Manwhore +1 (14 page)

I laugh. My cheeks flare red as I think about him and wonder if he’s as desperate to be with me as I am with him.

“But did he read your article? Something in it must’ve done something to him.”

Wynn brings out the copy of the magazine I have hidden under my bed, mainly because it has a picture of him, and taps on the last sentence. “This part:
I’d leap blindly into the air if only there were even a 0.01 percent chance that he’d still be there, waiting to catch me.
”

“Wynn. You two. Help me get ready!”

They turn on the music and with “Sugar” by Maroon 5 playing, I keep prettying up for him, repeatedly brushing my hair until it falls down my back, as lustrous as glass.

For weeks, I’ve been alone, staring at my laptop, hearing its low hum. It’s quiet for the night, the reporter tucked away. Now, the one humming is me. I’m wearing a dress fit for a princess. Now my friends are fussing around me, pulling out matching bags and shoes.

Gina is being especially helpful. Gina, who’s been concerned about me getting my heart broken. “Now you’re all eager for me to hook up with the same guy you wanted me to stay away from? You’re Team Saint now?” I tease her.

She pauses. “I’m Team what makes you happy. And . . . well, from what Tahoe told me, yes.”

I roll my eyes. “You believe that man?”

“He loves Saint as much as I love you!” she says. “He didn’t enjoy your breakup any more than I enjoyed watching you mope. He said . . .”

“What?” I ask, my full attention on her.

“He thinks Saint is really into you because usually people only fuck up with him once,” she specifies.

Wynn scowls. “What else did he say? If you’re going to be talking to him then you must tell us when you talk about Rache.”

“I only talked to him yesterday, and he said, and I quote, ‘Saint’s really into your best friend. Never seen him like this—ever.’ ”

I never thought my sexy parts could blush but they’ve been blushing every time I think of him.

“What does Momma Rachel say? Does she know?” asks Wynn.

“Mother?” I laugh. Her name is Kelly, not Rachel, but the girls call her Mom or Momma Rachel.

“She wants to meet him. She’s excited that he came over. But I don’t want to pressure him right now, my momma will have to wait until we see where this is going.”

“Okay, let’s get real here though. Are you planning to sleep with him?”

“YES! Dude, YES, I PLAN TO SLEEP WITH HIM. I’M DYING TO!” I say, laughing with pure giddy anticipation.

“The car’s downstairs!” calls Wynn from the window, then she goes to the kitchen to ring him up, and peers into my room. “He’s coming up.”

“Okay.” Inhaling sharply at the news, I hurry to finish strapping up my shoes and get a sheer blue shawl from a closet.

“Hey, Rache,” Gina says, grabbing my hand. She looks at me and squeezes. “I’m happy for you, it’s been breaking my heart. Because I do have one, you know? Paul didn’t take it all, only the men’s part. But the girl’s part is yours and Wynn’s.” She looks a little emotional, her eyes glistening a little. “You know I don’t believe in love. But I believe in second chances, and this is yours, Rache. And you know, I kind of admire his persistence. He really seems set on getting you.”

I squeeze her hand, breathless at the thought. “You have no idea how he is when he’s after what he wants. Patient but so, so ruthless.”

She smiles at me, and I smile back. Dropping my hand, she heads to peer out the door. “Don’t open it yet, Wynn, she has to look perfect,” Gina orders, but seconds later, Wynn is the one we hear speaking.

“Saint, come in! She’s just about ready!”

I hear his low voice as he greets her and I’m not immune to the sound.

I’m in my bedroom, but through the parted door, I see a glimpse of a long arm in a black jacket, silver cuff link and white cuff—his hand at his side. Tanned and square, his long fingers idle. I feel a visceral reaction seeing that hand, those strong, knowing fingers, my body flushing in remembrance of how it feels when he touches me.

I take one last look at myself in a strapless blue dress that falls to my feet, with a long, sexy slit on the left side, the color bringing out the bluish shades in my gray eyes. My hair is loose and, because my shoulders are bare and I could get cold, I draw the matching shawl a little higher.

The nerves tangle up inside me as I step out and take in the full image of Malcolm. His back is to me, but I take a tiny pleasure in seeing the back of his head, his confident stance, the incredible amount of energy he seems to suck from his surroundings.

“Oh, there she is!” Wynn happily tells him, signaling past his shoulder.

He turns, one hand in his pocket, the other at his side, and I can’t help but notice how he makes a fist when he sees me. “Rachel,” he says.

A massacre of emotions sweeps over me.

I can’t fight the nature of my body, and though I want to look cool, I’m blushing bright red as I smile shyly. “Hey, Sin.”

I walk over, tentatively set my hand on his chest and, seeing the admiring way he’s looking at me, press up on my toes to kiss his jaw.

He touches my bare back and holds me in place, prolonging the time that my lips are on his skin.

“You ready?” he asks quietly into my earlobe, so only I can hear.

I nod and we say goodbye to the girls. He slips his large, square hand into my smaller one, and as he leads me out of the apartment, I turn and see Gina mouthing, “Ohmigod!” and Wynn, a big wide “AAAAAAA!”

When we reach the sidewalk, Otis opens the door of the Rolls as Malcolm gives him instructions. I’ve barely slid into the center of the seat when the door on the other side opens, and Sin slides onto the bench opposite mine.

I don’t know if he likes my little strapless blue dress, the pink-painted toes displayed by my pumps, or the long slit on the side of said long dress. All I know is that my skin has broken out in goose bumps because of his nearness. And as he settles down across from me and his eyes take a slow, delicious trek up my body, there’s a little bonfire in my stomach.

I check him out too, because his tuxedo loves him so thoroughly it’s an instant aphrodisiac to watch them together. God, I’m this living, wanting, throbbing ache now.

“Hey,” he says, his eyes just a little bit liquid. “You look beautiful.” His eyebrows pull low then, shaping a perfect frown. “Though I was supposed to buy you a dress.”

“No,” I deny, smiling and shaking my head firmly.

“Yes,” he grins. “Stop saying no to me.”

Jesus. He looks at me with his green, green sparkling eyes, and I’m gone, gone, totally gone.

“I said yes to this black tie,” I counter.

I’m not supposed to feel shy right now. If there is a man who knows me, it’s
this
man. But he’s so masculine and looking at me as if I’m so female, he has the ability to make me feel so young and so terribly fragile.

“I bribed you with wine, I’ve come to know your vices,” he gruffs out teasingly. Then, he reaches out to take my hand and draws me across the car, to his bench. He chucks my chin when I’m settled down. “Your
every
vice,” he adds, deathly sober now.

“Do you?” I playfully say. “You don’t know them all. If you did, you’d be kissing me.”

He steals a heavy-lidded look at my mouth and I get a delicious little squeeze in my lower body when I realize he
is
going to kiss me. “But if you kiss me, you’re going to mess up my lipstick,” I say, but he’s already curling his strong arm around my waist and slowly, surely, dragging me flush to his side.

“Your lipstick will look great on me.”

“Sin!” I throw my head back and laugh.

He trails his thumb along the curve of my neck. “That laugh of yours,” he tells me quietly.

He says it as if it’s his greatest discovery.

A hairsbreadth from my ear, he whispers, “I can think of over five feet of you that I can kiss without messing your lipstick.”

Suddenly trembling in anticipation when I recognize the look in his eyes, I let him brush the shawl off my shoulders, laughing faintly and chiding “Malcolm” as he eases my hair aside to reveal the curve of my neck and shoulder.

He rubs his thumb along my collarbone and looks into my eyes as he continues to gently fondle my skin. He kisses the roundest part of my shoulder, his lips caressing up and down, side to side, before he sets a second kiss upward, heading toward my neck.

“Rachel,” he whispers, so thick and raw, trailing his fingers to the R necklace resting at the base of my throat.

I’m acutely aware of his fingers shifting the small, gold letter aside. Then his warm fingertips are lifting the metal so he can press his lips into the delicate nook where my pulse is fluttering wildly. I’m mad with lust under his moist breath on my skin, the space between his thigh and mine, the deliriously slow path of ghost kisses he drops on his way up my neck, toward my jaw.

“I lose,” he says when he reaches my mouth.

I’m confused. I’m bewildered by his meaning. He’s definitely not falling asleep—his stare is as alert as ever. But he said
I lose
and I can
see
that he’s really determined to lose somehow. Determined to lose against whatever it is he’s fighting. He looks completely unapologetic too.

“I lose,” he repeats.

My eyes widen when he reaches out and brings me over to his lap and every bit of Malcolm is surrounding me, enveloping me, maddening me. The dark gleam in his eyes is completely serious, completely unlike the times he teases me. Jaw set, he curls a hand around my nape and pulls me to the wall of his chest, so close that all that’s between us is my dress and his shirt.

His eyes are fastened to my mouth now and OMG, I’m so breathless when he brushes his lips across mine.

“Do you think it’s this intense between us because of what happened?” I whisper.

His lips feather across mine again. “I don’t know . . . but I’m pursuing it. I’ll take this fire any day over the ice I live in.”

His chest is rising slowly, and I’m starting to pant. I’m trembling all over. My heart is beating madly and I’m holding my breath, waiting for what he’ll do next. His warm hands, his strong chest, his soft mouth suddenly pressing to the corner of mine. I catch a sob as he sets the ghost kiss right there, right where I need it, where I love it, where it branded me from the first time.

The lipstick doesn’t matter anymore, nothing matters.

I open my lips, but he drags his mouth up the side of my face and exhales slowly, fisting a hand in my hair as he holds me to his chest. I don’t move a muscle. If he’s giving me time to protest, I can’t. I just can’t. I missed him so much, a ball of emotion is forming in my stomach and my throat and my heart.

His delicious scent is killing me. So familiar I’m high.

His hair tickles the side of my face as he goes to the other corner, and I can smell his soap, and when he sets his lips fully on mine, I quiver. He slips his tongue lightly into my mouth, as if testing my resistance.

I open easily and when his tongue strokes over the side of mine, I rub back languorously, a low, dull throb building between my legs.

He eases back and then he’s staring down at me with smoldering heat that’s almost frightening. He’s looking at me like I’m something else, something extraordinary, something perfect, like he can’t believe I’m trembling in his arms.

His hands frame my face, his palms swallowing it as his lips start to crush over mine harder. Groaning, he starts kissing me a little bit faster, and I can’t get enough, can’t work my mouth fast enough to get all of him that I want. I push my fingers into his hair—his hair! And let him use the small of my back to press my breasts against his chest as he sucks on my tongue, slow and greedy. Saint is kissing me like he wants me more than the world he likes to conquer and more than the moon he’s never been able to get.

We kiss a little more.

I pour all my love into the kiss. My walls are crumbled at my feet when the kiss stops, but I have no energy to pull them up right now. My lids are heavy, but so are his. I’m struggling to breathe, but his chest is pushing against his shirt as he breathes deeper too.

“I missed you,” I whisper.

He murmurs into the top of my head, “I missed you too.”

We fall silent then, simply in each other’s arms, until we reach our destination.

I’ve never been both so relaxed and at the same time buzzing all over.

When the car halts, Saint wipes my lipstick off his face, strokes his thumbs over my lips while I fix my hair, then he steps out first to a few audible gasps outside. He stretches his hand into the car for me, I slip my hand into his and then let him pull me out, immediately stunned by the dozens of heads in line at the entrance of the party already fixed in our direction. They spot Saint and immediately their curiosities are piqued as to who he’s with, so they glance at me and can’t seem to hide their surprised faces.

I’m shaking inside but his hand, oh, it feels so steady as we head over to the bouncer to be admitted inside.

He squeezes my fingers to catch my attention. “The look in your eyes. What are you afraid of ?” he asks as the bouncer swiftly recognizes him and tugs open the door for us.