Which was probably why he found himself thinking about taking her clothes off now that they were alone again in the safety of his plane. The pilot’s cabin was sealed shut during flight for both parties’protection. The flight to the Hamptons would be short—less than an hour counting the wait for takeoff—but still offered plenty of time to touch her the way he’d wanted to all day. Ever since they’d gotten dressed this morning, actually.
“Nice ride you’ve got here.” She smoothed her hand over one of the seats he’d had reupholstered when he’d bought the plane two years ago. The scent of the leather lingered even after the new carpet smell had faded the first year.
“Thanks.” He didn’t want to talk about the plane. He wanted to give her a better ride. One she wouldn’t forget after their flight was over. But out of deference to her, he reined in his thoughts. Okay, maybe not his thoughts, but he sure as hell kept better control of his mouth. “I got sick of trying to arrange charter flights as often as I needed them. I told myself this would save me money in the long run, but it was also sort of selfish. Always wanted a plane.”
He ran a palm over the polished walnut cabinet housing the media center at the front of the passenger cabin. The plane had been a cool toy, but it hadn’t come close to filling the gaps in life. It hadn’t been until more recently that he’d keyed into the need to give something back after all the ways he’d cashed in with his business. Teaching self-defense to smart-ass kids like Easy had actually bought him more true satisfaction than the expensive toy.
A welcome wake-up call.
“And since you must realize that showing up at your house in the Hamptons via plane is going to quickly announce your presence around the neighborhood, I can only assume you want to make your arrival known?”
He gestured to the chair she’d been standing behind. Maybe he’d stop thinking about peeling the clothes from her body if he were seated beside her instead of standing across from her and appreciating each and every nuance of her curves. It could happen.
Not.
“I’m done with hiding, thanks to you.” Her arrival at the rec center last night had spurred him out of the routine he’d fallen into. Made him realize he had more to accomplish. “And if there’s anyone in all of Long Island who hasn’t heard I’m back, they’ll know the truth soon after we pay a visit to Donata. She’s very good about spreading the latest news.”
Vanessa slid into the seat, her long, lean body pressing into the sleek expanse of leather. “I might have to skip the visit to any woman who signs herself as ‘Your Pussy.’ Call me old-fashioned, but I’m not much into sharing a man I’m sleeping with, even if the sex came about under extenuating circumstances.”
“And just what’s that supposed to mean?” He pushed an intercom button behind the media center and informed the pilot they were ready to take off. Then, switching off the system, he sat down in the seat next to Vanessa.
He’d been prepared to sit across the aisle from her to give her some breathing room, but he’d be damned if he would deny himself the pleasure of her proximity if she was going to play head games with him. “Are you trying to suggest that sex between us wasn’t inevitable? That you could have somehow avoided getting involved with me if we hadn’t been thrown into the carjacking situation?”
She turned to glare at him, her dark, smoky stare turning him on even though she happened to look damn annoyed with him right about now.
“I beg your pardon?” She crossed her arms, adopting a classic battle pose. “
Inevitable?
Don’t you think that might be overstating the case just a little?”
“Hell no. And buckle up, damn it.” He jammed his own seat belt into place, knowing there were a hundred other things they should be discussing before he walked back into his world after a six-month absence, but right now, this seemed more important. “I don’t care how traumatic things were last night. We felt the heat of this attraction long before we slid into the Mercedes.”
She shook her head, her long, dark hair dancing with the movement. “Feeling an attraction isn’t the same as acting on it. I think I could have scavenged a whole lot more self-control without the memory of a gun jammed into my temple.”
Damn. He was being insensitive and he knew it. Last night
had
been rough. He just didn’t like to think she’d been driven to his bed for any reason other than that she wanted him. Badly.
“You’re right.” He didn’t have any desire to argue with her now that they could let their guards down for the first time since they’d left his apartment that morning. Reaching across the armrest that separated them, he stroked a gentle touch along her shoulder. “I just wish I didn’t have to thank a couple of street punks for bringing you to me because I wanted you from the second you volunteered to demonstrate a self-defense move for me.”
A hint of a smile played over her full lips as the plane inched forward, the sound of the engines gently rumbling through the cabin no matter how much noise-deadening insulation he’d installed beneath the carpet.
“You looked like you were in need of a worthy opponent.”
“Except I don’t want to keep being your adversary.” Learning about her sister’s accident made him understand why her first instinct was to shove people away. She didn’t trust the legal system, and Alec suspected half her reason for going into law enforcement had been to do a better job than the cops had done on her sister’s behalf.
But he wouldn’t be another guy she mistrusted, another man she suspected wouldn’t hold up his end of the bargain. He just wasn’t sure what she expected from him.
“Which brings to mind an interesting point.” She kept her posture ramrod straight, no hint of relaxing into his touch. “If we’re not adversaries anymore, what are we? Where do you see this thing going once we can nail your partner?”
He hadn’t expected that kind of candidness from her. Not here. Not yet. The question felt like an opportunity, a chance to reach for something better than he’d ever had before.
But he must have taken too long to answer since she exhaled an exasperated, “Never mind.”
“No. I’m just thinking.” He wouldn’t let her yank the question back now. “I haven’t really thought about the future in so long. I’ve been buried in work with the center, just keeping my head above water.”
“Must be hell when you don’t have access to your private jet.” She crossed one gorgeous leg over the other, making it difficult to think about any future beyond undressing her.
“You’re just pissed because you know you would have been flying around in your own Cessna by now if you had followed your dreams after college.” He slipped his hand inside the cuff of her jacket sleeve, grateful for any access to her body.
Beneath them, the hum of the engines grew louder as the plane picked up speed. They must have received the go-ahead to take off because the aircraft launched forward fast enough to gently pin them in their seats.
“I know no such thing.” She closed her eyes for a moment as they lifted into the air, her lashes grazing her cheek in a rare display of relaxation—enjoyment?—for a woman who seemed to have been born wary. “There are thousands of MBAs in this city and only a tiny percentage of them achieve the kind of success you have.”
“One of the things Vercelli told me once was that people do business with us because they want to foster goodwill with the mob.” He didn’t appreciate the reminder that all of his success might not be built on hard work alone. “How messed up is that? But I never did a freaking thing to suggest to anyone I ever worked with that I had a connection to Sergio.”
“I didn’t mean to say your business is flourishing because of that.” A crease furrowed the smooth surface of her forehead. “I just meant to point out that no degree guarantees any kind of success. And I can promise you that no matter how close your ties to organized crime, you wouldn’t have this kind of success in real estate without a canny eye for development and a shrewd knowledge of what properties to buy. Business sense isn’t granted to any man because he carries a gun, and I’ve arrested enough nimrods with weapons to know this for an absolute fact.”
The plane leveled off as they reached their cruising altitude, the engine noise fading into the background, or perhaps Alec just grew more accustomed to the muted rumble.
“Thanks.” Her frank assessment pleased him more than a garden-variety compliment tossed out by women in his past. Donata’s interest in him had coincided precisely with the moment she found out he had as much net worth as his uncle, and his business was legal to boot. He’d been happy to help Donata get out from under Sergio’s thumb until he realized she’d never leave his protection without another man lined up to bankroll her expensive habits. “And for the record, I know you’d excel at anything you wanted to do. The MBA is a piece of paper. It’s
you
I have faith in.”
“Really?” She kept her tone skeptical, but Alec didn’t miss the hint of pleasure in her voice. “You may have missed your calling as a motivational speaker.”
He skimmed a touch along the inside of her elbow, his knuckles grazing the fabric of her linen jacket as he adjusted his hand for a better angle.
“I happen to be feeling pretty damn motivated right now.” He hadn’t meant to say it; the words just propelled themselves from his mouth.
But sitting next to her here in their bubble of privacy soaring over Long Island, he found it difficult to remember why he should keep his hands to himself. Her dark hair glowed with subtle bronze highlights under the lone reading lamp they’d left on above their seats. The supple leather creaked quietly behind her shoulders as she pressed herself deeper into the seat.
“Motivated for what? Seducing a city detective into your personal mile-high club?” Her words were softly chiding, but her breath quickened, her chest expanding and falling a little faster than before.
Not that his eyes were glued to her very admirable breasts, damn it.
“I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve had occasion to share this plane with clients and not once have I seduced any of them. I may have persuaded them to sign on the dotted line for a land deal or two, but I never cinched a mile-high quickie for myself.” His fingers strayed up her arm, stretching the fabric of her jacket as far as it would go to accommodate his touch. He could feel her heart pounding at the contact, knew she experienced the same relentless tug of attraction that had never been far from his mind today.
“There’s where you’ve been getting it all wrong, Messina.” She tipped her head back against the seat, a silent gesture of surrender if ever he’d seen one. “You can’t think in terms of a quickie when you’re flying around in a private jet. Look at this place. A woman is bound to be more in the mood for the five-star treatment once she sets foot in here.”
His hand stilled on her arm. Lust blindsided him, seriously impairing his ability to form sentences.
“I seem to have lost my capacity for thought somewhere between ‘five’ and ‘star.’ Can you clarify for me that you’re not going to be offended if I rip those clothes off you right now?”
“The way I see it, your uncle’s mistress is going to spit nails if she figures out we’re sleeping together, so I’d prefer to go into this meeting with a clear memory of why I took the risk.”
“Was that a yes?” His blood slammed through his veins with such force he couldn’t be entirely sure.
“Damn it, Alec, I’m going to be seriously offended if you
don’t
rip these clothes off me now.”
But Vanessa wasn’t most women.
She could admire a man who didn’t take his jet to some remote Caribbean island the moment times got tough in his real-estate business. With as much money as Alec must have access to, he could have gone into hiding anywhere around the globe, yet he’d opted to hang out in the Bronx where he’d taught kids how to survive. How to fight back.
Maybe Alec needed this escape right now as badly as she did.
“Come here.” His command was soft but unmistakable as he lifted the armrest between them and unbuckled her seat belt. His fingers maneuvered the metal buckle, brushing along her hip for a fraction of a second. Long enough to send a sensual flutter along her nerves.
Uncertainty—a foreign sensation—held her motionless. She’d expected him to take her at her word about ripping her clothes off. Their encounter the night before, and even that morning had been marked by deep hunger and restless need, driven by an elemental urge to connect.
She hadn’t anticipated this slow watchfulness on his part now, his eyes brimming with heat he seemed to be keeping carefully controlled.
“Over there?” She settled for walking her fingers up his lower thigh.
“Yeah.” He trapped her fingers and dragged her closer, tugging her toward his lap. “Over here. Where I can get a better look at you.”
She found herself leaning, reaching, stretching out across his chest as he wrapped his arms around her until she half sprawled over his lap, her legs the only part of her body that lingered in her vacated seat.
She didn’t need to hold on to him since he held her right where he wanted her. Still, she found her hands seeking his shoulders, her fingers gliding along his shirt to the corded strength of his neck.
“Is this close enough for you?” Her breasts tightened at his proximity, the anticipation of his touch making every inch of her skin hot with awareness.
“Not nearly enough, and I think you know that.” He tightened his hold on her with one arm while letting go with the other. Reaching up to the reading light, he clicked off the small lamp, casting the passenger cabin in darkness except for a softly illuminated red Exit sign above the door.
While the dark soothed her, easing any leftover doubts about the wisdom of being with him again, she couldn’t help but remember that he’d brought her closer in order to look at her.
Or so he said.
“You’ll never see me now.” She palmed his cheek, her fingers sifting into the dark hair along his temple. The motion brought her breasts that much closer to his chest, the ache for him growing sharper every second she was suspended over his lap.
“I don’t think you’re ready to let me see you the way I want to yet.” He reached into the V of her shirt, using the tips of three fingers to stroke down the center of her chest. “I want to know all about you. See the parts of you bared that you’ve never shown to anyone else.”
His soft caress distracted her, robbing her focus as the feel of lace over her nipples suddenly constrained her unbearably, the fabric agitating her until she longed to do the clothes ripping for him.
“I’m no innocent, Alec.” As much as she wanted him, she didn’t want to deceive him on that score. “I’ve been seen a time or two before.”
“No.” He shook his head while he blew a warm stream of air from his lips to the patch of exposed skin just above the valley of her cleavage. “I don’t think anybody else has ever touched you the way you let me touch you last night. And next time I take your clothes off I want to be naked with you for real. Do you understand what I mean?”
She shook her head, not understanding at all. Possibly a little afraid to understand. Maybe the high altitude was starting to get to her.
“I want the five-star sex as much the next guy. But I don’t think you find that with just anyone.” He covered her hand with his and slid it down to his lips. Planting a kiss inside her palm, he flicked his tongue over her skin before lowering her hand. “We had that last night because we connected on a deeper level. And while recreational sex is cool, too, it’s not something I can retreat to after getting a taste of what the real deal can be like.”
“Are you telling me—” Her thoughts seemed to run from her struggling brain, and no matter how much she concentrated, they only hovered further out of her mental grasp. He couldn’t be talking about deep and meaningful emotions, right? And yet, what else could he mean? “Last night was super-charged because of the fear. The adrenaline letdown. The cloak-and-dagger antics of getting into your apartment. That’s not reality.”
“Fear?” He slipped his hand beneath her jacket to lay on her waist, his thumb and forefinger playing barely there caresses up and down her side. “Is that what you were feeling when I poured drops of warm oil over your skin? Or when I licked each drop off you? Were you scared when I sat you on top of the dresser and drove into you like I’d never get enough?”
Her mouth went dry at the memories, her lips so hot and parched she had no choice but to bathe them with a swipe of her tongue.
A swipe Alec followed with his gaze. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
The warm red light from the Exit sign imbued his skin with a demonic glow, his probing questions confusing her when all she wanted was to lose herself in him, under him.
She couldn’t let him make this too complicated when her thoughts were being pulled in ten directions, her energies devoted to her quest for justice and her heart still grappling with the old hurts from Gena’s accident that they’d unwittingly brought to the surface today.
What had happened to her escape from reality?
“You know, maybe you’ve had a lot of time and experience to devote to figuring out exactly what kind of sex you like best.” Moving slowly, carefully, she found the first button on his shirt and slid the smooth, round disk through the hole. Followed by another. “But before last night, it had been a really, really long time for me.”
When he didn’t say anything, didn’t move, she decided to clarify. Press her case.
“Years. Several years.” Not to put too fine a point on it. But damn. She wouldn’t let him think she was Ms. Recreational, either. Undeterred, she kept up her slow conquest of his buttons. “Now that I find myself in a position to engage in sex that I really want, I’ll be damned if you’re going to go and make it too complicated for me.”
“Years?”
She finished the last of the buttons, exposing the smooth, taut skin of his chest and the hint of rock-hard abs any woman would love to get her hands on.
And speaking of rock-hard…
“You know, I’m reconsidering the merits of a good, old-fashioned quickie—”
His mouth found hers with sudden swiftness, erasing any doubts she might have had about how much he wanted her. She’d figure out how to handle his request for more of her later, when she wasn’t in the throes of urgent need.
His kiss came with just the right pressure, his lips demanding her response. The sound of their breathing mingled in her ears with the hum of the plane’s engines, the dull roar plunging them deeper into their own world, cocooning them in white noise. The sounds even drowned out her thoughts, releasing her from the last of her fears about joining with Alec.
She wanted this—wanted him—with a frenzy she couldn’t deny and a hunger that had only multiplied since the night before. Having experienced a taste of him once, she’d somehow gotten hooked.
He pulled back from her as if he’d run out of breath, as if he needed to break the live-wire connection they seemed to share. “You think I’m even capable of a quickie with you?”
Assuming it to be a rhetorical question since the bulge in his pants made him look pretty damn capable in her eyes, Vanessa kept her mouth shut. Shaking his head, he flicked the jacket off her shoulders, skewing the fabric of her T-shirt to one side to expose her bra strap.
“I want to feast on you like there’s no tomorrow.” He nipped at her bare shoulder, teeth grazing her skin and raising goose bumps.
Shivers licked over her at the idea of Alec tasting her deeply. Repeatedly.
No doubt, she’d arrive in the Hamptons still feverish and quaking with the tremors of her orgasms. Probably not practical, even if it sounded…incredible.
“Maybe I’d better take charge then.” Shoving to her knees, she straddled his lap. She yanked his shirt off his shoulders, leaving his arms caught up in the crisp cotton. “And don’t worry, I won’t ever tell anyone that you engaged in something so sordid as recreational sex. It’ll be our little secret.”
He watched her with moody eyes, his gaze fastened to her face even when she whipped the T-shirt over her head. But when she slid off her bra, she could see him shift ever so slightly in his seat.
“Don’t blink now, Alec.” Kneeling over him, she bent to whisper against his ear, making sure the soft curve of her breast grazed his bristly cheek as she shifted positions. “I wouldn’t want you to miss anything.”
He lifted his chin then, perhaps to look up at her, or maybe just to drag the rough edge of his jaw over the achingly tender softness of her breast. Her nipple puckered even tighter. Warmth pooled between her thighs, her body ready for him long before he’d taken off her clothes. Just like the night before.
Only this time, instead of him taking his time to peel her out of her clothes, here she was stripping things off for him, offering herself up for sexual conquest.
“Pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?” Alec’s voice held a dangerous edge, a warning note she didn’t have any intention of heeding.
His tongue darted across the taut nipple, the action sending an answering contraction between her legs, the pleasure intense enough to almost be painful.
She couldn’t imagine what might happen if he licked her now. There.
In a flash, he freed himself from the shirt around his elbows, shaking the cotton loose onto the floor as he stretched up to steady her.
“I’m sure I want this.” It was the only thing that seemed certain in her life. Whatever Alec could give her here, now, she would be signing on.
His arm banded around her back, her hips. He didn’t pull her down to his lap, but drew her hips into his chest so that her sex butted up against the center of his ribs. The heat of him penetrated her jeans, reminding her how hot this ride would be, how much she needed just to let go and enjoy.
Maybe with a little incentive, Alec would see how much fun recreational sex could be.