Текст книги "Playing with Fire "
Автор книги: Kate Meader
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Текущая страница: 9 (всего у книги 20 страниц)
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“Mr. Cochrane is already in your office, Mr. Mayor.”
Eli barely managed to suppress his disgust with that news as he nodded absently at Kelly, his receptionist. Early again. Though Chicago’s wealthiest businessman might prefer to assert his dominance by breezing in late, Eli was fairly sure Sam knew the mayor’s schedule to a T, and planned his meetings so Eli wouldn’t be in his office when Cochrane arrived.
Much better to make himself at home and make Eli look like the interloper when he walked in.
No matter how many times Eli strode into that office, if Sam Cochrane was already there, then the point was made. And today, as he entered and found that stone in his shoe sitting in Eli’s chair behind Eli’s desk, he felt singularly renewed in his plan to extricate his political life from Cochrane, come hell or high water.
“Sam.”
“Mr. Mayor.”
There was insolence in those two words. They both knew that Eli owed the office to Sam’s backing.
Sam was powerfully built and trim for his age. His third wife, thirty years his junior, kept him physically active, and his brain found exercise planning corporate coups and how to screw over anyone who looked at him crooked. But the front lines of political power didn’t interest him, not when so much could be gained by working behind the scenes.
Enter Eli.
At thirty, he was a year out of the Marines, working as an assistant state’s attorney, when Sam Cochrane approached him with his kingmaker proposal. The then-mayor was a three-time incumbent who had allowed city hall to ossify during his reign of inertia. Eighteen months to the election, and everyone expected an unopposed run—like the previous two elections. Butting up against the status quo would take chutzpah and money in spades.
Eli had the chutzpah. Guess who had the money?
He was under no illusion about what he was getting himself into. Sam was a shark who tore through business enemies and allies alike with razor-sharp teeth, but Eli was sure he could temper that ferocity once he was in office.
Over the course of a year, Eli attended every community meeting in every rat-infested South Side death trap of a school. He met with grassroots leaders and listened to their needs. He wrote opinion pieces calling out the current administration’s inadequacies and—wait for it—proposing solutions. By the time he declared eight months before the election, everyone knew who he was and what he stood for. He would be tough on crime, he would curb spending, he wouldn’t stand for bullshit. (He even swore on TV during a debate, and that clip was played over and over. Street cred for the win.)
That’s not to say the election wasn’t hard fought. It was. Precinct by precinct, ward by ward, Chicago’s own Battle of Stalingrad. But what threw him over the top was not his looks or charm or passion. It was not even his service in Afghanistan, where he had been captured by the Taliban, making him a bona fide American fucking hero.
It was the human-interest element. They were voting for that little boy who had crouched terrified in that closet all those years ago. They were voting for the son of a great man.
“Glad to see you’re none the worse for wear after the fire.”
Eli walked to the window and looked out over the busy Loop streets of his kingdom. Another snowstorm was forecast, promising a dangerous evening commute. Treacherous roads ahead.
“I was fortunate.”
“Damn fool for going back in, but it made you look good.” He laughed quietly. “Pity it had to be Dempsey who saved you.”
“She did a good job.”
“And now you’re rewarding her for it. People are loving the two of you together.”
Not just people, Eli thought. He rather liked the idea of the two of them together himself, clearly a little too much, because he’d been in a foul mood since her rejection. Two weeks since he’d made Alexandra Dempsey scream with his mouth sucking on her gorgeous breasts and his fingers slicking through her tight pussy, and he was feverish with want. She had accompanied him to a few events since—the opening of a charter school for gifted children on Chicago’s North Side, the Women’s Business Development Center’s annual luncheon. All calculated moves by Madison that kept the press in a frenzy about the budding romance between the mayor and the firefighter.
He was trying to respect her boundaries, but he also recognized that their chemistry was so potent that it was uncontainable by those walls she had built. Now he’d had a taste, and satisfaction wouldn’t come until he’d claimed every inch of her.
“We’re all about pleasing the people,” Eli said in response to Sam’s comment.
“You can control her?”
God no. “That’s what people like. The fact that I can’t. The fact that she has a mind of her own and she’s not afraid to speak it.”
“You taking her to the gala?”
Eli gave a noncommittal grunt. Tomorrow night he would have to poker up even more than usual. His father, the greatest and most beloved state’s attorney Chicago had ever seen, would have an award named after him at a glitzy gala. Called the Weston Cooper Justice Award, in the future it would be given to someone who represented the late public servant’s principles of truth, justice, and the American way.
What a joke.
Eli turned in time to catch Sam staring at that photo of Weston Cooper shaking hands with Mayor Daley. He was so young then, just appointed as state’s attorney, a life of promise spread out before him. That Sam dared to look at it enraged Eli to the point he had to grab the windowsill to prevent him from pummeling the older man.
“Just watch she doesn’t get too mouthy,” he said with a derisive sniff. “You screwing her yet?”
The roar in his blood at Sam’s disrespectful tone made Eli’s hands itch to commit murder, but he’d learned long ago the virtue of keeping his emotions in check. Show them—the other candidates, Sam Cochrane, even the good people of Chicago—weakness, he might as well withdraw from the race now.
But with her . . . losing his shit with her, whether it was fighting or fucking, that would be downright liberating.
“I happen to admire her greatly.” It came out sounding pompous.
“After all that shit with my car, how you tried to protect her, insulate her . . .” Sam shook his head. “I should have sued her into the grave. But I could see you had a soft spot for her.”
Not soft, all hard. He wanted her and it was making him insane. Other women repelled him because they weren’t her.
“Firefighter Dempsey is good for my numbers, that’s all.”
“She’s never been one for impulse control. Her father was the same.”
“You used to be Sean Dempsey’s closest friend,” Eli said casually. The reasons why Sean and Sam fell out were a mystery, and Eli would never ask him about it outright. One day, Sam would tell him.
But not today.
He pivoted in the mayoral throne, facing Eli. “The city council is still bitching about the sign. Are they going to give me trouble?”
Eli sighed. Sam wanted to mount his name in twenty-foot-tall letters on one of his skyscrapers along the river walk. It would be a blot on the downtown landscape and the city council was not impressed. “There’ll be a vote on the ordinance next week.”
“Trump got away with it a couple of years back.”
“And that’s what you’re aspiring to?”
Sam parted his lips to form a shark’s smile. “Every Gotham needs a villain, Eli. Just be glad it’s me and not you.” Unsubtly, his eyes flicked to the photo of Eli’s father. The one that spelled all that soon-to-be-crushed promise.
“Make sure it happens.” He stood with an exaggerated brush of his lapels. “It’s a small thing to do in the grand scheme of things, don’t you think?”
With Sam’s departure, Eli was left to think about those small things. Death of his soul by a thousand cuts.
E n Cachette.
Alex blinked at the antique silver-framed nameplate by the door and studied the email on her phone again.
En Cachette, 69 E. Schiller, 2 p.m. Please don’t be late! —W
She might be within spitting distance of the tony boutiques of Oak Street, but she had never heard of an exclusive clothing store on the top floor of a five-million-dollar brownstone in the middle of Chicago’s wealthy Gold Coast. Perhaps it was some sort of kinky sex club—and why did that idea in the same headspace as Eli Cooper excite her so much?—but that seemed less likely when she remembered that Eli’s assistant, Whitney, had sent her the address for her sartorial makeover.
Apparently, the mayor didn’t trust her to dress herself. Alex was inclined to agree, but she would have been much happier to spend a few mind-numbing hours at Macy’s with her posse rather than be prodded by whatever lay behind this door. Tomorrow night, there was an award gala dedicated to Eli’s father, and guess who was going as his date?
Alex Dempsey was about to kick it Cinderella-style.
The last two weeks had been torture, leaving her as horny as a three-balled tomcat. At the events she attended with the mayor, they were never alone, a state of affairs she suspected he had manufactured. His polite, respectful distance confirmed it, the “fake dating” scenario he had promised. But when a girl’s had a sex ninja like Eli Cooper yielding orgasms with the lick of a nipple, she was bound to be feeling a touch dissatisfied . . . with her own hand in particular. The empty spot inside her craved fulfillment she suspected only he could give.
She knew what the bastard was doing. If she wanted to get off, she needed to get on board the Eli Cooper Sexpress. Come sin with the sinner.
She pushed the buzzer, and after a few seconds heard, “Bonjour?”
Bonjour? Holy croissan’wich, this shit was for real.
“It’s Alex Dempsey. I was sent here by—”
“Oui, oui.” The door clicked, making the barest of moneyed hums to signify she was invited in. She climbed up a narrow stairway until she reached the top floor, made up to look like a French brothel circa 1859. The décor consisted of grosgrain ribbon wallpaper, lavish drapes, and furniture that looked like it’d collapse if your eyes rested on it longer than ten seconds. Onyx black mannequins dotted the space languidly, wearing a lace bra here, skimpy panties there, as if someone had started dressing them and lost interest midway through.
A petite brunette emerged from behind a screen in a cloud of perfume that stung Alex’s nostrils from ten feet out.
“Meez Dempsee? It eez a pleasure!” She gave Alex the wet fish handshake, all while assessing her with a cool, judgmental gaze. “I am Odile. We are going to have a lot of fun, you and I.”
“Sure.” Alex would be the judge of the fun levels. “I’m here for a dress. There’s this gala thing . . .”
“Oui, oui, I know all about it. Come with me.”
Alex was ushered into a dressing room with a rack of prom-like dresses, a triptych mirror, and plush carpeting. Without so much as a by-your-leave, Odile whipped off Alex’s parka, scarf, and hoodie with a skill that rivaled the mayor’s.
“You are . . .” She fluttered a perfectly manicured claw over Alex’s outfit of jeans and a tee emblazoned with the slogan “Silly boys. Girls want fire trucks, too.” “. . . More full-figured than Monsieur Mayor led me to believe.”
“He said I was skinny?”
“Mon Dieu, non! He said you looked to be a size ten, but men can never judge these things, and they will always undersize.” Her smile was arch. “It plays better for them later in the bedroom.”
Alex rolled her eyes.
“I viewed some pictures of you online. There are plenty to choose from.” An unfortunate truth. Her fifteen minutes after the Cochrane incident had lasted about three months. For a while there, she couldn’t raise a beer to her lips in a bar without someone snapping it. And now here she was at the center of another media typhoon.
“You are more like a sixteen, non?”
“Fourteen.” On a good day.
Odile walked to the rack of dresses and pulled off something horrendous: lavender taffeta that Alex wouldn’t wish on her worst enemy. Well, maybe Murphy.
“Sorry, that’s just hideous.”
“Hmm. Monsieur Mayor chose something else for you, but he did not tell me about the tattoos. He was adamant that you wear this.” From the rail, she plucked a garnet red cocktail dress with a plunging neckline, a dipping backline, and a fluttery hem.
It was absolutely gorgeous.
“But it will reveal your tattoos, and at such an important event, I do not think it would be suitable.”
A wild and insistent pulse started up in Alex’s veins. She wanted to wear the dress Eli had chosen. “Can I at least try it on?”
Odile shrugged in a very Continental way. “Why not? But I will find something else that covers you up in the meantime. Perhaps a wrap.” She smirked. “Or a burka. There is le lingerie, as well.”
“Underwear?”
“Oui,” she said with a sharp look, likely because Alex had translated le lingerie into unsexy English. “Monsieur Mayor picked it out himself. He was most certain about what he wanted.”
Alex’s heart rate sped to danger levels. A heated blush crept across her body as it remembered its reaction to Eli’s mouth sucking on her breast and making her come so fast she should consider submitting to Guinness World Records.
Odile was saying something and Alex fought to pay attention.
“What’s that?”
“Your bra size, mademoiselle?”
“Thirty-six-D.”
Another French smirk. “Oh, he pinpointed that exactly.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Her hair was all wrong. Straight and sleek and scraped back so severely her temples stung.
“It looks perfect!” Darcy and Kinsey both squealed like tweens at a One Direction show as K applied another spritz of hairspray. Getting ready for her big date had turned her friends into the kind of people Alex had avoided in high school. Peppy people.
“Now, just to make those eyes a little smokier.” Darcy tipped Alex’s chin up and started applying, smudging, and reapplying, though Alex questioned the necessity, given that the minute she saw Eli, her eyes would turn all smoky with lust anyway. Cosmetic enhancements so not necessary.
“Wow, you clean up good, girl,” Kinsey murmured, now sounding like a proud mama.
Alex blinked at her reflection in the mirror, marveling at how a little makeup could go a long way. The dress, understated yet sexy, fit her perfectly. Darcy had lent her a pair of red Christian Lacroix shoes that managed the miraculous feat of making her ankles thin and her appearance statuesque. The overall effect was startling. She hadn’t gone to her high school prom because no one had been interested (or brave) enough to ask her, and now she felt like she was getting another chance with the star quarterback. She’d be the envy of all the other bitches. Go Wildcats!
“It’s just a gala thing,” she said, more to herself than to the others. “They’re naming some award after his father.”
“Yes, but it’s an important event honoring his father’s legacy,” Darcy reasoned, a knowing smile playing on her lips. “And he bought you a dress.”
And underwear. Underwear she was dampening right now just thinking about him.
“What’s wrong?” Kinsey asked. “You’ve gone red.”
She’d never had girlfriends to confide in, or anything worth confiding, but now she was bursting at the seams and had to get it out.
“I don’t know what I’m doing here. I’m fake dating the mayor but we’ve already groped each other in a tampon closet and I’ve had two amazing orgasms and he’s had none. He’s choosing what I wear, including my underwear, he doesn’t respect my job or me, so why is it that all I can think about is having him so deep inside me I can’t walk straight for a week?”
“Whoa.” Darcy’s eyes flew wide. “He’s had none of the orgasms? No, don’t tell me. He’s sort of like a big brother to me and that’s totally TMI.”
“I told him I didn’t want a one-night stand.”
Kinsey squinted. “Before or after the orgasms?”
“After.”
“Dang, that’s cold, girl.”
Darcy looked puzzled. “Tampon closet?”
“Long story. Yesterday, I’m at this private boutique, which looked like a French whorehouse, and it was clear he’d been there before with other women because he has a fucking tab.” Other lithe, smooth-haired, nontattooed women. “It’s where he buys them lingerie and dresses.”
Darcy’s peeled back the scrap of red silk covering Alex’s dusky pink balconette bra. A low whistle followed. “Looks expensive.”
“Three bills. And a C-note for the panties.”
“Which he picked out,” said Kinsey. “Poor no-salary Eli. Those investments of his must be doing terribly.”
“And he paid for dinner that night at DeLuca’s, after the hockey game. Pulled out my chair, ordered my food, took off my coat.” Along with her bra. Get your other tit ready for me. Oh, God. “He’s so damn dominant. I don’t think I should be sleeping with a guy who dresses chauvinism up with chivalry.”
Darcy put her hands on Alex’s shoulders. “You don’t need to be simpatico on everything. He’s hot, he gets your engine running, and he’s into you. Just enjoy it.”
Kinsey touched a finger to her lips, considering. “Are you worried that you’re just a prop for his campaign?”
It was impossible to ignore the media’s fascination with the heroism of their respective families. Viewed in that light, their hookup made a compelling narrative—and made her uneasy about his ulterior motives. The man had a ballot box where his heart should be.
“I don’t doubt his attraction to me, but neither can I ignore the fact we’re somebody’s PR wet dream. I suppose the idea of being used, for whatever reason, doesn’t sit well.” The girls looked sympathetic, knowing that the memory of her last sexual experience with Mr. Two-Pump-Chump still pinched. How she’d felt like a man’s conquest. A joke. It was why she was carefully combing through the choices.
“Look, we know that Team Get Alex Laid has been sort of falling down on the job,” Darcy said, “but it’s largely down to the fact that our charge has changed. You want more than a good time, we get it, but sometimes asserting yourself sexually can be just as empowering as holding out. You have more control than you think.”
Deep down, Alex knew that she and Eli were on an equal footing as far as the sexual chemistry went. She trusted that her pleasure would be paramount with him—uh, two orgasms in less than three minutes! Odder still, she liked him despite his caveman tendencies.
“Unless you’re falling for him . . .” Kinsey had apparently missed her calling with the CIA.
Darcy’s face lit up. “Awesome! I’ve been rooting for you guys from the start.”
“No,” Alex said a touch too vehemently. “I’m attracted to him, but that’s all there is. Besides, he doesn’t believe in the sappy-ever-after.”
Darcy’s face fell.
“I just don’t want to be with someone who doesn’t respect me and what I do. Or who’s using me to get ahead.”
Kinsey hummed. “Not even for the amazing orgasms, orgasm hog?”
Alex opened her mouth. Closed it. Maybe she’d been looking at this all wrong. What did it matter what she thought of his worldview, his total lack of political correctness, or even his sketchy motives as long as he was delivering the goods in the bedroom, the hallway, or maybe a fire truck? Since when had she become so fussy? If she let things continue as is, she’d be donating her very intact body to medical science with hardly any wear and tear. If this man did it for her like no one else, if he could bring her to orgasm with a couple of blazing looks and a hot mouth sucking her nipples, then why not take advantage?
Darcy spoke to her in the mirror. “While I’d love to see the two of you ride off into the sunset, if it’s going to end in a few weeks anyway, you may as well enjoy it. Hit it and quit it.”
“He has had the hots for you from day one,” Kinsey said over Alex’s other shoulder. “I was with him in that restaurant, the night he spotted you. It was like his world stopped spinning. Even after you almost tanked his mayoralty when you destroyed Cochrane’s car. Even after you made him look like an idiot in that press conference, which he deserved. He’s still here. Wanting in your very expensive panties.”
“You’re the one who’s been down on him all along. Now you’re telling me to jump on board?”
“Orgasms, babe. If you can separate it out, then a little joyride of the cock variety won’t kill you.”
Alex stared at her reflection, relishing the feeling of having slipped into a new skin. You have more control than you think. With a last-minute plump of her breasts, she made sure those puppies were displayed to their best advantage.
Hit it and quit it. What could possibly go wrong?
Eli should have stayed in his armored car.
But it would have looked off if he didn’t meet his date for the evening at her door. It had been so long since he was on a real date, and he had never been on a fake date, but even he knew that shuffling awkwardly from foot to foot while her family buried you with their glares was part and parcel of the experience.
Alexandra lived with Gage, and Wyatt lived next door, so Eli was at a loss to explain why every single one of the Firefightin’ fucking Dempseys, including Beck and Luke, who did not live nearby, was standing in the hallway of her home. Had they taken personal time from work so they could posture and give him the Gypsy stink eye? Were fires raging and drunks going thirsty? From upstairs, he heard shrieking that sounded like Darcy. He assumed Kinsey was up there, as well, because, why the hell not?
Luke looked around and in some unspoken communication, seemed to get the go-ahead to represent the group.
“So, Cooper, we understand there’s some sort of arrangement between you and our sister, this publicity stunt where you vampire-suck her life force and use her for your campaign. We figure she’s a big girl and that’s between the two of you.”
So the “vampire-suck her life force” statement was a bit over the top, but he appreciated that Luke was approaching this with a certain level of maturity. This was no one else’s business, and Alexandra was a grown woman who could handle anything he threw at her. As she had so ably demonstrated when he’d sucked on her heavenly breasts and she came like a rocket.
Against the wall where Luke now stood.
Terminate that line of thinking now, Cooper.
Luke was still droning on. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t give you a little friendly advice. You might be using my sister, but if I hear that you hurt her in any way, shape, or form, then this truce we have going on will be over so quick you won’t even see us comin’ at you. Got it?”
“Luke, stop bullying him,” Eli heard from somewhere above. “That ego of his is exceptionally fragile.”
All eyes fired upward to find a goddess about to descend among mortals.
Christ Jesus.
Eli had seen the dress on a hanger. He’d spent all day imagining her both in and out of the dress. Now the whole package—hair, makeup, that drop-dead-gorgeous body—stole his breath clean away.
The bra he’d chosen had lifted and shaped her stunning breasts into weapons of cock destruction. Her spectacular legs tapered to fuck-me heels; her shapely hips swayed in a manner that could topple governments. Those tattoos on her arms, the brands of her tribe, riled him something royally. She was like the bad girl his mom would have advised him to avoid if she’d lived long enough to see him date. As for the panties . . . ah, the panties. He couldn’t see them except in his mind’s eye. They were pink and lacy, barely a scrap covering the cleft of her perfect ass with frilly wings on either side. Later he would blow on them, watch them flutter under his breath. Watch the gooseflesh he’d raise on her skin as his mouth drew close to where they needed each other most.
He was in danger of getting a not-so-fake hard-on for his fake date in front of her whole damn family. Perhaps if he stared longer at the tattoos, he’d remember that she was the sister and daughter of fallen Dempseys, true Chicago heroes. Unlike the man they were honoring tonight.
Her regal descent complete, she raised expectant eyes to his.
“Hi,” she said, and dragged her bottom lip between her teeth.
Woman, have mercy.
“Alexandra, you look beautiful. I should have no problem palming you off on some quality talent tonight.”
She tipped her nose up. That pleased her. “But let’s go higher than beat cop. Is the police commissioner spoken for?”
“He is, but the deputy commissioner is a free agent. Bad breakup last year, so he should be very susceptible to your particular charms.”
He held out his hand, inviting her under his protection, and his heart cranked out a dangerous beat when she took it and squeezed.
“Have fun,” Darcy said in a singsong voice from the top of the stairs.
Alexandra rolled her eyes and muttered, “Is that likely?”
“Fun is one of my platforms,” Eli said, enjoying the smooth skin of her palm. “After crime prevention and job growth.”
She let loose a husky laugh, then clammed up with a guilty look at her broody brothers.
“Let’s go.” To the rest of them, but especially to a steely eyed Luke Almeida, he said, “Don’t wait up.”
The last time Alex was in the backseat of a car with Eli was two weeks ago after dinner at DeLuca’s, and about two minutes before she came in her hallway. Twice.
Good times.
Sneaking a glance, she found him staring at her with not a small amount of breath-robbing heat. Perhaps he was remembering, too.
She swallowed. “Are you nervous about tonight?”
He hit her with that look, the one that turned her lady parts soft and her nipples hard. “Cops love me. Or I should say, they loved my father.” The resignation in his voice clashed with the hot smolder.
“He was a great man. The city doesn’t forget that kind of thing.”
His lips moved imperceptibly, and she got the impression that he checked a curse.
Maybe he was tired of it coming up. During the last election, it was the talking point above everything else: the issues, his movie star looks, even his military heroics. Barbara Walters had made herself and everyone dewy-eyed when she interviewed him just before Election Day. Eli’s pride in his father had reminded Alex of her love for Sean, invoking a weird commonality with him before they had met. It was why she had voted for him.
Yes, she, Alex Dempsey, had voted for Eli Cooper.
Now, that light in his eyes, the one that shone his pride in his father’s accomplishments and how one man went up against the mob in Chicago and lost, had gone out. It was weird to see him in a bad mood. He seemed to make a living out of presenting a certain face to the world.
“Sit closer,” he murmured.
“So you can look down my dress?”
He laughed that whiskey-rough rasp she loved. “Yes.”
She scooted in, leaving a foot of space beside them. Can’t make it too easy. With a dutiful glance at her abundant cleavage, he gave a wolfish smile. “Do you like what you’re wearing?”
“It’s beautiful.”
“The woman makes it beautiful.” He dwarfed her hand in his and traced lazy, erotic circles on her wrist. “Is your family giving you a hard time about me?”
“They’re just protective. They tend to take their lead from Luke, and he’s not your biggest fan.”
“What about the men you work with?”
“It’s not a problem.” So a few guys had made snide comments about her “wartime collaboration.” She’d lived with nasty innuendo her whole career in CFD; a few extras she could handle. If it kept her family safe . . .
Only now she was beginning to think she didn’t mind being here with him, getting all dressed up in clothes he had chosen for her. There was a lot to like about how Eli wooed.
She felt her butt scoot over a smidgen. The intimate interior of the car pressed in on her.
“If anyone gives you a problem, you’ll come to me about it.” Not a question, but a command.
“I can take care of it, Eli.”
“Let me enjoy this rare moment of looking out for someone other than myself, Alexandra.”
She wondered who took care of him. When he went home to the house where his parents were murdered, did he sit alone in the dark with his expensive scotch and his dog at his feet imagining a world where men didn’t break into your home and execute the people you loved more than anything?
This was not what where her mind should be wandering. Back to the orgasms.
The car stopped and Eli curled a hand around her neck. “Just one thing.” He unclasped the French knot Darcy had spent an hour crafting.
“Eli! That took forever.”
“I like your hair down. Uncivilized, rebellious. Like you.” His fingers tangled in her locks, mussing them out of downtown sleekness and into the wild boonies. All the while, he stared at her with those ice-blue eyes. “I don’t think you should change for anyone, and especially not for me.” His thumb trailed to her bottom lip and hovered there.
“Don’t you dare smudge my makeup,” she hissed through quivering lips. “It’s perfect.”
Lights of challenge brightened his eyes. “Shouldn’t have said that, honey.” And then he was kissing her, making a mess of her makeup, of her panties, of everything. His fingers, those dominant instruments of pleasure, burrowed in her hair, while his tongue tangled with hers expertly.
Drawing back, he touched his lips, as though savoring his sensual assault. “I’m glad you’re here, Alexandra. Tonight, I really need . . .” He placed a hand on the door handle and drew a breath. “I’m just glad you’re here.”
Stunned by that admission, she tried to haul herself back to the reality she knew existed outside this car. “Eli, wait, I need a mirror. I can’t go out like this.” She had no idea what this was, but she was damn sure it was not worthy of the mayor’s arm candy.
“Yes, you can. You look like how every woman should when getting out of a limo.”
“Like a bedraggled hobo?”
“Like you’ve just gotten some action.” With his hand still wrapped around hers, he dragged her out of the car into the street.
