Kiss Me, Baby - Vegas, Baby

1

Amelia

“C’mon, Amelia, don’t be a stick in the mud. Pick a dare instead of truth.”

I wanted to stomp my foot in frustration, but I’d probably end up spraining my ankle since my cousin talked me into wearing three-inch spiky heels when I usually went with flats or wedges. The only thing worse was the sparkly halter top and skinny jeans she’d forced me to pour myself into. But I couldn’t say no—not when we were in Vegas for her bachelorette party. Unfortunately, agreeing to stuff I didn’t want to do had been the theme of the day, which didn’t bode well for me. This was only the first day of our trip, and odds were good the stuff she wanted me to do was going to get worse as time went on.

Being the only sober one in the bunch was turning out to be a lot less fun than I’d expected—and my bar had already been set pretty low. But I was Maria’s maid of honor, so I couldn’t skip out on the trip.

“Are you sure you want to keep playing truth or dare?” I asked for about the tenth time in the past hour. “We’re almost at the hotel, and it’s been a long day.”

“No excuses!” cried one of Maria’s friends from college.

“Yeah, pick a dare!” the others chimed in.

“Fine,” I huffed. “Dare.”

Maria’s eyes lit up, and she rubbed her hands together in excitement. “I want you to kiss a guy before we get back to the suite.”

Kiss a guy?! I figured whatever she’d dare me to do was going to be outside my comfort zone, but I hadn’t expected her to tell me to accost a stranger. Especially when she knew darn well that I was a virgin. Not that she was daring me to have sex with some guy I picked up off the street, but still. Maria knew me well enough to know how weird I’d feel going up to some guy and laying a kiss on him. Then I brightened as I had an idea—maybe if I kept the kiss PG, I wouldn’t die of embarrassment.

Maria crushed my hopes when she added, “And it has to be a real kiss on the lips with tongue.”

I wrinkled my nose and heaved a deep sigh, my shoulders dropping as I trudged along with Maria and the rest of her bridal party. The next six blocks were torture. My feet were killing me, and the girls pointed out about a dozen guys they thought I should kiss. By the time we were less than a block away from our hotel, I was starting to seriously worry about how much they’d all had to drink because their picks were terrible. The last one had been walking into an attorney’s office whose awning advertised quickie divorces. He’d been wearing a tux, and the woman with him was still in her bridal gown. Presumably, the guy had gotten married last night and already regretted the decision. Kissing him in front of the woman he was about to divorce was out of the question because I definitely didn’t need that kind of drama in my life.

“There’s no way she’s going to do it,” one of the bridesmaids mumbled.

“Probably not,” Maria agreed before lifting the bottle of the one hundred and ninety-two proof Polish vodka she’d snagged at the ice bar we’d hit up before calling it a night. “But I’m cool with that too because then she’ll have to take a shot in a forfeit. That will be almost as funny because Amelia isn’t much of a drinker, and this stuff is like jet fuel.”

I grimaced, reminding myself that my cousin really did love me even if she wasn’t showing it in the best way at the moment. She’d had more than her fair share of that vodka, along with several other drinks tonight. Blaming her teasing on the alcohol, I was almost ready to call off her harebrained dare and take a swig from the bottle when I spotted him—the only man I could picture myself kissing tonight…or any night, for that matter.

He strode out of the hotel and casino directly next door to the one where we were staying. He was wearing a black suit that looked as though it had been tailored to fit his tall body. His dark hair was overdue for a cut, and my fingers itched to run through it, and I could practically feel the scruff on his face scraping against my soft skin. Something about this man had my dormant libido roaring to life.

As his head turned in our direction and his dark eyes met mine, I whispered, “I’m not going to need the vodka.”

“Huh? What’d you say?” Maria asked, her brow wrinkling in confusion.

“You’re not going to get the chance to see me drinking that jet fuel.” I sped up my pace, stepping as carefully as I could in the shoes that were bound to land me in the emergency room if she made me wear them again. Glancing over my shoulder, I added, “I accepted the dare, and I’m going to go through with it.”