by LETO, JULIE
“You coming in?” she asked through the glass, her thumb hooked toward the dingy metal door neatly hand-painted with “Madame Li’s Herb Shop. Deliveries here,” first in Chinese, then in English.
He took the key out of the ignition and opened his door just wide enough to bend out of the car.
“I’m invited?”
“Well, let’s see.” She slung the backpack over one shoulder, where it promptly hit the wall, then she ticked off her reasons on her fingers. “Your fiancée just jilted you for parts unknown so she could go find herself. She or her family has told everyone that’s important to you that you’ve eloped. I assume you’ve already arranged for a week off from work and I doubt anyone would dare to contact a newlywed on his honeymoon. And since the only person either you or I feel compelled to contact is probably going to make himself scarce today, can you think of anything else you need to do? Other than come upstairs with me?”
Her smile was reserved, but no less filled with possibilities.
“So you’re saying I should come with you because I have nothing else to do?”
She frowned, just as he’d expected, just as he’d hoped. He didn’t remember anything solid from last night’s encounter, but if he was going to start over, nurturing this connection between them—at least for the week she had pointed out he now had free and clear—he wouldn’t let her think she was anything but his first choice.
Because even before they’d made love, she had been his first choice. His only choice.
“Ouch,” she said. “That’s not what I meant at all.”
He slammed the car door shut and clicked on the alarm. Two quick beeps told him the automobile was shielded from thieves, though he wasn’t entirely sure about Chinese roosters.
“I didn’t think it was. That’s why I pointed it out.”
She smiled and nodded, obviously appreciating his pragmatic reasoning. “So, if you’re not coming up because you have nothing else to do, why are you?” she asked.
He edged around the side mirror, stepping into the inches separating Ariana from the hood of his car. She straightened against the wall, her backpack further padding them close. With his tuxedo jacket and tie tossed unceremoniously in the trunk and his shirt unbuttoned, he could feel her breasts mold softly—bralessly—against his chest. The effect was an instantaneous hardening of his sex.
“Think Madame Li has something to alleviate my headache?” Seconds ticked by before she looked up at him, then down at his obvious erection, then back up with a slanted glance that was half saucy bravado and half blatant interest.
“If she doesn’t, I think I may have something to ease your discomfort.”
MADAME LIN LI WAS a tall woman, statuesque in every sense of the word. Her great-great-grandmother had been the concubine of a Norwegian prince, so her nearly six-foot height and pale blue eyes were attributed to his genetic influence. But otherwise, she was Chinese in every sense of the word. Proud of her ancient heritage, Madame Li wore her sleek, embroidered satin dress with all the beauty of an Oriental princess, her jet-black hair twisted and secured with enamel chopsticks festooned with tiny red ribbons.
Her shrewd eyes and keen business sense, however, were decidedly American. The minute Ariana and Max passed from the alley into her kitchen, the private room she used to brew her specialty teas for her customers, her pencil-thin eyebrows shot up over wide eyes.
Ariana gave her a respectful bow. “Good morning, Madame Li. This is Maxwell Forrester. He’s a friend.”
Madame Li gracefully lifted a copper teakettle from her gas-burning stove and doused the blue flame. She nodded at Max while she poured the hot water into a porcelain pot etched with fine blue Chinese symbols.
“A new friend, Mr. Forrester? I’ve never heard Ariana speak of you.”
He bowed respectfully, all the while stretching his hands in his pockets so Mrs. Li didn’t see the most pressing reason for his interest in her boarder.
“We’ve known each other for a few years.”
She hummed her suppositions, but kept her obvious skepticism to herself.
“I was hoping you could brew a tea for Max,” Ariana said. “He has a terrible headache. Someone put something into his drink at the restaurant last night.”
“On purpose?” Mrs. Li asked.
Max shook his head, but Ariana shrugged. She knew he didn’t believe the drug was put in his drink accidentally. He suspected Charlie just as much as she did. Apparently, he didn’t want to discuss the matter with a stranger. She couldn’t blame him. Ariana had invited Max into her home, something she hadn’t done for any other man since she’d been married. She was taking another chance based on the two things they had in common: a betrayal by Charlie Burrows and a rather hot attraction. They absolutely had to deal with the first one. With regards to the second, well, that remained to be seen.
Ariana knew what she wanted, but whether or not grabbing the brass ring for a second time was prudent, she wasn’t entirely sure. But she sure as heck wouldn’t know the answer if she just sent Max on his merry way, now, would she?
“What happened, exactly?” Mrs. Li asked.
Ariana looked askance and Max pressed his lips together.
The Asian matron chuckled. “Okay, forget I said ‘exactly.’ Just give me a list of your symptoms, Mr. Forrester.”
“I was drowsy and disoriented at first, then…”
Ariana filled in the blanks in the most delicate way she could. “He was very…relaxed.”
Madame Li busied herself placing several teacups and saucers on a tray beside the brewing pot. “And this morning?”
Max shook his head, as if to clear the cobwebs. “I can’t remember much, if anything, about last night. And there’s the headache.”
Mrs. Li lifted the tray and placed it on an ornate, carved teacart without jangling one cup. “I have four ladies waiting for tea, but I’ll mix something up and bring it to you.”
“I can come down,” Ariana insisted. She admired Mrs. Li a great deal and already felt as if she was taking advantage of her hospitality by bringing Max in through her back door. She felt like a teenager trying to sneak a boyfriend into her bedroom. Not that Ariana knew what that felt like. But Madame Li had been her landlady for going on eight years, renting first to Rick and then subbing the lease to Ariana after he took off. If Ariana didn’t spend so much time at the restaurant and so little time at home, they might have developed a mother-daughter relationship.
As it was, they were friends. Friends who shared a few secrets—including Ariana’s reluctance to let a man into her life again. And yet, here she was, ushering one upstairs into her room.
Mrs. Li shooed Ariana and Max toward the back stairs. “You have other matters to tend to. I’ll bring the tea. Now, out of my kitchen.”
Ariana thanked Mrs. Li again and led Max by the hand behind the silk curtain that led to a narrow stairwell. They climbed two flights, emerging on the third floor just outside her apartment. She fished her key out of the front pocket of her backpack, silently aware that Max remained just inside the archway from the stairs.
She opened the door and her window sheers cast a glow like fire into the hall. She saw Max’s eyes narrow as he peered around her. He’d see nothing but scarlet until he came in—even after, for that matter.
“I’ve done some rather interesting decorating,” she said by way of enticement. “Care to see?”
She disappeared into the yards of red silk she’d draped across the archway leading into her rooms. She dropped the backpack atop her black enamel treasure chest and tossed her hat onto the head of a five-foot-long ceramic dragon.
Walking into her apartment always made her feel as if she’d entered a different world—a luxurious, exotic world with ancient secrets and erotic promise. And when the door shut behind Max, she felt as if her world wasn’t just bolts of secondhand fabric and rescued treasures from Madame Li’s attic.
Max’s presence made her home the stuff of fantasies. And if Ari
ana knew one thing about Max, she knew he was a man who could make all sorts of fantasies come true.
7
“SO? WHAT DO YOU THINK?”
In all his fantasies about Ariana Karas, never once had he imagined what sort of place she lived in. If he had, he most definitely wouldn’t have dreamed up this decor. Not that he didn’t like it. What man wouldn’t like a room that was a cross between a harem den and a Buddhist temple?
“It’s very red.” Going for the obvious seemed like the smartest move, particularly when his real reaction bordered on obscene. Okay, not obscene, but depraved. No, not that, either. Not with Ariana. Memory loss or not, he guessed that making love with her had been nothing short of glorious. In a setting like this, he might not ever want to leave her bed.
Or more factually, he’d never want to leave the endless collection of thick, embroidered throw pillows scattered on her shiny hardwood floors and over the plush carpets.
“I like red,” she said with pride. She moved across the room to a black enamel table and lit a thin reed of incense. The scent snaked toward him, teasing his nostrils with a potent spice he couldn’t identify. Not as sweet as cinnamon or as pungent as frankincense, the odor brought his senses alive, then seeped into his lungs and relaxed him from the inside out.
“In the morning, this room is very cheery.” She touched a long match to a row of candles and then opened windows and switched on lamps capped with paper-thin shades. “In the evenings, it’s soothing.”
And in the afternoon, it’s erotic as hell.
“Make yourself comfortable.” She gestured toward the mound of pillows he realized was actually a couch. “Do you want the phone? I’m going to take a shower, if you don’t mind.”
I wouldn’t mind taking a shower with you.
“Phone would be good. I’m going to see if Charlie is hiding out at the office.”
She grabbed a portable phone from around a doorway he assumed was an entrance to her kitchen, but a reluctant pause accompanied her handing it to him.
“What?” he asked.
“Just be careful who you call.”
“Why?”
She bit her lower lip, hooking her fingers into her belt loops again while she rocked on her heels. “You have a unique opportunity here. Too many phone calls could ruin it.”
God, her eyes were fathomless. Black as the finish on her furniture, yet as soulful as the ancient accoutrements she’d placed around her home. Ariana Karas was a mystery, no less fascinating or arousing as a foreign land to an explorer. The opportunity she spoke of wasn’t lost on him. She was ever so sweetly making him an offer he’d be a fool to refuse.
“You mean my chance to have one week of pure freedom? With no one expecting me to be around? No one looking for me?”
She grinned and backed away. “A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Just like my week off.” Slinging her backpack over her shoulder, she moved quickly across the living room to an archway shielded with dark, glossy beads and another layer of silk. “Help yourself to whatever. Look around. I don’t have any secrets.”
She disappeared through the strands of ebony beads, her departure accompanied by a musical tinkle that reminded him of wind chimes. This small space, no more than three hundred square feet, if his instincts were right, exuded relaxation and escape. She worked long hours at the restaurant; he knew that for a fact. Every restaurant owner he knew pushed twelve hours a day. But while he’d hired a decorator to give his home the proper signs of the wealth he slaved for all day, Ariana had created her very own mystical haven to escape to after the hustle and bustle of her busy workday.
No secrets, huh? Max seriously doubted that. In fact, he knew she had secrets—mainly, the mystery of what really happened between them the night before. He took the phone over to the couch, sighing as the velvet cushions swallowed the aches in his body. He kicked off his shoes and shed his socks, then tucked the polished loafers out of the way.
Stretching his legs, he scanned the room. He had entered a different world. A world where color and texture and scents mixed to create a sensual experience like no other.
An experience he could enjoy for an entire week, if he took a wild chance.
Seven days. No responsibilities. No expectations. Because of the wedding, he’d made certain to close all his major deals last week. He’d signed off on several hundred thousand dollars’ worth of real estate transactions that little by little, were making him a very wealthy man. He’d left only one deal open—the big one—the stage of development too early to close off. It killed him to let the purchase of the old Pier sit for an entire week. Still, he’d talked his partners into putting off any progress until he could give the project his full attention.
Max punched the number to Maddie’s parents’ house into the phone, calculating his words carefully before the butler answered the call and informed him that the Burrowses were at the reception hall with the rest of the wedding guests, who were celebrating Miss Madelyn’s marriage without the bride and groom.
Max grinned. Randolph Burrows wasn’t a man to waste money and Barbara Burrows wasn’t a woman to miss throwing the social event of the season. Bride and groom? Obviously, unnecessary. He hung up and redialed Randolph’s cell phone.
Barbara answered. “Maxwell? Why are you calling from your honeymoon? Is Madelyn all right?”
That answered his original and most pressing question. The elopement was Maddie’s lie, not her family’s. Madelyn had crafted a tension-free escape, and laid the groundwork for him to enjoy one of his own.
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered. “She’s fine.”
She was away from their influence and away from him. Madelyn was more than fine.
“I just wanted to apologize for our…spontaneity.”
“Just as long as you aren’t calling about business. I confiscated this phone from Randolph so he’d have a good time.”
Max laughed. “No, no business. I know you put a great deal of time and effort into the wedding.”
“Not an ounce of which is being wasted, I assure you. You kids have a great time. And don’t you worry about that deal you and Randolph have been working on, either. Every one of your investors is here, slurping champagne as if the world will end tomorrow. None of them will be in any condition to think about business for a couple of days at least.”
Max thanked his former would-be mother-in-law and disconnected the call. For an instant, he allowed himself to wonder how Barbara and Randolph would react once they realized that both he and Maddie had lied about their marriage. Of course, if Max managed to make Randolph a millionaire yet again, he was certain he’d be forgiven. Maddie would have to sculpt her own redemption with her parents, if she even wanted their approval anymore. Naturally, he’d help her, but she’d wasted so much of her life seeking the respect of her family, he hoped she’d wait until she was truly ready to make a stand.
Max realized for the first time since he was eight that he had an entire seven days with absolutely no responsibilities, no expectations, nothing. Whether he liked it or not, his big deal was on hold. His office staff had clear instructions to handle all emergencies as if he were dead and even his housekeeper was on vacation. He had nothing to take care of—nothing but a sexy woman showering in the adjoining room…a woman who had the same number of days to escape from everyday life. With him.
The shower stopped running at the same time as a light rap echoed on the door. He set the phone on the cushions and answered the knock. Mrs. Li stood on the other side, greeted him with a slight bow and handed him a laden tray.
“This tea will help you, I think.”
Though probably near fifty years of age, Mrs. Lin Li was an exceptionally attractive woman, partly because of her classic Asian features—almond-shaped eyes, glossy hair and fine skin—and partly because she broke the mold in unexpected ways—her height, light irises and steely carriage. A woman like her commanded respect and Max immediately gave it.
“I appreciate your hos
pitality, Mrs. Li. I’m sure your tea will work wonders.”
“It is not my hospitality you should value. Take care with my boarder, Mr. Forrester. She isn’t as worldly as her decor or behavior might indicate.”
Mrs. Li wordlessly disappeared down the hall, but her warning was clear. Max promised himself he’d heed it. He set the tray carefully on a low table in front of the couch. Fact was, he didn’t know very much about Ariana Karas. About what she knew or didn’t know. About what she wanted or didn’t want.
But he had an entire week to find out.
ARIANA PROPPED OPEN the bathroom door, spilling a billow of steam into her small, messy bedroom. Damp and aware of Max’s presence in the adjoining room, she couldn’t tamp down the memory of making love with him in the fog. Seeing and yet not seeing. Using touch to guide touch. Exploring the full breadth of sensual pleasure.
Too bad Max didn’t remember a thing.
With a grunt, Ariana twirled her hair into a towel, then dried herself briskly with another. She tried not to think about where Max had run his hands or mouth last night or how wonderful it would be to invite him into her room right now to help her remove the moisture from her skin while he evoked a separate wetness deep inside.
She wondered if he’d accept her invitation until she recalled the hard evidence of his desire that had been more than apparent downstairs when he’d pinned her against the wall.
But even if he didn’t remember what happened last night, they had just survived a tense morning-after. They’d done okay, too. He’d made no lame excuses for his questionable judgment with Madelyn, but had given Ari the facts to decipher as she saw fit. And she wanted to believe that Max was incredibly kind, but equally misguided. Marriage, in her experience, was never a convenience.
She knew that truth firsthand. Watching her aunt and uncle, whose marriage was even healthier than her parents’ thirty-five-year union, had taught her that making a lifetime commitment required more than friendship or mutual goals. Those characteristics helped, but without passion—without love—the union was destined for disaster.