Six Degrees of Desperation (Dirty Tricks) (4 page)

Charli hung back. "Audrey, can I talk to you
a minute before we go out?"

Audrey looked back, her brows pinched in a
hint of a frown. "Can you make it quick? They'll be pouring in
before we get into place."

"It's just that I need your advice."

"About?" Audrey glanced over her shoulder as
a loud whoop echoed through the empty saloon, and a flood of men in
boots trampled in, filling the tables and chairs.

"Connor."

Audrey's gaze returned to Charli. "What
about Connor?"

"I think I love him."

Her boss smiled. "Good, then tell him." She
looked back toward the barroom. "I think we'll set a record
attendance tonight. If all goes well, I can pay off the second
mortgage on this place." Audrey's attention moved back to Charli.
"Anything else?"

Charli's hands twisted around and around.
"What do I do about Original Sin?"

Audrey's brows rose. "You haven't told
Connor about your mystery cowboy?"

"No. Not yet." Charli's eyes filled and her
throat tightened. "And they'll both be here tonight."

Audrey's eyes widened. "Both? In my
place?"

With a nod, Charli brushed the single tear
that escaped the corner of her eye. "What should I do?"

"You have to break it off with one and tell
the other." Audrey shook her head. "God, I'm glad I'm not single
anymore."

"And to think I was bored here in
Temptation." Charli laughed, the sound not even funny to her own
ears. "I need some of that boredom right now."

"Audrey?" A tall, dark-skinned, man with
midnight black hair slicked back behind a black mask stood in the
doorway. In his matching black shirt, slacks and cowboy boots, his
head topped by a round-brimmed black hat like those worn by Mexican
cabellero's, Jackson Gray Wolf looked like a throw-back to old
Zorro movies still showing at the tiny hours of the morning in
black and white. The Kiowa Indian stepped into the doorway of the
storeroom. "Libby needs another box of Jack Daniels. They're going
to go through a lot tonight."

Audrey leaned up on her toes and pressed a
kiss to Jackson's lips. "Thanks for helping."

He caught her around the waist and dragged
her close, deepening the kiss. "Wouldn't have missed it for the
world," he said, his words muffled by her mouth.

Charli eased past the constricted doorway,
leaving Jackson and Audrey alone to their pre-ball groping. With a
sigh, Charli trudged toward the barroom, wishing this night was
over and that everything had already worked out. As she stepped
from behind the bar, Charli's heart cart-wheeled. She braced
herself for the onslaught of orders and the requirement to be
prepared to flip a bottle or two to entertain the crowd. Slapping
away wandering hands of drunken cowboys trying to feel her up, high
on booze and adrenaline from their events at the rodeo, seemed the
least of her worries tonight.

With her gaze zipping left and right and
constantly turning to see who came through the door, Charli spilled
drinks, dropped bottles and tripped, landing in one toothless
Mexican's lap to his utter surprise and delight.

When she tried to get up, he refused to let
go, pressing his fingers into her sides so hard, she was sure
there'd be bruises left behind. Nick McBride, Greta Sue's backup,
spun Charli out of the man's grip and onto the dance floor in time
for the traditional Party Mixer Dance.

The master of ceremonies Audrey hired for
the evening took the microphone at center stage and shouted. “Grab
your partner, but don’t get too comfortable!” Thirty seconds later,
he called out, “Switch!”

Audrey encouraged the waitresses to take a
turn around the floor. With a men to women ratio of five-to-one
during rodeo weekend, the waitresses helped to even the odds or at
least give the men a chance to dance at least once.

Charli spun from one man's arms to the next,
her head spinning, her gaze trying to lock onto the men's faces,
searching for Connor Mason's blue gray eyes behind the masks. On
her third pass from arms to arms, she ended up in the embrace of a
man wearing all black like Jackson, only pinned to his jacket was a
soft yellow rose.

He leaned down and whispered in her ear.
"Love you…naked."

With a gasp, Charli glanced up.

“Switch!”

With a deft move, her partner spun her
around and into another man's arms. This cowboy had on the normal
jeans and stiffly ironed white shirt of any of the regulars who
showed up at the Ugly Stick Saloon on a regular basis. His cowboy
boots were worn from use, but polished to a shine. He wore the
black mask offered at the door for those who didn't have a costume
but wanted to participate in the masquerade.

Noting nothing special about him, Charli
craned her neck to see where the man in black with the yellow rose
had gone. As her dance partner two-stepped his way around the large
oval dance floor, Charli panned the crowd, dread building with each
step. She had to find Original Sin, break it off and then find
Connor and tell him about her affair with the stranger before
someone else had the chance to break the news.

The master of ceremonies called out, “Change
partners!”

Charli braced herself, hoping to duck off
the dance floor and get back to work.

Instead, the cowboy holding her spun her
out, right into another man’s arms. She looked up at her new
partner, a man dressed all in black, wearing the Zorro-style mask
and sporting a yellow rose on his lapel. He smiled a secret smile
and pulled her hard against his chest.

Her heart ricocheting off her ribs, Charli
opened her mouth to tell him she couldn’t see him anymore. Instead,
the beat of the music kicked into high gear and the mystery cowboy
took off, twirling her under his arm and back into his chest. Every
time she tried to say something, he twirled her out again, until
the M.C. shouted for the couples to switch partners again.

“No, wait,” Charli cried, her voice drowned
out by the raucous hoots of the cowboys whose boots pounded the
floor.

As the endless song continued, she was
practically tossed from one man to another. And soon she was seeing
more than one man in black with the yellow rose on his lapel. She
blinked. Maybe she was dizzy from all the hand-offs and twirls.
Surely there wasn’t more than one Zorro with a yellow rose.

Then one passed her on the dance floor.
Before he got three steps ahead, another passed her with an
identical outfit and a yellow rose. Just in case she thought it was
all a hoax, the man winked and grinned.

Charli’s knees buckled in the middle of a
spin. Her partner caught her before she fell and was trampled by
the crowd partaking in the merriment. “Are you okay?”

“No.” Charli shook her head. “I need to get
back to work. Do you mind?”

He eased her to the side and escorted her
off the floor, thanking her for the dance.

She headed back in the direction of her
tables, keeping a look out for the mystery Zorros. Now that she
wasn’t dancing, she didn’t see even one. What was up with that?

Any chance at a relationship with the
handsome, gentle Connor Mason rode on Charli's ability to wrap up
this mess tonight. The sooner the better. Unfortunately, she was
there to work and her tables were yammering for drinks.

Begging off the dance floor, Charli hurried
back to her coverage area, snatching up empty mugs and bottles,
taking orders for more drinks and munchies. By the time she reached
the bar, she felt as if she'd run the gauntlet and only thirty
minutes of the night had passed. She had another four hours to
go.

For the next hour, she worked filling
orders, fending off advances and forcing a smile to her face when
all she wanted was to scream and run from the bar. The condoms and
lubricating jelly slipped to the very back of her mind as she
worried about the confrontation ahead when she had to let Original
Sin go and tell Connor of her transgressions.

Never mind the package Connor had picked up
at the jewelry store. God forbid he actually planned to propose
tonight—in this madhouse, with all these people around. Charli
prayed he didn't. Their relationship was too new. Too fresh, too
uncertain, even though she knew Connor Mason was a keeper, she
needed more time to make up her mind.

"It's your turn. Go on break." Audrey took
the tray of empty mugs and bottles from Charli's hands. "Go rest.
It's going to be a long night and the show starts soon."

Charli smiled at Audrey and slid behind the
bar where she filled a clean mug half-full of ginger ale and
hightailed it for the storeroom where she planned to sit on a stack
of boxes with her feet up for the few brief minutes she had to
herself.

Jackson was leaving the storeroom with a
case of vodka on his shoulder, headed toward Libby and the bar.
"It's all yours. I snagged a chair from the floor for you girls to
use during break."

"Thanks." Charli entered the storeroom and
closed the door behind her, reveling in the relative silence. Boxes
of wine, cases of beer and staple foods stacked from floor to
ceiling along the walls acted as additional insulation against the
steady thrum of the country western band, whose speakers blared
full blast in order to be heard over the shouts of the patrons of
the Ugly Stick Saloon.

Ears ringing, her feet throbbing in the
stiletto heels she'd worn with her costume, Charli rounded a tall
stack of corn chips to find the wooden chair Jackson commandeered
from the overcrowded saloon. The column of chips acted as a wall,
blocking the view of the door, making the room seem even more
isolated from the hubbub. Charli sank into the chair and let the
stress and strain of the evening leach out of her system.

The door to the storeroom opened.

Too tired to get up, Charli leaned back her
head. "You can have the chair after my break, but right now, I
couldn't move if the building was on fire."

"Poor Charli," a deep, resonant voice
preceded the man it belonged to around the stand of nacho
chips.

Charli jerked upright, all fatigue fading in
a flash as the man in the black suit with the yellow rose stepped
into view, the black cloth mask still in place, hiding his face
from view. "You."

A smile quirked on the corners of his lips
as he plucked the rose from his lapel and drew it down over her
eyelids and across her lips.

Charli closed her eyes, her heart skipping
several beats, breathing lodging in her throat as she sat frozen to
her seat, unable to move or protest the tender assault.

"We've missed you," he whispered.

Her mouth opened on a gasp and he claimed
her lips. Eyes wide now, Charli pulled back, her gaze rising over
the stranger's shoulder to see three other men, all identically
dressed, each sporting a yellow rose on his lapel. One by one, the
men paraded in front of her, trailing their rose across her cheek,
her neck, her shoulder.

When they stepped back, Original Sin trailed
his rose across the tops of her breasts. "Did you miss us?"

Fully prepared to say no, Charli's mouth
opened and nothing came out. She knew Connor was the sure thing,
the man a woman could bet her life on—a man a woman could count on
to love, honor and commit. Whereas, the men standing in front of
her, looking so incredibly sexy, made her so hot with the
possibilities, she couldn't work words past her throat.

"I'll take that as a yes." He held out his
hand.

Charli placed hers in his and allowed him to
pull her to her feet and into his arms.

"I've longed to hold you, to kiss you and to
witness the ecstasy in your face as we make love to you."

She swallowed hard, pushing words past her
constricted throat. "All of you?"

He smiled. "All of us."

"I'm only on break for fifteen minutes." She
glanced at the watch on her wrist. "Make that ten."

A low chuckle rumbled in his chest,
reverberating through hers. "What more do we need?" He lifted her
skirt, his hands sliding beneath to cup her ass.

In the back of her mind, Charli knew this
was all wrong. Connor would never understand. Any relationship
she'd hoped to have with him would be beyond repair if she let
Original Sin do all the naughty things his gaze told her he would
do in just under ten minutes.

No matter how wrong, Charli couldn't say no,
couldn't tell him and his buddies to take a hike, couldn't resist
the lure of all four men making love to her in the storeroom, fast
and furious.

"What if someone enters?" she asked.

"The door's locked." He lifted her legs to
wrap around his waist and he nodded at the man who'd moved behind
her. "Unlace her."

"Do you know how hard it is to get into this
thing?" Was that really her breathless voice? She should be telling
these men to leave, not arguing about how difficult it would be to
get dressed in the limited amount of time.

With four tall, handsome men filling what
little empty space was available in the storeroom, Charli barely
had air to breathe.

Then Original Sin slid a finger past the
thong of her panties and into her creaming pussy and that's all it
took.

Charli's sex drive shot from nil to max in a
nano-second, her resistance flying out the door. She tightened her
legs around Original Sin's waist and clung as his fingers thrust
into her again and again. Then he eased her away from his body.

Two of the men slid alongside Charli ducking
beneath her arms, each taking a thigh to spread her legs.

Original Sin tapped her clit with the juices
he'd acquired from his foray into her vagina, smearing the liquid
over her bud, stroking in long languid strokes.

"Faster."

"Say please."

"Faster, please, damn it," she said through
gritted teeth.

His finger paused. "You're a wild and wicked
lover, Charli, worthy of many long, hot nights in bed."