16 - Public-Private Partnership

The bill was finally paid and, after Jon had impatiently waited for both his and her credit slips, he scrawled his signature on the line and stood to help her with her coat.  “Where did you have lunch today?  I wanna go by and pick up some of that tiramisu.”

Much as he had guided her into the restaurant with one steering hand in the small of her back, he guided her back out again.  They navigated the closely set tables with matching expressions of affable indifference.

“I’d rather not.”

They both nodded at the hostess as they walked past, side-by-side, hands barely brushing as they did.  No one would ever guess they were more than casual acquaintances.

Pushing open the outer door, Jon held it wide as she stepped into the extremely cool night.  Sheridan zipped up the leather jacket, but it was a feeble barrier cold air that cut through to her skin.

“Oh my God, it’s him!”  Startled, she whipped her head to the right, where two women on a determined course were bearing down on Jon.

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath before plastering on a contrived ‘I love my fans even when their timing sucks’ smile.  Shooting Sheridan a look of apology, he nodded his appreciation as she silently stepped aside and let him do his thing with the fans.  They likely didn’t even know she was there.

“Can we get a picture?”

“And your autograph?”

The pair’s excitement was infectious and Sheridan struggled not to grin.  The women – clearly tourists – were about her age and unable to believe their good fortune.  Jon took it all in stride as part of a day’s work, and graciously lived up to his rock star image. 

“Sure, but can we make it quick?  It’s cold out here,” he teased, settling his arm around the shorter of the two and smiling into the cell phone camera. 

A couple of quick snaps, autographs and minutes later, the women were on their way, still squealing about having met Jon.  Bon.  Jovi! 

“Sorry about that,” he murmured, getting the door to the SUV for her.  “You were telling me which restaurant has the orgasmic tiramisu.”

She could see that he was still playing the game, keeping his features bland even while drawing the maximum amount of inappropriateness from the words.  It didn’t bother her.  Now that she understood the rules, she could play as well as anyone.

“No reason to be sorry, but I wasn’t telling you where to find my tiramisu.  I was telling you I’d rather go home.”

“But now I’ve given you the perfect opportunity to change your mind.”  His grin was positively lecherous. 

Gliding to a halt next to where he stood, she angled her mouth to speak privately in his ear, and submitted to her own bout of lecherousness.  “I don’t want anything sweet.  Right now, I’m more interested in something thick and salty.”

Putting her heels back on the ground, she reveled in the desirous glow of his eyes and the blatant tightening of his jaw.  The victory dredged a smug chuckle from her.  “Now, see.  That look will get you busted every time.”

It wasn’t as funny to Jon as it was to her.

“Get in the damn car, Kitten,” he all but growled before placing an encouraging hand at her back.  “Now.”

“There is a driver.  For the record, that makes this car public.”

The temporary crack in his mask had been firmly spackled with a hollow press-style smile.  Had anyone been nearby, they never would have suspected his gritted, “Right fucking now.”

Politely tipping her chin in thanks, one booted foot went into the back of the vehicle.  The second did not follow until she sweetly murmured, “This is not your area of control, Mr. Bon Jovi.  You’ll do well to remember that.” 

The door slammed, sealing them inside, away from prying eyes and the orchestra of city noises.  Their driver asked formally, “Where to, folks?”

“Back to Leonard Street.” 

If she didn’t know better, the tersely uttered command would have her believing that Jon was pissed.  He wasn’t pissed, he was… 

The thought was interrupted by his heavy, insistent hand blanketing her knee and pulling her skirt upward.  “You’re lucky I don’t give you that thick and salty right here, Kitten.”

Sheridan picked up the marauding hand and placed it firmly back on his own leg with a censorious glare.  “And you’re lucky I don’t bust you in the chops for inappropriate public groping.  Don’t fight me on this Jon.  What goes on behind closed doors stays behind closed doors.  I mean it.”

His mouth stretched into a flat line of unhappiness.  The thing that grated on him the most was that she was right.  He played by the very same rules, yet something about her made him want to break those rules to a million pieces. 

She was someone he would be happy to have at his side in any setting, representing herself as classy and sophisticated.  Tonight was proof upon proof upon proof of that.  From dinner, to the donning of her professional persona, to her easy acceptance and dismissal of a common occurrence in his life, she had been nothing but gracious and refined.  No one would ever suspect her as anything but.  It was almost enough to make him believe she was a different woman than the sex kitten he romped with last night.

It made him want to desperately to shake chic Sheridan up a bit.  To catch a glimpse of the siren who had his libido in overdrive.

“Those marks are your neck are mine,” he reminded her blandly, annoyed at being chastised like a schoolboy.  He tugged at the ends of the scarf, displacing it enough to see one of the bruises marring her smooth neck.

She didn’t try and stop him from outlining the shadow with his fingertip, or argue with his statement.  In fact, she readily agreed.  “They are.  And you can make a whole new set of them if you want to, but you’ll do it in private.”

Good sense or not, he still couldn’t let her have the last word.

“You won’t deny me anything in private, Sheridan.”

“You haven’t given me a reason to want to.”

Abandoning her neck, he moved on to her right hand, satisfied with her answer.  Jon picked it up and threaded their fingers together so that the heat of their palms melded.  She turned to him in wonder, probably stunned that he wanted to engage in such an innocent, yet intimate connection.

Sheridan King had earned his respect tonight, both in the way she hadn’t run blabbing to her friend about doing the nasty with him and with how she handled herself.  With who she was.

His thumb scraped along the back of hers, not asking for anything more during the remainder of the short ride to her apartment. 

❧❧❧

Stepping onto the curb in front of her building, Sheridan didn’t know whether she was relieved or disappointed that he had stopped pushing and gone silent.  It briefly crossed her mind that he was pouting, but she couldn’t imagine that he was that much of a child.

Men are strange.  He might be.

“Evenin’ Jack.” 

Sheridan’s head snapped around at Jon’s easy greeting of the doorman while ushering her into the lobby.    

“You know my doorman?”

“Evening Mr. Bon Jovi, Ms. King,” Jack returned with an affable wave of his wrist as they went by the desk. 

Jon chuckled, holding the elevator door for her.  If he had been pouting, he wasn’t anymore. “He was my doorman first.”

“I wondered how you got upstairs unannounced last night.”

The car began its short ascent to the fifth floor as he pushed cool fingertips under the hem of her sweater, finding the bare skin of Sheridan’s lower back. 

“Don’t ever underestimate me.  If I truly desire something, I’ll find a way to get it.”

His amused arrogance had her stifling a silent giggle.  He was still saving face from the car ride, but she didn’t mind.  As a matter of fact, she might even be persuaded to encourage his arrogance.  It was kind of hot on an intimately personal level.

“And you desired me.” 

It wasn’t a question, because she knew the answer already, but it didn’t stop his superiority from flowing freely.  “Are you fishing for compliments, Ms. King?”

“No.  I’m merely admiring your resourcefulness.  Isn’t that what you wanted me to do?”

She pushed the key into the door and felt the door swing inward at her actions.  Jon slipped in behind her, closing it before latching onto her wrist and spinning her to look at him. 

“I wanted you to do me,” he corrected, hauling her body flush against him.  “And now that we are in the confines of your precious privacy, you will.  Turn the lights on and strip, Kitten.  It’s time for me to see you.  Really see you.”

Her heart rate kicked up a notch with both excitement and apprehension.  If he saw her – and she saw him – there was no pretending that she wasn’t doing this.  No pretending that she wasn’t this person.  He could go tell the entire inner Bon Jovi circle what a nasty slut she was, and she would be fully accountable for her actions.  She wasn’t drunk; she wasn’t in dire and unusual circumstances.  Sheridan was just a woman who wanted to him to execute his every wicked thought up upon her.

That should scare the hell out of her.

“Kitten.”  Jon bent to nip at the underside of her jaw.  “We’re in my realm of control now.  Do as you’re told.”

On the contrary…  It didn’t scare the hell out of her; it excited her to a higher level that she’d ever been before.  She wasn’t one to give up control, but he was so masterful that she was almost embarrassingly grateful to relinquish responsibility to him.

“You have to let me go first,” she murmured deferentially, and the lock of his fingers around her wrist sprang open.

Reaching around him, she flipped the switch that illuminated the kitchen/dining area and then slipped from her jacket under his approving stare.  He followed suit, tossing his own jacket over a chair alongside hers.  She was reaching for the scarf when he stopped her. 

“That’s mine.”  With that, deliberate fingers worked loose the knot of fine fabric and slowly drew at one end until her neck and chest were exposed to his gloating gaze.  “Sweater,” he commanded, wrapping one fist in each end of the leopard print as his heated eyes licked over the array of purple love bites.

A tremor rattled her teeth, anticipating his reaction to the racy animal print bra she was about to reveal.  She obediently worked the hem over her head, letting the cashmere dangle from her fingertips as she shook her hair back into place.  His low growl paid for her lingerie purchase.  In full.

Motherfu… 

She was wearing a damn leopard bra underneath that sedate brown sweater.  And it almost held her in its undersized cups.  The edges of her aureoles peeked over, visible above the black lace edging the shiny, spotted print.

He fisted the scarf tighter.

Tousled hair, flushed cheeks, bite marks and leopard print made her unadulterated sex kitten on the top half, while her bottom half was still public Sheridan in the modest skirt and boots.  The two distinct halves of the same woman laid out for his pleasure.  The contrast was hot as hell. 

But if she had been hiding that on the top, what was she hiding on the bottom?

“Skirt off.”

She lifted an eyebrow at him, not disagreeing, just asking, “Can we go upstairs first?”

“Are you afraid for your precious dining table?” he asked with a feral grin.

“Maybe.”

“Lose the bra right now and you can go upstairs for the rest.”  He had to maintain the upper hand, even if he would like nothing better than to roll her all over that big, bouncy playground of a bed in the next ten seconds.  As much as she fought his reign in public, he had no doubt that, when it came to sex, she craved it.

“As you wish.”

A flick of her wrist had the front clasp open, her heavy breasts spilling free with their ripe nipples standing at attention.  She shifted her shoulders delicately to free her arms of the straps, and then draped the scrap of silk and lace over his shoulder with a saucy wink as she sauntered by with a wiggle in her hips.

“Meet you upstairs, Stud,” she purred.  “Turn the lights off down here, won’t you?”