Page 5

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Thunderstruck, Cam watched as Dani Wellford threw her hair back, notched her chin up in the air and strolled out of the ladies’ room like the bloody queen of England.

Sonofabitch.

He caught sight of himself in the mirror, crotch bulging, jaw agape, and turned away, appalled.

What the hell had just happened? One moment the two of them were crawling all over each other, driving each other a little out of their minds…and she’d been fully as hot for him as he was for her, thank you very much. He knew the difference between actual and fake passion, and that had been the real deal, dammit.

He swore under his breath in a continuous and lurid stream until he finally brought his breathing under control, which didn’t happen quickly.

As rational thought reluctantly returned to his besotted brain, he regained the presence of mind to admit she’d gotten him but good. As tempted as he was to accuse her of being a cock tease, he was honest enough to admit to himself that he’d come on to her and not the other way around. He’d locked the door. He’d backed her up against the counter. He’d kissed her first.

And she kissed you back .

In fact, she’d kissed him so passionately he’d been taken by surprise. Lost control of himself there, for a minute. He’d actually been seriously contemplating making love to her on that damned counter.

Until she’d abruptly gone completely ice cold in his arms. As if she’d flipped a switch and suddenly had no interest whatsoever in him.

It was disconcerting as hell. Not to mention damned confusing?—

He swore as he heard a gaggle of female voices growing louder fast. He wouldn’t put it past Dani to have recruited a bunch of women to come in here to powder their damned noses and humiliate the living hell out of him.

He dived into a stall and locked it hastily. Sitting precariously on the toilet, he hugged his knees, pulling his shoes up out of sight lest someone peek under the door and see his size twelve Barker leather and ostrich toe shoes.

His back ached in seconds. Hell, his boner ached. The way this night was going, he would topple over into the damned toilet any second and have to explain why his pants were all wet when he walked out of here.

Not to mention, if he got caught in here, his chances of getting hired at WMP would go up in flames the color of Dani’s fiery hair. Plus, lawyers were nothing if not gossipy. Word would get back to the D.A.’s office, too. He would be a laughing stock. His carefully crafted reputation, his whole freaking career plan, would be shot to pieces. Just like that.

He was in Hell. Fucking Hell.

The women chatted casually and took their sweet time peeing, reapplying make-up, and speculating about who was discreetly hooking up with whom tonight.

Every second felt like a week as the women relaxed and analyzed the party, sharing their observations and tidbits they’d overheard. So this was why women always seemed to make restroom visits in groups! They were having their own girls-only parties in here.

At long last, they finally trailed out of the bathroom. Silence fell once more.

Deeply suspicious of another gaggle of women waiting outside to pounce as soon as he showed himself, he held his position for several more long, uncomfortable minutes. Long enough to play back that smoking hot kiss she’d laid on him before she’d abruptly withdrawn from it and from him.

He’d made some mistakes in his life, but this had to go down as one of the biggest. He berated himself every way he could think of for being a fool until his rock-hard erection finally began to subside.

She’d been even sweeter and sexier in his arms than he’d imagined. She’d felt like silken sin. Hell, she’d practically purred as she rubbed all her luscious curves against him. Okay, that wasn’t fair. He hadn’t exactly been a passive participant in the kiss, either, and he’d been doing plenty of rubbing of his own. Speaking of which, her mouth and her body had been soft and eager, all restless movement and welcoming heat, drawing him in with blatantly carnal intent.

Crap. He was getting hard again just thinking about those blow job lips and big, dark, sex kitten eyes.

She’s. Off. Limits .

Right. Tell that to his dick.

You’re. An. Idiot .

All he had to say in response to that condemnation by his inner voice was, no shit, Sherlock.

He took a deep breath and commenced mentally reciting the criminal code pertaining to professional ethics violations. Sometimes, it truly sucked having as good a memory as he did. It usually came in handy as a lawyer. But right now, it wasn’t doing a blessed thing to take his mind off how bad he wanted to get into the sassy, forbidden panties of one Miss Dani Wellford, Esquire.

People at the party must be wondering where he’d gone off to. They would probably figure he was boinking one of the paralegals in a supply closet. Which wasn’t an entirely unfair assumption based on his past few years of social life.

He was the first to admit it surprised him that he’d grown tired of playing the insatiable playboy stud. It had been fun when he was a horny, immature prick fresh out of law school.

In retrospect, he was damned lucky he hadn’t accidentally gotten himself trapped into marriage by a real or fake baby scare. He would have done the honorable thing, of course, if he had gotten a woman pregnant.

Truth be told, he hadn’t had sex in nearly three months. Not since he broke up—reasonably politely, considering—with an interior designer from the Upper East Side who’d turned out to be just a wee bit more married than he liked his sexual partners. At least she’d been discreet and hadn’t wanted to ruin his reputation any more than he’d wanted to ruin hers.

He didn’t stop often to ponder his relationships with women, and he’d never done it while hiding in a ladies’ room, but he had to say, his personal life was a bit of a shit show.

He sighed as he unfolded his cramping legs and stood up. For a person who’d demonstrated extraordinary discipline and resolve in distancing himself from his parents’ sordid past, pursuing a great education, excelling in law school, and becoming a topnotch litigator, he’d sure managed to fuck up everything else in his life.

It was one thing to sow some wild oats—okay, whole fucking fields of wild oats—in one’s youth. It was another thing altogether to become someone who lived like some horny frat boy for one’s entire adult life.

It was high time he manned up and took control of himself and his libido. He needed to start acting like the kind of man his grandparents had raised him to be. The kind of man he’d always envisioned himself becoming.

He’d vowed never to turn violence upon a woman…but had he been harming his many conquests in a different way? Had he been treating them with the same disrespect and lack of recognition for their humanity that his father had?

The thought made him recoil in horror.

He wasn’t his father. He would never hurt a woman.

But did that include treating women with respect and recognizing them as more—much more—than sex objects?

He knew exactly how his grandfather would answer that if he were still alive.

He sighed. I’m sorry, Pops. I’ll do better from now on. I promise.

But first he had to sneak out of this damned bathroom without getting caught.

He peeked around the door of the stall like a felon making a prison break. The bathroom was still empty. One hurdle down.

He crept to the hallway door. This was the trickiest moment. He couldn’t afford to be seen strolling out of the ladies’ room by anyone.

Rueful, reluctant humor bubbled up in his chest at the absurdity of his predicament. He had to give Dani credit. She’d nailed him big time, trapping him in here like this.

And if he was turning over a new leaf toward women, he couldn’t, in all fairness, hold it against her. In fact, he probably owed her recognition for how brilliant a stunt she’d pulled off, trapping him in here like this.

Of course, one good turn did deserve another.

Yes, indeed. She was a worthy opponent and fully deserving of his respect.

A sense of lightness came over him. Of rightness. This was much closer to the kind of man he wanted to be than the one who’d walked into this restroom.

Abruptly entertained as he hadn’t been in months, he checked the hallway furtively.

All clear.

He slipped out of the bathroom and commenced plotting his revenge. Respectful, but revenge.