He trails his fingertips over my bare shoulder, then down along the plunging neckline so that he is tracing the curve of my breast, making my pulse kick up, and my entire body tremble with desire. “Damien,” I say, and I see the answering smile on his lips.
“Shhh.” His hand continues down, sliding over the soft, clinging material and making me bite my lip to hold back a moan. Then he moves lower still, until his fingers find the top of the slit that reveals my thigh. “Interesting.”
“Damien,” I murmur. I’m desperately wet, and I long for a more intimate touch. For his fingers to ease upward and thrust inside me.
“I love the feel of your skin,” he whispers as he strokes my thigh from slit to knee and then back up again, touching only what the dress reveals.
I whimper.
The corner of his mouth crinkles. “We’re almost to the theater.”
I shift on the seat, spreading my legs, my entire body thrumming. “I don’t care.”
He meets my eyes, his dual-colored ones looking back at me. I see the heat flare in his amber one, but it’s the passion reflected in the depths of the pure black one that has my core clenching in response.
Slowly, he moves closer, inching toward me on the seat and then leaning over so that he can cup the back of my head with one hand and brush soft kisses on my neck while his other hand eases higher beneath the dress.
The slit is completely unreasonable, so there’s not far to go, and I close my eyes, lost in the sensation of his mouth on my neck, my ear. And his fingers so delicately tracing the soft skin between my thigh and my pubis, coming close to where I want him, but never quite reaching, so that instead of quelling the wild desire inside me, he’s fueling it.
“Tell me what you want,” he orders, pulling back from my neck.
“I want you to touch me.”
“No,” he says, a sharp command in his voice. “Tell me what you want.”
I gasp as his finger traces along the top of my panties, crossing over my pubic bone and teasing me relentlessly. I feel the shift in the limo as we exit the freeway, and I bite my lower lip. We’re close. I should tell him I want him to stop. That there’s no time, and we can finish this later.
Instead, I say, “I want your fingers inside me. I want you to make me come.”
“I like that answer,” he says, his finger slipping over the tiny triangle of my thong to find the string that is really no coverage at all.
I suck in air as he tugs it aside, then strokes my slick skin as I writhe against his touch, spreading my legs even wider.
“That’s it, baby,” he murmurs as his thumb finds my clit and a wild electrical shock makes me gasp, a precursor of things to come. Then he slips his fingers inside me—two, three, I can’t tell—but the sensation of being filled is overwhelming. I crave more—I crave his cock, the pressure of his body over mine as he thrusts deep inside me—but there’s definitely no time for that, and I just grind shamelessly against his hand as his thumb continues to tease my clit.
“I see the line,” he says, referring to the line of limos that is part and parcel of these kinds of events. “Come for me,” he demands. “That’s it, baby,” he says as he increases the pressure on my clit, the surprise sending thousands of electrical charges to gather between my legs, building and building and then finally exploding with all the power of a star going supernova.
I shake, gasping and clinging to Damien’s shoulders as I try to claw my way back to reality. His mouth closes over mine, and I’m vaguely aware that he’s readjusting my thong and smoothing my dress.
“I love you,” he says as he pulls away.
I smile. “I know.”
With a wicked grin, he gently traces my thigh again, this time in the opposite direction. He stops at my bare ankle, swollen today from my pregnancy. “Something’s missing,” he says.
I start to tell him that I accidentally left it at home when he reaches into his suit coat and pulls the slim box from the interior pocket. He opens it, and the anklet sparkles in the dim interior lighting.
I smile, unreasonably relieved to have it here. “Put it on me?”
He bends to do just that, but he can’t get the clasp to connect. With my ankle so swollen, the bracelet is about half a centimeter too small.
“It doesn’t fit,” I say, stupidly stating the obvious.
“It’s okay,” he says, tucking it back into its box, and then into his pocket. “I’ll keep it safe.”
I nod, but it’s only for form, and I turn away, ostensibly to look at the crowd lining Hollywood Boulevard in front of the Chinese Theater.
In reality, though, I’m fighting a new wave of tears. Because even though I know it’s silly, I can’t help but think that not being able to wear the anklet is a very bad omen.
18
We’re helped out of the limo by two young men in the kind of black pants and red vests that give the illusion that we’re back in old Hollywood and these are eager young movie ushers.
Immediately, the questions begin. Shouts about my pregnancy, about fainting in Dallas, about the children’s foundation and the movie and everything under the sun.
Cameras flash wildly, but instead of making me cringe, I simply smile and wave one hand while I hold onto Damien with the other. And as we move down the red carpet, I lean over and whisper, “I’m glad you shared my limo.”
“Did I?” he counters. “Funny. I thought you shared mine.” And then he pulls me close and kisses me as the crowd applauds.
When we pull away, I’m laughing, and the heavy little knot that had appeared in my stomach when Damien had slipped the anklet back into his pocket starts to dissolve.
The red carpet is set in a serpentine pattern so that it heads from the street toward the pagoda of the original Chinese theater for the photo op and on-camera meet-and-greets, then curves around toward the ballroom where the pre-party is being held.
We follow it, pausing when we see Wyatt, who’s set up in front of the step-and-repeat publicity poster with the Stark Children’s Foundation logo. There’s no time for chatting, but I give Wyatt a quick hug after our photo, then promise we’ll see him inside. Then we continue down the path, and everything is so bright and shiny and festive that I feel a bit like Dorothy heading through Munchkinland.
I see Jamie up ahead, and though she’s fighting a grin, I can tell she’s in heaven.
“And here we have Damien and Nikki Stark, looking ravishing as always,” she says, in full-on reporter fashion. She stands by me as she speaks to the camera. “Tonight’s event is sponsored by the Stark Children’s Foundation. Mr. Stark, could you tell us a bit about what this exceptional organization does?”
“Of course,” Damien says smoothly, then gives a succinct rundown of the foundation and its mission to help abused and at-risk kids.