French Kiss

He held out his hand. Summer took it. Her soft fingers curling into his. He walked her backward, twitching his hips to the beat. She followed, matching him move for move.

It occurred to him that she wouldn’t have taken Joe Everhart’s hand so willingly. That thought rankled. If she only knew the truth. He was nothing more than a nerd in hunk’s clothing, just an archeologist doing what he had to do in order to make money to fund his passion. She had bought into the Masked Monsieur fantasy hook, line and sinker and while he was glad for it, he was also oddly disappointed in her.

But for now, he held Summer spellbound. She was his. Their gazes connected.

The rest of the club disappeared. In Joe’s head it was just the two of them, dancing together.

His eyes ate her up.

She wore a simple spaghetti strap tank top. The taut poke of her perky nipples straining against her cotton top told him that she wasn’t wearing a bra. His stomach pitched. If they’d been back at their apartment complex, if he wasn’t wearing the mask, he wouldn’t have possessed the courage to stare at her so blatantly. But the Masked Monsieur could do things Joe could not. Women went wild for his alter ego. He stroked a finger over her palm. She shuddered and her tremulous response sent an inferno of feral need burning straight through his groin.

He performed a cha-cha-cha step and she mimicked his footwork, her curvy little butt bouncing enticingly. She had goddess legs, enhanced by the flirty blue and white skirt she wore that barely covered her firm, slender thighs. Her calves were shapely. Her ankles perfectly proportioned. And he loved the way her pearly pink toenails peeked from beneath the straps of her sandals.

“Hi,” she said breathlessly. He could barely hear her over the music. “I’m Summer.”

He did not answer. He was afraid she might recognize his voice and then his whole crazy deception would unravel before it ever got going.

Joe nodded, wrapped an arm around her waist and dipped her so low that her loose, flowing hair grazed the stage floor. How often he’d thought about holding her in his arms like this! It felt three times as great as he’d imagined. She smelled so damned good. Her face was flushed and she was breathing hard and fast, her breasts rising and falling against his chest, her head hanging below his.

Within kissing distance.

Her navy-blue eyes widened until they seemed to encompass her entire face. And when she slipped out a tongue to moisten her rich, crimson lips, he almost groaned aloud. He was that far gone.

“Joe told me all about you,” he murmured huskily into her ear as he righted her, disguising his voice with a bad French accent.

“He did?”

“He says you are a woman who regrets nothing.”

“That’s true.”

“Ah,” he said. “This is my lucky day. For you see, I am a man who will dare anything.”

Chapter Five

The masked stranger’s seductive words set something off inside Summer. Something hot and rich and hungry. His tone, the look in his eyes and the way he held her suggested many sensual pleasures. Erotic pleasures to which only he held the key.

He was a man who would dare anything. Was he suggesting an affair? The look in his eyes said yes.

It was as if he totally got her. As if he knew exactly what her soul needed. Red-hot sex and nothing more complicated than that.

She wanted him. Badly. But she was scared to want him too much.

How could this man with his sly smile, his face cloaked behind a leather mask, his black hair slicked back with gel know her deepest needs? What on earth had Joe told him?

But who was the guy? She knew nothing about him. Not even what he looked like. She trailed her gaze down those granite abs. Okay, so she could see he was a hard body. Beyond that, he was a mystery.

What else was there to know? She wouldn’t want him to take the mask off anyway. It was part of the illusion. Part of what was sending all her blood rushing from her head to the tender aching spot between her legs.

The Tom Jones song ended and a lively hip-hop tune began. The Masked Monsieur pulled her off stage. They ducked behind the curtain just as a buff, man dressed in a cowboy costume jiggled onto the stage.

If she were smart, she would leave right now. Forget all about having a stripper for Devon’s bachelorette party. Because Summer realized that if she hired this man and he came to her apartment dressed like this she would sex it up with him the minute the guests departed.

And from the lusty gleam in the Masked Monsieur’s eyes, she could tell the same thought was on his mind.

But this was impossible, outrageous. To be so attracted to a total stranger.

But wasn’t it much better than being attracted to the next-door neighbor she could not have? Nothing wrong with hot anonymous sex. Her nipples hardened at the thought.