Slightly Sinful (9 page)

She made a beeline for the restroom to take evasive action. If she didn’t get herself together before the final meeting, she wouldn’t be held responsible for what she did. Her aroused mind considered how rude it would be for her to knock Nicholas Torres’ chair over and launch herself over his fallen form to land her throbbing wet pussy on his face.

~YH~

“Ms. Reynolds, may I please have a word with you?”

The meeting over and contracts signed, she was on her way out the door with her staff when Torres’ voice halted her exiting steps.

Darren paused as he headed out the door before her. Turning, he glanced over her shoulder at Torres then arched a questioning eyebrow at her. “Do you need me to wait for you?”

Yes. Better yet don’t leave me alone with him
, Delilah yearned to say. “No.” She placed a reassuring smile on her face and continued. “I drove my own car. I should be back at the office minutes behind you.”

Nodding, Darren exited the room and closed the door.

“Nicholas Torres, the self-made executive who began his work in the New York Stock Exchange as an independent floor broker and moved up until he owned his own firm. Reports on his life have said he took wild risks and diversified his finances. It paid off in a large way for him.” Her irony and annoyance weaved themselves around her words as she spoke, still facing the door. She was having a hard time looking at him, her emotions warring with her own stupidity. “Now, the world seeks him out for his business savvy.” She pivoted, eyeing him accusingly. “Elusive. He spends most of his time out of the country, managing to stay out of the camera’s eye.” She watched him. Stared at him as he leaned against the long oak boardroom table. He was less than ten steps away from her, silent.

Delilah was thankful he didn’t move closer. With her senses still reeling from earlier, she couldn’t handle him in close proximity.

When she’d entered the room after leaving the bathroom, she was relieved to discover the two of them would sit on opposite ends of the table.

“What do you have to say for yourself,
Mr. Torres
?” Head held high, shoulders back, she kept her demeanor cool and professional.

“Have dinner with me tonight.”

It wasn’t a question, but a statement.

“No, thank you,
Mr. Torres
. I’m already full on lies and deception.”

A sexy lopsided smile played across his mouth. “I’ll send my car to your house at eight.”

What in the hell?
“Are you hard of hearing or just that damned arrogant?” In her anger, she crossed the room, stopping at arms length. “I am
not
having dinner with you. Tonight or ever.”

He rose from the desk and closed the final gap between them, but didn’t touch her. His intense steel gray eyes captured hers, making his message clear. “Either you be ready at eight or I will personally come to your house and drag you out.”

“The hell you will--”

“Try me.” He cut her off, his Latin accent thick and heavy. When she remained silent, he continued, “We have much to discuss.”

Delilah noted something flickering in the depths of his eyes.

“Until tonight, Ms. Reynolds.”

He inclined his head and exited, leaving her seething in the empty room.

~YH~

Roberto entered his office and walked to the window. From his large corner office he could see multiple Fortune 500 company buildings towering along with his own over the Queen City streets creating the city’s metropolitan skyline. At times he missed the view of the river from his Spain office, but everything that had been missing from his personal life there was within reach. He still could not believe that just over a week ago he’d only pondered the possibility of meeting Delilah and returning stateside. The past weekend had changed things in a major way.

“So,
jefe hombre
.” Les’ voice announced his friend was in the room.

If his mind and heart were not so weighed down with his own thoughts, Roberto would have smiled at being called boss man by his friend.

Hearing the snick of the door as Les closed it, Roberto continued to stare out the window awaiting Les. His second in command had not hunted him down for nothing.

“Now that you’ve hired her company and she is within reach for a while, what’s next?” Les stepped up beside him, into his peripheral vision. “Are you going to tell her you have the hots for her, or just bide your time?”

The hots… if it were only that simple
.

“It’s complicated.” He glanced at Les, then away again.

“More complicated than you sexing her up in the media room?”

¡
Mierda
! he wondered how much his friend had figured out. It had been dark in the room and he and Delilah were far in the back away from the others; however, Les was a clever man.

“You caught that, I see.”

Chuckling, Les said, “No worries, I don’t believe anyone else knew what was going on in the back row.”

Roberto nodded. He wasn’t trying to disrespect Delilah before her team. It was just hard for him to be around her and not want to touch her. When she tried to pull the professional distant role on him, it pissed him off and the Neanderthal male part of him had him exerting his dominant side. Then once he caressed the silky warmth of her skin, he couldn’t stop himself.

He turned and faced Les. “She was at Daniel Silverman’s party Saturday.”

“His sexapalooza event?” Les had gone with him the last time and knew the type of action that went down.

“You got it.”

“No shit.” Rubbing his jaw, Les gazed down at the street, silent for a moment, then back at him. “I don’t recall seeing her there the last time. Do you think swinging and free for all fucking is what she’s into?” Les’ blue eyes darkened with concern.

Les knew how he felt about Delilah and even why he’d set out to hire her company. His best friend knew he was more than slightly interested in Delilah.

“No.” Roberto buried his hands in his pockets and strolled toward his desk. “If you could have seeing her there. She was a sexy auburn haired fish out of water. Not at all in her element.”

He recalled coaxing her into the orgy scene and how she’d been standing away from the door looking as if she wanted to run. At the same time, her gaze had strayed frequently to the room and he could clearly see she wanted to experience the room but was too afraid to try it. 

“Okay, so back to my original question. When are you going to talk to her?” Les crossed the room and now stood on the other side of his desk.

“Tonight.” Roberto sighed, removed his hands from his pockets and sat down. “She’s royally pissed at me right now and may not even show.”

“She’ll get over it and she’ll show.”

Looking up at the man who was like a brother to him, Roberto asked, “What makes you so confident?”

“If she wasn’t into you, not just sexually, then she would have called foul or went screaming from the room instead of sitting there and letting you do whatever it was you were doing in the media room.”

He couldn’t bite back the smile as he recalled the warm, wet satin skin of her pussy around his fingers. “Possibly.”

“Most importantly, once you confess you love her, then—“

“What!” Roberto slapped his hands on the desk and vaulted up from his seat.
“¿En qué demonios has sacado esa idea?
”

“English, Roberto. “ Les waved his hand in front of him. “You know my Spanish is limited to curse words, female anatomy and little else.”  

“Where in the hell did you get that idea?” Roberto bit out each word slowly as he eyed his friend across the desk.

Smiling broadly, Les folded his arms over his chest. “Besides your reaction now?”

Roberto lifted a single eyebrow, but remained silent.

“After seeing her once, you became fascinated by her. You had me sending any and all reports about her and her company to you. Anytime she did work for someone we knew you wanted to know. The only thing you didn’t do was have a PI follow her or have me inquire about her private life.”

He didn’t need that. He’d asked Silverman what he knew about her. Silverman knew Delilah through her friend Pamela who confirmed that Delilah was single and had been that way for awhile, focusing all her attention on expanding her business.

After lowering his arms, Les said, “Tell me you’re not in love with her and I will believe you.”

Standing up straight, Roberto looked into his friend’s eyes. The man before him was like one of his brothers, he could not lie to the man. Neither was he ready to confess his feelings, whatever they may be to anyone before he spoke with Delilah.

“I care about her. Let’s just leave it at that.”

“You got it.”

He let out a heavy breath. He had a lot to think about before Delilah arrived at his executive apartment on the top floor. That was too many hours away. There were other things that he needed to take care of before then.

Settling back into his chair, Roberto said, “I’d like to meet with the board members in an hour.”

“Anything you'd like them to be prepared to discuss?”

Leaning back, he stared up at Les. “Yes, my permanent return to the states.”

“Hot damn!” Les made a fist at his waist with one hand.

Roberto was thankful the other man didn’t finish up with a full out fist pump.

“It’s about time.”

“You're correct,
amigo
, it is.” Roberto confirmed with a smile.

Transitioning to the U.S. would be easy.

Now he just had to convince the brown-skinned red head that they should be together.  He knew they were sexually compatible, the woman made him crazy with desire for her. Next he wanted to find out how well their lives meshed.

~YH~

“What’s up between you and Torres?” Darren stepped into her office and closed the door moments behind her return.

Unzipping her briefcase, she removed papers, distracting herself from looking at him. “The same thing as everyone else. It’s just business.”

Not deterred, he moved further into the room until he stood on the other side of her desk. “If it’s just business, then the aroma of wet pussy I smelled on him during the break when we spoke about one of the slides he had questions on, must have been a figment of my imagination.”

Her mouth gaped, then she remembered her position of innocence and snapped it shut. Nervously she licked her lips. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“And the fact you were breathless during most of your briefing…still doesn’t jar your memory?”

She plopped down in her seat and dragged her moist palms over her skirt under her desk so Darren couldn’t see. “No.”

He lifted an insufferable eyebrow at her.

Pursing her lips together and flaring her nostrils, she gritted out, “Fine! Fine! Fine! If you insist on butting into my business, Darren.”

Not put off by her tone, Darren crossed his arms over his chest and waited.

Taking a deep breath, she told her friend the truth. “I will admit that your senses are correct. Other than that, I’ll tell you nothing but to say it’s complicated.”

“Now was that so hard?” he asked, dropping his hands.

She turned the eyebrow back on him.

“Only thing I’ll say is be careful. Dealing with such a man as powerful can be like playing with a blow torch.”

If you only knew
. “Thanks, Darren.”

He headed toward her office door and paused before opening it then looked over his shoulder. “Lila, you do what you feel is best and don’t let Pamela bully you with her neurotic thoughts about rich men when she calls you tonight.”

Frowning, she questioned him, “Why would Pamela be calling me tonight.”

He smiled and quickly exited the room.

Understanding, she called out to his retreating form. “Don’t you dare call Pam.”

But he was gone.

Delilah slumped in her chair and thought about how much her life had changed since she’d allowed Pamela to convince her to go on the wicked weekend. She’d gone away and had a night filled with fantastic sex with a mysterious stranger, only to find herself catapulted into the volatile path of a very real, challenging man.

Chapter six

The call came in as she stepped out of her shower. Grabbing a thick towel, she wrapped it around her hair, leaving her body naked as she crossed the carpet and retrieved the phone. After its eighth ring, she picked up the insistent house phone from its cradle on her nightstand. “Yes, Pamela.” She’d been waiting for her friend’s call, and it was just like Pamela to instinctively call at the ninth hour.

Her friend blasted her. “Why in the
hell
didn’t you tell me about your affair with Nicholas Torres?”

“I would hardly call it an affair.” Pulling a small hand towel from the drawer on her vanity, she placed it over the seat cushion before she sat down in front of her make-up table’s oval shaped mirror with its Hollywood lighting.

Water still dripping, she didn’t want to mess up her fabric and she refused to dry off. Her body was hot. Ever since she’d seen Nicholas, her skin had burned as if she’d been placed too close to a flame.

“That’s not what Darren tells me,” she argued.

After patting her face dry with the end of the towel turbaned around her head, she began to apply moisturizer. “I’m sure he exaggerated for effect, just to get you all riled up.” Her friends always worked as a team against her, telling her she was stubborn and bullheaded at times, not knowing good sense when it came to relationships.

“So, his hand wasn’t rooted to the wrist up your cunt during a briefing?” she questioned accusingly.

Damn, Darren did you have to be so accurate in your story telling?

“Silence… is that what I hear?” Pamela took that as confirmation of the truth. “Aha! So it did happen.”

“Listen, Pamela--” she began, sealing the top back on her face cream.

“Lila, don’t you dare try and blow smoke up my ass.”

“Fine,” she barked, the same word she had given to Darren. She began adding make-up on her face--dramatic colors around her eyes and completing it with fuck-me red lipstick.