Chapter 36

Not having any idea of what to say to that, Mac nonetheless felt her entire body flush with pleasure at his words. She dropped her head, unable to meet his gaze after his remark, but his hiss of surprise as his hand met her naked back caused her to look up again, eager to see his reaction.

For a moment his feet had stopped moving as he recovered from the shock of his hand on her naked skin. As he allowed his hand to investigate just how much of her back was exposed, his feet had once again started to move in time with the music.

She was unable make eye contact with him when she raised her head because his unfocused gaze was aimed somewhere over her left shoulder. So instead, she was able to enjoy a closer inspection of him than she had been able to do during the earlier part of the evening. It was odd to see him out of uniform, and even though he wore a beautiful black suit, he still appeared more casual than he normally did.

When AJ realized her entire back was bare he quickly put some distance between them. The feel of her naked flesh under his hand had caused a jolt of desire to surge through him and the resulting evidence of his arousal was hard to hide. How he wanted to hold her close, to press their bodies together, but he also didn't want to offend her, or move to quickly. She didn't know he was her secret admirer and also had no way of knowing that he had heard all she had said to him in the hospital. More than anything else he wanted her to know that he loved her and wanted her for more than just her body.

Mac couldn't help but feel hurt when he pulled away from her. She didn't think she'd been pressing too close to him, but obviously he felt differently. Now, instead of enjoying the feeling of being in his arms, she couldn't wait for the song to end so she could escape. She needed to figure out what she had done to make him pull away.

The rest of the evening she danced with every other male at the party. She even danced with Vukovic, as much as the prospect was distasteful to her. All she could be glad of, was that with enough senior staff present, he seemed to find a modicum of restraint and behaved himself, even if he did take quite a bit of pleasure in running his hand up and down her bare back. After a time even Clay approached her and asked her to dance. 'Probably so it wouldn't look bad that he hadn't,' she guessed. The Webb's were all about appearances after all.

Mac kept a watchful eye on AJ and every time he looked like he was heading her way to ask her to dance again, she either latched on to the nearest male and practically dragged him to the dance floor, or if that wasn't possible, she made a beeline for the ladies room.

When she saw him dancing with Harriett, Mac quickly asked one of the waiters to help her to her car with her pile of gifts. She tipped him and thanked him with a weary smile. As she pulled her car out of the parking lot, she gave a sad sigh. She had successfully managed to only have the one dance with AJ. Maybe after this latest show of his total lack of interest in her, she could convince her heart to allow herself to consider her secret admirer!

Mac just couldn't understand what had happened. She tossed and turned all night trying to find a reason why he'd said he would have asked her to dance anyway if Harriett hadn't forced the issue and then for him to put as much distance as possible between them as they danced didn't make any sense at all.

She awoke bleary eyed and exhausted to a knock on her door. 'Who the hell could it be at 0752 on a Saturday morning?!' she thought as she pulled her sleep deprived body out of her rumpled bed, all the while planning on how she would slowly kill the person that had awakened her after less than an hour of sleep!

To be continued….