Club Saturday: Contemporary Menage Romance (Sarasota Sin Series Book 2) (19 page)

Drake caught up with her, pulling Vania back behind a potted palm tree. “Where are you going? You’re bleeding,” he hissed. “We’re going upstairs and waiting for my doctor.”

“I’m fine. It’s a surface scratch.” She crossed her arms, fighting the roar of her body. “I don’t want to be here, not right now. And I certainly don’t want to fight with you.”

“Then I’ll take you to my home.”
 

“I don’t want to go there. You knew all along, didn’t you?” Guarded amber eyes watched her. “That you’d fucked Matt’s lover.”
 

“Vania, please, can’t you calm down enough to think this through?”

She wasn’t running from him, but Vania needed to get away from the pounding noise and the skeletons popping from every door. “Yes, later.”

“I was with her once, several weeks ago,” he explained anyway, “which was one too many times for me, even if I hadn’t started a relationship with you.”

“I can’t hear this right now.”

“If I wanted Gayle, I would be with her and not you.”

“That’s not why I’m upset.” She needed to calm down. Her anger was making her head pound harder. “In this case, not telling me about her was the same as lying.”

“I only found out the night we paid Matt a visit,” he explained. “You were furious with us afterwards. I couldn’t add the rest, could I?”

“The rest was pretty damn important. Why should I have found out from
her
, of all people?”

“Drake would have told you eventually,” Evan said, now catching up to them.

“When?” Her shoulders were heaving, her eyes staying on Drake. “After you sunk so far under my skin that it wouldn’t matter?”

“Yes.”

Vania blinked at Drake’s honesty, and decided to throw some right back at him. “It’s too late.” She shoved her finger at his chest; it rose and fell rapidly under her touch. “You’re both
already
under my skin.”

Chapter 21

“Vania,” Evan called to her as she took off. Drake stayed back, giving her some space. “Wait.” He gripped her elbows with a firm gentleness, his eyes narrowing to slits. “You think this is okay? To go off because you’re mad at Drake?”

“I wasn’t going off like that,” she corrected. “I just need some space.”

“Without me? I can’t share your space because Drake pissed you off?”

“What?”

“What about
me
?” Evan patted his chest over his heart. “You’ve lumped me in this Gayle fiasco? I didn’t touch her.”

She tried to take a step back but Evan kept hold of her elbow. “Evan…”

“I get that we’re in a unique relationship,” he whispered. “But you cannot, will not, get mad at me when you’re mad at him. Just as you will not get mad at Drake when you’re angry with me.”

Though Evan made perfect sense, she hated his tone. “I am not mad at you over Gayle. I needed air, but I shouldn’t have stomped off.”

His jaw unclenched. “Let’s go upstairs and discuss this further.”

“I don’t, however, like your current tone.” She wiggled her arm.
 
“Or the grip.”

“You have no idea how well I can grip you.” Fire ignited in his eyes, a wicked, burning flame. “Around the wrists. Around the ankles.” He swallowed hard as his mouth dipped to her ear. “You will come upstairs now and I will —"

“Though I’ve missed out on anything remotely like a sex life until I joined with you and Drake,” she interrupted, “you cannot use sex to manipulate me.”

“I can use sex with you any way I see fit.” He licked his bottom lip. “Because
you
use those innocent charms on me with lethal precision. Turnabout is fair play.”

“What innocent charms?” Vania knew he was derailing her. But she couldn’t wait to hear whatever nonsense Evan came up with next.

“The way you look at me.”

“That’s it?”

He lifted his hand to cup her jaw. “When I’m inside you,” he elaborated.

“That’s not innocent charms —"

“I haven’t looked away from a woman,” Evan said low. “I can stare her straight in the eyes and fuck her until she drops.”

Her stomach knotted. “I don’t want to hear this.”

“But you’re different,” he kept going. “Whether I’m buried inside you or standing here next to you, I try to close my eyes against the intensity, to fight this damned vulnerability I haven’t felt since I was a kid. But when I fight it, it hurts.” He patted his chest again. “No one has made me feel this way, not a single person, certainly not a woman.”

“
Evan
.”
 

“Jealousy was eating me downstairs, having to see that stranger taste what’s mine. Now you’re running away from me while you’re mad at Drake.”

Vania hadn’t realized how much she’d hurt him. “I’m sorry.” She stood on her tiptoes, wincing when her heel snapped. “I will never do again.”

“I’ll hold you to that promise.” Evan wrapped his forearm around her lower back and hauled her against him. What was he really thinking while looking at her
that way
? She wondered at his gleam, not quite the usual predatory glimmer but something more, something uncertain.
 

Evan’s eyes dropped to Vania’s mouth, his thumb brushing back and forth over her bottom lip. When he slowly lowered it to hers and took it with his teeth, goosebumps exploded over every inch of her skin.
 

His tongue slipped inside as he dipped her back, a groan leaving his mouth while her heart gave an odd thunk in her chest. These feelings were tangling in her mind, in her heart, changing her life too soon. How was this happening in the middle of such chaos?
 
Then she remembered what her grandmother had said about love always finding a way. Maybe…
 

When he pulled back on a small smile, Vania’s mouth moved faster than her head. “Evan, I’m fall —"

Flash.

Snap.

Flash.

Lights flickered all around, gaining breakneck momentum. But not one was from candles, hanging jellyfish lights, or even dance floor strobes. She groaned and covered her eyes. Yes, these particular flashes were irritatingly familiar.
 

Flash.

Snap.

Flash.

Vania turned blindly, listening to the questions hurled at Evan.

“Who’s the lady, Mr. Easton?”

Snap.

“Why is she holding her stomach?” A rush of escalating murmurs made her head spin. “Is she pregnant?”

Flash.

She punched the elevator call button.

Evan ignored them, focusing entirely on her, trying to protect Vania from the vultures by using his body as her shield. The move amped up picture taking and questions. This time around, Vania didn’t bother smiling prettily. They’d nearly caught her spilling an ‘I love you’ to Evan, a private moment that should’ve remained private.

Snap.

“Are you two serious?” a woman yelled, pushing her way through the gathering crowd. She appeared professional, in no way dressed like the club goers. Her clicking heels on the marble reminded Vania of Gayle Murphy’s determined stride.

Flash.

Orange circles danced in front of Vania’s vision. “I need to leave.”
 

Evan was trying to pull her the opposite way.

“No, I can’t walk through that crowd with my head bleeding,” she hissed. “God knows what the headlines will be tomorrow if I do.”

The elevator sounded. A woman walked out and Vania stepped in.

“No, wait,” Evan said, trying to keep her in hand. “We have to —"

“Deal with your admirers,” she begged, yanking away from his grip. “I’ll meet you and Drake upstairs.”

“That’s not the —"

Closing elevator doors cut him off. He didn’t press his hands inside the doors, going caveman on her and yanking her out. But Vania didn’t fool herself; she knew Evan would have if those cameras and cellphones weren’t going off at top speed.
 

She dropped her forehead to the cool mirrored wall.
 
No work, no cameras, no ex fiancé manipulating her, and no shoe-welding ex-lovers were coming at her inside this tiny space of solace.

Only blessed peace…

Vania reached her hand to the panel and realized she couldn’t get straight to the sixth floor, which was obviously what Evan was trying to tell her.
 

“Just great.”
 
Vania punched number four and figured she’d hop in the stairwell from the fourth floor, and then jog up the two remaining flights of stairs. This, she realized, would compound her aching heel.

The lights flickered as the elevator started moving, but it was plunging downward instead of heading to the fourth floor.
 

“No!” Vania shoved her fingertip against the four, pushing repeatedly, but the damn thing wouldn’t obey.
 

A sudden stop flipped her stomach. She waved out her hands, trying to regain balance.
 

From the side, a sliding sound caught her immediate attention. She looked over her shoulder, right as the mirrored wall divided and opened like a gliding pocket door. A blast of cool air hit Vania before the faint glow from a corridor beyond beckoned her from the elevator car.
 

No way, she thought.

She lifted her hand to her chest, trying to calm her heart, and then hit the elevator panel with her fist. When it wouldn’t go back up though the number four remained lit, she knelt, tore open the compact door hiding the emergency phone, and reached for the corded receiver.

“Hello?” She gasped, “The elevator’s not moving.”

Something glinted above her in the mirrored wall.

“That particular elevator,” a man with a bored tone explained,
 
“moves every —"

A whirl of air sounded overhead right before the phone whipped from her hand, clattering across the elevator floor with its snapped wires trailing.

Vania screamed and spun, placing her back against the corner, but saw no one. “Who’s there?”

“
Vania
.” A man’s voice taunted her, echoing from the corridor. “
Back to play
?”

“No.” Her knees threatened to buckle, so Vania leaned forward, tented her fingertips over the floor, and readied to bolt. She lifted her chin, keeping her eyes straight ahead and tried to sound calm. “Not again, not ever again…”

A silhouette appeared in the doorway, the darkness a barrier against identifying him except for a stream of light glancing off his blonde hair. “You say no, yet here you are.”

With her heart leaping from her chest, Vania fought to concentrate, not to allow fear to dictate over sound judgment. “Who are you?”

“
Vania
, you came in my mouth,” he said in that all too familiar whisper-rasp, though she had no idea who he was. “I doubt you’ve forgotten. I know I haven’t.”
 

He took a step inside.
 

“I was misled,” she said. “I thought you were my fiancé at the time, or I wouldn’t have come here.”

“Well, that’s disheartening.” He took another step towards her.

“Stay back.”

The stream of light shone down his entire body, his eyes sparkling behind a black mask ending above his mouth, his body dressed in dark trousers and a thin chocolate-brown Henley.
 

Another step closer… “Did you get my flowers?”

“Yes.” Vania choked back a sob. “Were you watching me earlier, when I was on the balcony?”

“On the balcony? I’m not some nutty stalker.” He took the final step, and Vania was forced to stand. But she wouldn’t be cornered.
 

Feigning right, she darted for the corridor.
 

He grabbed her waist, swinging her back against the elevator wall, and Vania’s glasses skittered to the floor. “Let’s discuss a few things before you leave.”
 
He used his legs to trap her. “We have chemistry most don’t. That’s hard to ignore.”
 

He caught her flying fists, his hands dwarfing her wrists.

“Stop!” Effectively trapped, Vania screamed, “Help! Somebody help!”

“Why are you screaming?” He sounded confused. “I don’t hurt women. When have I ever hurt you?”

Vania couldn’t believe how much stronger and larger he was than her. When up against her body, the man blocked out the entire elevator, and he smelled exactly like Matt. “Get off me, you freak!”

He lifted her wrists above her head. He gathered them in one of his hands, leaving the other free. When she pulled down with all her might, he appeared unconcerned but tightened his grip.
 

He cupped her jaw and took her bottom lip with his teeth, in the way of Evan, and bit down just shy of breaking skin. She knew he’d been watching them, that he was mimicking Evan’s earlier kiss. She screamed as he sucked on her lip for long seconds.
 

“You know my touch by now.” He trailed fingertips down her throat, fluttering outwards to her ear. “Why should you scream?”