to put something into a glass - anything, just to take the edge off. "Surprise me," I tell him.
I down the liquid – whiskey - grimacing as the alcohol burns my throat before crossing the room and dodging too many self-important people outfitted in black tie attire to count as I walk out of the ballroom to the front hallway, planning to head outside to get some fresh air. Okay, I’m actually planning to hide out and maybe read on my phone for a little while until I dart back inside to make an appearance at dinner, then get the hell right out of here.
The hallway is deserted compared to the crowd in the ballroom, only a few stragglers on their cell phones and one couple walking toward the entrance to the ballroom. A man with salt-and-pepper hair and a young redhead on his arm brags loudly to her about the size of his private jet. Talk about overcompensation. As I brush past them, the redhead gasps. “Noah Ashby!” I nod and smile, dodging them before I’m dragged into another boring conversation.
I’m so preoccupied with congratulating myself for my expert evasive maneuvering that I don’t notice the girl in front of me – or her dress – until too late.
Everything that occurs next seems to happen in slow motion. I swear, the sound of tearing is amplified by a million. I look down to see my foot on the back of a long red dress that trails on the floor. My eyes follow the dress up as the silky material skims softly around the curves of a woman’s hips, to her trim waist, to the creamy smoothness of her back where the material –
Oh shit. I broke the straps on her shoulders – the straps that were on her shoulders when I stepped on the back of the dress.
I lift my foot quickly, but instead of moving away from her dress, the material somehow clings to my shoe, and I step down again, catching it under my foot a second time. The woman shrieks, stumbling backward against me. Reaching out instinctively, I catch her as she lands with oomph, her back colliding with my chest.
Then, a flash goes off in my eyes. Someone – probably some asshole reporter covering the event – just took a photo of the brunette whose arms are draped over mine.
I look down at the woman.
The woman whose dress I just stepped on, tearing the straps and causing the top to slide right down over her breasts. The woman who’s struggling to upright herself, reaching for the top of her dress to hold it up, only to find it’s caught under my feet and when I try to step off of it, she falls back against me even harder. The brunette who someone just grabbed a photo of topless.
As the next flash goes off, I do the only thing I can think of. I hold my palms up in front of her tits to block them from the guy taking the photo.
But she chooses that exact moment to stand upright, lunging forward and straight into my hands.
Specifically, pushing her tits right into them.
Which means that I’m now standing here, wearing a tuxedo at a fancy-schmancy charity event, holding the boobs of some rich girl.
She shrieks. “Oh my God, are you groping me?”
Before I can answer, hands are on my arms. “Mr. Ashby, step away from the President’s daughter.”
The President’s daughter?
Oh, hell.
The woman whirls around, one hand gripping the top of her dress and yanking it up over her breasts, her green eyes flashing. Brown hair frames her face, cascading in waves over her shoulders. Her cheeks are flushed scarlet, although whether it’s from anger or embarrassment, I can’t tell.
Probably embarrassment.
Scratch that. She looks pretty damn irate.
“Oh my God. I recognize you. You’re the – the football player who’s donating his ranch,” she hisses. Her nostrils flare again. Holy shit. The photos of her in magazines don’t do her a damn bit of justice. They’re absolutely nothing compared to the woman standing in front of me right now.
The one whose tits I just grabbed. Shit. I just felt up Grace Sullivan, the daughter of the President of the United States.
And it was caught on camera. Good publicity from this event just went right out the fucking window. Hell, I’m probably about to end up getting waterboarded in a windowless room somewhere. If I'm lucky.
I hold my hands up as two agents pat me down. Meanwhile, the President's daughter stands there gaping at me, her mouth open. For a fleeting moment, I consider asking if she's staring at me because she's stunned by my good looks or because she's never taken a photo with a football player's hands on her tits before. But I reconsider that since she's wearing stilettos and I'm certain she wouldn't hesitate to use one as a deadly weapon. She looks like she'd have good aim. “I was not groping you,” I begin my defense.
Her hand grips her dress around her breasts - the same breasts I just cupped. I glance down because now I can’t stop thinking about her tits. When she notices, the flush on her cheeks intensifies and her eyes go wider. “Your hands were on my boobs.”
“Ma’am, the Secret Service will detain and -“
“Wait, detain me?” I was a good boy and stood still for a second while the Secret Service agents patted me down, but detain me for what was clearly a fucking accident? I don’t think so. “I stepped on your dress, but the whole boob-groping thing was really your fault, not mine, sweetheart.”
“Sweetheart?!” She straightens up, standing taller as she steps closer to me. One of the agents puts her hand up to separate us, but she swats it away. “I can handle a belligerent drunk, Brooks."
“Belligerent drunk?” I ask, bristling. “First of all, I’m not drunk. And just because I'm right doesn't mean I'm belligerent."
"Because you're right? So those weren't, in fact, your hands on my breasts?"
"Look, sweetheart. I don't go around groping women. I stepped on your dress, but you fell into me. And that flash went off because someone was taking a photo, so I put my hands up to shield your tits from the photo. Like a gentleman.”
“Like a gentleman?” she squeals.
“That's right. I wasn’t even touching your tits. Not until you pitched forward and fell into my hands. That was your doing, not mine.”
"You've got to be kidding me," she starts. Then a look of panic passes over her face, and she pauses. “Who took the photo?” She looks up at Brooks and Davis. "Obviously, the photos need to be deleted… Oh, God. My dad is going to be here any minute. He'll flip out."
Her dad. The President of the United States.
"I'll take care of the reporter,” I blurt out. The last thing I need is for a photo of me groping the President's daughter to circulate around the tabloids. I could kiss a potential lucrative contract right the hell goodbye. "He went out the front door. He won’t have gotten far."
One of the agents puts up her hand to stop me. “Sir, you need to stay here.”
Yeah, right. “I think I can take care of a fucking reporter,” I growl. “Unless you want to keep questioning me about whether or not I touched her tits on purpose.”
The Secret Service agent stares at me, her expression unchanging.
“Seriously?” I look at the President’s daughter.
"Let him," she says. The agent looks at her questioningly, and she shakes her head, sighing. "The groping…it was accidental.”
At least she admitted it. As if I’d purposely grope a girl, much less the President’s daughter.
I take off after the reporter. I can see the headlines now – Football Player Assaults Daughter of the President. Hell, could this night get any worse?
8
Grace
"God, could this night get any better?" Vi stands in front of me in a private room in the event building with a needle and thread in her hand, sewing the straps back onto my dress. Fortunately for me, Vi has always had a penchant for fashion design and carries a sewing kit in her purse "for fashion emergencies." Her skill with a needle and thread has come in handy on more than one occasion, and the girl can work magic with a little duct tape.
"Are you insane? Better? What on Earth could make this night worse?"
"I don't know. Let's see?
?? assassination attempt? Someone chokes on their steak at dinner? Car accident? Poisoning? You lean over a candle and your hair catches fire?"
"That was a rhetorical question. You're a little morbid tonight."
"It's a gift." Vi shrugs. "Oh, here's another one."
"Another cause of death?"
"Of course not. Another thing that could make this night worse."
I exhale heavily. "What?"
"If it hadn't been Noah Ashby that had ripped your dress off and touched your ta-tas. If it had been Senator Richards, that would have been infinitely worse…"
I nearly choke. Senator Richards is approaching eighty and has a reputation for being rather handsy. He's an equal-opportunity groper, too, crossing party lines and earning him the disgust of pretty much every woman on the Hill. "That's disgusting, Vi."
"You had Noah Ashby's hands on your boobs. By default, that makes this the opposite of a bad night."
Heat rushes through me when I think about Noah Ashby's hands. His very large hands, calloused and rough, warm against my skin. The entire thing – my dress tearing, flashing the world, falling against Noah's massive chest… and getting groped by Noah Ashby… was unexpected, to say the least.
So was my physical reaction to his touch, the arousal that coursed through my body like electricity. I tell myself that it was just a physical reaction, pure instinct, and occurring solely because it's been a long time since a man put his hands on my breasts. That’s what I told myself as I watched him take off out of the building after the guy who took the salacious photos, and that’s what I reassured myself again as I walked back to this room, the throbbing between my legs insistent.
It was purely a physical response that had nothing to do with Noah Ashby. The man was unlikeable in every way, a gruff, arrogant caveman who called me “sweetheart” like I needed a pat on the head. He was a stereotypical cocky professional athlete.
Of course, he did donate his ranch to the charity for the summer.
I refuse to cut him any slack for that. Professional athletes are always doing stuff like that just to get good press.
I clear my throat. "Not by choice," I tell her primly.
Vi clucks her tongue. "I'd let him touch my boobs anytime. He's delicious." A look of annoyance must flicker across my face because Vi laughs. "Relax, girl. I'm not going to go after your hot neighbor."
"What?" I ask, confused. "What does my neighbor have to do with Noah Ashby?"
"Noah Ashby is your neighbor! I told you, I looked up who bought the house. It wasn't exactly public record, but I was curious, so I asked this guy that I used to date - anyway, how I found out is beside the point. I tried to tell you before you went over there, but you weren't having any of it. You've already seen him naked and now he's grabbed your boobs. You might as well get it over with and get his throbbing rod inside you already."
I ignore Vi's crude euphemism because I'm preoccupied with the whole neighbor thing. "But I didn't see Noah Ashby naked. He's not my neighbor."
She looks at me skeptically. "Are you sure? You did have wine that night. You know how you get after two glasses of wine. You have the lowest alcohol tolerance of anyone I've ever met."
That much is true. You'd think with all of the dinners and events I've had to attend, I wouldn't be such a lightweight, but that's definitely not the case. In fact, I'd be a terrible spy – three glasses of wine and I'd be spilling state secrets like crazy.
I bring my attention back to Vi. "Yes, I'm sure. I was tipsy, not blind. And the neighbor is definitely not Noah Ashby."
"So you've gotten to second base with Noah Ashby and you got a private nudie show from another hot guy in the last few days? And you're asking how things could get any worse? You should be thanking the universe for dropping two hot guys in your lap – especially after the long drought you've had."
"It was not a nudie show," I correct. "At least, not for me. Brooks and Davis saw more of my neighbor than I did."
Two hot guys. My heart skips a beat thinking about her words. Two hot muscled guys who were shamelessly flirting with me. Well, one of them was, anyway. Noah wasn't flirting. The only reason I was inclined to believe that he wasn’t purposely groping me was that he seemed more irritated about touching my boobs than anything else. That fact alone makes my physical response to him all the more pathetic. My "long drought", as Vi put it, clearly has made me desperate.
Vi's laughter interrupts my thoughts. "Oh wow. You have the hots for both of them."
My brow furrows. "I do not."
"Oh, please. I saw that look on your face. How long have I known you? As if I don't know what that look means."
"It means nothing because there was no look. I spent exactly one minute with Noah Ashby, and I think he’s the most obnoxious person I’ve ever met,” I protest. “He’s almost as bad as my neighbor. Anyway, Noah is just a donor, and I’m going to go out there and thank him for his donation and never see him again. And we’re both going to pretend that he never saw my boobs.”
"Technically, he's only felt them, since you were facing the opposite direction."
"I'm sure he'll see them on the camera, if he can get the photos from the reporter. And if not, he'll see them on the cover of a tabloid, just like everyone else in America. I can already picture the headlines now: "‘First Boobs! President Sullivan's Daughter Bares All! Singlehandedly Destroys Father’s Chances of Re-election!’”
"'Star-Spangled Tits,'" Vi chimes in.
"Oh, God, what if Noah is getting hold of the photos so he can sell them?" I ask, panic rising in my chest.
“Why didn’t you just send Brooks and Davis after the guy?”
“They can’t go take down a reporter. That would make things worse. My Secret Service detail suppressing a reporter’s First Amendment rights in order to get photos of my boobs back? That would make a great article.” The prick of a needle stings my skin. "Ouch! Watch where you're pointing that thing, Vi!"
"Maybe if you'd hold still for a second, I wouldn't be stabbing you with a needle," Vi admonishes, yanking on the strap in her hands for emphasis.
"Maybe if you'd hurry up, we could go see whether I need to have a full-fledged panic attack because I'm going to be half-naked on the cover of magazines across the country - or whether photos of my boobs are going to be passed around the locker room of the football team like some kind of joke - before my dad gets here."
"Holy shit, your dad will have an absolute meltdown. Do you think he'll have Noah murdered?" she jokes.
"Even worse. He'll do that thing he does." I mimic my father's voice. "'Grace Monroe Sullivan, I'm profoundly disappointed by the fact that you've caused the spotlight to be focused on you and not on the re-election campaign.’”
Vi snorts. "Oh, please. Family values, my ass. If that photo of you and Noah polled well, your dad would make it his freaking campaign poster."
I wrinkle my nose. "Can we not talk about my father and a topless photo of me and a football player in the same sentence again?"
"Fine. Let's go find these incriminating photos. Just so you know, I'm totally going to look at them, by the way, since I missed all of the excitement earlier."
I slap her lightly on the arm. "I forbid you to look at the photos. And I’d like to point out that you wouldn't have missed anything if you hadn't been putting the moves on that tech billionaire."
"What can I say? Stanford Jones is hot in a rich, nerdy way. Beside, it's not like I have two gorgeous men throwing themselves at me."
"No one is throwing themselves at anyone," I remind her as we step out of the room.
Standing just outside the room in the hallway, Brooks is talking into her earpiece. "Ma'am, your father is en route."
I groan. So much for tracking Noah down and finding out whether he got the photos. "So soon?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Did the football player get the camera?" I whisper the question to Brooks, even though we're the only ones back in these rooms, which have already been
cleared and secured by the Secret Service in preparation for my father's arrival.
She doesn't have time to answer before I hear my father's voice booming down the hall. "Grace Monroe Sullivan, why on Earth are you back here instead of soliciting donations?"
I'm not sure if he's talking about soliciting donations for the foundation or for his campaign. Actually, scratch that. I'm positive he'd pick his campaign over needy kids. That statement sounds bitter, but it's not. I came to terms with my father's single-mindedness a long time ago. It's not that he doesn't care