He winked, thick lashes coming down over a dark brown eye, and turned up the music until it pumped through her blood. Soon afterward, everyone had a drink, the sunroof was open, and Fox’s arm was around her neck as they cruised through the city en route to their first stop.
Molly had only gone clubbing that one disastrous time, never partied with a boy, never made out in the middle of a dance floor. Fox was no boy, but he absolutely made out with her in the midst of the pumping mass of bodies that was the hottest club in town. Molly knew there had to be cameras around, but the place was all but dark, and she was in too good a mood to ruin the experience by focusing on the outside world rather than her man.
As Charlotte had said, being caught in the arms of a sex god was hardly anything to be embarrassed about. So she danced flush up against Fox’s hard body and when he demanded a kiss, opened her mouth for him, her hand curled over the warmth of his nape. The muscle and tendon of him moving under her touch as he kissed her was as hot as the weight of his hand on her ass.
Swaying with her under the pumping music, Fox scowled at Abe when the keyboardist cut in, but let her go. The members of the band were the only men to whom he’d surrender her. Soon as any other male even looked interested, Fox made it very, very clear Molly was off-limits. It was an intoxicating feeling, to be so publicly branded as his.
They went from club to club as a group, walking in at the front of every line. “This could go to a girl’s head,” Molly said, nuzzling at Fox’s throat in the shadows to the side of the dance floor.
Bending closer to her ear, his breath hot and intimate, he ran his hand down her side, stopping to caress the curve of her breast. “Does that mean you’ll suck my c**k when we get back—after I tie your hands behind your back and bind your ankles together?”
Molly felt her skin blaze, wasn’t ready for the kiss he laid on her, her ponytail wrapped around his hand. “You are so sexy when you blush.” A delicious bite of her lower lip. “So?”
Molly somehow found the will to speak through the pulse of arousal low in her body. “If I say yes,” she whispered in his ear, her lips touching his skin, “you’ll have me on my knees in the hotel room so fast my head will spin, and I’m having fun.” Not that she’d last long if he decided to persuade her. “I like being out with you and the guys.”
Hands on her hips, he squeezed. “I can be patient when I know what I’ve got coming.” Taking her hand on that low promise, he led her through to the VIP section of the club, no doubt leaving a generous tip with the bouncer whose hand he shook on the way in.
“Do you always tip so well?”
“I waited tables when we were trying to make it,” he said. “Worked as a bouncer, too. You wouldn’t believe the number of big shots who never tip, the jerk-offs get so used to being given everything for free.”
Molly went to part her lips to reply when there was a holler from the other end of the bar, and two seconds later, Fox was being lifted off his feet by a big black guy in a flawless charcoal-gray suit. David, who’d entered right behind them, received the same treatment a few seconds later. “Damn!” the stranger said. “You didn’t tell me you were coming in!”
“That’s why it’s a surprise, ass**le.” Noah’s laconic response had the older man grinning, the guitarist having just joined them.
“Fuck you, pretty boy.” Sharing a quintessentially male hug, complete with thumping back slaps, the two drew apart.
Abe, the last one to enter, held up a hand. “I don’t do girly shit like hugs, man.”
He was swallowed up an instant later and came out of it grinning, the deep smile rare on his face. Slapping Abe’s cheek with hard affection, the stranger turned to Fox. “You going to introduce us?” He was looking at Molly.
Startled, Molly found herself taking in the besuited man with new eyes. People had a way of ignoring her, appearing surprised when Fox introduced her. Seemed the “bit of pu**y” wasn’t meant to have a name. It would’ve infuriated her except that Fox always made it clear she mattered. So she was taken aback when he said, “Hell no,” a scowl on his face. “You’re not safe around women.”
Flashing an undaunted smile at her, the stranger said, “I’m Shawn, but most folks call me Doc. A beautiful woman like yourself, however, can call me Shawn.” He held out one thickly muscled arm. “Let me show you things Fox here didn’t even know existed until I shared my wisdom with him.”
Fox traded insults with Shawn as they walked up a spiral staircase and into a private section that offered a view over the entire club. Shawn, Molly realized, either owned or managed the club. From the confident way he moved in this space, she leaned toward ownership. Ordering them to settle in, he called up trays of finger food from the club’s generous kitchen. Then, with food and drink flowing while the music boomed beneath them, Molly sat back and listened to the band catch up with a man who was obviously a trusted friend.
“This guy,” Abe told her, “gave us our first big break.”
Noah nodded, his beer held loosely between thumb and forefinger, the green glass of the bottle sweating with condensation. “He wasn’t a big shot then—had a tiny place that was building a serious rep, and he put us center stage.”
“Good business.” Shawn ate a spicy spring roll before continuing. “They packed out the club night after night. Had lines out the door by the end of what was supposed to be their run—so of course I signed them up for another one.”