“…and mounted it in my den. Big moose.” Reginald nodded and pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Big-ass moose, Marcus.”

“You know, Clive was telling me a hunting story the other day,” Marcus said. Clive, hearing his name, turned his head, then narrowed his eyelids. Marcus grinned and continued lying his pants off. “You remember, Clive. The one about the deer. And the rabbits.” He turned to Reginald. “Hilarious. Wait’ll you hear it.” He backed a few steps away when Reginald turned his attention to Clive. “If you’ll excuse me for a minute, I have to visit the facilities.”

He swaggered away, but not before hearing Clive start a story that did not until just now exist. He caught Lily’s eye as he went. She lifted one prim eyebrow. He winked. Joanie and Felicia were ensconced in conversation, and as he walked past in the direction of the bathroom, he heard Lily excuse herself as well.

Clive and Joanie’s house was big, and given the fact he’d been there about nine hundred and forty-three times, Marcus knew his way around. The huge eat-in kitchen contained a dining room table that sat ten, a breakfast bar and island in the center of the room, and a newly built pantry Clive and Marcus had designed a few months back. The pantry not only stocked food but also had a humidor for cigars and shelving to hold bottles of wine.

It was kick-ass. He’d just stopped in front of its double doors when he heard heels click behind him. He turned and snagged Lily’s arm, opened the pantry, and closed them inside.

He had her up against a wall in a nanosecond, his mouth fused with hers a second later. She tasted like crisp white wine, apples, and something else… Her, he realized. It was a taste he’d gotten a sample of at the end of the block, a taste he hadn’t been able to forget since the night at Willow Mansion. Much as he wanted to make an excuse and leave, he hadn’t found an opening yet. And this, her, was exactly what he needed. Her palms went to his chest, her touch burning him down to the soles of his dress shoes.

After parting, she breathed, “I’m about to fake a burst appendix.”

“Joanie would insist on coming to the hospital,” he reminded her, his hands sliding down her lower back and over her skirt.

“I know. What about you, can you fake something?”

“Not me, baby. I’m a hundred percent real.”

A grin took over her lips, and then she shocked the hell out of him by cupping his junk in one hand. His semi- was becoming a full-on. And fast.

“Yep,” she purred up at him. “That’s real, all right.”

She unbuttoned his slacks. “I figure since we can’t ignore what’s between us, we’ll just have to indulge.”

“How much have you had to drink?” he couldn’t help but ask. It wasn’t like her to be careless, or risky.

“It’s been a long week, Black.” She unzipped him next, reaching into his underwear and squeezing his cock. He grunted and she shushed him. “Anyway, stop talking.”

He swallowed and dutifully kept his mouth shut, his blood roaring as Lily stroked him again. She backed him into a shelf, sending boxes of cereal wobbling behind him. His senses were heightened in the dark. It was like they were back in the mansion, groping in the dark and finding each other. Lily’s hands tugged his pants and boxers down, and she slid to her knees in front of him. A sliver of light from the crack under the door allowed him a tease of what she had planned. And he liked what he saw.

From the champagne, or maybe the rush of lust, Lily’s inhibitions were down, her guard dropped, and Marcus would have been all for it—okay, was all for it—but for the fact that their best friends were a few rooms over with their latest clients…

God. This was stupid. Was he really going to let Lily go down on him while—

He felt the tip of her tongue flick over his cock and he conked his skull against some cans behind him.

Yes. Hell yes, he was.

“Kiss me, beautiful,” he begged, wanting those lips again.

“Oh, I plan on it.” She smiled against his skin, then wrapped her lips around the head of his penis.

Aaaaaand…he was going to die.

He’d always thought of blowjobs as gifts from above, especially when an exquisite creature was willing and ready to perform one. He didn’t like to brag, but he’d gotten more than a few girls on their knees. He thought he knew just what to expect.

Except he hadn’t counted on Lily.

Once she licked the head, she scraped the fleshy part with her teeth, then sucked, then repeated the process. The sensations shooting up his spine were nothing short of glorious. He gripped the shelf behind him with one hand and wound the fingers of his other hand into her hair while she worked. And damn, she was working it. Working him. He thought she’d continue worshipping the tip, which, hey, he had zero problems with, but then her mouth opened and she swallowed him down, taking in every inch while he sucked a breath through his teeth and tried to maintain. What he wanted to do was pull her mouth off his cock, ruck that skirt up over her hips, and plunge deep inside her.

But since they were on borrowed minutes before Clive or Joanie or, God help him, both of them, came looking, he guessed he wouldn’t get that far.

Damn shame, too. Not that he wasn’t enjoying her mouth on him. A little too much, actually.

“McIntire,” he grunted, fisting her hair in his hand as she hummed, taking him deeper. The sound reverberated in his balls and tingled low in his spine.

“Lily, I—oh, fuck.” Whatever words he’d been planning to say shot out of his brain like a cannonball. He dropped his head against the shelf, bonking his head again and not caring even a little. He loosened his grip on her hair, enjoying the feel of her soft lips, lapping tongue, and the added bonus of her hand wrapped around the base of his shaft.

Then she picked up the pace. Yep. He was going to lose it.

Close. So, so close. Her fingers wrapped him tighter and he thrust his hips, sending him deeper into her mouth. She didn’t mind, either, opening wide to accommodate him. On the edge of coming, he was snapped back by an incredibly unwelcome interruption.

“Tawny port. We picked it up when we were in California last year,” came Joanie’s muffled voice growing ever closer to the pantry.

He lost Lily’s mouth in an instant. She rose to her feet and he jerked his pants over his hips and his cock while Joanie’s voice grew nearer, talking about notes of vanilla and how “one glass will do ya!”

Meanwhile, Marcus tucked his shirt in, bumping the head of his erection and wincing at the pain. He was right. He was going to die, but not in the fun way like he’d imagined earlier.

“Decent?” Lily whispered.

“Hardly,” he grunted.

The handle on the door turned and Marcus tugged Lily out of the way and hit the switch on the wall, bathing them in light. Her hair was disheveled, her lips plump, and his dick gave another mournful bob.

“Oh!” Joanie pressed a hand to her chest and Felicia stood next to her, looking equally shocked.

“Found it!” Lily shouted, reaching for a can behind Marcus’s head. She held up a can of cherry pie filling and Marcus wanted to howl. Good luck explaining that one. “Sorry. Can I borrow this?” She stepped in front of him, helpfully shielding his pants from view. “Oh, wait. Never mind.” She shook her head and replaced the can. “I thought that was peach.”

Joanie’s eyebrows rose significantly higher. “What…are you doing?”

“Marcus was showing me the newly redesigned pantry—looks great, by the way—and then he thought he’d be cute and shut the door on me,” Lily said. “He knows how afraid of the dark I am.”

Oh, boy. She was terrible at making things up on the fly.

“And then after letting me freak out for a minute, I got ahold of the switch. Thank goodness, because after the night at Willow—”