Ricky was staring straight ahead, lost in his thoughts. Wallace said something and as Ricky looked over, he noticed me and gave a blast of a grin that had the girls beside me twittering. He jogged down the rest of the steps, strode over, and scooped me up in a soldier-on-furlough kiss.

Whispers snaked around us. I’d caught a few earlier, but that kiss made people take a closer look. They recognized me and Ricky from a Chicago Post photo a few weeks ago. I heard my name and “biker,” and I’m sure Ricky did, too, but he just kept grinning down at me.

“I didn’t expect this,” he said. “Thank you.”

Wallace and CJ walked over.

“Hey, Miz Jones,” CJ said.

“Hey, guys.” I asked how their flight was as we headed to the baggage carousel. Then I said to Ricky, “I know you thought you’d be clear tonight. Does that still stand? Or does your dad need you?”

Ricky would have texted me if our plans had changed. I was saying this for Wallace and CJ’s benefit. My relationship with Ricky didn’t thrill Don Gallagher. He seemed to like me well enough. What he didn’t like is the Gabriel–me–Ricky dynamic. While Gabriel has made it clear he has no romantic interest in me, Don would rather Ricky kept his distance, just to be safe. Don values Gabriel’s legal expertise too much to rock that boat.

“Nope, it’s all good,” Ricky said. “I checked in with him before I invited you over.”

“Ah. Well, in that case . . .” I glanced meaningfully at a sign for the airport Hilton. “It’s a long drive back to the city, and I’m sure you had a tiring flight.”

His eyes glinted, sending a familiar lick of heat through me.

“Go on,” CJ said. “We’ll grab your bag.”

“Thanks.” Ricky put his arm around my shoulders and we walked away.

“Was that okay?” I said when we were out of earshot.

“My girlfriend surprises me at the airport and drags me off to a hotel? I don’t think my rep will ever recover. I definitely owe you.”

“I’m looking forward to repayment. It was a very long three days.”

“Damn straight.”

He tugged me around as he backed up. Next thing I knew, we were in a short service hall, partially blocked by a massive cardboard standee. He propelled me to the end and then pulled me into a kiss. If the one at the escalator had started reminding me how much I’d missed him, this one cemented it.

Five seconds later, I had my back to the wall, arms around his neck, hands in his hair, his hands under my ass. By the time I broke the kiss, I wasn’t even sure where we were anymore, and I looked around, blinking, before saying, “Hotel, five minutes, that way.”

He dropped his lips to my neck as he pressed against me. “So near and yet so far.”

I chuckled. “Well, if you don’t want to wait . . .”

“Tempting,” he said as his lips moved up my throat.

“I am wearing a skirt.”

“I noticed.” His hands slid under it, cupping my ass again.

“Did you notice what I’m not wearing?”

His fingers checked, making sure I didn’t just have on a thong. Then he groaned, pushing against me. “Now, that is a tease.”

“Between that sign blocking the hall, and the fact that no one has come this way since we arrived, I’d put our odds of not getting caught at about eighty percent.”

He kissed me so hard it left me gasping. “Tell me you’re serious.”

“I am always serious,” I said. “Even if someone looks in, it’ll seem as if we’re just making out, very enthusiastically.”

“Hell, yeah.”

He kissed me again, boosting me up to straddle him, which lowered our odds for discretion, but I wasn’t arguing. That’s when his phone rang, the tone playing “Big Boss Man.” His father. He let out a curse and fumbled to hit Ignore.

“Sorry. I texted him when I got off the plane. He’s just saying hello. Lousy timing.”

I caught his shirtfront and pulled him back into a kiss. He turned off the ringer and stuffed the phone into his pocket, and within seconds we were where we’d been, my back against the wall, skirt hiked up around my hips. I felt his phone vibrate and let out a snorting laugh.

“Ignore it,” he said between kisses. “Please.”

More kissing, hotter and deeper now, the bulging crotch of his jeans pushing against me in just the right spot, exquisite teasing as I could feel exactly what I wanted. He reached down for his belt. I beat him to it, and he chuckled. I flipped open his belt and then the button on his jeans and—

A shadow extended from behind the cardboard sign. Ricky turned his head to follow my gaze, his eyes narrowed. Then he caught my chin in one hand, pulling my face back to his, kissing me again, and I could feel the determination there, the lust and the need and the resolve not to let anything get in our way. Except . . . well, while I’m not one to let the words “public place” stop me from having sex, I’m no exhibitionist, either, and neither was Ricky, and even as he kissed me, we’d both slowed, our attention pulled down that hallway.

“I’ll get this,” he muttered.

He fastened his belt with an angry snap of the leather and strode around the sign. Then, “What the fucking hell?”

I smoothed my skirt and hurried after him as CJ said, “I think the hotel is that way.”

“No fucking—”