She's No Angel

by Leslie Kelly

  After putting the book down at around 1:00 a.m., he’d thought only of her for another long, hot night.

  That, he knew, was the biggest problem of all: he was falling for a woman he’d only known a few days and had only kissed once. Falling. Not just wanting.

  If it had merely been desire, he’d have had another sex dream and woken up with a hard-on. Instead, he’d slept hardly at all. He’d lain awake, picturing her face, hearing her sassy voice, replaying every conversation they’d had. And remembering their kiss in the lake. That had, eventually, given him a hard-on he’d had to take care of in the shower at the crack of dawn.

  So, proof. Jen Feeney was no good for his nights, no good for his days, no good for him. No matter how much he wanted her.

  “Good evening,” Mortimer said, not noticing Mike at the top of the stairs. He pressed a kiss on the cheeks of the two elderly women. His grandfather also kissed Jen. Taking her hands, he pulled back and gave her a thorough once-over. “Miss Feeney, you are as lovely as your aunts.”

  She smiled and murmured something in return, so she didn’t see the frowns on the faces of her relatives. They obviously didn’t like competing for his grandfather’s attention. The way the skinny one was glaring at Jen, he hoped she had a bulletproof vest on under that dress.

  Honestly, though, there was absolutely no way on this earth it would have fit. Because the red fabric clung to every inch of Jennifer’s body, revealing every line, every indentation, every incredible curve. Though he’d been about to walk down the stairs to join them, Mike remained where he was for a second, to get a grip on himself. He tried to keep his attention off the young Feeney female and focus only on the older two. The criminals.

  The one who’d glared the hardest—Ivy he’d heard Mortimer call her—was also the more whimsical looking of the two. From the broad hat that looked like a florist had thrown up on it to the yellow dress that appeared made of a hundred silky handkerchiefs, she seemed to have stepped off the cover of a 1958 issue of Life Magazine.

  What he could see of her hair, beneath the horrible hat, was a puffy light gray, curled in thin, wispy ringlets beside her face. She appeared to float on a cloud as she moved, her hands waving languidly in the air and her half smile probably meant to be mysterious. The adoring expression on her heavily made-up face, now that her attention had returned to his grandfather, matched the quivery lightness of her voice.

  The second sister—the one he’d seen when dropping Jen off—was sturdy and dour. With a stern expression on her square-jawed face, and a solid body clad in a dark, severe dress, she was her sister’s opposite. But at least she wasn’t wearing a hat, and her brilliantly shiny white hair seemed to catch his grandfather’s eye because he commented on it more than once.

  Which obviously annoyed the other one. Ivy had secretly pinched Ida Mae twice since they’d arrived. She’d gotten two pokes in return. All the while, they kept up a running stream of chatter, so nobody would guess what was happening. But Mike had a great vantage point from above and he saw every wicked exchange.

  How, he wondered, could these two be the dangerous predators he’d been picturing for the past year? They were more like a set of squabbling fifth graders.

  Sighing, Mike returned his attention to the third Feeney woman. She was positioned right below him, giving him a perfect visual shot right down the low neckline of her dress. He tried to rise above his baser instincts to peek.

  Baser instincts won.

  Lord almighty, did he need a drink. Or food. Something to fill his hands, which were clenched and hot with the need to tear her dress down the middle. He wanted nothing more than to savor that tight line of cleavage where her breasts met and hugged one another like a pair of long-lost twins.

  He wanted them hugging his face.

  “Now, ladies, shall we go in and have a nice drink?” Mortimer wagged a finger at Ida Mae. “A little birdie told me you’re not the teetotaler you made yourself out to be last summer. I could have used a drink then, you know.”

  Ivy tittered as her sister pinkened. “Well, maybe a tiny one,” Ida Mae said. “Bourbon. Neat. Make it a double.”

  “I’ll have a rum punch,” Ivy purred. And the two of them linked arms with Mortimer, who led them away from the front door. He pinched Ivy’s cheek here and Ida Mae’s backside there as he accompanied them into the living room.

  Jen didn’t follow. She’d caught sight of Mike standing on the stairs and remained by herself, waiting for him.

  “Hello,” she murmured as he slowly descended, left with no alternative now that he’d been spotted.

  “Hi.” Staring toward the living room where the giddy voices of the ladies could be heard above Mortimer’s low chuckles, he shook his head. “Those are your aunts, huh?”

  She nodded. “In all their glory. Ida Mae’s crocodile smiles yesterday? All about tonight’s invitation.”

  She seemed to be trying to make sure he hadn’t bought the old woman’s act. She needn’t have bothered. Once he’d discovered who her aunts really were, he’d remembered every wicked thing his brother and grandfather had said about them.

  He wondered if she knew about last year’s episode. Probably not. She wouldn’t have come here tonight if she knew they were being entertained by her aunts’ former kidnapping victim. “How’d they get you to agree to come?”

  “Quid pro quo, Clarice,” she said in a throaty imitation of Hannibal Lecter.

  Damn, she’d already started tugging that smile out of him and she’d only been here five minutes.

  “Just, you know, reminding you that I’m certifiable.”

  “Sorry about that,” he mumbled, meaning it.

  She acknowledged his apology with a slight nod. “They wanted to come so badly they were willing to agree to at least look over the brochures I brought.”

  He raised a skeptical brow. “You do know they’ll toss them in the incinerator thirty seconds after they get home tonight.”

  With a confident grin, she said, “Yep. Which is why I made them do it before we came. We actually had a fairly civil conversation about it and I convinced them I’m not going to lock them in a prison or sell them to a brothel.”

  Mumbling, “They’d probably like the brothel,” under his breath, he cast a slow, leisurely look over Jen. She had her shiny brown hair up in a twist that looked complicated as hell. But he knew it would be down around her face within two seconds if he slipped his hands into it.

  The halter dress that had merely been sexy from above was downright wicked close up. Tight enough to stop his breath. Low enough to stop his heart. Short enough to start everything else. Especially the uniquely male everythings.

  “You look beautiful,” he muttered, unable to help it.

  Her eyes widened in surprise. He understood the reaction…. Mike wasn’t the type to throw compliments at women. Since he suspected Jen already knew him as well as he knew her, she had to have realized that.

  “You look good, too,” she admitted, staring at the open neck of his dress shirt, then dropping her gaze down his body. She didn’t try to disguise her interest. Just as she hadn’t tried to disguise it yesterday at the lake. “Very good. I like you in jeans, but you do some fine things for a pair of pricy trousers.”

  She was forthright and honest. Tough and funny. And so far out of his league they weren’t even playing the same sport.

  His grandfather and brothers were right. He liked his women easy…. Not easy in terms of how fast they’d spread their legs, but easy in personality. Someone who would destress him at the end of a tough day. Not someone challenging. Not threatening. And yeah, okay, maybe a little bit in need.

  Jen was so obviously the opposite of those things, he had no idea why she’d gotten so far under his skin. He only knew he needed to pluck her out and forget about her.

  But she’s in danger.

  Right. She might be. After reading some of her book, he understood why some guys with no confidence, no sense of humor and even less inte
lligence wouldn’t get the joke. So despite knowing he should get away from her, he needed to stay close. To make sure she let him stay close.

  That, he was certain, was the only reason he reached out to cup her beautiful face in his hand and brushed a soft kiss on her lips.

  It was just his bad luck that she didn’t want soft. She wanted hard and deep.

  She immediately collapsed into him, her arms twining around his neck, one slim thigh sliding between his. Unable to resist, Mike parted his lips, taking the deeper kiss she was offering, giving it back to her ten times over. Her mouth was sweet and hot and she met every thrust of his tongue, tilting her head to mate their lips together more perfectly.

  He should stop. He was going to stop. Soon. Any second now.

  But instead, he blazed forward, forgetting every reason she was all wrong for him. At this moment, she was completely right.

  Dropping his hands to her waist, he tugged her even tighter against him. The hard tips of her breasts scraped his chest, the fabric of their clothes only heightening the intensity of it.

  Mike brushed his fingers over the base of her spine, revealed by the low-cut dress. Her satiny skin immediately cooled his hot hands, and he had to touch her even more, flattening a palm over the small of her back. As they continued making love with their mouths, all thought disappeared—the old folks in the next room disappeared, the house disappeared. There was only heat and softness, exchanged breaths and tiny gasps.

  The initial frenzy slowly gave way to a more sensual, sultry pace. Still licking into her mouth, tasting the edges of her teeth, feeling the softness of her tongue, he lowered his hand. Letting his fingers dip below the hem of the dress, he toyed with the lacy edge of her panties, almost groaning when he realized a lacy edge was all there was to them. She was wearing a thong and he’d bet big money that it was a red one.

  God, how he wanted to find out. He was dying to push her back, through the half-open door into Mortimer’s shadowy office onto his big leather couch. Or the matching wingback chair. His cock was ready to rupture his zipper as he pictured her on that chair, her legs draped over each side, her dress hiked up to her waist. And him using his teeth to remove that tight, damp thong from the curly slit between her thighs.

  “I hope this isn’t how he says hello to all his female guests,” an unfamiliar—but amused—male voice said, banishing the sinful images from his mind.

  Mike immediately removed his hands from Jen’s gorgeous backside, but as he did so, he got one finger tangled in the elastic of her thong, accidentally yanking it. “Oh, my God,” she whispered as they pulled their mouths apart to see a trio of people standing in the open doorway.

  One of them—a young woman holding a baby—he recognized as Sabrina’s sister, Allie. On one side of her stood a pretty gray-haired lady, and on the other side a tall, lean, dark-haired guy. All four of them—including the kid—were watching the spectacle he and Jen were making of themselves. And all were grinning.

  “I’m stuck,” he whispered as Jen tried to wriggle away from him, her face now turning as red as her dress.

  “Yeah, I figured that out since I’m the one getting my ass flossed,” she hissed back. Her eyes wide, she began sucking big gulps of air in through her swollen, luscious lips.

  Finally, with a toss of her curly hair, Allie broke the silence. “So, Mike, do you need some help getting your hand out of your friend’s underwear?”

  THERE WAS MORE ROMANCE in this house tonight than in a whole case of her favorite Harlequin books. From the moment they’d arrived and had seen Mr. Potts’s grandson in an embrace passionate enough to scorch the wood floors, Emily had looked around and seen nothing but love.

  Well, perhaps not love, not as far as the Feeney sisters went. Lust? Yes. They did display that, and had for many years. Tonight they’d both apparently set their caps for Mr. Potts.

  Emily and Ivy were close in age, with Ivy just a couple of years ahead of her in school. Even way back then, Ivy had been boy crazy. She’d been quite popular—pretty and vivacious, and even, as unbelievable as it seemed now, friendly. Her sister was the only one she’d tormented on a regular basis. But she and her sister had left school early, not even graduating, though they’d both remained in Trouble.

  Ivy hadn’t stayed in town for long. She’d turned into something of a celebrity, if a scandalous one, during the sixties. Marrying a wealthy record producer, she’d gone to live in a fancy place in New York City. Every so often the local paper would publish a picture of Ivy chatting with some famous person at a glamorous party, wearing furs and jewels. She’d lived a life that seemed beautiful and magical to Emily, even if her husband hadn’t been terribly handsome.

  Then her great tragedy had struck. Ivy’s husband had been killed and her house destroyed in a fire. She’d come back to Pennsylvania a changed woman. Strange. Distracted. Definitely not as nice. And more than a little bit fey.

  She must have loved that man very much. Because despite landing another wealthy husband—whom she’d also outlived—Ivy had never seemed happy again.

  “She does seem rather happy tonight, though,” she murmured under her breath, talking only to herself.

  Allie, who was standing nearby, waiting for Damon to return from putting Hank to bed, overheard. “What woman wouldn’t be happy a gorgeous man got his hand stuck in her panties?”

  Emily giggled. She hadn’t meant her—the niece. Who had been prettily embarrassed over what had happened earlier in the evening. What a lovely girl she was, and how charming. It was hard to believe she was a Feeney. Of course, the girl’s father, Ivan, had always been a wonderful young man.

  It was just as hard to believe he was a Feeney.

  But it wasn’t hard to believe men would go crazy over Jennifer, as they had for her aunt once upon a time. Mr. Potts’s grandson, Michael, hadn’t taken his heated stare off her all evening. The romantic tension between those two was so thick Emily could make a pie out of it.

  “I meant that one,” Emily said as she brought her teacup to her lips and sipped from it, casting a pointed glance at Ivy.

  “Oh, the loony bird?” Allie rolled her eyes. “I thought she and her sister were going to stab each other with their toothpicks whenever Mortimer turned his back on them.” She put a hand on Emily’s shoulder and squeezed. “Thank goodness they haven’t even noticed that they have some competition tonight.”

  Emily gaped. Competition? Her? “You silly thing.”

  “I mean it. You look beautiful. Classy. Just what a neat old guy would want.”

  “If I were interested in a ‘neat old guy’ I certainly would not display that interest in front of those two. They’d scratch my eyes out if they thought I wanted Mr. Potts for myself. Ivy told me as much when we arrived.”

  Allie sat on the arm of Emily’s chair. “Do you?”

  Emily didn’t answer. She merely sipped her tea, looking over the room as she had all evening. Watching for Mr. Ward to return from the kitchen, where he’d gone to check on the cook who’d been hired for the evening.

  “Okay, I’ll stop teasing. I know it’s not Mortimer you’re interested in. And I say go for it. Roderick needs someone to unstuff that shirt of his.”

  Shocked that she’d been found out, Emily slowly lowered her cup onto its saucer. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Oh, come off it. Mortimer and I both know you’re interested, which is one reason he had this party tonight and insisted that Roderick remain out of the kitchen.”

  “How could you…?”

  “You blush whenever he’s in the room,” Allie said with a simple shrug and a sweet smile. As if that explained everything.

  Mortified at the thought of what Mr. Potts must think of her—a silly old woman with a crush on his butler—she decided to leave immediately. Starting to rise, she said, “I have to go. I don’t feel very well.”

  Allie’s hand remained on her shoulder and she forcibly kept Emily from standing up. “You leave and I’ll tell Ro
derick myself.”

  “You wouldn’t!”

  “Sit your butt down. So far, those two old witches have been too busy fighting over Mortimer, their latest juicy bone, to notice another hunky eligible bachelor is in the house.” She wagged her eyebrows as she peeked at Mortimer’s grandson—quite a handsome young man with his stormy black eyes and blacker hair—then added, “I mean, a bachelor their age. Not Mike.” Her expression turned dreamy. Besotted. “Or Damon.”

  “Damon has eyes for nobody but you.”

  “I know,” Allie said with an enormous grin. “But I have to say, I’m glad we walked in on Mike Taylor with his hands down Jennifer Feeney’s dress so there was no question she was taken. What a stunner.”

  “I am quite sure,” Emily said, her tone tart, “that Miss Feeney was thinking the same thing of you! You are lovely, so glowing with happiness, it almost blinds me to look at you.”

  Before Allie could respond, Emily felt a tingling and a warmth in her body that said someone was watching her. Glancing toward the open doorway, she saw Mr. Ward, tall and neat and dignified. Similar to Mr. Potts in his traveling and adventuring, but so different from him in personality.

  Where Mr. Potts was a lightning storm, Mr. Ward was a gentle rain. It sounded silly—the romantic musings of a tired woman. But it was true. That was how she thought of them.

  She’d always been terrified of thunderstorms, but she loved the soft, nurturing fall of gentle moisture from the sky.

  Before Emily could stop her, Allie rose and stepped over to Mr. Ward. “You know, Roderick, I have been telling Emily all about your amazing collection of antique postcards. Why don’t you take her to your office and show them to her?”

  Oh, that girl. Emily was going to strangle her one of these days. But Allie seemed oblivious to her angry stare.

  “Why, I’d be delighted, Miss Baker,” Roderick said, that English accent of his so mysterious and intriguing.

  “I don’t want to put you to any trouble….”