“Which is why I’m calling room service.” He was calling room service mostly because he liked the thread of sexual tension spooled out between them a little too much. It wasn’t a substitute for sex, but it was equally pleasurable. “What can I get you?”
She took up the hotel services guide. “I’m broke. I can’t pay for this.”
“This is my treat.”
“A business expense?”
“You’re not business.”
“I thought we were going to work on my pitch.”
There was a possibility that would happen. He should insist it happen, but he’d rather work on Finley Cartwright than her pitch, unless her pitch was throaty groans in his ear.
She wasn’t traffic-stopping beautiful in a femme fatale way like Rory. Didn’t have the same fireball personality. Fin was your best friend’s little sister all grown up and making trouble. She was that quiet girl in the office who got plastered that one time and danced like she knew things. The spunky wallflower at the party who turned out to have a devastating personality and an original wit. She was a woman you’d watch simply to see what she did next. Lovely, but not intimidating. Attractive enough to make you look twice, and thoroughly, when she called attention to herself. Making you wonder how you managed to ignore her before.
“We’re going to work on your pitch.”
“Can I have the steak sandwich?”
He ordered two with fries, added blueberry-apple pie and cream, and a pot of coffee, while she explored the suite, going into the bathroom and exclaiming over whatever product they had available.
“I’m stealing these,” she called.
“It’s not theft. I paid for them.”
“It feels like theft. I don’t know why. I know hotels are okay about you taking this stuff, but it feels like a guilty pleasure.”
Ah, this woman had no idea about guilt or pleasure or the way the combination of the two was the reason Cal got up mornings and went to work.
She came out of the bathroom, hands to her hair, trying to tame it. She looked at the bed. He’d purposely stayed away from it.
“I’d like to see what happens when we kiss again.” The hesitancy he’d seen in her in the foyer was still there, but she was fighting it.
He circled behind her and took one of the easy chairs. “What was happening when we kissed the first time?” He didn’t like not knowing what the source of this chemical explosion between them was. If he didn’t know better, couldn’t read her, he’d think he was being played.
“It’s embarrassing.”
“I’ve been hard since then.”
“Oh.” She turned to face him. “Ohh. As I was leaving, my ex was coming into the Blarney with his new fiancée. The one he was seeing when he was sleeping with me. I refuse to remember her name, but it’s probably Madison.”
“Provocation.”
She frowned. “He’s rich, smug, and superior.”
“He humiliated you.” The Motivation.
She nodded. “I didn’t want him to know I was alone.” The Set Up.
“So, you picked me to hit on.” The Distraction.
“It was either you or throw myself over the bar at Liam. I didn’t have the gymnastics in me, and he needs that job.”
“I was the easier mark.” She was playing him, but it was completely innocent; shouldn’t have been a blood-rushing turn-on. Blood was rushing.
“Exactly.”
Finley Cartwright, junior con artist, all around surprise package, an utterly delightful, unexpected intrusion with a soft-serve of the unfamiliar.