1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Fourteen Page 5

  And when he did it, his deep voice wrapped around the words warmly, communicating that warmth to me.

  “Daisy, I’d very much like to take you to dinner.”

  “Thanks,” I returned sharply, using my tone to fight back that funny feeling that just kept growing. “But no thanks. I don’t need a pity date, not to mention…” I lifted my hand again, this time to gesture stiltedly to my face, “I’m not feelin’ good about goin’ to some fancy place and bein’ on show.”

  “I don’t pity you,” he told me.

  “Really?” I asked, cocking my head again, feeling my hair move and seeing his head shift slightly so I knew he watched it. “A girl who got the skin scraped off her ass in a parking lot because some guy tore her clothes off, threw her to the blacktop, and banged the shit outta her when she was only kinda conscious?” I righted my head and nodded. “Right. I get it. You don’t pity that kind of girl. My kind. I work a pole, I got it comin’.”

  I stopped talking, but I’d done it so heatedly, I’d stupidly not paid close attention to him while I was doing it.

  So when I stopped talking, I had no choice but to pay attention because the entirety of Marcus Sloan had changed. Every inch. Every molecule. The change filled the air and circled around me, drawing me into its snare like I was Snow White reaching for the apple, even knowing the dangers that lurked if I took a bite.

  “I misspoke,” he whispered, his words slithering over my skin, not like a snake.

  Like silk.

  And they kept doing it as he kept speaking.

  “I don’t pity you. I’m very sorry for what happened to you. What you endured. Very sorry, Daisy. However, I don’t wish to have dinner with you because I pity you. I wish to have dinner with you because you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

  Yep.

  My mouth dropped open at that too.

  “It’s too soon for you,” he murmured. “I apologize. We’ll take this slow. To that end, I’d be honored if you’d have lunch with me on Friday. Somewhere quiet where you won’t feel on show.”

  “It’s Wednesday,” I told him something he likely knew, but it being Wednesday, no way my face would be okay to go to lunch anywhere by Friday.

  Not at all.

  Definitely not with a man like him.

  And taking it slow meant taking it slow. Friday was only two days away. That wasn’t slow!

  “Yes,” he agreed.

  “I…you…uh…”

  I stopped talking.

  “Friday,” he decreed.

  “No,” I whispered.

  He seemed to lean toward me.

  At that perceived movement, I scrambled off the bench and took a big step back.

  His hands came out of his pockets and he lifted them to his sides.

  “Daisy, I won’t—”

  “No,” I shook my head. “No more flowers. No lunch on Friday.”

  “Please, I simply—”

  “No.”

  It came out strangled.

  Then I turned and ran.

  But I heard him order curtly, obviously not to me, “Make sure she gets home safely.”

  And whoever it was did just that if the Mercedes trailing me in my Porsche was anything to go by.

  Crap.

  Damn.

  Shit.

  I stood at the window in my apartment staring down at the Mercedes that didn’t move from sitting at the curb in front of my building.

  Crap.

  Damn.

  Shit.

  Okay.

  Whatever.

  Shit happened. Then it stopped happening and you moved on.

  Whatever this was with Marcus Sloan would stop happening too.

  And I’d move on.

  I turned away from my window.

  And all I saw was daisies.

  * * * *

  “I’m likin’ it but it needs some sparkle,” I told Chardonnay late Friday morning while sitting in the dancer’s dressing room at Smithie’s as she modeled her new stripper duds for me, doing it busting some moves.

  It was pasties, a G-string, and platform stripper sandals.

  She still needed sparkle.

  “Daisy, where am I gonna put sparkle?” she asked, staring down at her mostly nude body.

  “Glue gun the shit outta some and put it over your coochie, girl,” I advised. “Boys’ eyes go there, least that’s covered and they’re not lookin’ at your tits. Well, at least not all the time.”

  “This bears contemplation,” Chardonnay murmured.

  This bears contemplation.

  This bitch slayed me.

  Her name wasn’t Chardonnay. It was Penelope. She was pre-med, a senior, already accepted to medical school. She was also the shit because pretty much everyone knew she was stripping and she didn’t give a crap.

  “By the time I’m practicing rheumatology,” she’d shared with me, “I’ll be getting paid a whack and it’ll be all mine. I’ll buy myself a BMW and a big house in Cherry Hills and I’ll do it right off the bat because I won’t have student loans. So they can think what they want. They can also kiss my ass.”

  I, obviously, could not fault this way of thinking.

  “Black on black, but also some silver,” I advised. “Subtle but packs a punch.”

  “I’m not sure my powers with a glue gun are up to scratch,” she replied.

  “Take it off. Rinse it out and give that bitch to me,” I told her. “I’m hell on wheels with a glue gun and I’ll set you up.”

  She grinned at me as a knock came at the door.

  I looked that way as Chardonnay called, “Just a minute.” Her next was, “Okay, decent.” And I turned to her and saw she’d thrown on a robe.

  I also saw she was staring at the door with big eyes and lips parted.

  I looked again to the door and then I had big eyes and parted lips.

  Oh hell.

  Marcus Sloan dipped his chin to Chardonnay and looked to me.

  “Daisy, may I have a word?” he asked.

  No, he could not.

  “I’ll just—” Chardonnay started.

  “You can stay here,” Marcus told her. “Daisy and I’ll go to Smithie’s office.”

  No, we would not.

  “I don’t think—” I began.

  I got no more out because his eyes came to me.

  He’d never looked at me without sunglasses on.

  He had blue eyes.

  They were gorgeous.

  They were also more.

  Those eyes had seen many things. Not a lot of them good. And quite a number of those not-good things were very bad.

  I got that. Boy did I get that.

  But there was even more.

  Another person might find his eyes frightening, that seen it all and didn’t give a shit about any of it look that wasn’t cold and impersonal, just cynical and sly.

  I did not find it frightening.

  I found it captivating.

  He took a step into the room but lifted his arm to the side to indicate the door and said in an invitation that wasn’t exactly that, it was more a command, “Daisy.”

  There was something about the mix of his gentlemanly manner and his commanding tone (and, let’s face it, presence) that made me lift my ass off the chair I was sitting on and move his way.

  He was not an obstacle to getting out the door so he didn’t move.

  However, he did move after I cleared it because he followed me.

  Then he put his hand light on the small of my back.

  No pressure. Just a touch.

  Even at “just a touch,” I felt my shoulders get tight. But I didn’t want to expose my reaction, give him something to read about me, make him think I was afraid or protecting myself, especially after what he knew happened to me and the fool I’d made of myself at Wash Park.

  And as we walked down the hall, into the club, and toward the stairs that led up to Smithie’s office, my tension at being touched became something else
as the feel of the touch penetrated.

  He wasn’t pushing me. He wasn’t guiding me.

  He was a gentleman walking a lady through a strip club the way a gentleman should, regardless it was a strip club in which she was a stripper.

  I started feeling funny again.

  His touch left me as we climbed the stairs and I was embarrassingly aware that I was still slightly stiff from what had happened to me, not to mention my ass might be in line with his eyes.

  I motored right through that and stopped at the top landing outside the door, looking down as he climbed the last two steps.

  He put his hand right to the handle and murmured, “Smithie isn’t here.”

  He pushed the door open but didn’t move.

  He waited there and did it with his eyes on me.

  It was then I realized he wanted me to go in before him.

  He’d opened the door.

  For me.

  I started feeling funnier and quickly walked into the office.

  I didn’t go far, stopping in the middle and turning to him.

  He didn’t go far either, but oddly, he stepped away from the door and moved across the space.

  In other words, he wasn’t barring me in. If I wanted to leave, I had a straight shot. He wasn’t in my way.

  Oh my.

  “We have plans.”

  I focused on him and not my thoughts.

  “Pardon?”

  “Lunch. Today. You. And me. We have plans.” The words were short. Impatient. But even so, not unkind.

  I didn’t know how he pulled that off but I didn’t put too much thought into it.

  I had to get this done. He was my boss (kind of). He was also an important man. I didn’t know that outside of the fact I knew that and I couldn’t forget it for a second.

  So if he wanted “a word,” I had to give it to him.

  And then get away.

  “No we don’t.”

  “Our last meeting didn’t go as I’d hoped but I had thought I’d made my intentions clear,” he replied.

  I didn’t know how to respond to that because he had, I just didn’t get it nor did I want it.

  All of a sudden, a change came over him, and even though it softened his features, warmed the cynicism clean out of his eyes, I still felt the tension in my shoulders increase.

  “Are you okay?” he asked quietly.

  “Uh, yeah,” I answered normally.

  For some reason he looked to the floor, beyond me, then again to me.

  “You’re here.” Now his voice wasn’t quiet, it was soft with inquiry and concern.

  Here.

  Where, out back, I’d been raped just over a week ago.

  God, I needed to get away from this man.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “I’m here.”

  “Should you be?”

  “Chardonnay had a wardrobe question,” I explained.

  And again his expression changed. This time it didn’t hide he thought I had a screw loose.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Chardonnay. She had a wardrobe question,” I repeated. “And her roommates are bitches. Totally judgey about the stripper thing so she couldn’t model at her place because she has to show me her moves in her new getup and they’re there. She couldn’t come to mine. So we’re here.”

  “Why couldn’t she come to yours?”

  I couldn’t tell him that. I couldn’t tell him it was because the place was filled with daisies and I didn’t want to answer the questions that might bring. I didn’t want to tell Chardonnay or anyone not only where those daisies were coming from but that, in my worst moments, their bright, happy beauty was the only thing that was seeing me through.

  So I didn’t say anything.

  “Does she know what happened to you?” he asked gently.

  I nodded.

  His mouth grew hard, and probably because of that, his words were terse. “She should be more sensitive.”

  “I’m okay, Mr.—”

  “Marcus,” he clipped.

  “Right. Marcus. Sorry,” I muttered.

  “Smithie isn’t here,” he informed me.

  He’d already shared this intel so I didn’t know why he was repeating this to me.

  “Okay,” I replied.

  “This means you’re not here for any reason unless Smithie or Lenny are here, and if you need to be here and neither of them is available to be with you at all times, you call me. I’ll put a man on you.”

  At all times?

  He’d put a man on me?

  I stared at him.

  He reached into the pocket inside his suit jacket, took out a silver card case, flipped it open, and extracted a card. He flipped it shut, returned it, and walked to me, stopping not close (thankfully).

  He held the card up between us, offering it to me with two fingers extended.

  Lord, this man was fine. Even offering a business card!

  “I don’t…I don’t…” I swallowed, ignoring the card, “need a man on me.”

  His eyes turned hard too, and at their glinting fury, I finally started to be scared of him.

  I fought taking a step back.

  “They haven’t found him,” he whispered.

  “I know that,” I whispered back.

  And that made me shiver.

  I wasn’t thinking about that. The fact the guy who violated me got away.

  Smithie said he was taking care of it. Detective Jimmy Marker, who talked to me at the hospital when the staff called the cops after the ambulance took me there, said he’d do everything in his power to find him.

  I was thinking only about that.

  “You need to be safe. So you’re going to be safe,” he decreed, lifting the card up higher between us.

  “You need to stop sendin’ me flowers,” I didn’t exactly decree because my voice was kind of shaky, but I hoped he’d get my message.

  “I will, if you go to lunch with me tomorrow.”

  “You need to stop asking me to lunch.”

  “Fine. Then go with me to dinner tomorrow.”

  “Mr. Sloan—”

  He leaned into me, his face close, I could smell his expensive cologne, and I snapped my mouth shut.

  “Marcus,” he whispered.

  “Okay,” I breathed.

  “Dinner tomorrow.”

  “No.”

  He ignored me.

  “I’ll pick you up at seven. You won’t be on show. But you will be safe from anything you perceive might make you unsafe, including me. I simply want your company at dinner. That’s all, Daisy.”

  “Please, stop doing this.”

  His brows went up. “Why?”

  “You have to ask?”

  “Daisy,” he said gently, reaching to me, grabbing my hand and pressing the card in my palm. Closing my fingers around it, he continued to hold me lightly and I didn’t pull away because I didn’t want to share what that would expose either. “You were harmed. You were hurt. But what happened to you didn’t make you stop being who you are or make it so you shouldn’t live your life and enjoy doing it.”

  “I’m not talking about that.”

  “All right, so explain to me what you’re talking about.”

  “I don’t feel like it.”

  He nodded once. “Fine, so explain it to me over dinner tomorrow night.”

  “Marcus—”

  “I’m not going to give up.”

  This was beginning to make me mad so I shared crankily, “Well, that doesn’t make me feel real peachy.”

  His fine lips twitched and he asked, “Do you not find me attractive?”

  Was he crazy?

  “Of course I find you attractive. You’re all—”

  I cut myself off then because I wasn’t paying attention to what I was saying, mostly the fact I shouldn’t be saying it.

  Those fine lips of his curled up.

  Oh Lord.

  “I’m all what?” he pushed.

  “Can you let me go?” I
snapped.

  To my shock, he let me go, and not only that, he took a step back.

  You will be safe from anything you perceive might make you unsafe, including me.

  I started breathing funny.

  “Would you like me to explain why I don’t wish to give up?” he asked.

  Hell no.

  “No,” I answered.

  He let that slide and told me, “I want to be clear. I don’t want to come on strong.”

  “Well, you’re failin’,” I shared.

  At that, he smiled.

  I felt my throat close.

  With that smile, the cynicism and sly went right out of his eyes.

  They were twinkling at me.

  Twinkling at me.

  “You mistake me,” he said softly. “I don’t want to come on strong. I don’t want to take this at a pace you aren’t comfortable with. Not with what happened to you, but you should understand, I wouldn’t do that even if that hadn’t happened to you. So you’ll set the pace. Just as long as there is a pace.”

  “And if I don’t want there to be a pace?” I asked.

  “Then I’d like the courtesy of you sharing why you wouldn’t.”

  “And I’d like the courtesy of you not makin’ me do that,” I shot back.

  He studied me a second then looked beyond me.

  Again, he changed and he did it taking another step away from me, his face closing off so much, the cynicism and sly didn’t even come back.

  He gave me nothing.

  “I see,” he murmured.

  I shouldn’t ask.

  I really shouldn’t ask.

  I asked.

  “You see what?”

  “You know who I am.”

  “Yeah. You’re Marcus Sloan.”

  He shook his head. “That’s not what I mean and I believe you understand that.”

  I did, right then.

  And what I understood made me laugh.

  It just poured out of me.

  And I guessed I really needed to laugh because I did it so hard, I bent over with it, wrapping my arms around my belly.

  When I got myself together, still giggling, I straightened, lifted a hand to my eye and swept it across the wet under it, hoping my hilarity didn’t mess up my makeup seeing as I’d had to wring miracles to conceal the fading bruises that morning.

  “That’s funny,” I told him unnecessarily.

  He didn’t find anything funny. He still looked closed off but also there was a hint of transfixed that I didn’t get.

  “Your laugh sounds like bells,” he whispered.