“Um, no, you look stunning!”
“Thank you.” I glanced down at my dress, a gift from Ross. He’d arranged for me to have a shopping day at one of Bitsberg’s most exclusive boutiques, and they’d fitted the dress custom for me right before the dinner.
We took our places at the table, and Ross ordered our drinks. We settled in for a night of drinking, eating, and dancing. All the while, trying not to eye-fuck each other to the point the innocent onlookers at the table would notice.
After the first round of drinks, Ross took my hand and pulled me to the dance floor. A live band played music that made me feel as though I’d stepped through some kind of magic mirror and ended up in a lush, Jane Austin-ish scene.
Ross held me close as we moved around the floor, and I grinned up at him, impressed by his unexpected rhythm. “I had no idea you could dance!”
“I’m a man of many secrets,” he replied, grinning down at me.
“Be honest, you took lessons just for tonight.”
He laughed and spun me around. “You might be right, crash course online.”
“You aced it, babe.”
Ross pulled me back in and dropped a sweet kiss to my lips. It was slow and soft and made me melt right there on the dance floor. “You think we’ve stayed long enough?” he asked once we parted.
I smiled up at him. “It’s not even close to midnight. Don’t you want to stay and do the whole countdown thing?”
Ross arched one of his thick brows. “Do you?”
I dissolved into giggles. He was onto me. With a slow shake of my head, I replied, “Not even a little bit.”
“Check, please!”
We finished the song, laughing softly, probably appearing to the rest of the room as though we were sharing some kind of inside joke. As he took me around the floor for the song's finale, I dropped my head back and smiled up at the glittering chandelier floating overhead. I’d never figure out how I’d fallen into the fantastic dream world of Ross Leverette, but I knew I was going to stay as long as possible.
“Do you have to go?” I asked, pouting up at Ross from the bed. I wiggled, smiling to myself as his eyes followed every move of my body under the sheets.
He bit down on his lip and grinned at me. “You trying to get me fired?”
I laughed. “Can you actually get fired? I mean football players kinda have a get outta jail free card, don’t they?”
“Spoken like a true lawyer.”
I pushed up and flipped my hair back over my bare shoulders. “Money can buy you just about anything, it seems.”
Ross smiled. “Well, you can bang hookers, get speeding tickets, and get into stupid ass bar fights, but last time I checked, we still had to show up for practice.”
I sighed dramatically and flopped back against the pillows. “How practical.”
“Tragically so.”
I watched with wide eyes as Ross got dressed. The way he moved, every play of his muscles, and every step he took was dripping with pure sex. When he pulled his sweatshirt on, he turned back. “You gonna camp out here? Or you need a ride back to your folks’?”
I glanced around his bedroom. “You wouldn’t want me to stay here all day, would you?”
He shrugged. “Why not? I don’t have anything to hide from you. Plus,” he started toward the bed, his grin widening with each step, “it’s beyond hot to know you’d be here, naked in my bed, just waiting for me to get home again.” He dropped a sensual kiss to my lips, his fingers instantly tangling into my morning bedhead.
When he pulled away, our eyes met and my breath hitched.
“So, you stayin’?” he prompted, dragging his thumb over my cheek.
I sighed. “I wish I could. But I didn’t bring anything to work on.”
“You could take the day off, bum around and watch TV. I have ten zillion channels, and you can even wear my favorite PJ pants.”
I laughed and turned my head to kiss his palm. “As perfect as that sounds, I can’t. I have to get my notes together for my meeting with Sam O’Brian.”
Ross straightened and took a step back as I swung my legs over the side of the bed. “Who’s that?”
“He’s a lawyer that has a lot of experience with appeals. My soon-to-be boss at the public defender’s office set up the meeting. He thinks he’ll be able to advise me on how to best move forward with Hudson’s case.” I stopped in the center of the room, all of a sudden realizing that I didn’t have anything other than my dress to wear. The idea of wrangling myself back into it was not a welcome thought.
“You can borrow some jeans and a t-shirt,” Ross said, obviously watching my mental struggle play out across my face.