Watch Me (Stepping Up 1)

“I do, too. You want to have phone sex?”

She laughed. “I’m not into phone sex, Sam.”

“Have you ever had phone sex?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know if you haven’t tried?”

“I don’t want to try. Though I can certainly imagine all kinds of things I’d do to you if you were here now.”

“Like what?”

“Sam, I’m not—”

“Humor me.”

“Fine. I’d be in charge. I’d make you undress—as in completely. I wouldn’t undress. Then I’d drop to my knees and lick—”

“Stop,” he ordered. “Bad idea after all. I’m driving, and you’re going to make me crash.”

“Or you don’t like the idea of me being in charge?”

“You want to play dominatrix, bring on the leather and whips. Just as long as you remember whatever torture you dish out, I plan to return tenfold.”

“Promises, promises.”

“That is a promise. You can count on it.”

She was so counting on it. And when they hung up, after talking about everything from Kiki to the odd ménage possibilities between Tabitha, Carrie, and Jensen, Sam’s brother and their relationship, and even how much Meagan had often wished for a sibling, she was still counting on it.

She couldn’t wait to test Sam, to discover her inner dominatrix and see just what his “tenfold” promise would reveal.

17

THE NEXT DAY CAME and the arguments over who got what room, while impossible to avoid, were easy to predict. When it looked as if Tabitha and Carrie might end up rooming together, Meagan vetoed it, in spite of Kiki’s approving the pairing. Ultimately, Carrie would be crushed if she lost this competition, and Meagan saw the writing on the wall—Tabitha would happily manipulate Carrie to ensure that Carrie failed and she succeeded. In the midst of this, Meagan reviewed the locations of cameras, and a list of house rules.

When it was all said and done, what Meagan hadn’t predicted was the somber mood that would overtake the group as they settled into the house. One of them would be gone in only a few days, eliminated at the first live show.

Prior to rehearsal at the studio, Meagan and Sam had managed a few steamy stares with, frustratingly, no hope of acting on the crackling energy anytime soon.

Per Sam’s instructions, at nearly ten that night, Meagan called him to report their approach to the house. He was determined to greet her, and the contestants, at the house, to personally ensure he prevented any problems for their first night’s stay.

The contestants filed up the stairs, with moans of aching bodies, and a need for bed. “I’m going, too,” Kiki said from the doorway. “I’m dead to the world.”

That left Meagan and Sam in the foyer of the main house, staring at one another. Suddenly, her tired body was alive and alert.

“And here I thought we’d never manage to be alone tonight,” he said, for her ears only.

“If only it were so easy.” She had this bad feeling about combusting into flames from wanting this man so badly. She motioned to their surroundings. “I have this terrible fear that this is an alternate universe, and once we step outside it, the real world will erupt around us.” And just like that—as if she had jinxed them—a female scream came from the top floor.

“You had to say that, didn’t you?” Sam asked, even as they charged toward the girls’ side of the house.

They found Tabitha and her assigned roommate—a redhead named Jenny Michaels—on top of the bed. “Mouse! We have a mouse.”

The hall filled with females, followed by shouts from the guys, who were also charging up the stairs.

Sam used a stern “soldier in charge” voice, and ordered them all to their rooms, and boy, was Meagan glad he did. Truth be told, she didn’t have that kind of energy.

And even if she had Sam alone, tonight was not the night for them. She wanted to be everything she could be, when she was with him again.

After they’d calmed everyone down except for Tabitha and Jenny, who were insisting they move to another room, Sam stopped Meagan in the hallway for a private chat. “You know the best answer to catching a mouse, don’t you?”

“If you mean a cat,” she said. “Samantha’s not quite ready for the job. She’s as small as a large mouse right now.”

“Ah, but we don’t need Samantha,” he said. “I found an adult cat today.”

“Really? Samantha’s mother maybe?”

“Maybe. Anyway, I say we put him to the test.”

“Bring on the mouser, so we can try and get some sleep.”

He motioned to the girls. “I’ll leave you to the…fun, while I fetch Mel to help.”

“Mel?”

“I didn’t have the heart to call him Meagan, despite the fierceness so like your own. But a man—even the tomcat version—can be sensitive about a name. And we need him feeling manly right now.”