by Dorien Kelly
The boathouse didn’t smell of beeswax, lemon and unstinting care as the main house did. This was like stepping back in time. There was a slight musty, not-frequently-used smell about it, not unpleasant really, and distinctive enough that Cara closed her eyes, focused on the scent for a moment and wove it into her memories.
Then Mark gave her something else to remember. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her as though it had been years—not hours—since his mouth had last closed over hers. His hands moved quickly, surely down her back, then up and around to touch her breasts. She shivered with pleasure. One hand moved again, to explore the zipper running down the back of her dress.
Cara wriggled closer to him, loving the feel of his hardness pushing against her. She could do this to him. She could make him want her this way. The knowledge was incredible. Not that she needed a whole lot more inspiration than Mark’s hands everywhere on her. Then he backed off, leaving her breathing heavy with no place to go.
“Damn,” he said, briefly leaning his forehead against hers.
“What’s the matter?”
“I’m not exactly prepared for this.” He gripped her arms in his hands and gave her a quick, hard kiss. “I need to go up to the house. I’ll be right back. Make yourself at home.”
He was out the door, down the steps and onto the pathway before Cara could even form a response. She moved the zipper on her dress halfway back up, took a moment to calm sizzling nerve endings and began to look around. So this was a hotbed of sweaty, adolescent lust….
A marine-blue sofa done up in a slip-covered canvas-and-toggle maritime theme faced floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the water. Complementing plaid chairs with a small trunk between them sat against the windowed wall.
Cara ran her hand across the back of the sofa, then went around to the other side and sat on it. A couple of bounces up and down told her that Mark hadn’t focused much on the comfort of his high school girlfriends. Her pampered thirty-year-old bones weren’t up for this ride.
She stood and began to snoop. Behind closed door number one she found a small tidy bathroom, complete with shower. Door number two hid a walk-in closet. The shelves were stocked with fat orange life jackets, coils of line and assorted bits of boating paraphernalia.
Cara opened door number three. “Bingo!”
Here was an honest-to-God bedroom. She walked to the double bed, placed her palms on its surface and pushed. Unlike the canvas couch with the screaming springs, this had true potential. Cara pulled down the pale yellow comforter and folded back one corner of the white top sheet beneath. Her fingers trailed over the surface of the bed and a thrill chased through her.
Mark’s footsteps sounded on the stairway outside.
She stepped back into the main room just as he was pushing through the door.
Smiling, he held up a bag. “Food and drink courtesy of Jerome.”
“I take it he won’t be out here to interrupt us like he did when you were in high school?”
He set the sack on the kitchenette countertop. “Definitely not,” he said as he pulled out a bottle of champagne and two glasses.
She was well-stoked enough already, thanks. Her mind spun with imaginings of days and nights with Mark, living out the unbelievable sex that his smile promised. And then doubt began to creep in…
“I’m not a model,” she blurted. “I’m not elegant-looking like Nicole. I’ll never have a waist to speak of and there are these little pudges of fat at the top of my thighs that aren’t going to go away, no matter how much I exercise, which, granted, isn’t a lot. And my breasts—Stop laughing, Morgan!”
He closed the distance between them in easy, confident strides. “Sorry, but I can’t believe this. Are you actually trying to negotiate your way out of getting naked?”
“I’m—I’m just going for full disclosure.”
“I can think of a better way to accomplish that.”
He pulled his shirt over his head, leaving him in only a pair of khakis. Cara’s mouth went dry. This was the body of a naturally athletic guy—fit muscle covered by golden skin, dark hair over prominent pectorals, then narrowing and arrowing downward.
“Your turn,” he said.
She glanced around. They were still in the main room and already he was stripping. So much for rich boys being conservative. “Um, I’m not sure I—”
“I was hoping you’d say that.” He reached behind her and deftly slid down the zipper on her dress. When he reached the small of her back, he released the zipper but let his finger travel lower in a teasing trail. She shook, whether it was from the beginnings of evening coolness in the air, nerves or the sexual awareness that gripped her, she couldn’t say.
Mark pulled her into his arms. “Nervous?”
“I think… A little, maybe.”
“Well, let me let you in on a secret. So am I. I mean, I have every one of my teenage fantasies to fulfill. And to make matters more challenging, here I am trying to do justice to the local volcano goddess.”
Someone was having a perception problem, and it wasn’t her. “A volcano goddess? Me?”
“Trust me on this, sweetheart.” He reached behind her head and undid the twist that held her hair. He tossed the clip toward the couch, then combed ran his fingers down the strands he’d released. “Hot.”
He worked her dress off her shoulders. This was getting really good, so she helped him by freeing her arms. Then she pushed it the rest of the way down, leaving a circle of black fabric at her feet.
“Red-hot,” he said, running his finger down a crimson bra strap. Cara was thankful she’d had the optimism to put on her good underwear.
“Pure fire,” he said in a thick voice that made her think maybe the perception problem had been hers all along.
She stepped out of her dress, then slipped out of her sandals. And as any goddess worth the name should, Cara took the lead. She looped her fingers around his wrist and led him to the bedroom.
She settled herself on top of the sheets. They felt so soft, almost like silk, and so cool against her skin. “So when you had those sweaty fantasies, was the girl waiting for you, like this?”
Cara drew one foot upward, placing it flat on the bed and let her knee stray ever so slightly to the outside. There was a fine line between volcano goddess and total tramp, but based on the level of heat in Mark’s eyes, she was doing this just right.
The mattress gave as he sat on the edge of the bed and quickly rid himself of his shoes and socks. He joined her. Her bra was off and gone in a matter of seconds, and his kiss stole her composure in an equally short time.
She wasn’t the only person going about matters just right…. Two fingers slowly rubbed over the damp panel of silk between her legs, exactly were she loved it most. One hot mouth closed over a nipple, drawing her upward in a sensuous flight of feeling. That was all it took for Cara’s body to reach a peak it had been too long denied. She cried out Mark’s name as she came slowly, completely apart. He held her close to his hot skin, murmuring sexy phrases, awed words.
When she found the energy to open her eyes again, she smiled up at him. “Sorry. I’m sure none of your high school girlfriends ever did that.”
“More’s the pity,” he said, then knelt, reached down and tugged off her panties. He brushed his fingers across the red curls at the vee of her thighs and then stroked one finger inward.
“More fire,” he said in a satisfied voice.
Cara pushed her hips upward, following the heat of his touch. Oh God, was it going to happen again…this soon?
“Mark,” she forced past her ragged breathing.
He withdrew his hand. Shuddering, she reached for him, trying to pull him closer.
“Hang on, sweetheart,” he said. “My timing is totally messed up tonight. I’ll be right back. Promise.”
He left her then, cool air again washing against her overheated skin. Cara stretched and snuggled her head into her pillow a bit deeper. If she’d had even a whisper of modesty l
eft, she would have scurried under the covers, but she was a volcano goddess tonight and she planned to revel in it.
Mark returned with the paper grocery bag he’d carried in earlier. After removing a plastic bag filled with grapes, another with slices of French bread and a third with a wedge of cheese, and setting those on the white-painted nightstand, he turned the bag upside down and rained small square packets over the bottom of the bed.
Cara laughed. “Don’t tell me those are from Jerome, too.”
“No, they’re my addition.”
“Ambitious,” she said with an arch of her brow.
He shucked off his khakis and underwear, and Cara felt her eyes grow wide. “Or maybe not so ambitious, after all.”
He crawled over her, his legs bracketing hers, the weight of his erection hot against her belly. She pushed at his shoulders and he willingly rolled over so he lay flat on the mattress and she was framed above him.
She touched him where she wanted and as she wanted to. When she wrapped her hand around his penis, she smiled at the strained set of his jaw and the fine sheen of perspiration popping out on his skin. She played until he closed his hand over hers.
“No more,” he gasped.
With a sigh of mock regret, she reached for one of the condom packets still scattered about the foot of the bed. She opened it and fitted the condom onto him with hands that didn’t tremble too much. And when she was done, moved over him and kissed him, pushing her tongue into his mouth, stealing his taste.
Holding her safe in his arms, he rolled them again. She opened her legs and closed her eyes as he fitted himself to her. Hesitance and need battled. Perceptive as always, Mark sensed it in her.
“We’ll take this as slowly as you need to,” he said.
His gift of control was all she needed to lose the fear. “I don’t think slow is in my vocabulary tonight.”
He pushed forward until she was filled with him. Discomfort became pleasure in less than a beat of her heart. And as he drew back, then took her again and again with a sure, knowing rhythm on which any true volcano goddess could groove, she cried out and spiraled and danced among the stars. This time, Mark was right there with her, in her, completing her.
And when they came back to earth, he held her close and said, “You, Cara Adams, are the most amazing thing that has ever happened to me.”
Later, while Mark dozed, Cara felt hot tears slip from the corners of her eyes and travel down the sides of her face. Morgan had gone and done it. Her love was no longer a mere possibility. It was real, solid and overwhelming. She didn’t expect him to love her back; with her selfishness since his arrival, she’d given him little reason to. But if those do-over gods were worth their salt, they’d help her find a way to earn that gift.
ON OLYMPUS, HERA smiled and blew a kiss to her favorite mortal.
“You’re doing fine all by yourself, sweetie. Truly, you are.”
12
Cara’s Rule for Success 12:
Flexibility is an asset in today’s business world…
and if you bomb out,
there’s always a spot waiting for you
as a circus contortionist.
ON SUNDAY, CARA WAS happy—quite possibly even delirious. After a night spent making love, Mark and she showered and went up to the house in time to see Nic off.
Once Nic had departed, Cara did the dutiful-yet-gag-inducing thing and suggested that maybe she and Mark should put in a few hours at the office. Instead, Mark handed her a sweatshirt to wear over her wrinkled dress, then gave her a ride in the boat that had been the bane of his teenage years. When they returned, windblown and laughing, he packed an overnight bag and took her back to her apartment.
Since they were totally incapable of keeping their hands off each other, they didn’t surface again until evening, when she dragged him along for the weekly dinner at Dani’s house.
Her sister’s three-bedroom bungalow was no Lakewind, but to his credit, Mark didn’t flinch. He didn’t even look too grossed out when four-year-old Sarah was ushered from the table after sticking green beans up her nose. Cara, however, was put off her food entirely.
And that night, back at her place, Mark sweet-talked her into wearing the black lounge-singer dress he’d surprised her with a month ago. Then he peeled it off her inch by inch, his hands and mouth exploring all he exposed. Cara was simpler in her demands—she wouldn’t let him wear anything at all.
Evil and gray, Monday morning arrived. Cara tried to ignore the tension that was already boiling in her stomach and knotting the back of her neck. She and Mark drove to work separately, timing their arrivals so no one would suspect they’d been together all weekend. This, she knew, was just the beginning of the game they would have to play, and Cara hated it.
Then at nine-thirty, the courier dropped off yet another pissy piece of news about the Newby transaction. The land survey for a Connecticut mall disclosed that a corner of the parking lot sat on someone else’s property. The discrepancy was just enough that it appeared the mall might not have the required spaces to meet local regulations. A legal gnat, easily swatted, but for some reason the news was landing on Cara more like an elephant.
In need of a friendly face, she wandered from the conference room to Mark’s office. Stewart was on his way out just as Cara came in.
“Say the word and we’ll have you to the top of the waiting list,” Stewart was saying. He looked ready to add something else, but stumbled to an awkward verbal stop when he noticed Cara. He gave her a bluff smile, then escaped.
She sat opposite Mark. “What was that about?”
“The partners were wondering if I might be interested in joining a country club.” He showed her a glossy folder emblazoned with the name of one of the most exclusive—and expensive—clubs in the area.
“So the firm would be footing the bill?”
Looking uncomfortable, he nodded.
Cara hated golf and wasn’t especially fond of country clubs. In this instance, though, membership was also a benefit of the one thing she’d wanted for years: partnership. And they were handing it to Mark.
Cara waited for that bolt of fury and jealousy to sear her heart. Except it didn’t come. In its place was a huge, howling nothingness that seemed to have sucked the breath from her.
“That’s great,” she said, then pushed the corners of her mouth up in something she hoped passed for a smile.
He deserved partnership.
He really did.
Mark flipped the folder over. “Cara, we need to talk about what’s going to happen.”
She could scarcely function; her lips were going numb. “No. No, we don’t. At least not right now.”
“Sweetheart…”
She glanced toward the open door. “I really need to…”
He walked around the desk. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know. I need to be someplace else.”
I need to be someplace else…
Out of the mouths of babes and psychotic women. Cara closed her heart against the rush of emotion, but it was no use. She turned and hurried out the door.
Behind her, Mark was calling her name. Fighting panic, she waggled her fingers in a backhanded wave. Cara grabbed her purse from beneath her desk, then fled the building.
“Oh God,” she said as she jammed her car key into the ignition. Six freaking years of her life hammering though every crisis thrown her way. Six years battling for dominance. Six years gone and never coming back.
She needed out.
After leaving S.U.’s lot, she lowered the car windows, craving the air, the noise, even the exhaust fumes. She cranked the radio as loudly as she had back in high school, then headed south on Woodward to her home turf.
She’d invested six years of her life fighting for a prize. It was slipping away and instead of anger, she was feeling…relief?
What the hell was wrong with her?
Am I happy? wasn’t a standard question in Cara’s self-awareness repert
oire. In fact, Am I feeling a little PMS’sy? was about as close as she came, and that one only occurred to her on those days when she felt like choking the morning-TV weather guy for being so relentlessly cheerful.
Mark was the only person who, in recent memory, had asked her if she was happy. Her family assumed she was, and maybe she’d never slowed down enough to figure it out. Or maybe she had been processing that question all along on some subliminal level, and ignoring the results.
Mark loved his job. The more knotty and obnoxious the problem, the more jazzed he got. She, on the other hand, was drowning in zeroes. The responsibility that came with handling thirty-seven million dollars of someone else’s money was an enormous burden to her. No wonder the announcements placed in financial newspapers about deals such as these were called “tombstones.” One more and she felt as if she’d be dead.
It was her fault that she’d taken on more than she’d needed to, and she’d done it for some really crummy reasons: to show up Mark and to spite Gail Eberhardt. Okay, so the spite thing still didn’t bother her a whole lot, but what did was that she’d gotten so wrapped up in the game, she’d never even noticed that she no longer felt like playing.
In a rare incident of good karma, a parking spot opened in front of Bri’s store just as Cara neared. Cara parked, then went inside to find Bri sorting through a bunch of dresses still entombed in dry cleaner’s plastic.
“I screwed up,” Cara said.
“How? Forget to pay a bill or—”
“No, in a big way.” She paced a tight circle around the rack of Chinese robes. “The biggest.”
Bri stopped sorting dresses and latched onto Cara’s wrist. “Sit down and take a few deep breaths, okay? You’re going to make me dizzy.”
Cara sat on the red velvet fainting couch and thought back to that day only several weeks ago when she’d planted herself exactly here. That day on which she’d taunted the gods. Stupid, stupid Cara.
“What made you decide to come back to Royal Oak and open Retreads?” she asked her friend.