Page 1 of Dancing With Temptation

1

Roxie

“Well, this just sucks,” Roxie whispered then turned over in the bed, away from the last man she’d ever wanted to sleep with. Again.

Her eyelids closed as the blue orbs rolled around in their sockets. Had she really been this stupid? She opened her eyes quickly to see gray light glancing off the walls. They were familiar but not the walls she’d have found in her own bedroom. It was almost impossible not to groan out loud, not when being faced with that much truth.

Oh yes. It was true, no matter how much of a mistake she knew it was.

She’d slept with Lincoln Young.

Holy fucking moly.

Heat flooded through her body, shame mixed with pleasure because it might have been vanilla sex, but it had been damned good. Memories of the sounds she’d made, how she begged him for more, made her body pulse into aroused life. But they also made her brain twitch with…embarrassment? Was that it? She was embarrassed and not really ashamed?

“Are you going to sneak out and pretend this didn’t happen?” Lincoln’s far-too-sexy voice nearly made her jump out of the bed. It was early Saturday morning and they’d spent the entire night exploring every inch of each other’s bodies. Why was he awake?

“Oh, you’re awake?” She sat up and pulled the covers up over her chest. That was a stupid move, he’d seen everything she had to offer already, and she wasn’t really the modest kind of person, but…yeah. The need to protect herself from him in all ways was still there. She wouldn’t poke at what all of those ways were Too much though.

“Let’s get one thing straight, Link.” She pretended not to notice how he cringed when she used the nickname, even if it did give her a small bit of pleasure to see his annoyance. “That was just a…”

“Mistake?” He offered, interrupting her. She didn’t look at him this time but stared at the wall ahead of her instead.

“Yeah, something like that. I still hate you, you know?” A shrug of her shoulders made the bedding slip and she quickly pulled it back up. “Rebound sex you could call it. Or my boyfriend called me a whore and broke up with me and I needed friend sex. Whatever. It doesn’t matter to me what you call it. So long as you don’t call me for it again. It was like the last time…”

The words ‘that night of the fire that killed my parents’ almost passed her lips, but she cut them off.

“I understand.” He answered, a chuckle in his voice. That sound of mirth annoyed her a little, but she let it go. If she said something he might stop climbing out of bed.

Roxie averted her gaze as he walked out of the bedroom naked. Well, she did until he was past her, and then she watched him walk away, her eyes hungrily taking in the powerful swimmer’s body that had fascinated her even when they were teenagers.

It wasn’t like she’d admit that to anyone, however. Especially not to him.

“Are you going to stay for breakfast?” He called out before he went into the bathroom.

“No, um, I’ll crash at a friend’s place.” She called out, not sure which friend that might be, but she’d figure something out.

The second the shower came on, she ordered an Uber, hopped out of the bed, and dug around in her bag for a change of clothes. When she had something picked out, she walked to another bathroom, showered, and went back to his room to get her bag. She had on a black tank top, short denim shorts, and light blue deck shoes. No socks. The damn things made her feel like she was smothering when she had them on.

Normally she’d dry her hair and put on makeup before she’d walk out the door, but not today. She just wanted out of Lincoln’s presence. Thankfully, the Uber arrived before he could come out of the house to ask her another embarrassing question. Like, do you want to go back to my room for another round of awesome, mind-blowing sex that you won’t be able to wash out of your memory, no matter how hard you try to scrub it away?

Her cheeks were red again and she hated it. She’d had a lot of sex in her life, it wasn’t anything she was ashamed of, but for some reason, sex with Lincoln had been different.

“Can you take me to a hotel, please?” She asked the female driver, a pretty Hispanic woman with a cheerful smile. Roxie’s nails tapped against her teeth as she watched the car pull away from the security gate. Hurry, please…

“Which one, miss?” The woman asked and Roxie shrugged again.

“The Pelican Inn, that’ll be fine.” Roxie decided finally with a nod.

“Cool, no problem.” The driver said and pulled out into traffic.

Roxie dug her phone out of her back pocket and stared at the screen. She had over thirty missed calls and voice messages. What the fuck?

A quick scroll showed that most of the calls were from Wendy or Nathan. Hearing anything from the man that had called her a whore wasn’t high on her list of things to do so Roxie opened Wendy’s messages first.

Wendy said to call her at any time, just to let her know how Roxie was, so she hit the dial button to call her friend.

“Hey,” Wendy said before the first ring had even finished. She must have been sitting there with her phone in her hands.