In Your Wildest Dreams (29 page)

"Of course," she'd replied, wondering if her enthusiasm was more about getting one step closer to Tina or just about seeing Jake. Ribbons of anticipation had curled through her at the mere thought.

Now Stephanie traveled Royal Street by taxi, her heart beating harder than it probably should. Especially given that she'd spent ah day yesterday and most of today being a good little executive soldier, giving Rod Hartman his reassurance call, catching up with her other team members by e-mail and phone, and working on the pitch for the wireless company. Basically, she'd told herself, she was getting her priorities straight. One night of sex didn't mean she didn't have to care about her job, her future. All it meant was that she was a normal, red-blooded woman and Jake was a normal—okay, hotter than normal—red-blooded guy and they were having an affair.

God,
she thought as she exited the cab on Toulouse, a block from Bourbon, /
hope it's an affair.
She hoped he would want her again
...
and again
...
and again. And upon recalling that kiss at her door yesterday morning, she decided she had nothing to worry about. It
was
an affair. There
was
more to come.

When she returned to Chicago, she planned to let Curtis down gently. Now that she understood how she was supposed to feel with a man, she knew she shouldn't waste her time with guys she experienced no real connection with. She should move on to the men who
did
thrill her. At the moment, she couldn't imagine being as turned on by anyone as she was by Jake, but wasn't passion always like that? She'd known little of it, but had to assume that was the case.

And another thing, she'd decided. No more sappy
Unes
like /
wish I could ride back with you.
No matter how gentle and patient he'd been, she instinctively knew a man like Jake wasn't looking for a relationship. This would end when they located Tina. And that was okay.

Even if her stomach churned at the prospect.

Okay, so maybe she was feeling some tender emotions about the guy, but that was natural, given the sexual freedom he'd helped her find the other night. Not a problem, she promised herself. This was just an affair.

Her
first,
she thought with just a hint of I'm-a-liberated-twenty-first-century-woman pride. Her first real this-is-all-about-me affair. Jason didn't count, because that had been first love, and it had only happened once. And none of the other men she'd slept with counted, either, because there'd been no true passion involved. So as she reached the Bourbon Street party district, she experienced a pleasant little tingle between her thighs that came with the thought
I'm going to meet my lover.
Her first real, true, bona fide lover.

Darkness had fallen hours earlier and crowds of people moved up and down the small street, in and out of bars, restaurants, and open-air souvenir shops. On all sides of her, Stephanie sensed the night coming alive—people stood in clusters talking and drinking every colorful concoction imaginable. As she'd noticed the last time she'd been on Bourbon at night, some wore
Mardi Gras
beads.

Bars of every kind beckoned to passersby—offering jazz, karaoke, hurricanes, and
sex, sex, sex.
As she passed by the Playpen, she couldn't help revisiting her conflicted emotions on the night she and Jake had gone inside. Revulsion and
...
passion—with Jake. She shifted her glance to the storefront across the way where he'd kissed her senseless.

By the time she found LaVeau's, situated in a typical French Quarter brick facade, she was burning to see Jake. And praying she hadn't imagined his ardor at the door yesterday.

Music echoed through the open entryway, a song sung in Cajun French. Inside, she found a small dance club, generic except for the decor:
Mardi Gras
masks of every shape, color, and material wallpapered the place. That one aspect somehow turned LaVeau's lush and mysterious in a way that seemed to reach out and grab her as she worked her way through the people gathered at the bar.

"Stephanie."

At the rich, deep sound of Jake's voice, her heart nearly stopped. She turned to find him sitting with Tony at a small table near the back. As she moved toward them, her stomach felt as fluttery as when he kissed her.

When their eyes met, his hot gaze instantly transported her away from the music and the people, back to the little house on the bayou where he'd shown her sex was nothing to fear, but something to be reveled in, so long as you had the right person to revel with.

That quickly, though, she nearly gulped back the thought. The
right person,
she quickly amended, meaning only someone who truly excited you and
...
someone you trusted. Somewhere along the way she'd truly started trusting Jake, in so many ways.

"Find the place okay?" he asked as she took a chair next to him.

"Yeah, no problem," she said over the music.

Tony leaned slightly across the table. "I'm meeting a date here in a little while, as soon as she gets off work at a restaurant around the corner. If I'd known Jake was inviting you, I'd have chosen someplace quieter."

She smiled. "It's fine—I like it here. Seems fun."

Although, admittedly, on the inside, what she really liked here was the sexy man seated next to her. His muscled arms extended from one of his usual well-fitted dark-colored tees, the bottom half of St. Michael peeking from beneath the sleeve. His ebony hair lay just slightly over the shirt's neckband in back and a few locks drooped across his forehead. His eyes looked sinfully warm tonight, and when his knee touched hers beneath the table, his smile seemed laced with still more of that sweet, hot sin.

"So, about your sister's friend Raven," Tony said.

She blinked, shifting her gaze from Jake to Tony, drawn from her sensual preoccupation. "Yes?"

"I did some asking around and found out she bounces around a lot, but seems to work mostly in the CBD."

"CBD?"

"Sorry," Tony said. "Forgot you aren't from around here. The Central Business District—across Canal Street. A lot of big hotels that host conventions, tall office buildings, and a casino—the girls there work the big spenders from out of town, plus the locals that hang out at the few seamier places tucked between the high-rises."

She nodded.

"The Crescent is in the CBD," Jake pointed out.

"I figure Jake and I can hit some of the hotter spots in the area," Tony continued, "ask about both Raven and your sister, show your sister's picture to some bartenders, that sort of thing. It's not much, but it's something."

Fresh hope bloomed in Stephanie's heart. "It's a step in the right direction, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate it."

Tony shrugged. "Just my job, really."

Yet she shook her head. "It's a lot more than I got going through the official routes. And it sounds like a substantial lead to me—at least a lot more places to look."

Jake slipped an arm around the back of her chair, leaning in close. "But you'll be a good little girl and stay put and wait to hear from me, no?"

She thought of arguing that three people could cover the area easier than two, but thought better of it, given how many times they'd been down this particular road. So she simply pursed her lips and nodded, feeling almost contrite.

At Tony's puzzled look, Jake explained, "Miss Stephanie here likes to play PI, but I'm helpin' her only on the condition she take that particular job title off her
résumé."

She couldn't resist rolling her eyes, a little embarrassed in front of Tony. "He exaggerates. I was just trying to help."

"Gettin' yourself in trouble is what you were doin' and you know it."

She flashed Jake a chiding look, so he returned it. But along with his annoyance he experienced a healthy dose of want, and even as he narrowed his eyes on her in derision, he remained fully aware of the points on his body that touched her. His hand, resting atop the back of her chair, edging into her shoulder. His knee, pressed firmly to hers beneath the table. Frissons of electricity radiated through his body from those two little spots.

As usual, she looked gorgeous. Tonight she wore a formfitting, stretchy little blouse of lavender above a pretty flowered skirt that stopped a few inches above her knee. Her blond hair fell straighter than usual, tucked back behind her ears, showing off beaded earrings that matched the bracelet circling her slender wrist.

"Can I get you a drink?"

They all looked up to see the same twenty-something brunette who'd already brought him and Tony tall glasses of beer. He watched Stephanie tilt her head, considering. "I'll have a sea breeze."

He couldn't help chuckling.

She noticed and said, "What?"

"Nothin'," he replied as the waitress walked away. "Guess I just get a kick out of hearin' what you order. Never the same thing twice."

She shrugged. "They say variety's the spice of life."

He allowed a soft grin to sneak out. "I like a woman who's a little unpredictable."

"And I qualify?"

He nodded shortly. "You never stop surprisin' me, in fact."

She returned his smile and he supposed she knew he was thinking about the other night, about the sex they'd had right after they'd agreed not to have sex, the way she'd so warmly sheathed him with her body just when he'd finally accepted the fact that it wasn't gonna happen. The hottest surprise he'd ever received, by far.

As a Zachary Richard ballad came to a close, a more lively tune took its place. "Dance with me," she said.

"Huh?" he asked, then shook his head. "I don't really dance,
beb."

"Neither do I." "Then why ..."

"Because you like a woman who's a Utile unpredictable."

She pushed to her feet and took his hands in hers, and the last thing he heard before he let her pull him onto the dance floor was Tony, whose presence he'd almost forgotten, saying, "Nothing romantic, my ass."

No, Jake didn't dance, but there he suddenly was, in the center of a
sma
ll
but crowded dance floor, moving to an easy, bluesy beat with Stephanie Grant. She smiled up at him as they both found the rhythm without too much trouble; she still held both his hands. His heart felt
li
ghter
than it had in
...
God, he couldn't even measure how long, and he didn't really want to, either. He just wanted to be in the moment with her—no past, no future, nothing but this.

He soon found himself stepping up closer, resting his palms on her hips, swaying to the music, pelvis to pelvis, as she circled his neck with her arms. Through the speakers, he heard Los Lonely Boys wondering how far it was to heaven, and he couldn't help thinking she made it seem pretty damn close sometimes.

Before the song ended, their legs had become intertwined, creating perfect friction as they moved together, and his hands eased farther down, onto her ass. He couldn't help drawing her even closer as she smiled up into his eyes to say, "Is this what they call dirty dancing?"

He chuckled, squeezing her rear tightly. "If it's not, it oughta be."

When she slowly ran her tongue over her upper lip, he watched it grow slick and shiny, then took the invitation to lower a slow kiss to her pretty mouth. He skimmed one hand to the small of her back, wanting to feel every contour of her body against his.

"Missed you,
beb."
He heard the words leave him, as unplanned as the low rasp in his voice.

"I missed you, too," she purred, her face close, her hips still swaying sexily against his.

"Wanna get outta here?"

Her eyes sparkled with heat. "Your place or mine?" "Yours."

She laughed. "That was decisive." "Well," he began uncertainly, "there's
...
sort of a sixteen-year-old girl at my place."

Her face dropped as she went stiff in his arms—and he realized exactly how bad that sounded. He drew her closer, eager to reassure her. "A runaway," he explained. "She was havin' a rough time with her mom's boyfriend, so she took off. I found her on the street one night—same night I met
you,
in fact. I've been helpin' her get by, makin' sure she has somethin' to eat every day, and last night when it was rainin' so hard, I let her sleep on my couch. I tried to talk her into goin' to a homeless shelter or a runaway center, but she wants nothin' to do with it—and I just don't have the heart to put her back out now that I've invited her in."