“You wanna know the gossip I just heard in the ladies’ room?” she asked as we sat on a bench outside the hotel doors and lit a cigarette.
“No.”
“It has to do with Christian.”
I might hate him, but I still wanted to unravel him like a cat with a ball of yarn.
“Continue.”
She chuckled. “You know Jacie Newport—blonde, tall, disgustingly perfect—a member on the ACA charity board?”
I nodded.
“Well, I bumped into her in the bathroom—literally, mind you. She used to see Christian years ago, I remembered, and so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to find out just how he operates.”
I crossed my legs and leaned back. “Please, tell me you’re not still interested in him.”
“A woman would have to be dead not to be interested, Gianna.”
“Just call me Elvira,” I muttered.
“Pretty sure she wasn’t undead, but I get your point.”
I wanted to tell her Allister was Russian. Italians didn’t have a great affiliation with Russians here in New York. The Cosa Nostra and Bratva didn’t clash often, but when they did, it was a time us women sat around wondering if our husbands would come home. If I told her, maybe it would turn her off. Though, for some reason, I kept it to myself. I didn’t want her to know his secret. It was mine.
“Anyway, turns out the fed doesn’t stick around with the same woman for long.”
I scoffed. “That’s all the gossip you got? I could have told you that.”
“Well, surely, you didn’t know he’s only with the same woman a very specific three times.”
I frowned. “Like, three dates?”
“More like, three times between the sheets.” She smirked. When I still looked confused, she added, “Three romps in the sack? Three rolls in the hay?” I blinked. “Playing hide the pickle? Doing the horizontal hustle—?”
“Are you saying he only sleeps with the same woman three times?”
“I’m truly impressed with how quickly you put that together,” she said dryly.
My mind whirled.
Tap, tap, tap.
The rhythmic tapping of his finger, the adjusting of his cuffs, the turning of his watch, it all played in my head on a reel.
God, the man was more disturbed than I had thought.
“What if they never get to sex? Does foreplay count as one of the times?” The vision of his head between my legs and my fingers interlocked with his flashed through my mind.
She chuckled. “I don’t know. Trying to figure out if you have two or three turns left?”
“Please. You’re the one who wants him, not me.”
“Mmhmm.”
I ignored the sarcasm in her voice.
Silence settled between us for a moment as we both took a pull on our cigarettes.