I cringe. “Why the fuck do they call them that?”
She waves her hand. “An unfortunate name, whatever. Focus.”
I open my eyes wider. “Focused.”
She frowns, concentrating on me. Without warning, she stabs my hair with her fingers and musses it all up. “Good thing you haven’t shaved, the stubble will do,” she says, continuing to appraise me. “But your pants are too nice. Do you have anything else in your bag?”
“Jeans.”
She jerks her thumb at the back. “Get them. I mean, please,” she says with a smile at the warning look I give her.
I shimmy out of my pants and am bending over the back of the seat to get my suitcase when she smacks my ass.
That’s it.
In two seconds flat, I’m back in the driver’s seat. Her chest meets my thighs right here in the cramped interior of the car as I yank her over my lap.
“Not here! You perv!”
“Then are you gonna quit bossing me around, or what?” I give her a good whack that makes her arch her back and squirm.
“Okay, okay! I will. Ouch!” I give her another warning smack. “Got it. I will, now stop before someone notices!”
She scowls at me when I unceremoniously dump her back in her seat. “You could get someone’s attention that way,” she hisses.
“That was exactly my point.”
Chapter 19
Sam
I hope my affronted look makes it uber-clear to him how very uncool it is to spank a detective before she’s about to do a job. Ahem. Seriously, dude.
I furthermore hope it masks my raging need to undress him and jump him, right here in his car, but it seems it does neither of those things at all, because he brushes his lap as if he’s pleased with himself as he rights me next to him. Who gave him permission to be so much bigger so he can just toss me around like this?
And why is that so hot?
He clears his throat. “Now, where were we?”
I cross my arms over my chest. “Mighty proud of yourself, aren’t you?”
“Gonna smack my ass again anytime soon?”
I shrink back, pulse racing. “Well. No.” I clear my throat. “As you’ll recall, you were changing out of those too-nice pants and putting something a little more trashy on, before you decided it was a great time to manhandle the fuck out of me.”
He quirks a brow, and my heart does the little butterfly flutter thing.
Jerk.
Maddening, sexy-as-sin jerk.
“Maybe you need to be manhandled more often.”
“And perhaps I do not.” I’m afraid my haughtiness is unconvincing. “Miguel,” I say, more seriously now. “As… fun as this is, and as much as I’m dying to be alone with you in the hotel room again… we don’t want to miss our chance here.”
“Agreed. Let’s go.” He quickly scoots into the back and I clench my hand to avoid squeezing his perfect, tight ass cheeks when he flips himself over the seat to get to his clothes.
I look him over. “You still look too sexy. Too… coiffed or something.”
“Babe, it has more to do with how you carry yourself than what you’re wearing if you wanna give off a certain vibe.”
“And what vibe are you going for?”
He looks me straight in the eyes. “If you touch my girl, I’ll break your fingers.”
“Haha.” He doesn’t smile. Shit, he isn’t joking.
I nod. Okay, alright then. I can roll with that.
“Any other props?”
He nods, then grabs a pair of sunglasses from the car door pocket, puts them on, and frowns at me.
“Oh, yeah. Now you’re talking. I don’t suppose you have a smoke in here?”
“A smoke? You’re really taking this seriously.”
“Of course I am!” Why wouldn’t I?
“No,” he says. “I don’t smoke. Do you? Do they even still call it that?”
“No idea, and I used to, but no, not anymore.”
“Really? You are a former smoker?”
“Can we please talk about this later?” I open my car door as he opens his.
“Oh, we will,” he says in that deliciously menacing way that makes my panties dampen. Gods.
He’s always looking for a reason to dominate the hell out of me (not that I’m complaining), and it looks like I’ve just given him one. If I think long enough, I’ll give him a few more. But now, I have a job to do.
The bar’s dimly lit when we enter. The lingering smell of cigarettes makes me nearly choke at the door, since no one’s allowed to smoke in here. They push the limit, though, one lady even has one foot literally in the door and another out as she blows a smoke ring right near my face. I hold my breath until we’re inside.
“Still wish I had a smoke?” Miguel whispers in my ear.
“Ew, no,” I whisper back.
There’s a rowdy game of pool to the left, and a tiny, crowded dance floor to the right, with a crush of half-dressed, barely-legal women dancing.