After Hours. Vicki Thompson Lewis
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don’t want you to.”
“You don’t?”
He shook his head. “What we have going is too hot for little goodbye kisses, and you know it. If you came over here to kiss me goodbye, we’d be rolling on the floor in two seconds.”
He was right. She trembled with the urge to go over and unzip those soft denim jeans one more time. Judging from the size of the bulge under his zipper, he wanted that, too.
“Good night,” she whispered.
“Good night.”
She turned and forced herself to head toward the door.
“Eileen.”
She paused, her hand on the knob.
“About tomorrow night…”
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw him standing there, so obviously aroused. Heat sluiced through her. “What about tomorrow night?”
“Skip the underwear, darlin’.”
4
SHANE STARED AT THE carved mahogany door after it closed behind Eileen. Then he listened to the click of her heels echoing in the empty tiled hallway leading to the elevator. Sex on a rooftop?
He had no idea where he’d come up with that one. He’d had plenty of sexual fantasies, but they’d been pretty much confined to the bedroom. Okay, maybe he’d considered elevator sex, or doing it in an outdoor hot tub.
But on the roof? Not consciously. But desperation must have pulled this right out of his subconscious, and thank God for that, because rooftop sex had obviously appealed to her. He had a wild one on his hands.
Well, wasn’t that what he’d wanted? Eileen was the answer to his prayers, especially if he could pry her away from her plan to move in with the boyfriend. Logically he should need more time with her before he could possibly know she was the one, but instinct told him that time would only confirm what he already knew in his gut.
She was the woman he’d been waiting for. Maybe working himself to a frazzle all these years had been designed to bring him to this point, face-to-face with Eileen. At the very moment when he needed to add more play in his life, she’d appeared to help him do that.
The ding of the elevator bell, muffled by the closed door, told him she was leaving the building. That was his signal to get this new telephone system hooked up so he could go home, get some rest and figure out what favors he could call in to secure himself a rooftop for tomorrow night.
He’d even told her to skip the underwear. In fact, the command had been, Skip the underwear, darlin’. He’d never called a woman darlin’ in his life. Apparently she was bringing out his inner rogue. And he liked that.
He glanced over at the dolly stacked with boxed equipment. One of them contained her new phone, which was a good thing after the way her old one had hit the floor. He might as well take her new one in there and hook it up now. That office of hers was calling to him, anyway.
Sorting the boxes on the dolly, he pulled out the one he needed and walked down the carpeted hallway. No light on in her office this time. He stepped through the doorway and hit the switch.
The scent of her perfume mingled with the unmistakable aroma of fresh sex. But she’d cleaned away some of the evidence, stashing the crumpled papers out of sight somewhere so the desk looked neat and official with its calendar blotter and telephone positioned just so. The nameplate hadn’t been returned though. She’d known he’d be in here replacing her phone with a new one, but she hadn’t known then that he’d already discovered her name.
Walking around behind her desk, he glanced at the calendar blotter. She’d scribbled Benjamin leaves and a flight number and time on Monday. Her handwriting was almost as bad as his. Then she’d drawn an arrow across the week, ending with Saturday, when she’d written Benjamin home with another flight time and number.
So Shane’s arch rival was named Benjamin. Obviously the guy used the whole thing, all three syllables. Damned pompous. Wait a minute. One of the office lines on the receptionist’s phone had been labeled Benjamin. The guy worked right here with Eileen.
Shane left Eileen’s office and went through the suite flipping on lights and checking nameplates until he found the lair of Benjamin Hobbs, official adversary. The guy had a massive black desk chair and a desk big enough for Ping-Pong. Old Benny could have major desk sex on this baby, if he were so inclined. Shane was betting that he wasn’t.
Prowling the perimeter of the room, Shane took inventory of bookshelves with glass doors, English hunting prints, a framed license to practice law in the State of Arizona and a framed diploma from Harvard. The hunting prints were a cliché, but the Harvard sheepskin was impressive.
Aw, geez. On the far wall was a picture of a guy shaking hands with the governor. Had to be Benny. Yep, he’d even had the governor autograph the picture for him. What a suck-up.
Shane took the picture off the wall and studied his competition. Benjamin Hobbs had a symmetrical row of very white teeth, perfectly barbered blond hair and a nicely tailored suit. Plus he had at least a passing acquaintance with the governor. This was the kind of man women loved to bring home to momma. Shane wondered if Eileen’s mother was thrilled with the prospect of a Harvard lawyer in the family.
Shane had a business degree from ASU, and although he had a good bottom line, he was still essentially a tradesman. Harvard Law School trumped that by a long shot. Then he reminded himself that despite dating Mr. Great Catch, Eileen had walked into the reception area tonight wanting something more.
He’d do his damned best to give her that something more, which meant coming up with a few dynamite sexual fantasies, starting with the rooftop. He had no idea how he’d conduct this campaign and stay up with everything at Mercury, but he’d have to find a way.
After all, it was only for three days. Once he’d eliminated Benny from the scene, he might be able to ease into a more normal dating routine with Eileen. Or not. Because there was nothing routine about this woman.
AFTER A PEPPERMINT-SCENTED bath, Eileen crawled under the covers of her queen-size bed and slept more soundly than she had in months. It was as if her body had sighed and said finally. She dreamed of many orgasms.
Usually she slapped the snooze button a couple of times when her clock radio clicked on, but this morning she scrambled out of bed the minute she heard Shania Twain at 5:00 a.m. What woman could sleep in when she’d decided to spend the whole day without underwear?
She’d made the decision while soaking in her small apartment tub the night before. Sure, she could dress normally and then sneak into the office bathroom to change out of the underwear before going down to meet Shane. But she was in this for the fantasy, and that seemed like the wimpy way.
If Shane could come up with the rooftop suggestion, she could darn sure go through the day without underwear. No way was she going to blink first. This was the most excited she’d been since the time she’d been waitressing at the Violet Oasis and Michael Keaton had walked in. Not in his Batman costume, of course, but still….
She wolfed down some Cocoa Puffs and a cup of instant coffee while standing at the kitchen counter in her Maxine sleep shirt that said Attitude Is Everything. A girl needed her strength for sex on the roof. Fun with sex. She’d always believed it was possible, and now it was happening.
Back in the bedroom, she ran through a few calisthenics. She hadn’t been interested in exercise since the senior George Bush had been president, but now she was thinking about her body image as she never had before. After a short workout, she jumped into the shower for a quick shampoo and another pass over her legs with the razor. The whole concept of getting ready for sex thrilled her. If she had a man like Shane around all the time, she’d invest in regular visits to a spa for waxing, massage and seaweed wraps, just because he would appreciate the results.
Benjamin had told her he thought spa visits