Stiletto Secrets (13 page)

“So,” Nicholas turned to Emma, “are you going to tell me what the deal is with Claire, the ugly stepsister?”

Emma placed her hands in her lap and Nicholas noticed that she seemed a little nervous. That he didn’t like. He didn’t like the idea of her being nervous around him.

Emma scoffed. “You and I both know Claire is anything but ugly.”

“Like I’ve told Adam numerous times before, her beauty only goes skin-deep.”

Emma brushed a few strands of hair out of her face and for a second Nicholas wanted to do that.

“So she’s the one your dad is trying to set you up with?”

“Yeah, but I’ve told him for months now that it’s never going to happen.”

Emma turned to face him. “Why? Claire is a very pretty woman.”

“Only on the outside, Emma. I don’t trust her. Her reputation precedes her, and she’s well known to be nothing but a gold digger.”

“That she gets from her mother.”

Nicholas turned in his seat to face Emma and saw that she was biting her lip like she didn’t mean to say what she did.

Nicholas scooted closer. “Tell me what they did.”

“It’s a long story.”

“I have time.” Nicholas smiled.

Emma glanced at him, then took a deep breath. “My father met her mother, Lillian, when Lizzy and I were little. At first, we liked Lillian. She was kind, and she was everything a mother was supposed to be. Claire, on the other hand, always had a nasty streak in her. She would break things around the house and give Lizzy or me the blame. We never got along.”

Nicholas snorted. “Sounds like Claire.”

Emma glanced down at the table and then back at him. “Soon, after Lillian and my father got married, she started to change. She became more demanding, more strict. Claire could get away with murder, while Lizzy and I would always get in trouble. Lillian did such a good job at manipulating my father that he too started to lash out at us at times.”

Emma paused and took a few breaths. Nicholas noticed her eyes starting to glisten, but she continued anyway.

“After my father died, we found out that Lillian had somehow managed to get my father to make her the executor of the estate. Lizzy and I only got a small inheritance which had been placed in a trust, and it’s barely enough to cover our monthly expenses. Especially with Lizzy going to law school.”

Nicholas reached for her hand, and squeezed tight. “I’m sorry.”

Emma smiled meekly. “Luckily that’s all in the past. Lizzy and I are getting by, and everything is good.” Emma shook her head as if to rid her mind of old, painful memories. Just then Hunter and Adam arrived with the first round of drinks, and tequila. Nicholas removed his hand from hers.

“Here you go, me lady.” Adam smirked as he placed the tequila and a beer in front of Emma.

“Beer? Really, Adam?” Nicholas glared at him.

“What? She looks like she can handle her manly drinks.” Adam winked at Emma playfully and Nicholas wanted to punch him in the face.

Emma picked up the beer. “It’s fine. I happen to like a beer every now and then.” She winked back at Adam and Nicholas felt like he could break something, anything, a fucking brick wall. Why was he suddenly possessed by the very unwelcome feeling of
jealousy
?

“Yeah! See, Nicky boy, I told you she was special.”

“Adam, would you like that beer of yours to go down your throat, or up your ass?” Nicholas glowered at Adam, and Adam held his arms aloft.

“Touchy much?”

Emma chuckled next to Nicholas, and all he wanted to do right at that moment was reach out below the table and place his hand on her thigh, which of course he didn’t, because he wasn’t going down that road with her. Was he?

“So, Emma.” Hunter sat down across from her. “How do you know Nicholas here?”

“Hunter,” Nicholas warned since he didn’t know how Emma would feel about saying that she was in fact his maid.

“I’m a maid at the Blake mansion,” Emma said without a second’s hesitation. And there wasn’t even a hint of embarrassment in her tone.

Hunter’s smile grew wide, and he leaned over the table, closer to her. “So you got all the dirty details about what goes bump in the night in that place?”

Emma leaned closer to Hunter. “I happen to know everything. And that Nicky boy here,” she nodded in his direction, “snores.”

“I do not!”

Emma sat back in her seat. “You do actually. And the latest gossip amongst staff is that you sleep naked as well.”

“The staff talk about me?”

“Yup.”

“Do you talk about me?”

Emma’s gaze shot up to his, and then they sort of had a moment that felt really, really intense. So intense that Nicholas had to mentally fight the urge to kiss her right there and then. He wanted to kiss her until both of them couldn’t breathe.

He shifted in his seat and straightened his legs.

“Bottoms up, love birds.” Adam tapped on the table, shattering the moment between Nicholas and Emma.

All of them took their tequila and shot it back. Nicholas eyed Emma and saw her cringe a little as she swallowed the drink. It was obvious that she wasn’t a wild little thing, but there was a level of mischief to her, a little naughty streak that Nicholas could pick up on. He liked the idea of him being able to bring that part of her a little more to the surface, especially if it included silk sheets and moans of pleasure.

Nicholas felt desire stir in his groin. Fuck. He seriously needed to stop thinking about shit like that, especially around Emma. “I need another drink.”

Adam jumped up. “I got it!”

About two hours later and four rounds of tequila, all four of them were sitting around the table laughing and joking. Nicholas had been paying special attention to Emma, watching the way she just seemed to fit in so well with the rest of them. She wasn’t the least bit uptight, or vain like the women he was used to. If she was any other woman she would have gone to the ladies room about fifteen times to check on her makeup and hair. But Emma just seemed so comfortable in her own skin and Nicholas liked that about her a lot.

“Oh my,” Adam let out, and Nicholas followed his stare. A crowd of women walked in, and by the looks and sound of it, it was a bachelorette party.

Adam was in heaven. “Nicholas, are you seeing what I’m seeing.”

“I’m seeing a crowd of drunk women.”

“Exactly.” Adam grabbed Nick’s hand from across the table and fixed his stare on him. “And you know what drunken women mean? Orgies. Beautiful, sexy and wild orgies, my man.” Adam’s eyes darted up toward the crowd again. “And tonight I feel up for the challenge.”

Hunter shot back the last bit of his beer. “What challenge?”

Adam suddenly had this naughty glint in his eyes, and Nicholas saw that his gaze had zeroed in on one woman specifically.”

“I want that little bride-to-be,” he said dreamily.

And then all three of them burst out laughing.

“There is no way you’re going to be able to seduce the bride. You won’t even be able to get her phone number.” Emma laughed.

Adam snapped his head toward her. “Care to put a wager on that?”

“Name it.”

“If I win and get her phone number, you have to let Nicky boy here take a body shot off you.”

Nicholas stiffened. “What?”

“And if I win and you do not get her phone number, you’re going to have to take a body shot off him.” Emma nodded in Hunter’s direction, and Hunter jerked his head up.

“No fucking way!”

“Hey, relax, man.” Adam slapped Hunter on the shoulder. “I got this. There’s no way I’m losing.”

“You better not fucking lose, because if you do I will kick you in the balls if you come near me.”

Adam straightened his collar, took a big gulp of beer and focused his eyes on the bride to be. “I’m going in.” And he made his way toward the crowd.

All three of them sat in silence as they watched Adam work his charm on the ladies. Nicholas had to give it to the man, he had swagger and confidence like none other and he knew that if anyone was able to seduce a blushing bride-to-be, it was Adam. Which probably meant that Emma would lose the bet. Which she did, half an hour later.

“Ta-da!” Adam flaunted the piece of paper with “Chloe’s” phone number on.

Emma gawked at him. “A half an hour? That’s all it took? Half an hour?”

“I’m that good.” Adam winked. “Now, I took the courtesy of ordering that tequila Nicky will be taking via body shot.”

Nicholas turned to Emma. “You don’t have to—”

“Bring it.”

Okay, Nicholas could see that the last couple of rounds had given Emma a lot of courage, and it also kind of shot Nicholas’ resolve to not go
there
with her to shit.

The tequila arrived and Nicholas thought to himself that he had never craved a damn shot of tequila this much before in his life.

“Okay, love birds, let’s do this. Emma dearest, in case you don’t know, you need to—”

Emma got onto the table before Adam could finish his sentence, and she rendered little Adam speechless, which was a damn rare occurrence.

When Emma lay back on the table, Nicholas looked at Hunter and Adam. “Can you two get up? You’re crowding the woman.”

He didn’t like the fact that they were sitting so close to her while she was on her back on the table, looking all divine and perfect. His groin started to ache badly.

Nicholas kind of wished she would say no and not let him go through with this since he really wanted to, and there was no way he would be able to back out. “Emma, you don’t have—”

“Are you afraid, Mr. Blake?” she challenged, and he saw a little more of that wild side in her, a side that he knew he would be able to have a hell of a lot of fun with.

Nicholas grinned. “Very well then, Miss Tremaine. Challenge accepted.”

He took the shot glass and decided to show her just how well he was about to accept her damn challenge. Besides, his resolve was shot to shit, remember? So he was bringing it.

Nicholas got up from his seat and climbed on top of the table, straddling her. Adam and Hunter whistled from the side.

“This is going to be a body shot you will never forget, Miss. Tremaine.” He noticed her throat moving like she was swallowing hard, her chest rising and falling as her breathing deepened.

Nicholas took the hem of her shirt in his hands and jerked it up. Emma sucked in a breath.

“Now first, you need to take this in your mouth.” He held up the lime.

Emma nodded, and he slowly reached up, letting her take the lime from his fingers. His fingertips gently slid against her warm, wet lips and he had to bite his tongue to stop a moan from escaping.

He grabbed the salt. “Now you need to lift that pretty chin of yours.”

A crowd had gathered around them, whistling and cheering. Nicholas kind of wished they were in the privacy of his room where he could do exactly what he wanted to, which was get Emma naked and writhing beneath him.

Emma complied and lifted her chin, allowing Nicholas to pour a little salt right into the hollow just below her throat. He could see her breathing accelerate, almost matching his own. Everything about them, about him being on top of her like this, the prospects of tasting her, had him coiled as tight as a vice.

Taking the shot glass, he dragged the bottom over her exposed stomach, and he heard her breathing hitch.

She was turned on, he could sense it, see it, smell it. The air between them was stained with desire, pulsing with intense electricity. When he poured the tequila in her belly button, she moved causing a drop to roll down the side of her stomach.

“You need to be still, Emma. You don’t want to waste some perfectly good tequila.” He scooped up the spilled drop of tequila that ran down her side with his finger, reached up and traced that same finger along her bottom lip. He could have sworn her heard her moan.

She couldn’t look at him while her chin remained up with the salt still in the hollow of her throat. Nicholas could feel every ounce of blood in his body shoot straight to his cock that was now throbbing with the need to fill her and possess her completely. And he knew she was just as fucking turned on as him. He loved that he affected this sweet, innocent, beautiful woman. He loved that he had her all worked up with the mere prospect of him taking a body shot off her.

As he leaned forward, he placed his hands on either side of her shoulders. He lowered his head to her neck, staring at the salt like it was candy he had been craving all his life. “Are you ready?”

Emma nodded, and he smiled. He didn’t know who was going to enjoy this more, her or him. At first he didn’t like Adam’s stupid idea of a body shot, but now, like this, he loved it.

Best fucking idea ever.

With a slow, soft stroke of his tongue, he licked the salt from her skin and he felt a shiver move down her body, or was he the one that shivered? He didn’t know, but by God this was probably the most erotic thing he had ever done, and he had done a fucking lot—pun intended.

While keeping the salt on his tongue, he glided his chin down between her breasts feeling her chest rise and fall. Nicholas continued all the way down until he reached her navel.

The scent of her, something between peaches and sugar mixed with the sharp smell of the tequila was amazing and utterly exotic.

Still holding the salt in his mouth, he used the tip of his tongue and drew a circle around her navel. She bucked slightly and Nicholas smiled.

With a breath he sucked the alcohol into his mouth and quickly shot up, going for the lime she held between her lips. When his mouth collided with hers and he tasted the salt, tequila and the lime mixed with the unique taste of her, he knew it was over. He was done for, and he would have her. He would take her, consume and own her. He needed to, and there was no way he would be able to stop it.

Nicholas didn’t care for the lime. He didn’t suck on the tangy fruit slice, instead he sucked on her lips and cared only for her taste.

Nicholas parted his lips over hers and gave her a taste of the tequila he still had in his mouth. She let out a soft moan while his tongue gently moved past the lime in search of hers.

The second their tongues brushed together, Nicholas had to force back a groan. For that few seconds, there was no one else, just them. There was no Billy’s Pub, no crowd, no Adam or Hunter, no Mr. Blake or maid Emma. It was just them, and Nicholas knew he had lost the battle against his desire for her.