CHAPTER 1 - BEAU
Five Months Earlier
The dimly lit hotel bar is mostly empty, which suits me just fine.
I drop onto a stool at the far end of the long, polished countertop, away from the cluster of businessmen nursing beers near the television, and signal the bartender. She's mid-fifties with a no-nonsense air that I appreciate, sliding a whiskey in front of me without attempting small talk.
The drive from Silverpeak took longer than expected.
Some accident on the highway turned a three-hour trip into five, and I'm feeling every minute of it in the tension knotting my shoulders.
Traffic jams are no fun at the best of times, let alone when you have an angry fugitive handcuffed in the rear of your cabin.
Still, I managed to pick up my bounty and collect the keys for my new office space.
If nothing else, the last 24 hours have shown me it’s definitely time to start building something legitimate.
Here in my home town, where I can hopefully begin the process of repairing the damage my father did to our family’s name.
A fresh start. That's what this is supposed to be.
The television above the bar is tuned to local news, the volume low but audible. A polished anchor speaks with exaggerated concern while a photo fills the right hand side of the screen. Young woman, mid-twenties, bright smile.
"...still no leads in the disappearance of actress Amber Reeves, who was last seen almost three days ago. Police are asking anyone with information on the whereabouts of the young actress..."
I tune it out and bring the glass to my lips, sighing as the soothing burn of the amber liquid slides down my neck.
Just as I gesture for another, the door opens behind me, letting in a gust of cool air and the woman who's about to turn my life upside down.
I don't know her, but the second I see that red hair and fiery expression, I know I want to.
She takes the stool two down from mine and orders a gin and tonic without looking at the menu.
When it arrives, in something that looks more like a goldfish bowl than a glass, she smiles, her entire expression softening.
When she exhales, relaxing, her shoulders lower from her ears and she rolls them back, stretching her neck, letting go of the worries of the day.
Then she catches me watching, and her softer side vanishes again immediately. "What?"
"Nothing." I turn back to my whiskey. "Rough day?"
"You could say that." She slides a bill over the bar and takes a long swallow. "Not that you’d know. You’ve never had colleagues who treat you like you're invisible? Like your opinions don't matter because you're not part of their little boys' club?"
"I work alone, so I can't say that I have." As her full, rose pink lips move, I stare, obsessed with how they form each word. How they pout when I admit I know nothing of her woes.
"Lucky you." She gestures at the television, where Amber Reeves's photo is still displayed. "Everyone's assuming she ran off with some millionaire, that she'll turn up on a yacht in Monaco looking sheepish. Or in rehab. But what if they’re wrong?"
“They probably are.”
She turns to look at me properly for the first time. Blue eyes, sharp and assessing, cataloguing everything from my worn leather jacket to the stubble I didn't bother shaving this morning. Whatever she sees makes her mouth curve into something that's not quite a smile.
"You’re just agreeing with me to get on my good side."
"Is it working?" I venture, because I really fucking hope it is.
Red laughs, warm and infectious, and shakes her head in amusement.
"Maybe." She extends her hand, meeting my eye in a way few others dare to. “Are you always this shameless?”
I take her hand. Her grip is firm, her pale skin warm against mine.
It's subtle at first, just a prickle of awareness that travels up my arm and settles somewhere behind my sternum.
But when her eyes widen slightly, when her breath catches and her fingers tighten around mine, I know she feels it too.
“No. I’m just gripped by a sudden desire to please you,” I admit.
Not quite sure where those words came from, I brazen it out, loving how her cheeks pink ever so slightly as she considers what else I might mean by that.
"Mysterious," she manages, her voice slightly huskier than it was before. "And eager. I like it."
“Honest,” I correct, no laughter in my eyes now. She needs to know I’m deathly serious. The overwhelming urge to do anything she wants, anything to see that smile or hear her laugh again, grips me.
"Well, I’m not in the mood for talking, I'm afraid." She doesn’t look away. “No matter how adorable you are.”
Heat flickers through my chest, then lower.
"You think I’m adorable?" That’s not a word anyone has used to describe me before. Ever. Serious? Yes. Grumpy? Definitely yes. But never adorable.
"I think you know exactly how adorable you are." Her gaze drops to my mouth, and the prickle of awareness becomes a full-body hum.
“Not handsome? Charming? Single?”
She laughs again and fuck, I feel like punching the air in victory. "Are you making a move on me, Whiskey? Because I already told you. I’m not in the mood for small talk.”
She's right. She did.
"I am. But believe me, Red.” I wind a strand of her hair around my finger and watch, fascinated, as the shiny lock slides between them when I pull on it. “Nothing I’m thinking about doing with you involves talking."
She leans closer, and I catch something floral under the gin, something warm and female that makes my head swim. "Maybe you’re not my type."
I close the distance between us. “Give me a chance and I’ll make me your type.”
Her eyes flash as she snags the front of my shirt and pulls me to her.
The first brush of her lips against mine is electric.
A jolt that travels straight down my spine and pools hot in my gut.
She inhales sharply, her free hand coming up to grip my collar, and the soft questioning pressure becomes something else entirely.
“What the hell am I doing?” she murmurs against my lips as she lets me take charge, cupping the back of her head and deepening the kiss. The sound she makes, this breathy little moan that vibrates against my tongue, nearly undoes me right there at the bar.
When we break apart, we're both breathing hard. Her pupils are blown wide, her lips already swollen, and she's looking at me like she's just as stunned as I am.
"That was..." She trails off, swallowing.
"Yeah." I don't have better words either.
Her hand slides into my jacket pocket, finding the keycard. She pulls it out and examines the room number, and her voice comes out husky when she speaks.
"I hope you don't have a roommate."
"Just me."
"Good boy." She slides off her stool, keycard in hand, and heads for the elevator.
I follow, eyes fixed on her curvy waist and long legs.
The elevator doors close, and she's on me, her mouth finding mine with devastating accuracy, her body pressing against me from chest to thigh.
I grip her hips and lift, pinning her against the wall of the elevator, and she wraps her legs around my waist like she was made to fit there.
The friction drags a groan from somewhere deep in my chest.
"God." She tears her mouth away to gasp the word against my throat. "What is this?"
I don't know. I've had attraction before, chemistry, but nothing like this. Nothing that feels like a live wire running through every nerve ending, making my skin too tight and my blood too hot.
"Don't care," I manage, grinding against her. "Don't stop."
The elevator dings and the metal doors slide open to a mercifully empty corridor. We barely make it to the room.
I fumble the keycard twice before the lock clicks, and then we're inside, all pretense of self-control abandoned at the threshold.
Her back hits the door hard enough to rattle the frame.
I've got her shirt off before it fully closes, my hands shoving the fabric down her arms while her fingers tear at my shirt.
"Off," she demands, tugging at the hem.
I pull back just long enough to yank it over my head, and immediately, her hands are on my chest, palms skating over muscle, nails dragging lightly down my stomach.
Everywhere she touches sparks and burns, and when she leans in to press her mouth to the hollow of my throat, tonguing the skin there, my vision actually blurs.
"Christ." My voice doesn't sound like mine. "You're going to kill me."
"Not yet." She nips at my collarbone, then soothes it with her tongue, before biting me even harder. "I haven't even started."
Somehow her bra is gone too and she's bare from the waist up, flushed and beautiful in the dim light filtering through the curtains.
"Look at you." The words come out reverent, almost pained. I’ve never seen anything as stunning.
She shivers under my gaze, nipples tightening. "Touch me. Please."
I cup her breasts, feeling the weight of them in my palms, running my thumbs across her nipples and watching her arch into the contact. She's so responsive, every touch drawing a gasp or a moan, her body singing under my hands like an instrument I already know how to play.
It doesn't make sense. We've never met, but somehow my body knows exactly what she needs before she asks for it.
I drop my mouth to her throat, kissing and licking my way down to her collarbone, her chest, the soft swell of her breasts. When I close my lips around one peaked nipple and suck, she cries out and her hands fist in my hair hard enough to sting.
"More." Her hips rock against me, desperate for friction. "I need more."
I hitch her higher against the door, one arm bracing her weight while the other works the zipper of her skirt. It falls in a pool at our feet, followed by scraps of lace that were probably expensive and are definitely ruined now.
The first touch of my fingers against her slick heat makes us both groan.