When she set it down, she heard her name and opened her eyes to find Jessie looking at her with genuine concern.
“Are you feeling okay? You’re looking a little flushed.”
Jessie knew that she’d just gotten over being ill, so clearly she was concerned she’d had a relapse.
“Oh, I’m um…actually, I think I’m going to go and get some air… to the bathroom.” Tiana stood, adjusting her dress and Niko’s hand fell from her lap.
“Did you want some company?” Jessie started to stand.
“No,” Tiana stated, probably a little too quickly then softened her voice and smiled. “No, I’m okay. But thank you.”
She grabbed her clutch bag off the table and did not spare Niko a glance as she headed out the side door of the ballroom. As she walked out, her back to the crowded room, she felt like everyone was looking at her, watching her, and that they knew what she’d done. She pushed the door open and glanced over her shoulder and saw that only one person was looking her way. Niko. He definitely knew what she’d done. And from the look in his eye, they might not be done.
As badly as Niko wanted to get up and follow her, he couldn’t, not without the entire table seeing just how much he enjoyed what just happened. Also, there was a chance he’d knock the entire table over with the wood he was rocking.
“Do you think she’ll be okay?” Jessie asked, clearly concerned because Tiana appeared feverish, her cheeks flushed.
“Yeah.” He nodded confidently and thought about the most unsexy things one could think of.
After a minute or two he managed to get himself down to half chub, he grabbed his coat from behind his chair, placed it strategically in front of him as he stood, and excused himself to go outside and return a call.
In reality he was going to find the woman whose juices were on his fingers. He walked out the same exit she had and looked both ways down the hall, it was empty. There was an exit to outside, he opened it. There was nothing but a small cement area and a dumpster. He closed that and went down the hall. He opened one door and saw that there was a side room that looked like it could be used for meetings. There was a side hall, he walked down to the end and opened the door and found a storage closet.
The venue Jessie booked for the fundraiser was an old concert hall that was built in the ’50s and shut down in the ’80s. It was recently renovated, and this was the inaugural event, so Niko wasn’t familiar with the layout.
He continued down and found the restrooms. He was just about to check in the women’s restroom when the door opened and two women exited.
“Ladies.” He nodded as he held the door for them.
They both smiled up at him, one of their smiles was a little friendlier than the other and was accompanied by a run of her hand down his bicep as she passed him. He ignored it. Instead, he was focused on Tiana, who he saw in the reflection of the mirrors. She was standing at the sinks with her head down. He would have gone in, but he could hear other occupants inside. So, he closed the door and did all he could do, he waited.
After four more women left and six more women came, finally the door opened and Tiana emerged.
“Niko,” she said his name on a gasp, her lips parting and her eyes doubling in size. “What are you?—”
Cutting her off mid-question, he grabbed her wrist and basically dragged her along with him. He wasn’t sure exactly what had come over him. All he knew was that he needed to get her alone. Now. He’d missed her so much, and when he’d sensed her anxiety, all he’d wanted to do was calm her down, but as soon as he put his hand on her leg and touched her bare thigh, it was like his hand was drawn to her pussy like a magnet.
His strides were long and purposeful, and she had to speed-walk to keep pace beside him. He heard her let out a breathless laugh as she clung to his forearm with her free hand. He was halfway down the hall when he looked up and saw Jenna and Deacon at the end of it by the exit door that led out to the concrete and dumpster. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it looked intense.
They both stopped up short. He glanced over at Tiana, and could see she looked concerned. “Do you want to go check on her?”
He looked back, and Deacon had taken a step forward. Jenna was looking up at him, and the conversation looked…intimate.
“No, I think she’s good.”
“Good,” Niko said under his breath and pulled her down the side hall with the storage closet at the end. The storage room was still unlocked, he pulled her inside, slammed the door behind them with an echoing boom, and in the same movement he twisted the old-fashioned deadbolt, sealing them in a capsule of lemon-scented darkness and anticipation.
Niko didn’t hesitate, Tiana had barely enough time to draw a breath before he pressed her up hard against the door. His jacket slid to the ground as his hands skated up her torso and pinned her there, his mouth landing on hers in a collision that tasted of hunger, sweat, and the molten anticipation of deniedpleasure. Her body radiated heat as he caged her in. He could feel the wild thundering of her pulse through every point of contact: her ribs, her hips, her thighs, and the line of her jaw. His lips crashed to hers, mouths open, teeth grazing, tongues desperate. He devoured her, kissing her with a passion that unlocked a primitive drive in him. She mirrored his urges, her fingers clawing at his shoulders, pulling him closer and closer, as if she couldn’t get him close enough.
His thigh shoved between hers, prying her open, and she let him, pressing back, grinding against the hardness that strained at his zipper. She hooked her leg around his hip, and her dress bunched up, her skin vibrating with desperate electricity.
“Ireallylike this slit in your dress,” he said against her mouth.
He could feel her smile as his hand gripped her bare hip, and he ground into her. The pressure of his erection was urgent and insistent, a silent demand. She gasped into his mouth.
Niko’s hand slid down, trailing up her thigh, fingers searching, finding the bare skin at the V of her thighs and the damp lace of her panties. His other hand settled at the base of her throat, thumb stroking under her jaw as he kissed her again, less feral now, but impossibly, infinitely deeper.
Her hands fumbled with the waistband of his suit pants, working blindly between their bodies. The button popped free, the zipper followed, and her hand slid inside. She wrapped her fingers around his straining shaft, and he twitched and thickened in her grasp. He felt his blood rushing to meet her touch. He groaned, a low, involuntary sound, and his lips never left her skin, trailing down her jaw and her neck, biting the edge of her shoulder as she stroked him.
