by Kate Meader
The dress she’d worn today draped over her thighs, its loose fit making access easy, but he didn’t take the easy route. He just kissed her and fondled her rear, like he was learning her shape. Making plans for later.
His tongue tangled with hers, a deliciously sensuous dance. A small moan escaped his throat and set her on a path to wildness, giving her permission to enjoy this intensely physical connection. She was wet, and not from the rain. Between her thighs, heat she’d not felt in forever bloomed, all because Remy DuPre was slowly seducing her in a secret courtyard.
Forget his name. Forget who he is. Forget everything.
She rolled her hips into his erection because she was a modern woman and pleasure was hers for the taking. The action unmoored something in him. In them both.
Suddenly they were clawing at each other’s clothing below the waist, fighting to be the first to go hand to skin. Zipper down. Briefs tugged halfway off. I’m winning!
He refused to give her the lead. Large, rough hands hiked up her dress, kneaded her ass, and delved into her panties. Finally, finally he was touching her. He’s winning!
But it wasn’t enough, because she needed to feel all that hard perfection. She wrapped her hands around his cock and stroked.
He grunted. “Fuck.”
She did it again, this time sliding from root to tip. Controlling his pleasure, and the man with it, felt so damn good. Her mouth dried up and her pussy gushed, both clearly jealous of her hand.
“Harper—dammit—let me—”
His fingers stroked through her and it was amazing, but she couldn’t let him get ahead. Why should he dictate the terms? So it was expected that the woman should disintegrate first, but what if she couldn’t and why should she feel that performance anxiety and—
He pushed inside her, one finger, then two, the stretch amazing, and all the while his mouth devoured and destroyed, breaking her down pulse by shivering pulse. She loved and hated what he was doing to her. The pleasure she demanded that would only be her ruin.
She cupped his invading fingers and pushed them away, out of her body. Anything to get her bearings. Then she reapplied herself to breaking him with a hard, rough stroke, her fingers circling and pumping, using his pre-come to smooth her glide.
“Merde, Harper. This isn’t a fucking contest.” Oh, this dangerous man had her number, and to prove it, his fingers resought her heat, outside, inside, to the depths of her soul. Just a couple of strokes sent her flying. She came apart all over his hand, a victory for her damn hormones and a defeat for Clifford Chase’s daughter.
She needed revenge. She needed to see him on his metaphorical knees, because if she had to feel so weak, she wanted company on this ride to hell. Harder and harder, she pumped, stroked, raided.
“Oui, juste comme ça. N’arrêtez pas.”
His gaze was sticky hot on her hand, his groans louder with every stroke until he finally let go. Unlike her reluctant orgasm, Remy’s was wild, noisy, and joyful. She would expect nothing less.
She jerked back, thumping her head against the wall behind her. “Ouch.” Good. She needed the jolt to sanity.
His hand was splayed across her ass, now the other cradled her head. “You okay, minou?”
Tears sprang into her eyes, and not from her argument with the wall behind her. “I’m—I’m fine.” But she was far from it. She felt as if she’d lost some piece of herself, though she couldn’t say what.
“Hey, it’s okay, baby.” He wiped a tear that had escaped despite her best attempts to restrain it. “A kiss from me shouldn’t hurt.” His eyes crinkled with laughter, a joke in there about how they’d done a damn sight more than kiss.
His humor froze the blood in her veins. Kisses shouldn’t hurt. Men shouldn’t hurt. But the devil beat his wife, and that was the way of the world.
“I—I have to go.”
The rain had stopped, but even if it hadn’t she would have run through floods to escape him.
He watched her with a wariness that wasn’t there before. “I’ll walk you back.”
TWELVE
Three hours later, Harper felt a little silly for her behavior this afternoon. Things had gotten out of hand and she had acted like a frightened virgin.
That’s what happened when you’d gone so long without. You panicked. Her real concern should have been this attraction she had for an employee. She’d crossed a line and it wouldn’t, couldn’t, happen again.
She blinked back to the tour in time to catch the tail end of a story about the ghost of Pere Claude, whose robes could be heard swishing over the mist-shrouded streets near the cathedral along with his muttered prayers. The woman leading the tour had an animated way about her—a frustrated actress, no doubt—and she clearly relished her work.
“Antoinette, mistress of a wealthy Frenchman in the early 1800s, made the mistake of falling in love with the man who kept her in great style in this fine home on Royal Street.” The guide flourished a hand toward a beautiful building, dripping with history. “The Frenchman was also in love, but marriage to a woman with one eighth Creole blood was unthinkable at that time. He asked her to prove her love—if she spent the night outside, naked as the day she was born, he would marry her. It was a cold December night, much like this one”—tonight was actually quite warm and it was November, but the crowd went with it—“and the beautiful girl’s lover was sure she would come inside. But he hadn’t reckoned on her desire to prove herself good enough for him. In the morning, he found his beautiful Antoinette nude and lifeless outside on her balcony.”
She paused for effect, then pointed at the roof. All eyes followed her condemning finger. “Now on the coldest December nights Antoinette can be seen walking the roof, naked, wailing her love for the Frenchman who insisted she pass his harsh test.”
Harper repressed an eye roll. Typical man, who couldn’t appreciate his woman while she was here.
The women in the group huddled closer to the men they’d dragged with them on the tour. Typical women.
You sound like a jealous shrew, Harper. Granted, she wouldn’t have minded a strong male body to curl into on a winter’s night in New Orleans. If he whispered French in her ear, all the better.
“Bonjour, minou.”
The streets were filled with ghosts, and they sounded like hot Cajun hockey players. She turned, surprised to find the fantasy wasn’t of the spirit world at all. Remy stood before her like the result of some spell.
“Is there a GPS tracker in my purse?”
Eye crinkling ensued. “Just thought you might like some company.”
He wore a Jimmy Buffett Fun Run 1997 ball cap pulled low over his forehead, a tan leather jacket that smelled almost as good as him, cowboy boots, and very worn jeans. Probably the same ones he’d filled out so well earlier. You know, when he was feeling her up.
More than feeling you up, naughty girl. Her star center had kissed her senseless, fondled her ass, and given her an orgasm that left her knock-kneed. In truth, she’d be a damned sight safer if she stayed the hell away from Remy DuPre. Tonight she should have just changed into her PJs, mainlined a bottle of wine, and settled in for a Real Housewives marathon.
The group was moving. She was not.
He gestured to the slowly departing backs. “After you.”
Was it so wrong to take pleasure in his company? It so was. But if she never expressed it aloud, then it would remain her dirty little secret.
She let the group move away because frankly she wanted him to herself. Each thought in her brain was getting more wildly inappropriate by the minute. She wanted to pull him into an alley and finish what they’d started earlier. She wanted him to lift her skirt, slip a finger—two—no, three—inside her, stretching her in readiness for that thick, fat cock she’d stroked with such abandon earlier.
“Harper?” he asked again, eyeing her like he knew
exactly which lewd thoughts were running on the hamster wheel in her brain.
This was insanity. He was—oh, God. She hurried to catch up with the chaperones her untrustworthy mind and hands so obviously needed. He caught up with that easy, ground-eating stride of his.
“What brings you out on this fine evening?” she asked, endeavoring to be sociably distant.
“I haven’t done one of these tours for a while. Thought it might be fun. And educational.”
His presence was certainly educational for her. A warning about how she was in serious danger here.
The tour guide stopped outside a bar. “Now we have a tale that’ll appeal to all you lovers out there. This former speakeasy was owned by the New Orleans mob, and the mob boss’s daughter fell in love with a musician.” She arced her gaze over the group, alighting briefly on Remy. Her squint said she recognized either a native son or a mooch bumming a tour. “Every night the musician would bring his lover flowers, until one night he didn’t show. The mob boss had put a hit on him for daring to touch his precious daughter.”
“What happened to the daughter?” one of the ladies near the front asked.
The answer surprised no one. “She killed herself. Now her spirit haunts the balcony of the club and the sweet scent of flowers lingers on the stairs.”
Remy cleared his throat loudly. “Funny how all these ghosts tend to be women with an ax to grind.”
The tour guide—Josette was her name—glared at Remy. “Women who’ve been wronged tend to be pissed off.”
“Even in death, apparently,” Remy said laconically.
“Wouldn’t stop me,” Harper said.
“Precisely.” Josette pointed at Harper, as if this were a very insightful thing to say instead of a rather cheap shot at Remy’s observation.
Laying a withering glare on Remy, the guide continued. “Let’s move on. We’ve got at least three angry lady ghosts to cover.”
The crowd laughed at her good humor, and as they moved away, Harper slid a glance at Remy, who was grinning outrageously. It hit her right in the lady parts.
“Happy, DuPre? You’ve pissed off a live woman who’s probably in touch with the spirits.”
“Don’t you worry none. I’ve got a way of charming the ladies, both alive and dead.”
Forty minutes later, the tour ended about two blocks from her hotel, and Harper’s nerves set to a jangle again. She was going to have to negotiate an extraction from this situation, because Remy had made no move to abandon her.
Damn his manners.
As the tour guide smiled and accepted tips, Harper fished in her purse for her wallet and plucked out a twenty-dollar bill. So it was almost as much as the tour itself, but she imagined the guides lived on gratuities, and the tour had been entertaining.
She offered the money. Josette took it and thanked her, but bristled when Remy coughed significantly.
“Problem, couyon?”
“Still gouging tourists, bébête?”
“Better than chasin’ a stupid piece of rubber for forty-five minutes.”
Harper split a gaze between them just as Remy stepped in and pulled the woman into his arms. “I chase that stupid piece of rubber for sixty minutes,” he said, then added loudly, “You’ve put on weight.”
Josette thumped him hard in the shoulder. “Is it any wonder you’re still single if that’s the best you can do?”
Remy turned to Harper. “My pain-in-the-ass sister Josie.”
“My ugly Irish twin, Remy,” Josette countered. She held out her hand to Harper. “Hope you enjoyed the tour, and if you didn’t, I’d rather not know.”
“She doesn’t take criticism well,” Remy said. “I have the scars to prove it.”
Harper smiled. “Bet you deserved every one, what with your tactful tongue and all.” She shook Josette’s hand. “I’m Harper Chase.”
Josette’s eyes—cobalt blue just like Remy’s, Harper now realized—flew wide. “You look taller on TV.”
Harper gestured to her walking-tour-friendly wedges. “I’m usually in heels. Besides, I think everyone looks short next to your brother.”
“True. We’re pretty sure the Loup Garou left him on our doorstep. Momma took pity and raised him as her own.”
“The Loup Garou?”
Remy bared his teeth in a snarl. “Cajun werewolf.”
Josette’s phone pinged and she checked it. “Speak of the woman herself. We’d better get going. You guys need a ride?”
Remy shook his head. “I drove Dad’s truck in, so we’re good.”
“He doesn’t let me drive it!”
“Because you’ve crashed three cars in as many years, sis.”
“It’s the ghosts. They follow me around.” She grinned at Harper. “Okay, see you guys soon.” Off she went, leaving a gust of ghostly wind in her wake.
Remy’s hand moved to her elbow, spreading warmth through her like molten lava. “Dinner plans?”
“I’m not sure it’s a good idea.”
He remained uncharacteristically silent.
“After what happened this afternoon,” she explained. Patiently.
“When we went shoe shopping together.” A cheeky lift appeared at the corner of his mouth.
She fought a smile. “Right. Shoe shopping.”
“Thought I did a good job, tending to your needs.” He leaned in. “Serving you.”
“Stop. It.”
“What?” He blasted her with that do-me grin. “Just talking about shoes.”
“Remy, I can’t do this.” She lowered her voice to a desperate whisper. “I can’t kiss you, be seen with you, have anything to do with you.” Especially orgasmic things.
“Hell, Harper, we went for a walk in the historic French Quarter, took shelter from the rain, and the steamy NOLA heat got to us.”
“It’s November.”
He ignored that. “This is a passionate town and it makes people lose their heads.”
True. The phantoms of women who’d allowed their hearts to trounce common sense haunted the streets around her.
“So that’s all it was? A moment of New Orleans–inspired madness?”
“Told you, it’s New Orr-linz. I’d like to say it snuck up on us, but it’s been building since we met. Somethin’ had to blow.”
Relief loosened her locked-up muscles. He understood. “Yes. We’ve let off some steam and now we can forget all about it.”
He rubbed his chin, as if pondering a great question. “I dunno, Harper. It’s mighty hard to unring that bell, especially now I know how goddamned beautiful you look when you come. That’s kind of like locking the stable door after the orgasm has bolted. Like trying to shove the orgasm genie back in the bottle. Like—”
“Yeah, I get it.” But she wasn’t so sure he got it. This afternoon was a mistake—a sensual, erotic, crazy mistake. “Just because it happened and it felt good does not mean it has to happen again.” That sounded far too encouraging, so she finished with a definitive, “And it won’t.”
Harper Chase had decreed it.
“Okay, I hear you,” he said with a blitheness she didn’t believe for a second. “Now, about dinner.”
He still held her arm, and his touch was starting to burn a path of surrender all the way to places that needed to be fortressed. She refused to be another ghost statistic.
“Remy—”
“There will be chaperones present. My parents, my sisters, my nieces. So many nieces, Harper. You wouldn’t believe the level of estrogen I’ve been contending with my entire life. Now I refuse to sit by you at the dinner table. That way, you won’t be tempted to cop a feel.” He held up a hand as if she’d protested. “I’m serious, femme. No more harassment. You’re gonna have to find some other guy to work your sexual frustration out on.”
“You’re an idiot.
”
“A hungry idiot. Let’s roll.”
THIRTEEN
Sitting in his momma’s parlor, Harper looked a little overwhelmed. Remy liked that look on her. Liked it a lot.
Of course it wasn’t hard to be overwhelmed at a gathering of DuPres. They sure knew how to shock and awe. Take his nieces—five of them between the ages of four and eight—who were crowded around her in a horseshoe of admiration.
“Do you use rollers in your hair?”
“What color is your nail polish?”
“Do you have a boyfriend?”
“Are you as rich as Uncle Remy?”
To which Harper had answered: Sometimes; it’s called Rip Your Heart Out Red; several; and no one is. In that order.
He was already thinking of how to use his chatterbox nieces to pump Harper for intel later, but for now he recognized that it might be a lot for their guest to take in at once. He handed her a glass of wine, to which she muttered something that sounded like, “Thank Christ.”
“Mignon,” he said to his seven-year-old niece, touching her freckled nose. “Would you rather hold a snake or kiss a jellyfish?”
All his nieces ewwed at that. It was a fun game he played with them on the road, checking in on the important issues of the day through FaceTime.
“A snake!” So pronounced Diane, who had just turned six last week and was getting mighty opinionated in her advanced age.
“All right, this question is for everyone. Would you rather be invisible or be able to fly?”
A chorus of competing answers made that one a draw. His sister Elise put her head around the door. “Would you rather set the table before dinner or clean up after?”
“Neither!” Mignon replied, the cheeky little monkey.
“You have to choose,” Remy said. “Remember what I told you?”
“God hates a coward,” they all sang.
“Sure does,” he said. “No fence sitting allowed. How’s about y’all set the table and your aunt Josette will do the dishes?” He loved nominating Josie for chores.