was shadowed.
Georgie smiled invitingly and patted the mattress. “I only bite if you ask me to.”
He swallowed hard but stared at her dumbly. He’d been married for eight years. Monogamous for ten. He’d bought his first box of condoms in more than a decade at a drugstore on his way over there. His brain nearly seized when he remembered he’d left the damn things in his car.
She tilted her head. “Do you want me to?”
This was new enough territory for him. He didn’t need the added pressure of knowing when to bite or not bite. The last time he’d slept with someone for the first time, people didn’t talk about their kinky shit like they were discussing the weather or what to have for dinner. Those were the things couples discovered together. After they’d been coupling for a while and were comfortable. He definitely wasn’t comfortable now. As a matter of fact, he was fairly sure he was in over his head.
Running a hand over his face, he pulled on his jaw. “I, uh—” He made the mistake of looking down and discovered he was actually standing there naked, his dick sticking out like some kind of divining rod, twitching and jumping. A rush of insecurity slammed into him. His ears burned. His breath grew raspy. What the fuck did he think he was doing, trying to fuck a woman like this when he couldn’t even keep straitlaced Laurel happy enough to stay?
“Mike?”
His head jerked. She was smiling at him. Not laughing, just smiling. And reaching for him.
“Joking. A joke.” She wrinkled her nose, and the diamond she wore there sparkled. “Come here.”
He obeyed. What else was he going to do? Get dressed and run out the door like some kind of a virgin? “I’m sorry,” he said, the apology springing from his lips without conscious thought. “I’m…rusty.”
