Finding Joy (The Joy Series) (Volume 2) (15 page)

Adam pulled his arm away from her and tried to put some distance between him and the Pocahottie. “Hey, Carissa,” he said. The annoyance in his voice came through loud and clear.

“Clear out, Carissa,” Burke said. “This is a private party.”

Her eyes swept the group, pausing a little too long on Brian before finally landing on Burke. She gave him a scathing look. “I have a ticket to this party, too, Burke. I thought, from the looks of things, that Adam might need some rescuing,” she said with a wicked grin in my direction.

“I’m in good hands, Carissa,” Adam said. “You should go back to
your
party.”

Carissa blinked at him for a few seconds and then tried a different approach. “Okay, well, really I just wanted to ask about the contract. Are we still going to meet up next week?”

“Yes,
we
are,” I said. “I’m working on it now.”

Carissa swung her gaze from Adam to me. “It doesn’t look like you’re working on it. It looks like you’re making a fool of yourself and Adam on the dance floor,” she said in a saccharin sweet voice.

I’d had enough. I stepped toward her so that our chests were just inches away from each other. “Take your sleazy, Pocahontas ass somewhere else. He doesn’t want you any more. I don’t think he could make it any clearer if he tattooed it across his chest.”

Based on the stunned look on her face, I wasn’t sure she had received the message yet. I narrowed my eyes at her. “He’s mine. You had your chance, and you fucked it up. You can buy his apartment if you still want to, but it’s not going to get you any closer to him. It just makes you look like the crazy, desperate bitch that you are.”

I clenched my fists at my side and ignored my pounding heart. I had never bowed up to anyone before, but I think I’d done all right. Apparently, Carissa did, too, because she spun on her sueded heel and stalked away.

Carly jumped up and down on her red patent stilettos and hollered after her, “If you need some ice for that burn, Carissa, the bar’s back that way.”

Stifled giggles erupted around the table, but a booming laugh from Burke quickly drowned them out. “Damn, Allie, I didn’t know you had it in you. Now I know why he calls you ‘Allie Cat’. You’re menacing when you want to be.”

I smiled weakly at him. The adrenaline that had been pumping through my body was gone. Adam’s face was a blank mask, and I was a tiny bit worried that he was angry with me. Without saying a word, he grabbed my hand and pulled me away from our friends. With enough force to rip my arm out of its socket, he yanked me through the mass of bodies in the crowd.

Barnacle’s voice boomed after us. “If a girl had just busted balls like that for me, Adam, I’d have to take a moment, too.”

We passed Carissa, where she had rejoined her friends. Adam didn’t so much as glance at her, but she caught my eye and smirked at me like I was in trouble.

Near where we’d come in, there was a set of stairs that led to a lower level on the ship. I couldn’t keep up with him on the stairs in my Sandy heels and stumbled a little when he didn’t break his pace. Whirling around, he picked me up and threw me over his shoulder. He practically ran down the remaining steps. A few people mingled around here and there, and I heard a few giggles as we passed. But since my view was of Adam’s back, I had no faces to go with the voices.

Adam strode down a dark hall and then abruptly righted me on to my feet. He pushed a tiny door open and ducked inside. I paused to read the sign above the door.

When I hadn’t followed right away, he reached out and grabbed me, pulling me in behind him. “Jesus, Allie, get in here.” The door slammed shut behind me, and I heard the click of a lock. Adam picked me up and set me on the tiny sink, and I promptly fell in. The faucet pushed into my back, but one look around confirmed that real estate was going to be hard to come by in ‘The Head.’

“I’m sorry, Adam,” I stammered. “I don’t know what came over me. She just pissed me off. I mean, she had her hands all over you again. I swear I just about …”

His lips crashed into mine, cutting me off. All at once, his hands were in my hair, on my face … gripping my hips. I didn’t know how one man could have a handle on so many body parts at once. “Don’t apologize,” he muttered against my lips. “That was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”

Oh …
Oh!
He wasn’t mad at me. At all. I slid a hand into the back pocket of his jeans and gave him a squeeze about the same time that he slid his tongue into my mouth. I nipped on his bottom lip and slid my hands back around and started tugging on his shirt. “Get. It. Off,” I panted.

He grabbed it from the neck and yanked it off over his head. “You next.”

My costume was a little harder to manage than his t-shirt. But, two zippers later and it was a wadded up mess lying somewhere around his feet. Butt naked, I sat on the vanity in the tiny Head while the party went on above. “You still have your jeans on,” I whispered.

“Do something about that, why don’t ya?” he mumbled, as his lips trailed down my neck and across my chest.

I ripped the zipper down and slipped a hand into his jeans. I looked for the waistband of his boxers, but he wasn’t wearing any. I rubbed my hand against his hard stomach instead. “No boxers again,” I mumbled, while licking a trail from his ear to his collarbone.

“What can I say? You’re rubbing off on me.” He tugged his jeans down.

“You can rub off on me,” I said, wrapping a hand around him and tugged up and down. He throbbed under my light grip.

He pulled my hips forward, and my back slammed into the faucet again. “Ouch,” I whispered. He looked at me questioningly. “The faucet.”

He nodded and responded by picking me up and turning us completely around so that my back was now against the wall opposite the sink. He supported my ass with both of his hands. The room was so small that my feet hit the wall edge of the sink, providing leverage enough to make me think that great things were about could happen.

Adam eased his way into me, and I hissed at him. “Harder.” In answer, he pounded repeatedly into me. Pressing my feet into the sink counter, I met him thrust for thrust.

“You’re so fucking hot, Allie,” he groaned as he pumped into me again and again. I could feel him throbbing inside of me. “You’re not there yet, are you?” No, but he was close.

“Put me down,” I whispered. He set me down, and I turned sideways. I bent over with my arms against the wall adjoining the one that my back had just been up against. I looked over my shoulder at him. “Like this,” I begged.

He pushed up against my backside and slammed into me again, running the palms of his hands up and down my back. “For the love of God and all that is holy, I almost can’t handle you tonight.”

Gripping my hips, he pushed in until I was completely filled and then pulled out to the point where I could just almost feel his absence. In and out he went. Harder and harder with each thrust. It was exactly what I needed. He wrapped a hand around the front of me and slid it between my legs.

And that was all it took. One more thrust and Adam was right there with me. I rested my cheek on my forearms against the wall and panted happily while trying to gather up the pieces of my splintered psyche.

He pulled me up and leaned me against the sink again. He found a paper towel and reached around behind me to wet it in the sink. As he cleaned me up, I smiled happily at him.

“What the hell was that,” he said. His voice was as satiated as I felt. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but I like it.”

“I don’t know,” I said, shrugging. “I guess I wanted to mark you. Or I wanted you to mark me. Something like that. Somebody needed to get marked.” I looked down at his hand, which continued to wipe away any evidence of what had just happened. I had the sudden urge to stop him. “She can’t have you. You need to know that I’ll fight her before I’ll let that happen.”

He chuckled softly. “That won’t be necessary. I promise, Allie. I don’t want anything to do with her.”

“I think I believe that,” I said.

He threw the paper towel in the trash, pulled up his jeans, and wiped his hands on the front of them before gripping my face between his hands. He looked into my eyes, and I couldn’t have looked away if I’d tried. “Don’t
think
you believe it.
Know
it. I’m all yours.”

“Okay,” I said sheepishly.

“Okay.” A smug smile spread across his face. “Besides, I don’t think we have to worry about her anymore. I can’t imagine that she wants to buy the apartment now.”

“I’m sorry,” I said again.

“I couldn’t care less. I just thought it would be an easy way to get rid of it. But I’m done talking about her. I’m not going to talk about
her
after having mind-blowing sex with
you
.”

“It
was
mind blowing, wasn’t it?” I asked, arching my eyebrows at him.

“You know it was,” he growled.

“Ready to go back to the party?” I asked, gathering my clothes from the floor.

“No. I really just want to take you home now and fuck you properly.”

“Was that improperly?” I teased as I slid back into my pants.

“Absolutely not,” he said. “But I’d like to do it all over again and take my time.”

It wasn’t a bad plan. And if Caribbean Barbie hadn’t just seen him dragging me off in a huff, I would have been all over it. But remembering the sneer on her face when we had passed, I knew we needed to stay. I couldn’t have her thinking for one minute that her stupid ploys were working.

“Your offer is tempting. And I think I’ll take you up on it later, but can we stay for just a little longer?” I asked, pulling the tight black top back over my head.

Adam gave me a knowing look and nodded. “All right. But just for a little while. This costume is irritating.”

I looked at his t-shirt and jeans, and laughed. “What costume?”

“I wasn’t talking about mine,” he said, waggling his eyebrows devilishly. “I like you better out of yours than in it.”

“We’ll make this short and sweet,” I said, and turned to fix my Sandy bouffant in the mirror.

When I was some semblance of put-back-together, we slid down the hall and back up the stairs. As we walked hand in hand back through the crowd toward our friends, Adam’s jacket was still around my shoulders. Its warm, musky scent enveloped me. As we passed Carissa and her friends, I could feel her chilling stare on me, and I took comfort in the fact that his jacket wasn’t the only thing that reeked of him at the moment.

When we reached our table, we got several knowing looks, at least one nod of approval from Barnacle, and a few giggles from the girls. Nobody commented on our absence. The group was deep into a discussion on the band’s plans for the following weekend. Apparently, Burke had managed to book the band at one of the biggest bars in Manhattan. Everyone was certain that this was going to be their big break.

It was Barnacle who threw out the idea that had been rattling around in my head since seeing Carly on the dance floor earlier that night. “We should do a cover just for Carly. Let her do like a ‘guest’ spotlight.”

Burke looked at him like he was crazy. “Carly?” he asked.

“Yeah, Carly! Did you see her out there? Why the fuck is she waiting tables when she can sing like that?”

“You know, we could bring her in for one song,” Brian said, with a shrug. “We can see what kind of reaction we get from it. Maybe she’ll pull in the male crowd, which is the one thing we’re lacking.”

Carly giggled and took a sip from the drink in her hand. “Awww, thanks, guys, but there’s no way that I could get up on stage.”

Burke took a long and hard look at her. He’d always been the front man and ate it up. I didn’t think there was any way that he would share a spotlight with anyone … even his girl. “He’s right, Carl. You are good,” he finally said, surprising me. “I think you’d be great on stage.”

“Really?” she asked breathlessly. “I’m not sure that the biggest night of your career is the right time to break out something new.”

“Whatever,” Burke said, dismissing her concerns. “Let’s do it.”

I was impressed. When Burke didn’t have dirty, groupie skanks hanging on him, he was actually a pretty good boyfriend. But, even so, Burke was Burke, and that meant that Burke was generally only concerned with himself. Apparently he wasn’t a complete idiot though, and he had probably just given Carly the biggest compliment of their long-time relationship.

“Yeah. I think we should do it. But no Spice Girls. We can add a girl to the stage but we can’t lose our edge.” Leave it to Burke to follow up one of the smartest things he’d ever uttered with something completely moronic.

“I don’t want to do it, if you think you’ll lose your edge,” she said haughtily.

“That’s not what I meant,” he said, backpedaling. “I think you’ll be really good. We’ll come up with something great, okay?”

“Do you think we can get it together in a week?” she asked, clapping her hands together.

“Sure. We can start practicing tomorrow. I think I know the perfect song for your debut,” Barnacle said. His voice trailed off as he tracked something or someone passing our table. We all turned our heads to find out who the source of his distraction was. A scantily clad Brittany Spears had her back to us as she moved toward the bar.

There was something about her … something I couldn’t quite put my finger on … but she looked oddly familiar. As she took her drink from the bartender and turned back in our direction, I tottered on my Sandy heels.

It was Constance. My Constance. Dull, drab, barely there Constance.

Her dark hair up was tucked into a blonde wig that was pulled up on both sides in braided dog-ears. Little bows at the ends of her braids brushed her shoulders. She was wearing more makeup than I had ever seen on her. But while her hair and makeup were one thing, it was the rest of the costume … that … well … that would forever be etched in my brain.

A tiny white button-up shirt was tied just below her boobs so that her midriff was completely exposed. A plaid schoolgirl’s skirt hung from her hips but wasn’t long enough to cover the lace at the top of her thigh-high stockings. Heavy-soled Mary Jane platforms finished off the look. She was a perfect 40-year-old version of Brittany Spears during the ‘Oh, baby, baby’ phase.