Billionaire With a Twist (2 page)

I snorted, but raised my own glass to
match his. As they clinked together, his fingers brushed against
mine, and I felt a spark leap where our skin met. He must have felt
it too—he started, looking up at me, and our eyes locked. His
eyes were so deep, golden-brown like molasses swirled in honey, and
they warmed me up inside with a heat like the sun, spreading out from
my heart down to my toes, and up to my head until I was dizzy, my
heart pounding. I wanted nothing more than to sink into those eyes. I
wanted nothing more than to keep touching his fingers.

I wanted nothing more than to invite
him up to my room, then and there.

Focus, Ally! You have a presentation
tomorrow! No rando is worth throwing away your entire career for a
roll in the hay.

Maybe the whiskey was just getting to
me.

I pulled away hastily and downed my
drink, all of it this time. This sample had more of a honey flavor,
less of a bite. If I were writing copy I’d call it ‘soothing,
charming, a genteel liquor.’ Since I wasn’t, though, I
didn’t pull any punches. “The truth is, though, my
grandfather and his friends aren’t the customers of the future.
You see this same trend in advertising for comic books—the
company panders to its original base—not even all of the
original base but a small, vocal fraction of it—and alienates
all of its potential new customers in the process.”

“Tell me more about what you
think,” he said intently.

Which would have been catnip for me
even if I hadn’t been storing up a host of criticisms that went
unheard at work, and even if he hadn’t been so damned hot. I
didn’t need telling twice.

“This is your typical Knox
buyer.” I launched into an imitation of my grandfather. “‘I
jus’ don’ know how much longer they can be ‘spectin’
this centralized government t’ last. Times wuz much simpler
when a man jus’ brewed his own whiskey and shot at the
revenooers.’”

The man laughed, and waved a hand in
acknowledgment of my point before raising a challenging eyebrow. “So
what would you do if you had control of the rebrand? Throw in some
hashtags and make a Facebook page? Get a celebrity endorsement?”

“As if,” I snorted.
“Millennials might be self-absorbed, but we can still see
through pandering just fine, thanks.”

“Oh?” His thumb brushing
over my knuckles was an invitation, and a challenge, and both made my
breath catch in my throat. “A pink label, then?”

I watched his eyes dip to the side and
a lazy grin spread across his face, and I knew that he had spotted
the pink strap of my bra peeking out from the side of my
short-sleeved button-up shirt.

“Strange as it might seem, the
color pink doesn’t brainwash women into buying things,” I
replied, trying not to let on how breathless he had made me. Trying
not to imagine his hands instead of his eyes on that pink bra strap,
easing it slowly from my shoulder as he kissed my neck.

I raised the stakes, slipping my foot
out of my shoe to stroke his ankle, and then moved it slightly
higher. This was really out of character for me, but something about
our conversation, the flush of whiskey in my cheeks, the way he was
looking at me…I felt emboldened in a way I never did at work
or even when I was out with my friends.

I was rewarded with a flush of heat in
his gaze, his pupils dilating as his grip tightened slightly on mine.
He leaned forward, close enough that I could have kissed him without
rising from the seat. His lips were so full, they looked so soft—

He was so close I could feel the heat
of his breath as he murmured his next words: “So, tell me, what
would
you do?” He picked up his glass and drank, the
muscles in his throat working as he swallowed it down. I didn’t
look away. It was safe to assume my panties were on fire, and there
was only one way to put that fire out.

And you know what? I decided I’d
been overthinking things at work. Either I had confidence in myself
or I didn’t, and doing some last-minute drinking wasn’t
going to change a damn thing about my presentation tomorrow.

But some really good sex just might
give me an edge.

I lifted my own glass and downed the
remaining Knox. My decision was made.

It was go time.

I leaned towards him until our lips
were barely a millimeter apart. “Do you really want to know
what I’d do with this brand?” I whispered. Before he
could answer, I brushed my lips against the corner of his mouth. He
tasted like smoke and cinnamon and danger, and I liked it. “Or
would you rather know what I’d do with you?”

His eyes gleamed, and I knew his answer
even before he spoke.

#

Why had I never made out with a
stranger before?

Pinned up against the wall of my hotel
room, I pondered that very question as my still-nameless
about-to-be-conquest nibbled and sucked at my neck, eliciting shrieks
and giggles and moans as he found my most sensitive spots. His hands
dug possessively into my hips, and I could feel his rising erection
against my thigh as he pushed into me, heat flooding me down below as
my nipples tightened against his chest.

I was hungry for his skin, starving,
and my own hands found their way under his shirt to knead at the
muscles of his back and then slip under his boxers to grip his
perfectly sculpted ass. I licked at his neck just below his ear, and
he growled, his head rising to claim my lips once more. I moaned
eagerly into his mouth, opening in response to his demanding tongue.
His lips were just as soft as I had imagined, and if we were both
occasionally missing where we meant to put them, it was all right—we
were tipsy and turned-on and laughing, and on top of the world.

“Eep!” I shrieked as he
scooped me up in his strong arms. “Dude, you are drunk, you are
not supposed to be—I don’t know, doing things like
operating heavy machinery—”

“You’re not heavy
machinery,” he told me in that very serious way that slightly
drunk people have. “You’re light machinery. Light, soft
machinery with great boobs. More machinery should have boobs.”

“I hope for your sake you had a
head start on me at the bar,” I told him. “Or I am
mocking you for being a lightweight forever.”

“Guess I’ll have to find
something else for that mouth of yours then,” he said with a
grin, and oh, the images that flooded my mind. These panties were
ruined forever.

He tossed me onto the bed and I
shrieked as I bounced. “Asshole!”

But I was giggling.

He shed the remainder of his clothes,
dropping to all fours on the bed in front of me, and then advanced,
his eyes pinning me in place. He backed me up against the headboard
and took my wrists, holding them over my head as he kissed me
thoroughly, his tongue gleefully plundering my mouth before he began
to nibble at my jawline and neck, my giggles dissolving back into
moans as he traveled ever southward.

He shifted his hands so that just the
left encircled both my wrists, his right joining his mouth as it
closed over my breasts, sucking at them through the thin fabric of my
shirt. I keened, squirming at the tantalizing touch and trying to
bring the rest of my body into closer contact with his. As he
chuckled the sound reverberated against my skin, and he began to
unbutton my blouse, his hands and mouth hot against me. I leaned
forward and bit at his shoulder, pressing my hips into his to urge
him on.

“So perfect,” he murmured
against my tender skin before sucking my left nipple into his mouth,
and I cried out as he began to kiss my breasts in earnest, his other
hand finally abandoning my wrist to dive down the front of my pants.

His knuckles bumped against my clit and
I gasped, rubbing myself wantonly against him. He withdrew, teasing,
and I slid my hands over his shoulders, savoring the feel of his
smooth skin before digging my fingernails into his back in
retaliation.

As he tugged my pants off, I took a
moment to congratulate myself on my excellent decision-making skills.
No matter what happened tomorrow, this was the most fun I’d
ever had during a work trip, and I knew I’d be showing up to my
presentation the next day with a little extra bounce in my step.

He tore my panties off and stood there,
groaning appreciatively at the view as I spread my legs for him, and
then he came at me and began to kiss and lick his way down my
stomach, making me writhe in anticipation. He circled my belly button
teasingly before trailing his tongue down
there
. The first
touch of his mouth was electric, sparks shooting up my spine as he
traced my wet opening before kissing me deeply, his tongue spearing
straight and sure, deep inside.

“That’s it,” I
panted, encouraging him. “Right there.”

“Is that what you like?” he
growled.

That clever tongue flicked over me
before plunging into me again and again, his thumbs tracing
tantalizing circles on the sensitive skin of my thighs. I was
whimpering, bucking upward against him, feeling the beautiful burn of
his stubble against me, needing only a little more, only a little
more—

He hummed in satisfaction as he tasted
me thoroughly, and I felt the vibration of his mouth up through my
entire body and down to the tips of my toes.

“So beautiful,” he
whispered against me, lapping my wetness with long strokes of his
tongue, and without another thought I came harder than a freight
train crashing into a mountain, moaning blissfully as I rode out the
waves of my orgasm.

When my brain was once again capable of
receiving the images transmitted by my eyes, I saw him resting on his
elbows beside me, a smug grin on his face with just a hint of
shyness, as if he knew exactly how great a job he had done but
wouldn’t mind a little confirmation.

A glance downward told me the best way
for me to give him that validation.

I licked my lips, loving the way his
pupils dilated as his eyes dropped to my tongue, and began to trail
my hand down his sweaty, chiseled chest, taking my sweet time on the
way to that long, hard cock. I was going to make this so good for
him. I was going to stroke him and pump him gentle and slow, firmer
and firmer. I was going to sink down and take him slowly into my
mouth, teasing him with the promise of more as I drew spirals around
his length with my tongue. I was going to take him deep into the back
of my throat and—

His phone rang.

We both froze, and for a moment,
looking into those lust-darkened eyes, I thought he was going to let
it go to voicemail, and we would spend the rest of the evening
learning every inch of each other’s bodies.

Then he made a disappointed but
resigned sound in the back of his throat, and pulled away from me.
“Sorry. This is probably important.”

“Sure,” I said. Maybe it
wouldn’t be, though. Maybe it would be some unimportant thing
he could immediately resolve without leaving the room, and I could
get back to the important business of finding out exactly how he
tasted and whether I liked it better than bourbon. Maybe I could find
out exactly what noise he would make when—

He rolled out of bed, giving me a great
view of that cute ass as he bent over to search the pockets of his
discarded clothes for his phone. He pulled it out and cut off the
ringing with a stab of his finger, running a distracted hand through
his hair.

“Yeah? Yeah, it’s me. Look,
I’m kind of in the middle of—no. No. No, I see what you
mean. Yeah, that’s—of course I take this seriously!”
The volume of his voice rose, and I could see his jaw clench and his
Adam’s apple bob as he visibly struggled to maintain control.
“Yes. Yes, of course. No, I understand. I’ll be right
over. Yes. Goodbye.”

He snapped the phone shut as if he were
imagining snapping the neck of the person who had called him, and
began to pull his underwear and jeans back on.

I struggled to keep my disappointment
from showing. “Gotta run?” I asked, and immediately
wanted to slap myself. Of course he had to run. Hadn’t I just
heard him say that? What, did I think that if I just asked out loud,
the universe would magically turn back time so that that conversation
hadn’t happened?

Damn, but that would improve my sex
life.

“I’m afraid so,” he
said, glancing up from his zipper to shoot me a rueful smile. “It’s
an emergency.”

“No one hurt, I hope?” I
asked.

He had looked back down to hunt for his
socks, and now his head shot back up, surprised. “No, no, not
that kind of emergency. Just…” He did
drunk-person-trying-to-gesture-like-they’re-sober gesturing.
“Boring stuff. It’s a very boring emergency.”

I tried to smile. “Well, you
certainly put a new spin on wham, bam, thank-you ma’am.”
I let my gaze trail down his muscular chest and the still-tented
front of his blue jeans, the way my hand had been set to only moments
before. “Was really looking forward to returning the favor.”

A faint blush lit his cheeks, and oh,
this was only a one-night stand, that gentlemanly blush shouldn’t
be making my heart go pitter-pat.

“Not half as much as I was
looking forward to it,” he admitted. “Maybe I’ll
see you around…”

“I don’t know how much
longer I’ll be staying,” I said. “Work stuff. But
I…well, you never know. I wouldn’t mind it.” Yep.
Playing it cool.

He finished buttoning his shirt and
leaned forward, pressing a chaste yet passionate kiss to my cheek. “I
hope you have a wonderful time while you’re here.”

“I already have,” I
confessed, and the way he grinned, I almost thought he was about to
throw off his clothes again, and stay.

But he just kissed my other cheek, and
left.

I flopped back on the hotel bed and
sighed, staring at the ceiling.

“Well, that’s the way the
cookie crumbles,” I told myself. “And there’s no
use crying over spilled milk.” Maybe if I just kept reciting
clichés, I’d start to feel better.