The hallway ended, curving to the right. There were muffled voices. A louder one—Victoria’s. Behind us stretched the long, lonely hallway and a sea of closed doors.
In front of us: Victoria and Sven.
We were totally exposed if she came around that corner.
“And what’s the delay?” Victoria’s tone was abrupt. There was an answering silence, like she was on the phone.
“Unacceptable. I’ll do nothing of the sort. I have 300 people coming tomorrow and I would never cancel. We’ll move it after the party.”
“Ma’am.” That was Sven. Delilah and I were squashed together, pushed to the wall. “You have to be reasonable.”
I heard Delilah whisper, “You’re about to die, buddy.”
Whatever Victoria said next was unintelligible, but her harsh tone was clear. A cell phone went off, and I thought my heart was going to explode.
“Take that call,” she snapped. “I need to get back to my guests. I’ve been gone too long.”
Footsteps. Fucking footsteps terrifyingly close to where we were standing. Coming closer and closer. As I stood frozen, Delilah was reaching for the closest doorknob. She turned it. It opened.
And she yanked me inside.
26
Delilah
My first recognizable thought was: total darkness.
A second earlier I’d twisted the closest doorknob and prayed like hell it was open. It’d been a long time since I’d chased a suspect down a shadowy hallway without a second thought. And those times I’d had handcuffs and a warrant. I didn’t even have a weapon on me tonight—Abe had been nervous about museum metal detectors going off.
And now my palms were on the closet door—my back to Henry’s chest—his hands boxing me in. The only sounds were our labored, panicked breathing. I found the doorknob, engaged the lock.
My ear went to the wood. I heard footsteps, striding away.
“I think she’s gone,” I whispered.
When I turned my head, our mouths almost connected.
Henry’s words came back to me: You’re the most beautiful woman in this room, Delilah.
“Of course she’s fucking concerned. She expected a job to get done.” Sven’s voice barked right outside our door.
Henry wrapped one arm around my waist.
“Not tomorrow,” Sven growled.
Henry and I were breathing in perfect sync.
There was a horrible, piercing crack against our door. My head snapped back.
“I’ve got you,” Henry whispered.
“What did I just say?” Sven’s voice was dangerously low. “And I’m not afraid of her.”
A bizarre laugh threatened to force its way from my chest.
And then I heard the most wondrous sound in the world: Sven also walking away.
Henry and I collapsed against the door in relief.
But his arms stayed wrapped around me. And pressed to my ass was a cock as hard as steel.
“I think the coast is clear,” I managed to whisper. “We should probably go now.”
“We should.” The reluctance in my partner’s voice was its own aphrodisiac. Henry reached in front of me, covering my hand with his on the doorknob. “We should definitely go.”
Whatever space I’d landed us in was pitch fucking black and soundless, set adrift from our brightly colored reality.
“Unless,” I said, voice trembling, “we’re the kind of fake married couple who sneaks away to fuck in a closet at a gala.”
He didn’t say a word. But a hoarse growl came from his throat as he shifted his hips against me.
And the slight brush of friction was enough to make us both gasp.
But I turned the doorknob, even as my baser instincts screamed for me to stay. Cracked the door open an inch.
“Why the hell would they be back here? There’s nothing except conference rooms and utility closets. Tell Jim he’s a fucking idiot. They’re still in the audience.”
“Shit,” I hissed, clicking the door shut as quietly as I could at the last second. I spun around and Henry landed hard against me, flattening my back to the door. “It’s the guards from the front.”
“And all I know is if Karen fucking finds out, we’re all fucking fired. So open all these doors and search each room, assholes.”
Sounds of collective grumbling floated past the door. But no one pulled it open.
Yet.
Henry and I were face-to-face in the dark, every inch of our bodies together, like our slow dance. The difference being that no one could see us here—we were cloaked in a kind of fog, far from the viewing eyes of Victoria and the guests.
Far from the viewing eyes of Freya and Abe.
We were trapped in a place beyond space or time, beyond consequences or responsibilities. A secret place of bodies and limbs, hushed breath and lips.
“If they find us,” I whispered, “we can still tell them we’d snuck away to have newlywed sex.”
I could just make out the edges of Henry’s shy smile.
“What’s newlywed sex?”
His palm was suddenly on the back of my calf—I could feel the heat of it even through the gauzy layers.
“We recently eloped, right?” I said, breathless. “Newlyweds can’t keep their hands off each other. At least that’s what I’ve heard.”
His hand danced up the back of my knee now, my thigh—there was the whisper of shifting fabric. He hooked my right leg high around his waist, the silk layers sliding away to reveal my bare skin. The tips of his fingers almost reached the swell of my ass.
And the flimsiest scrap of material separated my pussy from the hard ridge of his cock.
Henry’s index finger traced a path from my collarbone, to my throat, to my chin. Tilted my face all the way up. “We should get our stories straight, wife. In case we have to make this look real.” His hips flexed—a purposeful movement—and my clit was treated to a sweet, grinding pressure. My mouth popped open. “Don’t you think?”
Outside the door, far to the left, came the sound of doors opening, slamming; a repetitive “not here” as they searched the unauthorized area we’d snuck into.
“It’s not nice to seduce your fake wife at a gala,” I whispered.
Henry grasped my wrists, pinned them above my head with one hand. “Who said your fake husband was nice?”
I liked this fantasy—too fucking much. My internal walls wouldn’t stop clenching, begging to be filled. He rolled his hips, ghosting his lips along my hairline, at the base of my neck.
“I think…” I said, mind clouded, “if we get caught, we could say…” His mouth found the curve of my throat. He kissed me there, dragging his lips slowly, fucking slowly, until they reached my jaw. “We do this kind of thing all the time.”
“I fuck you in public?”
Our bodies were writhing together in silent, erotic motion against the door. The sounds of the guards growing closer were practically nonexistent. What was real were the sensations already building low in my belly—the consequence of Henry’s skilled movements. Every grind was a delicious burn right where I needed it. It’d been so fucking long since a man had known how to touch me. But here I was, legs spread against a door as Henry worked my body into a quiet frenzy.