CHAPTER 22

Ford and I meander along the perimeter of the ballroom, looking at the items available for silent auction bids. The charity dinner is being held at the Luxor and is set to begin soon. But first, patrons are liquored up and then set loose on the tables, all to raise money for homeless veterans.

“Do you do this often?” I ask Ford as he strolls along with me. Each of us have a glass of champagne in hand, but that doesn’t stop him from putting his other hand on my bare lower back, which is super sensitive to his fingers.

“Charity events?” he asks to clarify and I nod as I look at a set of front-row tickets to Adele along with backstage passes. I don’t even bother to look at the bids, because I couldn’t even afford to touch it.

I’m surprised Ford does fancy events like this. Not that he’s not suave and sophisticated as well as rich, so he can afford to do these things. But the man I know is completely satisfied to stay tucked in his club, running his business and fucking until his heart is content, so it’s just a little odd. Not the charity itself. Given his military connections, I get why this would be important to him.

The next item we come to is a pair of boxing gloves that are old and worn. As I look closer, I note they’ve been signed by Muhammed Ali. I gasp as I lean forward to look at them, and then my eyes glance down to the paper where people can write their bids. There are several already, but the last one makes me swallow hard.

$9,500.

Holy shit.

“You a fan?” Ford asks, nodding at the photo of Ali hanging on the wall above the gloves.

“Of boxing,” I tell him with a smile. “I love it, and well… Ali was one of the greats.”

“I would have never pegged you as a fan of boxing,” Ford muses. “Hockey, maybe. Football, I can see. But not boxing.”

“Hello,” I reply tartly with a roll of my eyes. “This is Las Vegas. Boxing is huge here.”

“That it is,” he murmurs before taking a sip of his champagne.

“Not that I’ve ever been to a live event, but I’ll usually go to a sports bar and watch.” I turn to look back at the gloves, knowing they’ll fetch a very good price. “I hope more people bid on those gloves. Totally worth more than that.”

“I’m with you,” Ford says. “I paid almost twice as much for them at a non-charity auction.”

My head snaps around, the champagne sloshing in my glass. “You donated those?”

“Yup,” he says with a shrug. “I have all kinds of sports memorabilia, and this was definitely a worthy cause. I’m sure these gloves will go for a lot more. There are some serious spenders here tonight.”

He’s not kidding. The number of jewels being worn by the women is almost blinding, and some of the bids I’ve seen have been in the tens of thousands of dollars. It’s mind boggling to me.

Ford and I walk around a bit more, and he bids on a painting by a local artist I didn’t particularly care for, but that stuff is so subjective anyway. He also steps aside for a moment and talks privately with the man in charge of the auction, but I don’t suppose it was a necessary introduction to me. And then someone is at a microphone, asking everyone to take their seats at their assigned tables for the meal to be served.

We’re at a table with six other people who Ford knows. It hits me suddenly that he’s not just a hermit who hides in The Sinful Night Club, but a real businessman. He owns a prominent security-consulting company and is probably very involved with the community if he’s attending functions like this.

I sit quietly, feeling like Julia Roberts in Pretty Women as the men discuss business and politics and the women talk to each other and ignore me. I only hope to God they don’t bring escargot because I definitely cannot eat it, and I don’t feel like being embarrassed by flinging a shell across the room.

When the salad is served, however, the chatter across the table dies down and Ford turns slightly toward me as we eat. Leaning over, he whispers, “I hate all this polite chitchat.”

I have to swallow down a giggle before I whisper back to him. “Well, suck it up and eat your salad.”

Ford responds by putting his hand on my leg, giving it a squeeze, and then using his fingers to pull at the silk of my gown. He gets it to rise right to my knees and then his hand is snaking under. I slap a hand on his wrist, look around the table to see everyone engaged in food or personal talk, and then I make a decision.

Not to stop him but to pull his hand up higher. I do this while watching Ford’s nostrils flare and his eyes darken with arousal. But he does nothing more than squeeze the inside of my thigh before taking his hand away. I grin at him in satisfaction when he leans over once more to whisper, “Would you have really let me finger you under the table?”

“Yes,” I whisper back to him, my skin tingling with the prospect of what I almost let him do.

“Dirty girl,” he says with appreciation in his eyes. “But even I have my limits on what I’ll do in public. Besides, you’re too much of a screamer. We would have never gotten away with it.”

He’s so right. It would have been stupid, but I still cherish that feel of his hand on my leg knowing he was thinking of me in that way.

The salads are removed efficiently after we finish. Within moments, the main course is served—Kobe beef tenderloin and lobster tails—and private talk resumes around the table. Not sure this is really the norm, but Ford is not engaging anyone, content to talk to me as we eat.

“So… tomorrow is pancake day, huh?” he asks as he cuts into his steak.

I nod as I do the same. “I’m trying to establish routines… habits with Connie. Things she can count on. Sunday is always pancake day.”

“You think her mom is going to come back?” Ford asks, stilling his utensils to look at me.

I stop cutting my steak. “I know this sounds awful, but at this point… I hope not. She’s so inconsistent and unpredictable. I don’t think Connie can handle her coming back and going away again. My mom and I are giving her a stable home. With her illness and recovery, that’s the most important thing.”

“And pancakes,” Ford adds with a smile as he goes back to his meal.

“God, she loves pancakes,” I say with a laugh and slice off a small piece of steak. “She’d eat them every meal, every day.”

Ford nods, chewing on a piece of steak. I take the opportunity to do the same and almost moan in pleasure over how tender it is. I can’t afford steak at all, much less steak like this.

“What’s the one thing you would eat every day for every meal if you could?” Ford asks, and I’m not at all surprised by what seems like an inane question, but really… we ask each other this kind of stuff all the time.

“This steak,” I say as I cut into another piece. That gets me a grin from Ford. “But seriously… I think gummy bears. I’m addicted to them.”

Ford grimaces, and I may have ruined his delicious dinner. I eat another piece of steak and make a move on my lobster tail as I ask, “What about you? What would be your one thing?”

“Easy question,” he says with the same confidence and authority by which he commands me when we’re naked. “Red velvet cake.

It’s odd we’re eating the finest meal I’ve ever had and yet we’re talking about pancakes and red velvet cake, both of which are like little luxuries to me since I try to watch carbs and sweets. It’s why I make a stab at some asparagus and ignore the baked potato.

Our conversation continues, light and steady, not too personal but not inconsequential either like talking about the weather. As the meal winds down, an orchestra starts playing music. By the time the desserts are cleared—and okay, I tried some of the chocolate mousse—people were hitting the dance floor or roaming around the auction tables again.

Ford jumps in on a conversation beside him, but when they start talking about golf, I tune them out. Instead, I turn slightly in my chair and watch the dancers, marveling at the gorgeous designer gowns and jewelry of the other women. No doubt, I’m not wearing as much in jewels or clothing, but as I look around at the men in the room, there’s a little bit of pride within me knowing I’m here with the hottest man. I’ve seen several women appraising him openly, and I wonder if any of them have been with him at the club.

A warm hand squeezes my shoulder, and Ford leans toward me. “Want to dance?”

“You dance?” I ask with slight disbelief. I mean, this guy rescues kidnap victims and blows up shit. Oh, and he has kinky sex. I didn’t peg him as a ballroom dancer.

“I can get by,” he says with a smirk as he stands from his chair and holds his hand out to me.

When I take it, he pulls me up and immediately into him so our bodies are touching. “Well, I haven’t been to a formal dance since prom in high school, although I’m sure I could probably still pull off the Macarena.”

Ford laughs and leans down for a spontaneous and affectionate kiss that’s over before it begins, and then he’s tugging me toward the gleaming parquet floor. I hope I can manage to handle it in my high heels.

When he reaches the center, Ford pulls me into his arms with such smoothness it seems as if no effort was expended on his part. He leads and I follow. It turns out that I can apparently dance, even though I’ll give the credit to him.

“Enjoying yourself?” he asks as he looks down at me. It’s almost a magical moment as his hand splays across my lower back, his thumb rubbing my skin. His other hand clasps mine and he holds me intimately close. I feel like a princess.

“Very much,” I admit to him. “Thank you for bringing me.”

“Thank you for coming,” he says back politely, but his voice is a low rumble that sounds sexy as hell and makes me want to pull him into the bathroom and take advantage of him.

I try to make sure our relationship stays where he wants it to so I can’t get any expectations that would later be dashed, reminding myself I am his employee first and foremost. “It was a pleasurable part of my job to accompany you.”

Ford stares at me a moment, his expression flummoxed. But then he grumbles, “You and I both know damn well it’s not part of your job. It’s a fucking date.”

I’m completely shocked by his renunciation, which is hilarious. I laugh playfully as I look up at him. “Well, try not to sound so put out by it.”

He growls what might be a string of curses, but they’re cut off as his mouth connects with mine. It’s a hot kiss but not erotic. One of those where his open mouth moves slowly over mine, yet only our lips touch. It’s sweet and intimate and… caring?

When he pulls back, he looks a little off-kilter as if he can’t believe he just did that. I’ve always known Ford is the type of man who doesn’t commit for the long term, and he looks almost spooked right now.

I immediately start back up conversation. “Okay, don’t you think it’s about time given all the dirty, filthy things I’ve let you do to me that you tell me a little something about your background? Like what were you like growing up and did you have a dog? Oh, and how did you come to live in Las Vegas?”

I hold my breath, wondering if Ford will shut down on me. Instead, he gives me a smile that’s filled with fondness for his past. “You know I’m from New Jersey already and I don’t have a big family, but I was extremely close to my mom and dad. My dad was a carpenter and my mom ran a home business making and selling soaps.”

I smile because of the tone of affection in his voice for his parents.

“After I got out of the military and decided to start my own private contracting company, I looked at a lot of places to put down the company’s roots. I considered places like D.C. or New York City, but ultimately decided on Las Vegas because there’s a lot of private wealth here and need for security services. And for the government stuff, we don’t need to be in Washington to communicate with them. In fact, they come here to us if they have a mission they want us to bid on.”

“Do you miss New Jersey?” I ask him.

“Yeah… I miss the snow and how gorgeous it is in the fall. I go back once in a blue moon on vacation, but it’s hard to take time off. And with my parents gone, it’s not the same.”

“I bet,” I say softly as I slide my hand from his shoulder to his neck. I stroke my thumb there in commiseration.

“What about you?” he asks, and this surprises me. While I’m all kinds of nosy because I happen to just like Ford on a personal basis, I always sort of felt he didn’t need to know anything about me. “You’ve told me about Connie, and your mom seems nice, but what was it like growing up here?”

“Well, Las Vegas is my hometown, although the Las Vegas I live in isn’t the glitzy strip. I don’t go there very often.”

“What about your dad?” Ford prods.

I give a little shrug as I turn my gaze over Ford’s shoulder. It’s a bit of a sore subject. “He took off when I was about two and never came back. Left my mom for another woman.”

“Jaden’s mom?” Ford asks so I have to look back to him. His eyebrows are furrowed in confusion.

I give a sardonic smile, because it is a bit confusing. “My mom was married first to a man named Laurence. They had Daena, but he split before she turned one. Mom then met and married Jaden’s dad, Jackson, within like six months after her divorce. He had Jaden already. Jaden was about three years old when Jackson married my mom. Jaden’s mom was apparently on drugs and unstable. They had me three years later.”

“So you and Jaden share the same father, but you and Daena share the same mother?” he states for clarification.

“I have this whole chart with a colored graph I can show you,” I quip, loving the way his eyes drop to my mouth as my lips purse up. “Even I get confused sometime.”

“I expect you and Jaden aren’t very close then,” Ford murmurs. “I mean… he was only around you a few years. He would have been around five when your dad left, right?”

When I shake my head, the cute smile slides from my face and Ford notices. “When I say my dad left, I mean he left. Left Jaden behind too. He stayed with my mom because he didn’t want to go back to his mom, and besides that, she couldn’t be found. My mom raised him with Daena and me, and I can tell you it was no picnic trying to house, feed, and clothe three children on what she made as a waitress.”

Ford’s eyes furrow again in confusion, but unless I’m crazy, I see a bit of hardness there too. Perhaps he finds it as distasteful as I do that a man leaves his children and never looks back.

But then his gaze softens, and he pulls me in close. He drops my hand, his arms going around my waist. Mine go up to loop around his shoulders. We sort of sway back and forth with our bodies pressed tight. Ford’s green eyes focus on mine with an unusual warmth. Tilting his head down until his face is close to mine, he asks, “So how did a girl such as yourself wind up working in The Sinful Night Club, letting me fuck you in front of others, and learning how to be sexually uninhibited like I bet you never thought you could ever be?”

His words slither through me, leaving tingles in their wake. If Ford wanted to drop me to the floor right now and take me, I’d let him. But the man asked a legitimate question that needs answered.

“She ended up at The Sinful Night Club because she needed help and didn’t have a choice,” I murmur as I thread my fingers through the back of his hair. His eyes flutter closed briefly and his head pushes against my hands like a cat demanding more. “But she ended up underneath you learning all kinds of sinful things because she wanted to. It’s as simple as that.”

Ford’s eyes open. They’re dark and glittery at the same time.

His lips curve up and just before he kisses me, he says, “Good answer, Thalia. Very good answer.”