have a nice dinner as well. I hope you don’t consider it rude of me to evict you like this.” She shrugged and gave a roguish smile. “Valentine’s Day, you know.”
Teddy didn’t want to be in the room when they attempted to eat. Relieved, he nodded. “Of course. Thank you for the opportunity.”
Romeo mumbled his thanks too.
“I’ll contact you tomorrow,” Joyce said, reaching for the pasta bowl. “Your flight leaves around noon, I believe. We’ll talk before then.”
Assuming the dinner didn’t kill her, and her companions.
The waiting Lincoln Town Car was very nice—certainly tons better than Teddy’s scooter—but a bit of a letdown after the Rolls. “Where to?” asked the driver, a thin older woman with smile crinkles at the corners of her eyes.
Teddy turned to Romeo. “What are you in the mood for?”
Romeo’s answering look was so scorching that Teddy gasped. He gave the driver the address of their hotel.
Chapter Seventeen
They didn’t exactly sprint to the hotel elevator, because that would be undignified. It was more like—Okay. They ran. And Romeo pushed the button approximately a hundred times, yet still it took the elevator forever to reach the lobby and slowly open its doors. They jostled inside.
“If you push all the floors this time I’m going to die,” Romeo announced. He looked serious.
Teddy had no intention of pushing all the buttons. In fact, if elevators came with warp-speed buttons, he would have engaged one. He didn’t manhandle Romeo during the ride up, but only because he knew there must be a security camera and he didn’t want to give any voyeurs their nightly thrill.
On their own floor at last, they burst out of the elevator and raced down the corridor, which had lengthened by at least five miles. Once they were at the door of their room, the damned thing wouldn’t open no matter how many times Romeo swiped the card, and now it was Teddy’s turn to die, and—Oh.
“You’re trying to open the door with Joyce’s debit card.”
Romeo stared at the plastic in his hand as if he’d never seen it before, so Teddy gently pushed him out of the way and swiped his own key card. It worked on the first try.
Good God, they were finally inside.
Coats and shoes still on, they crashed their bodies together and, lips locked, stumbled awkwardly to the bed. Their bed, in which Romeo was no longer a disliked near stranger or an off-limits object of desire, but rather a warm and willing and wonderful man.
With far too many clothes on.
“Forget Spandex,” Teddy grumbled as he struggled with the buttons on Romeo’s coat. “I should have dressed you in nothing but a toga. One good tug and boom! Naked.”
Romeo was working on Teddy’s coat too. “Kinda cold for that.”
“It’s practically tropical compared to back home.”
At last their coats and Romeo’s scarf were off, thrown to the floor and soon followed by Teddy’s vest and Romeo’s sweater and undershirt. Teddy unbuttoned just enough of his shirt to tug it off over his head and toss it aside.
Then they paused. They’d seen each other shirtless already; in fact, they’d seen each other pantsless too. But that had been different, because back then they were just looking. Now they could touch. And, Teddy realized with a shiver, taste.
He pushed Romeo back onto the mattress, straddled him, and began to nibble and lick. He started with Romeo’s ears and the tender stretch of his neck, worked his way to the collarbones, and settled in on his nipples. Pebbled and salty, they felt pleasant against his teasing tongue, and Romeo arched underneath him with satisfying moans.
“You’re good at this,” Romeo said, voice already roughened.
“I was afraid I was out of practice.”
“Hang on.”
For a terrible moment, Teddy thought he’d done something wrong. But no, Romeo was smiling up at him, pupils wide with desire. “It’s been a while for you, huh?”
Teddy, who wasn’t even sure how long it had been—many months at least—nodded.
“Yeah, me too,” Romeo said. “So let’s slow this down, okay?”
Right. Because it might very well be their only time. But that didn’t bear thinking of, so Teddy nodded again. “I can try.”
“Lemme see you strip.”
If Teddy had been standing, his knees might have buckled at the gentle command. It was sexy. And playful. And flattering—that a man as beautiful as Romeo wanted boring ol’ Teddy to put on a show. And it was only four and a half little words but they made Teddy’s pulse race.
He had to take off his boots first, and