by Nora Roberts
“I remember that dress,” Parker whispered. “I can see her in that dress.”
“She’d had the top down, and her hair was all windblown, and she wore these big sunglasses. I thought, Jesus, she looks like a movie star.Anyway, she didn’t have a blowout. She had a slow leak she didn’t notice until she did, and pulled over, called for service.
“I’d never seen anybody who looked like her. Anybody that beautiful. Until you. She talked to me the whole time.Where did I go to school, what did I like to do. And when she got that I was Kay Kavanaugh’s boy, she asked about her, how she was doing. She gave me ten dollars over the bill, and a pat on the cheek. And as I watched her drive away I thought, I remember thinking, that’s what beautiful is.What it really is.”
He lifted his beer again, caught the look on Parker’s face.
“I didn’t mean to make you sad.”
“You didn’t.” Though her eyes stung. “You gave me a little piece of her I didn’t have before. Sometimes I miss them so much, so painfully, it’s comforting to have those pieces, those little pictures. Now I can see her in her spring rosebud dress, talking to the boy changing her tire, a boy who was marking time until he could go to California. And dazzling him.”
She reached out, laid a hand over his on the table. “Tell me about California, about what you did when you got there.”
“It took me six months to get there.”
“Tell me about that.”
She learned he’d lived in his car a good portion of the time, picking up odd jobs to pay for gas, for food, for the occasional motel.
He made it sound funny, adventurous, and as they ate, she thought it had been both. But she also imagined how hard, how scary it would have been all too often for a boy that age, away from home, living on his wits and whatever he could pocket from work on the road.
He’d pumped gas in Pittsburgh, picked up some maintenance work in West Virginia, moved on to Illinois where he’d worked as a mechanic outside of Peoria. And so had worked his way cross-country, seeing parts of it Parker knew she had never seen, and was unlikely ever to see.
“Did you ever consider coming back? Just turning around and heading home?”
“No. I had to get where I was going, do what I was going to do.When you’re eighteen you can live off stubborn and pride for a long time. And I liked being on my own, without somebody watching and waiting to say I knew you wouldn’t make it, knew you were no good.”
“Your mother would never—”
“No, not Ma.”
“Ah.” His uncle, she thought, and said nothing more.
“That’s a long, ugly story. Let’s take a walk instead.”
On the busy main street they ran into people she knew, or people he knew. On both sides there was enough puzzlement and curiosity to amuse him.
“People wonder what you’re doing with me,” he commented, “or what I’m doing with you.”
“People should spend more time on their own business than speculating on other people’s.”
“In Greenwich everybody’s going to speculate about the Browns.They’re just going to be careful when it’s you.”
“Me?” Honestly surprised, Parker frowned at him. “Why?”
“In your business you get to know a lot of secrets. In mine, too.”
“How’s that?”
“People want their car detailed, for instance, and don’t always make sure everything’s out of it they don’t want other people to see.”
“Such as?”
“That would be telling.”
She elbowed him. “Not if I don’t know who left the what.”
“We have a running contest at the garage. Whoever finds the most women’s underwear in a month gets a six-pack.”
“Oh. Hmmm.”
“You asked.”
She considered a moment.“I can beat that,” she determined.“I can beat that.”
“Okay.”
“I once found a Chantelle demi-cut bra—black lace, thirty-six-C, hanging on a branch of a willow by the pond and the matching panties floating in the water.”
“Chantelle who?”
“That’s the lingerie designer.You know cars. I know fashion.”
“Something about cars and weddings,” he said as he opened the passenger door for her, “must make women want to take off their underwear.” He grinned as she slid in. “So feel free.”
“That’s so sweet of you.”
When she settled back in the car again, she considered it a successful evening. She’d enjoyed it, enjoyed him, learned a little more—even if she’d had to nudge, poke, and pry the more out of him.
And had only had to excuse herself twice to take calls from clients.
“Big wedding this weekend,” he commented.
“Two big, two medium, and a coed wedding shower Thursday evening, right after rehearsal. Plus two off-site events.”
“Busy.Why does a guy want to go to a wedding shower?”
She started to give him the diplomatic, professional response, then laughed. “Because their fiancee makes them. We set up a cigar bar on the terrace. It helps get them through.”
“Morphine wouldn’t do it for me.The wedding deal. I meant Carter’s sister.”
“Oh yeah. We’re all looking forward to that. Sherry’s been nothing but fun to work with.We don’t get many like her.You’re at table twelve.You’ll have a good time.”
“Planning on it.”
When he turned into the drive, she was as sorry to see the evening ending as she’d been skittish to have it begin.
“Summer’s done,” she said as she got out of the car into the crisp.“I love fall, the color of it, the smells, the change of the light. But I’m always sorry to say good-bye to the green and the summer flowers. I guess you’re sorry to say good-bye to your bike until next year.”
“I’ll get a few more runs in.Take a day off and we’ll have one together.”
“Tempting.”And it was.“But we’re packed for the next couple weeks.”
“I can wait. I’d rather not.” He stepped closer, and though he didn’t touch her, she felt the spike of excitement.“Why don’t you ask me in, Parker?”
She intended to say no, had intended to say no since she’d dressed for the evening.Too soon, too much, too risky.
She opened the door, held out her hand.“Come in, Malcolm.”
He took her hand, shoved the door closed behind him. His gaze stayed on hers, compelling, the only contact but palm to palm.
“Ask me upstairs. Ask me into your bed.”
She felt her heart beat, rapid kicks at the base of her throat. Be sensible, she ordered herself. Be careful.
Instead she moved into him this time, took for herself this time by laying her lips on his.
“Come upstairs, Malcolm. I want you in my bed.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
IT WAS A LONG WAY UP, HE THOUGHT, LONG ENOUGH FOR HIM TO sense her nerves. She was skilled at hiding them, but he’d learned how to read her. Especially now when he was aware of her every move, her every breath.
They climbed the graceful stairs to her wing where the quiet was so absolute he swore he could hear his own heartbeat. And hers.
She stepped into the bedroom—big, filled with quiet colors, art, photographs, the soft gleam of furniture he imagined had served generations.
She locked the door, caught his raised brow.
“Ah . . . it’s not usual, but Laurel or Del could . . . Anyway, I’ll take your jacket.”
“My jacket?”
“I’ll hang up your jacket.”
Of course she’d hang up his jacket. It was perfectly Parker. Quietly amused, he stripped it off and handed it to her.When she crossed to a door, went inside, curiosity had him following.
Closet wasn’t a big enough or fancy enough term. None of the closets he’d ever owned or seen held curvy little chairs, lamps, or an entire wall of shoes. In an alcove—and closets didn’t generally run to alcoves—a lighted mirror r
anged above some sort of desk or kneehole cabinet where he assumed she fussed with her hair and face, but the only thing on it was a vase of little flowers.
“So is this everybody’s closet?”
“Just mine.” She tossed her hair as she glanced back. “I like clothes.”
As with closet, he didn’t think like was a big or fancy enough word for Parker Brown’s relationship with clothes. “You’ve got them color coordinated.” Fascinated, he skimmed a finger over a section of white tops. “Even, what do you call it, graduated, like a paint fan.”
“It’s more efficient. Don’t you keep your tools in order?”
“I thought I did.There’s a phone in here.”
“It’s a house phone.” She took her own out of the purse she set on a drawer-filled counter.
“Need to make a call?”
“It needs to charge,” she said, walked by him and out.
She could give tours in this closet, he thought, taking another moment. Have cocktail parties. Hold board meetings.
When he went out, she’d set the phone on the charger on the nightstand closest to the terrace doors.And to his continued fascination began to fold down the bedspread—comforter—whatever it was.
He just leaned on the wall and watched her. Brisk and graceful, he noted, as she smoothed out, folded, smoothed. Parker Brown would never just fall into bed.
No wonder he’d never felt about any other woman the way he felt about her.There was no other woman remotely like her.
“I don’t make a habit of this.” She set the folded cover on the bench at the foot of the bed.
“Folding down the bedspread?”
“Bringing men here. If and when I do—”
“I’m only interested in you and me.You’re nervous.”
She turned to walk to the dresser. Her gaze met his in the mirror as she unfastened her earrings. “You’re not.”
“I want you too much to be nervous. It doesn’t leave any room.” He walked to her now. “Are you finished?”
“What?”
“Overthinking, second-guessing.”
“Nearly.”
“Let me help you with that.”
He took her shoulders, jerked her against him. The hard, hot demand of his mouth helped. Quite a bit.
Even as she lifted her arms to circle his neck, he tugged her sweater up and off in one quick, impatient move. He tossed it on a chair.
“You can hang it up later.”
“You don’t hang sweaters.”
“Why not?”
“It—” Her breath sucked in when he skimmed his hands over the thin chemise, over her. “It ruins the shape.”
“I like yours.” He pulled off the chemise, tossed it on the sweater. “Nice.” He trailed his fingers over the lacy cups of her plum-colored bra. “It’s the kind of color coordination I can get behind.”
Her laugh ended on a shaky gasp as his hands slid down, his lips roamed down. As he knelt down. “Malcolm.”
“Better take off the shoes.” He tugged the short, inside zipper on the boots. “Wouldn’t want you to forget yourself and wear them to bed.”
“Are you making fun of me or seducing me?”
“I can do both.You’re not the only multitasker in the room.”
Once he’d pulled off her boots, he ran his hands up her legs. “Now these are the Holy Grail.”
“You’ve seen my legs before.”
“Not like this.” He unhooked her pants, slid the zipper down, then guided her pants down her legs with his hands. “No, not like this.” He lifted them one at a time to free them from the pool around her feet.
He ran his hands up, calf to thigh to tease the edges of plum-colored lace.
Her phone rang.
He looked up, his eyes sharply green, almost feral. “Not this time.”
She shook her head. “No, not this time.”
He sprang. His movement so quick both her vision and her mind blurred. His mouth didn’t merely take but possessed while those rough-palmed hands raced over her, setting off charges under her skin. The nerves that had ridden there exploded into pure, primitive need.
She tugged at the buttons of his shirt. Her hands wanted flesh, too.Wanted to take it, to own it.When she had it, the muscles, the ridges, the rough and the smooth, need leaped to craving.
She tried to satisfy it, her mouth on his throat where the blood beat hot, her teeth on his shoulder where muscles tensed like wires. But the claws of it only sharpened.
He could have taken her there and then, hard and fast. She wanted him to, heard herself tell him to, to feed and sate that craving before it ate her alive.
He swept her up. It wasn’t like being carried to bed but like being dragged into a cave. And she reveled in it.
When she was under him, she arched up, pressed urgently against him.
“Now. Now, now, now.”
He managed to shake his head. “You’re killing me.”
He couldn’t want so much and end it almost as it had begun. But the whiplash of lust was brutal, and she was a storm raging, slashing under him, around him, over him. Her body, so firm, so arousing with that silky skin over disciplined muscle, eroded control. He needed more of it before he took all.
Not to savor, since he knew savoring would drive him mad, but to devour in great gulps of greed.
Those perfect breasts possessed at last by hands and mouth while her nails dug into his back, his hips. Those incredible legs, open for him, winding around him, the muscles of her long thighs quivering as he did what he liked. All he liked.
And that face, the cool, classic beauty, flushed now, fierce now, eyes deep and blue, lips hot and avid.
He drove her up once, his hands rough, ruthless, for her, for himself. He wanted to see her break for him, rise and shatter. She cried out, her nails digging deeper. And as she broke, he plunged into her.
She cried out again, a strangled sound that gasped out pleasure. That pleasure, wild and whippy, blew through her like a gale, again, again, until there was nothing else.
Lost in the speed, drowned in sensation, she drove as she was driven, with a kind of dark fury.
He thrust deep; she rose high, their bodies sheened with the sweat of effort and greed. She saw his face above her, the tumble of dark hair around it, those feral eyes fixed on hers.
She tried to speak, to tell him . . . something. But all that would form was his name.
When the phone rang, she only heard the frantic pounding of her own heart.
She lay stunned under him, breathless from the storm and from the full weight of him that had dropped on her like a stone.
They’d torn each other to bits, she thought, in every way but bloody. She’d always considered herself open and responsive in bed—with the right partner—but this had been like a pitched battle with one goal.
Give me all you’ve got, then give me more.
Which, she concluded, explained the sensation of mild shock and smug satisfaction.
She liked to think he felt the same, or he’d just dropped into a coma. Not a heart attack, at least, since she could feel that beat slamming against her.
When she lifted her hand to his hair, he grunted.
Not comatose then, but a . . .
“You’re a flopper,” she told him, and his head shot up.
“What?”
“You’re a flopper, which is why . . .” The sheer insult on his face turned on the light in her brain. “Oh God, not that way.” Laughter bubbled up, fought to get past the anvil on her chest. She gasped with it, waved her hands in the air, fought to get words out through the uncontrollable giggles. “After.You flop after.”
“I’m a guy, which you should’ve figured out by—”
“Not that way either.” More laughter, helpless, finally rolling free when he shifted. She sucked in air, had to sit up, hold her own ribs. “After-after. You just collapse.” She slapped one hand on the other.“Dead weight. But it was all right because I’d stopped bre
athing anyway somewhere between the third and fourth orgasm.”
“Oh. Sorry.” He shoved the hair out of his face. “You count orgasms?”
“It’s a hobby.”
Now he laughed. “Happy to add to your collection.”
She didn’t cover herself, and he admitted he’d thought she’d be the type to grab for the sheets once the heat of sex cooled a little. But she sat there, rosily naked, smiling at him.
“You’re full of surprises, Legs.”
“I like sex.”
“Really? I’d never have guessed.”
“I often forget I like sex during extended periods when I’m not having sex. It was nice to be reminded.”
She reached out, traced a finger over the cross-hashing scars over his hip and thigh. “That had to hurt.”
“That’s from the big one. Mangled me some.”
“And this?” She brushed the thinner lines over his ribs.
“Yeah.There, the shoulder. A few others here and there.”
“This?”
He glanced down at the sickle-shaped scar on his right thigh. “That’s from another gag. A little miscalculation.You don’t have any.”
“Scars? Yes, I do.”
“Baby, I’ve been over every inch.”
“Here.” She rubbed a fingertip a few inches above her hairline on the left side of her head.
He sat up, gave a rub himself. “I don’t feel anything.”
“Well, it’s there.” And seemed, ridiculously, a point of pride now. “Four stitches.”
“That many?”
“Don’t brag.”
“How’d you get it?”
“We were in Provence, and it had been raining all day. When the sun came out, I ran out onto the terrace. I was seven. I slipped and went headfirst into the iron railing.”
“Wounded in Provence.”
“It hurt just as much. How about these?” She frowned at the thin, almost even grouping of horizontal scars on his left shoulder blade. And felt his body tense this time when she touched them.
“No big. I got knocked into a locker. Metal louvers.”
She left her hand where it was. “Your uncle.”
“It was a long time ago. Got any water handy?”
Ignoring the question, she leaned over, laid her lips on the scars. “I never liked him.”