Something that looked suspiciously like guilt crossed Colt’s face before his expression went blank again. “You can still call her. My brothers are there. She’ll be fine.”
“I know.”
“I want you to relax. You’re always worried about everyone else. Let me worry about you.”
“I like to worry. It gives me something to do.”
“You’ll have something to do today. I set up a day at the spa for you.”
“A spa day?”
“A facial, sugar scrub, pedicure, full-body massage. Anything you want.”
“What if I want you to take the day off and give me a full-body massage?”
“I can’t. They called me back because they need me here. I thought you understood that.”
“I do,” she sighed.
“And you’re not going to cook tonight. After the spa you’re going to go shopping for something nice and then I’m going to take you out for a nice dinner.”
“Can you do me a favor before you go?”
“What?”
“Just show me how to work your fancy shower again.”
“That I can do.”
He eased himself off her and handed her a robe. “It took me a week to figure it out. I wasn’t here when they installed it, and when my assistant called asking me if I wanted written directions left, I snapped at her and told her that it was just a shower. How hard could it be? That’s one of the few times in my life I truly felt like an asshole. I showered at the gym for a week.”
He walked ahead of her into his spacious bathroom that was half the size of Lolly’s house. She could only imagine how uncomfortable he had been there. In that tiny bathtub shower, with the pink rubber bathmat and the shower curtain that stuck to you as soon as the water went on. Lolly’s house had been one of the nicer places that she lived so she hadn’t noticed any of those things, but compared with this space she wasn’t sure how Colt lasted there at all.
“If you want just a simple shower, you press the top left button. The up and down arrows control the temperature. The sideways arrows control the pressure. If you want steam, press here. If you want to feel like you’ve gone through a car wash, press this button twice.”
“A car wash might be nice.” She followed his directions and water started to fall from the ceiling of his shower. “Is this real? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Wait till you feel it. I only use that when I have some extra time. It’s the kind of shower that makes you want to stay in till your hands get pruny.”
“You don’t use this a lot, do you?” He hadn’t come in until nine last night and when he did, she could tell he was exhausted, tense, not the way she thought anybody should be coming home from a job they loved. She had been lonely without him even though she had kept herself busy by exploring the building and making him a lavish dinner. She wanted to be annoyed when he came in so late, but she wasn’t because he seemed to like having her here. He was good to her. There was only one other man who had been good to her before and he was long gone.
“No. Not often.”
“Maybe we can make time this weekend.”
“I have to…” He stopped himself, but she knew what he was going to say. “I’ll make time.”
“Have a good day at work.” She leaned forward, giving him a lingering kiss, but he didn’t walk out like she had expected.
He sat on the edge of his massive tub. “I have a few minutes. Get in.”
“I think you just want to see me naked, you perv.”
“I do.” He watched her as she untied her robe. She opened it just a little to reveal one of her breasts. She didn’t know why she was teasing him. She didn’t know why she was starting something she knew they couldn’t finish, but there was something about the way he looked at her. Like he was hungry for her.
“You’ve seen me naked a lot. I’d think you’d be tired of seeing it by now.”
“No man ever gets tired of seeing a beautiful woman’s naked body. I never get tired of looking at yours. I like to watch you. It sounds creepy but it’s true. I like to watch you work and cook and speak and breathe because I had this picture in my head of what my fantasy girl looked like and she looks just like you. And sometimes I can’t believe you’re real.”
“Colt.” She choked on his name, crossing the room so that she could cup his face in her hands and kiss him. “You’re full of shit. You got that off the Internet or read it in a book because no man in the history of the world could come up with something so sweet.”
“I keep a writer on my payroll for moments just like this,” he said in his usual deadpan voice. He stood up, pulling the robe completely off her body, his hands grazing down her sides, touching all the places she had complained weren’t perfect. Then he got down on his knees to kiss the round part of her belly and the curve of her thighs. He cupped her behind, squeezing her flesh between his fingers as he spread hot openmouthed kisses across her hips. She flooded then, moisture seeping out and covering the insides of her thighs. She throbbed for him and he seemed to understand that she needed him to soothe her, because he slipped one long finger inside her and slowly began to stroke her.
“Wh-what are you doing?” she gasped. “I-I-I thought you had to work.”
“I’m making time.” He pushed her against the shower, the cool glass against her hot skin turning her on even more. He took her leg and tossed it over his shoulder and simply looked for a moment. She was open to him and so exposed, but just as she was starting to feel self-conscious, he licked inside her one slow long lick that made her knees buckle and her cry out his name.
“Get in the shower.” She thought he was going to walk out, to go to work, but he didn’t. He yanked at his tie, his hands shaking with need as he ripped at the buttons of his shirt, causing some of them to break off. If he were any other man, she might be scared. He was so big, so strong, so intense, and he was coming for her—but he was Colt. And he cared about her.
When he was finally naked, he stood there, chest heaving, cock pointing straight out at her. She knew what was about to come and the wait was nearly making her bust from her skin. “I said get in.”
She did and the warm water rained down over her, another sensation to add to her overly sensitive body. He came after her, grabbing her, pulling her over to the marble shower seat. He sat, pulling her on top of him. Her entrance slid up against his hardness. Their skin was wet, their bodies were slippery but still fit perfectly together. Every time she had sex with him it was incomparable and she didn’t think it could get better, but this was better. “Put me inside you,” he rasped, his mouth against her skin. She ran his head along the length of her opening, teasing herself, teasing him even though she knew they were both past that point. “Ride me, baby. Ride me slowly. I want this to last.”
She slid him all the way inside her, loving the way he groaned when he was fully buried in her. He kept his hands on her hips, helping her, guiding her as she slid up and down him.
“Look at me,” he ordered when her eyes drifted shut. She looked into his eyes and he was staring back at her as they moved together in unison. She had never made love like this. It was more than just the steamy setting. It was that she was actually making love. She was looking into the eyes of the man she loved and he was looking back at her. She felt close to him and after years of not letting anyone near her heart it felt just plain good.
She felt him slide into her a little harder. She moved on him a little faster. The warm water was on her back, his hard body was against her wet skin, and she was losing control. Every time he groaned, every time he said her name as he drove into her, pushed her closer to the edge. She didn’t want to come. She wanted this to last longer because she knew as soon as they finished he would be gone again, off to work, leaving her to wait until he came home again.
But he pulled her nipple into his mouth, sucking hard, and brought on an orgasm so intense that she shed tears. He lost all control then, moving her hips wildly, pump
ing into her in a way that took her breath away. He spilled inside her, taking her mouth in the same moment. The kiss was sweeter than expected. It was as if he didn’t want it to end, either.
“What have you done to me?” He ran his thumbs over her cheeks.
“You’re the one who broke into my house. I was just minding my business until you came along.”
He softly pecked her lips. “Do me a favor and run a bubble bath.”
“A bubble bath?”
“Yes. I’ve got to call into work and tell them I won’t be in until lunch.”
Chapter 14
Colt glanced at his watch for the third time since this meeting had begun two hours ago. He couldn’t get his head into this negotiation. His mind was on Zanna. Zanna whom he’d spent an hour with in the tub. Zanna who made him pancakes and sausages and then made him sit with her and watch an episode of the trashiest talk show on the planet. He was never late to work, never got to his office after seven AM since he’d started running it. But today he walked in at noon. Five hours late and he hadn’t wanted to come in at all. If he could have, he would have sat there all day, eating leftover candy and watching mindless TV. He had been to Paris, white-water rafting, and to the pyramids in Egypt but there was nothing more exciting than sitting with that pretty girl on a couch.
“I’m sorry, son, but your mind seems to be elsewhere this evening.”
He was sitting in his boardroom across from Harvey Leyard, the owner of the little mom-and-pop car shop that King’s Customs had been trying to acquire for the past three months. “I’m listening, but we’ve been here for two hours and haven’t been getting anywhere.”
“Well, maybe we would get somewhere if you showed a little concern, a little care. This is my life’s work and you want to buy it out from beneath me and you don’t even seem to care enough to pay attention during this damn meeting.”
“I know you have been losing business steadily for the past two years to the big chain shop down the road. I know that you are seventy-seven years old and unable to do the work that you used to, and you’ve got a kid working for you that’s a hell of a customizer whom you can barely afford to pay. I also know that if King’s Customs takes over your business, we’ll do right by it. I started it with my brothers. We are family-owned just like your place is.”
“That’s just the thing. I want to keep it in my family!”
“Who’s going to run it? Your daughter is a doctor. She is too busy to worry about your little place. If you don’t want to sell it to me, fine. All I know is that I left a beautiful woman at home who is waiting for me to take her out. I promised her I would be home early tonight and she’s a hell of a lot more important to me than kissing your ass.”
He got up from the table.
“Sir.” Cedric hurried after him. “We’ve been working on this deal for months. We agreed that it was in a perfect location for our expansion project and that it would cost far less than building a new shop and hiring all new employees.”
“Yeah. But I just don’t give a shit anymore. I’m going home early.”
“You never leave early. You never come in late.”
“I own the place.” He loosened his tie. “I’ll do whatever the hell I want. You’ve got a wife. Go home to her. When’s the last time you walked in the door before eight?”
He left Cedric standing there. Fifteen minutes later he was back home. He walked in the door to find Zanna staring out the window overlooking the Strip. She was in a sophisticated black dress, her hair pin-straight and hanging down her back.
“Hey,” he said to her, finding that when she turned around, her face was elegantly made up. She was beautiful. She was always beautiful, but she didn’t look like herself.
“Hi.” She smiled at him and he saw her, the woman he knew. “What do you think?” She turned in a circle. “I went into the salon and told them to make me look like a woman who would date Colt King. This is what they did.”
He didn’t want her to look like a woman who would date him. He wanted her to look like herself, but he didn’t say anything, just walked over to her and ran his fingers through her now flattened hair. “You’re gorgeous. Let me change my jacket and we’ll be on our way.”
They walked into The Country Home, a restaurant that served overpriced Italian rustic food, but the place was spectacular—designed to resemble an enchanting Italian lagoon with each table in a private cabana.
“Well, holy hell. This place is freaking amazing,” Zanna exclaimed, her Oklahoma accent thick in that moment. Her eyes were wide again, reminding him of what it must look like when a kid went to Disney World for the first time.
The maître d’ looked back at her. “We have an excellent table for you tonight, sir.” He led them to a corner cabana that felt private even though the restaurant was full. “You ordered the ten-course meal. Here is the wine list; your waiter will be out with your first course momentarily.”
“Ten courses,” Zanna whispered when he was gone. “You know I can barely finish three courses for ten ninety-nine down at Ruth’s. Where do you expect me to put ten courses?”
“They’re small plates, Zanna. More like bites. You’ll see. This is one of the top-rated restaurants in the country.”
“It looks like it.” She glanced around her. “I never thought I would be in a place like this.”
“What kind of wine would you like? We could get a nice bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon.”
“Get what you want. I’ll stick with water.”
“Come on, Zanna. We’re out in the best restaurant in all of Vegas. You can’t just have water. You can have whatever you want.”
“I used to drink strawberry wine that cost three ninety-nine at the corner store. I don’t know what kind of wine to get. Get what you like.”
“Colt.” A leggy blonde walked toward him. It took him a moment to place her because he was so caught up in Zanna, but he recognized the woman. Nicole Ramsey. They had dated for a few weeks last year. He broke it off as soon as she hinted that she might want more from him. “It’s good to see you again.”
“Hello, Nicole. How are you?” he asked purely out of politeness.
“I heard you were out of town.” She looked over at Zanna, her eyes taking her in, sizing her up in a way that only women could do to each other. “Was it business or pleasure? You never leave town for so long.”
“It was both.” He looked back at Zanna, who openly stared at Nicole.
“I can see you’re busy. Have a great evening. I heard the tartare is great.”
“Who was that woman?” Zanna asked. “She looks just like Veronica Lake.”
“She’s nobody.”
“She’s obviously somebody if she walked all the way over here to talk to you, and she was eyeing you like she was a tiger and you were a big juicy steak.”
He laughed at her observation. “She was not. She’s someone I went out with a few times.”
“I think you left an impression on her,” she teased. “Colt King, Vegas’s most famous lover.”
“My money left more of an impression on her than anything else. She wanted to be Mrs. Colt King. But she sure didn’t want to be my wife.”
“So it was serious between you two?” she asked, not in a jealous way, but simply as if she was curious.
“No, I don’t get serious with women.”
“But she wanted to get serious with you? Does that happen to you a lot?”
“I try not to get involved,” he said, wanting to end the conversation.
“She still thinks she has a shot with you. That’s why she came over.”
“I don’t want to talk about her anymore. I’m here with you.”
“She’s real classy-looking, a lady. Probably thinks I’m a hooker.”
“Zanna…”
“Okay, so maybe not a hooker. What’s the term for the high-class ones? A call girl? That’s it! She thinks I’m a call girl.”
“I would never bring a call girl to one of the m
ost expensive restaurants in the country.”
Their waiter appeared then and if he heard any part of their odd conversation, he didn’t let on. Colt ordered a sweeter wine that he thought she would like. It arrived a few minutes later along with their first course.
It was a chilled cilantro pear broth.
“Oh, this is cold,” Zanna said in surprise. “Is this supposed to be cold?”
“Yes, you don’t like it?”
“It’s fine.” She smiled at him as she put her spoon down. “So, tell me where would you take a high-class call girl for dinner?”
“Why are we having this conversation?”
“Just indulge me.”
“I’ve never been with a call girl, so I don’t know for sure. I might not take her to dinner at all.”
“You have to! That’s just rude if you don’t.”
“Okay.” He thought about it for a moment as their next course appeared. Baked goat cheese. “I think stuffed-crust pizza or maybe double cheeseburgers and milk shakes.”
“That sounds amazing actually. Why wouldn’t you take a normal date there?”
“I don’t think it would have ever occurred to me to do so. Men are supposed to impress women, and I don’t think greasy cheeseburgers would do that.”
She poked at her baked goat cheese, which he never cared for, either. “I would eat greasy cheeseburgers with you, and pizza. In fact, if you took me for ribs, I’d be mighty impressed.”
“Let’s go then.”
“What?”
He stood up and grabbed her hand. “Let’s go get burgers and milk shakes.”
“But they already started serving us. And that wine probably costs more than I make in a week.”
“I don’t care. You want greasy cheeseburgers and ribs, we’re going to have greasy cheeseburgers and ribs.”
“I didn’t mean to imply I wasn’t having a good time. You left work early so we can eat here. You were looking forward to it. We should stay.” But he knew she wasn’t having a good time. He could tell ever since he had brought her into his world that she had been feeling uncomfortable. He had worked so hard to get everything he had, but none of it was important to her. She was the only woman he had known to whom none of what he had made a damn bit of difference.
The Bad Boy CEO Page 17
