“Incentive?” Eric stuffed an extra-large red corduroy bolster behind his head and laced his hands together in his lap. “You mean bribe, right?”
“Bribe, bonus, compensation, prize. Whatever. I think it’ll be worth your time to pay attention.”
“That means shut the hell up, Haydon.” Egged on by jeers and wolf whistles, Ray did little more than wink and return the floor to Sydney.
Daring anyone else to interrupt, she took a deep breath. “Here’s my winner-take-all deal. My father, who many of you know, has made me an offer I should refuse. But I won’t.”
Macy waited for reactions as the out-of-left-field comment sank in. She wasn’t disappointed. Those who’d met Nolan Ford were curious, and said so. Those who hadn’t still wanted to hear what the millionaire venture capitalist had to do with the evening’s game.
“Nolan’s going to pay us to play?” Anton made the crack while sorting through Macy’s CDs.
“No,” Sydney answered. “But he’s selling his ketch and giving me the final week to use it. Full crew of sailors included.”
“What I want to do is donate the week to the winner, who is then welcome to choose a destination, within reason, and take along as many guests as the yacht can handle.”
Anton applauded. “All right, Sydney.”
“Oh, my God! Are you kidding?” Melanie’s eyes grew wide.
And at that, Macy leaned over and kissed Sydney’s cheek. When she smiled in response, Macy wrapped an arm around the other woman’s shoulders and whispered, “You don’t have to do this.”
Pressing her forehead to Macy’s, Sydney returned the hug. “Yes. I do. You know how things are with Nolan.”
Macy had more to say, but now wasn’t the time. She left Sydney with another quick peck and addressed the crowd.
“Hey, people. No one is going to be sailing anywhere if I don’t get my way. Anton.” Macy pointed, and he pumped up the volume. “Lauren.” Lauren held Macy by the shoulders and, once Macy had covered her eyes, twirled her to the rhythm of the beat.
Macy barely had time to decide what she was going to ask from Leo before she was pulled to a stop, turned to the right, then back to a stumbling, feet-tangling left.
A deep breath and…it was time.
She lifted her chin, ran her fingers into her hair, her tongue over her lips. Then, with her imagination wearing the underthings she’d failed to wash in time for her body to wear, she looked Leo Redding in the eye.
Big mistake. Big, big mistake.
She’d forgotten about his eyes. How he seemed to see more than a near stranger should see. How what he saw was intimate, private, not at all what she wanted to reveal.
With each step she took toward him, her pulse quickened.
At every bluesy note, her heart beat harder.
From the roots of her hair to the tip of her toes, her blood ran hot, raising a flush on her skin. Leo never looked away, stirring her further. Macy would swear she felt her nostrils flare.
And then she knew what she wanted. To see him smile. To make him smile. As much to prove that she could, that she possessed the stronger will and the necessary feminine wiles, as to add fuel to the fire of her fantasy.
Having drawn even with his widespread knees, she wedged her legs between, leaned forward and planted both hands on the flat arms of the chair. The tips of her fingers brushed the insides of his elbows. His only move was to reach up and remove his glasses.
She angled in closer, lifted one hand and touched a finger to his cheek. “I want you to do something for me.”
Leo raised a brow. In the background, an anonymous hand clapped to Eric’s mouth muffled a smart remark. Macy gathered her wits and her courage and climbed into Leo’s long-legged lap.
“I want you to smile. Can you do that? Can you smile for me, Leo Redding?”
Moving even nearer, she twisted around and settled her seat in the natural dip of his thighs, draped her legs over the arm of the chair, her elbow crooked around his shoulders.
He smelled wonderfully warm and male, and she snuggled up to his body, which felt…oh, he felt like nothing she’d ever known.
His legs beneath her bottom were hard. His belly at her hip was hard. The muscles across his shoulders were solid and hard beneath her forearm. Even the hand, the very large hand resting on her shins, was a study in masculine strength.
Lips parted in seductive invitation, she stroked an index finger over Leo’s cheek and shivered at the prickle of evening beard. She trailed the same finger down a path to his collar, worked loose the knot on his tie.
“C’mon, Leo. I know you can smile. You’ve got all the right muscles.” She toyed with the top button of his shirt, poking the bare tip of her finger beneath the placket to his collarbone.
Still no response. Nada. Nothing. Ignoring the murmurs of the audience, she whispered directly into his ear. “I’ll make it easy on you. A quick grin and we’ll call it a night.”
She pulled back to look at his face, expecting a gradual capitulation. But no, he was stoic to the core. It was time to get down and dirty.
Pouting always worked for Chloe, so Macy gave it a try at the same time she lightly touched her thumb to the edge of Leo’s mouth, drawing the corner upward.
No reaction. Macy held back a scream.
She plied her final weapon, running her fingertips in feathery movements over his tightly drawn lips, begging, with her mouth only inches away, “One smile. Please?”
And then she felt it. A shift. A change. A flare and a flash in Leo’s eyes, and a new sense of his body hardening beneath hers.
A part of her wanted to extricate herself from both his lap and a situation as awkward as any she could recall sharing with a man. A part of her wanted to wiggle, to experience and explore this private intimacy.
She managed, instead, to sit very still and avoid disclosing to the rest of the room what was now so impressively, so solidly pressed to the back of her thighs.
Leo reached for her wrist, removed her motionless fingers from his lips. She blinked slowly and smiled, a smile meant for Leo only, Leo alone. She wanted him to know that, between the two of them, they’d get out of this with no bloodshed, go on to live another day.
And then the man blew the wind from her sails.
He smiled.
Not a humorless grin. Not a slight curl of his lip. Not a sneer or a snarl, but an ear-to-ear, start-my-heart-beating smile. Yet that wasn’t the worst part. The best part. The worst. Because once he’d released her wrist and she’d made ready to hop up from the chair, he cupped the back of her head.
And he kissed her.
Oh, hallelujah, the man could kiss. He tasted like beer and smoky barbecue and a man aroused, and she was starving. She couldn’t get enough when he teased her mouth with the tip of his tongue, rubbed his lips softly, then roughly, over hers.
It was a complicated kiss, meant for show and to prove that he was not relinquishing the win. Mentally, she fought back. Physically, she surrendered.
Desire took full advantage, reaching between her legs to remind her how long it had been, how good it could be. Oh, this wasn’t supposed to happen.
She silently grimaced and broke the kiss—to cheers and applause and ear-piercing whistles. She pulled back far enough to meet Leo’s gaze.
His mouth was slightly reddened and still smiling. But his eyes sparkled with fireworks that were less a celebration