Sin With Me

23

He says, “Pretty please?”

“I can’t trust myself around you!” I blurt, and instantly want to punch myself in the face.

His tone gets all growly and gruff. “Because . . . ?”

I sit on the edge of the bathtub, close my eyes, and sigh. “Because I’m too attracted to you.”

Even his silence sounds confused. “You realize that makes zero sense, right?”

“It does to me. I don’t expect you to understand.”

“I would if you explained it.”

“No.”

“Gee, hesitate a little, why don’t you?”

“Stop being cute, it’s aggravating!”

“Sorry, Slick, cute is my middle name.”

“Argh.”

“Is this a bad time to ask you what you’re wearing?”

“Oh. My. God. I’m going to strangle you when I see you next!”

His voice brightens. “So you are coming to the party!”

“Good-bye, Brody!”

He says quickly, “How about this—think about this whole situation over the next few days—”

“Which whole situation, specifically?”

“Us. Me wanting you. You wanting me. You being a big wuss and not giving me a chance because I’m so scorching hot your panties melt off every time you look at me.”

“Dear God,” I grumble. “I’ve created a monster.”

“Ahem. As I was saying. Think about what you want to do here. Then come to the party, and we can talk about it.”

When I make a dangerous noise in the back of my throat, he quickly adds, “Okay, we don’t have to talk about it . . . you can wear something that will tell me what your decision is.”

“I think you were right when you said you needed therapy. Seriously, Brody, you’re crazy.”

He completely ignores that. “A green dress for ‘Go.’ A red dress for ‘No go.’ Whaddya say?”

“I say you’re nuts.”

“Good,” he says, sounding as if I’ve just agreed to his terms. “See you Saturday then, Slick.” His voice drops. “And please don’t break my heart—wear a green f*****g dress.”

Then the bastard hangs up on me.

I open my eyes, stand, and stare at myself in the mirror. “We’re not going to that party,” I say firmly to my reflection.

She doesn’t look convinced.

The next few days pass quickly. I’m busy at work, and exhausted by the time I get home because I’m not sleeping well. I’ve been eating dinner and going to bed early.

And getting up early, screaming and covered in sweat.

It’s a good thing my condo building has excellent soundproofing, because I’d be giving poor old Mr. Liebowitz upstairs a nightly heart attack if he could hear me.

On Friday I have a date with Marcus. By “date” I mean rough, animalistic s*x at my place. I come more times than I can count, primarily because the entire time I’m fantasizing about—guess who?

Yes, that’s right. The panty-melting, guitar-slinging, King Kong–channeling, velvet-voiced lusciousness that is Brody Scott.

I’m so screwed.

Lying next to me on his back—sweating and panting, the bedcovers demolished beneath us—Marcus starts to laugh. “Holy hell, Grace. You almost broke my d**k off. That was epic.”

I smile drowsily at the ceiling. “I know. I’m a goddess.”

“You taking new vitamins or something?”

Yep. Vitamin B.

When I chuckle at my own inside joke, Marcus rolls to his side and gazes down at me, his eyes warm. He pulls the sheets down to my stomach and begins to languidly trace a finger over my breasts. He says casually, “So . . .”

I look at him sharply, already knowing where this is going. “The answer is no.”

His finger falls still beneath my left n****e. “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“You were going to ask whether or not I’d thought about extending our one-month stand. And the answer is no.”

He looks confused. “No, you haven’t thought about it, or no, you don’t want to extend it?”

“Both.”

He blinks. “Ouch.”

I sit up, sighing, and push my hair off my face. I prop my elbows on my knees and look at him over my shoulder. “You’ll find someone else within a week.”

“Yeah, probably. That’s not the point.”

“That is the point. We’re both tramps. It’s what we do.”

“And we’re good at what we do—together.”

I groan.

Marcus sits up and slides his big, warm hand up my back, under my hair. “All I’m saying is that a thirty-day limit seems arbitrary.”

“It isn’t. Believe me. It isn’t.”

He studies my face for a while in silence. Then he quietly asks, “Does this have to do with that big binder you keep on your kitchen counter?”

Immediately I’m in uber-defensive mode, hackles up and hissing. “That’s none of your business!”

It’s as if he takes that as a challenge, because he bulldozes straight ahead. “The binder that contains pictures of your friends and work associates with their names on labels and descriptions of how long you’ve known them, and detailed lists of your bank accounts, insurance policies, credit cards and mortgages, and a letter to yourself explaining that if you wake up and don’t know where you are—”