“Uh huh, really looks like you were looking for me,” I replied with light sarcasm, glaring at Dante. The look he gave me back was... confusing. Way too complex for my tequila fuzzed brain to figure out, so I shrugged it off and let Eddy coax me into a swaying dance with her.
Soon, Dante joined us and the three of us danced together while the pounding beat of the music reverberated through us. Hands seemed to be everywhere, but it wasn’t until Dante’s lips brushed the back of my neck in a light kiss that I became uncomfortable. Was that a platonic friend-kiss? Or something more?
“Um, I think I need to pee,” I told them, and started weaving my way over to the pool house where I imagined there would be a bathroom. It was just on the opposite side of the pool, so I waved away their half-hearted offers to accompany me. It was pretty obvious Eddy was into Dante, so maybe they needed a bit of alone time.
Who knew, maybe there was something sparking there? I hoped so. Dante deserved to be happy.
10
After I’d taken my sweet ass time peeing in the pool house bathroom, then spent twice as long struggling to resituate my lace G-string and skin tight dress, I was exhausted. Instead of heading back around the pool to join my friends again, I sat down on a sun lounger to people watch for a few minutes.
At least, that had been my intention. I could only assume I passed out, though, because I awoke to huge, strong hands picking me up and cradling me into a broad, muscular chest.
“Sebastian?” I mumbled, trying to squint up at the person carrying me. My tongue was slow and fuzzy. Damn tequila. “Where are you taking me?”
When he didn’t reply, I started struggling to get out of his grip. It was about as effective as an insect thrashing for freedom after being pinned to a board. Or a butterfly, perhaps...
“Stop it,” he ordered me. “I’m taking you home.”
Desperately trying to work some saliva into my dry mouth, I looked around us. Dante and Eddy were nowhere to be seen, but the party was still raging.
“I don’t need your help, Sebastian. I can handle myself. Just put me down.” I wiggled a bit more, but he didn’t seem bothered. His steps didn’t even falter as he carried me farther from the party and out to the drive where expensive cars were parked all the way back to the front gates. Of course his sexy as sin Bugatti was right by the front door. God forbid Sebastian Roman Beckett be expected to walk any great distance. Lazy prick.
“Stop muttering curses at me under your breath, Butterfly,” he said. “It’s annoying.”
I squinted up at him, but the fucker had somehow perfected the art of standing directly in front of the moon, so his face was in shadows. Just as I opened my mouth to reply, the distinctive sound of his car unlocking beeped, and he slung me over his shoulder while he opened the passenger door. I’d barely managed to squeak a protest before he manhandled me into his car and clicked the seatbelt into place.
“That was brave,” I slurred when he took his seat and slammed the door shut. “I could have happily vomited down your back right then.” Even as I said it, my stomach roiled and lurched. I’d been joking, but come to think of it...
Beck leveled a serious glare at me as he started the ignition. It gave a throaty purr and I relaxed back into my seat with a sigh, totally ignoring Beck’s glare. What was he looking at me like that for anyway?
Whatever it was all about, he kept his trap shut and rolled the sexy beast of a car down the driveway then hit the accelerator when we turned into the street.
“Fucking shit,” I moaned as quietly as I could handle in my inebriated state. It was all just becoming way too much for me. Between the booze, the car, the speed... Beck... I was quickly losing my tenuous hold on dignity and resolve.
Almost like he could read my mind, Beck pushed the car faster. He threw us around corners so fast the scenery was a blur outside my window. His shirtsleeves were rolled up to the elbow, and somehow my eyes became glued to the muscles in his forearm flexing and moving as he handled the powerful car with ease and confidence.
As much as I hated to admit it, suddenly the roiling in my stomach was no longer arousal. It was something else. Something significantly less sexy.
“Shit,” I said, swallowing frantically. “Beck, you need to stop.”
He flashed a look at me, confused, but didn’t even so much as slow. “What? Why?”
“Beck, seriously. You need to stop right now.” One of my hands gripped the arm rest for dear life while the other held the seatbelt away from my body, like that could stop what was about to happen.
He must have seen something in my face—possibly sheer terror and total lack of blood—that made him click that I was being serious and not fucking around.
Shifting down gears as quick as he could without hurting his car, he slowed from the insane speed we’d been traveling. I pressed a hand to my mouth. He wasn’t stopping fast enough. Oh god. Shit. Fuck. Please don’t let this happen.
The car came to a stop on the side of the road and I frantically opened my door and threw myself out—except I hadn’t undone my seatbelt. The black fabric strap did exactly as it was designed to do, locking up and throwing me back into my seat.
Horror rolled through me, and my stomach rebelled.
My head pounded like a bass drum, and I rolled over in my plush bed with a groan.
Why?
It was the pained, desperate mental cry of all hungover girls, wasn’t it? Why did I drink so much? Why didn’t I use better judgement? Why?
The sour tang of vomit reached my nostrils, and I gagged. Oh my god. Not again.
Scrambling as fast as my stiff, sleepy limbs would carry me, I ran into the attached bathroom and cradled the toilet bowl as I dry heaved. Apparently there was nothing left inside me to come out. What the hell had happened?
Peeling myself off the marble floor, I used the wash basin to pull myself up and peer at my bedraggled appearance in the mirror.
Holy. Fucking. Shit.
My makeup was smeared halfway down my face and my hair looked like something seen on the wife of Sasquatch, with a crusty patch of vomit dried into the ends.
Worse. I was practically naked. All I had on was the little black lace thong from the night before. Where was my bra? My dress? Wait, I hadn’t been wearing a bra under that dress. Rubbing my face with my hands, I frantically tried to remember the night before. After the tequila and the dancing and the drive home...
Oh shit.
Beck’s car. I threw up in Beck’s Bugatti!
Groaning, I sunk back to the marble floor in a puddle of shame. I vomited in Beck’s goddamn million dollar car. He’s going to murder me and rightfully so.
But then what happened? My memory was totally blank, and that made me feel even more ill. Had I passed out on the side of the road in a pool of my own vomit?
“Jesus fucking Christ, Riley,” I muttered, dragging myself back to my feet again. I still needed to use the basin for balance because the room was dipping and swirling something awful.
Cold water would help. I turned the faucet on and splashed my face a few times before giving up and staggering over to the shower. My hair desperately needed washing anyway.
“Ugh, gross.” I cringed at my image reflected back at me from the full length mirror directly outside the shower. It was not a pretty sight, and I could only hope the steam would obliterate my own image soon.
Just as I squirted a handful of shampoo into my palm, something caught my eye in that narcissistic shower sex mirror.
“What the fuck...” I mumbled, peering down at my body to find the unfamiliar mark. My hair was everywhere so I pushed it over my shoulders to get a better look at my chest.
Sure enough, there was a small, blue pen ink drawing on the side of my left breast.
“Mother fucker!” I screamed when I saw what it was. A fucking butterfly drawn mere inches away from my nipple. If there had been any question about who took my dress off, Beck had made sure I damn well knew it was him.
Dripping water everywhere, I stomped back into my bedroom in search of my phone. That fucker was about to catch a piece of my mind for this invasion of privacy. It didn’t faze me that I didn’t have his number. A man that arrogant would have put it in my phone, I had no doubt. He probably installed a tracking device too.
Finding it on the bedside table, plugged into the charger, I snatched it up and paled. It seemed Beck had also taken the liberty of changing my clock to twenty-four hour time because the numbers thirteen thirty flashed at me.
Thirteen thirty. That meant I had thirty minutes until this jet was scheduled to leave on some mysterious Delta mission which I was supposed to be partaking in.
Well, fuck it. I didn’t want to go anyway.
But something wasn’t sitting right... I stared at my phone a bit longer. Beck had changed the clock to twenty-four hour time and turned my phone on silent. Why?
Suspicion burned in my belly. That fucker turned my phone on silent so I would sleep all day, then made sure I would see the time and know I’d missed the flight when I woke up. Which meant he didn’t want me to go.
“Sebastian fucking Beckett. When are you going to learn?” I shook my head, tossing my phone on the bed and hurrying back to the shower. I had a flight to catch in thirty minutes.
11
My borrowed car came to a screeching halt beside the shiny white Cessna at fourteen hundred hours exactly.
“Suck it, bitches.” I snickered to myself as I climbed out of the white Mercedes and left the keys in the ignition. I had no doubts someone would see it safely back to the Deboise McMansion.
Grabbing the railing, I skipped up the steps and ducked into the jet with a supremely smug grin on my face. I wasn’t sure what reaction I expected, but it wasn’t the casual indifference they greeted me with.
“Oh great, the spare made it,” Evan muttered as he sipped on an amber liquor in a crystal rocks glass. “Thought you said she’d still be asleep, Beck.”
Beck didn’t reply to Evan’s bored sounding enquiry, instead flicking a glance over me from head to toe, then turning back to his laptop open on the table in front of him. The bastard looked incredible, which was only made worse by how utterly dog shit I was feeling.