Page 127 of Heart Strings & Hotlines
“What did I miss?”
We all turn at the sound of Lottie’s voice, and my brain goes numb as I take her in.
“Breathe, Brad, geez. You’re going to pass out. I knew you should have chugged that drink.”
Rafe removes the glass from my hands before I drop it.
I’m not sure what to take in first. She’s done something to her long hair so it sits gracefully over one shoulder. There’s a pin or a button or something on the left side of her head that sparkles in the overhead lighting.
An earring dangles from her exposed ear like a sparkling teardrop, matching the one that hangs low between her breasts.
I suddenly have a love/hate relationship with her ruby red dress. It has no straps to hold it up. How the hell is she keeping it on?
The dress appears to be a structure in its own right, with a cut clear down to her ribs, but somehow still lifts and separates her luscious tits. The fabric looks soft, and I long to touch it but fear doing so because I’ll want to know every nook and cranny, the how and whys of this dress holding together as it does. Logically, it should fall away from her body with the slightest movement, but as she glides closer, the damn thing only moves as if it’s a piece of her, hugging the curvature of her waist, down her hips, to a slit on her left thigh that might show off a panty line if she’s not careful.
She stops in front of me, and my hand falls to the slit, attempting to keep it closed. I’m going to be chasing her around all fucking night on dress duty, just so no one gets a glimpse of something they don’t have permission to see.
I can’t do this.
I’m going to end up in jail for murder if she goes out in this thing.
With that depressing thought, I remove my hands from the slit of her dress, place them on her shoulders, and spin her around with every intention of marching her back to my room to change, but the frustrating woman digs in her heels.
“What are you doing?” She laughs over her shoulder, her bare shoulder that shimmers as though she’s been kissed by gold dust.
“Nope. I can’t do this, Charlotte. If you walk out of this apartment wearing…this, I will not survive the night. And every man with eyeballs might end up blind.”
Kara cackles on the sofa. Rafe hoots from his perch next to the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Lottie? She spins slowly as I study the frame of her dress, still trying to find the magic that holds it together.
“Thane Scotland Wilder.”
How the hell did she find out my middle name?
“I knew that would come in handy someday,” Rafe says and belly laughs.
I hope he chokes on my expensive gin.
“Charlotte Ireland Sinclair.” She gasps, reminding me that I want to have shirts made in her specific shade of blush.
“My middle name is not Ireland.”
“It sounded good.” Then I bite my lip. I know what her middle name is. I found it when I pulled the dossier on her. What was it? “Dorcas. Charlotte Dorcas Sinclair. I like Ireland better.”
“Dorcas?” Kara is stumbling over herself to stand upright. “Dorcas?”
“It’s not dork-us.” Lottie is spitting mad. I’ll admit, it’s helpful to know these emotions as they happen. “It’s dor-sayse.”
“Siri, how do you pronounce Dorcas, spelled D O R C A S?”
Lottie swipes the phone from my hand and shoves it between sofa cushions. “Forget you ever learned that name. I mean it.”
“I will. Just as soon as you change. I rather enjoy being a free man.”
She steps up until her exquisite chest presses against my ribs. “You will forget that name, and I will not change this dress after I spent two hours getting ready.”
“Don’t test me on this, Charlotte.”
