by Cat Schield
“I was thinking you used to find me irresistible.” The slightest trace of doubt entered her voice, but her pose remained that of a woman confident of her sexual impact on a man.
“I was twenty-five at the time.” Simon snorted in disgust, but her words conjured memories of their time together. She’d been gorgeous and eager to please in bed. In the beginning their relationship had been all about fun and games, and then the games stopped being fun. “In those days I found most beautiful women irresistible.”
“You loved me then. I know you did.” In a dramatic gesture that was pure Francine, she dropped her coat to the floor. “And I know I hurt you when I left you for Dane.”
“That was six years ago.” He and Dane competed over everything. Women were no exception. Old habits might be hard to break, but he drew the line here. “You’re with my brother. Why do I have to keep reminding you of that?”
“He’s never home.” The little-girl whine might work on her father and her fiancé, but Simon found her childishness a complete turnoff. Once upon a time she’d been more genuine. Before a three-year engagement with no wedding date in sight had begun to take its toll on her confidence.
Impatience lashed at him. “So you’re lonely?”
“It’s more than that.” She paced toward him, all trace of seduction dropping from her manner. “He’s gone all the time and even when he’s home he’s always working. I might as well be single again.”
Francine single again? Simon’s heart stopped. That would be bad. Very bad.
“What makes you think I’m a better bet? I travel more than Dane.”
“But you don’t have to. You’re the boss. You can choose to make as many business trips as you want. You aren’t being ordered around by your superior officer.” Her gaze left him and moved around his living room.
He’d bought the top floor condo during preconstruction in order to customize the entire three thousand square feet to his specific design. He’d spared no expense in the materials and fixtures. The place screamed money, and the shock on his big brother’s face, during the two seconds it had taken Dane to recover, had made it worth every penny Simon had spent.
Growing up, Dane had always been a step ahead. Smart, athletic and popular as all hell, his older brother had graduated first in his class in high school and had been student council president as well as captain of the track team. Simon, on the other hand, had struggled with his grades, spent more time in detention than class, and enjoyed kicking ass on the football field. Dane had gone to college on a full scholarship. Simon had paid his own way.
Proving that hard work and perseverance evened the odds.
“And these last few months,” Francine continued, her voice a throaty purr, “I’ve started to think maybe I picked the wrong brother.”
Simon didn’t believe her. Francine knew exactly what she was doing when she traded one brother for the other. But the sting of her betrayal was mild in comparison to how pissed off he’d been to find out that Dane had actively stolen her away.
“You didn’t pick the wrong brother.” Annoyance cracked like a whip along his nerves. “You’re engaged to Dane. Don’t screw that up. He’s the right man for you.”
He did not need this distraction in his life right now. Expanding his business required every iota of his focus and attention.
“But if I wasn’t engaged to Dane,” she said, injecting a breathless note into her voice, “would you be interested in me then?”
“No.”
Simon caught a glimpse of himself reflected in the glass behind Francine. He eyed the grim stranger. Who was this guy with the tick in his jaw? And what had happened to the blond all-American with endless mischief in his eyes?
He rolled his head to loosen his tight shoulder muscles. To say he and his brother were competitive was like saying that Everest was a big hill. Simon could see Francine using that to create trouble between him and Dane this Christmas in a bid for her fiancé’s attention. She’d tried it before and the brothers hadn’t spoken for six months.
“I don’t believe you.” She bit her lower lip and regarded him from beneath her lashes. “Let’s get comfortable and talk about that, shall we?”
“We have nothing to talk about.” He turned toward his front door.
“Then let me demonstrate.”
There was no missing the slide of a zipper in the silence that followed.
Simon whipped around in time to spy Francine heading across the living room in the direction of his bedroom. Her long fingers caught the dress as it dipped off her shoulders.
Disbelief at her boldness held him immobile. She tossed a seductive look over her shoulder just before she dropped the dress and disappeared into the hall.
His paralysis broke. “Damn it, Francine. Get dressed. I’m not doing this.”
He snagged the chartreuse dress off the floor as he passed it. The silk slipped like a reptile’s slimy skin against his fingertips. Repulsed, he ground his teeth and reached the hallway too far behind Francine to stop her from entering his bedroom.
“Who are you?” The question came out of Francine in an incensed squeal that he might have found amusing if he wasn’t neck deep in trouble. He entered his room, his gaze going immediately to Caroline. Sympathy for her cooled his fury.
Dressed in sexy black lingerie and thigh-high stockings, Francine had backed Caroline against the foot of the bed. Caroline ripped her gaze from Francine and sent him a strong message.
Help.
“I see you’ve met Caroline,” Simon smoothly interjected, stepping forward to hand Francine her dress. “She was waiting to surprise me when I got home.”
“I fell asleep.”
He smiled, picturing how she’d looked draped across his bed. “My very own Goldilocks.”
A becoming pink flooded Caroline’s cheeks, but she looked as if she’d swallowed a bumblebee.
Francine looked from one to the other, her expressive features broadcasting anger and a trace of fear. “I didn’t realize you had company.”
“You didn’t give me a chance to tell you.” Simon gestured toward his future sister-in-law. “Caroline, this is Francine.”
Caroline offered her hand with an uncertain smile. “Nice to meet you.”
Francine snubbed Caroline’s polite gesture and crossed her arms, increasing her already considerable cleavage. She glanced from Simon to the rumpled bed behind Caroline. “Are you two dating?”
The upcoming Christmas holiday flashed before Simon’s eyes like a horror movie trailer. If his brother’s fiancée convinced herself she’d picked the wrong brother, it would take a freight train to knock the idea out of her head. He pictured Francine in his parents’ house and imagined the conflict she would cultivate between him and Dane at every opportunity. He needed something to defuse the tension…
“I’m his—”
“Fiancée,” Simon interrupted. “We’re engaged.”
Fiancée?
“What?” The word burst from Caroline like a violent sneeze. She gaped at Simon, wondering if she’d heard him properly.
“You’re engaged?” Francine’s equally outraged explosion assured Caroline her ears hadn’t deceived her.
“Darling, don’t be angry with me.” Simon stepped between her and Francine. His bright blue eyes glowed with mesmerizing intensity, holding her transfixed and tongue-tied. “I know we agreed to tell my parents first, but I can’t wait any longer for the world to know about us.”
He caught Caroline’s hand and squeezed it hard. A warning. A bid for help? The contact made her skin tingle and her emotions tumble. His touch stirred things in her, a chaotic brew of attraction and wariness. Thoughts spinning, stomach in free fall, she was way out of her element.
“But—”
He placed two fingers over her lips. “I know you’re thinking Francine will run to Dane and spill our little secret, but I assure you, she’s going to keep this visit to herself.”
The man looked and sounded c
ompletely serious. And convincing. He almost had her believing they were getting married.
“As for why Francine is here in her underwear.” His lips tightened into a hard line. “She spilled something on her dress and wanted to rinse it out. Isn’t that right, Francine?”
Francine’s silence spoke louder than words. Something churned below the surface between her and Simon, piquing Caroline’s curiosity. She recognized the redhead from the family photos in Simon’s living room. Given Francine’s state of undress, Caroline had first assumed Simon and Francine were involved in some sort of clandestine affair. Obviously that wasn’t true or he’d never have introduced Caroline as his fiancée. What sort of insane drama was this?
“We’ll leave you to get dressed,” Simon said, towing her past Francine.
Her mother had often said rich people had a whole lotta crazy in ’em, and Penny Sampson had witnessed a whole lot during the twenty years she’d worked as a housekeeper for the wealthiest family in Barrisville, Alabama.
“Have you lost your mind?” Caroline whispered when they reached the living room.
Simon released her hand and strode to where a coat lay on the floor. “What do you mean?”
“You just introduced me as your fiancée.” Caroline tucked her freed hand beneath her opposite arm to preserve the warmth of his touch. “Why would you do that?”
“It’s complicated.”
“No kidding.” His brother’s fiancée shows up and starts taking her clothes off. Caroline was glad Simon hadn’t been too keen on it, but why did he have to pull her into the middle of the family drama?
“You were just in the right place at the right time.” He dropped the coat over the back of the couch and returned to tower over her. “And I’ve never been so glad to find a woman sleeping in my bed.”
Her heart hiccupped as a sensual light flowed into his eyes, instantly transporting her back to his bed, to the moment she’d awakened to find him standing over her, watching her sleep.
The enormity of her screwup slapped Caroline in the face.
Heavens, what had prompted her to lie down on the man’s bed?
The tantalizing scent of his cologne for one. The softness of his Egyptian cotton sheets for two. Exhaustion brought on by too much work and too many worries for three.
As for what had prompted her to eye him like a half-starved cougar in search of its next meal, that could only be blamed on the man himself. Hunky daredevils with wavy blond hair and delicious blue eyes were not something she stumbled upon every day. And this one had enough charm and sex appeal for ten men.
Her temperature ratcheted upward a notch.
“Look, I’m sorry about falling asleep in your—” To Caroline’s intense embarrassment she felt her cheeks go hot again. She clapped her hands over the betraying color.
“Bed?” he prompted, a wicked glint in his eye. His silky laugh chased chills up her spine. “If you hadn’t, it would have taken me forever to get rid of Francine.”
“So you two aren’t…?” Caroline groped for a word and quickly rejected the ones that popped into her head. “Involved?”
“God, no.”
“Then what is she doing here in her underwear?”
“Trying to seduce me. She is under the mistaken impression that she’s engaged to the wrong brother.” He rubbed his face and cursed. His attention shifted to the hallway behind her. “You being here has changed her mind on that score.”
Whoa. Yep, she’d been right. She had bumbled into a crazy drama, and a family one at that.
“Yeah, about that—”
“Later. She’s coming, and I really need you to play along.”
Play along?
“I can’t. The whole thing’s too crazy.” She shook her head as he captured her hands and began a tantalizing slide of his fingers between hers. “You don’t know me. I don’t know you.”
“That’s funny because I feel as if we have a connection.”
The combination of his throaty murmur and the gentle rasp of his thumb against the ragged pulse in her wrist melted her reservations. The room, the half-naked Francine, the world…started drifting away.
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Is it?”
As tempting as it was to imagine they had some sort of connection because of a few dozen flirtatious notes exchanged over the last six months, she wasn’t the sort of girl who indulged in fantasies.
Her knees wobbled as he carried their clasped hands to his chest. A wispy curl of something smoky and forbidden spiraled upward inside her. She tugged to free herself, but he spoke a word that stopped her.
“Please.”
“Oh, all right,” she grumbled, unnerved by the longing that surged through her muscles and lodged in her joints. “But just for now.”
“Thank you.”
He’d no more gotten the words out when Francine reappeared. Caroline took a long look at Simon’s future sister-in-law. Strawberry blond hair fell past her shoulders in a silken curtain, framing a perfect oval face with high cheekbones, a long, narrow nose, and full sculpted lips. Her jade green eyes could have stared in cool arrogance from the cover of any high-fashion magazine in the world.
The gown she wore looked as if it cost a fortune. Caroline shifted her weight as Francine continued to ignore her as if she were a coat rack. She didn’t need the redhead’s obvious disdain to know she wasn’t in the woman’s league.
Francine fetched her coat and slipped her arms into the sleeves. “When did you get engaged?”
“Right before I left for Australia.” Simon offered Caroline a sexy smile, his blue eyes dancing with mischief.
“Have you been seeing each other long?”
No doubt Francine had utilized her time alone in Simon’s bedroom to check for signs that a woman occupied the space: clothes in the closet or drawers, a tube of lipstick on the dresser. When her search hadn’t even turned up an extra toothbrush, Francine no doubt saw Simon’s ploy for what it was.
“Not long,” he admitted. His thumb grazed Caroline’s chin. He sure looked the part of a smitten fool. “I think this has been a surprise for both of us.”
“You can say that again,” Caroline muttered. She hated lying. It went against everything she believed in. No good ever came of it, and you usually ended up hurting the ones you loved.
“You’ve kept her quite a secret,” Francine said, continuing to behave as if Caroline wasn’t standing two feet away.
“I wasn’t ready to share her with anyone.”
That he had an answer for everything triggered a warning buzz in Caroline’s mind. Why had he insisted on fabricating a relationship with her? Francine’s lips curved in a dangerous smile.
“You mean you weren’t ready to share her with Dane.”
Simon stiffened. A muscle jumped in his jaw. All trace of softness vanished. He’d become as cold and relentless as a glacier.
“Dane has you, Francine. You’re all the woman he needs.”
From the sarcasm lacing his tone, Caroline doubted he meant to flatter Francine. Nonetheless, her lips curved in a smug smile.
“I’ll call you tomorrow.” Francine thrust her hands into her coat pockets and headed for the front door. “We can discuss plans for traveling to Savannah together.”
“I’m afraid that’s not going to work for us. Caroline and I are driving down on Friday.”
That stopped the redhead cold. She pivoted on her toes and brought her green gaze to bear on Simon. “You’re bringing her home for Christmas?”
He slid his hand across Caroline’s hip and drew her body against his in a proprietary manner. His shrug dispersed the tension vibrating in his muscles. When he smiled down at Caroline, he looked like the happiest man on the planet. “I think it’s time my family met my bride to be. Don’t you?”
Chapter Two
“You’re really going through with this?” Disbelief raised Francine’s eyebrows, confirming that the redhead was suspicious of Simon’s surprise enga
gement.
“Of course.” Forgoing subtlety, Simon herded Francine toward the foyer. “Say hello to your parents for me.”
His brother’s fiancée didn’t look at all pleased to be so unceremoniously bundled out the door, but Simon remained unmoved by her pout and her attempts to stall. Her heels sounded like exclamation points on the foyer’s wood floor.
“It appears we’re going to have an interesting Christmas this year,” Francine said, her sharp gaze returning to Caroline.
“Indeed we are.” Simon gestured Francine through the open door. “And I’ll be very disappointed if you spill my news to Dane or my parents before I get the chance to tell them.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t dream of it.”
With Francine gone, Simon strode straight at Caroline, his long legs eating up the distance between them way too fast for her comfort. “She’s probably dialing Dane’s number right now.”
“I can’t go to Savannah with you.” Caroline stiffened as he neared, a little intimidated by the forceful scowl on his face.
He halted with his toes just inside her personal space bubble and set his hands on his hips. “I thought your note last week said you didn’t have any plans for Christmas.”
“I don’t.”
Caroline cursed herself for giving in to melancholy and opening up about what a pathetic social life she had. Corresponding with a man she’d never met had seemed like a perfectly harmless thing to do. Well, at least it had started harmlessly enough, with a note from him asking her to do a little grocery shopping. Followed by a note back from her about a particularly good deal on salmon.
Then, after a few weeks of impersonal missives, he asked her what she did for fun.
She’d explained that between her classes and work she didn’t have any time for fun.
He lectured her on all work and no play, and she acknowledged he seemed to be an expert when it came to having fun, based on his frequent travel and the sports equipment she’d find in his spare bedroom afterward: rock climbing, surfing or skiing. She’d never asked him what he did for a living, but professional thrill seeker seemed fitting given the photos of him skydiving, hang gliding and white-water rafting. The common denominators in all the photos: danger and Simon’s broad grin.