So Irresistible

by Lisa Plumley

  Feeling muddled and off balance, Shane didn’t know if he should kiss her or hug her, challenge her or congratulate her on being the first woman in eons to truly engage him. With Gabby, he felt both combative and empowered, seen and enlivened. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t care. Maybe this tangle of mixed-up emotions was what he got for ignoring the softer side of life for so long. Or maybe it was just her, making him feel this way. But for one night only, Shane wanted all of it.

  He wanted the clean and the messy, the complicated and the easy. He wanted to whisper something romantic in Gabby’s ear—so conveniently exposed by her boyish haircut—and find out if he could make her blush. He wanted to hold her hand some more.

  He wanted to lose himself in her. And since Shane was there to experience every sloppy emotion he usually suppressed …

  “The craziest thing is,” he said, unable to squash a smile as he looked at her, “this feels so right, right now.”

  “Everything feels right in a brewpub past midnight.”

  “It’s not just that. It’s you.”

  Her arched brows suggested a healthy skepticism that Shane couldn’t help respecting. Gabby laughed. “Wait till you know me better. If you’re impressed now, you’ll be floored later.”

  “I don’t doubt it.” He took a pull of his porter, realized he didn’t want to be too drunk to remember this night, and set the bottle aside. “What do you say we skip the ‘impressed’ beginning and go straight to the ‘floored’ middle?”

  “Why not go right to the end?”

  “Because that’s not the fun part.”

  “But everything happens that way.” She gestured, chopping her hand lightly on the tabletop to emphasize. “Beginning, middle, end. You can’t skip parts. No matter how tempting.”

  “It is tempting. And yes, I can. No rules, just … living.”

  Her direct gaze met his. “Where did you get such a no-holds-barred attitude, anyway? Did you just get paroled?” She touched his arm and nearly incited a riot in his nerve endings. “Tell me the truth. I’ll know it if you’re fibbing.”

  Shane laughed. She was perceptive. Not that he’d ever been in prison, but Gabby had clearly spied the darker side of him. He didn’t doubt she’d guess if he tried to put one over on her.

  Oddly enough, though, he didn’t want to try. He didn’t even want to employ a few “fixing” skills, the way he’d done to snag their not nearly private enough corner booth at the brewpub.

  “I grew up in foster care. I learned early to live day to day—to take things as they come.” Effortlessly, he signaled for another round of drinks. Even if he wasn’t planning to down more porter, it was only right to pay for the use of the booth. “Some families were good. Some were bad. Some were indifferent.” Shane squinted momentarily, remembering those days. Then he shrugged. “When I wasn’t in trouble, I was invisible.”

  “So you stayed in trouble a lot.”

  He grinned as their new drinks arrived. “How’d you guess?”

  “You look the part. Despite your boyish demeanor, that is. You look … like trouble.” Gabby picked up a bottle of porter, put a bottle in his hand, then toasted him. “To bad behavior.”

  “Bad behavior?” Warily, Shane drank. “You don’t mean that.”

  “I never say anything I don’t mean.”

  He liked that. It also scared the hell out of him. The last thing he needed was a woman who saw through his infamous charisma, sussed out his disreputable past … and wanted to be with him anyway. It was fortunate this was a onetime thing.

  “We have that in common,” Shane told her truthfully.

  “I wouldn’t still be here if we didn’t.” Looking sparkly-eyed and pretty, Gabby nodded at his bottle. “You’re not drinking?”

  “Not anymore.” Suddenly, more than anything, he wanted to remember tonight. He inhaled deeply, catching a whiff of those spicy scents that clung to her. He felt … moved by her nearness, brightened by her smile and her smarts and her straightforward way of putting things. “I want to remember you.”

  “Aw.” Grinning, she downed some porter. “Cheesy, much?”

  “Obviously, you’ve never met a man who took you seriously. Otherwise, you’d be used to hearing things like that.”

  With her bottle partway to her lips, Gabby paused. She eyed him through exotic dark eyes. “Yeah. I scare most men.”

  “That’s on them. At least they know where they stand with you. If they can’t handle that”—Shane spread his arms, feeling more in sync with her all the time—“screw ’em.”

  “That’s what I say!” Shaking her head at him, Gabby gave him another sexy up-and-down look. If Shane hadn’t known better, he’d have sworn he looked his best in roughed-up jeans and a T-shirt. Gabby looked as though she wanted to lick him all over.

  He wanted to be licked. All over. Repeatedly. Starting now. Eventually and much too soon, her attention meandered back to his face. By then, Shane’s scruffy jeans felt a size too small. There was something liberating about being with Gabby. Maybe it was because nothing real could come of their meeting. Maybe it was because Shane liked a woman, like her, who knew what she wanted. Either way, he wanted her. Fake name or not.

  He didn’t want to “fix” this, either. Given the reasons he’d come out tonight, Shane figured that only a genuine response would be enough to drive back his demons.

  He could have charmed and persuaded her, cajoled and manipulated her. He could have had her at his place already.

  He hadn’t earned his reputation for nothing, after all.

  Instead, insisting on honesty even when he didn’t have to, Shane touched her arm. “Do you want to get out of here?”

  “I don’t know yet.” A teasing sidelong look. “Do you want to discuss your tragic misspent youth some more?”

  “Umm … yes?” He laughed. “If that’s what it’ll take. Sure.”

  “It’s not,” Gabby reassured him. “I just wanted you to be willing. I’m practicing Serial Killer Defense 101.”

  “I’m not a serial killer,” Shane assured her with perfect equability. “I’m a professional business hit man.”

  It was 100 percent brutally honest. But Gabby didn’t believe him. “Wow. That sounds like an incredibly macho way of describing … accounting, or whatever.” She waved. “I don’t care what you do. I care who you are. Also, I care that you’re not in some FBI database. So, smile for my friend Pinkie.”

  Shane looked up. A skinny blonde wearing a pink bandanna around her head snapped his photo with her cell phone. For some reason, the burly dude next to her scowled. The old guy beside him looked worried. And the middle-aged man nearby peered at his elbow, muttered to himself, then punched up his own cell phone.

  “Your compatriots?” Shane asked, nodding toward them.

  “Something like that.” Puzzlingly, Gabby gave them a wistful look. She sent a text, then turned to him. “The important thing is, you’ve been IDed. If I don’t show up for work tomorrow, they’ll know where to start looking for me.”

  “You’re not very trusting.”

  “I’m not very gullible. There’s a difference.”

  “No …” Steadily, Shane studied her. “I don’t just mean about this, with me. I mean, you’re not very trusting. With anyone.”

  Gabby gazed at him. Again, she seemed amused. Also a little shaken. “Hmm. Perceptive and studly. Even if you were wrong—”

  “But I’m not wrong,” Shane felt compelled to point out.

  “—I think I’d still want to kiss you right now.”

  Then Gabby leaned forward, took his jaw in her hand, and lowered her mouth to his.

  Giddily, Gabriella became aware of a thousand things at once. The feel of Shane’s hard, darkly stubbled jaw beneath her palm. The masculine warmth and soapy smell of his skin. The hardness of his big body and the cacophony of the brewpub and the feel of the bass music pounding up through the floor, up through the corner booth, all the way up into her bones.

&
nbsp; Kissing Shane rocked her world in the hottest possible way, and she wanted more of it. She wanted more of him. Right now.

  It seemed that she’d scarcely had that thought before she made it happen. Gabriella kissed him again. She felt exhilarated and powerful and full of onrushing possibilities—and that was before Shane cradled her cheek in his hand, pulled her even closer in their leathery booth, and made her forget all those sensations she’d just registered. Instead, all that existed was Shane’s mouth, soft and wide and wet. All that meant anything were his hands, roving over her shoulders, thumbing over the flimsy straps on her dress. All that could be known was wanting.

  It was as if, by kissing him, Gabriella had lit the fuse to something unstoppable and explosive and urgent. Their bodies pushed together, crowding in the booth. Their hearts raced, hard and fast. Their breath caught and held. They gasped between kisses as though those kisses were more sustaining than oxygen.

  Gabriella had never experienced anything like it—and she couldn’t get enough of it, either. She craved Shane—and his confident, arousing touch, too. That’s why, after a little more conversation, she and Shane left the brewpub hand in hand. Her friends’ teasing catcalls sounded, but Gabriella didn’t care.

  She didn’t care because she and Shane were heading to her car … and then they were stopping just outside it, unable to resist another kiss. And another. They were groping with hands and hearts and smiles toward something she hadn’t come to the brewpub for—but now that it was within reach, she needed it.

  She needed Shane’s hands, big and agile and gentle. She needed his mouth, kissing her neck. She needed his body, full length against hers as they leaned together on the passenger side of her trusty Toyota and lost themselves in another kiss.

  The chilly late-night April air made Gabriella shiver. So did the sound of Shane’s voice as he dealt with that problem.

  “Cold?” he asked. “Here. Let me warm you up.”

  He did, and in ways that had nothing to do with their bodies. Because his smile reached into her heart somehow and made her feel safe in his arms. His gentleness affected her, too. Gabriella didn’t know if it was his difficult upbringing that had made him so considerate of her feelings or if it was innate in him. All she knew was that she liked it.

  She liked him. Probably more than she should have.

  If love at first sight existed, she thought irrationally as she caught sight of Shane’s handsome, rugged face in the moonlight, then she’d caught a whopping bad case of it tonight.

  She only wished Shane hadn’t quite guessed at her inner self so readily. She wasn’t entirely comfortable knowing that he’d been able to deduce her difficulty in trusting people within a half hour of their meeting. Gabriella had thought she’d kept that tendency of hers pretty much hidden. God knew it gave her enough trouble with her staff—and sometimes her friends.

  But Shane, surprisingly, had seemed … accepting of that quality in her. Maybe that was because he was the same way?

  He didn’t seem to be, Gabriella mused as they finally slid into her car. In fact, Shane seemed completely trusting—of her, of their situation, and of what was to come … however much nakedness, hotness, and mind-scrambling sex resulted from it.

  Maybe that was the mind-set that came from not following rules. After all, he had said, quite succinctly, rules are made to be broken. That sacrilege alone should have made Gabriella not want him. Instead, it seemed to have made her want him more.

  She did love a bad boy.

  But only for tonight, Gabriella assured herself. Tomorrow, she’d be back to following the rules, obeying tradition, and observing the proper chain of command. Tomorrow, she’d be back to doing things her dad’s way. Just like she’d vowed to do since coming home to Portland.

  After all, doing all those sensible things was going to repair her relationship with her family. She was counting on it. Because, obviously, she’d pushed rebellion just as far as it could go—and she’d learned to regret it, too.

  Mischievously, she eyed Shane. “I already know you don’t like rules or tradition. How do you feel about the chain of command?”

  “That depends on who’s doing the commanding.”

  “What if it’s me?”

  “Then it’s got all kinds of possibilities.” Through dark and unexpectedly hopeful eyes, he glanced at her. “My place is just a few blocks away, if you’re feeling ‘commanding’ already.”

  She shouldn’t have agreed, Gabriella knew. This wasn’t like her. She wasn’t a one-night-stand kind of woman. But they’d talked for a while in the brewpub, and she’d taken sensible precautions. And even though Shane was a man who definitely didn’t lack for machismo, he was actually willing to let her take the lead. That was unusual and intoxicating—especially given the rush of desire she already felt coursing through her.

  She could control this. She could control him. Shane would be her very own one-night-only, one-and-only sexual fling.

  “I’ll drive,” she told him. “You give directions.” She tossed him a wicked look. “For now. I’ll give directions later.”

  Chapter Five

  Shane was someone else’s to command—and for the first time in his life, he liked it that way. He liked that Gabby scarcely looked at his deluxe high-rise apartment when they reached it. He liked that she stepped inside its tastefully lit ambiance without hesitation or awe or pretend coyness. He liked that she wasted no time pinning him against the nearest wall and kissing him. He liked that she felt free to let her hands roam while she did so.

  He liked everything about being with her.

  Except the inevitable end of being with her. Beginning, middle, end, Gabby had said earlier. You can’t skip parts.

  Stunned to have even considered the future under hotter-than-hot circumstances like this, Shane pushed away the thought of their one-night liaison coming to an end and focused on kissing Gabby instead. In his arms, she felt like heaven on earth—like knowing he was wanted and needed and accepted.

  That’s how Shane knew that, no matter how real and necessary this felt tonight, it was only an illusion between them. Because he’d never been wanted and needed and accepted. Not in the way he’d longed to be. But now, with Gabby …

  He knew he could please her. He fully meant to do so.

  For the next several hours, that’s all that mattered.

  “Take off your shirt,” Gabby commanded breathlessly. Her words reminded him of their conversation about the chain of command—and set him aflame, too. “I want to see you. Right now.”

  Evidently, Shane hesitated a heartbeat too long, because Gabby didn’t wait for him. Lunging forward for another kiss, she grabbed twin handfuls of his T-shirt hem and yanked upward. He felt her knuckles graze his midsection, sensed her becoming distracted, broke off their kiss to find her stroking his abs.

  “You should never cover all this.” Eyes alight, she stripped off his shirt. Without looking, she tossed it aside. The Chihuly freeblown glasswork on his coffee table served as an impromptu butler stand—doubtless not what Lizzy had intended when she’d decorated with it. “You look incredible .”

  Shane shook his head. “I feel even better than that.”

  Her smile quirked upward. “I bet you do.”

  At her provocative tone, he almost laughed. “No, I mean—”

  I feel even better than that … because I’m with you.

  He couldn’t say that. It was too vulnerable, too open.

  On the other hand, that’s why he was here.

  “I mean I feel even better than that,” Shane told her as he pulled her against him again, “because I’m with you.”

  “Ah.” Again, Gabby didn’t take him seriously. “Just wait. Things are going to get even better between us. Like this.”

  She kissed him again, and the feel of her mouth against his took his breath away. Struggling to remain in control, Shane found that he could not. All he knew were the sensuous glide of Gabby’s mouth, the arresting feel of h
er hands stroking his shoulders, the delicate fullness of her breasts pushing against his chest. He needed … everything from her, and he needed it now.

  Otherwise, he didn’t think he could stand it.

  Growling as much, Shane turned them around. He maneuvered Gabby as far as his apartment’s dining table before losing all sense of space, time, and direction. Lifting her onto the long, polished tabletop, he stepped between her spread thighs and kissed her again. Her hair felt like silk in his hands. Her moans of pleasure poured through his apartment’s serene air, displacing all the temporary newness installed as part of his upcoming “fix” and infusing the whole place with possibility.

  “Touch me.” Gabby took his hand, then placed it on her bare thigh. “Right here. More.” She kissed him, then let her head loll back, exposing her long, pale neck. “Higher. Do it.”

  Willingly, Shane did. He stroked his palm up her thigh, feeling himself grow twice as engorged at the feel of her warm, taut skin beneath his hand. He hiked her black dress higher, following the path of his movements with his eyes, drinking in everything about her. He could have sworn he glimpsed skimpy black underthings, inches away from his fingertips. He groaned.

  “You’re so beautiful.” He brought his forehead to hers, gently, then gazed into her eyes. “You feel … amazing.”

  “Lick my nipples, and I’ll feel even better.”

  As invitations went, hers was beyond seductive. Assuredly, Gabby flicked away her dress’s straps, making her invitation even bolder. Her motion made her dress fall away. It puddled at her waist, revealing her pert breasts, rosy nipples, and myriad thin silver necklaces that Shane hadn’t noticed before. Her jewelry fell over her modest cleavage, glimmering in the low light, making Gabby seem feminine and magical and much too delicate for the rough, passionate liaison he had in mind.

  “Do it,” she urged, giving him a lazy grin. For incentive, she grabbed his belt buckle and hauled him nearer. “That’s a command—and you know how I feel about obeying commands.”