Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
Reese checked the clock impatiently, glaring when she read eight o’clock. If she had known Knight was going to be so late, she would have run to the store and bought some clothes. Instead, she’d showered and washed her thong in the sink. Now she was starting to get annoyed. And hungry.
The phone rang. “Hello?”
“I need to talk to you.”
“Where are you? It’s eight o’clock. I’m dying of hunger, my stomach is digesting the lining of its walls.”
“I thought we said I’d pick you up at eight.”
“I don’t remember eight. We never said eight.”
“Reese, we have more important things to talk about than what time it is. I’ll be over in half an hour.” His voice was tight.
Whatever he wanted to talk about couldn’t be as important as her suffering through another day of wearing the same pajama pants. “Swing by your apartment and get me some clothes, will you?”
“What?”
“I have nothing to wear and I want to go out to dinner. Grab me a pair of your jeans or something and a T-shirt.”
There was a long silence where Knight’s strangled breathing filled the phone. He seemed a little tense.
“What’s the matter? Did you have a bad day?”
“You could say that.”
“So let’s make it a better night.” One or two, or a thousand different ways to do that popped into her head. All involving her and Knight naked.
“I’ll be over as soon as I can.”
Derek had started to suspect he’d lost his head over Reese, now it was confirmed. She had gone behind his back, infiltrated Delco Pharmaceutical, potentially compromising his case, and yet he was standing in front of her hotel room holding a bundle of fresh clothes for her to wear.
Insane, that’s what he was.
He pounded on the door vehemently.
Reese opened it, standing in her pajamas. “Good, you brought the clothes! You’re so nice.”
Nice was not what he was feeling.
Handing the bundle over to her, he stepped into the room. “Why didn’t you just order yourself some clothes?”
“I’m not made of money, Knight.”
“I would have thought you would with your new job and all,” he said carefully.
“What?”
Trying not to yell, he said, “Would you care to explain to me what you were doing in Delco’s board meeting this afternoon?”
Reese halted in her tracks in front of the bathroom door. “You know that already? Geez, that was fast. How did you know?”
Derek’s blood pressure shot up. She sounded so nonchalant, he found himself saying in exasperation, “Your voice was a dead giveaway.”
Reese broke into a smile. “You’re recording the Delco meetings? That is so cool. Did you get anything good today? Because I didn’t hear anything good. They just run on at the mouth as far as I can tell.”
Well, he had walked right into that trap. Now Reese knew what they were doing in the investigation, something he had never intended to tell her.
“I can’t tell you, Reese.” There were only so many ways he could say that, and yet she persisted in trying to pump him for information.
She shucked her pajama pants and shook out the jeans he’d brought her. And despite how totally pissed he was at her running into this investigation headlong with New York attitude flying, his mouth went dry at the sight of her in her panties, long smooth legs touching distance from him.
“That’s why I had to take matters into my own hands. So I called Chatterton and he gave me a job. Now I can gather evidence for my story and for you. If Markson trips up, I can help out. I’m your insider now, Knight. Isn’t that great?”
If that was her idea of great, he’d hate to see bad.
His hand automatically went to his pocket for his antacids. But when he’d gone home, he’d changed into jeans and had left them in his suit jacket.
“Reese, honey, babe, that is not a good thing. You can’t be a reporter and my girlfriend and working for Chatterton, all while being aware that meetings are being recorded. There’s about half a dozen different ways that would be a conflict of interest and probably illegal.”
She paused while pulling his jeans onto her narrow hips. “I’m your girlfriend? Since when?”
That’s what she had pulled out of that whole explanation? “Since we started seeing each other every day, taking meals together, and sharing a bed. I think that would be called dating by most people’s standards. ”
Reese zipped the jeans, buttoned the button, and let go. They promptly slid back down to her hipbones, where they came to a saggy rest. “Give me your belt,” she said, holding out her hand.
Derek did as he was told, undoing his black leather belt and silently handing it to her.
“Because you know, I’m not sure that I ever agreed to be your girlfriend. That implies exclusivity and a commitment to continue seeing each other. That’s very different from dating or hooking up.”
He could not believe they were having this conversation. “So what are you saying? You want to have sex with someone else? You don’t want to see me anymore?”
Cinching the belt on the last hole, she frowned. “Well, no.”
The breath he’d been holding let go with a whoosh. If she had said she wanted to let some other asshole put his hands on her gorgeous body, he would have punched a hole in the wall. “Then you’re my girlfriend. End of story.”
Her eyebrow shot up. “Well, aren’t you getting all caveman.”
Nothing was ever easy, and this only confirmed that maxim. He rubbed his temple. “Look, I’ve had a long day and I’m not exactly sure what we’re even talking about.”
Her belligerence disappeared. “Oh, I’m sorry.” Her hand patted his cheek. “Let’s go eat, then. You look tired and hungry. But you know, I just think I object to the phrase girlfriend.”
Sticking her arms in one of his long sleeve button-up shirts, she added, “It’s just so intense or something.”
Watching the sleeves swallow her, he reached over and rolled one up, then the other, tugging the ends together more over her tank top. “What should I call you, then? My lover?”
Still gripping the shirt, he could feel her breasts beneath the soft fabric, pushing against him, her nipples taut and teasing.
He had stepped into her space and was leaning over her, leg inserted between her thighs, and the fresh smell of her shower enveloped him.
This close, he could see her hair was still damp, not as wet as it had been that first night he’d met her, but damp underneath, where it caressed her skin.
“How about just your friend?” Reese looked up at him from beneath those mink colored lustrous eyelashes, a dusting of freckles beneath each eye noticeable on her makeup-free face.
Burying his head in her neck, he kissed her, trailing his tongue downward, leaving a wet path of possession behind him. “Friends don’t do this.”
He dragged her tank top down and covered the rounded top swell of her breast with his mouth.
Then he sucked. Hard. Wanting to mark her, to claim her, to say yes, no matter what the hell she wanted to call it, for as long as she was in Chicago, and as long as they both wanted it, she was his.
Exclusively his, and he was hers. They wouldn’t be with anyone else, and they would date, and they would spend each night they had together, pleasuring each other until that explosion of lust they felt in each other’s presence was gone, eradicated, saturated, satisfied.
“Oohh,” she said, eyes drifting shut.
His jeans were so loose on her that his whole hand fit between her stomach and the pants, and he reached down inside and cupped her mound, sliding across the satin of her panties.
Heat met him, pouring out from the center of her, spilling into his hands, and he pushed against the panties, sliding his finger an inch or so inside her despite the barrier.
Thoughts of dinner disappeared. “Let’s stay here and order room service.”
“No,” she murmured. “I want to go out.” She gave a halfhearted tug at his hand down her pants. “Stop it, Knight.”
“Okay.” He stopped and went to remove his hand.
“Shit, don’t stop!” Reese grabbed his elbow and guided him back down.
He laughed. He loved her honesty, especially when it was what he wanted to hear.
“Okay, Knight, let’s have a competition. If you win, we’ll stay in.” Reese spoke while moving his hand up and down, rubbing him against her.
Derek gripped the back of her head with his other hand, aching for her, turned on by her desire for him. There was nothing shy about Reese and how she wanted him, and he couldn’t imagine anything sexier.
“If I win, we’ll go out.”
“What’s the competition?” He figured he would agree to just about anything at this point.
He pressed again, sliding her panties into her, his finger coming back wet, hot from her moist heat.
“It’s simple.” She clung to him, rocking herself onto his questing, stretching, reaching finger.
“Whoever comes first loses.”
Given the way she was responding to him right now, Derek nearly laughed out loud. “This isn’t like arm wrestling. I’ll win this one, Reese.”
Without warning she squeezed his rock solid cock with one hand, yanking the zipper of his jeans down cleanly with the other. “Don’t bet on it.”
Her fingers moved at the same time his did, and Derek decided there was no such thing as an easy win.