Trouble Me: A Rosewood Novel (4 page)

At this rate she was going to be a bona fide expert in liquor brands.

When he didn’t leave, she gave an audible sigh. This whole let’s-pick-up-the-chick-at-the-bar game had grown old. Maybe it was time to head upstairs. Unfortunately, she had a nasty suspicion that Mr. Blinding Teeth might actually follow her out the bar. No way was she letting him anywhere near her room.

Damn it
, she thought; all she’d wanted was to unwind.

“So what’s a beautiful woman like you doing in a
place like this? Listen, you sure embarrassed my friend over there.” He pointed back to the table at goon number three. “He wanted your phone number so he’ll know where to reach me in the morning.”

Ugh
. When she refused to reply, staring fixedly at a bottle of vodka the color of raspberry syrup instead, he laughed, a braying noise.

“I get it. You’re a ballbuster. That’s all right. Mine are hard as rocks for you—like the rest of me.” With a leer, he grabbed his crotch.

The guy was totally off-the-charts gross. Jade felt dirty just breathing the air next to him. Shifting on the stool, she sent him straight to hell with her eyes. “Get lost, creep,” she enunciated clearly before looking away.

This time he didn’t laugh. “You know what? Your ass is real tight. I think you need me to loosen it up.” He stepped closer, crowding her space in blatant intimidation.

Infuriated, Jade’s fingers tightened about her glass. She lifted it and turned a bit so that when she chucked the remains of her drink, they would hit his disgusting face. She was aiming for a bull’s-eye.

But her drink-throwing arm stalled, then relaxed, and the glass returned to the bar with a soft
clunk
. Someone had intervened. Laying a hand on the creep’s shoulder, he spoke with quiet authority. “That’s enough, buddy. The lady’s not interested.”

“Who the fuck are you to tell me what to do?”

“I’m the guy who’s going to make you wish you never pissed me off by making me listen to your bullshit while I was enjoying my drink. Now beat it, and go back to your table. Now.”

Jade blinked, and a smile of happy astonishment lifted her lips. How about that, she thought. Chivalry was not dead. And as knights in shining armor went, this one, with his calm confidence, seemed more than capable of
slaying any nasty dragons or ugly, conceited trolls who crossed his path.

Meanwhile, El Jerko was doing the macho thing, puffing his chest out as he took the other man’s measure, while he debated whether he dared start something. From the fury mottling his face, he must have realized this was not a fight he’d win. Not in a million years.

With a muttered curse that Jade’s newfound hero didn’t even deign to acknowledge, he slunk off.

Jade immediately forgot about him. She was too busy remembering how to breathe.

Her rescuer had stepped closer. The man was gorgeous. Really, really gorgeous. Electric-blue eyes set in a chiseled face. Ridiculously thick lashes. A wide jaw that ended in a pointed chin with a hint of a cleft. His lips were a tad on the thin side, but that didn’t stop Jade from thinking they’d know how to kiss just fine. His arresting face was framed by short black hair. A five o’clock shadow darkened his lean cheeks, making him look slightly raffish.

The heartthrob features she could have handled. It was the weird sense of recognition she had when she stared into the man’s face that was making her nerve endings sizzle and her heart bound like a rabbit.

Equally unsettling was that she was certain he felt the same jolt of connection. It was in the quick flare of his eyes, which just as suddenly narrowed, piercing her like twin bright-blue lasers as he tried to place her.

He wouldn’t succeed. Because on second thought Jade was sure this man was a stranger. She’d already scanned her memory bank and no guy this hot was in it.

Determined to ignore the disturbing reaction, she managed a nod and a casual “Thanks for the assistance.”

“Happy to oblige.”

She liked his voice too. Liked its low timbre and the
fact that there was something no-nonsense to it. That added up to a few too many things she found appealing about him. With another nod, she turned resolutely back to the bar.

So she intended to dismiss him as she had everyone else who approached her, Rob thought with one part amusement and three parts curiosity. Had she made any sign of encouragement, any indication that she was looking for a man, he’d have been turned off.

He was far from turned off. Instead, it felt like an electric current was crackling through him, doubtless the effect of seeing how stunningly beautiful she was up close. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d seen her somewhere before. Probably when he was channel surfing, because she certainly had the looks of a movie star. Those eyes were such an intense green. Must be contacts, he decided.

Intense color aside, her gaze sparkled with intelligence, energy—and awareness. Meaning she’d felt it too: that instant sizzling attraction between them. And, like him, she had no intention of yielding to it. How interesting. He couldn’t help wondering what her reasons were.

“Care to dance?” The question came out of nowhere.

“No, I—” She swiveled in her chair as she answered and, as their eyes connected, the sentence seemed to stall in her throat. Her tongue peeked out in a nervous sweep of her upper lip, and that was enough to make him decide that he really wanted to dance with this woman.

Gesturing over his shoulder in the direction of the table where the bozos from the other conference were congregated, he said, “There are still a couple of guys over there who’ve yet to come over and sweet-talk you. I got the impression you might like to avoid another round. Come on, dance with me.”

Jade eyed his outstretched hand, considering. She was certainly sick of getting hit on by guys with football-stadium-size egos. But this man, all chiseled hardness, wasn’t some puffed-up dolt. It was a pretty sure bet that he knew how to make a woman burn. A quick glance at the heat in his aquamarine gaze was enough for that well-banked spark of wildness inside her to blaze to life.

She did nothing to subdue it. After all, she was going back to Rosewood the next day. The teaching job at Warburg Elementary would begin in a few short weeks. Her life was going to be staid and respectable, and she a veritable paragon.

Tonight she might as well have fun.

Just tonight.

An annoying little voice piped up, warning her to play it safe. The smart thing to do would be to hightail it up to her hotel room and go to sleep. She ignored the pesky voice; her brain was obviously a little freaked out after such a long day. She could handle a dance with a man—no matter how hot he was.

But when she put her hand in his and felt the zing of energy that coursed through her at this simplest of touches, she wondered whether maybe he was in a whole different league from the college guys she’d fooled around with.

He led her to the dance floor. A slow tune started, one that she recognized instantly from years of listening to the radio in the main barn at Rosewood. It was Phil Collins’s “In the Air Tonight.” The song rocketed to the top of her list of the world’s sexiest songs. Though, come to think of it, “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” might very well strike her as impossibly sexy too, were she listening to it in this man’s arms, her body pressed against his, her heart slamming against her ribs as her nerves thrummed.

They moved in sync with the slow rhythm of the bass. His hands began traveling too. Splayed, they moved leisurely
from the small of her waist to the curve of her buttocks while the warm breeze of his breath fanned the shell of her ear like a tropical caress. Shuddering, she bit back a moan of pleasure. It escaped her nonetheless as his hands moved again, this time to cup her rear and bring her close.

The hard length of his erection was enough to stop her heart, then make it beat double time. Like the mirrored disco ball hanging above them, her senses spun, glittery bright. Thought and speech were impossible. She could only feel. It was glorious. Crazy and wild and glorious.

She was vaguely aware that Phil Collins had stopped singing, but there was simply no way she could tear her body from his muscular length. Even if she were to manage it, her legs might not support her. A single dance with this stranger had left her weak-kneed and dizzy.

When his head dipped, she instinctively angled hers. Their mouths met in a light graze that left her lips tingling. Her tongue swept over her upper lip, savoring the taste of smoky bourbon and male desire.

His electric gaze tracked the subtle movement and his arms tightened, drawing her closer still, until their bodies were fused. Liquid heat pooled deep in her core. Never before had she reacted so quickly—so combustibly—to a man. But here she was, practically melting on the dance floor, and he hadn’t even really kissed her yet.

And, God, she wanted him to. She wanted him to do a lot more besides.

It had been too long, Rob thought, since he’d held a woman in his arms and felt her body yield in unspoken need. He’d missed the smell of scented skin; the soft catch of breath as desire sparked, flared, and caught; the brilliant light of sexual hunger in a woman’s eyes.

And this woman responded as if she’d been fashioned just for him, the signs of her arousal as intense as his own.

That was something else he’d forgotten: how red-hot and all-consuming lust could be, so much so that fantasies of the two of them fucking right there on the dance floor crowded his mind. Which was nuts. Public sex wasn’t his thing. But while Rob wasn’t about to start spouting any crass pickup lines, he couldn’t deny the truth any longer: He wanted this woman as badly as did every guy who’d been hitting on her and all the ones who’d been gearing up to do so. He ached for her.

He told himself it was okay. She wasn’t like Becky at all; he could lose himself in this blond siren’s long-limbed body. Just tonight.

“Do you have a room?”

A room with this man … sex with a stranger. Jade swallowed nervously.

She’d be the first to admit that she’d done some pretty reckless stuff in her day, but even her college hookups had been with guys she’d at least
seen
before. So while the huskily murmured question caused her sexual craving to flare into a veritable inferno, she wasn’t such a risk-taker that images of her body dismembered and buried in a landfill two states away didn’t flash bright red with sirens blaring in her imagination.

But he wasn’t drunk, and he wasn’t emitting any weird vibes or making any creepy, kinky comments. He wasn’t doing anything but making her melt inside and out against his deliciously hard body. She wanted to rub against him all night. Naked and in private.

Her eyes met his and Jade saw the fierce attraction, the hot need she knew was mirrored in her own. Steamy sex on a stormy night. It’d be just for tonight. Then they’d go their separate ways.

She nodded slowly. “I have a room. Do you want to come?” She could hardly believe the sultry whisper was her own. She was pretty sure her double entendre was
out of character too. But it was hard to think or care what she sounded like when her brain was feverish with desire.

“I do.”

She liked a man of action. Already he was leading her off the dance floor and heading toward the bar’s entrance. The dark blues, reds, and blacks of the bar’s interior streaked by, then lightened into a swath of beiges as they crossed the lobby. The distance seemed as long as a desert trek. Objects lost their focus; people became a blur. The only thing she could concentrate on was the feel of his hand holding hers. His fingers were strong and, like hers, slightly callused. She wanted them touching her, rubbing her breasts, tweaking her nipples until they ached; she wanted them stroking her inner thighs, lifting her legs, settling them around his shoulders.… She stole a glance at his mouth and stumbled.

Dear God, please let him be even a tenth as talented as she was imagining.

“You okay?” he asked, his grip tightening, steadying her.

She nodded, unsure she could trust her voice.

An elevator was waiting. They stepped inside, the door slid shut, and the harsh drag of their breathing filled the small space.

“What floor?”

She stared blankly at the twin column of numbers. Fortunately, the aggravation she felt at knowing he had enough wits about him to think of such pesky details as what floor they should get out on cleared her fevered brain momentarily. She released his hand to step forward and press 4.

“Thank God.” His laugh was short. “I don’t think I could have stood it if you were on eight. Too long a wait. Even the fifth floor would have been a stretch.”

Feeling better to hear him admit that his need was as
raging as her own, she smiled. “Well, then, how about I race you down the hall?”

Rob returned her smile. “You’re on.” He liked her confident spirit. He liked that she was unbelievably sexy too. He didn’t even have her naked yet and the blood was pounding in his veins. He hadn’t desired a woman like this in years, not since—then the elevator doors were opening and she was bursting out of them and tearing down the hall, and he was spared having to finish the thought as he sprinted to catch her.

Stumbling into the room, they fell into each other’s arms, bodies straining and hands searching. Mouths locked to exchange hungry, devouring kisses. Hearts thundered as hard as the rain beating at the windows.

He raised his head to draw in a much-needed gulp of air, and a thought suddenly occurred to him. “Hey, I haven’t asked. What’s your name?”

Jade wasn’t about to divulge it, not when she was within hours of Warburg. The Radcliffe name was too easily recognized, first because of Rosewood Farm, her family’s horse-breeding operation, and second because of Margot’s fame as a model. Success had also made Jordan and her interior-decorating company, Rosewood Designs, fairly well known. She didn’t want to have to field any questions about her connection to those Radcliffes. Why get bogged down in banal chitchat when she’d never see this man again?

Lifting the hem of her tank top, she pulled it over her head and let it fall to the floor. “Do you really care what my name is?” she whispered.