INTIMATE STRANGER

by Donna Sterling

  And he wanted to make sure she knew with every thrust that he was making love to her, no one else. His memories of Diana were too precious to evoke, and his need for Jen possessed him too completely. But he could no longer speak to tell her anything. It took all his effort to restrict his movements, stifle his groans. She undulated with tiny, secret moves, fanning his inner fire, and the strain soon grew too great to endure.

  And from the increasing urgency of her breathy gasps, he knew she was nearing completion. So was he. Just one good, jarring thrust would shove them both over the edge. Unable to hold back a moment longer, he gritted his teeth, splayed his hands around her hips and braced her for the impact.

  But then a movement beyond them suddenly hooked his attention. A movement on the stairway. Auburn hair. White blouse. Someone was climbing the stairs.

  Drawing in a deep, gasping breath, he fought to pull back on his raging need for release. "Jen." Breaking out into a sweat at the tremendous effort, he hoarsely whispered, "Someone's coming."

  "Coming," she breathed, dazed with passion, hot and fluid in his arms, her hips circling, circling. "Ohhh … yes…"

  He jerked his arms tighter around her, desperate to get her attention, and to stop her gyrations before she and he both lost control. "Not us. A waitress."

  "A waitress?" The perplexity in her whisper and gaze soon gave way to wide-eyed awareness. "A waitress!"

  "Shh." Struggling to normalize his chaotic breathing and contain the fire in his loins, he squinted through the heat and peered beyond her. Dread gathered in his chest. "She has people with her."

  Jen stared at him in dawning horror. "Oh, my God! Do you think they saw us from downstairs? Do they look like they know? Are they coming for us?"

  He shushed her with a warning squeeze, and subdued voices reached them from the far end of the balcony. The waitress assured the older couple who trailed her that they'd see the stage much better from here.

  Jen went stiff and silent in his arms. She barely breathed, in fact. Her face was burrowed into the side of his neck in clear mortification.

  The waitress, meanwhile, seated the silver-haired, dignified guests at the U-shaped booth nearest the stairway, a fair distance from them, but far too close for comfort. When they'd settled in to watch the play, the waitress turned toward Trev and Jen with a smile.

  Trev attempted an answering smile over Jen's shoulder—not easy when the urgency still pulsed inside him, and her hold around his neck nearly cut off his air supply.

  "Can I get y'all anything?" the waitress asked as she approached.

  "No, no." He held up a hand to stop her from ambling any closer, suddenly conscious of the red silk panties on the seat and the empty condom packet in the ashtray … and, of course, Jen straddling his lap, intimately joined with him. "We're good."

  The waitress stopped a few feet away from their booth, and her glance flickered over Jen. Or, rather, over Jen's back. "Everything okay, hon?" she asked Trev in concern.

  "Oh … yes." Did she hear the unevenness of his tone, the sexual rasp of his voice? "My wife just gets … emotional … during shows like this."

  The waitress blinked in bewilderment, and the audience, damn them, murmured again with laughter. The play was obviously a comedy.

  "The, uh, lead actor reminds her of … of someone she lost," he added.

  Her mouth formed a silent Oh, and she nodded in sympathetic understanding. "Are you sure I can't bring her a glass of water, or more wine?"

  Trev shook his head and muttered thanks.

  The waitress urged him to wave if they wanted anything. "I'll be watching out for y'all from downstairs, hear?" Mercifully, then, she left them.

  To watch out for them from downstairs. Trev shut his eyes and leaned his head against Jen's. No one said that sex in public would be easy.

  "Do you think she knew?" came a pained whisper in his ear.

  "I don't think so."

  "Did she … see my … panties?" Abject humiliation vibrated in every syllable.

  "No. She was too far away."

  "Are you sure?"

  "Positive."

  She let out a torrent of breath against his collarbone, but her relief was short-lived. "I can't believe you got me into this," she seethed. "What are we going to do? How can I get off you if people are sitting right there?"

  "They're not all that close. And the booths are high-backed. Shouldn't be too hard. At least, not while the place is still dark."

  She sucked in a panicked breath. "Do you think they'll have an intermission, and turn up the lights? It can't be time for that yet, can it? Do you think more people will move up here? Oh, my God, Trev," she wailed in quiet misery, pressing her face to his, "we're bound to be caught!"

  He ran a hand over her silky, disheveled hair and hoped she'd calm down before she hyperventilated. "No, we won't be caught. The waitress is gone. We're okay."

  Her choppy, frenzied breathing gradually slowed, and as he held her, a sense of warm satisfaction grew in him. His mystery lady might "feel alive" while "living on the edge," but not too close to that edge. And if she was upset by the thought of the waitress seeing her panties on the seat, he knew damn well she hadn't pranced around on that air-hockey table, or gang-banged the Baltimore Orioles.

  But in his heart, he'd known that, anyway. He'd just wanted her to admit it.

  Now he wanted only to make love to her. Soon, and repeatedly. He wished they were already home, their clothes off, her body sprawled beneath his. He longed to watch her face, her eyes, while he thrust deep and she gripped him in the throes of climax.

  Enflamed again by serious need, he tilted her back for a kiss—hot, intricate, and not the least bit subdued by their brush with disaster. She soon lost her stiffness, melded against him and moaned in renewed passion. Nothing could have pleased him more. She was just as needy as he.

  "Let's go home," he murmured urgently, "and get naked."

  She nodded with a gaze that promised endless hours of lovemaking.

  It occurred to him then that he'd been intimate with her twice, but hadn't yet seen her naked. The first night they'd made love in the dark; this evening, in public view. "Tonight we'll keep the lights on," he swore, more to himself than to her.

  "Lights on?" A small frown etched lines between her brows.

  "I want to see you. To know you."

  Something about that mission statement brought a flicker of alarm to her gaze. "I—I've always preferred the dark. So much more … intimate. The glare of lights would only ruin the mood."

  He stared at her incredulously. Was she too shy to let him see her naked, or to make love in the light? His lady of the evening, his wild Madam X … the temptress who, even now, remained intimately joined with him in public?

  No way. Shyness couldn't be the reason. So then, why did she want the lights off?

  He'd make it a point to find out—and to change her mind. Tonight.

  * * *

  7

  « ^ »

  Trev didn't intend to make a big deal out of her insistence that making love in a lighted room would "ruin the mood." He simply planned to take her to bed, with the lights off, and at some time during the long, hot night of lovemaking, switch on the bedside lamp. By that time, she'd either be too passionately involved to remember her bizarre protest, or he'd discover her reason for it. Either way, he swore, by morning, she'd never again hesitate to get naked with him, even in broad daylight.

  He held this plan firmly in mind while he suffered through their physical separation at the restaurant booth—a discreet shifting that took mere seconds. The struggle to zip up his jeans was much more of an ordeal, considering the state he'd been left in. Jen, meanwhile, slipped back into her panties, restored her hair to its shiny, casual twist and finished her glass of peach wine. Trev tossed money onto the table for the bill, then hurried her out of the darkened theater, his blood still coursing from their sexual game.

  The prospect of a two-hour drive seemed unendurab
le

  Jen didn't make things any easier. No sooner had he settled behind the wheel of his car than she slid her arm around him, ran her fingers through his hair and whispered, "What's the big rush? Or should I say … where's the fire?"

  While he drove the car out of the crowded parking lot, she proceeded to fan that fire into a blaze by nibbling his neck, stroking his chest and thighs, and wriggling her panties down her long, curvaceous legs—a sight he wished he could see more clearly than the darkened car allowed.

  Before he even reached the expressway, he veered the car off the road into the first secluded spot he found, and in the dark, cramped quarters of the front seat, he made love to her. There wasn't any finesse involved—just hot, explosive need. Never had he taken a woman with such savagery. Never had a woman responded with such passionate force of her own.

  To be fair, he had to admit they wore each other out.

  He regenerated completely during the drive home, though, his mind ablaze with erotic ideas for the night ahead. She, meanwhile, curled up in the passenger seat and fell asleep. At least, he believed she'd fallen asleep.

  But when they reached the furnished beach house he'd rented, he wondered if she'd been pretending. Because as soon as he pulled into the driveway and killed the engine, she sat up, mumbled something about finding a bathroom, and tore into the house. Before he knew it, she'd found the guest bedroom, grabbed her suitcases from where he'd set them and vanished behind a locked door.

  "Jen," he called. "Come to my bed, or I'll come to yours."

  "Sorry. Too tired."

  Her reply stunned him. He understood why she was tired, of course, but not why she refused to come to his bed. "We'll sleep for a while," he promised. "Until you get your second wind."

  Nothing he said persuaded her. He spent the night alone—a whole night, when he could have been holding her, at the very least. Sleeping with her. It startled him, how much he wanted that.

  During long hours of frustrated speculation, he'd mulled over a number of possible reasons she hadn't slept with him. By morning, he'd discounted all but one. She'd been ready to make love to him all night long, he swore—until he'd mentioned keeping the lights on. Only then had reservations entered her gaze. She'd insisted that the light would "ruin the mood," and that the dark was more "intimate."

  Had she suspected that he'd planned to show her differently? Had she deliberately provoked their passion in the darkened car to avoid making love at home, in the light?

  Alone at the kitchen table the next morning, he pushed aside his half-eaten breakfast and stared through a bay window at the sunshine glinting off the blue-gray ocean. The woman was driving him crazy. Why the hell had she flaunted herself in a see-through dress, tried to convince him she was shameless, carried on with him in public, and then balked at getting naked with him in the privacy of his bedroom? If he accomplished anything at all today, he would at least find an answer to that question.

  But then, she presented so many damn questions.

  "Is that bacon I smell?" The soft, incredulous question sounded from the arched doorway of the kitchen.

  "Yes, ma'am. Bacon it is." The mere sound of her voice, the mere knowledge of her presence, mildly aroused him. Annoyed with himself for reacting like one of Pavlov's dogs, he shifted his gaze to her, and his breath stopped somewhere between his lungs and throat.

  In sleek-fitting jeans and a white eyelet blouse that tied at her waist, her thick ash-blond hair flowing to her shoulders in silky disarray, her face innocent of makeup and a sleepy morning smile lighting her eyes, she was simply too beautiful to bear. At least, without touching her. Pulling her into his lap. Kissing the very breath out of her.

  He wrapped both hands tightly around his coffee cup to keep from reaching for her. She'd stunned him last night with a rejection; he wouldn't risk starting the day with one, too. By the time he reached for her, she would want him. He'd see to it.

  Moving closer to the table where he sat, she peered in amazement at the platter of bacon, eggs and toast. "Does this mean you cooked?"

  He quirked a brow at her. "Why so surprised?"

  A wry sparkle played in her eyes, and she opened her mouth to utter some irreverent quip, he was sure. But then she stopped, as if she'd caught herself just in time. She actually looked shaken. "You—you just don't seem like the type of guy who cooks, that's all."

  He studied her curiously. Had she thought she would offend him with whatever she'd been about to say? He wondered what it had been. He wondered if he'd ever find answers to his questions about her. Any of them.

  "So … do you enjoy cooking?" she asked, clearly trying to normalize the conversation.

  He decided to help her out. Lull her into relaxing her guard. And then do whatever it took to uncover her true thoughts and feelings about him—as well as the other maddening secrets he knew damn well she kept. He'd somehow come to consider that a top priority.

  "I can't honestly say that I enjoy cooking." He settled back in his chair in a deliberately nonchalant pose. "I learned out of necessity when my grandmother gave it up. With my sister away at college, that left only my brothers and me to man the kitchen. I might not be a master chef, but, trust me, I was the least of three evils." He smiled and gestured toward the bacon and eggs that hadn't turned out too bad. "Grab a plate and help yourself. Might need to warm it in the microwave. The coffee's on the counter behind you. If you'd rather make some fresh, go ahead. I've been up quite a while." He paused and watched the subtle sway of her shapely hips as she sauntered to the cabinet for a cup. "Guess I had too much pent-up energy to sleep."

  If she felt the gentle barb of that comment, she didn't show it as she poured herself a cup of coffee, sat in a chair diagonal from him at the square oak table and helped herself to a small sampling of everything he'd made. "Why did your grandmother stop cooking?"

  So, she intended to avoid the issue of where she'd slept, and why he hadn't slept. Not for long, she wouldn't. Allowing her only a temporary reprieve from the topic that dominated his thoughts, he smoothly replied, "Arthritis."

  "Oh, that's too bad." She looked genuinely dismayed. "She must have hated that." The soft, sad words had barely left her mouth before she hurriedly added, "I mean, I—I don't know how your grandmother feels about cooking, of course, but I'd imagine that anyone would hate … well … being disabled in any way."

  Trev narrowed his gaze. Was she acting unusually skittish this morning? Walking on proverbial eggshells around him? "Yeah, I guess most people wouldn't be too glad of it."

  Her lips pursed briefly at his mild sarcasm, but she avoided any other acknowledgment by digging her fork into the small mound of scrambled eggs on her plate and focusing on her breakfast. After a brief silence, she asked, "Who's cooking for your grandmother now?"

  "Her younger sister moved in. I'm hoping the company might cheer her up."

  "Cheer her up? She hasn't been … happy?"

  "Not since Diana disappeared." A shard of grief pierced him at the mention of her, inflicting enough pain to make him realize how much of a respite he'd found with Jen—and to remind him that in seven hellish years, only this woman seemed to wield the magic to ease his abject loneliness. How could he possibly let her go? But then, how could he not?

  Forcing his focus away from troublesome questions and back to the conversation, he explained, "My grandmother's had a hard time accepting Diana's disappearance. You see, she'd been the one to suggest that Diana attend the writers' conference—the trip she never returned from."

  Pausing with the fork halfway to her mouth, Jen stared at him with such a troubled expression that he found himself wanting to reassure her that his grandmother would eventually get over her irrational sense of guilt. But he had his doubts that she would—especially if she never accepted the fact Diana wasn't coming back.

  "I'm so sorry that you and your family have gone through such torment."

  Something about the anguished sincerity in her voice touched him more deeply
than had any other offer of sympathy. Clearing his throat to ease a sudden tightness there, he gruffly replied, "Thank you." The moment dragged on too long, though. He couldn't bear to have the sadness intrude on their time together. Leveling her a deliberately stem glance, he said, "That comment about 'torment'—you weren't referring to my cooking, were you?"

  Her brows jutted up in surprise. "Of course not!"

  "I'll admit, the bacon might be a little on the well-done side, and the eggs a little undercooked—but the toast, if I must say so myself, is a true culinary masterpiece."

  The hint of a smile seeped back into her eyes, and his heart hailed its return like a long-lost friend. "Oh, come on, Trev. It's all cooked to perfection. If I didn't know better, I'd say you're fishing for compliments."

  "Good thing you know better."

  They shared a smile, then. And his gaze lingered on her mouth. And her gaze drifted to his. He wanted so damn much to kiss her.

  An almost imperceptible flush rose into her face, and she abruptly bent her attention to her breakfast. After finishing the eggs and distractedly nibbling the bacon and toast, she said with a rather forced casualness, "I have a feeling you won't have to cook much for very long if you don't want to. Within a month, you'll have half the women in Sunrise lined up at your door, ready to ease your burden."

  Trev sipped his coffee and studied her. Was she merely making conversation to avoid the sensual tension that had gripped them, or did she want to know if he intended to date? Or was this her way of telling him that she wasn't mistaking their relationship for anything meaningful?

  Whatever she'd meant, the comment bothered him. It touched on topics he wasn't ready to deal with. Like, what would happen between them when their two days and three nights were over.

  Hell, he wasn't sure what was happening between them now. He only knew that he wanted to kiss her, and sleep with her tonight. Make her want him so much that she wouldn't think twice about getting naked with him in broad daylight. Wanted to stare deeply into her eyes while they made love, and maybe find that window to her soul.