Rich Bitch: Everything's Going to the Dogs (6 page)

They kissed and held each other for a long time and then fell asleep just as day was breaking.

***

Vince woke to silence. He took a moment to stretch and orient himself. A smug grin was plastered across his face where he suspected it would stay for days.

He reached out for Sophie, as he’d reached for her twice more during their few hours together, each time finding her sleepily responsive, and then wildly so. But the grin stalled when he realized he was alone in the bed. A glance at the clock told him it was ten-thirty. Late for him to start the day, but then, he hadn’t exactly had a restful night.

Probably, she was making coffee, and breakfast, he thought as he rolled to his back and contemplated all the wonders of a gorgeous, sexy, Cordon Bleu-trained dog sitter staying in his apartment.

He sniffed appreciatively, wondering what the chances were that she’d bring him the paper in bed. Hmm. Maybe the Doberman could be trained to fetch the Times and bring it to him on the weekends. He sniffed again … but none of the mouth-watering smells from his fantasy were reaching him. No rich, dark coffee aroma, no scent of sizzling bacon.

It was so quiet he might as well be alone in the apartment. He didn’t hear a single dog sound. No scratching at his door, no snuffling, no clicking nails on his hardwood floors, no howling, growling, barking of any kind.

He was out of bed and dragging on jeans in an instant.

“Sophie?” he called out as he yanked open the bedroom door.

Nothing.

Even more odd, no clatter of tiny and oversized paws flying hell for leather across the floor to maul him. Only silence. Eerie, heart-pounding silence.

Sophie was gone. The dogs were gone. He took a second to regroup and try to calm his pounding heart when it registered on his panicked brain that the leashes were also gone. She’d taken off for a walk. Panic turned to anger.

What was the matter with the woman? A crazy ex was stalking her and taking pot shots, and she was going back out there on foot. Did she have a death wish?

He was out of his front door and pounding down the hallway when he heard the elevator doors open, and there she was, looking as fresh as a spring morning, with Lady and The Tramp in tow, a brown bag from which heavenly fresh-bread scents arose, and a smile that had his heart pounding all over again. Instead of blasting off at her as he’d planned, he felt more like the Doberman, who gazed at her adoringly and drooled.

“Good morning,” she said, in a soft, sexy tone that reminded him of every intimate thing they’d done last night. Her accent was as soft and alluring as a caress. When she spoke he heard the slide of cotton bedsheets across heated, tangled limbs, the pant and sigh and “oh, that feels so good” of great sex.

It was there in her sparkling eyes and knowing smile, the way he could see her nipples perk to attention flirtatiously as she gazed at him, so he felt his cock stand to attention ready to flirt back. More than flirt.

He couldn’t blast her, and he couldn’t stand here in the hall with his tongue hanging out about to whine softly for a treat. He had something important to say, and he had to say it.

“You should have woken me,” he managed.

Her smile curved higher. “You need your sleep. For later.”

His lips turned to rubber. Not later, he wanted to say. Now. “I was worried.” And in that second he realized how absurd it was to stand out in the hallway with the still-leashed dogs staring raptly up at the pair of them. The Dob sat, alert, as though at any moment a Frisbee was going to go sailing down the hall and he had to be ready to fly after it. Mimi was fully reclined, her head resting on her ridiculous manicured paws, only her beady black eyes following the conversation, her pom-pom tail wagging softly when she heard their voices.

Instantly, Sophie’s eyes flashed sympathy. “Oh, Vince. I am so sorry. I did not think. I only went to the French bakery. Come. I will make us some coffee, and you may scold me all you please.”

She bustled past him, her hands full of dog leashes and paper sack, trailing an illusive fragrance that made him want to get her naked ASAP.

Pulling himself together with an effort, he followed her into his apartment and to the kitchen. Refusing to act like some boorish brute who let the little woman do everything, he got the coffee started while she put bread, cheeses, and jam on the table. Not to be outdone, he pulled out his plastic squeeze bottle of honey in the shape of a bear. She fussed a little with dishes and napkins. Sliced melon and rinsed fresh strawberries. Put on a CD that one of his old girlfriends had left behind. One of those female crooners with a single bizarre name. Dido, maybe. Or Enya.

Once they were sitting and he’d poured them both coffee, he took a good hit of caffeine to get his brain in gear.

“Look, Sophie.” He reached across and took her hand, was about to say, “You can’t do that; you can’t go out without telling me,” when she leaned forward, squeezing his fingers with her own.

“I had a wonderful time last night.”

Boom, there it went again, any sensible thought. He’d always thought the idea of a woman blowing a man’s mind was a figment of songwriters’ imaginations or teenage boys with crushes. But nope. Here he was, a thirty-four-year-old man with his mind blown clean of all rational thought.

Except the completely rational urge to be intimate with this fascinating woman. Nothing could keep the answering grin off his face. “I had a fantastic time, too.” It was almost scary how good he felt this morning. Which only made her safety that much more vital to preserve. “But here’s the thing. You can’t go out like that without telling me.”

A tiny frown appeared between her brows. “But I have to. The dogs must be walked. I must shop for food.”

“I’ll walk the dogs until we have that bastard back behind bars.” And if Vince could arrange a half hour or so with Sophie’s insane stalking ex before the police nabbed him, he’d remind him that it was a very bad idea to attempt to hurt Sophie ever again.

Her frown deepened as she looked at him. Absently, she rubbed the spot where the wood chip had grazed her. “I can’t believe Gregory would shoot at me. It doesn’t seem like him.”

“I know, honey. I’m sorry. I’ve got some friends who are cops. I’ve already called my buddy Ed. They’ll get him soon, I promise. But until they do you have to stay here and be safe.”

She pulled her hand away and reached for a slice of baguette, still warm from the bakery. “I must shop,” she reminded him.

“We’ll go together,” he said. “We can buy in bulk, enough food for a few weeks.”

Her nostrils flared as she made an expression of disgust. “Shop in bulk? One does not buy good, fresh food in a warehouse, Vincent. I cannot work this way.”

A jug of wine, a stack of frozen Hungry Man dinners, and thou would do fine for Vince, but he had a pretty good idea she wouldn’t feel that way.

Food kept you alive. Why did she have to go and make it an art form? “You can give me a list of things. I’ll get them fresh.”

“But I am supposed to be the caregiver. You can’t do my work.”

“I think after last night we’ve moved to a different level. Please. I can’t let anything happen to you.”

“But I’ll be like a prisoner. I can’t live like that.” She rose suddenly, walked to his landline, and lifted the receiver.

What was she doing? Calling a cab? Cold sweat prickled at his neck. She couldn’t go like this; how could he protect her? “Who are you phoning?”

“Gregory.”

He rose, too. “You can’t call him. Are you insane? He’s trying to kill you.”

She flapped her hand at him in a classic shut up move. He thought about yanking the phone out of the wall, but retained enough sense to realize that acting like a barbarian wasn’t going to reassure her about staying in his apartment 24/7. So he waited in frustrated silence for a few minutes.

Her shoulders slumped after a minute, and she replaced the phone. “He doesn’t answer. The answer machine is not on.” She flicked a glance his way, and he knew he’d convinced her, at least halfway. If
 her insane ex wasn’t answering the phone, then where the hell was he?

Vince strode to the window and looked out, but no lunatic wearing a chef’s hat and brandishing a shotgun appeared to be hanging out down at street level. Still, he was glad he had a gun of his own, and at least one dog he could count on in a crisis. He forced himself to relax and turned back to Sophie. “Let’s eat our breakfast,” he said.
 She nodded, but somehow the warm intimacy of earlier was gone. A stalker with a gun was hell on a budding romance.

“What are we going to do, then, stuck here all day?” Sophie asked him. She was so gorgeous and so vital, all he could think about was protecting her. Well, and some other things.

“I have a few ideas.”

“We can’t make love all day,” she said, shaking her head so her dark hair brushed her jaw and gesticulating with her hands, including the one that held bread spread with strawberry jam.

In her agitation, she waved the bread about, and a dollop of jam toppled off the bread to land on her
 shirt, where it covered the upper slope of her right breast.

“
Merde
!” she cried, dropping the bread onto her plate and picking up a napkin. He watched the jam, fascinated. It caught the light when she moved and glowed ruby. He took the napkin from her and said, “Let me.”

He leaned forward. He watched her breasts rise and fall as she breathed, watched the patch of preserves. The scent of strawberry was as sweet as summer. He put his lips to the spot and sucked the jam into his mouth.

She laughed. “What are you doing?”

“I’m cleaning you up. I like to do a very thorough job,” he promised her. He was thinking he’d get her mind off her troubles for a while, but the minute he got close to her, he was lost.

He looked down, and where he’d pulled part of her cotton shirt into his mouth, he’d left a crinkly round wet spot. There was still a little jam left, so he leaned forward and this time pulled more shirt into his mouth, and sneaky devil that he was, he managed to get her nipple this time.

There was some kind of flimsy bra there as well, but he still made the most of his position, using his teeth gently but firmly to be sure she felt him through all that fabric. She sighed and pushed forward against him, grabbing the back of his head and pulling him tighter against that wonderful round flesh. He smelled her laundry soap, and her skin, and strawberries.

He launched himself at the other breast until he’d made another patch of wet blouse and bra, and another nipple was hard on his tongue.

When he pulled back, he was breathing heavily, and so was she. Sunlight spilled through the window, tossing bars of light across the sturdy pine table, the food, and the woman laughing at him breathlessly. Suddenly, he was filled with a lust so strong it was more need than desire.

“I want you,” he said.

“I know.” And she did. He could see his own desire reflecting back from her. Beneath the wet patches on her shirt her nipples were rock hard in the wet, wrinkled fabric—almost shocking against the elegant and unmussed rest of her.

He scooted closer and kissed her mouth, thrusting his tongue deep in his frantic need. She licked at him, nipped him, took over his mouth as he made short work of the buttons down her front. He managed to undo her bra by feel, then kissed his way down to her still-damp breasts, the centers puckered and her beautiful, sensitive, coral-tipped nipples luring him until he took one into his mouth.

It wasn’t enough. It didn’t seem like anything could ever be enough with this woman. He wanted all of her, now. His hands were under her skirt, reaching. She gripped the seat and lifted her hips so he could strip off her panties.

Crazed with lust, he stood and shoved their breakfast to one end of the table. He heard a thunk as something crashed to the floor, but he didn’t much care. In the other room one of the dogs let out one muffled bark at the sound, but neither came to investigate for which he was grateful. He didn’t want a crowd watching what he was about to do.

He pulled Sophie from her seat and hoisted her to the edge of the table. She clung to his shoulders, reaching up so she could kiss him again. He could taste her urgency, feel her mounting desire, and it fueled his own. Or his fueled hers.

He bunched her skirt around her hips, then decided he needed her to be naked. So he took the extra few seconds to strip her of her skirt and then pushed her gently to her back until she was laid out on his table like a feast. Her skin was honey-toned in the warm light, her nipples dark coral. As she drew in a shuddering breath, he watched her rib cage rise, then the slight swell of her belly.

She was surrounded by the remains of their breakfast. The fruit, some bread, the jam, his squeeze bottle of honey.

As he reached across her, she reminded him he was fully dressed still by grabbing his T-shirt and pulling.

One hand on the honey, the other reaching behind him, he yanked the thing over his head, put down the honey beside her raised knee, and then slipped the shirt off his arms.

Sophie rose to her elbows and without a word looked significantly toward his crotch. Some things could be communicated in any language, he realized, as he obligingly stripped out of the clothes he’d dressed in less than an hour ago.

He stepped between her knees, thought about parting them, then looked down at her, so glorious, the dark triangle of hair in the shadow cast by her raised legs. He wanted the sun on it.

“Open yourself for me,” he said softly.
 A tiny sound came from her throat. For a second she didn’t move, and then she parted her knees with enough slowness to torture them both.

“All the way,” he whispered, waiting until her thighs rested on the table, her knees hanging over. The sun turned her hair glossy, her thighs impossibly pale. He could see the faint line of a blue vein and followed 
it higher to where she was glistening with her own desire. Wet and plump and so very open for him.

If he went down on her now, which he wanted to do quite desperately, it would all be over far too quickly. He wanted to draw out their pleasure. So he picked up his bear-shaped squeeze bottle of honey, leaned right over her, and squirted a golden drizzle onto her right nipple, then drew a lazy line to her left.

“It feels cold,” she gasped, when he trailed the honey down, between her ribs, across her belly, filling her belly button with a golden pool of honey. Where he drizzled the honey goose bumps sprang up. He thought it the most erotic sight. He stopped just below her navel, and her hips jerked a little, in frustration, he guessed. Good. He wanted her on edge.

At least as on edge as he was himself.

Back to her breasts, and he licked at the honey, swirled it around with his tongue, rubbed his lips until they were smothered with it, and kissed her mouth, covering her with sticky sweetness. He lapped at her lips, making her giggle, lapped his way back to her breasts, and tongued her until he no longer tasted sweetness, then continued to follow the sweet path he’d drawn. As he tracked his way south, her body began to tremble, and her sighs turned into quick pants.

As he dipped his tongue into her navel, he saw her hands grip the sides of the table. She never closed her legs, though. She kept herself completely open to him, and he loved her for it.

Her eyes were tightly closed so she never noticed when he picked up the honey bottle again. As he drizzled the thick, golden liquid into her curls and over her pulsing clit, she cried out.

She was wet, and sweet and sticky. Her own musky scent mingled with the honey, and he salivated as he closed in on her. The minute his tongue touched her she cried out. He felt the shudders already beginning; her intimate flesh was plump and sweet with her desire. As much as he wanted to make this last for both of them, she was too close, and he couldn’t hold himself back. He lapped at her gently, until she tipped her hips up and pushed against him. Then he cupped her hips in his big hands and licked and sucked greedily. Her panting was growing harsh, her own wetness outpacing the honey, and then, when neither of them could wait another second, he sucked her clit into his mouth and tongued her hard.

A cry seemed torn from her as she climaxed against his mouth. Her torso rose as though she were climbing a rope— literally trying to climb out of her own skin, he thought smugly.

He heard another
Mon Dieu
and then a lot of other stuff that sounded earthy and exactly the kind of thing a woman should say in the throes of orgasm. Especially as he caught his own name in there.

He kissed his way back up her body, leaving sticky honey mixed with essence-of-Sophie lip prints along the way. When they kissed, she wrapped herself around him, pushing herself up so they ended with her sitting on the edge of the table, her legs wrapped around his hips. She was still hot and wet, and he felt 
the little aftershocks against his own needy nakedness.

A small, firm hand grasped his shaft and guided him to the opening of her body. Once more he cupped her hips. She clung to his neck, and they never stopped kissing as he thrust, hard and deep inside her.

Oh, she was so exquisitely, absolutely right. Tight and wet and so very hot. He was pumping, she was pumping, their tongues were mating, the honey was doing its best to seal them together, and then suddenly her head fell back. He wondered for a second if he’d deprived her of so much oxygen she’d passed out, but she drew in a great shuddering breath, and then he got it. Her lower body clenched him as she used that breath to cry out her release. He managed to get her all the way through her climax, while his cock felt like pure fire. He couldn’t hold on, couldn’t hold it, and suddenly it didn’t matter; the fire poured out of him, into her while he shuddered his heart out.

He found that his legs were trembling, so he had to hold on to the edge of the table for support. He dropped his head to her shoulder and kissed the damp, soft skin of her neck.

Then, because he felt like it, he lifted her, still joined to him and walked them both into his shower. He’d never been so glad that he’d renovated the bathroom to suit his oversized frame.

Between the shower, her begging him to let her cook him the world’s most complicated meal, more sex, and time to sit and talk, the hours passed. If her safety was never far from his mind, he didn’t let on, and Sophie never once made noises about leaving his apartment.

She even decided to trust him with her shopping list, sort of.
 “I must have some
moules
,” Sophie decided suddenly. She’d begun making noises about dinner, and rude comments about his lack of kitchen supplies. She glanced at him sternly.

“Mules?” he asked, wondering if she meant those girlie slippers with heels. He hoped she didn’t mean the beasts of burden. That’s all he needed in the apartment, more animals.

“
Moules
, mussels.” She made a sharp gesture, a flick of her wrist, and an opening of the fingers. “And they must be fresh.”

He blinked at her.

“For dinner. Yes? You like mussels?”

He had a feeling she could cook road kill and make it taste delicious. Or mules.

She opened cupboards and started muttering to herself in French. Mimi wagged her tail at the sound and sighed daintily through her black button nose.

While Sophie wrote him a list that included a separate list of ingredients for the dogs’ dinner, he collected leashes and decided to take the dogs with him.

While Mimi and the Doberman did their thing, he kept a sharp eye out for trouble, but his neighborhood seemed as peaceful as it ever did. He got everything on her list, including the mussels which he was assured twice were fresh.

He returned, and things went fine until Sophie, in the middle of cooking dinner, suddenly said, “You have no cardamom.”

He felt like saying, well, duh. Vince considered himself a liberal-minded man, but he secretly suspected that a single guy who stocked cardamom, whatever the hell that was, also wore pink golf shirts and subscribed to House and Home.

Nothing wrong with that, of course, but Vince wasn’t that sort of man. Mind you, he had to admit that a man who gave Mimi house room might as well grow a cardamom tree in his living room. If they grew on trees. Jeez.

While he harbored these reflections, Mimi snoozed on his favorite chair, and the Doberman sat at Sophie’s feet watching the dinner preparations with unblinking brown eyes.

“
Imbecile
!” Sophie said, after she stepped backward and almost fell over the dog. “
Que tu es bete
!”

“He doesn’t understand. English,” Vince said with deep appreciation as the dog wagged its tail while Sophie insulted it.

“He must move.”

“Probably he’s hungry.”

“He’s always hungry, this one.”

“I think there are some dog cookies in the cupboard,” Vince said. “They came with Mimi’s things, but 
she won’t touch them.”

He moved around behind Sophie, giving her a wide berth, since he was not keen to be called imbecile
 and the like unless strictly necessary. He reached into a cupboard and brought out a seriously embarrassing looking can with hand-painted poodles all over it. A custom job, no doubt, like the collar. He eased open the lid, and inside were bone-shaped cookies that had to be handmade. Probably from some specialty poodle boutique.

He tossed one at the Doberman, who caught it in midair and wolfed it down. He tossed a second, and 
that went the way of the first. To be fair, he walked over to where Mimi snoozed and waved one under her nose. She didn’t even open an eye, just scooched her body a bit so her nose moved farther away 
from the dog cookie.

“Finicky,” Vince said, replacing the tin.

“Cardamom I must have,” Sophie insisted. “I know where you can buy it.”

“Yeah, well, so do I,” Vince lied. “You keep cooking. I’ll get it.”

“Are you sure?” She looked doubtful.

“Sophie, I’m a college-educated man; I can manage to buy cinnamon.”

“Cardamom!”

He grinned at her. “I know. I was joking.”

She threw her hands in the air and started muttering. Sometimes, he decided a language barrier wasn’t such a bad thing.

He glanced at the dogs, but they seemed engrossed in their various activities.

Sleeping on his chair and supervising the dinner preparation. Seemed a shame to bother them. Besides, they’d be some protection for Sophie in his absence, and he’d be a lot less noticeable without them. If the insane chef was hanging around, he hoped to surprise him.

So he headed off alone. He checked out the perimeter of the building, and the adjacent areas, but everything seemed okay. It took him three stores to find cardamom. He was about to pick it up when his cell phone rang. It was Sophie, and she sounded frantic.