Free The Red Diary by Toni Blake

thought they might not be so little if she'd put on a few pounds. Lauren Ash's girlfriends were too skinny for his taste.
    The princess, on the other hand, was just right. Her sleek black suit hugged her slender hourglass shape and shored up every notion Nick had already formed about her body: Her legs went on forever, her breasts were full and round, and every curve begged to have his hands gliding over it. Her blond hair had been drawn up into a big clip, but a few strands fell free. "I'll go turn on some music and grab some chips," she said.
    A minute later, as he continued running smooth strokes of paint over the rough stucco, a local top forty station boomed a current hit from outdoor speakers, the music punctuated with a couple of splashes from the pool and the sound of a beer tab being popped.
    "So, what's with the swimsuit?" "What do you mean, whats with it?"
    The second voice belonged to Lauren, the first to Carolyn, and both were so close-just around the corner below him-he couldn't help listening.
    Carolyn was so lively that she reminded him of a Muppet. "I just haven't seen you in a one-piece since, like, the tenth grade, and I know you hate an uneven tan. And you look so cute in a two-piece."
    He heard Lauren's sigh and thought she'd looked plenty cute, way more than Carolyn in her slinky silver lame bikini. Admittedly, he would've enjoyed seeing more of Lauren, but she looked sexy in the black suit just the same. "Sorry if I sounded edgy," Lauren replied, softer. "As for the suit, it's just what I pulled out. No particular reason."
    The girls' voices faded as they drifted back toward the pool, yet Nick wondered about Carolyn's observation, as well. From Lucky's appraisal, he'd have expected the princess to be flaunting all those sexy curves.
    After a little more work, he backed down the ladder to refill his paint tray. However, the longer the pool party continued, the more difficult it became for him to block it out, especially knowing Lauren was back there with the "dudes," as he'd started thinking of the two guys. His stomach twisted when he imagined her giving them what he wanted from her. And hearing the party noises while he worked gave him the damnedest sensation of being some kind of servant in the midst of high luxury. Before starting on the last square of pink remaining on the side of the house, he rounded the comer and leaned casually against the stucco. He just wanted to see how the party was going, if it was still the small crowd of five or if it'd grown. And he also wondered vaguely if Lauren Ash was hoping he'd stay hidden, as good help surely did.
    His eyes fell instantly on the pool, on Carolyn and the dudes in the shallow end. The guy with the ponytail held her from behind, one arm looped around her waist, the other across her chest, and the blond one played with her feet. "Stop it," she said. laughing, kicking. But even from that distance, he saw the anxious light in her eyes, heard the teasing lilt in her voice. Pony Tail tugged threateningly at one of her silver triangles, laughing, and Carolyn looked over her shoulder to scold him. "Mike!" Yet Nick felt confident that Mike, like Lucky, had been there and farther before.
    The blond guy parted her legs and stepped between them to haul her up out of Mike's arms. "Come 'ere, babe." Carolyn wrapped her arms and legs around him in the waist-deep water.
    "My hero," she cooed, drawing him into a passionate kiss.
    It was then that Nick caught sight of Lauren Ash from the comer of his eye. She stood still as a statue. not twenty feet away, watching the scene in the pool just as he was. It wasn't as if they were watching it together, yet somehow he felt as though they were, like two strangers thrust into someone else's intimate world. And, of course, that reminded him of her intimate world, the one he'd unwittingly violated earlier in the day.
    As he shifted his gaze to her, he tried to define what he saw in her eyes. Something dark he couldn't read,