Striptease

Several deep breaths later, she doused the hot lights, stopped the music and ejected the tape from the camera. Then she slipped back into her clothes. Jacob wouldn’t be in the office again until Monday, she realized, tugging up her leggings. That gave her time to concoct a clever comeback should he ask her what she was trying to prove.

She wanted to watch the tape, to see what he was going to see, but knew she’d never have the guts to send it off if she witnessed herself baring all. No, she thought, tucking the tape into the padded mailer she’d addressed earlier.

As much as she’d rather have Jacob discover the rest of her personality’s facets one-on-one, he’d made the first move in this sex, lies and videotape business.

Her striptease was simply move number two.

IF NOT FOR THE CHANCE to spend time with Renata, Jacob wouldn’t have come. It was August in Houston, and it was too friggin’ hot for a cookout. Damn fool thing to do, he grumbled, forgetting where he’d put his cajones. That particular forgetfulness made it hard not to be whipped and dragged around by Chloe’s sugary-sweet pleas.

He grumbled again and exited the Southwest Freeway into the historical neighborhood where she and Eric lived. The woman had better make good on her promise of free-flowing beer. That was all he had to say. And Renata damn well better show. Those were the only reasons he was here.

Well, those and the fact that, thanks to Melanie Craine, he’d been walking around for two days now with a World Series bat between his balls. More than once on the way over, he’d had to shift and adjust the goods just to be able to drive comfortably.

The way this group of women stuck together like racked billiard balls, he figured Melanie would be here today. And he had a payback to deliver. In the end, that had been the deciding reason he’d blown off a Saturday afternoon baseball game at Minute Maid Park.

Yeah, that’s why he was here. To even the score.

Not because he couldn’t wait to get a look at what she was wearing and spend the rest of the afternoon trying to get her out of her clothes.

He pushed away the thoughts long enough to navigate the narrow streets without running his truck up onto a curb. He wouldn’t think about Melanie’s amazing body again until he’d parked. He’d think, instead, about a lesser reason he’d come: Chloe’s claim that the party was a bribe to get Renata to join gUIDANCE gIRL as a consultant.

His sister said she never saw him often enough, so Chloe had begged him to come. Not that he minded being used by a gorgeous woman—witness him offering himself for more of Melanie’s games—but Jacob didn’t think his sister needed much in the way of persuasion.

She was an expert at dispensing advice, having done so since grade school when she’d been eight, he’d been eleven and she’d told him to always have extra change for the ice-cream man in case Kelly Sims was broke. Renata, champion of the weak and wounded, crusader for a woman’s right to have her ice cream and eat it, too, would fit right in with the rest of the gIRL-gEAR women.

Even recognizing that female bonding potential, he wasn’t having an easy time figuring out the dynamics of the group. He was hoping today he’d pick up a few clues. Most of his video work didn’t require personal involvement with clients. But this assignment was different.

Documentary or not, if he made this show work, he could write his own career ticket. Any number of NYC-based production companies would wet their proverbial pants after seeing a show of this caliber on his résumé. The inheritance he’d received from his paternal grandmother had allowed him to outfit his own studio and perfect his craft on top-of-the-line equipment. And getting to know the women away from the office would go a long way to making sure the shoot turned out to be his best ever.

He pulled his Explorer Sport Trac in behind a line of two-seaters and sporty status cars parked at the curb. Adding that half dozen to the double row of vehicles running the length of the driveway, he figured this shindig wasn’t the quiet and cozy get-together Chloe had claimed.

Not that he was particularly surprised. He wouldn’t classify anything he’d learned about the seven female friends’ working relationship as cozy. Or as quiet. He had a feeling hair was pulled and mud-wrestling done on a regular basis. Or not. But hey, a guy could dream.

He hadn’t seen enough of their off-site playtime to know that game’s score. The only true playtime he’d witnessed, in fact, had been Melanie’s incendiary striptease. And even then he didn’t know if she’d been the one playing, or if she’d been playing him.

He groaned in defeat. How could a two-dimensional, gray shadow be sexier than a living color peekaboo peepshow? He’d lived in a state of unbearable arousal since watching the tape. What the hell had she been thinking? And why the hell had she turned off the recording like that, right in the middle of his left-handed fun?

Talk about strokus interruptus.

No matter all the reasons he gave himself for showing up at Chloe’s today, the bottom line was that he was here to see how far he could get Melanie to go. He’d spent the morning watching the tape again. And watching it one more time. Not because he’d needed a refresher; Melanie’s shadowed image had imprinted itself on his brain the first time he’d popped the tape into the VCR and hit Play.

He’d watched because he knew he’d be seeing her today. And because he couldn’t reconcile her shadowy seduction with the woman who worked in a black-and-white office and wore work clothes that were dull and ugly and drove him nuts for wanting to strip them away. Especially after that yellow thing she’d been wearing at the wedding.

That outfit had been all he’d seen when she walked through the sanctuary doors and into his camera’s LCD view screen. He’d followed her progress down the aisle and watched the way her body moved, bouncing beneath the nearly sheer top that was as loose and flowing as her short skirt was tight.

The contrast was definitely the sort of which his professional eye took notice. But it was her body underneath that grabbed his more primal attention. That, and the way the heels she’d been wearing did what heels were supposed to do to a woman’s ass and long legs.

For weeks he hadn’t been able to get that image out of his mind, and now that he’d seen her take her clothes off…forget it. The shadowed striptease had turned him on even more than watching her walk down the aisle.

He hadn’t realized how much until he’d been putting together the outtakes in an effort to point out how far over the professional line she’d stepped that day. She’d encroached on his artistic territory, tried to run his show.

He’d wanted her to see that she’d been just plain wrong, that her issues with control weren’t doing her any favors. And he’d always been a hell of a lot better at showing than he’d ever been at telling.

Well, apparently, not this time.

He supposed he deserved the bump-and-grind gauntlet she’d thrown in his face. Melanie had been pissed off enough at his effort to come right back and turn the tables. And she’d done a damn fine job.

The three faces of Melanie Craine just didn’t click. She’d been a witch wearing yellow, a tease in severe office black, a vamp wearing nothing at all. And he was about to get hard again, dammit. So he pushed away thoughts of Melanie and pushed open the gate of the eight-foot cedar fence into Chloe and Eric’s backyard.

The crowd was huge, the pool inviting, the air humid and hot. He wanted a cold beer in a very bad way and he wanted to see his sister, but he didn’t want anything half as bad as he wanted to get his hands on Melanie Craine.

PUSHING BACK LONG STRANDS of curling chestnut hair from her face, Renata Faulkner handed Eric Haydon a plate of burgers ready for the grill.

He was a nice guy, but definitely not a guy she would’ve expected to find living with Chloe Zuniga. Though it seemed time had indeed healed all wounds, the Chloe whom Renata had known had always been too hard-core, bitterly sullen and punk. And here was Eric, amazingly all-American.

Then again, maybe there was more truth than Renata had ever wanted to believe to the theory of opposites attracting. It seemed to be working brilliantly for these two. Her reunion with Chloe might be but days old, yet Renata had seen enough to know her friend had found herself the real deal.

“Hey, thanks,” Eric said, trading her for a platter of burgers just short of well-done. “I see Chloe hijacked you into kitchen detail.”

Renata grinned. “She always was the bossy type. And definitely never one who took no for an answer when she wanted a big fat yes.”

“You’re not telling me a damn thing I haven’t spent a good year figuring out.” Eric dodged another blast of flame and smoke. “She’s a piece of work and then some.”

“C’mon now, sugar. Don’t be talking trash about your woman to her old friends.” Walking up and into the conversation, Chloe smacked Eric soundly on his denim-covered backside. “I’d rather Rennie remember me in my more precious incarnation.”

Renata laughed out loud. “Precious as a sliver of broken glass beneath the ball of a bare foot.”

Her arm snug around Eric’s waist, Chloe arched a brow sharply. “I can see leaving you two alone together is not going to be a good idea. A girl needs to know her secrets are safe rather than being shared for a laugh.”

Eric lowered the grill’s heavy lid, hooking an elbow around Chloe’s neck and gesturing with the barbecue tongs he held in the same hand. “C’mon now, princess. We’re not laughing at you. Only with you.”

“Right.” Chloe ducked out from beneath Eric’s arm and linked her fingers through Renata’s. “We’ll be leaving you now to your manly meat business.”

Eric sulked. “But I thought you liked my manly meat business.”

Chloe rolled her eyes as Renata laughed and let her old friend drag her away. “He’s such a doll. Wherever did you find him?”

“It was one of those six degrees of separation things. I knew Lauren, Lauren knew Anton, Anton knew Eric. Hmm. I guess that’s only three degrees,” Chloe amended, then shrugged and grimaced. “Five minutes. I need five minutes off my feet. I’ve been running like crazy for hours.”

Skirting the newly installed swimming pool, the women settled on opposite sides of the patio’s glass table beneath an umbrella of cream-and-green stripes. Propping her feet on the seat of a third chair, Chloe sighed in relief. “Anyway, Eric and I ended up paired for one of Macy’s gIRL gAMES. The rest, I suppose you can say, is history.”

Renata saw no need to hide her approval. “A period of history I wouldn’t mind studying in the least.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Oh, yeah.” Renata looked toward Eric and smiled. She took a deep breath and shook her head appreciatively. “One of these days I am going to have to get myself one of those.”

“Shopping?” Chloe asked with a laugh.