Page 69 of Dream Girl Drama

He nodded. “Would you like me to take the cart to your room?”

“Oh no, I always wheel my own luggage.” She took a twenty-dollar bill out of her wallet and pushed it into his hands. “It’s a habit of mine. I’ll take it myself.”

“Okay...” he said, nonplussed. “The elevators are to the right of reception.”

“Thank you.”

Chloe wheeled the luggage cart containing one, little suitcase—and a mysterious lump—through the upscale lobby, smiling at everyone she passed in the hopes of either distracting them from the twitching animal beneath her coat... or convincing them to keep their mouths shut. Luckily, she sailed into an empty elevator and tapped the button for floor eleven without incident, melting back against the wall once the doors were closed.

Two minutes later, she was standing in front of room 1125.

She knocked, her adrenaline spiking when she heard the footsteps approaching, her heart booming like cannon fire in her chest. Palms sweating. And then, there he was. Sig.

Gorgeous and stressed out. In dress clothes—a glorious rarity.

His hair was wrecked from his fingers, hands gripping the doorframe like he might rip it off at any given moment. Eyesstarvedas they roamed over her body. Her face.

Down to the lump on the luggage cart.

“That’s the dog, isn’t it?”

“I improvised.”

His mouth ticked up into a roguish half smile, his hand dropping from the doorframe. He didn’t take his eyes off Chloe as he wheeled the cart into the room and uncovered the dog with a flourish, shaking his head when he revealed the dog was fast asleep. “Kind of fitting, isn’t it?” Sig said, pacing back toward Chloe slowly, taking her wrist and drawing her into a big, beautiful, half-lit suite. Firmly pushing her up against the wall and sandwiching her there. Hard. Taking her face in his hands and tilting it up. “The night we met, you snuck me into the country club.” He settled his mouth on top of hers, inhaling deeply, both of them exhaling in an identical, savoring way. Savoring each other. The fact that they were together. Alone. No rules. Their problems were equally present and far away, but they tacitly agreed to ignore them. Ignore everything but each other for now. Just for now, while it was dark and no one knew where they were. “Now here you are, sneaking a dog into a hotel the night I make you mine. I’m detecting a pattern.”

Chloe gave a slight headshake. “I’ve been yours for a long time.”

“It’ll never be long enough.” He dragged his lips side to side against hers. “Ten thousand years wouldn’t be enough.” He searched her eyes. “Are you okay?”

In her haste to reach him, she’d managed somewhat to put the article out of her mind, but the worry in his expression brought it all back, reminding her they were under scrutiny now. “Yes.” She wet her lips. “How did you find out about the article?”

“At the meeting tonight. There’s a new general manager. She—”

“She?” Chloe’s lips twitched. “Cool.”

“Yeah.”

When he didn’t continue, she reached up to stroke the sides of his face, her chest nearly bursting when he turned into her palm, rubbing his cheek there. “What happened?”

He closed his eyes. Shook his head. Pressed closer to her, as if pinning her in place would keep her from disappearing. Stop what was happening to them.

“Sig,” she prompted again, dread prodding her in the side.

“They won’t offer me a contract because of this. Because of us. How it would look to the public. How it would reflect on the team. They want me to stay away from you, but I can’t fucking do it. I won’t.” He opened his mouth against her neck, kissing her pulse, dragging his lips higher to her ear. “Sweden is sounding pretty good about now.”

Devastation peeled like a bell inside of Chloe. Denial. “Sig. I... I’m so sorry. I can’t believe this is happening.” She gatheredall her strength and pushed against his chest. “You want that contract, that captain spot more than anything.”

“Wrong.I want you more.”

“If getting it means staying away from me, that’s what you have to do.”

“Absolutely not,” he growled.

“Sig.”

“What was it you said about wanting to feel a man’s weight on top of you?” He dragged her into a kiss. A hot, thorough one, his tongue licking in and killing every single protest in its infancy, his hands on her bare legs now, yanking up the hem of her skirt while he worked her mouth in the perfect distraction. Those big, calloused hands slid up the backs of her thighs to clutch her backside roughly, kneading her cheeks in his hands and lifting her up, moaning into her mouth. “Get those pretty thighs around me. You’re about to feel my weight.”

Chloe’s legs moved on command, circling his hips, gasping at the outline of his erection against the mound of her sex. “We’re going to talk about... all of this... later,” she managed.

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