Insatiable (8 page)

She let out a snort. “I suppose
you
wanted soft music and roses and candlelight?”

When he remained silent, her heart gave one painful lurch against her ribs.

“Ten.” She shut her eyes. “Nine. Eight.”

She didn‟t see his shrug, but heard it in his derisive laugh. “You‟re the one wearing a ripped dress, not me.”

She ignored him. Why hadn‟t she thought of this earlier, before she‟d allowed him to tatter her resistance with his wicked tongue and clever fingers? “Seven. Six.

Five. I‟ll do it, Shawn.”

Good-bye fancy hotel, hello humiliation. But embarrassment be damned, she was putting a stop to this.

She wanted to keep her best friend. After the friction one night of sex had created between them, she knew unequivocally her original assessment was right.

This kind of supposed friendship was a very bad idea, even if it did come with multiple orgasms.

“Four. Three. Two. Last chance.” As their gazes locked, she let out a yell loud enough to loosen the rafters.

Unhurriedly, Shawn rose and slipped on his pants. “I forgot daring you is a dangerous proposition.”

Insatiable

37

A glittering smile was her response, one that widened exponentially at the almost instantaneous knock on the door. “Guess who‟s
screwed
now?”

“Ms. Dawson?”

Rachel grinned while Shawn‟s eyes hurled daggers at her. “Yes?”

“This is hotel security. Are you all right? We had reports of a scream.”

Shawn shrugged into his shirt, then left it unbuttoned as he strode forward to answer the door. He opened it partway, bracing his arm on the jamb to block the view of the bed as he affixed an angelic expression on his face. “I‟m sorry about the noise. My wife gets a little…enthusiastic. She‟s indisposed right now, or she‟d tell you that yourself.”

Wife? Enthusiastic?

Even beyond annoyed at him, she had to admire his chutzpah. “Shawn, you better can it—”

“See, there she is, calling me back to bed again. You must understand how hard it is being apart.”

Their visitor cleared his throat. “I was under the impression Ms. Dawson was traveling alone.”

“She was. But I was able to join her last night, and well, the separation‟s been harder on both of us than we realized.”

Defeated, Rachel slumped against the pillows to listen to Shawn spin his magic.

Shawn pulled out his wallet and flipped it open to display an impressive wad of green. “Let me reimburse you for your trouble.”

There was a lengthy pause, doubtlessly caused by the flash of all those Franklins. “You assure me Ms. Dawson is safe and sound?”

“Of course.” Shawn cocked his brow at her over his shoulder, his smile blade sharp. “Aren‟t you, darling?”

She wasn‟t scared of Shawn in the least. But she
was
scared of her parents discovering she‟d been found chained to a bed in a hotel room, clad in nothing but a torn dress and most likely bearing a vivid assortment of bruises and hickeys.

Some indignities were a bit too much to suffer, even in the name of justice.

“I‟m fine,” she muttered, repeating the statement when the security manager asked her to raise her voice.

Within two minutes, Shawn wrapped up the situation in a pretty bow, sending the manager off with a promise to keep things down and a proliferation of
thank-yous.

Once they were alone again, he crossed his arms across his chest, drawing her gaze unerringly to the trail of golden hair that bisected his washboard abs. “Do you have any idea how bad that would‟ve looked?” His voice didn‟t hold a whit of amusement. “Our families have reputations to uphold, not just in Calvin Bay but nationally.”

38

Cari Quinn

“Get bent.” She yanked on her ankle so hard it cracked. “Next time, keep your cuffs in your pocket, and we won‟t have a problem, now will we?”

She waited for his snappy comeback, but all she got was a view of him shooting his cuffs—the ones attached to his shirt—before he began doing up buttons. Then he retrieved the key to his handcuffs and freed her without sparing her a glance.

Surprisingly slighted by his silence, Rachel rubbed her abraded ankle as he sat at the opposite end of the bed and put on his shoes.

That‟s it? He was just…
leaving?

“We had sex,” she reminded him.
Great
sex. They would‟ve had more—

probably a lot more—if the alarm clock from hell hadn‟t restored her sense.

She didn‟t know if she was grateful or pissed.

He rose, collecting his gold watch off her nightstand and sliding it on to his wrist. “Screwed each other, you mean.”

“Whatever.” She tunneled her hands through her tousled hair. She‟d be doing battle with her blow-dryer and pick for hours this morning, she just knew it. “So what, now we pretend it never happened?”

“You pretend what you want. I‟m going to get some breakfast.”

What about me
? she wanted to ask as he moved to the door. In the days before rough sex and oral favors, sharing his blueberry pancakes would‟ve been a nonissue.

Now she got the distinct impression she wasn‟t invited.

She grasped the handcuffs sitting forlornly amid the tangled sheets. “Don‟t forget your toys,” she said, tossing them to him.

“Yeah.” With his hand on the knob, he hesitated, not looking at her but staring fixedly at some point on the wall just above her dresser. “I get that you‟re not happy about what happened last night.”

“And this morning.”

“And this morning,” he agreed, his lips lifting briefly. “If you‟d prefer I go back to Calvin Bay—”

“No.” That the answer tumbled so fast from her mouth shocked even her. “That isn‟t necessary. We‟ll just…go on.”

“Tell me how,” he murmured.

Before she could formulate a response, he closed her door behind him.

Insatiable

39

Chapter Five

“You better have a damn good explanation for going AWOL, Shawn, especially right before one of our biggest presentations. Lee was counting on you to show your designs to the investors, as was I.”

Shawn pushed his blueberry pancakes around his plate, diligently trying to sop up copious amounts of syrup. “I needed to be with Rach. It couldn‟t be helped.”

If his father found his statement odd, he didn‟t comment. Besides, as Rachel herself had stated, most of their friends and family would twitter with joy if anyone got an inkling they‟d
screwed.

God, he hated that word, especially in connection with her. How had he gotten stuck being the romantic in their relationship? He didn‟t know, but guessed it probably stemmed from the repeated viewings of
Titanic
he‟d been subjected to.

“Shawn, are you there?”

“Yes.” He dropped his fork with a clatter, then pressed his fingertips against the dull ache in his forehead. “Dad, trust me, if I‟d had any other option, I would have taken it. You know how seriously I take the company.”

Otherwise he wouldn‟t have been
thisclose
to reaming Rachel for siccing hotel security on him. Sometimes he thought his father‟s goddamned company meant more to him than anything else, even his own needs.

Except her. She won every competition, every time.

“Yes, I do. I also know how seriously you take Rachel.”

Busted
. “I feel responsible for her welfare—”

As always, Dillon Griffin had no patience for bullshit. “When are you going to tell her you‟re in love with her?”

Shawn reached for his ice water. After three gulps, he felt no more capable of speech. Was he really that transparent?

Yes. Yes, he really was.

“How long have you known?” he asked finally, when the lies and evasions he‟d expected to come readily to hand just…didn‟t. His father‟s hearty laugh made him wince. “That long, huh?”

“My first suspicions arose when you carried her home the day she took a spill from her tricycle. Your mother said you looked more shaken than she did.”

“She‟d skinned both knees.”

40

Cari Quinn

“A tragedy, to be sure.” His father inhaled, no doubt drawing hard on his ever-present pipe. “She‟s perfect for you.”

“No kidding.” Shawn resumed his meal with all the enthusiasm of a man facing the gas chamber. “But she doesn‟t want the sure thing. She wants the not-so-struggling writer who probably rides his Harley to black-tie publishing events.”

“Way I see it, you‟ve got two options.”

“And they are?” Shawn asked, surprised that his all-business father was letting him off the lecture hook with a little advice. Of course, he could probably scent his son‟s desperation through the line.

“She meet up with Halston yet?”

“Who told you?” He fiddled with his fork as he answered his own question.

“What am I saying? Mom told you, after Alexis told her.”

“Actually, Morgan got to your mother before Alexis had a chance to.

Apparently, her sister‟s not answering her phone—and as of late last night, neither were you.”

“You don‟t say.” No wonder their respective family‟s involvement in their love life had Rachel so freaked. Next, the lot of them would insist on installing surveillance in her hotel room. “To answer your question, yes, she‟s seen Ryan. I think.”

Whether she‟d just
seen
him or actually been with him, he refused to speculate.

“She didn‟t tell you?”

“We didn‟t talk much.”

Thankfully, his father let that avenue of conversation pass. “Two options,” he repeated. “Either you tell her the truth and risk scaring her right into Halston‟s arms, or you sack her with indifference.”

And so began the football references. His father liked to compare most things to the sport, especially areas related to business and women, two subjects the elder Griffin considered himself an expert on. “Yeah, indifference always works.”

Bitterness coated Shawn‟s tone. “Ignore a woman, and she‟ll come running.”

“A sad truth, my boy. Pretend you don‟t care what she does, or with who, because you‟re busy living your life. If she‟s interested, she‟ll seek you out.”

“Brilliant plan, Dad. What happens if she shacks up with Halston while I‟m

„living it up‟?”

“Then you weren‟t meant to be together anyway.”

Shawn‟s knuckles whitened around the fork he‟d impaled in his half-eaten pancakes. His father might well have said,
Worst case scenario, the world ends
tomorrow
. “And I‟m supposed to be okay with that?”

“You‟ll deal with whatever outcome arises.”

Shawn had a feeling his father‟s voice had strengthened more to demonstrate his faith in his son than due to his own unswerving beliefs in that area. At the moment, Shawn couldn‟t say he blamed him.

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41

“In the meantime, build your offense. And submit the sketches you owe me.

You brought your laptop?”

“Of course.” He preferred pen and paper to using software, but he didn‟t exactly have a drafting table handy in his suite at the Barclay. “I‟ll get you something tonight.”

“Do that.” Just before his father clicked off, he added, “She‟s already yours, son. The time‟s come to prove it.”

Expelling a long breath, Shawn closed his phone. It looked like he‟d be needing a damn costume for the masquerade ball after all.

* * *

She wasn‟t a prude and figured her sex drive ranked around average. But it didn‟t seem right that she‟d rolled off him only to wake the next morning just as needy.

Rachel pressed her cheek against the damp tiles. She‟d told him to stay, she reminded herself. Even now, he was probably in his hotel room, fiddling with autoCAD on his computer while he scarfed down his breakfast. He was big on multitasking, as he‟d amply proved by feathering his tongue over her lower back while he fingered her—

“Build the wall, Rachel,” she said aloud, squeezing her eyes shut as she turned her face up to the icy water.

Whenever she needed to stop unwelcome thoughts, she envisioned adding bricks to contain whatever she didn‟t want to think about. But her old trick didn‟t seem to be working this time, probably because sex with Shawn had been hot enough to blast her puny bricks sky-high.

Yet another thing she could blame him for. Her list was growing by the second.

She soaped until she was bright pink, rinsed until a prune had better skin texture. Then she stood staring down at the city from her hotel window as she patted herself dry.

New York was just as she remembered. But as much as she loved the lights and the glamour and the excitement, she had to admit she already missed California. She hadn‟t expected to, because she could see palm trees and the blue-green water of the Pacific every day. No thrill there.

But last night, she‟d discovered the seemingly everyday sometimes wasn‟t. As comfortable as being with Shawn had always been, getting naked with him had been a refreshing ride on the tilt-a-whirl of unpredictability.

And to think only weeks ago, she‟d accused him of being staid.

42

Cari Quinn

Unable to keep from grinning, she turned to sort through the clothes she‟d hung neatly in her closet as soon as she‟d arrived. After choosing loose pants and a silky tank top, she called a truce in the war on her hair and fastened the curls in a messy topknot.