“Jade.” Of course her name was Jade. I wondered what her real name was as she started to gyrate over me.
I’d be lying if I said the lap dance didn’t turn me on, but I was also super relieved when it ended. I’m sure I was the worst customer ever, sitting stock still with a deer-in-the-headlights expression as the shirt came off and her breasts rubbed against my face. I didn’t know if I was allowed to touch. Did I want to touch? I could feel her wetness on my leg through her thin panties. All sorts of thoughts battled and conflicted in my head. I liked it—did that mean I was a lesbian? No, surely being turned on by something in such a sexy environment was totally normal. Also, I had to wonder if Jade was here because she wanted to be, or was this her last stop before the poor house? Was there a little Jade at home who needed to eat? I hadn’t seen any stretch marks.
I was very, very aware that I was thinking way too much. I wished I was the kind of girl who could simply relax and get down with it. Counterpoint: if we’d done this last night with the amount I drank, I’d totally have been down. Last night, apparently, I was down for anything.
“Let’s get out of here,” Scott said.
“You’re not going to get one?”
“Nah. You look a little over-stimulated.” His voice was teasing, but he was right.
If only I was the kind of girl who could make friends with Jade, get her to open up, and maybe have her show me a few moves. Nope. I sat with the least sexy expression of stupefied wonder on my face.
Against my better judgement, I didn’t want to say goodnight to Scott. I was tired, though, and the thought of drinking anything else made me want to ralph. Again. “Where are we going?”
His genuine smile touched me more than I expected it to. I’d made him happy. “I don’t know about you, but I’m in the mood for someplace quiet. I can’t handle too much more of the crowds and the loud.”
“You read my mind.” Now I was smiling, too.
“Do you want to come back to my suite?”
Scott
Mackenzie hesitated. I’d blown it by asking her back to the room. I wanted her badly, which was a new sensation for me. Usually when I say jump, women bat their eyelashes, ask how high, and tell me how handsome and funny I am on the way up. Mackenzie wasn’t like that, which intoxicated me. Plus, watching her under Jade’s lap dance drove me wild. I debated ducking into the bathroom to relieve pressure, but it seemed crass. I had to suck it up and enjoy the blueness of my balls.
I consoled myself: The evening had gone far better than I thought it might, though neither one of us had acknowledged, out loud, that we were legally married. The gentlemanly thing to do would be to walk her back to Linq, tell her goodnight, and plan to meet her Monday to get the marriage annulled.
She took a deep breath, and I steeled myself for reality to come crashing back down. “Sure, I’ll come up for a bit.”
Whoa. I hadn’t expected that at all. I played it cool. “Great. Let’s bounce.”
“Don’t you have to settle up?”
“It’s all taken care of.” I was a VIP at the Pearl and hadn’t done anything tonight above and beyond my membership.
“Must be nice,” she murmured.
“What must be?”
“To never have to think about money.”
“It is.” I couldn’t lie. I dimly remembered my parents fighting about finances when I was a kid. Then dad struck gold—metaphorical gold, in the dot-com bubble—and sold at the right time. Our path was set from then on. “I mean, let me give you some context. I’m always thinking about money. I’m just not worried about running out of it. But it’s always on my mind. How to breed it, grow it, keep it.” And how to keep most of our fortune away from my sister, Serena.
We headed to the lobby and out past Ambrosia. She blew us a kiss, and I waved goodbye. The Pearl was her establishment, and she did her damnedest to make it a respectable place. A fine upstanding businesswoman, that one.
The little alley was dark and quiet, and I wondered what would happen if I tried to kiss Mackenzie here. She leaned against me as we walked, which seemed like a good sign. I didn’t want to do it out on the strip, in the sea of tourists. I didn’t worry that we’d be seen, fret about PDA, anything like that. I just wanted the kiss to be more special than that. Something between us. Then I’d get the ball rolling on the annulment. Once I got back in New York, I’d look up Giuliana.
I stopped her as we walked. She put her hands out dramatically, as though she were trying to keep her balance. She was funny.
“I would really like to kiss you right now,” I told her quietly.
The corners of her mouth turned up in a smile, and her cheeks flushed pink. She looked away, and without thinking, wet her hips with her tongue, which did not lessen my desire.
“Okay.”
I leaned in. We had kissed last night—probably at a church in front of a… minister? Justice of the peace? Who knew? We’d done a whole lot more than kiss, but I couldn’t remember any of it. So kissing Mackenzie Taylor in the alley outside the Pearl was essentially our first kiss.
She was stiff and nervous at first. Our lips met, and hers stayed closed. She kissed back, but I could tell she wasn’t into it. I pulled away.
Annulment, ho!
She reached out, caught the collar of my shirt, and pulled me back to her. Our lips met again, and I could feel warmth radiating from her. Her mouth stayed closed, but the kiss was like kindling with tiny flames of passion hungrily lapping at it. We broke apart, headed to the strip and back to the Bellagio. The fountain show was just starting as we arrived, so we lingered to watch the music, the lights, and the water.
“I can’t get enough of these fountains,” she confessed. “I feel like I could watch them forever.” She stood in front of me and leaned back against me. I wrapped my arms around her shoulders. I could feel the swell of her breasts and hoped I didn’t get a hard-on against her back. It wouldn’t fit my dignified image at all.
Before the show ended, she took my hand and led me up the winding path towards the doors of the hotel. We cut through the swath of people. All kinds of people. Folks in my tax bracket stood shoulder to shoulder with people who probably couldn’t afford to be here. The fountains were beautiful, though, and it didn’t matter who you were or what your background was, you couldn’t help getting lost in them.
Unless a beautiful woman in a bewitching yellow dress was pulling you towards a private, quiet room.
We didn’t talk much on the elevator ride up to the thirty-sixth floor. The elevator opened directly into the room. I hadn’t closed the curtains, and the lights from the strip lit it in a flashing melody of bright colors. Pinks from the Flamingo, blues and purples from Bally’s, dignified golds from Paris.
I kissed her again. Her hands found the back of my neck, and I ran my hands across her back, feeling the warmth of her skin through the thin material of the dress. I wanted it off and crumpled on my floor. But I wasn’t going to push.
She parted her lips for me, and I almost died tasting her. She tasted like Corona and strawberry lip gloss with a little hint of tequila. Gently I teased her with my tongue. She pressed her body against mine and lowered her hands to my back. She pulled my shirts out of the way and ran her fingers across my skin. Her touch was like an electric torch.