Wicked Sexy (Wicked Games #2)(4)

Where I find a man—a huge, tanned, dark-haired beast of a man, clad all in black—sprawled in the middle of my bed with his arms propped behind his head and his giant booted feet crossed at the ankle.

I scream and drop the glass. It shatters against the marble floor.

The beast grins, revealing a set of perfect, gleaming white teeth.

“Howdy, sweet cheeks. It’s nice to see you again too.”





Two





Connor




“Son of a bitch!” Tabby shouts, red-faced, and I just can’t help myself.

I burst out laughing.

It becomes immediately apparent that’s the wrong thing to do when she picks up a glass paperweight from the coffee table and hurls it at me. It smashes into the wall inches above my head, dislodging a shower of plaster, and then lands on the spot where my face was half a second ago.

“Temper,” I chide, now standing beside the bed with my arms folded over my chest. “Tsk, tsk.”

“I’ll give you a f*cking tsk,” she growls, grabbing a cut-crystal ashtray.

“Whoa!” I throw my hands up. “Jesus, sweet cheeks, who shit in your cornflakes?”

She does this puckering thing with her whole face—like a scowl only times ten—that’s supposed to look menacing but instead is cute as f*ck.

“That would be you, jarhead! I hoped I’d never see you again!” She cocks her arm, readying her aim. “And what the hell are you doing in my hotel room?”

The last part is shouted so loud, people in the lobby can probably hear it.

“To talk business.” My gaze drops to the towel she’s clutching against her chest. Her grip is so tight, her knuckles have turned white. I let my eyes drift farther down, taking in dangerous curves and lean legs and bare toes—painted black, naturally—and drawl, “Though if you had any other ideas, I’d be open to hearing ’em.” I meet her gaze to find her glaring at me. I crack a cocksure grin. “That bed’s mighty comfy.”

The ashtray sails through the air. It misses my left ear by a breath and smashes into the wall. I turn and inspect the damage, and then turn back to her with my cocksure grin still firmly in place.

“You’re a shitty aim, sweet cheeks.”

Her nostrils flare. Her chest heaves. She says in a low voice with an edge like a blade, “Call me sweet cheeks. One. More. Time.”

I laugh again. I’d almost forgotten how much fun it is to piss this woman off.

Red hair and long legs flying, Tabby darts over to the dresser next to the bed, grabs a lamp with an inconveniently heavy-looking ceramic base, whirls around, and brandishes it at me like a weapon. She yells, “Get out!”

I rest my hands on my hips and look down my nose at her. “You would bash me with a lamp after I got you the GenCeuticals job?”

She freezes. Her expression registers horrified disbelief. “What?”

“Seriously, Tabby. You think a guy like Roger Hamilton would pay a woman eighty thousand dollars to conduct a penetration test if someone he trusted implicitly hadn’t suggested it?”

“You’re the Special Ops guy he mentioned he had on retainer?”

I nod.

Tabby closes her eyes. “Motherf*cker.” Defeated, she lowers the lamp to the dresser.

I feel kinda bad for how hard she’s taking the news, so I add a bit of truth to lessen the sting. “If it makes you feel any better, I thought walking right through the front door and pretending to be an executive was a ballsy move. Brilliant. And unexpected. Hamilton will shit his pants.”

“Why didn’t he just have you do the job? I’m sure you could’ve rappelled onto the roof from a black helicopter or something macho and melodramatic like that.”

I shrug. “I’m out of the pen testing game. Not enough money in it. Metrix has moved on to higher-level stuff.”

She narrows her eyes at me. Another thing I’d forgotten in the three years since I’d last seen Tabitha West is how brilliantly, lucidly green her irises are. Like an emerald held up to the sun. Like a big cat stalking its dinner in a tangled, primeval jungle, its eyes illuminated in a slanting shaft of light.

Fuck. Now is so not the time to get a boner.

“Such as?”

“Extractions.”

She processes that for a moment, her thumb working the knot between her breasts where the towel edges are joined.

Never thought I’d be jealous of a knot.

“People,” she guesses correctly. “Politicians, royalty, wealthy businessmen, like that?”

I nod.

“Makes sense,” she muses, turning her attention to the view of the city outside the windows. “Kidnappings, natural disasters, hostage situations… There are a million different scenarios where rich people might need their asses saved.”

“Most people think I’m talking about teeth when I say extractions.”

She snaps her head around and stares at me. “I’m not most people.”

“No,” I agree, holding her fierce gaze. “You’re not.”

We stand in silence for just longer than is comfortable, while I wrestle with a surprisingly strong urge to stride over to her, whip off the towel, throw her over my shoulder, and then throw her down on the bed.