"It's too late to back out now," Edward told her, "A deal's a deal."
"But Edward! I know it seemed a good idea at the time, but we'd both had a few glasses of wine, and... and I just think you're going too far."
Edward ignored Alejandra's pleading and shook his head slowly. "You were happy for me to give you... sorry lend you... the dress. But if you weren't willing to pay for it then you should have backed out then."
Alejandra knew he wouldn't back down. He never did. Now she wished she'd never agreed to this deal in the first place. But the dress had looked so good on the mannequin, and she'd just had to have it. Beautiful clothes were her weakness, and Edward knew it. It had seemed just a tease when Edward had said he'd buy the dress for himself, and that perhaps she could borrow it from him.
"I'll want it back later," he'd said with a wink, "And then what will you do?" She should have known from the look in his eyes that he meant every word.
"Then I'll just have to prance about in my underwear for the rest of the night," Alejandra had replied.
Edward smiled. "I'd like to see that."
"I bet you would," she'd teased, reassuring herself that it was just play acting. "But what if I enjoyed it more than you did?"
Now she felt very different, standing in the middle of Prague's main square. She admitted to herself that, even at the time, she had a feeling Edward would enforce the terms of the deal. But it was one thing to do it in the privacy of a hotel room and quite another in the middle of a public square surrounded by late night revellers.
Alejandra took a deep breath and looked down at herself. The dress really was beautiful. The bright green satin matched her eyes. The plunging V neckline showed off her smooth, amber skin and the loose folds of fabric just barely covered her breasts. There was no bra that she could have worn beneath the dress and the tight, figure-hugging cut of the waist would have revealed every line of her underwear. So, she'd gone without underwear at all, just for one evening. It was not something she made a habit of, and certainly not with a dress this short. Somewhat unexpectedly, she'd felt turned on for the whole evening. She hadn't told Edward this yet, though.
Edward stood a few feet away from her with his arms crossed impatiently.
"You can have it back in one hour," he said.
"One hour!" Alejandra almost shouted. Her eyes pleaded with Edward but he remained implacable.
"An hour in your underwear; that's not so bad," he teased.
"But Edward... this is all I'm wearing." Edward raised an eyebrow in amusement: so Alejandra had been without underwear all night? He wished he'd known that before.
Alejandra's eyes pleaded: if he wasn't embarrassed on her behalf then surely he'd be embarrassed to be seen with a naked woman?
Edward only smiled. "One hour," he repeated.
