“Yes,” she whispers conspiratorially, picking up the thread, like she can’t resist this game. “They’ve been married for twenty years, and they still do it every night.”

That’s an interesting addition. I arch an eyebrow. “That sound like something you’d like, sweetheart?”

She nods. “Someday. Especially since my last boyfriend wasn’t like—” She cuts herself off. “I shouldn’t say it.”

My curiosity is piqued. “No, you should say it. I want to know.”

She grabs her glass and takes another sip.

“Tell me, Natalie. He wasn’t like what?”

She runs her fingertip along the rim of the glass, avoiding answering.

I give her a pointed look. “Fess up. He didn’t want to cuff you? Spank you with a crook? Do it every night?”

Because I’d cuff her. I’d tie her up. I’d spank her. I’d fuck her on all fours. In a car. On a plane. Anywhere and everywhere and every night. No hang-ups for this guy.

“Fine. He wasn’t very . . . interesting in bed.”

And I’m hard. Just like that. Not because of her ex, but because of what this implies—that she is interesting in bed, and I’m very interested in interesting things happening between the sheets with her.

“And you prefer interesting, I take it?”

“Strange, that I,” she says with a wiggle of her eyebrows, “at the least, prefer regular nookie. And I think handcuffs, doggie style, public sex, and spanking are just fine and dandy.” She clasps a hand to her mouth and cringes. “Shit. I didn’t say that out loud, did I?”

“Every single delicious word.” I smirk. “So, we have a deal? No more sad Natalie tonight?”

She exhales, nibbles on the corner of her lips, then grins playfully. “As long as I can ride the rollercoaster, it’s a deal.”

“You’ll get your rollercoaster, and you’ll get the full Vegas experience. Nothing less,” I say, holding out my hand.

She takes it and we shake. “Full Vegas experience.”

“One night. We’re going to fit it all in.”

“We’ll go all out.” She sweeps her arm grandly.

“Let loose.”

“Throw caution to the wind,” she says with a full-wattage grin. She reaches for her vodka tonic, her elbow knocking her phone closer to me. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her text messages. The one from Lila is the most recent. But beneath it is one to Charlotte she must have opened after closing the Lila one, and the words flash temptation at me, like a line I shouldn’t cross but will anyway.

I want him so badly.

And that’s all I need to know. The words embolden me, and I return to what I’m pretty sure she was hinting at before Lila’s message landed. I tap her glass. “Tell me, why do you like vodka tonics?”

“Guess,” she says, inching close, her command a flirty invitation.

“Because of how it tastes on your lips when I kiss you?” I ask, trying that on for size.

She says one word. Yes.

And before I know it, I’m kissing Natalie.

8

Let’s back up.

How did we get from not kissing to kissing? What was that turning point? Did she lean into me? Did I move closer to her? Details matter. I’ll gladly share them.

Start with six months of sexual tension. Add in two mojitos for her, two beers for me, and a couple vodka tonics. Stir that with some bad news on the business front, and top it with the cherry of Natalie’s hit-me-over-the-head-with-a-stick comment that left no question as to what she wanted . . . and here I am.

We don’t lean into each other. There’s no inch-by-slow-sensual-inch pull. It’s not a slow burn.

It’s a fiery crash. We’re two cars speeding on the highway of this night, and we slam into each other, crawl across the hoods, and kiss like crazy.

Nothing is tentative about this. We go from not kissing to kissing in less than sixty nanoseconds. Yeah, I don’t really know what a nanosecond is, either. But it happens in no time.

And now my hand is in her hair, yanking her close as we crush our lips together. We kiss hard and rough, fueled by pent-up desire and more than enough vodka and rum to make this inevitable.

Her teeth scrape me, and I growl, loving her roughness. I suck hard on her bottom lip, and I’m rewarded by nearly the same sound from her. She’s like a tiger, and together we’re animals.

I grip her head tighter, and her hands are all over me—in my hair, then down my chest, then along my arms. We kiss so deeply, it’s like we’re trying to climb each other.

At some point, she breaks off, breathes out hard, then whispers in my ear, “I’ve wanted to do that for so long.”

“Not as long as I have. Now get those lips back on mine,” I tell her, and she complies.

My hands cup her cheeks, but I’m not gentle, and she doesn’t want me that way. She’s not a gentle girl. She’s badass and tough, and she wants what I want. I hold her face tightly in my hands, and she practically crawls into my lap in a rush to get closer, then closer still as she presses her tits against my chest.

I’m seated on a stool at the bar, and we are putting on some kind of show. But I don’t care.

My tongue searches and hunts, wanting to taste every corner of her mouth, savoring the vodka and the tonic and, most of all, the Natalie. She whimpers and moans, and I swallow every sexy sound she makes.