by Lila Monroe
“Couldn’t get enough after all?” Grant drawled lazily, propping himself in the doorway at an angle that both effectively barred my entry and showed off his biceps and pecs to drool-inducing advantage.
Focus, Lacey!
I squared my shoulders and barreled forward, the shock of my advance knocking him out of the way despite his strength advantage. I walked rapidly down the hall; it was a lot easier to keep my resolve when I didn’t have to look him in the face. “We need to talk.”
“My, my, you are eager,” Grant snapped from behind me, abandoning all pretense of languor. I heard the door slam shut in anger. “Has it been a whole hour for you?”
I whirled on him, anger flaring. “Will you cut the bullshit for once? We’re in real trouble!”
Something about my tone, or maybe my eyes, must have alerted him that I really meant what I was saying, because he took a step back and raised his hands defensively before lowering them and asking, slowly, “What kind of trouble?”
I was so surprised by his capitulation that it took me a few seconds to find the words. Only when his eyebrow began to rise did I blurt out: “Portia is engineering a hostile takeover!”
I led us into the living room and told him everything I had observed at Rama, pulling up the information on James C. Brandt on Kate’s phone—sending out a quick mental thank-you to her for letting me borrow it—to show him the long and storied history his hedge fund had of partnering with an ally within the company, and using that person to divide loyalties and smooth the way for his takeover. As I talked, Grant’s face grew more and more worried, but the skepticism failed to fade entirely from his eyes.
“Why on Earth would Portia do such a thing?” he said when I finally ran out of breath. He ran a hand through his hair, looking baffled, uncertain, and concerned at the same time. And perhaps a little hurt? “She has everything she needs in her current position, and I’ve responded to all her concerns as best I can. What could she stand to gain?”
“I can’t say, Grant, I’m not in her head,” I said wearily, sinking down onto the couch. I looked up at him earnestly. “But you saw how she was acting in the meeting. All that sudden concern over costs? Making allies beforehand to try to ambush and pressure you? Playing nicey-nice to keep the conversation rolling after you said things that would have gotten your head bitten off any other time? Tell me you’re not a little bit weirded out about all that.”
Grant chewed his lip, looking off into the distance. “It was strange, I admit. I didn’t pay the attention to it at the time that I could have, because…”
I waited for him to finish the sentence, but he let it trail off and began to pace around instead.
I jumped back in. “Is there anything else? Has anything else she’s done lately pinged your radar?”
Grant paused thoughtfully. “She stopped by after you…left. She was acting very concerned, but I didn’t think—and later she was asking questions, lots of questions, but I thought she was just trying to distract me from…And I saw her talking to my secretary when I know she can’t stand the woman; she could have been pumping her for information. I didn’t think anything of it at the time because…”
He trailed off again.
“There’s a shareholder meeting at the end of the week,” I said when it became clear that he was going to leave that sentence dangling there. “If Portia’s going to make a play, she’ll have to put it to a vote there.”
“Yes,” he said absently, and echoed, “If she’s going to make a play…”
And that was what it came down to, I guess. If he believed me that she was going to do it. “Do you believe me?” I asked.
“The evidence is…mounting,” he said, but he still looked distracted.
“Well, then, what are we going to do?”
“I suppose—” Grant began musingly, and for a whole second my heart soared with the giddy hope that he was going to approach this problem like a reasonable human being. But then his eyes narrowed in suspicion, and his gaze swung back to me, accusing. “Why do you even care?”
“Excuse me?!” I spluttered.
“You’ve made it quite clear that you don’t give a fuck about the company,” he snapped, his red-hot anger making his accent crisp and near-British as he bit off the words. “Or me, for that matter. So why the show? Why the mad dash to my apartment to save the day? Perhaps you’re hoping for a nice little bonus—or maybe you’re allied with Portia and this is a feint on your part, to throw me off guard?”
“Is that what you really think?” My voice broke on the last word, the hurt catching in my throat. My heart felt as if it were being pierced with thousands of shards of razor-sharp glass. “Is that what you really believe I’m capable of?”
“I know exactly what you’re capable of,” Grant said, stalking towards me. His eyes flashed. “I’ve learned that you’re capable of more coldness and deceit than I thought a mortal woman could be. I learned that, much to my regret, on what was supposed to be our wedding day.”
“How dare you!” I exploded, leaping to my feet. I slapped him across his face, my vision blurring with tears. “How dare you say that I don’t care!? The whole reason I didn’t marry you is that I care too much!” My voice cracked further and the tears fell faster as the words I’d sworn I’d never say spilled from my mouth. “Every time I looked at you it stabbed me in the heart, how much I cared and how much you didn’t—”
“Lacey—” he started, but I couldn’t stop blabbing.
“—because it was all just an act to you! It was all about company PR! How could I stay when I knew you didn’t l—”
Grant closed the space between us with a single stride and clasped my shoulders, yanking me into his arms and devouring my lips in a passionate kiss.
My eyes slid closed automatically at the overload of sensation, and before I knew it I was kissing him back, savoring the taste of his mouth. The scent of him filled me as I melted into his arms, his strong hands holding me tightly to him as we wound around each other.
We kissed as though it were about to be outlawed, we kissed as though we could breathe each other’s essence into ourselves, we kissed as though kissing were the only thing keeping the world from ending.
Our lips broke apart and I almost staggered, dazed. Grant’s eyes gleamed with desire and he leaned in to claim me once more. Somewhere through the fog of lust in my brain a small siren of responsibility blared, and I managed to get out: “But, the company—”
Then Grant kissed me again with an urgency like fire, and I forgot anything but him.
“The company can wait for now,” he murmured as we broke apart, a devilish smile playing upon his lips. “But I can’t wait one moment longer for you.”
He guided me to his bedroom, laying down next to me as he kissed slowly down my neck. He teased and nipped around the collar of my silk shirt, slowly pulling it off over my head. He looked at my breasts in awe, and then buried his face between them. He growled. I tried to remember how breathing worked.
Sliding my skirt up my legs, he slipped a finger under the lace of my panties, massaging me in a delicious and tantalizing rhythm. Oh how I wanted him inside me again, and I bucked against his fingers as he stroked me. So good. So right. Wait.
Was this a good idea? Maybe it wasn’t a good idea—maybe—his lips trailed kisses back up my neck, his mouth claiming mine again, and oh yes, it was. It was a very, very good idea. Consequences be damned. I fisted the bed sheet in my hands, writhing beneath him.
“Come for me, Lacey,” he demanded, sliding in his finger, first one, then two, and then the third, stretching me, still not quite filling me up, oh God, I needed him to—
His questing fingers found my g-spot, and I moaned as he intensified the pressure. Using his thumb to tease my clit, I felt myself getting closer to the edge. His strong fingers continued thrusting into me, perfectly, and the whole world went a blinding white as red-hot heat rippled outward from my core, leaving me helpless as an epic orgasm tore thr
ough my body like an earthquake.
I slowly came back to myself, feeling Grant settling himself on top of me, the lovely weight and heft of him, the strength of his arms and legs, the warmth of his skin.
I stroked his hair, his cheek, the strong line of his jaw, before taking his hand and pulling his arm around mine. He squeezed me tight.
The cool night air danced in through an open window and ruffled the silk sheets, but I was warm in Grant’s embrace all night long. And as far as I was concerned, there wasn’t a single place in the world I’d rather be.
33
The tropical sunlight played teasingly over my skin, warming me, though not as much as Grant’s gaze as it traveled the line of my bikini-clad body. The spray of the waterfall made his skin glisten as though each muscle had been made of polished marble, and the sun off the water wasn’t one bit more brilliant than his smile.
“Come on in, the water’s fine,” he drawled, beckoning me into the turquoise pool surrounded by bright flowers. “And don’t feel as though you have to bring the bathing suit…”
I slid into the pool, the rushing of the waterfall nearly drowning out the rapid beating of my heart, the cool water doing nothing to quench the fires he had lit inside of my veins…
Beep-beep beep beeeeep. Beep-beep beep beeeeeep.
“Goddammit, not again,” I muttered, and slapped the alarm off before whacking the pillow in frustration. When would my subconscious stop torturing me with visions of myself and Grant together again? When would I be able to get a good night’s sleep without torrid dreams which, to add insult to injury, got cut off right before the good stuff by the sound of my ancient alarm clock going off, leaving me with only the scent of Grant on the silk pillow—
Wait just a damn second.
My alarm made an entirely different sound than the one that had just gone off. I didn’t have any silk pillows, and they sure as hell didn’t smell like Grant.
Also, why could I still hear a waterfall?
Memories of last night came flooding back in HD and surround sound, and I sat upright in shock. I gazed around Grant’s bedroom. So…it hadn’t been a dream. There was the evidence right before me—the clothes on the floor, the rumpled sheets, the half-open door to the bathroom, steam drifting out of it from Grant’s morning shower…ah, so that was where my dreaming mind had gotten the sound of the waterfall.
I let my mind drift to last night, to the way Grant had consumed me with his mouth and his hands, to that tender look of passion in his eyes, to the—
I wanted to rest in the amazement and the afterglow, but unfortunately my common sense had woken up with the rest of my brain, and Grant wasn’t right there to send it back to sleep. Shit, what had I done? And what did it mean for him?
What did it mean for…us?
Was there an us?
The sound of the shower cut off abruptly, and I fidgeted with the blanket, suddenly shy.
Grant wandered back into the bedroom, naked except for the towel he was using to squeegee his hair.
Even as nervous as I was, I couldn’t help but take a moment to admire the long lean lines of his body, the way his muscles rippled as he walked. His cock jutted at half-mast from a triangle of golden-brown hair, and my fingers twitched on the blanket, wanting to trace a line down his chest until they rested just above him. I wanted to look up teasingly into his eyes as I very deliberately kept from touching where he wanted me to, and I wanted to say—
Grant’s head swung towards me and he started slightly as he saw that I was awake. “Ah. Good morning. Fancy running into you here.”
His eyes darted all over my body, as if checking that I was really there. A smile crept onto his face, and he couldn’t seem to decide what to do with his hands, starting to lower the towel and then raising it again as drops of water began to drip onto his shoulders.
I couldn’t help but return the smile. God, but I loved him. I loved him when he was imperious and when he was nervous, when he was angry and when he was sweet. I loved each line of his face and every way they changed, in every mood and every situation. I could watch this beautiful man all day. “What a coincidence. Good morning to you, too.”
“I was thinking, ah, eggs?” he said. “Or fruit. Or pancakes. Toast? It occurs to me that I don’t know your favorite breakfast food yet.”
You, I thought but didn’t quite have the confidence to say. “All those sound good. Any of those. I mean, one. Or two. You don’t have to get all of them.”
“I, er.” He elected to lower the towel, finally, not quite covering himself but not keeping his arms awkwardly raised anymore. Now that was more like it. “I may have already ordered all of them.”
“Good,” I said. There was a dizzy, fizzy, soaring singing in my blood, as if I’d downed a glass of champagne just by looking at him. “That’s good.”
There was a silence, probably not as long as it seemed to be, where we were both frozen across the room from each other, me sitting and him standing, both of us naked and grinning our matching goofy nervous uncertain grins.
“Oh, come here!” I burst out finally, opening my arms, and he laughed—a real laugh, at ease and hardly nervous at all, and came into my embrace, pillowing his head against my breasts as I let myself fall back against the headboard, holding the man I loved.
“You don’t—I take it you don’t…regret it, then?” Grant said against my skin. He was curled up against me, seeming in that moment so vulnerable. So lost. “Staying over? Letting me…touch you?”
I stroked his hair gently, feeling yet more love bloom within my chest. How was it that each time I thought I couldn’t love this man more, I found there was yet room to grow? “Not one bit.” I hesitated, my hand stilling as my insecurities struck. “Do you?”
“Never,” he said, pressing a kiss against the swell of my breast as he found my hand and gripped it with reassuring warmth. “Never in a thousand years.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. “Good.”
He chuckled gently. “My sentiments exactly.”
Silence fell again, a little awkward, but not entirely uncomfortable. I found myself wishing we could stay like this forever, and not have to rise and deal with all the problems in the world.
But the world wouldn’t wait for us.
“It’s all right,” I started, at the same time Grant began to say: “If you’d like to talk about it—”
We stuttered off into nervous chuckles, and I caressed his lightly stubbled face.
“How about we talk about it when this is all over?” I suggested finally. “We can figure out what we’re doing here—what this is—after we’ve figured out what Portia’s up to.”
He reached up and covered my hand with his, caressing my fingers. “That works for me.”
The first step in what I was mentally calling Operation Snowplow—‘cause she was an ice queen, get it?—was to figure out what Portia was plotting. And what better place to look for clues than the castle of the ice queen herself—by which of course I meant her office at Devlin Media Corp headquarters.
Grant and I had managed to keep a low profile all the way into the building—it helped that we went through a service entrance, and it was the weekend—but we were stymied by the appearance of Portia’s secretary bustling down the hallway towards her office door, holding a steaming latte she must have picked up on her lunch break.
“Damn,” I muttered, frustrated, peering around the corner as the secretary fumbled with a set of keys. “If we’d just gotten here fifteen minutes earlier!”
“Don’t lose hope yet,” Grant said. He stretched, showing off the way his tight shirt clung to his abs, and grinned wickedly as he undid several buttons on his shirt. “I’ve always wanted to play a homme fatale.”
“Isn’t that supposed to be femme—” I started, but Grant was already sauntering down the hallway towards his prey.
The secretary looked up and her whole face filled with the expression of a deer in head
lights, if headlights had ripped abs and a smile so charming your panties gave up and fell to the floor of their own volition.
“Why, fancy running into you here, Emily,” Grant purred, resting an arm against the wall next to her so that he could loom into her personal space and, by way of a bonus, block her view of the rest of the hall.
“Oh, um, er, hi,” she stammered. I could see her flushing red over his shoulder. “Ms. Smith’s not in, I didn’t know you had an appointment, I mean—”
“No appointment,” Grant murmured, his voice low and intimate. “But lately I’ve been taking a rather…personal…interest in these matters.”
The secretary blushed so hard I was amazed that there was any blood left for the rest of her body.
Grant ran his hand along her sleeve. “I like the way this feels,” he said. “So soft.” His hand lingered right on the collar, just where the fabric met her skin. “Your hair looks soft too.”
“I—I—I—” Emily the secretary stuttered like a faulty tape recorder.
Grant slid his arm around her shoulder, one finger playing with a ringlet of her hair. “It’s a pity Portia isn’t here, but it does give us some time alone—to discuss business, of course.”
“Of course,” Emily echoed, dazed.
Grant began to lead her down the hallway. “Perhaps we could discuss the matter over wine…I know a nice intimate restaurant not too far away…you can take a break, can’t you?”
“Intimate,” she whispered, gazing up into his eyes as though someone had written a winning lottery number there.
“Tell me, Emily,” Grant’s voice carried to me as they disappeared from sight, “do you believe in mixing business with pleasure?”
Meanwhile, around the corner, I was rolling my eyes so hard I almost sprained them. He was going to give that poor girl a heart attack. And if her choice of employment was any indication, she already had enough trouble in her life.
But there’d be time later for pitying those caught in the crosshairs of Grant’s charm.