Page 17 of Dublin's Danger Dancer

His arms encircle me and within a flash I’m sitting on his lap, straddling him, my damp clothes against his skin. His hands forage in my hair and the backs of my ears. Hungrily, he pulls me into him, kissing me deeper.

Shame rings through my body. I hear my mind demand me to focus. Focus on bringing a guy I’d chased only an hour earlier after he shimmied down a drain pipe away from the site intelligence told us was used to divvy up trafficked women.

He pulls back. He cups my face in his hands, trailing his index finger along my bottom lip.

“You don’t know how many times I thought about this and it’s even better than I imagined,” he says, with a seriousness I haven’t seen in his eyes before.

“Why don’t we go to your room?” I say.

He doesn’t need to be asked twice. He pushes his arms underneath me and scoops me up.

He carries me towards his bedroom. Another patent immaculate white door with a silver knob. He turns the handle, revealing a huge king-size bed covered in a simple white duvet and white pillows fluffed up, no doubt by the maid. He lays me down and I feel the thickness of him against my thigh.

“You look so beautiful on my bed,” he says, brushing hair away from my forehead, “but I know where you’d look even more beautiful.” I didn’t need him to finish that sentence.

It was as if I had taken drugs, being here with him. Making poor decision after poor decision so desperate for a breakthrough my sister’s case, I’d lower myself to this. Stripper is one thing. Allowing a man like this to penetrate me is something completely different.

“I want to finish my whiskey,” I say.

“Now?” he asks, his eyebrows knitting together.

“Now. And then I need to use the restroom.”

He rises from the bed to get the glasses. I stop him placing my hand over his wrist.

“Can you fill mine up?” I ask, raising my lashes slowly. “It’s been a while.”

He turns his whole body to me and looks down at me. He brushes his finger up my neck and along my jawline. “Don’t worry,” he says, “your pleasure is my only concern, whatever that looks like for you.”

He returns, but only with one glass.

I take a gulp.

“I need to get something from my bag.”

“You can use the restroom at the front. Next to the door where we entered,” he says, stroking my fingers as I pull away from him.

I lock the door behind me. I push my palms into the marble top looking into the pure white sink, searching for answers. Vomit rises in the back of my throat. I hadn’t thought this through.

I look up at the spotlights on the bathroom ceiling.

I had to do this. I take the tranquilliser in my hand. I pull the capsule apart so I had the tranquilliser ready to shake into his drink.

I flush the toilet, wash my hands and leave the restroom. I pour him another whiskey from the decanter and add the tranquilliser, swirling viciously until the white powder dissolves. I dust my hand off on the side of my leggings and tread back to the room, holding the whiskey glass.

“I thought we should make a toast,” I say. Liam rises from the bed and takes the whiskey glass.

“To what?” He asks, looming over me.

“Orgasms.” I say, lifting my own glass and clinking it against his.

A wide smile spreads across his face. “Orgasms,’’ he says, raising his glass.

“Sláinte.”

“Sláinte,” I repeat.

We both throw back the whiskey. The heat of it courses down my throat as I remind myself of the sedation time.

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