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She swallowed hard. “Ah, yes. Sure.” Was he serious or…?
He rolled his bag to his door.
Feeling more than a little out of sorts, she forced her attention from Blake and opened her door. The bellman carried her bag inside and she added to his tip. When all was said and done, the kid departed and Darla poked her head into the hallway. Blake was in his room, it appeared, his door firmly shut. She shut her own door and fell back against it. Was he being discreet or…no! She refused to believe Blake was playing her. She felt a connection with him, a level of comfort she never felt with another man so quickly, if ever. A knock sounded on the door and she jumped. The knock sounded again. Darla grabbed the door and pulled it open.
Blake stood there, tall and broad, still wearing his faded jeans and T-shirt, looking too sexy for her own good. “You gonna invite me in or leave me out here where someone might see me?”
“I have to get ready for drinks.” She looked at her watch. “We have fifteen minutes.”
“It was canceled,” he said. “Now can I come inside?”
She backed up and let him in, fearful he would be seen and eager for an explanation. “What do you mean drinks are canceled? I didn’t get a call.”
He stepped inside and shut the door, sliding her lock into place and turning to face her. A mixture of hot man scent and some deliciously right cologne washed over her, overpowering her with a spike in awareness. Of the man. Of the bed behind her—that she wasn’t going anywhere near until she knew what was going on.
“Meagan tried to call and text you, but apparently you don’t have good reception in the mountains. They’ve had some security issues at the audition site.” He leaned on the door as she had just moments before. “She had to cancel.”
“Oh, no,” Darla said, obviously alert, concerned. “What kind of security issues? We have to go and help out.”
“Wait. There’s more.” He read from his cell phone. “Blake. When Darla offers to come over and help us—and since I know Darla well, she will—tell her I said no. Sam gets cranky when too many people get involved with his things. I suggest both of you just get some rest and we’ll see you in the morning.” He glanced up at her.
“My God, she typed you a full memo in text message.”
“Yeah, she did,” he agreed. “But our bottom line here is that there is no meeting and no drinks with Meagan.” He reached for her and pulled her against him, his hand sliding down her back, molding her to his long, hard body. Her thighs pressed to his, her hips melded to his, making the thick ridge of his erection more than evident. “So, instead of a bet,” he murmured, “how about we negotiate more of a deal?”
“I’m not sure why that’s different but I’m not skydiving.” Her hands settled on his chest, his impressively hard chest, and warmth seeped into her palms. She couldn’t believe she was doing this, that this was really happening, that she wasn’t even trying to talk herself out of it. “Just for the record, if at any point before you leave this room and I tell you I will skydive, don’t believe me. I won’t be responsible for saying it. If you can live with that, then I want to know what your ‘deal’ is.”
“The idea that I might get you to agree, even if you change your mind later, isn’t a bad one.” He laughed. “But no skydiving. This is the ‘deal.’ For the rest of the night, if I can’t make you forget to worry about tomorrow morning, then my father will go on your show. I’ll give him the thumbs-up to embarrass the hell out of me, and believe me, not only will he do so and do it well, he’ll enjoy every second. My father revels in that kind of stuff. But if I succeed, then you give me my interview and we talk about the shoe incident and clear the air in the same public way this war started.”
“That’s big Texas talk and big Texas demands, if I ever heard them.”
His hand traveled a path up her back, to her neck, under her hair. “Sweetheart, talking isn’t what I have on my mind.” His bent toward her, his mouth a breath from hers, tickling her lips and so much more with promise. “Do we have a deal?”
If it was going to get him to kiss her, and sooner rather than later, oh, yeah, they did. “Sure,” she said. “We have a dea—” His mouth closed down on hers before she ever got the final word out.
* * *
BLAKE HAD INTENDED TO START slowly with Darla, to start with tender, seductive kisses, before exploring every inch of her sleek, sexy body. Intended but failed. She wrapped her arms around his waist, her lush breasts pressing against his chest. And once again, when he’d have sworn it was no longer possible for a woman to do so, Darla seduced him, not the other way around. The instant Blake had set eyes on her again in the New York airport, and ten times over since, she controlled him without even trying. He was charmed by her, intrigued by her, and he was lost in the touch of her soft, yielding lips beneath his.
