Hidden Depths(8)
“Of course. They know me at the front desk.”
“Do this a lot, do you?” he joked, but it didn’t quite come off.
She paused. “I mean because of my work with Mr. Reynolds. I’ve had dealings with all the better hotels.”
“Why do you keep calling Michael ‘Mr. Reynolds’?” he snapped. “It’s creepy.”
Her chin hiked up a little higher. “I’m not interested in your impressions of my vernacular. Or in your assessment of ‘creepy’. Some people might think it was ‘creepy’ to arrange for a prostitute to come service you at a family party.”
“Not you, though, I guess.”
“On the contrary, I found it heartwarming. I admire multitasking.”
Her delivery was so deadpan she could have made it as a stand-up comic and he found himself inadvertently laughing. So in the spirit of friendlier relations, he pitched an obvious softball. “So what are you interested in, then?”
She cocked her head. “I thought we’d already established that. Where’s the bedroom?”
Okay, now nobody could ever say Evan Reynolds wasn’t cool with anonymous sex. More than cool with it. He preferred it. Even more specifically, right at this moment, he preferred it with her.
So why was he hesitating?
He had no idea why, but he was rooted to the spot for a second instead of springing forward to the main act as he should have done at her question.
She found the bedroom without any help from him, though, just wandering off in the right direction, and he followed. Once she was by the bed, she reached for the side zipper of her dress, not looking at him. Stunning himself, he said, “Hold on a minute.”
She glanced his way.
“Is this your thing?” he asked vaguely.
“Is what my thing?”
He looked her up and down. “Does it turn you on to be treated like a whore?”
“I don’t know. Does it turn you on to treat a woman like a whore?”
“Only when she is one. When she isn’t—and doesn’t let me in on the fact—it sort of pisses me off.”
She sat on the bed. “Yes, I’m sure you were quite put out by the whole episode at your father’s party. Are you planning to lecture me now?” She slipped off her shoes and crossed her smooth, bare legs, leaning back on her palms. “Oh no, that’s right. You didn’t ask me here for a lecture. You—how did you put it so eloquently at the hospital?—you wanted to fuck me again.”
The word on her prim and proper lips turned him on, much more than if she had actually been the hired escort he had thought her originally. Not sure what that said about him, he asked the question he really wanted her to answer. “Why did you go along with it? At the party, I mean.”
“You didn’t give me much of a chance to object, if I recall.”
The unexpected response infuriated him. “Bullshit. You could’ve spoken up at any time. Instead you stripped when I told you to strip and climbed into bed with me and let me fuck you without breathing a word of who you really were.”
“What difference did it make who I was? I was still a stranger to you and you were still exceedingly,” she pursed her plush lips delicately, “enthusiastic about the whole process. Does this have something to do with not paying after all? Do you feel as if you walked out on the check at a restaurant or some such thing?”
“Wow. Great self-esteem, Miss Prentiss. Really.”
“I have all the self-esteem I need, Evan. All the analysis too, thanks. But maybe you should try some. Analysis, I mean. I’m starting to suspect there may be some latent Madonna-versus-whore conflict going on in that handsome head of yours. Are you worried you defiled me by sleeping with me? Because I assure you I was perfectly fine with it. I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”
“Perfectly fine with it.” He snorted, not even touching the “handsome head of yours” bullshit. “So you just wanted to fuck? Is that it?”
“Is that so hard to believe?”
“Not for me, but I get the feeling you have a pretty uptight rep.”
She shrugged. “You’ve been listening to gossip, haven’t you? Let’s just say I don’t like to be approached in the workplace.”
“But at a party where you’re delivering your boss some papers, it’s okay.”
“You were refreshingly forthright at the party, Evan, but I’m finding you a touch obtuse right now. What are you trying to get at?”
He looked at her, hard.
“Nothing,” he said disgustedly. What was he getting at anyway? That he was special to the frosty Miss Prentiss? That he had gone where no man dared to go before or some crap? Christ, maybe he had been on his island too long. Maybe he did need some psychoanalysis, a self-help tool he had always disdained in favor of picking up a hammer and nails and pounding away at something.