Only in Vegas (5 page)

“Funny, but I don’t recall telling you to pretend my groin was a shoe,” he managed, his voice strained.  He couldn’t remember a time in his life when a woman had him this hot and bothered.

Angel dropped her foot away with a giggle.  “Sorry, just trying out my seduction techniques.  You know what they say, ‘practice makes perfect’.”

No, practice makes hard.  Very hard. 

Trey bit back a groan.  They weren’t even to Vegas and he was already a goner.  One look in Angel’s mischievously glinting eyes and he knew he was in big trouble.

*
              *              *

Angie smiled as she watched Trey, taking in the spectacular view outside the plane’s window.  He seemed almost mesmerized, not that she could blame him.  She’d reacted the same way the first time she’d flown to Vegas.

She leaned across him for a quick glimpse of the landmark below.  “That’s the Grand Canyon,” she announced with a smile.

“Pictures don’t do it justice.”

His aftershave drifted up to tease her senses.  Unable to help herself she leaned in a little closer.  Damn he smelled good.  “No, they don’t.”

“Thanks for insisting I take the window seat.”

“Now you see why I did,” she said as she shared the incredible view with her best friend.  The flight into Vegas, if Mother Nature was cooperating, was breathtaking.  And today, thankfully, Mother Nature was feeling very agreeable.  Not a cloud in the sky.

“I’ve been told that it was something to see, but I never imagined...”  He blew out a breath that caressed the flesh at her neck.

The effect of it had Angie pulling away from the window and retreating back into her own seat.  “There’s a lot of the world out there just waiting to be seen.”  She turned to him.  “Trey, I know how much your company means to you, but, and please don’t take this wrong, sometimes I think it consumes you.”

He turned from the window, not with the warning glance she had expected, but with a grin.  “Watch it, Angel, you’re beginning to sound like my sister.”

She returned his smile.  “Well, someone has to watch after you.  You certainly don’t.”

A dark brow lifted.  “I need watched after?”

“Yes.  You do.”  She reclined her seat, then reached up to adjust the flow of the air conditioning vent above her. 

Just when she would have thought it impossible, that dark brow edged up even further.  “If anyone needs watching over, Angel, it’s you.  Not me.  Need I remind you about the year’s supply of beef you bought because the guy selling it looked like he needed the money?”

“It was cheaper to buy it that way.”

“Not when your freezer is the size of a shoe box?

“That’s what I have your freezer for.”  Flashing him a sweet smile, she reached for the travel magazine tucked inside the pocket on the back of the seat in front of hers. 

He gave a husky chuckle.  “I suppose I should be thankful the guy wasn’t selling a truckload of girly products.”

Smiling, she began flipping through the pages.  “Oh, did I forget to tell you?  My
girly
order should be arriving sometime next week.  It’s a good thing you have a bachelor’s bathroom with near empty cabinets.”

He reached and cupped her chin, turning her face to his.  “You are kidding, right?”

Angie fought the urge to laugh at Trey’s playfully exaggerated expression of distress.  “Yes, I’m kidding.”

He dropped his hand away, releasing her chin, and blew out a breath.  “Thank goodness.  You had me sweating it out there for a moment.”

“Come on,” she said, finding it hard to look at anything but that sexy grin of his, “I’m not that bad.”

“I know better, remember?  In fact, sometimes I think I know you better than you know yourself.”

She couldn’t argue with that.  Trey had always been pretty good at reading her.  And he was always there to rescue her whenever her act now think later actions got her into trouble.  As did Kathy, but with her friend away on business more often than not, Angie found herself turning more and more to Trey when she had a problem.  She trusted him and trust was not something she gave easily. 

“If you think that view of the Grand Canyon is something, wait until you see it up close,” she said, not wanting to delve too deeply into emotional issues.

“We aren’t parachuting in are we?” he teased.  “Because I have to tell you I’m not into extreme sports.”

She laughed.  “Me either.  I was thinking that you and I could take a bus tour out to see it while we’re in Vegas.  The Grand Canyon is one of those places you have to see.  Not in pictures.  Not just from a plane.  But up close and personal.  I’m telling you, Trey, it literally takes your breath away.”

He shifted in his seat to look at her.  “I love seeing you this way.  So excited.  So passionate.”  His Hollywood hunk-blue eyes moved over her.  “So sexy.”   

Sexy.  A thrill of delight went through her.  Her body reacted to his word, to his thoroughly assessing gaze.  Her nipples peaked eagerly beneath her demi-cup bra, begging for his attention.  Why hadn’t she left her jacket on?

Angie bit her bottom lip to keep from groaning aloud.  Then, as if her failure to control her own sexually starved body wasn’t enough of an embarrassment, the
girls
caught his attention. 

Trey smiled.

Not a full mouth, nice to see you kind of smile.  It was one of those lopsided, devil-may-care kind of grins she imagined said I’m ready for ‘dessert’.  She’d never been at the receiving end of one of those before.  At least not that she was aware of.

“Cold?”

“No,” she blurted out as she hurried to fold her arms across her breasts, shielding them from his view. 

“No?”

He had her there.  If she wasn’t cold, she was aroused with clear proof.  “Maybe a little cold,” she lied.  Because at that moment she was anything but cold.  Who would have ever guessed the changes one little request like ‘pretend to be my lover’ would bring about?

He reached over her to shut off her air vent.  “I’m guessing there are going to be a lot of things out here that take one’s breath away.”  

Too late.  Hers was already gone.

Angie looked down, focusing on the magazine in her hands.  She tried very hard not to think about the little curl of warmth growing in the pit of her stomach.  The same one that had flickered to life during dinner with Trey the night before, when he’d ‘tested’ her.

Mentally, she tried to convince herself that it had nothing to do with Trey.  That she had simply picked up a bug at work.  Only this unsettling ribbon of heat wasn’t content to remain in her stomach.  Instead, it traveled downward, centering itself between her thighs.

She crossed her legs, hoping to suppress the unfurling sensation.  She might have succeeded had Trey not chosen that particular moment to place a hand on her thigh.  A gesture he had done countless times before without any sexual intent.  And though she was certain this time was no different, but her body seemed to be having trouble comprehending that.  If only she had worn pants instead of a jean skirt, one that was suddenly too short for comfort.

Where was toss-the-plane-about turbulence when one desperately needed it?

At this point, she’d settle for sudden decompression in the cabin.  Anything to get his hand off her bare thigh and bring her temperature back down before she internally combusted.

“You feeling all right?”

“I’m fine.”  Angie shoved the magazine back into the pouch on the back of the seat in front of her and shot to her feet, successfully removing herself from the heat of his touch.

His expression turned to one of concern.  “Angie?”

“Just taking a trip to the little girls room.” 

“You look flushed.  Can I order you something while you’re gone?  Maybe some ginger ale?”

“Ginger ale sounds good.  Thanks.”

Slipping past the woman in the aisle seat next to her, Angie raced for the bathroom, wondering what her jump-before-you-look nature had gotten her into this time.

Trey stood halfway up, debating on whether or not to go after Angel and make sure she was all right.  It wasn’t like her to get air sickness.  Hell, she flew several times a year on travel agent ‘fam’ trips to all sorts of destinations, and not once did he ever recall her mentioning that flying bothered her.  But her face had been undeniably flushed when she’d darted out of their row.

Angel’s abrupt departure and his near departure from their seats had the elderly woman in the aisle seat staring his direction.  The book she’d been reading when the plane took off was now lying in her lap.

“She’s not quite herself today,” he explained with a smile as he lowered himself back into his seat to await Angel’s return. 

A couple of minutes later, he cast a worried glance back over his seat.  No sign of her yet.  A worried frown tugged at his mouth.

He motioned for the flight.

“Can I get you something?” she asked.

“Could we have a couple of ginger ales, please?”

The attendant left and then returned a few moments later with their drinks. 

“Thank you.”  Trey lowered his lap tray and placed their glasses on it.

“Honeymooners?” the elderly woman beside him asked when the flight attendant walked away. 

“Excuse me?”

She motioned toward Angel’s empty seat, then to him.  “You two.  Are you kids on your honeymoon?”

Kids?

“No, we’re not.”

“Oh, wait, let me guess.  I’ll bet you two are flying to Vegas to get married?  Am I right?”

He laughed at her assumption.  “Afraid not.  Angel and I are just friends.”

Speaking of which, Trey cast another glance in the direction of the restrooms at the back of the plane.  He really should go check on her. 

“Honey, I’ve been around more years than I care to admit, and I know the spark of romance when I see it.  You two definitely have it.”

It appeared the poor woman’s eyesight was going.  Trey shook his head.  “Angel’s—”

“Just the prettiest little thing,” she finished for him, and then patted at her blue-grey, fresh-from-the-beauty-salon do.  “What I wouldn’t give to have hair like hers.  Mine used to be long in my younger days.  Men have a thing for long hair.  But then I guess you already know that.”

He nodded.

“And those eyes.  Are they real?”

“Real?”

“As opposed to those newfangled colored contacts,” she clarified.

“Oh, yeah, they’re real.”  He twisted around to get a better view of the aisle way behind them.

Damn it, Angel, you’re starting to worry me.

“No wonder you’re so smitten with her.”

Smitten?  That caught Trey’s attention.  Angel was his friend.  That was all.  But the woman was right.  Angel did have great hair and incredible eyes. 

“You’re such a nice looking couple,” she continued with a warm, grandmotherly kind of smile.  “And let me tell you, Las Vegas has the sweetest little wedding chapels.  My late husband and I, God rest his soul, renewed our vows last year at the Little White Wedding Chapel for our fiftieth anniversary.  Stuart was such a romantic.  We were married in that same chapel all those years ago and I’m so glad he had us do it again before he...well, you know.”  The old woman’s smile sagged and her eyes grew misty.

“Fifty years?”  Trey tried to imagine spending that many years with any of the women he’d dated, but oddly enough it was Angel he envisioned himself rocking with on the front porch of the house he someday hoped to build. 

“The best years of my life.”  She leaned toward him and added, “Stuart was my best friend.”

Her words stirred something in Trey’s gut, but before he could give it much thought or even respond, Angel appeared in the aisle way.

His best friend. 

Trey attempted to stand only to have his movements hampered by the lap tray.  “Are you all right?”

“Better.  Thank you.”  Angel smiled at the woman and excused herself as she passed by her on the way to her seat.

She does have great hair,
Trey thought again as Angel settled into the seat beside him.

And lips.

“You feeling okay?” he asked, his worried frown easing slightly.

“Much better.  Thanks.”

“You are a very lucky girl,” their elderly seatmate said to Angel the moment she sat down.

Angel appeared understandably confused.  “I am?  Why is that?”

“Because you have such a nice young man in your life.”  She smiled at Trey, and then patted Angel’s hand.  “He’s a keeper, dear.”  That said, the woman retrieved the book from her lap and returned to her reading.

Angel turned to him, one solitary dark brow lifting, her expression demanding an explanation.

Trey smiled.  He couldn’t help but like the old woman.  Leaning close, he whispered, “What can I say?  She’s got good taste.”

“What is she talking about?” Angel whispered back.

He glanced past her to find the woman clearly engrossed in her book once again, then mouthed, “She thinks we’re in love.”