by Lori Foster
“Uh, no.” Grace licked her dry lips. “What did he say?”
Noah started forward, faltering a little but with definite purpose. And damn if he didn’t have a small, wicked smile tilting one side of his mouth. “You’re all…” His gaze dipped over her too-round body outlined in the clinging clothes—top to bottom and back again, making her heart leap with embarrassment. His eyes met hers. “…wet.”
Grace’s mouth opened, but not a single word emerged.
Noah kept advancing, closer and closer, despite the way she instinctively backed up. Until he stood directly in front of her, until the power of him, the heat and the deep male scent of him touched her all over.
Her breath caught, her pulse tripped and tumbled.
“Gracie,” he murmured, and he touched her cheek, looking at her in a way he’d never looked at her before, in a way no man had ever looked at her. His smile deepened, his eyes brightened. “You’re going to have to lose the wet clothes.”
Grace closed her eyes and wished like hell he wasn’t drunk. But wishing didn’t work. He was drunk—the fact that he’d said such an outrageous thing to her proved it—and that meant she couldn’t take advantage of him, no matter what he said, no matter how badly she wanted to.
Well, damn.
Chapter Two
Even in his inebriated state, Noah knew that half of what he said and did was out of character. Or rather, it was out of character for the man he’d tried to be, to live up to his grandmother’s specifications.
But for the first time in years, he felt like himself again. He was a free man, allowed to do as he pleased, with whomever he pleased. He owed Kara nothing, and after Agatha’s explosion, he didn’t owe her anything either.
In his typical fashion, he’d carefully considered how to handle things after being disowned. Only then had he reacted. He’d already set his plans into motion, and before long, he’d be completely free of Agatha. If they had a relationship after that, if his grandmother claimed him at all, it’d be because she wanted to, not because she needed to.
Because he lived without illusions, he was prepared for either reaction.
He hadn’t been prepared for Grace. She’d thrown him for an emotional loop, giving him her unquestioning support and loyalty. As an illegitimate and late addition to the Harper family, loyalty meant the world to Noah.
Probably because he’d never had it.
Agatha had recently proven he couldn’t have it from her, no matter how many different ways he bent himself—which was why he wouldn’t bend for her anymore.
And he sure as hell hadn’t ever gotten it from the foster parents who’d grudgingly taken him in. Only his brother—who he hadn’t met until he was nearly grown—had ever given him that kind of unconditional support.
And now Grace.
Agatha had made an excellent choice the day she’d hired Grace Jenkins. Noah remembered sitting in on the interview, watching the too-plump twenty-two-year-old, fresh out of college without a single reference. She was alone in the world; her parents had passed away in an accident years before. At that moment, he’d felt a strange affinity to her. They were both alone, both stubborn and determined.
Grace had lifted her rounded chin, met Agatha’s shrewd gaze squarely and listed what she considered her best qualities.
Hardworking, driven, intelligent, rational…and loyal.
That thought made Noah frown. He caught Grace’s hand and tugged her with him toward his bedroom. “Does Agatha know you’re here?”
Noah practically dragged her, she showed so much resistance. But he didn’t let up. He liked the feel of her soft hand in his, and he especially liked the way she looked at him with those enormous brown eyes. They were sexy, no two ways about it. He’d always liked her eyes as much as her determination and backbone.
Noah especially liked them now.
Of course, he was beyond horny, on the ragged edge, but it was more than that. It was…he didn’t know what the hell to label it, and at the moment he didn’t even care to try. “Gracie?”
He pulled her into his bedroom and turned to face her.
She looked up at him through her lashes. Long wet ropes of twisted brown hair clung to her face and throat. She glanced around his room and licked her lips. “What?”
“Does Agatha know you’re here?” he repeated.
“She knows.”
Noah crossed his arms. “I bet she was none too happy.”
That adorable stubborn chin of hers lifted. “I’m a grown woman, Noah Harper. I make my own decisions.”
Shaking his head, Noah turned away to rummage in a drawer. “Meaning she forbade you to come here, huh?”
Grace started to inch back when he located a white T-shirt and pulled it out. He caught her by the upper arm. She was…very soft. Plump, as he already knew, but also soft and warm and intensely female.
He could smell her wet hair, her damp skin, and his blood burned.
It hadn’t been that long since he’d walked in on Kara, but there’d been much to do, to deal with, and no time to find a woman. Knowing he was now free to indulge his true nature made it doubly hard to wait. He was so frustrated, so sexually primed after the long deprivation of his engagement and the emotional drain of ending it, he felt ready to go nuts.
But he had to remember that this was Grace, his grandmother’s secretary, a gentlewoman, a very respectable and innocent woman.
I’m not used to men touching me. God, the very idea of being her first made his imagination shoot into overdrive and all his muscles clench.
“Grace,” Noah said, his voice too harsh, “are you going to be in trouble for coming here?”
She lifted one shoulder. “I don’t know. I’ll deal with that later. Not that it matters.” That ferocious, protective glimmer lit her eyes. “None of them had any right to crucify you. I couldn’t stand by and let you think that we all felt the same.”
“Because you don’t?”
“Of course not.”
“Because you know me so well?”
She stammered, then snapped her teeth together. “Noah Harper, I’ve known you for three years. You’re like me in a lot of ways. Hardworking and proud and conscientious. You would never do anything so reprehensible as breaking an engagement without a good solid reason.”
God, her faith in him felt good. It seeped into him, warming him from within, easing some of his roiling tension.
Noah prided himself on his ability to analyze situations, to calmly make sound decisions. He couldn’t analyze Grace or how she made him feel.
Without another thought, Noah bent and kissed her.
Grace leaped back so quickly, she lost her balance and landed on her butt.
Dazed by her reaction, Noah frowned, bent to haul her upright, and lost his balance, too, almost landing on her. She stiffened her arms against him until he’d regained his equilibrium and straightened back up.
“Noah, really!” Grace sputtered from her position at his feet.
Hoping to sound gentle rather than predatory, Noah stared down at her and said, “Out of those wet clothes, babe.”
She lumbered upright in graceless haste and clasped her hands together over her sweater, as if to keep it on her person.
What? Did Grace think he meant to attack her? Hell, he could barely keep from falling on his face. Not that the idea of having her under him didn’t appeal. It did. In a big way. But Noah doubted he was up to the performance. Gracie was the type of woman who deserved to be treated special.
She was not a woman for a quick lay.
Still, he noticed the frantic rise and fall of her magnificent breasts. Unable to stop staring, wondering how she’d look buck naked, Noah asked, “What’s wrong, Grace?”
Noah actually heard her gulp. It had been a long, long time since he’d had to deal with a timid woman. He kind of liked it. Before becoming engaged to Kara—and even a few times after—women had come on to him with blatant confidence in their skills. Even Kara, though re
served in her genteel nature, had never doubted her appeal or her influence.
Grace, however, looked like a bewildered rabbit, ready to bolt if he said boo.
She hadn’t looked like that earlier, when she’d vehemently defended his abused honor. Noah grinned. Yeah, he liked it; he liked her, a lot.
“There’s no reason for me to change my clothes,” Grace muttered, “because I’ll just get wet again when I leave.”
Noah was drunk, no two ways about it, but he wasn’t dead. Grace felt like a balm, like a ray of warm sunshine in the middle of the storm, and he wanted her.
He waited till she looked up, then snared her gaze. Her dark eyes widened warily. “I don’t want you to leave, Grace.”
“You don’t?”
Noah felt himself sway and squared his shoulders. “Will you stay with me, Gracie?”
Her gaze skipped to the bed behind him. “Here?” she squeaked.
That single word sounded like a suggestion, a seduction. His gut tightened. “Yeah.”
Grace looked scandalized and…maybe full of yearning? Damn, Noah wished his head wasn’t so foggy with drink. He had the feeling that dealing with Grace would prove tricky. Especially since at the moment he wasn’t even sure of his own mind, much less hers. He only knew he wanted, and the wanting was somehow tied to Grace.
For now.
“Why?” Grace asked, still holding herself and still very uncertain.
“I need you.”
He said it without thinking about it, and Grace appeared to melt right before his eyes. Her knees went weak and she leaned on the dresser while devouring him with her deep dark gaze. Her lush mouth relaxed, her face softened, her entire expression became one of tenderness and acceptance and love.
Noah hadn’t known he was starving till he saw everything he wanted so clearly in Grace.
“Oh, Noah,” she whispered.
Metering his pace so she wouldn’t run from him, Noah approached her. He slung the T-shirt onto his shoulder and, still holding her gaze, began unbuttoning her sweater.
With a gasp, Grace looked down, away, everywhere but at him.
“Hey.”
She swallowed and shook her head, quivering—from cold or nervousness?
“We…we should turn out the light.”
“It’s not on.” But the curtains were drawn wide, and despite the rain-dark weather and low purple clouds, there was enough gray light coming through the windows that Noah could see her clearly. A good thing, since he wanted to visually explore her whole body, inch by luscious inch.
He pushed the drenched sweater off her shoulders and inhaled sharply. Her breasts were more than a handful, full and heavy and so sexy his cock strained in his jeans.
Her bra was the sturdy type, white cotton with an underwire, necessary to support a woman of her endowments. But it, too, was wet, making it transparent. Noah could see the outline of her rosy nipples showing through.
He was busy staring and trying to rein in his lust when Grace jerked away, turning her back on him and hunching her shoulders.
Because he’d drowned his anger in drink, his damn reflexes were slow, and Noah stood there a moment trying to decide what had happened. By the time he realized she was actually hiding from him, it was too late. Grace reached behind her and flapped an impatient hand. “Give me the shirt.”
There was a strange quiver to her tone, what sounded far too close to embarrassment to suit Noah.
Somehow, he’d find a way to make her understand her own appeal.
He handed her the tee and said, “Get rid of the bra, too.” Yeah, all of it. He cleared his throat, but even to his inebriated ears, he still sounded far too turned on. “You’re soaked down to your skin, Grace, and I don’t want you to catch cold.”
And if she believed that, he’d sell her a bridge.
Grace froze, clutching the T-shirt in her small fists. Then, with a contortionist’s dexterity, she pulled it over her head without losing her fragile grip on the sweater. Beneath the cover of the tee she stripped out of her bra and finally removed the wet sweater—without showing Noah a single speck of additional flesh. She dropped the sweater and her bra over the arm of a bedside chair.
Noah quirked a brow, amused and also disgruntled that he hadn’t gotten to see her. He felt drunker by the moment. And hotter. “Now the skirt.”
Grace peeked at him over her shoulder, and he saw her cheeks were hot with color. But she had guts, his Gracie. She kicked off her shoes, then bent to pick them up and place them neatly by the door. With her bottom lip caught between her teeth, she reached beneath the skirt and peeled out of her panty hose. She folded them and put them with the shoes.
Unknowingly, she provided Noah with a tantalizing strip show that nearly did him in. His testicles tightened, and his blood surged.
Noah locked his knees and said, “Go on.”
Because he was so much taller, his T-shirt hung to mid-thigh on her, half covering the long loose skirt. She’d put it on over her wet clothes and now it was damp, too. It also molded to her breasts, and the second Noah noticed that her nipples were pressed tightly against the cotton, he nearly lost it.
Grace walked to the other side of his bed, where Noah couldn’t see the bottom half of her, and reached back to slide down her zipper. She watched his face while he watched her body. Her movements thrust her breasts forward, made her nipples even more noticeable. He could almost taste her in his mouth, feel the texture of her against his tongue.
In a growl, Noah asked, “Why are you hiding from me, Grace?” He had his suspicions, but he wanted to hear her say it to be sure.
She pursed her mouth and shimmied the skirt down her fleshy thighs. Soft, silken, fleshy thighs. Noah wanted to feel those thighs high on his shoulders, or better yet, against his jaw while he tasted her….
“I’m fat.”
His head jerked up, all thoughts of devouring her temporarily scattered. “What the hell did you say?”
Grace frowned and dropped the skirt over the footboard of the bed. Cheeks warm, her eyes soft, she faced him in nothing more than his white T-shirt and panties. Her wet hair streamed over her shoulders, her feet pressed together, she said, “You’re not blind, Noah. You’ve known me three years.”
“Yeah, so?”
“So you know I’m fat.”
Anger ripped through him. It wasn’t at all like what he’d felt when confronting his grandmother and Kara and her parents. No, this was the real thing, singing through his veins, firing his blood.
Through a red haze, Noah surveyed Grace, and all he could think about was getting his hands on her. All of her. “Who says?” he growled.
She tilted her head in confusion. “No one has to say. I have a mirror.”
“And I have a hard-on.”
She drew back, blinking rapidly. “You…you’re drunk.”
“Yeah.” He couldn’t very well deny that when even now he kept swaying on his feet. “I’m also ready to combust with wanting to get inside you.” There, let her deal with that honesty.
Her gaze skipped down his body to his lap, her fascination almost tangible. Damn, but Noah felt it like a lick of fire.
Or just a lick.
“Not,” he rasped, wanting to reassure her, “that I intend to do anything about it.”
Grace chewed her lips, still staring at his cock, which without his instruction flexed and strained against the rough denim of his jeans. She lifted dark eyes to his. “No?”
Through his teeth, Noah said, “You’re an incredible woman, Grace. Too damn good to be bedding down with me.”
That caused her modesty to evaporate posthaste. “No!” She rounded the bed in a furious stomp that did interesting things to all her bouncing parts. With a short finger jabbing at his chest, she shouted, “You’re the finest man I know, Noah Harper!”
He caught and held her wrist, keeping her hand close so she couldn’t prod a hole into him. “A man presently disowned by the only family who ever wanted to cl
aim him.”
Anger vibrated through her. Her hand opened on his chest, fisted in his sweatshirt. “Agatha is being pigheaded. But don’t worry, I’ll see to her.”
Now that thought was truly alarming. “You let me deal with Agatha.”
Her chin firmed. “I’ll do what I think is right.”
Noah scowled. “Grace, it’s not necessary for you to get involved. I have no doubt my grandmother will turn around soon enough. She might not really want me in the family—”
“She does!”
“—but she needs me there all the same.”
Her frown almost matched his own. “What are you talking about?”
“In the last few years, there’s been a shift of power in at least one aspect.” Noah felt great satisfaction as he explained, “Not only have I been in charge of all the finances, making all the decisions without influence, but the employees at the restaurant are loyal to me first, Agatha second. And she knows it.”
Looking much struck, Grace murmured, “I hadn’t really thought about it, but of course you’re right. She’s been deferring to you for so long…”
“Hoisting all the work on me, you mean. Especially anything that required a diplomatic tongue.” At Harper’s Bistro, Noah was in charge, and that gave him leverage. “Agatha tends to demand a lot for a little, and her impatience is legendary. I believe in rewarding good work accordingly.”
Grace stared at him, deep in thought. “I know you’re very respected. Agatha brags about that all the time.”
Noah didn’t allow himself to believe that. Compliments from his grandmother were few and far between. Not that he gave a damn. Not anymore.
“The fact that Agatha chose to add another chef into an already territorial mix of personnel will only alienate them more. If she doesn’t quit pushing, she’s going to end up with several key members of the staff walking out.”
And then, Noah thought, she’d be beckoning him back, despite what her society friends might have to say about it.
He knew how to deal with his grandmother, and he would.
“Oh dear,” Grace said, already jumping ahead mentally to all the complications, and likely more work such a scenario would bring her. As Agatha’s personal secretary, Grace caught the brunt of his grandmother’s temper and had to deal with the fallout whenever things didn’t go her way. Grace had fixed more messes than Noah ever would.