The Supermodel's Best Friend (A Romantic Comedy) (22 page)

The thought that the stool might not be so
soft made Miles push away from the doorway and stride over through
the crowd to the bar. “Lucy,” he said loudly. “I’ve been looking
for you.”

The guy frowned at him and looked down at
Lucy. “You know this dude?”

Lucy gave Miles a slow, sultry once-over.
“Coulda shoulda didn’t,” she said, then threw her head back and
laughed.

Miles put a hand on the chair-guy’s shoulder
and nodded darkly at Lucy. “She’s drunk.”

He gave Miles a look that said
no shit
and put a second arm around her, grinning. Then he dipped his nose
into the mop of curls on top of her head and visibly inhaled, an
intimate act that made Miles want to reach over and stab one spoon
up each hairy, trespassing nostril.

“Hi, Miles!” Fawn waved and jumped down from
the bar onto the floor, her eyes darting over his shoulder to the
door.

He should have waited for Huntley, let him
make the big heroic gesture, but he wasn’t thinking about other
people’s happy endings right then. He leaned closer to the Giants
guy, tightened his grip on his shoulder. “Get your hands off of
her.”

“Who the hell are you?”

Lucy unwrapped the guy’s arms but stayed in
his lap, although with better posture. “Yeah, who the hell are
you?”

He took the beer out of her hand and put it
on the bar. “A friend,” he said.

“Pffft!” She slid her arm around the Giant’s
sweatshirt. “What I need is a man.”

“Oh, yeah,” the guy said.

Miles turned to Fawn, who looked like she
didn’t like the Giants guy much more than he did. “Huntley wants to
talk to you,” he told her. “Let’s get out of here.”

“He’s here?” Fawn squinted over his shoulder,
smiling, gripping the bar for balance.

He really should have waited for Huntley.
“No, he’s on his way.”

“Pffft.” With a contemptuous hand gesture,
Fawn went back to her beer. Miles felt a powerful temptation to
join her. After he beat the crap out of the orange octopus who kept
sniffing Lucy’s hair.

“Lucy,” he said. “This loser is not in your
plans.”

“Oh, now you care about my plans.”

“You want a lap to sit in, fine.” Miles took
the stool next to them and held out his arms. He’d never started a
bar fight, but wasn’t that just the sort of thing he needed to
spice up his life? Beating the crap out of the guy would be like
therapy. He’d spent years talking to teenagers about self-control
and non-violence, but the sight of hairy Giants arms wrapped around
Lucy would have made Ghandi bust out the baseball bat.

Cricket bat.

Lucy pushed the guy’s hand away from her rib
cage but stayed where she was. “You’re no different than this
loser, just wanting sex, sex, sex.”

“Hey, don’t call me a loser,” the guy
said.

“You know I’m different,” Miles told her. He
let his gaze sharpen, put some of his soul in his eyes.  He
waited, sitting on the stool next to them, not blinking, feeling on
the edge of something.

The bar roared at something on the TV and
Lucy’s chair wobbled to the side to watch. She unwrapped the orange
arms around her again and slid down to the floor, never taking her
eyes off Miles, and he heard his heart pound louder than roar of
the crowded bar.

She turned away from him. At least she wasn’t
rubbing her ass into that creep’s lap anymore. The nice, round ass
in a pair of jeans he hadn’t seen before, still black but with
something shiny on the pockets. Like bait.

Then she stepped back until her bottom
brushed against Miles’s knees.

His mouth went dry. His sober reflexes were
fast and sure, and he hauled Lucy’s curvy deliciousness up into his
lap before she could reconsider the impulse.

She was stiff at first, back arched as though
she’d just climbed up into the top row of bleachers and was trying
to see over somebody else’s head.

Miles was feeling pretty stiff himself. He
hadn’t stopped thinking about the way her body had felt under his
mouth, how right she felt in his arms.

Now she didn’t seem like a woman who had her
eyes on the prize of a 30-year fixed mortgage and a dependable,
pompous bore.

Because now she was shit-faced.

He palmed her thighs and slid his hands up to
either side of her waist, pulled her closer to his chest, and
rotated her away from the crowd facing the TV. If she felt his
hard-on through his jeans, she didn’t seem to mind. With each
moment he held her, she relaxed a little more until her back melted
against his chest and his mouth settled against her ear. “I
shouldn’t be doing this. You’re drunk. It’s not good.” He inhaled
her scent for himself and fresh possessiveness exploded in him.

“You feel good.”

He groaned inwardly. If they weren’t in
public he’d be getting her naked by now, drunk or no. “I’m not
good,” he said.

“Promise?”

Sharp desire stabbed through him. His thumb
found the curve of her breast and he caressed her, hearing her
gasp, savoring the way her nipple hardened. His lips found one of
the pearls in her earlobe and he rolled it between his teeth.

Whack
. Miles drew back, stars
exploding in his head. “Hey!”

Fawn stood in front of them wielding a
studded purse. “What are you doing to her? Lucy? Are you all
right?”

“I’m letting him be bad,” Lucy said. “Give
him a minute.”

Readjusting his grip on the hot, soft body in
his lap, Miles glared at Fawn through Lucy’s curls. “You have a
license for that thing?”

“What are you doing here?” Fawn’s eyes
glistened with tears.

Miles heard her real question. “Huntley sent
me. He’s on his way.”

“Why didn’t he get here first?”

With the pain in his skull and a different
kind of pain in his lap, Miles struggled to speak over the noisy
bar. “He thought you’d be in Mendocino with your mother. I took the
northern route.”

Lucy leaned back and he slipped his hand
under her shirt. When he felt bare silky flesh, all words left him.
He buried his nose in her neck and licked the pulse thrumming
there.

“Oh,” Fawn said, sinking against the bar. She
watched them for a long moment, then said, “Should you really be
doing that here?”

Miles’s hand moved down her body, seeking the
heat between her thighs wrapped in tight denim.
Oh,
definitely
.

“Lucy, I want to go back,” Fawn said.

Lucy’s hips were making little circles in his
lap, driving him on, but then she sighed and stopped. “Hold on.
Need to think.”

He cupped her.

Some other metallic object connected with his
skull, not quite as hard as the purse, and Lucy broke free of him.
She tapped him with the spoons one more time and dropped them on
the bar. “Fresh air. Need some.” She took Fawn’s arm and stumbled
away through the crowd while Miles waited for some blood to return
to his brain.

No time. That blood had other plans. High
hopes. Hot, hard hopes.

Miles took after them, holding his jacket
over his crotch. He found them in the parking lot. Icy wind blew
off the shore, blasting away some of the lusty confusion of the
bar. The two women had found their coats somewhere and looked a
little more sober, standing tall in the cold night, waiting for
him.

Lucy’s pale face and bright hair stood out
sharply against the black jacket, jeans, and boots she wore. He
knew her tall friend next to her was stunning, famously beautiful,
but he only wanted to look at Lucy.

Pulse still racing, Miles tried to catch
Lucy’s eye, but she stared at the ground.

He had to get her alone.

Now.

He dug his cell out of his pocket, dialing
quickly. “I’ll get Huntley on the phone for you, Fawn. You can talk
while he drives here.” Not the best idea on the hairpin curves over
the coast, but he had to cull Lucy from the protection of her
herd.

Huntley’s voice burst into his ear. “You got
her?”

“She wants to talk to you.” Miles strode over
and shoved the phone at Fawn. Lucy looked up at him then, eyes dark
and wide, lips parted, so damn hot. He slipped his hand down her
arm to entwine her fingers with his and pulled her away, across the
lot to a dark corner under an arbor near the building’s
entrance.

He tucked a curl behind her ear, though the
wind blew it right back into her face, and hunched down to kiss
her.

She pushed him away, leaning back on a fence
post, breathing deeply. “Look, I’m sorry to lead you on back there,
but you didn’t follow the plan. Remember the plan? You don’t touch
me, I don’t… you know… ”

Bending his knees to reach her, he brushed
his lips along the soft curve of her cheekbone. His body responded
to her scent, sparking to life, remembering. “I’m pretty sure I
didn’t agree to any plan.”

“Exactly! My point. You don’t like the plan.
My plan.” She put a hand over her heart. “It’s a really good
plan.”

The outdoor lights lit up her face, and she
looked beautiful, otherworldly, and very not sober. He brushed
another curl off her forehead. “Did you check into a room?”

“Yes, but we left the bags at the desk.” Then
she scowled. “No. No room.” She shoved him in the shoulder.

He grabbed her fist, held it softly against
his chest. “Huntley should be here soon, and looks like Fawn’s
going back with him.”

Frowning at her captured hand, Lucy made a
feeble effort to pull free. “He’d better suck up. I want to see
major sucking up.”

“You like sucking up?”

She met his gaze. “If Fawn goes back, I go
back with her.” She forced a laugh. “Obviously. I mean, I’m her
best woman. I mean man of honor. Maid of woman. Shit.”

He tugged her close. “You are definitely made
of woman,” he growled.

Sinking against him, she sighed, wriggled
closer.

Desire sliced through him. “Let them have
their reunion in private,” he said in her ear. “We’ll go back in
the morning.”

Her free hand slid around his waist and
cupped his ass. “God, I’d like that.”

He pulled her hips against his and bent down
to taste her hot, sweet mouth again. Her tongue met his, slick and
eager, soft, open. He tilted her face to deepen the kiss, shocked
by the way his legs buckled, how his body cried out for hers.

But she broke away and stepped back.

“See, this is why you need to follow the
plan,” she said, gasping. “It’s very simple. You don’t initiate, I
don’t respond. See? Simple. Excellent plan.”

He blinked, breathing heavily, his vision
clouded with desire. “One night, Lucy. When’s the last time you
just had a really, really good time, just for the hell of it?”

She arched away from him, her hand still on
his chest, small but firm. “Oh, sure. Funny you mention hell. The
devil is from hell. You’re the devil. You can make hell sound good,
pull me down with you, but then what? Then I’ll get all burned up,
smell like brimstone, suffer forever and all that.” She spun
around. “Forget it, Lucifer. I’m going with the other shoulder.”
Then she walked away.

She was killing him. He strode after her.
She’d run in the wrong direction, noticed her mistake, and weaved
back to get back to Fawn.

“Shoulder?” he asked, falling into step
beside her. He rubbed his lips, desperate to taste her again.

“You know, the devil on one, the angel on the
other.” She shot him a dark look. “I know which one you are.”

He managed to grin. “I like the sound of
that.” He put an arm around her, encouraged when she slowed down.
“I’ll tell you what your devil is. And it isn’t me.”

She lifted her chin, tried to stare at him
down her nose even though he towered over her. “Here we go again,
the I-hate-Alex song.”

He shook his head slowly, cupping her cheek
in his palm, savoring the contact again. He wondered if she could
feel his hand shaking. “Your devil is fear. Not me. Fear.”

She rolled her eyes, laughing nervously. “Oh,
right.”

His thumb traced her lower lip. He savored
the softness, the hint of moisture, and bent closer. “Fight for
what you want. Don’t let fear beat you.”

“So if I don’t screw you right here in the
parking lot it’s because I’m afraid?” She grabbed his wrist. “Nice
try, buster, but I’m not that drunk. You’re just one big hormonal
organism looking to score. Your pop psych arguments have no effect
on my superior intellect.”

He pulled her hand up to his mouth and rubbed
his lips across each soft, delicate knuckle. “How about my physical
arguments?”

Watching him through half-closed eyes, arm
extended, her lips parted, she managed a frown. “Unfortunately,
those are more effective.”

Her skin was so soft. He caressed her fingers
in his, stroking, kissing, smelling her. “I think you need to
modify your plan.” He separated her index finger from the rest and
sucked it into his mouth like a lollipop.

Her eyelids fluttered. She moaned.

He licked the pad of her finger, sucked it in
deeper. “One night,” he whispered around the prize in his mouth.
And then I’ll talk you into another.
“What are you afraid
of?”

She pulled her finger free. “Are you kidding
me?” She twisted away, staggering in Fawn’s direction. “Afraid. Of
course I’m afraid. I’m not an idiot.”

Miles watched her, fighting for control
before he joined them.

So close.

Fawn was smiling when she handed him the
phone.

He knew he wasn’t. Clenching his teeth, he
went over to his bike, zipped himself back into his jacket.

Maybe he was crazy. She said no. She really
didn’t want to give in. Whatever reasons she had for avoiding a
little fun—fuck that, a lot of fun—were probably good ones. No
question she’d been clear about what she wanted.

He took out his helmet and looked at her,
standing as tall as her short height made possible, chin defiantly
up, hands on her round, sexy hips.