I want her—like I’ve rarely wanted a woman.
More than Becca?
After calling the elevator, I disappear inside the car and let out a breath. For the first time, I’m going to willfully and gleefully cross the sacred line between business and pleasure. There’s something about Sloan—about the way I feel when I talk to her… I need to understand why I’m so hooked.
When I wake after a restless night, I grab my phone. My last text from Sloan came around three a.m., joking about being on her second gallon of coffee. I don’t dare text and wake her up now.
Hours drag by, and even though it’s a gorgeous day in Dallas and exploring the city is pleasant, the waiting chafes.
It’s after noon when my phone finally rings and her name crosses my display. “Sloan?”
“Hi. I’m awake and mostly okay. Last night was weird, but I ran across something when Shane sent me to his office to fetch his laptop cord. Well, I searched his office since I was there alone. I didn’t dare take the document last night, and Carissa tells me he and another group have been in the office since noon. She’s pissed she had to come in on a weekend, and they’re running her ragged doing their menial shit. Anyway, once they’re all gone, I’ll tiptoe into the office, grab this smoking gun, and come right to you.”
“No.” At the moment, I’m inclined to tell her to fuck the smoking gun. “Come now. We’ll talk about your find and figure out next steps—”
“This is really important. I swear. If I don’t grab it… I’m already worried when I go back it will be gone.”
“What is it?”
“You have to see it to believe it. I’ll be there about ten. Meet me in the bar?”
“Let me come with you. I don’t want you running into Shane alone in case he’s still there.”
“Jeremy, I can’t. It’s sweet, but…if we run into Shane, he’ll be doubly angry.”
“Tell him I’m your date, and you left something in the office you just stopped in to grab.”
She sighs. “Even if I did, there’s a security guard, and you’re not on the approved visitor list. Please. I know what I’m doing. I have a plan. Trust me.”
Sloan hasn’t left me much choice. “All right. I’ll see you at ten. If you don’t make it, I’ll come looking for you.”
“I appreciate your concern. It’s sweet. But I’ll be there.”
She ends the call, and I mutter a curse, then settle in to watch the Cubs play the Brewers while I do a little of the work I missed during yesterday’s travel.
At nine thirty, I head downstairs. People are coming in. It’s not congested yet, but it’s definitely more crowded than last night. I resist the urge—barely—to text Sloan and ask if she’s all right. Hopefully, the guy who fucks and sucks his way through most workdays is too far in his orgasm coma to suspect that she knows anything. Or too wrapped up in his “process emergency” to care about her now.
I find a table in a quiet corner and sit to wait. And wait. Ten comes and goes. So does ten thirty. Texts go unanswered. I start to panic.
Then the door from the street opens, bringing a gust of strong wind with it. In walks a redhead in a silky champagne dress that dips off the shoulders, nips in with her tiny waist, then clings to the lush curves of her hips before ending above her knee. She’s wearing a pair of sparkly platforms that wrap around her ankles, lending her petite figure a good four inches of height and making her legs look miles long.
Holy shit.
She stops in the middle of the dimly lit bar and scans the room, looking for someone.
Me?
On autopilot, I make my way to her, every hair on my body standing up and every inch of my skin tingling. “Sloan?”
I drag my gaze up from her pert ass in time to see her whirl around to me, rosy lips slightly parted and a blazing curl cupping the side of one softly rounded breast. I swallow.
One look at her…and I’m in deep trouble.
“Jeremy?”
“Yeah.” I hate lying, and before I leave town, I’m going to tell her my name. Now isn’t the time. “You okay?”
She nods. “I thought about what you said, about seeming like I have plans in case someone in the office caught me there, so I dressed up. I’m glad I did. I ran into Perez. He scowled and grilled me a little, but he let me go.”