Locked (PresLocke Series Book 2) (11 page)

“Problem?” Ace asked, his eyes twinkling, and I shook my head because
God
he was gorgeous when he was aroused, and the flush on his cheeks hinted he was becoming more so the longer we stood there in our dark corner.

“No, but we have company. So behave yourself, hotshot.”

He straightened, his shoulders tensing, but when he turned and spotted Mallory, I noted the way his entire frame seemed to relax.
 

“Ace.” She beamed and disengaged her arm from Alejandro and stepped forward. She took Ace’s arms between her hands and leaned up on tiptoes to press a kiss to his cheek. Ace returned the affectionate gesture, and I knew from the conversations I’d had with him over the past few weeks that the friendship these two shared was genuine. He’d expressed many times how he’d wished Mallory had had a more integral part, because then at least there would’ve been a friendly face on set. As it was, she had fewer lines than I did, so really she’d only been there a handful of days.

“Mallory, man am I glad to see you here tonight,” Ace said.

“Needing some moral support?” she asked as her eyes found mine again and she smiled.

“You could say that. Or maybe I just want someone else here to take the spotlight off us.”

She flashed her famous smile and ran her hand down Ace’s arm to give his fingers a squeeze. “Hate to break it to you, but I could walk in here naked and no one would look away from the two of you.”

“I find that difficult to believe, Mallory,” Alejandro said as he moved up by her side, and she slipped her arm through the crook of his.
 

“Oh please, these two are the talk of the town…hell, the world right now.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” Ace said, and when I moved up to stand by his side, he automatically reached for my hand, and that small gesture had my heart thudding.
 

“It’s nice to finally meet you,” Alejandro said as he held his hand out to Ace. “I’ve been wanting to work with you for some time, and when Mallory said she was going to be in one of your movies I knew this would be the perfect place to make a shameless pitch. I’m a huge fan.”

Wow,
I thought as I watched the two extraordinarily handsome men shake hands.
Now that’s one hell of a compliment.
I barely stopped my mouth from falling open, but if Alejandro had just told me he was a fan of
mine
,
I might’ve passed out. As it was, I was finding it increasingly difficult not to act like a total fanboy in front of this couple. But Ace, as always, was cool under pressure. Calm in the face of the unbelievable. Because these were his peers, Mallory was his friend, something I always seemed to forget until moments like this where I felt star-struck and he was…well, Ace was himself. This was all part of his world.
 

“Are you kidding?” Ace chuckled. “I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t have to twist my arm. If we can find the right project, that would be fantastic.”

Mallory snuggled into her man’s side and aimed her megawatt smile at him. “See, what’d I tell you? No need to be nervous.”

I glanced at Ace’s strong profile as he smiled at the two of them, and in that instant I was in complete and utter awe. These two had three Academy Awards between the two of them, and here they were practically giddy over the prospect of working with my man.
And damn if that doesn’t make me proud to be the one on his arm.

As if Ace had read my mind, he turned to face me and then frowned a little. “I’m sorry. I’m being so rude,” he said, and then looked back to the two of them. “I’ve been so hellbent on keeping things to myself I forgot to introduce—”

“Dylan Prescott,” Alejandro said just as Mallory said, “Oh please, Ace. As if everyone in this room doesn’t know your lovely young man’s name.”

See. I knew I liked her.
“Lovely…” I said, holding out my hand in her direction. “I’ll take that.”
 

As she shook my hand, she laughed, and it was so charming I couldn’t help but reply in kind. “Well, you should, you’re gorgeous. Ace here’s lucky to have caught you before anyone else did.”

I was about to respond when she released my hand and I took her boyfriend’s to shake. But when I glanced up at him and met his gaze head-on for the first time, I tripped over my words. “I uh…um…”

Ace chuckled beside me, and I wanted to turn around and whack him in the arm. So sue me, Alejandro was a very attractive man. A very
famous,
attractive man, and it was odd to be the sole focus of someone that felt so familiar because you’d seen him on the big screen. There was no way any normal person, a.k.a. myself, wouldn’t get tongue-tied.

“It’s nice to meet you, Dylan,” Alejandro said.

Locating my tongue, I managed to somehow agree that it was nice to meet him too, and then the moment passed and Ace was talking again. The three of them discussed their upcoming movies and how they thought they would do, and then they both inquired after what I did until Mallory declared she was ready for another Gilligan’s Bitch boozy shake
and Alejandro excused the two of them and they headed off toward the bar.
 

As I watched them go, I kept my eyes on them as they wove their way through the crowd.

“So, what do you think of Hollywood’s golden couple?” Ace asked, his lips by my ear.

My eyes followed the two of them until they reached the counter, and once they were there and Mallory had leaned over to talk to the bartender, Alejandro glanced over his shoulder, and this time when his eyes met mine and his lips curved in an immoral smile, my breath caught and I coughed.

No way.
 

There’s no fucking way…
 

But as Alejandro ran his eyes down over me and then they flicked between Ace and myself, I knew I was spot-on.
 

It appeared that Hollywood’s golden couple had a secret even bigger than ours, because I was one hundred percent positive in that moment that I was staring at…Zorro.

* * *

AS MALLORY AND Alejandro left to head over to the bar, I was trying to come up with an excuse Dylan would agree to so we could leave as his fingers tightened around mine. I turned to step in front of him and looked into his wide eyes, and then noticed the way his mouth had fallen open and he seemed to be searching for words.

Star-struck.
I knew how intimidating it could be to meet people as famous as those two. I’d been a wreck at my first wrap party too, but that just made Dylan more endearing. That innocence and…
Hang on a second.
Dylan’s cheeks had turned bright pink and he kept darting his eyes over my shoulder, which in turn had me looking back. But all I saw was Mallory and—

Oh. My. Fucking. God.
My eyes locked with Alejandro’s dark ones, and as he swiped his lower lip with his tongue, I had a very immediate reaction to him watching us, just as I had that night at Syn.
 

No…
I had to be imagining this, right? But one look at Dylan’s flushed face told me I wasn’t. He had recognized him too. Recognized the stranger who had stood across from us, much like Alejandro was now, in the shadows and light as I’d fucked Dylan like I never had before.

“Ace,” Dylan whispered, and shook my wrist gently. But it was no use; it was like I was in some kind of trance. Hypnotized by the man still watching us.
 

How had I missed that? How was it that up close and smiling at us I hadn’t put it together, but from a distance one glimpse of that arrogant smirk full of sex and I was right back at the club deep inside Dylan, coming in time with the man I’d just shaken hands with?

I tore my eyes away from the one who’d just rocked my entire world in a matter of seconds and looked at Dylan. I wasn’t sure what I expected to find there, but the fevered arousal was not it. His expression was tense, on edge, but not because he was worried or annoyed. Oh no, Dylan had a look he’d once told me meant one thing in particular. He had the look of a man who wanted to be fucked. And I was just the man for that job.

I aimed a look to the exit of the After Dark and said in a tone that was so raspy I was surprised he could hear me, “Let’s get out of here.”

And Dylan’s answering nod was all the permission I required.
 

10

BLOW (MY MIND)

IT WAS EVIDENT as we dashed past Ace’s friends with just a wave that he didn’t seem to mind that we’d spent less than an hour at the party he’d sponsored. But I didn’t think he’d fully thought through what the press would think when we emerged onto the sidewalk and the questions started.
 

“Were you asked to leave the party early?”

“Is it true you’re feuding with the cast?”

Jesus, I hadn’t even thought about what it would look like if we left early, and Ace hesitated for the briefest of moments. Two seconds later, though, we were moving again, and thankfully our driver had parked directly in front of Licked, so we were through the crowd and in the back of the Town Car in record time.

As we pulled away, I kept my head down, not wanting to give them a clear shot, but when Ace’s palm landed on my thigh, my eyes shot to his. There was a smile playing on his lips as he ran his fingers lightly across the material.
 

“What?” he asked. “I can’t…
soothe
my boyfriend after walking through a group of hungry paparazzi?” The fevered look in his eyes from minutes ago hadn’t been tempered; it was even more intense now in the dark, confined space.
 

“Right here? In the car?” I whispered.

He bit into his bottom lip and his fingers inched toward my cock, which was stiffening at a rapid pace at the arousal I felt radiating off Ace. I managed to tear my gaze away from his to look out the windows, checking to make sure there wasn’t anyone staring inside, but I could only see the lights of buildings we passed whiz by.
 

I tried to keep my voice down so the driver couldn’t hear me, but nodded in his direction when I said, “What if someone sees?”

“Guess we’ll have to be careful.”

Well, shit.
“You like taking risks, don’t you, Locke?”

When he leaned across the seat and pressed his lips to my cheek, I swallowed back the groan that wanted to slip free.
 

“I never use to…” Ace said, and then chose that moment to graze his flattened palm over the zipper of my pants. “But lately it’s become
harder
to curb my impulses.”

I turned my head, and with his face so close I could see the way his pupils were blown and it had my breathing coming faster.

“Let me touch you,” Ace said, and I automatically looked toward the driver, but Ace wasn’t having any of that. His hand left its place between my legs to come up and grip my chin, turning my head back so I was facing him, and his eyes fell to my mouth. “Don’t worry about him. He’s paid well.”

Yeah, hell, who was I trying to kid?
As if I wasn’t going to let him do what he’d just asked. I slid a little farther into the leather of the seat and spread my legs. Ace dropped his gaze down to my movements, and when a rumble of approval left his throat, I close to whimpered.
 

“See, this won’t be hard to achieve at all, will it?”

“Would you stop saying that word right now?” I knew I sounded particularly put out, but good God, I knew my limits and sitting in the back of a Town Car with Ace palming my—
Fuck
—

“
Hard?
Is that what you want me to stop saying? Because, Dylan,” Ace said, his warm breath ghosting over my parted lips as he continued to hold me captive with his powerful stare, “my cock’s been hard ever since I worked out that Alejandro was the one who watched me fuck you until you couldn’t walk that night at Syn.”

Damn
… The reminder of why we were now in the back of this car speeding across town to Ace’s house was enough to have me bucking my hips up against the pressure of Ace’s hand.

“Do you remember how it felt?” he asked, as his fingers curled around the erection I now had no hope of controlling. “When I stripped you down to nothing, and had you kneel in front of me? In front of
him
?”

I gasped and reached down with one hand to press
his
more firmly against me. It wasn’t enough, though. I didn’t think anything could be enough to ease the ache he’d built with his words, the imagery, and the fierce way he was holding my gaze like some kind of sexual magician.
 

“Do you remember?” he asked again, this time in a voice that said he expected an answer.

I lifted my hand from where it was covering the top of his and gripped his bicep so hard I was surprised he didn’t tell me to let up. But if he was going to drive me out of my ever-loving mind with his filthy fucking recap of one of the hottest nights of my life, then I needed something to keep me grounded.

“Yes,” I said in a breathy voice I didn’t recognize. Ace nodded slowly, and then he reached up to untuck my button-down shirt from my pants, letting the length of it fall over where his hand had grazed only seconds earlier.
 

When my eyes flitted to the window to see if anyone was pulled up alongside or trailing behind us, Ace’s voice snapped me back to him.
 

“Close your eyes,” he said, and I gave him an incredulous look. “Pretend we’re back there…back at Syn…everyone’s eyes on us as I touch you.”
 

His hand moved under my shirt, and he unbuttoned my pants and then drew the zipper down. With a devilish smile on his face, his fingers dipped beneath my boxer briefs, and though my shirt somewhat concealed what his fingers were—
fuck
—wrapping around, I still found myself looking at the rearview mirror ahead to make sure the driver wasn’t paying attention.
 

“I won’t ask you again,” Ace said, his grip firm around my cock, but he wasn’t moving it farther, wasn’t giving me the friction I needed, so when my hips jerked up, he shook his head. Then his hand began to withdraw, and I quickly grabbed his wrist to stop him.