Stone: At Your Service (Carolina Bad Boys #1) (11 page)

I stifled a laugh.
“You’re leading?”

“
For a change, Butch.”

We shuffled next to one another, grinning when the oboe cued in. The Charleston for two men from Charleston was a cakewalk. We had it in the bag, not that it was a contest but my be-the-best competitive streak wasn
’t something I could turn off, unless it was be-the-best boyfriend material.

Keeping up with the fast moves, we had little time to exchange barbs especially with Jules targeting us with the camera. The quicker we danced, the harder we smiled
. Whistles and claps joined the music.

The song ending, Nicky performed his back dip
move on me again. I clung to him in hopes he didn’t marble-floor my ass. It probably looked like I loved this shit. The ladies certainly ate it up.

“
OMG! I want to be in the middle of that Manwich!” Someone squealed from the background.

Nicky
took me out of the back dive, his shoulders jerking with laughter.

Janice
was right next to us, hair and glasses askew, mouthing and pointing at her cell, “Trending now!”

Jesus Christ, Javier had met his match
. I was gonna make sure the two of them were never in the same fricking room together.

“
Nice moves, Nicky.” I ran my hand around his waist, just happy we hadn’t been made to kiss for the camera.

“
I learned from the best.” He knocked against my shoulder.

Like me, Nicky had gotten
a crash course in manners, mechanics, and cutting a rug from my parents. When his well-to-do, devil-may-care parents had decided they’d had enough of childrearing as soon as he hit sixteen, they Euro-toured it. They left him on his mimi’s lowcountry doorstep and he’d become an instant Stone adoptee.

Jules
Gem swirled her finger in the air, and it was time for the switch up. I located Leelee, struggling in LaForge’s clutches. I did not want her tangling with him during the tango, especially since megaphone-mouth had added canoodling to the mix.

I waved off Janice, Missy,
Jacqueline. I pushed through the crowd, intent on Leelee alone. The music started: hot, fast, and sensual. LaForge had his hands all over her, and I was two Latin dance steps away from wrapping my fingers around his windpipe. Coming up behind him, I trapped his foot with my leg. I twisted his jacket down his arms—with flair—and pushed him onto his knees. Splatting him face first to the floor with my hand to the back of his skull, I stepped over him.

It was all part of the dance, right?
“Oops, my bad.”

My hips moving in time to the music, I approached Leelee. Her horror
from the moment before faded into a hesitant smile.

“
May I have this dance?” I offered her my hand.

Her fingers
laced between mine. “I’d be delighted.”

We danced through the
seductive arrangement, liquid as water, hot as fire. With Leelee’s back to my front, my lips lingered too close to her bare shoulder. Her hips guided me against her bottom. Swiveling around, she flicked her dangerous heels between and behind my feet, matching every single one of my moves with a sinful come-hither combination of her own. Her eyes sparkled. A teasing smile canted her mouth.

I whipped her around on my hip, the slit of her dress parting up her thigh. My hand skimmed her sleek leg until I met soft bare flesh
above the thigh-high fishnets. When her neck dropped back, my mouth was there. A solid shock went through me, an electric current racing to my cock. Slanted against me, Leelee slid down my thigh all the way to the floor.

I
’d watched my folks dance so many nights, the kitchen table shoved out of the way, my dad singing in low tones as they swept around the room. I’d seen their connection but had never felt the same myself. Not with Claire, not with my Friday night babes. Leelee sang to every single part of me until my body felt singed with fire and all my thoughts revolved around her.

When she ran her palms up my arms and over my shoulders,
I held her closer. “Maybe you should think about filing a complaint against LaForge.”

She shook her head.
She kept her face hidden against my throat until I tipped her chin up, spanning my fingers over her cheek as the song stampeded around us. The fear in her eyes unnerved me.

“
Why not?”

“
He has too many connections. As a pro he could ruin me overnight, and I’m just getting up to speed with my career.”

“
I don’t like the idea of him sleazing all over you,” I gritted out.

“
I’m a big girl, Stone. And you said it yourself, you’re nobody’s knight in
—
”

Anger and shame boiled over inside me
. “I know what I said, and I was a dick.”

“
No one’s been there for me before, Patrick never was.” Her fingertips skimmed my neck, spurring reckless need.

“
He’s a dick too.” I spun her a few times, getting a contact high off her giggle.

The provocative song continued.
Tight steps, smoldering looks. I bowed her back, pivoted her to me. She knew the rhythm as well as I did.

Fingers filtering through the short strands of her hair, I tugged
Leelee to me. “You almost had me fooled with this.”

“
Did I?” she flirted.

“
Yeah, but I prefer you red.” I looked from her enchanting eyes all the way down her body to the killer heels.

“
Why, Stone, I didn’t think you were into the guy-girl thing.” Her light laugh tensed all the muscles in my groin until they were taut enough to snap.

Leelee
’s gyrating hips were about three inches away from finding out just how much I was into the guy-girl thing. How much I was into her.
My grip became tighter on her hand and waist.

She rode up from a low roll all along my leg, snapping her heel, tilting her head . . . and I was dead. Everyone
else in the room disappeared. I deepened my stance before running my lips alongside her mouth. Our breath met. Our lips opened. The temptation too great, I twirled her away.

Some drunk fuck blundered into us, shoving us together. The near-miss kiss became a hot mesh of mouths.
Canoodle?
Hot arousal pounded through me when I tasted Leelee’s lips on mine. I grabbed her ass and dove into her mouth, practically mounting her on a table.

“
Aaaaand
cut!” Jules called out just when my erection was about to detonate.

Leelee broke our kiss with a stunned look.
“What was that, Stone? You’re gay!” She pushed me away from her. “It’s just for promotions, right?”

“
Yeah, promotions,” I muttered.

“
You’re a natural, Stone! You absolutely
have
to be in the cover model contest,” Jules squealed beside us.

I batted
Jules and her bullhorn away from my face. Lifting Leelee’s hand, I brought it just below my lips in formal thanks—and dropped it.

“
Stone?” Her confused voice cut me up.

I stiffened my shoulders and headed toward Nicky.
“I can’t walk you to your door tonight, lady.”

Joining Nicky at the usual table,
I spackled on a smile for my buddy as I listened to Leelee’s heels snicking away. The gut-deep arousal I couldn’t act on ate a hole through my stomach, but it wasn’t half as bad as the horrible tightness in my chest. I would never have Leelee. I wasn’t good enough for a woman like her. Hell, my own wife had walked out on me.

Thursday
: Mm Mmm (Not) Good

THANKFULLY, AFTER I GAVE Leelee the old heave-ho—a
so long, unlucky lady
move I’d perfected down to the don’t-care-stare—the night wound down quickly. No one was the wiser, but who knew how long that would last since Jules’s RAWR creation had gone up all over the Internet. And being the masochistic prick I was, I really wanted to see our kiss myself. A hundred times over. Then I wanted to run head first into one of the fancy marble columns in Con central command, because I’d fucked up with Leelee and potentially with Nicky too.

She wasn
’t just a piece of tail I could screw and move on from. All the signs so far pointed to romance with a capital
R
, and I’d never let myself get into this position before. The fact it was happening now, when I couldn’t make a move if I wanted to, put a big neon billboard over the signs, reading: Josh Stone is Screwing the Pooch but Good. Add in the fact Nicky was my best bud and I was here to be his fake lover, and it all spelled Gargantuan Disaster.

In our room, I shucked my shoes and
, shedding my clothes down to briefs, flopped onto the bed.

“
What was that
mm mmm
stuff y’all were talkin’ about earlier?” I asked Nicky.

“
Hmm?
” He halted midway through hanging his shirt in the closet.

“
Ha ha, dickface.”

Nicky rummaged around his
messenger bag—or murse, as I liked to call it—before tossing a book at me. “Male-male romance. Remember? That’s what Jacqueline writes. She asked me to give this to you.”

I glanced at the cover that showed two half-naked guys on the
brink of a kiss.
Solar Flares
. Flipping it open, I shouted, “Sweet! She signed it.”

He
moved into the bathroom as I read the inscription aloud:

Stone,

A fuckhawt read for a fuckhawt guy.

*le sigh*

xoxo
, Jacqueline~

Didn’t I just feel warm and fuzzy—and a little like an all you could eat male buffet. I thumbed a few pages in, hitting a dog-eared page. “And she marked passages?”

“
I told her what you’re like.” Nicky gargled through a mouthful of toothpaste.

Gr
eat, so now I’m the stud-muffin smut-reader of the group, with the Twitter-viral ass.

“
So I should probably be readin’ this, since it’s written for dudes like us?”

The toilet flushed, the water ran, and he ambled back into the room.
“Typically, male-male romance is written for the ladies.”

I popped up in bed.
“Women get off on two guys going at it?”

“
Hell yeah.”

That was a massive head scratcher, the likes that would have Viper digging in her ears for days.
“Huh. So how is this any different from me reading your stuff? That’s for women too.”

“
I s’pose it’s not, really. Have at it.” He bundled into bed beside me.

“
Well, Jack
é
e did go to the trouble of giving me a signed edition
.
The least I can do is read.”

“
Yup.” Laughter hovered around the edges of his agreement.

I glared at him.
“Have you read it?”

“
Yup.”

“
All righty then.” True to my nature, I chose the third marked passage, in the middle of the book. There was nudity, cocksucking, kisses. It was pretty steamy. A tingle even started in my balls. Then it all went way the hell south, literally. Cranking my eyelids closed, I froze in a clenched-ass posture.

“
Oh hell no. There’s bunghole tonguing!”

The other side of the bed shook with Nicky
’s laughter. He managed to huff out, “You never tried it?”

“
Dude, when has my mouth been near a man’s butthole, ever?”

“
What about women?”

“
Totally different story. And maybe.” Jesus, if this kept up we’d be trading fucking cupcake recipes next, while we lounged in bed together, talking about chick-or-dick sex, at a romance convention. Still, I was curious. “You?”

“
Maybe.” He smirked. The Don Juan probably thought he had more moves than me. He definitely didn’t lack for bed warmers. He was simply more choosy, less promiscuous, more discreet than me.
Fucker.

“Sweet dreamin’, Josh.”

“
I hate you, Nicky.” Which of course in our world meant love—in some sort of twisted, always have your back, gonna beat your ass kind of way.

****

Dawn burned bright when I snuffled awake. Nicky snored beside me, half his head and all his hair hidden under a pillow. I checked the clock, thought about the kid probably jumping on Ma’s bed at this precise moment, and went back to sleep.

Two hours had passed when I woke from nightmares of Leelee kneeing me in the
nut-sack, Nicky smothering me with a pillow, and JJ running wild with the evil, grinning leprechaun from Lucky Charms.

I stretched my arms and legs, and groaned long and loud.

“Coming to breakfast?” Nicky stood from packing his daily dos into his man-bag. He’d left his brown hair loose and he hadn’t shaved. He looked a little more rough and tumble—like he did at home—in shredded jeans and an old linen shirt.

Owning up to being a dick part II vs. laying low? I opted for the middle ground.

“Lookin’ good, cubbie.” I jumped up, scrounging for my gym shorts and sneakers. “But I think I’ll hit the weights. Will you be in the lobby in a couple hours?” I hung the lanyard, carnation and all, over my
hairy bear
chest.

“
I might be, but if I’m not, someone will be around.”

Yeah, it was a specific someone I was worried about.

“Hey, how’d your dance with Leelee go off? I didn’t get a chance to look at it online last night.”

Think fast, shit-for-brains.
“Uh, probably not worth a look. I don’t even think Jules had the camera on us.”

“
Really? You mean you didn’t put any famous Stone moves on her?”

Oh, I put the moves on her all right, with my hands and my mouth. And Nicky would shit a brick if he found out.
“Savin’ all those for you, babe.”

Before he left the room, I reached over to pat his cheek, which was the closest to a
true lover’s touch as we were ever gonna get.

I left not long
after him. The gym was empty presumably because all romance writers already looked awesome, or they didn’t know a barbell from a hand weight. Leelee sure had, but she wasn’t there either. It was probably a blessing, yet I couldn’t shake thoughts of her as I went through a workout regime that was more grueling than usual. By the time I finished, I could’ve sworn my brains, my guts, and my muscles were splattered all over the blue-matted floor.

After a hasty cleanup in the hotel room, I headed to the lobby: the epicenter or
the aftermath, depending on how you looked at it. And it looked like a little unpleasant aftermath was coming my way since Leelee sat at a lonely table in the far corner.

I commenced my walk of shame. As soon as she saw me, she closed her laptop, unplugged the cord from coffee table outlet, and smashed everything into her bag as fast as she could. I swerved in front of her when she shot to her feet.

“Leelee.” I placed a hand on her arm.

The instant she looked up at me, I wished I
’d left my heart on the gym floor too because what I saw tore me up. Confusion warped into hurt, and then her eyes glittered, green and frosty.

“
What were you sayin’ about harassment yesterday?” She glared at my hand until I thought it would shrivel up and fall off. Something I needed my dick to do, because lo and behold, Miss Leelee Songchild was even sexier when she was pissed right the hell off at me.

I dropped
her arm because it sure sounded like she’d call security on me even if she wouldn’t do it on LaForge. “I’m not harassing—”

“
No. You just kissed me,” she hissed, tightening the shoulder strap on her bag as if it was armor.

“
I’m supposed to say it was a mistake, Leelee.”

“
It didn’t feel like one.”

I swallowed roughly, gauging how much to admit.
“To me either . . .” Fuck it. I never was a smart boy, so why start now?

The rapid pulse at the base of her neck, the nervous lick of her perfect pouty lips entranced me.

“I’m sorry.” I got closer to her, slowly, one step at a time. Placing a hand over hers, I stopped her from fidgeting with the shoulder strap.

“
Are you?” Her fingertips hovered over her mouth as if she still tasted my lips like I did hers.

How could I get through this week without lying to her through my teeth? And better
yet, why wasn’t the lobby bar open yet? It was my turn to fidget nervously, shoving a hand into the pocket of my trousers, jingling loose change.  “I don’t regret the kiss, but—”

“
Nicky,” she whispered.

“
Yeah.”

Her eyelashes fluttered to her flushed cheeks.
“So maybe you can stop it with the mixed signals. Friends?” Leelee held out her hand
.

“
Okay, friend.” I placed my palm in hers all the while knowing if I got the chance to plant one on her again, I was going to take it. Pulling my hand free, I ran it across my chin. “So, friend, I have a favor to ask.”

She playfully rolled her eyes.
“Well now, that didn’t take long.”

“
I told my ma about your book.”

“
Stone!” She punched my arm.

“
What’d I do now?”

“
Your mom?
Ride
is full of sex.” Leelee jutted out one curvaceous hip and wagged a finger in my face—I fucking liked it. “I can’t believe you told your mother about it. You said you didn’t even like the book.”

“
I never said that.” I’d tried to beat off to it several hundred interrupted times already.

“
The guy-girl thing?”

I shrugged.
“Read some more. Changed my mind. It’s hot as hell. Anyway, my ma reads that stuff, and she has a book club of horny old women. She asked if I could get you to autograph a copy for her. I’ll pay for it, ’course.”

Hell, I
’d buy a dozen of her books if she’d keep talking to me. I threw in the puppy dog look—not like Viper the rabid bitch. And man, I’d never worked this hard for a woman, especially one who almost certainly
wasn’t
gonna wind up on her back in a bed with me on top of her.

She huffed, fluffed her gorgeous strawberry blon
d hair out, and turned away on—
Oh, I’d missed those earlier
—peep-toed, toe-cleavage stilettos. “Fine. I’ll do it.”

Click clack went the heels
, swish sway went her hips. I salivated behind her all the way to the elevators.

Friends, yeah, this is
gonna be good.

There was a coy curve to her lips when she faced me.
“Fancy meetin’ you here.”

An empty car arrived, and I bowed low.
“After you, Madame.”

Leelee
entered, pressing the button to my floor and hers. “I’ll just run to my room and sign up there. Doing that stuff in front of others makes me clam up. What’s your mom’s name?”

I was too busy staring at the new, life-sized decorations in the elevator to respond.

“Stone?”

“
What the hell is this?” I gestured to the floor-to-ceiling posters of various book covers plastered all around the car. We were surrounded by half-clothed men and women in various stages of hot and heavy action.

Leelee sucked in her lip and let it pop loose.
Not helping.
“They only put them up once the Con gets rolling. Second-wave marketing.”

Clever.

“Are any of these guys your type?” she asked.

“
Heeeelll, no.” She frowned and I hurried on. “Ya know, none of them are Nicky, so . . .”

“
Mm hmm.
I’ll let you off the hook. Tell me your mom’s name so I can get it right.”

After I rattled
off the details, Leelee smiled. “You, me, and the elevator again, Stone?”

I zeroed in on a hairy-chested,
ruffle-shirted pirate who had a big-breasted bombshell fainting over his arm, presumably from his virile manliness. “And Captain Jack Sparrow does high seas porn?”