Choosing the Right Man (NICE GIRL TO LOVE Book Three) (9 page)

Abby couldn’t breathe. Bracing her hands against the stall walls, she tried to keep the room from spinning even more than it was.

“Ooh, ooh! I heard Rachel got him for a one-nighter by just showing up at his house in a trench coat and crotchless panties. Ohmigosh, can you imagine his date wearing something like that?”

The women laughed.

Abby shut her eyes and fought the waves of nausea slamming into her. She could hear her own heartbeat thrumming in her ears, a gray haze blanketing her vision.

All those women…

One by one, she heard the women leaving. But she couldn’t get their voices to leave her head.

All those women…

And now she was trying to become one of them.

After emptying her dinner in the toilet, she went to the sink and stared at her reflection. Turning on the faucet, she cupped handfuls of water and splashed her face over and over again.

But no amount of water could wash all the ugliness of the past ten minutes away.

She grabbed a napkin and wiped away every last trace of the cosmetics on her face. Pulling a hair tie out of her purse, she jerked her hair back up into a ponytail. Half of it was drenched anyway.

Even if Connor didn’t want to leave yet, she was getting the hell out of the building.

“Abby, there you are.” Connor dropped his phone back into his pocket. “I was starting to think you abandoned me for the night.” He smiled, studying her hair. “Hey, you pulled it back. You look cute.”

Cute. As in gollie-gee-whiz adorable. The walls started closing in on her again.

His grin faded. “Are you okay, sweetie?”

“I’m feeling a little sick. Do you mind if I head home already? I’ll call a cab.”

“Don’t be silly. I’ll drive you.” He quickly took her purse and put a steadying hand on her back. “Do you want to sit down for a bit more? You look really pale.”

“No, I just want to go. Are you sure it’s okay for you to leave already? It’s not even nine o’clock. What about the party?”

He shrugged. “What about it?” His worried gaze deepened as it drifted over her face. “If you feel faint, let me know. I’ll carry you the rest of the way.”

For some reason, that caused a riot of laughter to hit her in the belly. And she couldn’t stop it. Her head started spinning again but this time it felt like it was floating away.

“Abby, I’m calling an ambulance. This looks serious.”

Finally the giggle fits stopped. “No, I’m fine. I just…have a really bad headache. It’s making me a little loopy.”

He opened the car door for her and gently helped her in.

Abby’s head was in complete disarray. How could this man be the same one the women were talking about earlier? It’s not that she wasn’t aware of Connor’s past. His one-month rule alone was a good indication. But just the sheer numbers were hard to wrap her brain around. After being with all those women, how could one woman ever be enough for him? She pressed her fingers into her temples.

“I don’t want you to stay alone tonight, Abby. If you’re not comfortable staying at my house, I can sleep on your couch and keep an eye on you there.” He paused for a beat before adding quietly, “Or I can drop you off at Brian’s if you’d prefer.”

She heard the hurt in his voice when he offered the last option and though a part of her was tempted to choose it, she shook her head. “I’ll be fine, Connor. Alone. But if I need to talk to someone, I promise I’ll call you.”

And while this was yet another fib to add to the stack this joint custody dating was racking up, this one, she truly wished she could deliver.

A
BBY WAS ALREADY HALFWAY ASLEEP
when she dropped down into bed to turn in for the night. And she was down to only a quarter consciousness when her phone rang.

“Hello?” she muttered sleepily into the receiver.

“I almost forgot how sexy you sound on the phone.”

She jolted awake in a flash. “Connor?”

“Glad to know you remember my voice,” he smiled over the phone line. “I was planning on waiting in bed all night for you to call me but
then
I remembered that I have fingers that can dial a phone number too.”

She valiantly fought back a smile. The man was entirely too charming for his own good. “Connor, really, I’m fine. I must have just eaten something funny.”

“Okay, then how about
you
keep
me
company on the phone. We can play a round of
Twenty Questions
,” he bulldozed right along. “Or rather, just the version where we have to answer each other’s questions no matter what.”

Oh, that was tempting. Not the answering part but the asking part, definitely.

“There are no off-limit questions…” he anted up lightly.

That sounded like a dare. What was it about talking on the phone that made things seem less dangerous than they probably were? “Okay, let’s play.”

“True or false?” he fired off quickly. “Everyone deserves a second chance.”

Geez, he was intending to play down and dirty stickball. Warily, she answered, “True.”

“Interesting. Okay, your turn.”

She asked the first question that came to mind. “Do you like strip clubs?”

He chuckled. “Depends.”

“Hey, no fair.” She glared at the phone. “That’s not an answer.”

“It is too,” he decreed. “You just need to make your questions more specific if you don’t want vague answers.” The last came out as a taunt.

Huffing, she sat up fully in bed. Now, it was on. “Fine. Your turn.”

“Yes or no? Do you still use that pink vibrator we played with in the tub that one night?”

She gasped. “Do you really expect me to answer that?”

“I’d reply, but then I’ll have to count that as one of your twenty questions.”

Argh!
“Fine. No, I haven’t. I…can’t seem to bring myself to.”

A long pause, and then a gentle, “Your turn.”

“Have you slept with anyone since September?” Without realizing she was doing it, she held her breath.

“No, I haven’t,” he answered softly. “I haven’t wanted to, either.”

Oh. “Your turn.”

“Do you miss me?” Now it sounded like he was the one holding his breath.

“Yes,” she admitted. “As much I did the day you left. More, maybe.”

For a while, neither of them spoke.

And then he broke the ice again, “It’s your turn to ask me a question, sweetheart.”

Heart in her throat, she asked the question she’d wondered over more days than she cared to admit. “If I’d come to you during the months you stayed away, what would you have done?”

He didn’t even hesitate. “I would’ve locked you in my house and asked you to never leave again,” he replied quietly.

Holy swizzle sticks.

“My turn. There was a day last fall when I saw you as I was getting some Chinese take-out in town. Did you see me, too?”

She sucked in a sharp breath. So he
had
seen her. “Yes. And I jumped into a Brazilian wax shop to avoid you.”

“I know,” he let out a weary breath. “You don’t know how many nights of sleep I lost thinking about that day.”

“Really? Why?”

“Honey, the shop you ran into had a poster advertising 30+ different wax designs. I can guarantee you that I had at least 30+ hot nights being tormented by the possibilities.”

She flushed. Right, of course. The designs. The shop had a flipbook of photos they’d shoved in her hands that day and she’d had to pretend to flip through them while she was hiding out.

Most awkward day ever.

Speaking of awkward. May as well ask the question that had been plaguing her all night.

“Yes or no. Do you truly believe one woman would be enough for you…someday?”

“Yes. If it’s the right woman.” His voice dropped an emotional octave. “And if it’s the woman I’m thinking it is, I believe she’ll be more than just ‘enough’ for me.”

Wow.

A weighty pause, and then he came back with, “Do you ever think about that last time we slept together?”

Darn him. “No.”

“Liar.” The playful tone was back. “You know, there are penalties for lying in this game.”

“Okay, fine. Yes.”

“Too late. It’s time to pay your fine.” He was doing an impressive job sounding matter-of-fact about this.

Covering up the smile in her voice, she asked warily, “What’s the fine?”

“Describe that night for me. I want to see it in your eyes.”

“Connor—” They were treading dangerously close to crossing a line.

His voice sobered then. “I took it too far, I’m sorry honey. Let’s go back to the game.”

But it was too late. All the vivid memories of that night came barreling into her brain, one after the other until it was all her mind’s eye could see. “I-I…I remember you kissing the inside of my thigh…” Her heart raced just recalling the image.

“Sweetheart, we don’t have to do this.” His voice was strained tight.

“It’s not phone sex if we don’t do anything with our hands, right? If we just talk?” she asked, not entirely sure she could keep to those constraints at this point.

“I guess not. But honey, any memory of you would inevitably lead to my needing to ‘finish the job.’ You’re so damn sexy I get hard just thinking about you.”

A quick burst of heat shot through her. “Then we’ll stop if it gets that far.”

“No promises,” he hedged.

She’d take it. “I remember that I was wearing a pair of black satin panties.”

“That were held together by bows at your hips,” he finished.

She slipped her hands up above her head and held onto her pillow to keep them from straying. “You lifted me up and put me on top of the dresser with the mirror...and then you let me touch you.”

His breathing picked up over the phone line.

“We both watched in the mirror as I wrapped my hand around you—”

“Abby,” he groaned. “Honey, I’m about two seconds away from not being able to stop at all.”

So she remained silent. But her mind didn’t. Heat sparked over the phone line as she remembered what it felt like to feel his bare skin brushing against her breasts. His large frame bracketing hers as he settled between the vee of her legs and ground himself against her, anchored her mouth to his while he thrust into her slippery heat.

Eyes shut, she arched into the memory, felt his tongue and teeth as he’d latched onto a nipple and took her to the brink with just that stimulation alone. He’d been relentless, driving into her over and over again, harder and deeper, until she’d clamped down on his rigid length to keep from spinning into oblivion as her orgasm began crashing over her.

“Connor,” she gasped too far gone in the memory. “I can’t stop.”

“Then don’t,” he replied hoarsely. “
Come for me, Abby
.”

The words were straight out of her most private dreams, only infinitely more potent live. She clutched the blankets as shivers of electricity shot down her core. Blinding, white-hot pleasure built to a crest that slammed into her in a wave so intense she cried out when she never cried out. Her body arched as the unexpected release charged through her, whipping all around, throwing her into a vortex of twisting pleasure she’d never felt before. It swept through her, jolting her again and again, a mindless bliss that exploded across her senses, and shattered her into a thousand pieces.

He’d made her come just by his voice alone.

“God, I wish I were there with you, sweetheart,” rumbled Connor into the phone.

“I do too,” she whispered, feeling the truth in that throughout every cell in her body.

C
ONNOR WAS PROBABLY IN THE BEST MOOD
he’d been in months. Sure, he’d used up nearly all the cold water in his house last night—something he didn’t think was possible—but he’d also been privy to one of the sexiest things he’d ever not-witnessed in his entire life.

An extremely fair exchange.

“Hey, Connor. You have a minute?”

Seeing that his firm’s best investigator had one of his magic folders in his hand, he made the time. He pushed the intercom on his phone. “Laura, hold my calls for the next half hour.”

Motioning for Jay to sit, he opened up the folder. “What case is this for?”

“Your father’s.”

Frowning, he tossed the folder back. “I’m not getting involved.”

Jay shoved it over again. “You need to read this, buddy.”

Puzzled at his intensity, Connor flipped the file open and scanned the first document in the pile. His eyes flew up a second later and his hand shot out to grab Jay by the throat. “What the hell are you doing investigating Abby?”