Romancing Tommy Gabrini (13 page)

“Oh,
can we now?
 
And why’s that?”

Tommy
looked down, at her chest.
 
“We’re going
to need our strength,” he said and then looked her in the eye.
 

Grace’s
breath caught.
 
She didn’t know quite how
to respond to that.
 

Before
she could formulate any response, the manager came over to their table.
 
He extended his hand.
 
“Tommy,” he said jovially, “good to have you
with us again.”

Tommy
stood up as the two men shook.
 
Grace was
struck by how big Tommy looked, and the presence he commanded.
 
The idea of a man like him pleasuring her, as
he had all but declared by his little comment, was beginning to excite
her.
 

“How
are you, Frankie?” he asked.

“Wonderful,
sir.”

“Heard
you had a good round last week.”

“The
best I’ve ever had.
 
Beat my entire
party.
 
There’s talk of suspending me
from the club as we speak.”

Tommy
laughed.
 
And then looked at Grace.
 
“I want you to meet Grace McKinsey.
 
Grace, Frank’s the manager here.”

Frank
shook her hand.
 
“Nice to meet you, Miss
McKinsey.”

“Nice
to meet you,” Grace replied.

Frank
then turned his attention back to Tommy.
 
“Have they taken your order?”

“They
have.”

“Please
let me know if there’s anything you need.”

“I
will.
 
Have a good evening.”

“You,
too, sir,” Frank said and walked away.
 
Tommy sat back down.

“My
goodness,” Grace said.
 
“I know you
should treat your customers well, but they treat you as if you’re a rock
star.
 
As if you own the joint.”

Tommy
smiled.
 
“Probably because I do,” he
said.

Grace
stared at him.
 
He owned Diamante’s?
 
She was having dinner with the owner of one
of the most luxurious restaurants in Seattle?
 
This date was beginning to become surreal for real, she thought.

“So,
Grace McKinsey,” Tommy said, leaning back and placing one hand on his hip,
“what’s your story?”

Grace
smiled.
 
“My story?”

“That’s
right.
 
Everybody’s got one.
 
You said you were born here?”

“I
was born in Oregon,” she said.
 
“I was
raised here in Seattle.”

The
waiter returned with a bottle of the best wine they had to offer.
 
He poured both drinks, left the bottle to
chill with them, and then excused himself.
 
Grace immediately took a sip.

“Where
in Oregon?” Tommy asked this as she sipped, his blue eyes roaming
downward.
 
She wore a simple pale gray
dress, tastefully low-cut and complimentary to her body.
 
An inexpensive dress, to be sure, Tommy also
noticed, but he liked that unpretentiousness about her.
 

“Happy
Valley,” she said when she finished her sip.
 
“It’s a small town outside of Portland.”

“Over
in Clackamas County, right?”

Grace
smiled.
 
“Right.”

“I
know it.”

“When
my parents divorced, my mother remarried.
 
Her new husband wasn’t real interested in having a kid around so my
father, who had moved to Seattle, came and got me.”

“Good
man.”

“Yes,”
she said.
 
“He was wonderful.”

Tommy
nodded, and stared at her.
 
“Was?”

“He
died.
 
He and Jillian’s husband were
driving back to their hotel from a golf tournament in Palm Springs when their
car was broadsided.
 
Both of them were
killed.”

Tommy
was astounded.
 
“Your father was Mike
McKinsey?”

Grace
looked at him.
 
“You knew him?”

“I didn’t
know him, no, but I knew a McKinsey had died in that car accident with Clive
Birch, who was a friend of mine.
 
I knew
he had been a VP at Trammel.
 
And he was
your father?”

“That’s
right.”

“Geez.
 
I didn’t put two and two together.
 
And he was in that accident with Clive.
 
Your father.”

“It
was an awful thing.
 
Jillian was torn up
and I was torn up and we kind of grieved together.
 
I was her assistant at the time.
 
It was awful.”

Tommy
understood that.

“That
was also when Cam and I became closer.”
 
Grace
said this and looked at Tommy, expecting him to once again admonish her for her
poor choice of man.
 
But he didn’t go
there.

“Who
came after Cam?” he asked.
 

“Nobody
came after Cam.”

Tommy
hesitated.
 
“So you haven’t been with
anyone since Cameron Birch?”

Grace
nodded her head.
 
“That’s right.”

“Not
even for a . . . night?”
 

Grace
knew what he was asking.
 
She sipped more
wine.
 
“Not even for a night,” she said.

“I
thought you said you guys broke up five months ago?”

“Four
months ago.”

“So
you’re telling me that you haven’t had any in four months?”

Grace
smiled.
 
“You make it sound like it’s
been four years.”

Tommy
raised his eyebrows.
 
“Well,” he started
saying, but Grace shook her head.

“Never
mind,” she said and Tommy grinned an alluringly rakish grin and hunched his
shoulders.
 
Grace loved that smile of
his.

“But
what about you?” she asked him.
 
“What’s
your status?”
 

“My
status?”

“Yeah.”

“Single,”
he said firmly.

Grace
smiled.
 
“You say that so proudly.”

“Not
really.”

“Yes
really.
 
You said that with some serious
emphasis, as if you were reciting some kind of battle cry: ‘Say it loud!
 
I’m single and I’m proud!”

Tommy
laughed.
 
“Well I certainly didn’t mean
to sound any trumpets.
 
I’ve never been
married was my point.”

“Never
even engaged?”

Tommy
didn’t want to be reminded of his last engagement.
 
An engagement that left him alone on what was
supposed to be his wedding day.
 
“Yes,”
he said.
 
“I’ve been engaged
before.”
 

Grace
waited for him to elaborate, but nothing else was said.
 
She knew what sore spots looked like, having
one or two herself, so she decided to move on.
 
“What possessed you to buy a restaurant?
 
Especially one as luxurious as this one,” she added.

Tommy
was more than willing to move on, too.
 
“I buy many businesses,” he said.
 
“Some I keep, some I sell for profit.
 
Diamante’s was one of the ones I decided to keep.”

“So
you’re what they call a corporate raider?”

“That’s
not the phrase I would have chosen, but yes, that’s right.
 
I’m a venture capitalist.”

“Not
a bad living I’m sure.”

Tommy
chuckled.
 
“It pays the bills.”

“No,
Tommy.
 
My job pays the bills.
 
Your job don’t have bills.”

Tommy
laughed and lifted his wine glass.
 
He
then took a sip himself.

“So
what did you do before you became a mega businessman?
 
Did you ever work in a McDonalds, say, like
the rest of us?
 
Or were you born into
the good life?”

Tommy
snorted.
 
“Not bloody likely,” he
said.
 
“My old man was a cop and I
followed in his footsteps, and my kid brother followed in mine.”

Grace
was astonished.
 
“You used to be a
policeman?”

“I
did.”

“What
rank?”

“Captain.”

“You
were a police captain?
 
Wow.
 
Why did you leave?”

“Many
reasons, and I just wanted to try other things.
 
So I prayed and went for it.”

“You
went for it and never looked back.”

“You
got that right,” Tommy said.

“You
didn’t want to look back?”

“Not
for a second.
 
Being a cop was
tough.
 
And restraining.
 
I’m glad to have that life behind me.”

When
the waiter left, they both got down to business.
 
It tasted so good that Grace ended up
cleaning her plate.
 

Tommy
picked up her empty plate, turned it over and then back upright, and
smiled.
 
“Still think it’s too much
food?” he asked her.

“What
can I say?
 
I was suddenly hungry.”

Tommy
shook his shoulders effeminately.
 
“I’ll
show you hunger,” he said, and Grace laughed.

They
arrived at her apartment building and took the elevator to the seventeenth
floor.
 
Tommy leaned against the rail and
Grace stared up at the changing floor numbers as they chugged along.
 
There were other people in the elevator, too,
but Grace could feel Tommy’s eyes all over her.
 
She felt conflicted by the attention.
 
Especially after what Nayla had told her.
 
And, in truth, she didn’t know what she
wanted to do herself.
 
Guys like Cameron
she understood.
 
Their motives were usually
crystal clear even when they didn’t intend for them to be.
 
But guys like Tommy were in a different
league.
 
Grace didn’t know where to begin
to figure out his motivation.
 
Sometimes
it was obvious.
 
He wanted sex and sex
alone.
 
But other times it wasn’t obvious
at all.
 
They seemed to connect on a
deeper level, and he seemed to want much more.
 
Or, she thought wryly, she at least hoped he wanted more.

The
elevator binged and then the doors opened, and Grace and Tommy stepped
off.
 
Like two interested people burdened
by anticipation, they walked quietly to her apartment at the end of the
hall.
 

CHAPTER SEVEN

She
lay naked in the middle of her bed, her inner thighs already wet and ready, as
he slung off his shirt, stepped out of his shoes, and then unbuckled and
unzipped his pants.
 
The rod that flapped
out was already heavy with his erection and Grace couldn’t avoid staring.
 
She didn’t mean to.
 
It wasn’t as if she’d never seen a dick
before.
 

But
his manhood won the prize hands down.
 
She’d been with black guys who were average-to-large, and white guys who
were average-to-small.
 
But none of them,
not one, had equipment that was as large and thick and as inviting as
Tommy’s.
 
His dick was so inviting, in
fact, that as his naked body climbed on top of her, and that same hard, thick
dick slid across her thigh, her vagina pulsated in a way that caused her to
smile.
 
She felt like a novice again.
 
She felt the kind of anticipation she had her
very first time.

Just
a few minutes earlier she had inwardly debated whether to let him in her
apartment at all.
 
They were standing at
the front door.
 
She had thanked him for
coming to her surprise party, and he had mentioned how much he enjoyed
himself.
 
His blondish-brown hair had
flapped over his forehead, and he had his sports jacket off and over his
shoulder, revealing just how buff he really was.
 
And she felt the weight of just how difficult
it would be to turn him down.