I pushed my door open wider and turned presenting my back to him. The dress was strapless so I had to hold it up in the front until it was zipped, unless I wanted to flash him my top half. His fingers brushed the bare skin along my lower spine sending tingles racing up it. He pulled up on the zipper and his hand came to a stop in the middle of my back. It lingered against my bare skin for a second, the spot beneath his touch warming on contact.
“Thank you,” I said suddenly feeling a little out of breath.
I turned to face him and met eyes that blazed with the heat of a blue flame. I swallowed hard then shouldered passed him. “Are you ready to go?”
He held his arms out in a sweeping gesture. “Lead the way.”
A long, sleek black limousine idled on the curb outside of my apartment building.
I shook my head as the driver held the door open for me and Chase. Of course the
car
my grandmother sent would be a limo instead of a much more practical town car.
“I bet you’re loving this,” I said to Whitney who was seated across from me beside her date.
“You know I am. Are you yet?” Her eyes indecently roved over Chase as she spoke.
She unabashedly and very overtly visually molested him in the back of the limo. I couldn’t blame her for it though. He looked good in jeans and cotton tees, but the relaxed look also afforded him an air of lightness, of casualness. In the serious black, slim-fitted, tuxedo he was downright gorgeous, but he also emanated a dark, possibly cruel beauty that I’d neglected to notice before. It screamed raw masculine power that would cut you down just as easily as it would swallow you whole. He looked like dangerous temptation at its worst and was all the more sexy for it.
I wonder if he fucks as powerfully as he moves.
Whitney’s previous words floated through my head. With them came an image that made my stomach coil tightly about itself. A warming sensation flooded my core and I bit down hard enough on my tongue to draw blood in response. I inwardly winced at the pain, but it had done its job. My senses focused on the throbbing pain at the tip of my tongue, effectively cutting off an ache at its head that had started to blossom elsewhere.
“Do I ever enjoy myself at my grandmother’s events?” It was a rhetorical question. One that essentially ignored the question behind the question Whitney had asked.
The ride from our apartment near Emory to the Fox Theatre in Midtown was a short one. We arrived less than fifteen minutes after we’d left the apartment. The driver pulled up to the curb in front of the historic theatre. He opened the door for us and we stepped out onto the red carpet.
Obviously my grandmother’s pretentiousness knew no bounds.
Chase offered me his arm and I all but blanched when he did. I was still grappling with the absurdity of him accompanying me this evening.
A photographer waited for us near the theatre’s entrance. We paused and I stood rigidly while he snapped several pictures.
A burly, security looking type in a suit stood erect outside the entrance’s closed doors. A thin white wire hung from his ear and he held a tablet in his hand.
“Name,” he half requested, half demanded without looking up from the tablet.
“Alex Sinclair plus three.”
He touched the tablet’s screen and typed in what I assumed to be my name. He looked up at our group pasting the type of smile on his face that people who knew they were hired help and were well aware of who wrote their checks bestowed on the people who did the writing.
I fought the urge to roll my eyes.
“Have a good evening Miss Sinclair,” he said too cordially as he opened the door for us.
As much as I did not want to be at the Fox that evening, I had to admit that its Egyptian ballroom was beautiful. Its lavish decorations complete with sweeping columns and ornamentations that paid homage to its name were breathtaking to behold. As much as I hated attending the events my grandmother held in the ballroom that was a favorite of hers, I always enjoyed looking at its interior design architecture while I was there.
“Alexandria. Whitney.”
My grandmother spotted me the minute I entered. Knowing her she’d instructed the security guy at the door to have her alerted the second I arrived. I swear the woman was like a shark scenting blood.
I winced at her use of my full name. “Grandmother,” I greeted her with a sugary sweet smile returning the favor.
She eyed Chase and Whitney’s date. The scrutinizing look on her face communicating that she was unimpressed. “You both brought guests,” her tone was as condescending as her facial expression.
My smile widened. Maybe Whitney inviting Chase along wasn’t such a bad idea after all. My grandmother clearly disapproved of him as my escort and anything that annoyed the hell out of her was whipped cream with a cherry on top for me.
“It is nice to meet you Mrs. Sinclair. My name is Chase Vincent. I work with Alex
andria.
Thank you for the invitation.” Chase gallantly introduced himself making every attempt to be charming.
It was wasted effort. My grandmother couldn’t be charmed by anything but status and money.
She pursed her lips into a thin line, then curtly nodded her head. “Technically, I did not invite you. Alexandria did…”
“Where is Granddad?” I cut her off before she could really get started.
“He was called away unexpectedly on business. He is in New York until next week.”
Great. So he got out of this but I couldn’t.
My grandmother’s attention diverted to the ballroom’s entrance. “The Monahans have arrived and I saw Richard and Celeste walk in a little while ago. Come Alexandria. Let us greet our guests.”
You mean your guests
, I wanted to mutter but I held my tongue in mixed company.
“After you Grandmother,” I said instead.
Before turning away dismissively from my guests she deemed to inform them that there were cocktails and hors d’oeuvres and the table with the number one marker was reserved for us. Her tone portrayed the picture of southern hospitality.
Twenty minutes later I joined Whitney, Chase and her date at our table which was blessedly by the bar. After nearly half an hour of rubbing elbows alongside my grandmother with Atlanta’s finest I needed a drink.
I covetously eyed the crystal glasses already at the table. “Looks like y’all got the party started without me.”
“We did. But we also got you one too,” Whitney grinned at me.
She pushed a half full glass in front of the empty seat beside Chase.
“Have fun?” He said giving me a knowing smirk as he stood and pulled the chair out for me.
I sat down. “Yeah, about as much fun as having a root canal.”
Whitney rolled her eyes at me. “I just saw you talking to the Mayor, the owner of the Falcons, the
Governor,
and several movie stars. Some people have all the luck and don’t even appreciate it.”
“Well next time feel free to be paraded around in my place.” My fruity cocktail drink tasted good going down but after the last twenty minutes I’d spent at my grandmother’s side I would have preferred to be knocking back a shot of tequila. I eyed the open bar, briefly toying with the idea of doing so then dismissed it. My grandmother would blow a gasket and while I lived to irk her, I had enough manners to do it in private and not in public.
The live musicians playing on stage changed the tempo of their tunes from boring elevator music to something a bit more lively and better fit for dancing.
“Kellen,” Whitney turned to her date with a smile that meant she was up to no good. “I want to dance. Come on.” She stood up pulling him with her. “You guys should join us.”
“N—“ I started to use any excuse I could come up with on the fly, but Chase beat me to it.
“Sure thing.” He stood up and offered me his hand.
I didn’t miss the conspiring look he and Whitney exchanged.
I narrowed my eyes at her and then him. My butt remained glued to my seat for a full minute then I gave into peer pressure. I took Chase’s hand and let him pull me to my feet.
Once on the dance floor, Chase didn’t keep our bodies an appropriate amount of space apart. He circled his arms around my waist and melded us together. I expected a half-hearted two-step but what I got was him leading me in an elegant waltz around the dance floor. My body relaxed on its own accord, coming alive. I forgot about where I was and who I was with and lost myself in the music.
“You’re pretty good at this.” Chase’s voice in my ear brought me back to awareness. His breath was warm against my neck setting the nerve endings there on edge.
He twirled me around then dipped me and brought our bodies back together.
“So are you.” My voice sounded breathless, almost throaty, and wholly foreign to my ears.
I inhaled deeply and smelled a very masculine mixture of aftershave, cologne and a hint of spice. It was so dangerously intoxicating that I almost told him he smelled good. Almost.
As we intricately stepped, turned and dipped in sync around the little space we’d carved out for ourselves on the dance floor I found that I was smiling in spite of my previous effort not to. I loved to dance. Always had. It didn’t matter the type or the form. I grew up being initially trained in classical ballet but then ventured into jazz, tap, modern, and hip-hop during my pre-teen and teenage years. I didn’t have time or the freedom to dance professionally, but I was minoring in dance and took a few classes for it every semester.
When I danced I was happy. I forget about all the reasons I had not to be losing myself in my movements. It was with that thought that I realized that there, on the ballroom floor, in a glittering champagne-colored gown, dancing a waltz with a guy almost ethereal in his harsh beauty that other feelings I hadn’t felt in two years were stirring inside me too— contentedness, lightness, and things more intimate.
Two years ago was when Deacon and Danielle died. I also realized that thinking of them wasn’t producing as large of a boulder on my chest as it usually did. The weight was still there, pressing down on me, but it was a little less heavy at that precise moment.
“You’re still smiling, but the light has dimmed in your eyes,” Chase’s blue eyes peered into mine. “I much prefer them lit up. They remind me of warm honey. Sweet and enticing and completely irresistible to not consume.”
Chase closed the iota of space that still existed between us. He welded my body to his and I fit perfectly against him. Before I could process what was happening or back away or ask him what the hell he thought he was doing his mouth slanted over mine. The kiss was searing. I felt it throughout every inch of my body down to the tips of my curling toes. I opened my mouth to object but he took it as both an invitation and an encouragement deepening the kiss. It was not like any other kiss I’d every experienced before. It was a demanding and needy and all consuming inferno. It overtook me and my good sense along with it. I relaxed into it and found my tongue pillaging his mouth as his pillaged mine. God, I hadn’t been this intimately close to a guy since…since…. I cut the thought off before it finished taking form, but the damage was done.
The flames had been thoroughly doused. I placed both hands on his chest, ignoring the hard feel of his pectoral muscles beneath them, and gently pushed. There was no way the minuscule effort I exerted could have forced him back but he immediately put space between us. Neither one of us spoke for a moment. I was breathing so hard and my heart beat in my chest so violently that I thought I might be in the middle of a heart attack. Heat crept into my cheeks at my body’s response. Then I noticed the heaving motion of his chest and took a small comfort in it.
I looked around the room, needing my eyes to focus on anything but Chase. Some people stared. Other people whispered in our direction. I took two steps of my own back. I used the first excuse my mind conjured up.“That was completely inappropriate for the setting.”
He immediately sobered. “That was my bad,” he said sounding stiff and awkward for the first time since I’d met him.
“It’s cool. Let’s just forget it ever happened.” I refused to acknowledge that the words made me inwardly wince a little. Okay, maybe a lot, but the amount didn’t matter if I was ignoring the response altogether.
I turned on my heels and walked calmly to our table. He could follow or not or go find another partner to dance with. We weren’t an item and the room was full of pretty, young debutantes that had been eyeing him since we arrived.
Whitney and her date returned shortly afterwards.
I spotted my grandmother approaching our table and for once I didn’t begrudge having to interact with her. “Alexandria,” my grandmother’s voice was full of censure and disapproval. “If you will excuse yourself from your acquaintances a few more guests have arrived that it would be remiss for you not to greet alongside me.”
This time I was glad to do so. It offered a much needed reprieve.
“Shots on the way home!” Whitney declared excitedly once the four of us were behind the dark tint of the limo’s windows. She held up a bottle of Patron Silver.
I was the first to speak up. “I’m in,” I said as I reached for a glass. It was something to do other than sit awkwardly beside Chase.
“Sure!” Whitney’s date said taking the glass she handed him.
“Why the hell not?” Chase picked up a glass too.
In the few minutes it took us to get from the Fox back to our apartment, we managed five rounds of shots. The guys looked no worse for the wear, but Whitney and I both needed help getting out of the car. The world tilted when Chase let go of my hand and I tried to stand on my own. I shook my head then blinked and it slowly righted itself.