Black Diaries

39. Surprise, Surprise

I got the camera. How could the paparazzo help handing it to me after I asked so nicely? A little charm can really do wonders sometimes. And I can only assume that news of me and my steel-edged charm spread among the journalistic community of New York, because the paparazzi suddenly seemed to lose interest in chasing E.W. Winslow's mysterious new girlfriend.

E.W. Winslow himself, though, certainly did not lose interest. Not at all.

"Cassidy!" Without even waiting for the rotor blades to stop, Elliot leaped from the helicopter and strode towards me where I stood leaning against the wall, waiting, a ridiculously happy grin on my face. He was back!

"And?" I asked. "How was your day with Zack and the metal monsters? Missed me?"

He simply grabbed me by the shoulders, pulled me close, and planted a kiss on me that forced all the breath out of my body and nearly made me faint. It went on, and on, and on, as if he didn't so much want to kiss me as devour me.

"Cassidy!" he groaned against my mouth, and deepened the kiss even further, plumbing the darkest depths of my mouth, filling me with exquisite pleasure. Finally, he took a deep breath, and ripped himself away from me. Still he was staring into my eyes as if I were the only woman in the world for him. No... not as if. It was clear there, in his eyes: I was the only woman in the world for him.

My lips parted in another grin. "I'll take that as a yes."

His midnight-blue eyes sparkled with wicked thoughts. "Come. I've spent the last twelve hours in a garage and out on a filthy race course and need to wash. You can help me."

"Oh, I can, can I?"

"You not just can—you will!"

"Really?" One of my eyebrows went up. "And what if I don't feel like playing your bathroom assistmpf—"

My words were cut off by his lips covering mine again. I realized that he was right—he smelled deliciously raw of sweat and dirt and something else I couldn't identify. His normally faint masculine smell seemed to be doubled or tripled, and I felt my mouth go dry with desire.

"I'm only going to tell you one more time," he whispered. "Come to the bathroom with me—now!"

"Yes," I breathed, and before I could blink he had picked me up and carried me through the door, from the roof into the penthouse.

"Careful," I growled, nipping at his ear. "You'll get me dirty!"

"I want to get you dirty. I want to get us both dirty all over and then we'll wash it off together, feeling every inch of each other as layer after layer peels off and we're laid bare!"

Holy...! His words alone made me want to tear his clothes off! So, not being a restrained kind of girl, I gripped the collar of his shirt and tugged. Before my hands could tear his shirt open down the front, though, his hands were there, caging me.

"No," he whispered into my ear.

"Yes!" I hissed back.

"No," he insisted. "Remember—all good things take time."

"That's a matter of opinionmff..."

His lips covered mine once more, and my hands, along with my whole body, slackened, melting into him. When he took his lips away and his spell lifted off me, we were already in the giant marble bathroom. He sat me down on the edge of the tub. Holding me against his chest with one arm, he reached out with the other to turn on the faucet. A steaming jet of hot water shot into the luxurious tub, spreading in waves over the gently curving bottom.