Spinning around, I found myself gaping at a tall, utterly bitable man.
And he was staring at me too.
Staring at me as I stood there…in my shell-bra and a pair of skimpy nude panties that barely covered the essentials.
Heat suffused my skin, although it wasn’t because I was embarrassed. He dragged his eyes up to meet mine and lust exploded through me, turning what had simply been heat before into burning, scorching lava.
“Hello there,” I said, my voice far huskier than it needed to be.
He didn’t speak.
Not a single word.
7
Dash
Too many people.
That was the only clear, lucid thought in my mind next to, Shit, I need to breathe.
I’d gone to talk to Sondra again, or rather, she’d hunted me down, and we’d chatted for a while, then she’d gotten swept up into the crush of the party, and it was like somebody had hung a neon sign over my head.
Fresh single man meat. Come get him.
It was just as bad as it had been when I was in school.
Too many people gathering around, staring at me, and although none of them were gaping because of my freakishly high IQ or because I was going to school with people three or four years older, I was still the target of intense scrutiny. It seemed like the quieter I was, the more curious they got. Or maybe they simply smelled more blood.
In desperation, I blurted out, “Do you want to dance?” to the one who looked the least predatory. Seriously, some of them practically had on the prowl stamped on their foreheads.
She looked caught off-guard, but when I held out a hand, she accepted, and I led her onto the floor just as a slow song started.
Maybe I sucked at being social, but I was good at strategy.
As my partner began to fill the silence with chatter about who was who at the party, I circled us around the dance floor to the French doors that had been thrown open to let the air in. Her name was Elle, and she was cute and smart and absolutely way too…happy. That kind of happiness was probably infectious, spreading to everybody around her, but it only served to make me aware of how not happy most of my life was. I tried to focus on the feel of the cool air on my face and keeping us near the doors.
As she laughed at the ending of her story – I had no idea what it was – I timed my exit.
“Wow. That was fun. You dance so well.” Her smile was flirtatious without being too cloying.
If I’d been anyone else, I would’ve been flirting and laughing right back, but I wasn’t anyone else. I didn’t want to stand here and make small talk with a woman I was sure was just as delightful as she was sweet.
“Thanks. Excuse me…” I broke away from her and moved quickly through the crowd to get to the doors.
Yeah. It was pathetic, but I had to get outside.
Once I stepped outside, I sucked in a breath.
“Are you well, sir?”
I caught sight of a suited man, one who eyed me with a mix of suspicion and amusement. I pegged him in a blink as security. Not a bodyguard, at least not right now. He might act the part when needed, and he definitely had the look, but right now, he was just keeping an eye on the lay of the land. Growing up the way I had, I knew professionals when I saw them.
“Too many people,” I said, keeping my answer vague. “I usually tend to avoid them.”
“So you came to a party at a congressman’s house?” He cracked a grin at me, one that lit up his dark face and even reached his eyes. “What did you expect?”
“Exactly this,” I admitted. Shooting another look back at the house, I shook my head. “I’ll head to the garden for a while.”
“A number of people have decided to escape the crush that way.” He laid a finger alongside his nose. “Most of them decided the garden was a great place for a few minutes alone.”
I sighed. “Shit.”
“That way.” He jerked a thumb in the other direction. “You’ll run into security, but as long as you’re just walking around, nobody will mind.”
I gave him a nod and headed in the direction he’d indicated. The farther I moved away, the quieter it became. The cool night air managed to cool the sweat that had broken out along my neck over the past hour, and I welcomed it. Without any direction in mind, I roamed around, paying little attention to anything beyond making sure I didn’t walk into anybody or anything.
I might have stayed out there for the rest of the night, but I was used to October in California. Not Pennsylvania. Vast difference.
After about a half an hour, I had to either go inside or freeze my ass off. Some guys acted like they were too macho to get cold. Not me. I got cold, and I did something about it.
The front door loomed ahead, and I could see the people gathered on the wide, elegant stone stairway, smoking, and exchanging small talk. I ignored all of it and kept going, hoping to be able to hang out at the fringes of the crowd until it was late enough that a polite exit was possible.
Then I almost walked right into what looked like a screeching cat fight.
“You bitch!”
That came from a tall, slender woman with hair that was going delicately gray at the temples. Her eyes were narrowed, and judging by the smell of alcohol wafting off her, blood-shot. She struggled against the arms of two men fighting to hold her back.
“I hope you die!”
There were two other men with the woman on the end of the attack. Her face was blotchy red and swollen, but her eyes spat fire.
“I’m going to sue your miserable ass!” she shouted. “You tried to kill me! I’m going to have you arrested for assault!”
More bodies rushed into the vestibule, and I had to dodge to get out of the way. That put me in a hall leading not where I wanted to go.
Though after a few steps, I thought that maybe this was exactly where I wanted to go after all.
It was blissfully quiet.
One of the black-suited security guards rushed past me. He paused for a second. “Sir, you can’t be here.”
“The hall…” I gestured. “It’s sort of blocked. Got shoved in here. How do I get to the ballroom?”
He grunted then pointed down the hall, giving curt directions. “Go straight there. This leads to the personal wing and more security personnel are on those floors. Try to go up there, and you’ll be removed from the premises.”
I had no doubt he was being honest. “Got it.”
Still, once I rounded the corner, I didn’t go straight to the hall that would lead me back to the ballroom.
Why in the hell would I?
It was quiet back here.
A glance into one open doorway revealed a sitting room. I almost went in, but the reason the doorway was open was because there was no door.
I wanted a fucking door. Something I could use to close out the world and give myself some fucking space. I ignored the next one up, because the door was open. I had no doubt security would check inside if they came through and it was shut.
The next door was closed.
As long as nobody was inside…
I eased the door open and stepped through the doorway.
Nobody–
Shit.
I all but fell over my feet as my eyes landed on the curvy, perfect body of a woman clad in a red wig, barely-there panties, and…was that what it looked like?
She turned to face me, and I realized it was.
She was wearing seashells that barely covered enough of a set of full, gorgeous breasts to be considered decent.
Then she took a breath, and those amazing tits moved, and I reconsidered my previous position.
Nope. Not decent at all.
I slammed my jaw as my brain processed the words I’d dimly heard a few seconds ago.
“I’m sorry. I’m not Piety,” I said, tearing my eyes away from her chest and hoping she couldn’t see the flush I knew was staining my cheeks.
My cock sprang to attention in a way it hadn’t in a long, long
time as she thrust one hip out and planted her hand on it. In her other hand, she had a drink, and she watched me with a glint in her eyes as she lifted the glass to her lips and sipped. Her hair spilled down over pale skin as she stared at me boldly. It was a wig. Had to be. That sort of red didn’t exist in nature. Still, she looked good in it.
I had a feeling she was the sort of woman who’d look good in pretty much anything.
And even better out of it.
“You’re missing your tail,” I said, not even thinking about how fucking stupid that sounded.
“Am I?” She arched her eyebrows, and a ghost of a smile danced around her lips as she looked down at her body, staring at her legs and wiggling her toes as if that would make said tail appear. “I guess I am.”
“What happened? Or is this the new costume rage?” The questions popped out before I realized I was going to say them, and I wondered if she thought I was flirting.
Was I?
She rolled her eyes and took another sip from her drink before turning on her heel. “A jerk happened, thank you very much.”
As she walked away, I was treated to a view every bit as perfect as the front. Her round, plump ass was the kind that made a man just want to grab it and not let go. Determined to find something else to stare at, I jerked my gaze away.
And that was when I noticed the glittering, shimmering mess of green and blue on the desk.
“I guess you’re not missing your tail after all.” Frowning, I glanced from the fabric back to her...just in time to see her looking back over her shoulder, craning in a deliberate attempt to look at her butt.
“Well…look at that!” She winked at me. “I do have a tail.”
My cock twitched as she rounded the desk and tossed back the rest of her drink, then planted the empty glass down on the desk, all the while displaying that to-die-for body.
“Some moron stepped on one of my fins. I worked on this forever. Spent close to eighty hours on it. Can you believe that?”
As she spoke, she picked it up, displaying a skirt that flared out at the bottom…in fins. It was startlingly elegant.
“Eighty hours,” she said again. “Eighty hours! And he just tromped all over it.”
Light flickered over the skirt as I examined it. “You made that?” It looked like a thousand crystals were hand-worked into it. I’d spent enough time around costumes thanks to my dad, and I knew if she’d made that, she was pretty talented.
“Yes.” She huffed out another breath and tossed me a look. “I almost forked him.”
I blinked, jerking my attention back to her. “You what?”
“Idiot jerk,” she grumbled, ignoring me. “But I fixed it.”
“And you almost…?”
I saw something on the desk then, and my brain clicked things into place. Fork. Forked. Right. The year The Little Mermaid had been rereleased, my dad had been on wife number four, and she had a little girl who was obsessed with the film. I hadn’t been living at my dad’s then, but every time I’d come by to visit during that two-and-a-half-year marriage, Appalachia had made me watch it. I lost touch with her after our parents divorced, like I did with most of the children of my dad’s numerous lovers.
Then the stranger-mermaid captivated my attention as she lowered the skirt and stepped into it.
Most guys would argue that it was more fun to watch a woman undress.
But there’s something terribly sexy about watching one dress as well. She shimmied her hips as she eased the mermaid skirt up and smoothed it down before tugging the zipper up, every motion making those amazing breasts jiggle enticingly. She shot a look at me and rolled her eyes. “Are you enjoying the view, honey?”
Yes.
But I couldn’t quite manage to get out a reply that wouldn’t sound like stupid middle school boy fumbling through seeing a girl without her shirt on.
So, I just stared her down, resorting to the look I’d perfected as a skinny fifteen-year-old who’d decided that going straight to Stanford after graduation was better than living with his father on one movie set after another.
It was condescending and rude as hell.
Normally, it pissed people off.
She winked at me. Fucking winked.
Then she picked something off the desk. “You know, you spent all the time admiring my tail…”
“What?”
She grinned at me. I had the feeling she knew I’d been checking out her ass.
“Don’t tell me you weren’t checking out my handiwork.” Now her expression went innocent, even as she smoothed a hand down a hip covered in sparkling green and blue. “I did pretty good, if I do say so myself. It’s a nice tail, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.” Clearing my throat, I gave her a terse nod. “It’s a nice tail.”
Who the hell was this woman?
“Come on. Help me out.” She snapped out the rolled-up fabric she’d been holding and turned, presenting me with a view of her back yet again. “I need to get out to the party. My friend is waiting on me.”
“Help…?” Mystified, I watched as she contorted and twisted, her movements both awkward and elegant, not making sense at all.
At least not at first.
By the time it did, I was all but dumb with the need to touch her. She was lacing herself into a corset. In under a minute, she had laces in one fist, and she shot me a demanding look. “Come on. Lace me up.”
A corset. On top of that impossibly sexy get-up, she was wearing a shimmery, nude-colored corset and she wanted me to…
“Come on. Lace me up,” she said impatiently. “I’m already late as it is.”
I needed to go take a walk outside again. Or take a cold shower. For like eternity.
But instead of disappearing out the door, I moved closer to the mystery girl. “I have no experience with this.”
“Think of it like tying a shoestring. But you have to tug the slack out from the top and bottom, then meet in the middle.” She twitched her hips, a message of clear impatience even as it sent even more blood rushing to my cock.
Following her advice, I began tugging the slack out, bit by bit.
“Has to be tighter.”
“You need to breathe,” I responded.
“I’ve been wearing corsets for years, honey. I know when it’s too tight – and this isn’t tight enough. Pull the damn strings already.”
She was pulling my strings. And her scent…I pulled harder than necessary, and she ended up falling back against me. “Oh…”
“Sorry,” I said, the words thick in my throat, my nose buried in her faux hair. Wig or not, it smelled like her. “What color is your hair?”
The question escaped me before I could swallow it.
“Ah…it’s brown. Just brown. Nothing spectacular.”
I had a feeling she was wrong about that. Nothing about this woman could be less than spectacular.
She pulled away from me, putting distance between us. “Can you tie me up now? A double-knotted bow.”
Without saying anything, I tied the strings as she instructed, expecting her to rush away now that the task was done.
Instead, she turned to face me, a faint smile on her lips.
I wondered if she’d taste like a mermaid.
What in the hell is a mermaid supposed to taste like? That rational part of my brain that normally controlled everything seemed very, very far away.
She licked her lips and fluffed her hair. Then she asked the question that every man loathed.
“How do I look?”
8
Astra
He was so hot, with his burnished copper hair and tall, lean body. Like fucking surface of the sun hot.
And nervous. Or maybe just awkward.
I had the feeling he was also a bit of a stick in the mud. He didn’t apologize for looking at my mostly-naked body – hell, I’d have been insulted if he had since I was putting on a show just for him – but he also didn’t act on the desire I clearly saw in his eyes.
Those eyes. I’d thought they were hazel at first, but when he’d come closer, I realized they were a dark, rich green.
I wondered what his name was.
I wondered who he was here with.
I also wondered why he was standing there looking like he wanted to run the hell away from me, even though he seemed to want to touch me at the same time.
“Are you here with anybody?” I closed the distance between us with slow, measured steps, stopping when I was less than a foot away. I reached up and caught the lapel of his jacket, rubbed the satin of it under my thumb. It was a nice suit. He wore it well. Not every man could wear a suit like this guy did, no matter how expensive the cut or how much he’d paid a tailor.
Despite how reserved I suspected he was, he exuded a strength and confidence that told me his serious nature didn’t mean he was a pushover. That was good. I didn’t find that sort of men attractive.
I’d been told on more than one occasion that I was a bit intimidating.
As I moved a breath of an inch closer, waiting for his answer, he didn’t look particularly intimidated. Cautious, yes. But it was the sort of caution that made me want to grab it and strip it away – destroy it.
Caution had never been my strong suit, and I didn’t see why anybody else really bothered with it. Piety had always been my anchor, keeping me from going too far, but she had new people in her life to worry about, which meant I got to fly a little freer.
His eyes dipped to my mouth, and I was overcome by the urge to kiss him. Bite him, right on the lower curve of his full, very bitable mouth.
But he still hadn’t answered the question of whether he was there with somebody, and even my impulsive nature would wait for that. I didn’t have a lot of rules, but there was one very clear, very firm one.
I didn’t cheat, and I didn’t touch guys who were cheaters.
Okay, so that was technically two, but they went together, so I only counted it as one.
“Are you?” I asked again, easing in closer.
He blinked, looking confused. “Am I what?”
Nice to know he wasn’t as unaffected as he seemed.