Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4)

He set down his glass on the counter. “You said work brought you to town, that you’re shooting the catalogue all over the city. Are you enjoying it?”

“Immensely,” she said with a nod. “The models are beautiful, the locations are playful, and the lingerie is, as you say, to die for.”

His eyes flashed with mischief as he made a noise of approval. “Big fan of lingerie myself.”

“That so? Something you want to tell me?” she said, coyness coloring her tone as they bantered, so much that it filled her with an effervescence that rivaled the champagne’s effect.

“Very funny.” He dropped his voice to a whisper. “I meant…on women.”

That buzzing intensified. This was chemistry. This was the electricity in the air before a storm. She was wrong about him being a safe choice for her first time out in years.

Now that she was centimeters rather than an ocean away, she was intensely aware of how not-safe he was.

She threw caution to the wind. “Anything in particular when it comes to lingerie? Baby-dolls? Corsets? Garters? Hip-huggers? Bikinis? Cheektinis? Stockings? Bikini briefs? Boy-cut shorts? Thongs?” she said with the speed of a freight train, rattling off anything and everything silky that hugged a woman’s bare flesh.

His lips quirked up as he took a drink. “That one,” he said dryly, tapping the air with his index finger.

“Which one, Michael?”

He made a rolling gesture with his hand. “All of them. Every. Single. One.” Then he scratched his chin. “Question, though. What on earth is a cheektini?”

Annalise lowered her arm to her hip, shifted her pose, and drew a line mid-cheek across the denim of her jeans. “They go right here.”

Heat flashed in his gaze as he stared at her ass. “Right there, you say?”

“Yes.” She traced the line once more across her rear. “The panties cut across, so your cheeks…” She paused, searching for the right words in English. “They hang out?”

He nodded his understanding, his eyes on her the whole time, darkening. She hadn’t expected the intensity of his stare. Nor had she expected the rush it sent through her. It had been so long since she’d felt like this. “Yes. And the one I’m wearing right now is red with lace trim.”

She shocked herself when she said that. She hadn’t expected to be so bold. But it felt easy, and right, and so damn good.

Perhaps she’d surprised him, too, because he licked his lips, then groaned softly as he uttered, “Red.”

Like it had six syllables. Like it was the sexiest word in the world.

Before the conversation could turn naughtier, the music shifted, and the lead singer tapped the microphone, said hello, and launched into the first song.

“More champagne and then we go stage-dive?”

“Absolutely. Let’s start a mosh pit.”

They did neither, but a few minutes later, they were watching the band, listening to the music, and drinking another round. Someone bumped into Annalise, and she moved closer to Michael. Before she knew it, they were shoulder-to-shoulder, hip-to-hip, swaying to the music.

By the time the band finished, they’d polished off another glass or two. The buzz was headier, and so was the intoxication from the music, the low lights, the energy, and this whole night that felt like a cocoon of possibility.

She wiped a hand over her brow. The club was hot.

“Let’s step outside,” he said. “Where it’s cooler.”

She nodded, and once again, his hand was on her back. He guided her to the tall glass doors that spilled onto a terrace attached to the club. As he opened the door, he reached for her hand, holding it as they walked to a bench and sat down. Groups of club-goers were scattered at nearby tables.

He traced her palm lightly with the pad of his thumb, and her heart sped up. That barest touch was bursting with heat. Electricity flared between them. They could power the lights at this club, the billboards down the street. She barely understood how it was possible to be like this with someone she hadn’t seen since that unexpected and heartbreaking day when they were both twenty-four. She’d been going one way in life; he’d been heading in another. Seeing him then had been as close as she’d ever come to the fire of temptation. She hadn’t given in.

Now, they were both thirty-four, and her heart stuttered just from being near him. This torch might have flickered to a soft, ashen glow in years past, but it could be turned fiery and bright in an instant. “I’m glad you were free tonight,” she said. “I’m glad you asked me to the show. I’ve had an amazing time. Most of all, I’m glad you said yes. I’ve been thinking of you.”

“You have?” His voice sounded stretched full of hope, like he was holding all the world in that two-word question.

Like her answer to it had more power than she would have ever suspected.





CHAPTER FIVE


This was what he’d wanted, but knowing she’d been thinking of him barely scratched the surface of his curiosity. His throat was parched, and he was so damn thirsty for more.

His voice was low, rough. “What do you think about?”