Excerpt from "In Your Wildest Dreams"
A Warner Forever Release
July 2005
ISBN: 0-446-61487-4
©2005 by Toni Blake
Page 2
Half an hour later, a cab pulled to a stop on an ancient, narrow street, delivering her to her destination. She felt sinfully beautiful. She felt naked. She wished she were anywhere else.
"Chez Sophia," the driver said.
She handed the polite middle-aged man a ten over the seat. "Keep the change."
Stepping out into the sultry night, she watched the taxi dart away and battled a brief second of feeling too alone. Put her in front of a roomful of hard-nosed CEOs in a sharply-cut suit and she was a confident, eloquent woman, in perfect control of everything around her. The stark opposition of where she was - who she was - tonight, struck once more.
Yet she'd come too far to turn back, so she took a deep breath and turned toward Chez Sophia, staring up at elegant fern-hung balconies, all curving wrought iron and grace. That quickly, the aura of the place began to surround her, the sensation nearly as cloying as the sticky air.
Moving toward the front entrance in heels that clicked on the sidewalk with each stride, she subtly tugged upward on the bodice of her low cut dress in some last-minute stab at self-preservation.
But no. She wasn't here to be herself. All her suits were at home. She'd come to be someone else - someone she could never really be. Biting her lip, she gently pulled the clingy fabric back down, maximizing her cleavage. Feel beautiful. Not naked.
"Good evening, miss. Welcome to Chez Sophia." The twenty-something doorman wore a white shirt, red vest, black tie.
She manufactured a smile. Sell it. "Thank you."
He motioned toward the interior of the grand saloon, abuzz with people drinking, smoking, laughing. A Dixieland trio played in one corner, the large bass briefly drawing her eye. "Our high-tech dance club is straight down the hallway, the Zydeco Lounge is to the right, and -"
"I'm here for the private party." That's what Melody had told her to say.
The doorman's eyes changed. To disappointment? Lust? Surely she was thinking too much. Either way, his gaze dropped boldly to her cleavage before he brought it back to her face. That's all she was tonight - cleavage, curves.
"Through the doorway past the stairwell," he said.
"Thank you." But she could no longer meet his eyes. Damn it, you're supposed to be selling it.
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