10 Ways to Steal Your Lover

by Dee Tenorio

  That mystery mental lover finally came into clear focus.

  He turned right then, catching her ogling. At first, the corner of his mouth lifted in a masculine grin that had her heartbeat skipping. But after a second, he seemed to realize she was looking at him for more reasons than his fabulous ass. His expression fell into the serious lines she knew best and he turned for her, letting her look at him.

  Craig would have asked her what was wrong.

  Craig would have told her she was freaking him out and then Craig would have laughed it off and told her to talk or go away.

  But Kane stood there and let her listen to the whispers of her heart she’d been forcing herself to ignore for a very long time.

  “It’s you,” she finally whispered, though she knew he couldn’t possibly understand what she was talking about.

  So why did he seem as if he did? How did that deep green gaze of his get any more intense? Standing ten feet from him, she felt that steady stare as if it were cutting right through her. She wasn’t feeling fanciful and no one could tell her it was her imagination, either. The man was waiting for her to come to a conclusion he already knew.

  He said nothing, simply standing there until she figured out what she was trying to say. Kane, who’d always managed to make her laugh, even while he made her uncomfortable. Kane, who listened whenever she had a story to tell, who never thought she was silly for her simple hopes of home and family or her grander dreams of earning a master’s degree. He’d even been the one who’d wiped her tears when Craig had canceled on an important dinner with her family prior to the wedding, standing in with her so well that her father had asked why she wasn’t marrying Kane instead.

  He finally moved, walking those few feet between them. Without hesitation, his hands slid around her waist, pulling her flush against him. Her hand slid up his arm all by itself, grasping the hard muscles there. The warmth that seemed a natural part of him spread into her. Smoothly, his mouth found hers, gently grazing her lips before settling more firmly. She moaned as he tasted her, coaxing her to open for him. When she did, her eyelids fluttered shut and the whole world utterly disappeared.

  This, this was what she’d been wanting, needing for so long. The rightness of finding your place, knowing exactly where you belonged by the feel, the fit, of it al.

  But why did she have this connection with Kane? And so effortlessly? Every other man she’d ever known had always felt just that tiny bit wrong, until she’d convinced herself she was crazy waiting for amazing when wonderful should be good enough. It wasn’t just lust. The sensations filing her blood and her heart were richer than that. She could practically hear the click of puzzle pieces snapping together whenever their gazes found each other. When their lips met, their skin touched, it was something far more powerful. Something that sang right through her, demanding she recognize it for what it was.

  Amazing.

  He finally pulled away, not letting her get further than a few inches, their hips still pressed tight, her gaze held wiling captive by his. “It’s me,” he murmured. “And I’m telling you right now, Delilah Anne McGavin, if I have my way, it’s going to stay me for the rest of our lives. You’re mine now and I’m going to do everything in my power to prove it to you.”

  She heard a soft thump, her upheld fingers going numb and tingling, but it barely registered as one thought tightened everything in her body.

  Yup, definitely in over my head.

  Strangely, for the first time in her life, that wasn’t at all frightening.

  ***

  Cal him greedy but Kane stole another soft kiss from Delilah’s lips. She seemed way less stunned by his claim on her than he’d expected, but really, what the hell else was he supposed to do when he caught her staring at him the way he’d always wanted her to.

  The way she did in his dreams.

  As if she loved him.

  She wasn’t there yet, he decided as she stared up at him intently, but the spark was there. Not to the point that she’d accept it, but she was close enough to give him a chance. A chance was all he needed. With her fingertips fanned over his cheeks, she pulled him back to her, stealing another, deeper kiss of her own.

  Once his brain was completely scrambled, she stepped back, a nearly drunken expression on her face. She stumbled a little, backing up and catching her foot on her impromptu toga. “I’m just gonna…go…check out the bathroom.”

  He nodded, his teeth and his fists clenching as he forced himself not to follow after her. Waiting until she disappeared into the open doorway, he let himself sink down onto the foot of the bed and stared down at his left hand.

  Married.

  To Delilah.

  It was the best thing he’d ever done that he couldn’t remember.

  That part stung a little. A man should be able to remember his wedding day.

  Speaking of stinging… He looked at his right hand, finally taking a look at the scuff marks on his knuckles, the bruising there beneath them. He frowned, recognizing the patterns. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear he punched the hell out of something. Couldn’t be, though. He hadn’t been in a fight since he was a teenager.

  While he looked down at the bruises, he finally noticed the open phone on the floor. Gasping, he picked it up, hearing the shrill voice of his brand-new mother-in-law long before he got it up to his ear.

  “Delilah! You pick up this phone right now! Do you hear me?”

  He winced, wishing for a second that he could pawn the call back onto Del, but that wouldn’t work. She was so nice and relaxed in the bathroom. Her mother was a lovely woman but she had the singular ability to twist Delilah into knots in five seconds flat.

  “Mrs. McGavin?”

  The litany stopped instantly. A few beats passed before a much calmer voice came over the line. “Kane?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  More silence, then suddenly he heard a sigh of relief. “Thank God, we were so worried when the two of you disappeared before the wedding even started. I mean, first Craig left after that bizarre apology and when I went to check on Delilah she was gone. No one could find you either. It was like everyone went completely out of their minds. So I was really hoping she was with you, but after what my mother said she did, well, she could have been anywhere. I told them you were probably chasing her to save her from herself. Is that what happened, Kane? You were saving her?”

  He was going to regret asking this, he knew it. “Your mother did something?”

  The dinner he’d stood in for Craig had been to introduce Delilah’s new husband to her entire extended family, so he was already wincing at the possibilities. As straight-laced and well, all right, uptight, as Dinah MacGavin was, her mother was irreverent and slightly off her cracker. A cantankerous hippy who seemed to take a certain sick pleasure in driving her daughter up the wall, Rainbow Layne had planted herself at his side and kept the night interesting with an on-going run down on which relatives needed her homemade herbal supplements and which ones made her need narcotics. Suddenly, the blacked out hours made scary sense.

  Dinah sighed. “She thought Delilah was freaking out from the pressure of the wedding. Said I was pushing her too hard.”

  She was. He’d seen that himself in the week leading up to the big day.

  “So Rainbow slipped her a mickey.”

  “A—” The empty champagne glass he remembered. But that memory was of the empty glass in his hand. Not Delilah’s.

  “A mickey of what, exactly?”

  Dinah made a sound of distress. “One of her concoctions, but she specifically mentioned peyote. I remember that. She thought it would relax Delilah, it never occurred to her Del would run out of the church in a psychedelic haze before the ceremony.”

  Before. That was the second time she’d said it, too. He felt one of the knots in his bely loosen at that. He was just getting used to being a woman-stealer. He didn’t think he could handle being an bigamist adulterer on top of it.

  “It’s
such a relief to know she was safe with you all this time.” The relieved laugh didn’t do much to put Kane back at ease. Normally, he’d be feeling guilty right about now, but guilt seemed a concept very far from this bizarre situation. “God knows what trouble she could have gotten into.”

  And God was the only one.

  “She’s safe now,” he assured, his mind wandering back to the bathroom. Safe and sound. Probably in the shower. Warm and sudsy. And all his…

  “Um, Kane?” Dinah’s laugh turned nervous and unsure. “I thought I heard the strangest thing earlier. I could have sworn you said Delilah was yours now. Isn’t that funny?”

  Hmm, maybe Del should give her mother a little more credit for her mind reading skills.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Oh.” He heard her take in a breath, as if she were going to say something, then she seemed to realize how he meant his answer. “Oh!”

  “I have to go now, Mrs. McGavin. I’ll have Del call you back soon.”

  “But, but, but—” was the last he heard as he clicked the phone shut. He tossed it down on the bed and looked toward the open doorway of the bathroom.

  Just as he’d thought. This was his chance. Probably his only chance to be with her and for the first time since they’d met, he had the advantage over Craig in their weird little love triangle. He could put away the guilt and deal with it later, just as he’d put away his desire and his dreams all these years. It was finally time to let them show. He’d already stolen the bride and he couldn’t undo it.

  Time now to steal himself a wife.

  Chapter Four

  When Delilah first came into the bathroom, she’d had the delusion that it would simply be a room where she could grab a shower, brush her teeth and possibly tame her hair. But really, who could have expected one room could be paradise, particularly inside of a hotel?

  But it was.

  First things first, there were trees in here. Not plants. Trees. At least ten, placed artfully all over the room. She had no idea what kind they were—fat little mini-palms?—but their long fronds fanned out in several directions, growing from white pots that came to mid-thigh. Overhead, brilliant blue sky and morning sunlight filed the room. A glass ceiling slanted from high above, all the way to the floor ahead of her. And what a floor. White marble covered the ground in two directions. To one side, a bar of double brass sinks awaited, dark gray towels hanging from brass rings and a huge mirror glinted back at her. To the other side, a shower big enough for an elephant, but without any kind of spigot she could see. If it weren’t for the glass door, she’d have thought it was a linen cubby of some kind.

  But straight ahead was what stole her attention.

  She took a few steps closer, unable to believe what she was seeing.

  First was the broad fireplace, it’s white marble the same as the floor, dividing the room as cleanly as a bar, wide enough for Kane to lay in if he wanted, weathered gray Stetson, beat-up boots and al. Double-sided, apparently, because she could see through its glass doors front and back to the blue sky beyond it. The floor, on either side of it seemed to just drop off, several feet from the glass wall.

  When she reached the side of the fireplace, her eyes widened so much they stung.

  The drop off tuned out to be steps. Wide steps, textured marble, leading down into a…pool, really. In someone’s over-luxuriant mind, though, this was a bathtub.

  She was reminded of the bathing chambers of kings in the stories she’d read of Arabia or Rome and Greece. People for whom water was as sensual and valuable as gold. They’d bathe in pools like this, their many attendants surrounding them and seeing to their every possible need.

  Immediately, her mind went to Kane in the next room. How would he attend her needs in a bath like this?

  Heat flooded her face, the sensual stroke of thought shooting to her belly, down to her sex. A throb of wanting had her pressing her thighs tight together. That kiss of his had already made her wet, almost embarrassingly so. Maybe the kiss was to blame for how easily she could envision them together in this bath, her back pressed to the cool glass while he surged into her, water splashing against their bodies. Or would he lead her to the water’s edge, laying her on the marble while he held her thighs open and feasted on her, that direct green gaze watching her the entire time, making sure she was enjoying every single lick? Or would he lead her to the steps where she now stood, guiding her to her knees so that she could do the attending?

  She backed away from the edge, pushing the temptation of it to the other side of her mind. Right now she had to get cleaned up and start thinking about what they were supposed to do now. Sex with Kane was not something she should be considering. Not sober sex, anyway. She could forgive herself for cheating while she had no idea what she was doing, but that excuse wouldn’t hold water in the bright light of day.

  It barely held any for her enthusiastic response to Kane’s lovemaking when she woke up.

  Care to explain that kiss you dropped on him two minutes ago?

  Nope. Not at all, Colonel. Not to herself, not to Craig. Especially not when every thought of him right now felt so distant and that niggling sense that she’d forgotten something important pulsed like oil light she couldn’t turn off.

  She trudged to the shower door, dragging her sheet behind her like the Queen of the Nile. Dropping it, she forced some practical thoughts into her head. She stepped inside the cavernous shower, only startling a little when the recessed lights above turned on automatically. She looked around for some kind of control, but all she found was some kind of electronic interface in the middle of the back wall. Several bubbled buttons awaited her, but hell if she could figure them out. Nothing simply said “On”. Starting with “Temp”, she set the small screen to a safe eighty-five degrees, but that didn’t turn anything on. Grumbling, she hit “Rain”. Water immediately began falling from the ceiling. She shrieked, scaring herself, as her hair quickly matted down over her face.

  “Of course. Because if you worked right, all this might just be a dream. Can’t have that.” She glared at the console, wondering briefly how much it might hurt to punch it until it fell out of the wall.

  A muscled arm suddenly reached over her shoulder, pushing another button she couldn’t see through her hair while she screamed and flapped her arms before slamming her back to the smooth wall.

  Kane stood there, his firm mouth curved into an indulgent smile. “You okay there, Rocky?”

  “What are you doing in here?” she snapped, trying desperately to cover her breasts and privates while trying to get her hair out of her face at the same time. Neither action seemed to be working, leaving her with most of her hair plastered across her cheeks and in her eyes, getting pelted with enough water to flush out the gutters in front of Craig’s house.

  “Taking a shower.” He was, too. The button he’d pushed had turned the water from a downpour to multiple streams from every side spraying thick streams toward his chest and back. As if it were nothing unusual to bathe in front of her, he reached for the complimentary soap in a recessed shelf. An assortment of sponges sat in a basket and he plucked one out without so much as a bat of his eyes. Next thing she knew, a fresh clean scent filed the air and he was rubbing suds over his wide chest.

  He turned his back to her—I am not looking at his ass, dammit!—and dunked his head into the streams, using his hands to slick the dark gold strands back from his face. Like she wasn’t there at all.

  “You couldn’t wait until I finished?”

  “We’re married now.” As if that meant anything.

  “You don’t know that,” she replied sulkily, still holding her breasts uncomfortably. Or maybe it was her crossed legs that were uncomfortable.

  “I know you’re not married to Craig.”

  She frowned, the tickling sensation in her mind of a memory trying to push itself to the surface again. Sitting in the bride’s room at the church, looking in the mirror and seeing Craig’s reflection behind her. His
tie undone, looking at her with almost pained sadness…

  “Your mother said we left before the ceremony.”

  “You talked to my Mom?” The memory slipped away, ephemeral and impossible to re-grasp in the wake of his words. She loved Dinah but having the rancher who thought they were married talking to the woman who thought marriage to a banker was the perfect fate for her daughter was not a conversation she wanted to happen.

  “You must have dropped the phone when you were kissing me.”

  Oh, he just had to put it that way. “You kissed me first.”

  He turned, water dripping off his face, the hard angles of his face unsoftened without his hair to cloud his intensity. “I did a hell of a lot more than that.”

  And so had she. He didn’t say it, the same way he wasn’t saying she was sounding like a child. He didn’t have to.

  She sighed, the indignation abandoning her. Nothing about this situation would allow her to be indignant ever again. “Sorry, you just…surprised me.”

  “You like surprises.” He turned his back again.

  She used to. Since he wasn’t looking, she let herself look at him again, considering. Okay, seeing Kane naked wasn’t exactly a surprise she disliked, but she wasn’t admitting that any time soon.

  She ventured into the water, turning her back to him, letting the streams push her hair from her face. Eyes closed, the warm water slowly began to leech the strain from her muscles and her mind. Just when she fully relaxed, she felt his hands slip into her hair, massaging with shampoo he must have grabbed from the basket. It felt so good after the initial jump that she didn’t bother getting upset about it. She’d already allowed him to stay, what was the point or arguing?