Page 103 of Sweet as Sin (Bad Habit 1)
And if I screwed her over, the word that I was unreliable would travel fast. She’d referred me to dozens of her friends, many of them celebrities. I couldn’t flake. Not today.
“Barney could hang out with me on set. He’d probably love that, right? He wouldn’t be in anyone’s way.” As Nico’s mouth thinned, I hurried to add, “And he could stay with me the whole time. You know how tight security is at the studios—”
“Not tight enough. The answer’s ‘no,’ Kat.”
Frustrated, I pulled out of Nico’s arms and walked away to look out the wall of windows. “This is ridiculous, Nico. Your brother hasn’t threatened me. I know you think he’s up to something, but I can’t live my life around what-ifs.” Grasping at straws, I added, “Maybe he just took a vacation, and that’s why you can’t get in touch with him.”
“Nice try,” said Nico sourly. “But drug dealers don’t take vacations.”
Stunned, I spun to look at him. “A drug dealer? Oh my God, Nico, he’s still doing that? And you still talk to him?”
“Yes, he’s still doing that. And no. I don’t talk to him. Before Avery’s funeral, we hadn’t talked for five years.” He paused, looking at me as if he was choking down a sudden violent anger. Anger and something that might have been anguish.
My intuition buzzed exactly the same way it had the minute I’d first laid eyes on Michael. “Why? What happened five years ago?”
Nico’s lips parted. Before a word left his lips, someone shouted from downstairs.
“You’re going to be late for the meeting, man! We gotta get a move on!”
Barney.
Nico closed his eyes, and squeezed his forehead. “Fuck. The fuckin’ meeting. I completely forgot.”
“What meeting?”
With a heavy sigh, Nico dropped his hand and gazed at me. “With my label. All the bigwigs. They love to get their face time, especially before a tour. I’ll be gone for at least a few hours.”
I seized the opportunity in front of me. “Great! Barney can drop you off at the meeting, then come with me to the studio! I’ll only be working for a few hours, so we can pick you up when we’re done!”
Nico scowled. “Baby. Forget it.”
Sensing a chink in his armor, I drew closer. “I happen to know that your record company’s offices are in Hollywood, sweetie, which, coincidentally, is also where my job today is. As a matter of fact, I think Paramount is just down the block, isn’t it?”
Nico watched me move toward him, his gaze alternating between my face and the twitch I’d put in my hips. I always dressed a little more businesslike when I went to the studios, and this morning I had on a cute black pencil skirt and a pair of nude heels that I knew made my legs look longer.
“Kat,” he said. But his warning tone wasn’t as convincing as his eyes, which were eating me up.
“So we’ll be right next door to each other.” I flattened my palms on his chest and blinked up at him, smiling coyly. “And then we’ll be back together, lickety-split.”
Nico pulled me against him, winding his arms around my waist. My breasts were crushed against his chest. In a voice like a growl, he said, “Hearin’ you say anything with the word ‘lick’ in it just makes me wanna fuck you, woman, so take care. And quit tryin’ to manipulate me with those big goddamn eyes. It’s not gonna work.”
But I could tell it was working. He’d gone from ‘absolutely not’ to ‘maybe you could convince me,’ even if he didn’t realize it himself.
I whispered, “Okay. No manipulating you with my eyes. How about this?”
I tilted my head and softly licked the spot where his jaw met his neck, just beneath his earlobe. I knew I’d hit the jackpot when I heard the low grumble he made in his chest. His arms tightened around me. He dipped his nose into my hair and inhaled.
“Not takin’ any chances with your safety.”
I sucked his earlobe into my mouth, then ran my tongue lightly around the shell of his ear. “No. Definitely not. I’ll be very, very safe with Barney.” I wound my arms up around his neck, pressed myself tighter against him, and trailed kisses over his jaw until I reached the corner of his mouth.
Warily, he watched me with hooded eyes. “I know what you’re doin’. Forget it.”
With the tip of my tongue, I licked the corner of his bottom lip. “Please?”
He groaned.
I flexed my hips into his. Suppressing a smile at how hard he already was, I said, “Pretty please? With a cherry on top?”
