She swallowed, and then let out a flood of words that had him struggling to keep up. “I, uh…I work at a bar called the Olive Martini and it’s near the corner of Broadway and 47th and if you’re in the neighborhood, you can pop in and the drinks will be on the house.” She sucked in a gust of air. “I know a free drink doesn’t make up for…um, this, but it’s all I can do.”
She clamped her mouth shut and looked at him with wide, shameful eyes, as the humor of the situation finally settled in with full force. A complete stranger had just slipped into his bed, kissed the hell out of him, brought him to a level of hardness he’d never known, and now she was offering him free drinks to make up for it?
Laughter lodged in Ben’s throat as he tried to formulate a sentence that might make the situation seem a little less absurd.
He never got the chance.
With an awkward smile and another look of terror, the redhead hurried for the door, just as a flash of pink from the carpet caught Ben’s eye.
“Wait,” he called as she reached for the door handle. “You forgot your—”
She slid out and closed the door with a soft click.
“—panties,” he finished.
Chapter Two
Maggie tore down the street in a full-throttled run, sucking in the night air as if an overdose of oxygen would erase the pure humiliation sticking to her throat. She glanced over her shoulder, half expecting to see the sexy stranger she’d just mauled chasing after her. Nope. All she saw was the slow rush of people flowing out of one of the theaters, chattering about the show they’d just seen.
She knew her dark-haired hunk wasn’t in the crowd because…hell, because lethal good looks like his would be impossible to miss.
How was it possible for someone to be that attractive?
Once he’d turned on the lights, she’d had to slam her mouth closed to avoid drooling all over the hotel room carpet. He had the kind of looks you only saw on Calvin Klein models these days—cobalt blue eyes, straight white teeth, dimples that melted your insides. But with a bit of an edge, which showed in the way his scruffy brown hair curled under his ears and in that tribal tattoo inked on his biceps. He had bad boy written all over him, which she found incredibly sexy, and all she knew was she’d better thank her lucky stars she’d gotten out of there.
Who knows what she would’ve done if she’d stayed even a second longer.
Probably fucked his brains out.
“Excuse me, coming through,” Maggie called as she wove through the same group of teenagers she’d passed on the way to the hotel.
“Hey, baby, what’s the rush?” one of the baggy-clothed kids asked with a laugh.
What’s the rush? Um, maybe because she’d just stroked, caressed and made out with a complete stranger. If that didn’t make a girl want to flee for the hills, what did?
She ignored the kids and pushed forward, her high heels clicking against the sidewalk. People kept getting in her way, slowing her down, when all she wanted was to get to her building and pretend she hadn’t just committed the most reckless act of her twenty-five years.
Why hadn’t Tony been there?
The question sliced through her so quickly that she stopped in her tracks. For the past five minutes she’d been beating herself over the head for winding up in a stranger’s room, but there’s no way she’d gotten the room number wrong. She’d written it on her hand, for God’s sake!
Furrowing her brows, she flipped over her hand and stared at the three digits she’d scribbled on her palm. Yep. 312. The ink was starting to smear, but there was no mistaking the numbers. She’d gotten it right, which meant that Tony—that jerk—was to blame for this entire mess.
Why hadn’t he shown up? He would’ve called her cell if the plan had changed, wouldn’t he?
Maggie reached into her purse and rummaged around for her phone. She pulled it out, and then groaned. The battery was dead. She tried turning it on, but the thing simply wouldn’t comply, so when she spotted an unoccupied payphone, she made a mad dash for it.
One quarter and five seconds later, she accessed her cell’s message service and heard Tony’s voice.
“Hey, Mags, it’s me. Listen, I’ve got some bad news. We had to make an emergency landing in Tallahassee. Some freak hurricane just swept in and the airline is delaying all the flights. I won’t be able to get a flight out until tomorrow morning, but we’re shit out of luck, babe. I have a meeting with a publisher in the afternoon and I’m heading out to Bora Bora at five. Looks like we’ll see each other next time I’m in town. Probably the end of August. Say hi to the folks at the Olive for me.”
Maggie hung up the phone and gritted her teeth. Say hi to the folks at the Olive for me?
Anger swirled in her stomach like a cluster of enraged butterflies, but deep down she knew she couldn’t blame Tony for what had happened. He didn’t control the weather or the airlines, and it wasn’t his fault that a delay she hadn’t known about had sent her into bed with another man.
Hell, she blamed herself for the embarrassment she felt. Why on earth hadn’t she turned on the light when she walked in, instead of hopping into the bed and giving a stranger a hand job?