Chapter Nine
Andi
“Don’t think of me too much on your date.”
Did Paul tell me that so I would think about him? Did he tell me that to keep my mind off of the fact that I was nervous as hell? Was he flirting? So many things were going through my mind as I drove to my date.
In the last forty-eighty hours, I’d been in more compromising positions with Paul than I had been in with any other man in the last twelve years. The crazy thing was that I wasn’t uncomfortable. I wasn’t even running for the hills when his hands were on my ass in the hallway earlier as I stood dripping wet. I couldn’t believe that I’d forgotten my clothes in my room or even my robe. I wasn’t used to sharing a place with anyone and my mind was on the fact that I had a date tonight.
My date for the night was a dinner at Javier’s in the Aria hotel. I had yet to be to the strip, but the little I saw in the bumper to bumper traffic as I made my way to the hotel made me never want to go down there again. It was insane. It was almost better to get out and walk if I could, but I’d gotten a tip from Leah to valet park once I’d made it to the hotel. She assured me that all valet parking in Vegas was free, you’d just had to tip them when they got your car at the end.
After I valet parked and found my way to the restaurant, I took a deep breath and tried not to think about what I was actually doing. It reminded me of my seventeenth birthday. The circumstances were different, of course, but there was still a lot that was similar.
I was going on a date.
I was going on a date with a stranger.
And I was getting paid.
I needed to snap out of it. Be Andi, not Joss. I was undercover and no longer seventeen. I wasn’t a scared little girl anymore. If anything were to happen, I had training to protect me now. I would fight back.
I took a deep breath and walked into the dimly lit restaurant and up to the hostess stand. After telling her who I was meeting, she walked me to the table and my date stood as I approached.
“Andi,” he greeted, kissing me on the cheek.
“Preston.” I returned the kiss on his cheek.
Taking a long look at my date for the night, I decided this wouldn’t be too bad. He was dressed in a pair of dark brown slacks and a black, long-sleeved shirt that hid what I imagined was a rock hard body. He had his sleeves rolled up a quarter of the way up his arms. Why was that so damn sexy? His blond hair was wrapped up into a man bun, and he had a strong jaw and beautiful blue eyes with a smile that gave off the impression—or maybe a warning—that he knew how to have a good time.
Taking my hand and guiding me to our booth he gave my body a once over with his eyes and smiled. “You, darlin’, are absolutely gorgeous.”
Gorgeous.
Flashes of Paul’s smile danced across my mind. “Don’t think of me too much on your date.”
This was going to be a long night.
Doing my best to stay in character, I gave him what I hoped was a confident smile.
The night went on without a hitch. He was smart, sweet, and his smile didn’t lie—he was a shit load of fun to be around. After dinner, Preston wanted to go dancing at Haze, the nightclub inside Aria. We stood in line for a few minutes, then once we got in, we went straight to the bar. He ordered a round of drinks, and I took in the atmosphere of the club as I waited for him to make his move.
I watched as people let loose all around me: grinding on each other, kissing, laughing, taking shots—living a carefree life. I wondered what it would be like to let go and simply be. I’d never had that—ever.
Not wanting to ruin the good time I was having, and not wanting to fuck up my first date, I put a smile on face and turned my head back to Preston only to find him staring at me with that smile. He held a hand out to me. “Let’s go, beautiful, I wanna show my date off.”
Preston dragged me to the center of the dance floor and put an arm around my lower back, pulling me close. The first thing that hit my senses was the way he smelled, and I couldn’t help but feel disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, Preston smelled amazing, but his scent wasn’t the one I craved.
“Don’t think of me too much on your date.”
Once again dragging my attention back to the man I was dancing with, I could feel the bass of the music through the soles of my feet vibrating all the way up to the top of my head. Between the beat of the music, the alcohol coursing through me, and the hard body I was dancing up against, I could feel my nerves starting to unwind. I was starting to let go for once, wanting to have what everyone around me had.
Turning in Preston’s arms, I put my back to his front, and we started moving again. As soon as I closed my eyes, a pair of deep chocolate ones appeared in the forefront of my mind. When a pair of hands started making their way down my arms and grabbed my hips, it was no longer Preston I was dancing with—it was Paul. Throwing all inhibitions out the window, my hips started to really move with the music.
I was abruptly brought out of my fantasy by a pair of lips coming down to my ear with a deep baritone voice that I knew didn’t belong to the man I was dancing with in my head. “Come up to my room with me.”
Instantly I stilled and turned around. I had to think quickly; I didn’t want him to notice the hesitation. “How about a few more drinks? I’m having so much fun and it’s still really early.”
For the rest of our date, I nursed the same drink with water on the side. In between the dancing and talking, I had him going back to the bar every chance I got. It was the only foolproof way I could think of to avoid the proposal of me going up to his room with him.
By the time our date was getting ready to wrap up, he could barely walk. The rest of the night went exactly as planned. I got Preston up to his room where he passed out on his bed and I was free and clear.
Maybe this whole escort thing wouldn’t be so bad after all.