by Inez Kelley
So maybe this flavor-of-the-month thing had benefits.
Consumed with the need to feel his skin, Frannie tugged at his shirt collar and he raised her tee shirt hem. Both tops landed on the floor with a soft thwap. Heat engulfed them as passion arced higher. Flesh on flesh, the sparse hair on his chest pricking her nipples, she gasped into his mouth. Jinx seemed as hungry as she was. He cupped a small breast and lightly pinched the tip, swallowing her cry of pleasure. She arched her hips into his groin and felt through thin cotton how hard he was, how hard she’d made him in so short a time. Power surged through her. Clamping her thighs around his hips, she pressed herself harder against the hidden steel. A deep masculine moan sounded low. The rumble deep in his chest vibrated against her swelling breasts, thrilling her. He grabbed her hips once again, pulled her hard against him and rocked his hips forward, lips never leaving hers.
This is going to be good. It’s like he’s reading my mind. Let’s hear it for similar brain patterns! Wahoooo!
His maddening mouth slid down her jaw. With her head back against the mirror, she whimpered. Her neck beckoned for his tongue and he skimmed her throat as he tasted and caressed down to her swollen breasts. At last, his lips captured one aching peak. An internal spotlight shone on her, intensifying every zing of pleasure Jinx plucked from her sizzling flesh. Hot and teasing, his tongue provoked each bud to stinging awareness before drawing them into the warmth of his mouth. A soft hum buzzed the pebbled crests.
Every nerve ending in her body sat up and screamed his name. The soft brush of his hair in her hands was more noticeable than the bite of the faucet in her lower back. The feel of his hot skin against hers created a firestorm, baking her in its heat. Her core turned to molten lava, she pulled his head back to hers and kissed him. Gawd, hurry!
“Where’s my shaving kit?” he asked between nips of her lips.
Why does he want to shave now? Oh, wait…shaving kit…condoms. Hallelujah! “Upstairs on my bed.”
At her last word, he groaned into her mouth. Wanting him more than imaginable, Frannie was reluctant to leave the warmth of his embrace. The bed could wait one minute longer. With lusty patience, Jinx made no move to unseat her, but allowed her tongue and lips to trace a blazing trail down his neck to his shoulder, where she nipped him with sharp teeth. The untamed savagery brought a shiver which spiked her desire another notch.
He caught her lips once more before whispering, “Let’s go upstairs.” She nodded into his kiss. “I love you, Frannie.”
Like a bucket of cold water, his words ripped Frannie from her sexual haze and she shoved him away. He stepped back against the wall and her ass slid into the sink basin. The washcloth soaked her ass, cold seeping into her skin.
“What did you say?”
“I said I love you.” Wide devil-dark eyes gaped at her.
The stunned expression on his face might have made her laugh if she hadn’t gone from incredibly horny to incredibly pissed-off in two-point-two seconds. Struggling to pluck her rear end from the sink, she flailed her legs until her thighs, still feeling his body’s crush, caught on the edge and pulled her free. She hopped off the vanity, grabbed her shirt and threw his at him. It hit him squarely in the face as he followed her out of the small bathroom. Her hair poofed with the force of her cotton tee being snapped over her head.
“You have no idea how royally you just screwed up. Two minutes ago, you were pretty much guaranteed a piece of ass. Now you can get the hell out of my house and stay out!”
Frannie grabbed her coffee mug, pitched the cold milky liquid down the sink and poured herself another cup she really didn’t want. She refused to think about how her hands were shaking and sloshing the hot brew around. Damn him! She’d really wanted an orgasm.
“I mean it, Frannie. It just hit me.” Still holding his shirt, he reached to cup her arm. She fixed him with a glare she hoped was colder than a witch’s tit in February but he was still gawking at her in amazement. “When I saw you, something smacked me in the gut. I knew it was…damn, Frannie, this is real.”
Frannie slammed the cup down on the table with a loud crack. Only the fact it was her favorite extra-heavy ceramic mug prevented it from cracking like an egg.
“I don’t know whether to be insulted or amused. There’s no way in hell you have any real emotion for me except maybe lust. There’s no such thing as love at first sight. You were horny. Great, so was I. That should have been enough. But no, you thought the only way you’d see any action was by saying those oh-so-coveted words to the mousey little woman. Wrong move. You blew it. Now get out of my house.”
Face burning with shame, angrier at herself than him, she drew a hand across her mouth, wiping his passion away. I never learn. She had forgotten for one brief moment she didn’t belong in his circle, in his arms or in his life. Any man would drink from an available well but they never bought the property unless it was prime acreage.
“Think about it, Frannie,” he pleaded. “It’s like destiny is throwing us together, showing us how much alike we are, how special we can be together. I know what I feel. This is real.”
“This is nuts and so are you. Out!” She thundered toward him, a bundle of raw, aching fury. Grabbing his coat, she flung it at him as he walked backwards up her hallway. “Out! Out! Out!”
She wrenched the doorknob so hard it flew out of her hand and hit the wall behind her. Jinx pulled her against him for a firm, deep kiss. Gawd, he knows how to kiss like a sailor knows how to tie knots. She faltered for just one second and leaned into his mouth before pushing him away.
“I knew it!” In excitement, his brows arched to form perfect horizontal parentheses above his dancing eyes. “You feel it, too. I see it in your eyes.”
“That isn’t love. That’s contempt. Out! Before I call the police.”
He stroked her cheek with the back of his hand and bent toward her. Frozen in place, Frannie swallowed, her mouth longing for his once more. I am so weak. A fraction of an inch from her face, he whispered, “We both know if I just pick you up and carry you upstairs, the only calling will be you screaming my name when you come.”
Her jaw dropped and she stared at him in speechless shock. She flashed on all those affronted face slaps in black-and-white movies and her palm itched to make a rerun. If her vision was red tinged before, it erupted in crimson edges when he smirked at her.
“Who in the hell do you think you are with that arrogant, high-handed, sexually dominant crap? You know what? Never mind. I don’t care. Just leave, now!”
Jinx leaned on the doorframe and chuckled, which sent her volcanic ire skyrocketing. “Damn, you’re feisty. I’m going to marry you, know that?”
“And I’m going to commit you. Now, out of my house, fruit loop!”
With a confident smile like the cat that ate the canary, the magpie and the bluebird all in one bite, he took two steps to stand on the threshold before turning. “I’ll go. But I’ll see you tomorrow, Frannie. We’re meant to be. I’m going to prove it to you.”
Frannie slammed the door in his face, her lips twisted in an ugly sneer of rejection. Two seconds later, she re-opened the door and pitched his boots at him. Missed, damn. Bare chested in the frosty moonlight, he grinned at her like a lovesick fool. She banged the door closed, snapped off the porch light and threw the lock with a loud click. His laughter sounded through the leaded glass.
Seething with sexual frustration and irrational irritability, Frannie shoved the cheesecake and leftover pizza in the refrigerator, turned off the coffee pot and slapped the light switch to plunge the kitchen into darkness. She pounded up the stairs, making as much noise as possible just because she could.
The sight of Jinx’s forgotten suitcase on her bed made her temples throb. Collapsed facedown beside it, she groaned into her pillow. Muscles releasing her anger, she slumped into the mattress like a deflated balloon. Hocus jumped up beside her. She ruffled his fuzzy head and tried not to compare it to another head of silky black hair.
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“He’s crazy, Hocus—certifiable, one-hundred-percent straitjacket club. There’s no way he loves me and I certainly don’t love him. But da-yum, he sure can kiss.”
Her front door had beveled frosted glass in an oval. Jinx stared, his mind whipping with a million thoughts, each one more thrilling than the next. She’s the one. His belly warmed with a laugh though his shoulders shivered. Inside, everything went dark and the sound of angry heels pounding the stairs rang out. She has spunk to spare. He dropped his jacket to the porch floor and pulled his shirt right side out, never taking his eyes from the flecked and pieced glass. That’s my future wife in there. Holy shit, I found her.
An old man walking a poodle in a Santa Claus sweater paused by the porch. “Missus throw you out?”
“Something like that.” Jinx found and pulled on his boots over damp socks. “It’s just a tiff, we’ll work it out.”
“Well, good luck. Spent many nights on the couch myself but still managed forty-three years with my wife. Flowers help some but the only thing to do when they’re this mad is say you’re sorry and you’ll never do it again. Lie if you got to.”
“It would be a lie because I’m not the least bit sorry.” Jinx pulled his coat on and released a chuckle. “Not sorry at all. I’m right and she’d going to see that.”
“Well, good luck to you. If you love her, make it work. Too many marriages just throw in the towel these days.”
“Oh, I love her.” Stepping onto the sidewalk, he turned his head up and saw a light blazing through a window. Her bedroom, he guessed with a small sigh of regret. He’d almost found out. “And I don’t give up. When I know what I want, I go for it. Getting her to come along is going to be the challenge.”
“I’ve got my dog to ‘come along’ but never the wife.” The old man sniggered while his dog sniffed around Jinx’s feet. “‘Course, can’t swat your wife with a rolled-up newspaper either.”
Jinx zipped his jacket and fished in his pocket for his keys. He raised his eyes once more to the lit window and a grin lifted his lip. “No, and I might end up getting my nose whapped a few times, but I’m going to have her eating out of my hand before it’s all said and done.”
“Just make sure she doesn’t bite your fingers off.”
Chapter Two
“Suddenly he stops. He looks up. For, lo, there she stands. The girl of his dreams. Who she is or whence she came, he knows not, nor does he care for his heart tells him that here, here is the maid predestined to be his bride.”
—Grand Duke in Cinderella
“There’s a Mr. Sullivan on line three.”
Frannie dropped her head on her desk and groaned. She’d been waiting for this moment all morning. She knew Jinx wouldn’t just drop it. He was crazy; crazy people had more stick-to-it-ness than Elmer’s glue. She didn’t even bother raising her head.
“Tell Mr. Sullivan I’m not at my desk, Tracey. Send him to voicemail hell.”
“Having a pre-mid-life crisis?”
Standing in the connecting door, Steve McAlly chuckled at the scorching look she sent him. He intercepted her hands as she reached for her coffee mug and handed her a takeout bag from the corner diner. “Eat. You put too much caffeine in your system. By the time you’re forty, you’re not going to have a stomach lining left. Selfishly, I don’t want my partner getting sick on me. Who would go on all those last minute ‘save my adorable ass’ trips for me?”
Steve looked like your typical California surfer heartthrob and knew it, relished it even. His purposely disheveled blond hair and twinkling blue eyes had people forever fawning over him. He liked the attention. Frannie teased him about using more hair product in a year than she did. He simply laughed her off and called her jealous. She called him mirror-obsessed. She’d never buttered him up and it allowed their friendship to grow flawlessly. He loved her like a little sister and teased her relentlessly. She in turn had adopted him and pestered him like family.
“Yeah, about that—” she dug hungrily into the bag, “—next time Alvarez gets all panicky, you go hold his hand. That man gives me the creeps.”
“But that ‘creep’ brings in mucho dinero for this company. Thanks for bailing me out and going on such short notice.”
Steve sat in the dark blue upholstered chair beside her desk and watched her eat her breakfast sandwich. Frannie fought the urge to fidget under his perusal. The violet smudges under her eyes had taken two coats of makeup to hide and she prayed he wouldn’t notice. But he knew her well. He’d been her study partner in college as well as her best friend. When the financial group of McGee, Thompson and Fitch looked to expand the accounting department, he lobbied hard for her acceptance. It had been her ability and tenacity, though, that propelled her through the ranks until she became his assistant. She’d earned her place. He and Frannie worked well together, read each other’s body language and she thoroughly enjoyed being on his staff most days. But today he seemed too nosy.
“You okay?” His question was too probing to be casual.
Her shoulders lifted in what she hoped was nonchalance. “I’m fine. Maybe a bit jet-lagged is all.”
Her eyes darted to her phone and a niggle started at the base of her neck. He’d noticed the move. Dayum.
Steve stuck out his leg, pulling his pants up to show thin brown socks. “Here pull this one. The other leg has a bum knee.”
“I’m fine. Honest.” She smacked at his calf. “Put that away. You want somebody to sue your ass for sexual harassment?”
Again her eyes went to the phone. Steve snorted. “Meet anyone interesting while you were gone?”
She blanked her face and avoided looking at him. “What gives you that idea?”
“Because you’re acting like my sister did when she gave Cory Mitchum her phone number in ninth grade.”
Busted.
She threw a crumpled paper napkin at him and wrinkled her nose. “Butt out, Steve.”
He caught the paper ball midair and tossed it into the can with a bit of a flourish. “Now who is sexually harassing whom, asking me to stick my butt out? Have you no shame, Ms. Sullivan?”
“Shame on you for being nosy.” She pulled a manila folder across the desk and asked an obtuse question to divert his attention back to work. It worked. Within minutes, she had him buried under so many work details he had totally forgotten her preoccupation with the phone.
The telephone’s intercom toned with a loud noise, drawing Frannie and Steve’s attention from the spreadsheet they were bent over. Tracey’s voice filtered through.
“Mr. Sullivan’s on line four. He says your voicemail’s full.”
That’s because I turned it off to avoid listening to your sweet Southern charm.
With a fierce scowl, Frannie crumbled a yellow sticky note and replied through clenched teeth. “Tell Mr. Sullivan I said to drop dead.”
“Well, that certainly sounds like a story I want to hear.” Steve laughed but the intercom cut off any response Frannie might have been about to make.
“Mr. Sullivan advises that he loves you, will you marry him and what time do you get off work?”
Stars swam in front of her eyes. She sank to her chair, covering her face in embarrassment. Did he have to show off his craziness to everybody? Why couldn’t he just go play in traffic or something?
“Tell Mr. Sullivan I said he’s a lunatic, no I will not and not until the second Tuesday of next week.”
“Mr. Sullivan advises he’ll be waiting.” The crackling phone line couldn’t hide the amusement in the young office manager’s voice. It was echoed in Steve’s bright blue eyes.
“Not. A. Word,” she threatened him with a pointed finger. Holding his hands up in surrender, he backed out of her office.
“Not a word. But I can’t wait to see what happens next.”
“Mr. Sullivan on line two.”
“Tell him to leave me alone!”
“Mr. Sullivan advises he loves you, will you marry him and wants to know if you
prefer veal or lamb?”
“Tell him he’s a fruitcake, no I won’t and I don’t eat baby animals.”
“Mr. Sullivan advises that’s very sweet and you’re a truly compassionate woman.”
“Tell him he’s a complete jackass in need of a lobotomy.”
“He’s on line three this time.”
“What can he possibly want now? He’s called every half hour on the hour.”
“Mr. Sullivan advises he loves you, will you marry him and you’re out of coffee creamer.”
“Tell him he’s bonkers, no I won’t and to get out of my refrigerator…and get out of my house for that matter!”
{
Frannie arrived home with tense shoulders, a stiff neck and a bottle of coffee creamer. Her front door was unlocked and the sound of Christmas carols on the all-music channel blared from her TV. The treacherous leap of her heart wasn’t from happiness he was here, she told herself. It was anger. No, it was fury. Yeah, fury is good. Fury would keep her from remembering the taste of his mouth or the feel of his hands.
Entering her kitchen, she glared at a pair of very well-filled-out jeans sticking out from under her kitchen sink. Last night’s dishes had vanished and the trash had been taken out. Well, at least he’s housebroken. The refrigerator door swung widely under too firm a hand. Jaw clenched, she moved a six-pack of beer she hadn’t bought out of the way so she could put her creamer on the top shelf.
“I could have you arrested for breaking and entering, you know that? And I never said you could store your beer in my fridge.” At her voice, Jinx’s dark head popped up and he smiled at her. He dried his hands on one of her flowery dishtowels. Her eyes flew to his long fingers and her nipples puckered in memory. A gulp stuck in her throat. She refused to let her eyes drop to the way the denim hugged his thighs when he stood. Nope, not going to look. Too late. Dayum.