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  Exiting the bar and entering the adjacent hotel lobby, I scan the elegantly restored 1920’s structure with crown molding, high ceilings, and pillars in every corner, taking in the high-back furniture positioned on red Oriental rugs. Only a few guests remain, either seated or mingling about. I’m about to head for the exit when a wave of sentimentality hits me, no doubt delivered by the tequila. Despite my eagerness to leave, I pause in my steps. My hand goes to my small black purse where Katie’s card holds a special friendship necklace. We are sisters, two people who choose to be family, and I can’t help but think of how often the rocker boyfriend makes her cry. I don’t want to risk her waking up tomorrow feeling as alone as I do tonight. I need to slip the gift under her door.

  Decision made, I head to the front desk to find her room number. Both of the attendants behind the counter are busy with customers, so I fend for myself and find an open computer and look up rocker boyfriend’s room number. Glancing at the time on my cell phone, I note the late hour. It’s nearly eleven and I really need to hurry or the train I take will be shut down.

  Quickly, I cross the room, bypassing several sitting areas and a number of expensive paintings, to step into the enclave housing six elevators. Punching the nearest button, I wait. Alone. It’s the theme of the night I think. Alone. Alone. Alone. I have no idea why that word is bugging me. Or really, it’s not the word. It’s the implications behind it that I never think about and I swear it’s the tequila. Silently, I decide right then, no more tequila now or ever. I don’t like what it does to me.

  The doors to the car farthest from me open and I rush forward, wishing my four-inch black strappy heels were about four inches shorter as I step inside. I lean against the wall, letting it hold my tired body when a man suddenly steps inside moments before the doors seal. Instantly, I’m alert, aware in ways I would not be with most strangers. But then, this isn’t just a stranger, any more than he is just a man. It’s Jensen, and I push off the wall, turning to face him. He faces me as well and in mere moments we are sealed inside.

  Time stands still as he reaches over and punches in a floor and I realize I have not done so at all, and I can’t even seem to care. Instead, I drink in just how beautiful this man is, how tall, broad and leanly athletic he is in his finely fitted suit. Not one of the powerful, even good-looking men my job has bestowed upon me have created this kind of burn in me. And none of them made me want to climb under his jacket and wear them like a glove the way I seem to with this one.

  I blink with that warm, wonderful thought, and in that instant, he moves, advancing on me. Before I know his intent, his hands are slicing into my hair, his big body pressed to mine, walking me against the wall. Another instant and he is kissing me. Oh God, he is kissing me like I have never been kissed before. Deep, passionate, drugging strokes of his tongue that are more a claiming than a seduction. I am his in that moment and I don’t even fight it. Me. Good girl, the boss’s secretary who doesn’t color out of the lines, is so out of the lines right now, I’m about to fall off the page. And I like it. Oh yes, I like it a lot.

  The elevator dings and he pulls back, staring down at me. “That’s our floor.”

  I feel the blood drain from my face. “What? No. I can’t—”

  “You can. We can.” He grabs the door.

  “I don’t know you.”

  “I plan to fix that,” he assures me.

  Doubt bites through the haze of tequila and desire, creating uncertainty, threatening to ruin this with good, logic, safe thoughts that will lead me away from this man, not to him.

  “Now or never,” he challenges.

  My throat restricts but the good girl in me, the sane one who protects herself because no one else will, utters the only acceptable answer. “I can’t.”

  His eyes, that I now know are a deep beautiful sea green, fill with regret. “Understood. My loss.” He releases me and begins to move, leaving me cold where I was warm only seconds before. I don’t think. I react, grabbing his arm. His leg pins the door, his gaze colliding with mine, his eyes darkening with a mix of what I think is satisfaction and conquest, but smartly he doesn’t speak, as if he knows that if he says the wrong thing, I’ll bolt.

  He draws my hand into his, his fingers lacing with mine in what feels far more intimate than it logically is, but then I’ve just proven logic has no room in encounter number two with this man. I am lost to him and in the promise lacing the air with something unfamiliar and wicked, something I have never experienced before. Nerves flutter in my stomach, but they do not win, not when heat licks at all the places I want to feel this man. And not when I crave the freedom to simply experience the moment I never allow myself.

  He leads me into the hallway, I am relieved when he doesn’t push me in front of him. He seems to get me without even knowing me, holding on to me but still leading, going first down the hallway, as if he’s aware of the vulnerable, exposed sensation walking in front of him would give me.

  It’s then that I realize we’re on the thirtieth floor, where the elite suites are, and I wonder who this man is, my curiosity piquing further when he stops at the “Heather” room, our most expensive rental. But I don’t have time to debate his importance. He pulls me in front of him, his hips framing mine, the thick pulse of his erection nestled against my backside as he slides a key card through the door and pushes it open.

  This time, I am in the lead, vulnerable position, and I have this gut feeling it’s intentional, his way of telling me the final decision to move forward has to be mine. This is my moment of control and I inhale, waiting for the need to bolt to overcome me, but it doesn’t. My mind knows I’m with a stranger, it knows this is dangerous, and my actions are out of character for me, but the low burn in my belly this man creates has control. I barely know the instant I decide to stay. I am simply claiming the tiled entryway as my path, and this night as an adventure. He doesn’t give me time to go far or to reconsider my choice. The door slams shut behind him and a dim light fills the open expanse of a room, with windows overlooking the city. I take another step, and he shackles my wrist, dragging me around and to him. My purse, which I’ve forgotten I’m holding, slides to the floor, but I don’t care.

  He is hard and warm, and I am melting into the defined lines of his body even before the fingers of one of his hands tangle into my hair, dragging my mouth to his. His breath is a tantalizing promise of another kiss, his free hand curving my backside, molding my hips to his, of something more. “I’ve been thinking about how you’d taste since the moment I laid eyes on you.” The declaration is a low, raspy seduction made a promise by the thick press of his cock against my belly and the hot press of his tongue into my mouth.

  And I do not feel the normal things I’d expect with a stranger, like fear, nervousness, or doubt. There is a thrill to the unknown with this man I did not know was a part of me, but it is. It so is. My body has control, or perhaps this man has control, because I can’t find it in me to find a reason for this to be bad. There is only the sensual overload he’s creating in me, the way his scent, so divinely woodsy, teases my nostrils. The way his taste, of what I think is a mix of bourbon and mint, seeps into my mouth. And, oh God, do I like bourbon and mint. It’s addictive. He’s addictive and our silence is golden. It’s freedom and it’s forgiving, asking no questions, demanding no explanations. It’s freedom I never allow myself, not even with past lovers, but I feel it now.

  My fingers flex where they have landed on his hard chest, and I fully intend to begin exploring every deliciously masculine line of his physique. He distracts me though, walking me backward, pressing me against the wall, shocking me by shoving my hands over my head, using one hand to connect my wrists and pin them in place. I’m held captive, both by his grip and his piercing green stare. But even more so by how much I not only want him, but how much I want to give myself the permission to do something daring and edgy. For once in my life, I want to color outside the lines, and not in sweet hues of pink, but in fiery red. />
  I inhale and hold in the air as his free hand goes to my waist, gliding upward over my ribcage, slowly taunting me with his intended destination, until he is cupping my breasts. He studies my face, waiting for a reaction. I cannot deny him or me. My lashes flutter and my back arches, my body leaning into his touch. His fingers tease my nipples through my dress but the touch is too brief. His hand caresses its way back to my hip. “How many times have you fucked a stranger?”

  It’s a surprising question that ends our sweet silence, but somehow, coming from him, it’s not a demand. It’s a further seduction. “Never.”

  “Do you know how dangerous it is to trust someone you don’t know?”

  A shiver runs down my spine but it’s not the fear such a question should create in me. I’m aroused, my sex clenching, my thighs damp. “Yes,” I reply. “Yes, I do.”

  “And yet, you’re here.” The words are thoughtful, as if he’s contemplating why that might be rather than asking me for an answer I don’t have, and he never gives me a chance to deliver.

  Abruptly, he releases my hands, rotating me to face the wall, and my hands press to the smooth surface. He steps into me, the thick pulse of his erection nestled to my backside once again, his breath warm on my neck, by my ear. He nips my ear with his teeth. “You don’t begin to know how dangerous it is. Or what I can do to you if I so please. Right here. Right now.” He yanks my dress all the way up to my waist, the black thong I’m wearing leaving me naked to his touch, his palm caressing my cheeks. “A good man would spank you for taking the risk.”

  My heart leaps. “What? No.” I try to turn, afraid I have made a mistake, but his powerful thighs cage me in. “No, I—”

  “But I’m not a good man,” he continues, his hands high on my ribcage, fingers framing my breasts. He leans in, his head dipping low, his lips grazing my neck. “I’m the kind of bad guy good girls like yourself run from.”

  It’s an erotic thrill that is one part fear and one part electricity. I believe him. And I believe that is exactly what drew me to him. He is what I am not and never will be. He is daring, dark, completely without the many inhibitions I hate that I possess. Rejecting that part of me, I declare, “I’m not running.”

  “You should be.” He reaches down and yanks away my panties. I yelp with the shock of the action and there is just a hint of fear in me, but there is also arousal, there is a burn low in my belly. I want to know what his kind of bad is in a way I am not sure I’ve ever wanted in my life. “The list of ways I’m going to make you come is long and creative,” he assures me, the words licking at my sex the way I want his tongue to, and soon. Please, soon. “But,” he continues, “I’m going to start by licking your pussy. I want to know how you taste.”

  I feel him shrug out of his jacket and then he’s squatting, hands on one of my calves, caressing up, up, up. His fingers graze my sex, trailing over the slickness there, delving inside me. He strokes back and forth and I’m so aroused I think I might come, but he doesn’t give me that one last touch I need. He moves again, his touch gone in a moment, leaving me cold, but it doesn’t last. He sits against the wall and slides in front of me, his hands shackling my hips. I look down, his eyes meeting mine, or mine his, I don’t know, but that’s when his tongue licks my clit.

  My lashes lower and my knees nearly buckle with the spiral of pleasure that one touch of his tongue delivers. His mouth clamps down over my sex and the licking, sucking, and tasting begins, and I lose myself, completely, totally lose myself to pleasure. I drift into the sweet, dark sticky place that consumes me like honey does a bee, controlling me, claiming me, but it is not complete. The buzzing of a cell phone, his not mine, breaks through the spell, but he ignores it, pressing two fingers inside me, stretching me, pumping into me. I begin to lose reality again, hanging on a proverbial ledge, so close to that blissful sweet hotspot, when the phone in the hotel room sounds. This time though, I am too far over the edge to be pulled back. I stiffen and my body clenches, the orgasm spiraling through me, sensations rippling in my sex and darting to every nerve ending I own.

  I lose time. I lose the ability to stand and his arm wraps my hips, holding me up. I blink and he’s staring up at me, watching every feeling I have ripple over my face, his fingers still between my thighs. “I’m done,” I say before I can stop myself.

  Amusement lights his eyes. “You are far from done, I assure you.” His cell starts to ring again and his fingers slide out of me. I expect him to take the call but he stands and takes my hand. “Come with me.” He shackles my wrist and starts forward, and I am embarrassingly aware of my missing panties and skirt to my waist as he all but drags me toward the bedroom.

  We make it to the edge of the bed and he tugs me back against him, his hands cupping my naked ass. “You taste like—”

  The hotel phone rings and he curses, running a rough hand through his hair. He sets me on the bed. “I’ll deal with this and then with you.” He steps away, giving me his back as he grabs the phone, and a wave of discomfort overwhelms me. Who calls at this time but a wife or a girlfriend? What am I thinking? This is something my mother would do.

  “Not now,” he bites out to his call. “No. I said—” Whoever it is cuts him off.

  My mind starts dancing to a hard rock tune that is far more midnight demise than midnight seduction. I’d been in the elevator. There are cameras. This is my workplace. I stand up and my heart is in my stomach. Yanking down my skirt, I half wish he’d turn and half wish he wouldn’t. I want him to convince me this wasn’t a mistake. His mouth could convince me. His body could convince me. I have his back. His back. He won’t look at me. This feels wrong, off in every way. This was a mistake.

  I take off my shoes and hurry toward the hallway, grabbing my purse and never stopping. I’m out of the door in a flash, and I run down the hall. The door behind me doesn’t open so he’s either glad I left or still lost in debate with whoever called. I don’t take a chance, though. I exit the stairwell, go down two flights, and run down the hall and catch a service elevator. I exit and put on my shoes, finding the side door and head out into the hot summer night. This was a foolish move I made tonight, a risk I can’t afford for a hot man I didn’t even manage to see naked. No other place will pay me the way Meredith pays me. I can’t lose it or it will be another year and a half before I can take the MCAT again.

  Ten minutes later, I’m on the subway, and I collapse into a seat. Slowly, logic returns and I’m breathing easier. I’m not going to get fired. I was off duty and free to do what I please, as long as it didn’t hurt the reputation of the hotel. I could have stayed with Jensen, except for the phone calls, and my gut instinct that they were a problem. He was married. I feel sick with the certainty he was married.

  By the time I reach my stop and enter the twelve-story red brick building where I live, I wish for the elevator we don’t have, and I can’t take the stairs fast enough. Once at my door on the seventh floor, I enter my apartment and slam the door shut, locking it, before I lean against it. One night of hot sex, even with a man as delicious as Jensen, isn’t worth proving my mother right. I am not like her and I never will be. Alone again and it still feels wrong tonight when it’s always been safe. It is safe.

  I walk to my bedroom, and kick off my shoes, turning on a hot bath before I grab my purse to dig out my phone and charge it, only to find it missing. I sink down on the lumpy, ancient mattress, and drop to my back. I left my phone in Jensen’s room. I don’t even have a landline to call and try to get it back. No more tequila for me. Ever.

  Part Three: The Morning After

  After hours of tossing and turning, I bolt to a sitting position in my bed in a panic, glancing at the clock. Four a.m. If Jensen takes my phone to the front desk and Katie sends me a text about something private, the potential the staff will see it is very real. I get up and go to my ancient monster of a computer and send her a message. I’ll go into work early to call her and to be sure Jensen isn’t an early riser and drops my p
hone off sooner rather than later.

  I’m back in bed and staring at the ceiling fifteen minutes later, finally dozing off around five, and jolting awake at six, the aches in my body wishing I hadn’t slept at all. I think I’d feel better. By seven, I’ve had three cups of coffee and am dressed in a pale pink skirt and black sleeveless silk blouse with my black pumps. I’ve forced myself to take a few minutes to cover the dark circles under my eyes and applied just a little extra lipstick to match my skirt and a little extra eye shadow and blush.

  I walk into the hotel at 7:20, almost two hours before I’m scheduled, and head straight to the front desk. “Has anyone turned in my cell phone?” I ask Sheila, the thirty-something front desk supervisor who is as friendly as she is efficient.

  “No but I’ll keep an eye out for it. What color is it?”

  “White but it’s in a red case. An iPhone.”

  “Oh,” she says, her red painted lips twisting. “That’s bad. They can be reused fairly easily.”

  “Yeah,” I say, though I somehow doubt Jensen needs to use my phone. “Thanks for keeping an eye out. I’ll be at my desk in the next fifteen minutes. And Sheila, I’m worried about the staff reading some personal stuff from my mother.” It’s not completely a lie. My mother is a piece of work who has embarrassed me more than once. “I don’t want Meredith to get irritated by chatter floating around about her or me like it did last time.”