Bride of Fortune

by Leanne Banks

  Jason knew how important this project was to Tyler. He also knew his brother had been routinely working seven days a week to make sure everything went smoothly. “This is not your fault. We’ll call the company lawyers, and I promise we will find out what happened.”

  “It’s Friday night,” Tyler said doubtfully. “We might have a hard time getting the lawyers.”

  Jason flipped through his small book of numbers. “They’re on retainer. We pay them to be available.” He punched out a number. “We sure as hell aren’t going to wait for outside investigators to wade through their paperwork to get the answers we need. Too much is at stake here.”

  He couldn’t help remembering the odd dream he’d had, and the blood at the construction site. He shuddered at the knowledge that the image had become true.

  A half hour later, after he’d talked with Officer Crowther again, he called Adele to give an update. Her voice felt like water when he’d been stranded in the desert. “There’s too much we still don’t know,” he told her. “We already have an attorney on the site. Tyler’s scouring daily construction reports, and I’ve spoken with the press. Could you tell my mom it might be best if Lisa stays with her for a few days? I’ll be working round the clock.”

  “Of course,” Adele said. “What are you doing for food?”

  “I haven’t even thought of it,” he said.

  “Then don’t,” she said. “I will.”

  “You don’t need to do anything else. You can go home now,” he told her and they hung up. He wondered why the simple act of talking to her and hearing her voice made him feel as if he’d just gotten a second wind. He shook his head. God knew he didn’t have time to figure it out now.

  A little later, a security guard entered the trailer with a bag of food. Appearing slightly harried, he looked at Tyler, Devlin, who had appeared moments ago, and him.

  “Yes?” Jason prodded expectantly.

  “Which one of you is Jason Fortune?” the guard asked.

  “I am.”

  The guard dug into the bag, produced a wrapped sandwich and handed it to him. “A pretty, but pushy redhead made me promise to put this in your hand. She said there are a few rainbow sugar cookies in there too.”

  The guard left the bag on the desk and exited the office while the three men sat in silence. The atmosphere in the office had been thick with unrelenting tension, and the guard’s words cut through it like a knife.

  Tyler snickered. “Pretty, pushy redhead. Wonder who that could be.”

  Jason shook his head, but couldn’t help cracking a slight grin. “I told her to go home.”

  “She probably did,” Tyler said, “after she went to the deli and harassed the security guard. Hand me that bag.”

  Jason tossed him the bag and felt his father’s knowing gaze. His father’s eyes saw more than the deli sandwich and a flustered security guard. He saw Adele’s unrepentant determination to look out for Jason’s welfare and her ability to add a breath of levity in an incredibly dark moment, and Jason saw it, too.

  The grueling night continued. Jason appeared on television the following morning, then joined the board for an emergency meeting. Take-out meals mysteriously appeared, delivered, he was told, by a redhead. Late the following evening he finally went home and grabbed a few hours of sleep.

  On Sunday he met with Link Templeton, an investigator with outstanding credentials. Jason immediately clicked with the man with the observant hazel eyes. Link exuded an air of confident experience, and Jason felt a measure of relief that Link would get to the bottom of the incident.

  It was dark on Sunday evening as he drove toward his home. Still restless from the events of the last days, he rejected the idea of going home and turned instead toward Adele’s condo.

  She opened the door and he drank in the sight of her. A silky robe covered her from head to toe, her face was scrubbed clean of make-up, her hair hung in soft curls to her shoulders and her large green eyes searched his. “Come in,” she said without hesitation.

  Before he’d seen her he’d felt raw from the aftermath of the accident. Now, he felt raw from his desire for her. He closed the door and immediately took her into his arms.

  He felt her gentle probing gaze on him in the soft light of her foyer. “How are you?” she asked.

  “Well fed,” he said dryly. “How many times did you bring food to the site?”

  “A few,” she admitted. “I figured you would forget to eat unless it was put in front of you.”

  “You were right,” he said. “How did you get to the guards?”

  “Persistence,” she said. “And cookies.”

  He chuckled and slid his fingers through her fragrant hair. “Rainbow sugar cookies. My father liked them.”

  She smiled. “Good.”

  He felt as if he’d waited an aeon to kiss her, and he couldn’t wait a second longer. He lowered his head and took her mouth. The taste of her raced through him like fire, and he was immediately aroused. At another time, he thought, he could have gone more slowly and seduced her. She deserved the time and the seduction. He forced his mouth away from hers. “I can’t do this slowly now,” he said in a voice that sounded rough to his own ears. “If you want me to leave, tell me now. I’ll count to ten.”

  Adele just stared at him and the seconds ticked past, echoing with the pounding pulse in his brain. A sliver of fear flashed in her eyes, and she closed them tight, but still said nothing.

  The time passed, and she finally opened her eyes. The fear had been replaced with hot desire that played over him like an intimate touch. Jason slid his hands beneath her robe and pushed it from her shoulders. She stood before him totally naked.

  Adele wondered if she would ever breathe again.

  Heedless of her nudity, she slipped her fingers through his silky black hair and drew his mouth to hers. Jason spun them both around until she felt the cool wall at her back and his heat everywhere else. He devoured her with his lips and claimed her body with his hands.

  She struggled with a trickle of fear. His passion was so powerful she wondered if he would consume her until there was nothing left of her. She had never known a man could hunger for her like this. She had never known she could hunger for a man like this.

  When she’d seen the strain on his face, she’d wanted to take it away. Adele pushed aside the fear and followed her heart. She tugged at the buttons to his shirt and urged the jacket and his shirt off his shoulders.

  Jason pulled back and stripped the clothes off his upper body. Gazing at her with eyes full of fire, he swept her into his arms and carried her to the bedroom. He spilled her onto the bed, then the condoms from his pocket, and shucked his slacks and briefs.

  His chest rippled with strength, his abdomen was washboard flat, and between his powerful thighs, his arousal jutted out large and hard. He followed her down, covering her like a warm blanket.

  “I have wanted you since the first time I saw you,” he said, and sucked gently at her bottom lip while one of his hands traveled down to fondle her nipple. The sensation of his hard body and his hands and mouth made her grow damp and swollen.

  “Why?” she asked breathlessly. “Why me?”

  “You were stronger than any woman I’d ever met.” He trailed his other hand down coaxing her legs apart and touching her intimately. “I had to have you,” he said, and slid his finger inside her and she rippled at the sensation. He swore. “It’s not enough. I want you every way at once.”

  He lowered his head to take her nipple into his mouth.

  Adele arched toward him helplessly as he drove her mindless with his mouth and hands. His urgency fed hers. He made her reckless with need. She wanted closer. She wanted more of him. She squeezed his shoulders and slid her fingers down his smoothly muscled chest. He lifted his mouth from her breast to her lips.

  “I want to kiss you everywhere,” he said against her mouth.

  Her need climbing, Adele skimmed her hands down his abdomen and brushed his hardness wi
th her fingertips.

  Jason stiffened. “Don’t—”

  Adele stroked him again and felt the first drops of his honeyed arousal. “Why—”

  He swore and reached for protection. Her head spun with the speed. His gaze fastened on hers, he pushed her legs apart and plunged inside her.

  Adele sucked in a sharp breath at the intimate invasion.

  Jason closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. “You’re so small.”

  She bit her lip. “And you are not,” she said in a fractured whisper.

  He laced the fingers of one of his hands through hers and gazed at her. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “You didn’t really hurt me,” she said, slowly adjusting to him.

  “No?” he said in disbelief.

  “You just surprised me,” she managed. “Kiss me,” she said.

  His eyes darkened with desire and, leaning down, he French kissed her mouth with caresses so hot she felt herself turn to liquid. He didn’t move his lower body. He just made love to her mouth until Adele could stay still no longer.

  “No,” he told her.

  But Adele didn’t stop. She drew his tongue into her mouth as she undulated beneath him, swallowing his groan.

  “You don’t always follow instructions well,” he said as he pulled back slightly, his face inches from hers, his eyes glittering.

  “Aren’t you glad?” She lifted her hand to his strong face and felt him sink into her more deeply.

  Gazing down at her body, he began a mind-robbing rhythm, stretching her and pushing her with every stroke. Adele felt hot inside and out.

  She arched against him, and he narrowed his eyes in pleasure. “I don’t know how I’m going to get enough of you,” he said and lowered his mouth to hers again.

  The thrust of his tongue echoed the thrust of his masculinity inside her, and the sensations were too erotic for words. She felt herself tighten with each pump. Her breath shortened, and she felt herself drawn closer to the crest.

  “C’mon, Addie, I want it all,” he murmured in sensual encouragement. “I want all of you.”

  Like a tornado, it took her by surprise. She crested and clenched around him, feeling him stiffen with his own peak. Her climax rocked her to her core, and she clung to him, fearing she would splinter out of control.

  Her mind a jumble of scrambled synapses, she tried to breathe and think. Jason rested his head in the hollow of her shoulder, his breaths as labored as hers. When Adele’s brain began to operate, she was less concerned about her lungs and much more concerned about another, more vulnerable, part of her. She feared the man who had just taken her body had also taken her heart.

  Jason wanted her again. The knowledge amazed him. He had never felt so sexually replete and hungry at the same time. His mind was already making love to her again, and he could feel his body react with shocking speed to the possibility.

  Adele shifted beneath him, and he moved to her side to ease the burden of his weight from her, still keeping his arm around her waist. She tried to move away, and he instinctively tightened his arm and searched her face.

  She looked lost.

  His heart contracted at her expression. “What’s wrong?”

  She swallowed visibly. “I—uh—” She licked her lips. “I’m not used to this,” she said in an unsteady voice.

  He sat up, but didn’t remove his hand from her. “To making love,” he concluded. She’d been so incredibly tight.

  “That, too,” she said. “I—I’m not used to this.”

  He saw her hands tremble before she laced them together, and his heart caught again. Protective instincts rising to the surface, he pulled her into his lap, circling his arms around her. “Used to what?”

  “To you,” she said in a low voice. “To feeling like I got hit by a tornado.”

  “It was too fast,” he said.

  “No, no,” she said, then looked up at him. “Was it?”

  The artless trust in her gaze caught and held him. “Yes, it was,” he said, lifting his hand to cup her jaw. When she rubbed her cheek against his palm, he felt the want like an ache, but not in his loins. “But I couldn’t wait. It may not make sense to you, but I feel as though I’ve been waiting to make love to you since the moment I saw you.” He paused. “And you?”

  She lifted her gaze to his, and the power of the emotion in her eyes set him back. “Before,” she finally said.

  Confused, Jason dipped his head. “Before when?”

  “Before I met you,” she whispered, and rocked his world.

  After that, Jason held her for the longest time, until Adele stopped trembling and relaxed in his arms. He woke her in the night and took her again like thunder and lightning. Then, with the dawn, he made love to her with such slow tenderness it made her tremble again.

  So perhaps it had nothing to do with speed, she thought as she gingerly rose from her bed while he slept. Maybe the trembling was all because of him. The unsettling thought hovered over her while she performed the equally unsettling task of gathering her robe and Jason’s clothes from her foyer. By the time she tied her robe and splashed her face with water, Adele had the foreboding sense that she had just made a whopper of a mistake.

  Jason’s hands around her waist took her by surprise, and she gave a little yelp. Completely at ease with his nudity, he lifted a dark eyebrow. “Jumpy this morning?”

  “I guess,” she said, and didn’t like the indecisiveness of her answer. “Yes, I’m jumpy.” She turned to face him. “I don’t know how to do this.”

  “Do what?” he asked calmly.

  “What we’re doing,” she said, flustered, and wondered if she’d ever been less articulate.

  His lips twitched. “I’d say you’ve done a damn good job for a woman who doesn’t know what she’s doing.”

  She sighed in frustration. “That’s not what I’m talking about. This is why I didn’t want to do this,” she said, knowing her articulation wasn’t improving. “I mean, I’m not mistress material, and Heaven knows I’m not going to be your wife.” Adele’s heart felt as if it were clanging like an out-of-tune bell. I don’t even want to go near the wife thing, she reminded herself. “But this is so intense. And there’s your family.”

  “Let’s leave my family out of this and keep what’s private between us private,” he said quietly. “I can take care of you.”

  His words chafed at her. “Can you? Can we? You may be your own man, but your family is a big part of you. How can they not see what’s happening?”

  His jaw tightened. “I’ve done it before.”

  Adele felt as if he’d slapped her. “Oh, you have? Gosh, I could have sworn you said this was different for you. But you’ve felt exactly this way before for another woman.”

  His eyes darkened with a hint of anger. “Adele,” he began, impatience threading through his tone.

  “I think you need to leave,” she said.

  “You misunderstood,” he said.

  “Yep, I think I did. You need to leave. I can’t think with you standing naked less than a foot away from me. For that matter I can’t think with you dressed in Eskimo wear twenty-five feet away from me. Please go.”

  He wasn’t budging. Her panic rose, and she knew she was going to have to do something drastic.

  “I’m not leaving.”

  “Okay,” she said. “You get dressed, and I’ll go into the den.”

  He looked at her as if he didn’t trust her, which was actually pretty darn smart of him. He glanced at her robe and probably drew the correct conclusion that she wasn’t wearing a stitch beneath it. “Okay,” he said reluctantly. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

  He would be, but she would not, she thought as she grabbed her keys and a five-dollar bill from the kitchen. He must have heard her open the door. Just before she closed it behind her, she heard him yell.

  “Adele!”

  Eight

  She was out of her league and out of her mind. “Let’s keep our private life
private.” Adele echoed his words and made a sound of disgust. “Yeah, right. As if everyone who isn’t blind won’t be able to read my face every time I get within twenty-five feet of him.”

  Seeing the car in front of her pull away, she inched her car forward. The great thing about a fast-food breakfast was the drive-through window. Adele ordered seven items including two beverages, since she figured it would be a while before she returned home. She would be okay, she told herself. She had all her basic needs covered as well as her body. She had breakfast and a full tank of gas.

  After she parked in the back of the parking lot, far away from the road, she took a bite of a cholesterol-laden egg, bacon and cheese biscuit and sipped her orange juice.

  Okay, so maybe it wasn’t the most rational move in the world to walk out of her condo with no shoes and covered only in a thin wash of silk. It couldn’t be any less rational than going to bed with Jason Fortune last night.

  She took another bite of the biscuit and scowled. It must be nice to have that much self-control. Once upon a time she’d had that kind of self-control.

  She crumpled the paper around the biscuit and reached for the hash browns. “I do not like this. I do not like this,” she repeated like a litany to herself.

  Adele traded the juice for coffee and took a long swallow of the strong, hot liquid. She took another sip and forced her brain out of neutral.

  Jason might wait at her house for a while, but since he was Mr. Very Important to Fortune Construction, he couldn’t dawdle too long on Monday morning. Adele thought of the recent accident, and her appetite left her. She tossed the hash browns back in the bag.

  Sighing, she decided she would face the big bad Fortune lion later after she’d gathered her composure. Fast food, a shower and a very tight hair clip would help her project outward calm.

  By the time Jason reached the office, he wanted to chew glass. As he passed his assistant, he barked out an instruction, “Barbara, page me the second Miss O’Neil arrives.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “There are messages and your brother—”