Page 2 of After-Party Consequences

The man nodded and rushed back into the venue as Cade dropped his cargo onto her feet.

‘Don’t you think you’re being a bit of a spoil-sport, Sir Galahad?’ she said breathlessly, the playful glint in her translucent green eyes—the emerald hue reminding him of the Hand Grenade cocktails he’d once served by the dozen on Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras—telling him she didn’t have one single clue how close she was to getting a damn spanking.

He’d worked eighteen-hour days, seven days a week, for over a decade to stop people judging him for a past he couldn’t change, and she’d nearly trashed it all in a single night with her antics.

He stabbed the elevator call button. ‘Ya think?’ he growled.

‘Yes, I do think,’ she remarked in that crisp accent, which had a smoky purr which only added to his irritation. ‘You seem quite uptight.’

She brushed the short cap of honey-brown curls back from her face, and he noticed the smudge of glittery cosmetics that made her huge doe eyes look even bigger.

His gaze drifted down her figure. Her legs looked about a mile long thanks to the place mat–sized sparkly red dress and ankle-breaking heels. With the height boost from her footwear, her face was almost level with his, which, given that he was six-three, was a rarity. But despite her height, her body reminded him of a gazelle, slender and toned but also fragile. That she didn’t have a bra on was something his body noted. And then discarded. His gaze snapped back to her face.

‘Fair warning, kid,’ he snarled. ‘Next time you decide to shake your booty on a table, don’t do it in my place.’

The flushed excitement on her face disappeared as her lips flattened, and her breasts rose and fell in a huff of outrage. Her stunning eyes narrowed, as if the Hand Grenade was about to detonate....

So little Miss Court Trouble wasn’t used to being told no.

Tough.

Cade Landry had no problem calling out reckless behaviour.

Surface beauty was just that, shallow and unearned. What mattered was a person’s core. And from the things he’d seen so far, Charlotte Courtney was just like every other entitled rich kid who thought they were a grown-up but had no idea how to act like one.

Charley glared at the man sucking all the available oxygen out of the lobby area with his tall, dark, impossibly annoying handsomeness.

How typical... Charley Courtney’s hunk in shining armour turns out to have a judgemental streak as broad as his mile-wide shoulders.

‘I see, and how do you plan to stop me,exactly?’ she demanded, calling him on his self-righteousness.

She knew about Southern men and their manners. She’d met a few after she’d been headhunted by a modelling agency at age sixteen—and ended up in the US working the catwalk while being hit on by a load of much older guys. Of course, Cade Landry hadn’t actually hit on her. If anything, he had seemed surprisingly undazzled... But give him time.

‘How about we kick off with having you arrested for underage drinking,’ he replied, folding muscular forearms over his chest and making the seams of his tuxedo bulge...distractingly.

‘How do you know I’m underage?’ she demanded, determined to hold her own.

His gaze swept to her bottom with enough indifference to make all her nerve endings stand on edge. ‘Don’t make me laugh, kid.’

The way he said ‘kid’ in his Southern-fried accent couldn’t have sounded more condescending if he’d tried.The judgemental approach was new, she’d give him that, and somewhat unexpected. Men rarely tried to correct her behaviour these days... But even so...

‘I’m not a kid,’ she sputtered. ‘I’m eighteen.’ In fact, she’d turned eighteen that morning.

She’d only come out tonight with the guys from the photoshoot in Caesars Palace to escape the direct hit of her father’s latest passive-aggressive text—one line informing her he would have no time to see her when she returned to London after her latest assignment. He hadn’t mentioned her birthday. But then, it wouldn’t be the first time he’d forgotten.

Maybe her celebration had got a little out of hand, but no one else had tried to stop her. How typical that this man had appeared from the crowd like an avenging angel only to turn out to be a pompous ass...

Why Mr High and Mighty and his bulging biceps were having an unfortunate effect on her libido, though, she had no idea.

She hated to have her behaviour examined and found wanting by people who knew not one single thing about her life. Plus she didn’t evenlikesex, because she had discovered—when she’d lost her virginity to a photographer after her first catwalk show in New York—it was totally overrated.

‘That’s still a kid from where I’m standing...’ he said, but then she saw the flicker of something behind the cool expression.

‘You think I’m a child?Really?’ she challenged him, desperate to believe she’d seen something more than disdain.

His gaze darkened—and the frown on his brow became a crater.

He really was stupidly handsome. Tall and muscular with a shock of unruly black hair, his deep tan suggesting he either spent a lot of time sunbathing or he lived outdoors. She doubted he was an idle man, though, because his physique—and the way he had caught her and carried her out without breakinga sweat—appeared to have been forged in fire, rather than an expensive gym. The small scar which bisected his eyebrow and another visible through the stubble on his jaw made it obvious he hadn’t led a charmed life. But then, neither had she. The only difference was her scars weren’t visible.

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