Summer Heat

by Carly Phillips

  It was just a story, why was she reacting so strongly to it?

  Stupid question.

  Saint Connor saves another one.

  First his brother and then perfect strangers he met driving past a vandalized house. The man was so…so frustrating. That whole bad boy part of him was just one tiny, inconsequential part of him that he so wrongfully defined himself by.

  Inside that hard, gruff exterior was a kind, caring man. A sweet man. A man that seemed to be hellbent on buying up every ripe avocado in the area to make sure she’d have an endless supply of guacamole while she was staying at his home. Simply because she’d mentioned that was her dissertation writing snack of choice.

  Out of nowhere, she saw Tom waving a hand in front of her face.

  She blinked and focused back on him again. Shoot, had he asked her a question? If he had, he didn’t repeat it.

  Instead, he just teased, “There’s that smile again, Abby.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CONNOR WALKED into his office, closed the door, and sat down before he let himself go quietly ape shit.

  $7.3 billion.

  That was the unexpectedly sudden, final closing agreement for the complex multi-corporation dual merger and acquisition case he’d devoted the last five months of his life to. Seven-point-three billion dollars.

  Taking a deep breath, he stared out the window at the picturesque view that his equity partnership had bought him in the firm, even though he was way too keyed up and pumped full of adrenaline to see anything really.

  Seven-point-three.

  Billion.

  Absently, he reached over and flicked the little stress reducing toy Abby had given him last week—a colorful little monster with wobbly arms, crazy troll hair, and a suction base that kept it secured to his desk for even the strongest stress-flicks to its googly-eyed head.

  Talk about sticking out like a sore thumb. It didn’t go at all with his office décor and yet he found himself keeping it front and center next to his phone on his executive mahogany desk.

  Because it was weird and funny in the cutest possible way, just like Abby.

  And that’s why he loved it.

  No woman he’d dated in the past would’ve gotten him anything like it. Nor would any of ‘em have gone to the trouble of looking up the 1971 Charger to learn all there was to know about the car’s history. But Abby had. In fact, she now knew more about his car’s engine stats than he did, something she’d excitedly displayed all throughout breakfast this morning.

  It’d been adorable.

  Then she’d gone and done the exact opposite of adorable by slipping him the tongue in what was supposed to be an innocent goodbye kiss. And he’d experienced an actual leave of his senses. He’d been ready to throw her up against the nearest table, floor, or wall and have all kinds of circus sex with her.

  It was a near thing, too.

  If the appointment alarm on her phone hadn’t sounded, there was a good chance he’d still be there right now going for round two…or twenty.

  He flicked the stress monster again.

  Before he fully realized he was doing it, his fingers were reaching for his phone and dialing her number.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey.” Okay, now what? Another flick. “So…we closed the deal for $7.3 billion today.”

  The sound of books falling on the other end of the phone line had him sitting up taller. And grinning. She’d dropped her books for him.

  “Oh my gosh, congratulations! Was it the carve-outs you renegotiated that sold them? I bet it was. Oh, but what about all those re-management concerns you had for the merger side? Did the spin-off push anything back at all? I know you were worried about the intellectual property on the acquisition end.” Somehow, all of that came out as one long sentence. But she wasn’t done yet. “$7.3 billion?! Holy crap, Connor! Were all the parties happy with the new deal? What am I saying? Of course they were. How are you not completely freaking out right now?!”

  Connor laughed silently when Abby finally dragged in a gasping breath. Christ, she was priceless. “When I get home, I’ll be sure to give you the short version of everything that happened, sweetheart.”

  “Screw the short version, I want to hear it all. It’s a good thing I made—”

  Silence.

  “Abby? Hello?”

  “Sorry, yes, I’m still here.”

  He frowned. “Are you okay? You got cut off there for a bit.”

  “I dropped my phone.”

  That sounded like a lie. “Okay…well, what were you saying? You mentioned making something.”

  “Oh, it’s nothing. I can save it for another night. I’m sure you have some big celebration planned with all your colleagues. So of course the short version, definitely. Even if I’m sleeping, come wake me up okay? I’m dying to know the details.”

  For crying out loud, he wanted to wrap her up in his arms and kiss her senseless. She actually thought he was going to celebrate without her tonight. “Abby, I’ve seen way more than enough of my colleagues for the past five months. I want to spend my night with you, share everything that happened today with you. If you don’t want to cook whatever you had planned, we can go out. Anywhere you want.”

  “Anywhere I want?” Her voice still had that heart-tugging hesitancy. “We should go where ever you want to go.”

  That was a first. To his knowledge, the standard reply to that offer was usually the most expensive restaurant and/or the most exclusive club. At least in his experience with women.

  He embraced the novelty. “Well, if you’re going to let me choose, I’d kind of like to stay in.”

  “Really?” He could almost see her skeptical frown through the phone.

  “Yes. But again, if you don’t want to cook, I will. Or we can do take-out.”

  “You’re being ridiculous. Of course I’ll cook. This is your big night. But are you sure you don’t want to—”

  “I’m coming home for dinner, Abby. Period. I’ll be there at eight.” Damn, that sounded light years away. Maybe he could cancel his next few meetings…

  “If you’re absolutely—”

  “Abby.” She was so freakin’ precious.

  “Okay, okay. Yes, eight o’clock. But, if you make it nine, you can probably get in some celebratory drinks with your friends and that’ll give me extra time to make something way more elaborate and—”

  “I’m hanging up now, sweetie,” he sang out. “See you tonight.”

  All he caught after that were razor sharp snippets about pigheads and horse butt as he replaced the phone back in its cradle. Knowing Abby, she could’ve easily been talking about him or the menu she had planned.

  Either way, this was already promising to be an interesting night.

  * * * * *

  AT EIGHT O’CLOCK on the dot, he walked in his house to the sight of Abby bursting out from the kitchen at full speed. She launched herself at him and peppered his face with kisses. “Congrats, congrats, congrats!”

  Chuckling, he caught her face in his hands and gave her a long, slow kiss.

  “You smell good.” He stopped and sniffed again. “In fact, this whole house smells good. What is that?” Definitely not pighead or horse’s butt.

  She gave him a strange look. “Cookies.”

  He looked over and sure enough there on the big granite island was a platter of freshly baked cookies. He grew still as a statue.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He was wondering the same thing as well.

  And then it hit him. “No one’s ever made me cookies before.”

  In no way was he prepared to see tears wash over Abby’s eyes. Though she covered it up well with a whole lot of blinking, he saw the pain there—pain for the boy whose mother had never made him cookies.

  Pain for him.

  “Well, that puts a bunch of pressure on me,” she said, audibly modulating her voice. “Hopefully, you have the same taste in cookies as your niece.”

  Now that she
mentioned it, he did recall Skylar raving about Abby’s world famous cookies. “How long have you been baking these for her?”

  She shrugged. “Since Beth’s hands started failing her pretty early on, it was hard for her to do things in the kitchen so…I don’t know, maybe kindergarten?”

  He picked up a cookie and felt a strange desire to crystallize the moment, savor his first bite of a cookie made just for him.

  As his teeth closed on the warm, chewy treat, he looked over and caught Abby gnawing on a thumbnail nervously, waiting for his reaction.

  He wanted to crystalize that moment as well.

  “They’re delicious.” His voice was rougher, thicker than usual.

  She averted her eyes again. “Oh, good. I’m glad you like them. I didn’t know how else to help you celebrate your big win. I tend to defer to baking for all things celebratory…which is why I keep an extra pair of jeans the next size up when any holidays come rolling around…” She was babbling adorably, seemingly unable to stop. “I’m sure you’re used to more lavish hooplas—”

  He grabbed her and kissed her again.

  As his male ego was pleased to note, that seemed to ground her. By the time he relinquished his hold on her lips, she was smiling again. “I made pot roast in the crockpot. Since you’re such a fan of good ole fashioned dishes and all, I called my mom for her recipe and wrote it out on an index card for you so you can add it to your collection.”

  The gesture tugged at his chest. More and more, in unique little Abby ways, she was burrowing the most unlikely, but clear cut path to his heart.

  He was going to miss her when she was gone.

  It hit him then how different the house was going to be tomorrow after she left...after she went back to her own home. His gut clenched at the thought, rebelled against the notion of her calling anywhere else home since his only concept of the word for the past few weeks had existed around her.

  Because of her.

  And now he didn’t want to give that up, didn’t want her to go back to a home that he wasn’t in, didn’t want to think about the other inevitable reality he knew he’d have to face a few weeks after that.

  The end of their month together.

  Somewhere between his bedroom door and his closet, he was struck with the inane thought that there were thirty-one days in August.

  One extra day in the month.

  It stood to reason that his arrangement with Abby could be a thirty-one day month instead of thirty…never mind the fact that in the past few one-monthers he’d had, he’d been paring it down to four square weeks.

  The lawyer in him told him it was a completely asinine argument to make, but some other unnamed voice inside him said it was genius, and that they were to present the discovery to her as soon as possible.

  Because what it all boiled down to was the one thing he’d risk making a stupid argument for.

  Another day with Abby.

  “Okay, it’s ready!”

  Blinking himself back to the present, he quickly changed out of his suit and headed back down to rejoin Abby. Halfway there, however, he got sidetracked by a little piece of paper sticking out from her bag on the couch.

  The first bolded sentence of the email printout caught his attention before he could stop himself. Then the second sentence had him outright invading her privacy.

  He smiled, picked up the paper and brought it with him into the dining room.

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked, coming up behind her and slipping his arms around her waist for a warm hug.

  “About what?”

  “About getting an article accepted for publication.”

  She spun around and snatched the printout from his hand.

  Even though she was remaining impassive, he could see her eyes practically dancing the conga.

  “I was going to tell you tomorrow. Since it’s not exactly on par with a $7.3 billion dollar deal and all.”

  His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Where’s the woman who reamed my ass for downplaying her accomplishments just the other week?” he asked sternly. “You getting an article published in a journal is a very, very big deal. Completely on par with my news.”

  Her lips curved up at the corners.

  “So we should celebrate,” he suggested, nuzzling the side of her neck.

  “We already are.”

  “But this is your gift to me. I want to give you something you want. So tell me. How can we celebrate your amazing news? Name it and it’s yours.”

  She gnawed on her lower lip and then asked shyly, “Before or after dinner?” The way she was now rubbing her sweet backside against him was a pretty good indication of which she’d prefer.

  He grew hard in an instant. “Before.” Wow, he sounded almost primitive just then.

  “Okay.” She pushed him down into one of the dining chairs. “We’ll do my celebration first and then we can have yours.” Tugging on his button fly, she teased, “I hope you’re not too hungry…because what I want isn’t going to be all that quick.”

  That’s what she thinks. With her curious hands all over him, he was ready to go off like a rocket ship at T-minus counting.

  But then she moved those hands off his jeans, and placed them on top of his. At his questioning look, she smiled. “Keep your hands on the sides of the chair.”

  She couldn’t be serious.

  “I’m serious.”

  Damn.

  “No touching.” She slid up his shirt and trailed tiny tortuous kisses across his chest…down his stomach…

  Jesus.

  Eyes half-lidded with lust, she murmured softly, “What I want for my celebration is to have full reign over your body…starting here.”

  Holy hell.

  Her hot little mouth was going to have him ‘celebrating’ in about thirty seconds if he didn’t get some control, fast. He steeled himself, gripped the edges of the cushion until his knuckles were strained white, almost painful.

  But any marginal progress he’d made by that move was undone, however, when she kneaded her hands up his thighs and then along the base of his shaft, gripping him tight as she slid him deeper into her mouth.

  His hips lifted sharply off the chair. Just once. He couldn’t help it. She was driving him crazy. Crazier still when she purred in pleasure at the hard, quick thrust.

  He let out a tortured groan, a wordless warning to her that he’d come soon if she didn’t slow down or—heaven forbid—stop.

  Another thrust, another purr and she was locking her eyes on his, holding his gaze as she slowly, slowly took him all the way to the back of her throat.

  Fireworks exploded behind his eyelids.

  He forgot all about her rule then and reached out to spear his hands through her hair, gently pulling her to her feet so he could pick her up and push her up against the wall.

  His mouth crashed onto hers as he yanked a condom out of the pocket of his jeans and got it on in record time.

  Pulling aside her panties, he poised himself at her entrance.

  “Open your eyes, sweetheart. Let me see you.”

  When she did, he plunged into her heat.

  Nothing, absolutely nothing had ever felt so good, so perfect. So his.

  For eighteen more days.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “WHY DON’T YOU STAY? The construction guys are still going to be coming in and out of your cottage, finishing up. It’ll be hell on your concentration,” reasoned Connor as he kept an unyielding hold on her last fully packed suitcase.

  And for the umpteenth time that morning, Abby almost gave in.

  But she didn’t.

  Because the truth of the matter was that she wouldn’t be able to bear it when he carried her luggage into the guestroom instead of his own room.

  Her firm headshake wasn’t enough to dissuade him, however. “C’mon, you have way more room here to spread out your research. Plus, you have a gourmet kitchen to help you tour the world in style, not to mention a very efficient dis
hwasher that’ll work for kisses and heavy petting.”

  Abby chuckled and pasted an overbright smile on her face. “Tempting, but it’ll be better for me to be back home before school starts.”

  It wasn’t lost on her that the word ‘home’ tasted weird and chalky in her mouth now...all because she and Connor would no longer be using the word to refer to the same place.

  Yeah, it was definitely time for her to go.

  She hugged him tightly. “I had such a great time, Connor. Thank you so much for letting me stay here.”

  Why did that feel like goodbye?

  He held onto her hand. “Have dinner with me tonight?”

  She couldn’t. She couldn’t keep playing house with him. Couldn’t keep finding new and better reasons to fall for him even more, to lose even more of her heart to him. She had to be strong. Protect herself.

  “Can we do it tomorrow night instead?”

  Oh yeah, real strong, Abby.

  His hand tightened around hers for a bit, and then slowly let go. “Of course. Tomorrow night it is.”

  Remember, you can’t keep him. You have to give him up in two weeks. At least that reminder had the desired effect. Steeling herself, she asked casually, “Did you want to go out for a change?”

  It was a simple question and yet it was taking all she had to keep the tears from showing.

  He stared at her silently for a moment before nodding. “Why don’t we go to Le Mille Feuille?”

  One of the most expensive restaurants in the area.

  Her heart couldn’t take much more. “Sounds great. I’ll call you so we can plan a time.” She quickly took her last suitcase from him and shoved it in her ‘SUV’—even she was using the quotation marks now. She slammed the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  * * * * *

  ABBY FELT HER breathing go haywire when she heard the doorbell ring.

  Aside from the one brief phone call they’d had to confirm what time he’d be picking her up tonight, they hadn’t spoken at all since she’d moved back to her cottage.

  Twenty-four hours.

  She’d spent nearly that entire time at the library—reading, writing, arranging her books by cover color instead of topic. Anything in her power not to think about Connor.