One for the Money

Mostly we have to be this close because it feels so damn good to hold her.

“You were joking about the fight to the death, right?” she asks.

“The ref will stop it if he goes too far.” The word ref is a lofty term for what the man in the ring actually is. His only job is to keep them from killing each other.

And to count down at the end.

Wagner throws a hard jab, and Thorn’s body recoils from impact.

Eva gasps. This is not a choreographed fight routine. This is not something for television. It’s real. Fists crack against flesh. They tackle each other, use vicious holds that wouldn’t be allowed in any of the real boxing matches.

She’s shouting in the following moments.

I should be watching the fight, too. But I’m watching her. Surprise makes golden lights in her dark eyes. I feel the shock in the crowd. Then even more shouting.

“He’s coming back,” she says. Though I can only tell because I’m looking at her lips. The crowd consumes her voice. Something big is happening in the ring, but I don’t care. I’m mesmerized by her excitement. It almost looks like arousal. This is how she’d be when I’m thrusting inside her, when she’s begging me to go harder, faster, deeper. Then I’d change the angle. I’d press that spot inside her with my cock. I’d rub my thumb over her clit. Her head would fall back. Her eyes would close. Bliss would overtake that beautiful face.

Her shining gaze sweeps back to me. “He’s coming back,” she says again.

To hell with the boxing match.

A roar goes up around us. The bell clangs.

Someone has won the match, but I don’t care who. I pull Eva close and kiss her. It starts off hard and demanding, a possessive press of lips. Ten thousand dollars is riding on that bet, but it’s not more important than her. Not more important than this.

I lick at the seam of her lips, and she parts them with a surprised gasp. Did she think she was safe from me? Did she think she was safe as long as we were watching boxing or playing poker? I want her too badly for that. I deepen the kiss, and she responds with a sweet submission that makes me hard as stone.

Male calculation takes over. How quickly can I get inside her? Is there an empty closet somewhere in this warehouse? Can we make it to the car and park somewhere private?

A nip at her bottom lip is a promise—a promise unfulfilled.

She pulls back, her cheeks flushed with arousal, her eyes bright with surprise.

Her shock checks me. She didn’t expect us to kiss, because we aren’t really dating. This is a wild night out for a woman who specifically has no interest in relationships. That’s why she needs to get her mom off her back. That’s why she needs this fake relationship.

Desire leaks from her expression, replaced with slight embarrassment.

Eva Morelli doesn’t kiss passionately in the middle of a crowd.

Except she did, with me. It makes me want to kiss her again, to prove the point.

Someone jostles her from the back. I catch her body securely against mine, but it’s enough to shatter the moment. The shouts of the crowd pour over us. Wagner is doing a bloodied and bruised victory lap around the outside of the ring. While we were kissing, he won.

Chapter Nine

Eva

Adrenaline runs through my veins, making me feel shaky and overbright.

Adrenaline from the fight.

Adrenaline from the kiss.

Finn held me as if the world were ending, as if the cacophony that surrounded us was an apocalypse, as if that was our last chance.

It strikes me now, as I look at his hard-set profile, that he often acts like that. The underground casino, the secret boxing match. There’s a desperate intensity to his actions, as if he knows there’s a ticking clock counting down his time.

“Why do you come here?” I ask.

After crowding the bookie for their winnings, people jammed the valet and parking lot to get out of here. Rather than fight the rush, Finn led me for a walk away from the warehouses, down to the dark, gravel beach. If you had a boat and followed the coast long enough, you’d eventually reach the dock where he keeps his boats. There are no boats here, though. No yachts. No cute little seafood shanties and gift shops. This isn’t precisely a good part of town. It isn’t a safe part of town, but somehow I feel safe with Finn.

That’s probably a mistake.

The intensity of the kiss proved there’s something deeper inside him, a grief, maybe even an anger, that he keeps behind a thick screen of charm and playboy insouciance.

“Because it’s a good time,” he says lightly, but I can tell now it’s a lie.

“It is a good time. In fact now I owe you fifty cents.” But I’m coming to know him better. Spending time together, even in a fake relationship, is giving me insights into the man behind the quirked half-smile. “I think there’s more to it than that, though. I think you seek out places like this, because you—”