He reached for me, and I went to him, arms around his neck as he kissed me back onto the seat, stretching out next to me, his thigh between mine. We kissed like we hadn’t seen each other in years, desperate, longing kisses that did nothing to really put out the fire. In fact, it just added more fuel.

“I missed you so much, Sara,” he murmured against my neck. “When I’m away from you it’s like I can’t take a full breath. It’s like I’m drowning and you’re my life raft.”

“You’re so sweet.” I cradled his head in my hand as he kissed his way down my cleavage. “There’s a song in there somewhere…”

He chuckled. “You know me too well.”

“You missed me?” I asked. “You thought about me every day?”

“Every minute…” He assured me with kisses all over the tops of my breasts. “Every second.”

His hands were working my skirt up, up. He glanced down at his handiwork with a deep sigh.

“You’ve got sexy damned legs.”

“Do I?” I looked down, pulling my dress up even higher to look.

“Don’t do that.”

“Do what?” I pulled my skirt up almost to my hips.

“Sara…” There was a warning in his voice, in his eyes

“Can he see us?”

“No.”

“Good.” I grabbed his hand and slid it under the elastic of my pantyhose. He curled his fingers around my sex, his palm over my pubic bone, rocking gently.

“Tease,” he groaned as his fingers slid through the slippery seam of my sex.

“Me?” I gasped, shifting my hips. “Oh that’s so good…”

I kissed him, sliding my tongue along his lips, desperate for him.

“Is it going to be a long ride?” I asked.

Dale sighed. “Not long enough.”

“Then I guess this is the best we can do for now,” I whispered, rubbing the heel of my hand through the thin material of his trousers, feeling him, hard and wanting me.

“For now.” He groaned, his hips rocking with my motion. “Oh God, this is torture.”

It was—the very best kind of torture. We continued to tease and torture each other to the brink of insanity, igniting that pure, animal lust that took over our bodies and minds whenever we were together.

Then the limo pulled up to our destination and I sat up and straightened my dress, my hair, and prayed that wherever we were, it had a nice, soft bed and plenty of water.

Because we were going to need them.

CHAPTER FOUR

When the driver opened the door to the limo, Dale got out first, holding his hand out for me. I took it, my remaining shoe in my hand as I walked barefoot—well, almost, I was wearing nylons—into the lobby of the Waldorf Astoria hotel.

“Dale, you didn’t.” But of course, he had.

I had a rush of déjà-vu as we stood at the counter, checking in. We had just been talking about first times in the limo, and here we were at the Waldorf Astoria, the place he had brought me two years ago. It had been the first night we’d ever spent together. Dale was recreating it, from the limo ride to the hotel.

“Same room?” I asked, watching Dale sign the paper the desk clerk put in front of him.

Dale just smiled and that little dimple his cheek appeared, making him look even more mischievous. He slid the paper over to the desk clerk, an older man, tall with almost white-blond hair he slicked back. He wore round wire-rimmed glasses and he peered over them at me.

“It’s not Halloween,” the desk clerk remarked.

“Huh?” I cocked my head at him, questioning.

“I assume you’re Cinderella?” He pointed to the shoe in my hand.

“Oh no, I’ve already found my Prince Charming.” I laughed and hooked my arm through Dale’s.

“I assume everything’s ready?” Dale inquired, slipping his wallet into his suit jacket pocket and glancing at the desk clerk.

“Everything you asked for, Mr. Diamond. Have a glorious stay.”

“Oh we will,” I agreed as Dale led me toward the elevators.

Before I’d met Dale, my only experience of a hotel had actually been an old Howard Johnson’s down in Florida. The owners had converted and re-named it The Lookout Motel, although I hadn’t found the scenery—a set of railroad tracks complete with a train that went by at 4 a.m. next to a self-serve storage facility—much to look out at. I thought maybe they had meant something else, like “Lookout for cockroaches!” and, in the case of the shower, “Lookout for inconsistent water temperature!”

That had been before, when my mother was alive. It was the only family trip I remembered taking and, as usual, it had been spoiled by the stepbeast and his incessant drinking. They drove down from New Jersey to visit my mother’s family, although there weren’t many left. Her mother had been an only child, her father had just one brother, and my grandparents were both dead before I turned five. It was a cousin’s wedding, which I found boring at the age of thirteen, but I was unbelievably excited at the prospect of visiting Disney World. The stepbeast had promised we could go.

Of course, he broke that promise. The night after the wedding I went to bed nearly vibrating with excitement. The next day was Disney World! When my eyes finally closed, my body having reached its peak of exhaustion, I didn’t remember anything until early the next morning when I woke and found myself face to face with a mouse. It was sitting there cleaning itself right in front of my face.

Of course, I screamed. My hand jerked involuntarily, moving to shoo it away, and only succeeded in flattening it between my hand and the wall. The panicked mouse bit my thumb and tore off running along the side of the cot to the edge and then dropped down onto the television stand, disappearing behind the box.

My scream woke my mother and the stepbeast, who was very sluggish and hung-over and yelled obscenities as he tore the room apart looking for the elusive mouse. When he couldn’t find it, he called me a fucking liar and said my punishment for lying—he accused me of getting them up early so we could go to Disney World sooner—was a trip back home. Right then. He made my mother pack while he took a shower and then made us both load the car while he checked out of The Lookout Motel.

We drove away just as the sun was coming up over the horizon. I remembered my mother saying, “Pete, she could get rabies. I saw the bite on her hand.” The stepbeast had grunted and replied, “If she gets rabies, we’ll put her down. Dumb woman—there was no fucking mouse.” I cried silently in the back seat, letting the tears fall onto my jumper, forehead pressed to the window. I didn’t get rabies but I did get a nasty infection. And I never got to go to Disney World. That was the last Florida mouse I ever saw—and it definitely hadn’t been Mickey.

The Waldorf Astoria wasn’t just a step up from The Lookout Motel—it was more like a giant leap. Dale had begged and borrowed—although he probably hadn’t stolen anything—to get the room for us the first time. Tonight, he just pulled out his credit card and paid. We’d both come a long, long way since then.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Dale nuzzled my neck as we stood waiting at the elevators.

“You’d need more than that.” I half-smiled as the elevator opened. It was empty and we stepped inside.

“Inflation?” Dale smirked, pushing the button. It was forty-seven floors to the top.

“Deep well.” I put my arms around his neck. “You are the most amazing man in the whole world and I love you with all my heart, Dale Diamond.”

“Quit trying to get out of it.” He grinned and put his arms around my waist, pulling me close and nuzzling my curls. “What were you so lost in thought about?”

I sighed and told him, knowing he wouldn’t give up until I did. By the time I was finished, the elevator doors were opening.

“That bastard,” Dale breathed, his arms tightening protectively around me. “I hope he rots in jail for the rest of his life.”

“They reduced the sentence to aggravated assault, remember?” I reminded him with a little shiver. The thought of the stepbeast getting out of jail, after what he’d done, haunted me, mostly at night when Dale was asleep—or worse, out on the road. “Just five years.”

“You don’t have to remind me.” He lifted my chin, searching my eyes. “But by then we’ll be long gone, living in L.A. behind a fortress with an army of security guards. You’ll be as guarded as the Queen of England.”

“If Russell was any indication of the kind of security we’re going to have…” I joked. I didn’t like to think about the stepbeast and his inevitable release.

“Hey, he got us out of there, didn’t he?” Dale put his foot out to keep the elevator door from closing. He pulled me with him into the hallway, taking out the key card and opening the door. Dale flipped on a light and the room came to life. It was like Dorothy stepping into the Land of Oz for the first time. Except we’d been in this room before.

“Strawberries and roses and champagne.” I smiled., looking at the table where the goodies were all laid out. “You remembered.”

“Of course I remembered.” Dale took of his suit coat, loosening his tie. “I may forget appointments or my times tables—Mrs. Dunwitty would be ashamed of me—and sometimes I even forget my own song lyrics. But I don’t forget you.”

“You’re pretty unforgettable yourself, you know.” I put my satin pink high heel, dyed to match my dress, on the table with the flowers and champagne. I eyed the strawberries, remembering we’d left before I could even taste the wedding cake.

“I know.” He grinned, untying his dress shoes and sliding them off. Now he looked a little more like the Dale I knew, in black slacks and a white button-down shirt. The pink cummerbund was gone. I couldn’t remember where it was. The rental place was going to charge him for it—not that it mattered.

“It was a really beautiful wedding.” I sat in one of the chairs, picking up a strawberry and licking at the hardened chocolate.

“It was all right I guess.” He popped the top on the champagne and turned over the champagne flutes. “Ours will be better.”

“Ours?” I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

He knew I wanted to marry him—and he’d proposed to me, so the feeling was mutual. But everyone from his manager to his publicist to his hairdresser said we shouldn’t. Not yet. Greg, his manager, had been the most adamant, of course, followed by Jan, his publicist. They insisted on keeping me a secret. Dale’s band, Black Diamond, was going to make them a hell of a lot of money, and since Dale Diamond himself pretty much was the band, the other members utterly forgettable, they focused solely on their money maker.

And they didn’t want their money maker romantically attached. Because that didn’t make them money. What made them money was a very sexy, very single rock and roll star who exuded so much sexual energy on stage girls passed out from screaming his name. Some of the reporters on shows like Entertainment Tonight said they hadn’t seen anything like it since Elvis—then they’d show clips of Elvis and girls screaming and falling over. Followed by clips of Dale and girls screaming and falling over.