Her First Vacation

by Leigh, Jennie

  “Let’s go get some of your things and get out of here. We can go to my hotel. It’s not exactly the Ritz, but it’s the best place in town, and they have their own kitchen so we won’t starve. If we’re going to wind up being snowed in for a day or two, I’d rather not have to deal with your mother and sister. I want you all to myself.”

  Claire shot him a small frown, then her face cleared, and he saw her smile. “For a brilliant federal agent, you’re not very smart. I don’t live here anymore. I haven’t since a week after I came home.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not a federal agent. Not anymore. I quit. About a week after I let you walk out of my life.”

  Claire blinked in surprise. “You quit? Why?”

  “Because it was making me hate myself. Because I was sick to death of lies and the twisted way I was sometimes forced to use them. I’d have gotten out sooner if I hadn’t had a personal stake in bringing Garret Palmer down. The man he admitted to killing was a federal agent. Undercover, like I was. More than that, he was my friend. Charlie taught me everything I knew. When Palmer killed him, it pulled me in as effectively as a fish on a line. I had to get him, to stop him. For Charlie.”

  “And you did.”

  Colin nodded. “Yes, I did. But in the end, I wasn’t thinking about Charlie at all. You see, by the time I shot him, you were the one I was getting him for. Because he’d hurt you. Because he would have hurt you so much worse if he’d had the chance. I’ve never been particularly bloodthirsty, but when I saw the marks he’d left on you, I wanted to kill him so much it hurt. If I’d had a clear shot at his head, I probably would have killed him. As it was, you were the one who made it possible for me to put him down. If you hadn’t ducked out of the way-”

  He stopped, clearly not wanting to give voice to what would have happened. Claire felt an uncontrollable shiver work through her body at the memory. Colin’s grip on her hand tightened reflexively, as if he too was reliving the moment. She shoved the fear away. It was over and done and Garret Palmer would never hurt her or anyone else again. She smiled up at Colin.

  “So, do you still want to go to your hotel, or would you rather come back to my apartment?”

  He didn’t hesitate. “Your place. We’ll stop by the hotel and pick up my things, first.”

  She nodded. “Let’s go, before this snow gets any worse.”

  Colin paused and glanced toward the house. The front door was closed, but he could clearly see the outlines of several people around the front windows. Obviously, Claire’s mother and sister weren’t the only ones watching. He turned back to Claire.

  “What about your family?”

  “What about them?”

  He shook his head. “I might have been a little...brusque. Do you want to try to smooth things over first?”

  “I stopped catering to my mother and sister as soon as I came home. I’m not going to start it back up now. If they have questions or comments, they can call me. If not, they can sit and stew in their curiosity and annoyance. It doesn’t matter to me either way. I’m not living for them anymore. You taught me that I had every right to focus on doing what was best for me. That’s why I got my own place.”

  He gave her a warm smile as he began to lead her down the drive. “I always knew you were smart. I just didn’t know how smart I was.”

  She shot him a look that probably terrified the children she taught when she directed it at them. “Don’t let it go to your head. I went on that cruise in the first place because I knew I needed a change. You just pushed me in the right direction.”

  He stopped beside his rental. Claire took one look at it and shook her head. “That thing is a piece of junk. We’ll take mine. It’s got four-wheel-drive.” Colin turned and spotted the Jeep she indicated. Would she ever stop surprising him? He’d figured her for a nice, classy sedan. Something upscale and genteel. From the looks of the Jeep, its large tires weren’t just for looks alone. He cast her a sideways glance as she led him to it.

  “Somehow, I never figured you for the outdoorsy type.”

  She arched a brow at him as she pulled open the passenger door. “Yeah, well you never figured me for the see-through underwear type either, did you?”

  He stopped in the process of moving toward the seat. He turned his head to lock his gaze on her. “Speaking of which, what kind of scraps are you wearing beneath that thing?”

  Her smile was pure mischief. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”

  He kissed her then, because he couldn’t stop himself. His hand slid down her back and across her rear and he knew, just from that touch, that she had on a thong. God help him, the anticipation was going to kill him. She pulled away, giving him a knowing smile. “Like the hint?”

  He would have grabbed her again if she hadn’t backed out of reach with a laugh. He got in the Jeep, buckling his seatbelt as she opened the driver’s door and climbed inside. She had to hike the skirt up a little just so she could climb up into the seat. He waited until she was buckled in and had started the engine before shaking his head.

  “I still can’t believe you’re wearing a getup like that in a vehicle like this.”

  She pulled out onto the street before answering. “Yeah, well I left the Mercedes at home because of the weather.”

  He shot her a surprised look and she laughed. “Just kidding. I’m a teacher, remember. The Jeep suits the climate and my occasional urges to put some distance between myself and civilization. Believe me, it’s far closer to my taste than formal dinner parties are.”

  “Then why were you going?”

  She shrugged. “Because for years I’ve been there without really being there. I was always in the kitchen, making sure the caterer got the food ready on time and that the wine was just right and the linens and countless other little details like that. And even if I hadn’t been in the kitchen, it wouldn’t have mattered. No one paid the slightest bit of attention to me, unless it was Mother or Diane making some comment on the inappropriateness of my dress or my hair or my lack of makeup. Tonight, things would have been different. Maybe some part of me wanted to prove that I could do it. Or maybe it was just a childish desire to have something I’d been denied too many times.” She glanced over at him as they stopped at a light. “You know, all little girls want to get to be Cinderella sometime.”

  Colin ached for the sadness in her eyes, the years of pain he knew she’d lived with. He reached out and closed his hand over hers where it rested on the gearshift.

  “I’ll take you to a ball, sometime. Somewhere. You can count on it.”

  She shrugged and smiled and the echoes of sadness in her eyes vanished in a flash. “I don’t need fairy tales, Colin. The truth is, I almost didn’t come tonight at all. It suddenly occurred to me this afternoon that whatever I thought I would get from the party, it wouldn’t be what I really wanted. I certainly never expected to find the man I loved waiting for me when I walked through the door.”

  The light changed, but neither of them noticed. Colin was kissing her again, feeling his heart thud heavily as her words washed over him. She loved him. She’d said it out loud. Finally, someone behind them honked, and they separated like a pair of teenagers who’d been caught necking. Claire smiled a little shyly, then put the Jeep in gear and moved through the intersection. It took them another five minutes to reach his hotel. Claire had known where it was because she knew there wasn’t another hotel in the town that offered a full service kitchen. The others were roadside rest stops. Rooms with beds and bathrooms and little else. Colin checked out of the hotel, tossed his suitcase into the back of the Jeep, and they headed off again. By that time the snow was really starting to come down. Claire stopped and put the Jeep into four-wheel-drive like a pro, then continued without so much as acknowledging Colin’s amused stare. Finally, they reached a neat little grouping of surprisingly large duplexes. Claire parked in front of one of them, then turned to smile at him.

  “Home sweet home.”

  He heard the t
hread of nervousness in her voice and wasn’t surprised by it. She’d shown him that she was willing to flirt with him earlier, but this was the moment of truth. He leaned over and cupped her cheek. He kissed her lightly, tenderly, and he felt her sigh against him. When he pulled away, it was with great reluctance and nerve-shattering anticipation. She killed the engine and got out. By the time Colin had pulled his suitcase out, she was unlocking the front door of her half of the duplex. He followed her inside, kicking off his shoes inside the small foyer so he wouldn’t track snow all through her home. He sat his suitcase down and turned to face Claire. She’d dropped her keys and purse on a small table, and now she just stood there, looking almost as nervous as she had the night he’d followed her to her room.

  He wanted to lift her onto that little table behind her and part her legs so he could bury himself into her warm body. He wanted to drop to the floor and pull her down with him. Hell, he just wanted her. But he didn’t move. Instead, he gave her a smile he hoped didn’t show the strain he felt.

  “This has been sudden, I know. If you’re not ready, that’s fine.”

  He watched her as she watched him and prayed that she wouldn’t tell him she’d changed her mind about him staying with her. He could go back to the hotel. He doubted they’d given his room away this quickly. And if he had to, he could go through the process of a real courtship. He’d take her to movies and dinner. He’d give her all the time she needed. But it would damn near kill him to keep his hands off her. Just when he thought she was going to turn around and pick her keys back up, she released a soft sigh and took a step toward him. She was still nervous, but the flirtatious light he’d seen in her eyes when she’d teased him about her underwear was back.

  “I thought you wanted to know what I have on underneath this dress.”

  The teasing in her voice was all the invitation he needed. He reached out and caught her by the nape, pulling her up against him as his mouth came down on hers. Fire coursed through him, generating so much heat he figured she wouldn’t need to turn up her furnace to ward off the cold. She made a small noise deep in her throat, and he felt his body clench in response. He loved the sounds she made when he touched her. He loved the taste of her. He was almost giddy with the ecstasy of just having her body pressed tightly to his.

  He told himself he’d go slow. He would show her with his gentleness just how much he loved her. He’d keep the need screaming inside him leashed so that he could prove how much he adored her. He was doing an admirable job of maintaining his control, too, until she pulled herself just far enough away from him to allow her hand to slip between their bodies and cup the front of his pants. That touch, both bold and tentative, blew all his grand plans right out the window. He growled as the need took over, and before he even realized it, he had spun her around and lifted her off the floor. Her back was against the wall and her legs came up to clamp around him. He rocked against her and nearly lost it when he felt how hot she was. He looked down into her smoky gray eyes and forced himself to at least hold on long enough to find her bed.

  “Bedroom?”

  Her voice was breathless as she answered. “Upstairs.”

  He spun around and headed for the stairs he could see through the open doorway a few feet away. They made it half way up before he had to stop and lower her to the floor. She kept rocking against him, rubbing herself along the length of his constrained erection. In the end, Colin stopped trying to fight himself. He pushed her dress up past her hips, opened the front of his pants and shoved her panties aside so he could sink into her. Neither of them had the control to hold on more than a few moments. He screamed her name as her muscles clenched around him and pushed him over the edge. Eventually, they made it to her bedroom. Colin got to enjoy the way the burgundy satin of her matching bra and panties looked against her creamy skin for the short moments it took him to rid her of those small scraps. They fell to the bed, in each other’s arms and touched and tasted and loved until exhaustion finally claimed them and they fell asleep in a tangle of arms and legs. As Colin felt sleep pulling him under he said a quick prayer of thanks that at last he’d found the peace he’d once believed would never be his.

  Claire woke slowly and stretched, only to moan as her body protested the movement. She was aching in more than one place. But then she knew she had good reason to feel as if she’d done a strenuous workout. She and Colin had been all over each other and her bed. She felt a flush of heat in her face as she added the staircase. She reached out, searching for him with her hand. Her eyes flashed open when she found the bed empty. The first thing that went through her mind was the memory of the last “morning after” they’d shared. He’d left her then, too. Pain squeezed her heart, and she sat up as she felt her stomach begin to clench. Then her eyes found the clothes lying strewn in a trail from the door to the side of the bed. They’d already been undressing each other before they even made it to the top of the stairs. From where she lay, she could see his jacket lying right beside the bolero that matched the dress she’d so casually left lying in a pool on the floor just inside the door. She focused on each item of his clothing, willing the tightness that had gripped her body to ease. He wasn’t gone. He wouldn’t have left his clothes behind.

  She listened and realized she could hear sounds coming from directly below her. The duplex wasn’t particularly well soundproofed. Not within each individual unit, at least. She heard the refrigerator door close, then a muffled curse. He was in her kitchen, and from the sound of things, he was cooking. She felt the last threads of fear and pain wash away. She slid out of the bed and pulled her robe off the hook on the back of her bedroom door. She slipped it on as she headed for the stairs. When she reached the kitchen, she stopped in the doorway and just watched.

  Colin wore his underwear and nothing else. He was at her stove, cursing beneath his breath as he struggled to get the front, right burner to light. She watched him for a moment, allowing her gaze to take in the tight curve of his rear as he bent to examine the burner, as if he might somehow see what was causing the problem. She felt heat flush her body that had nothing at all to do with the heating vent that was blowing warm air directly onto her head. She stepped into the room just as Colin straightened and moved the frying pan he’d found onto a different burner. She moved up behind him and reached out to run her hand over the tight curve she’d been admiring moments before. Colin jumped and spun around so fast that Claire had to step back to keep from getting an elbow in the face.

  “What are you doing up?”

  She arched a brow at the terse question. “Someone was making enough noise right below my bed to wake the dead.”

  He gave her a sheepish look. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think about your bedroom being right over this room.”

  She shook her head. “It’s okay. I’m an early riser anyway, remember?”

  He smiled. “Yes, I do.” His smile turned to a slightly scolding frown. “But now how am I going to bring you breakfast in bed?”

  “How about we cook it together, then go back to bed as a pair?”

  She saw the hunger leap into his eyes. He pretended to consider her suggestion for a moment, then reached out and pulled her up against him. “Yeah, I like your idea better.”

  A few minutes later, Claire was positive they’d never make it anywhere near her bedroom before they gave in to the inevitable need. A few more minutes and Colin proved her suspicions right. The kitchen table would probably never be the same. She certainly knew she’d never sit down to eat at it again without blushing. Finally they fixed breakfast and ate. They showered and dressed, though it took them a while to get to that point since the act of showering kept being interrupted by their need to pleasure each other. Claire managed to convince him to get into his clothes eventually, though. Then she drug him out of the house and into the street where they were almost immediately embroiled in a massive snowball fight that Claire knew had probably been going on most of the morning. Half the kids involved had been her student
s in the past. If they were curious about Colin, they didn’t ask. They just accepted him into the game and did their best to bury him beneath an avalanche of fluffy snowballs.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  It was lunchtime when she and Colin stumbled through her front door, slamming it just in time to avoid getting hit by a fresh barrage. She laughed out loud as the thuds landed against the solid wood. And then Colin was kissing her again. When he let her go a few moments later, he was grinning like one of the kids outside.

  “I haven’t done that since I was a kid. Maybe, I never did it at all.”

  She smiled up at him. “You know they’ll probably be waiting for us when we go back out. You got them good with that sneak attack of yours.”

  His grin widened. “Yeah, there are some benefits to being good at playing dirty.”

  They stripped out of their outer clothes, and Claire headed for the kitchen, calling back to him over her shoulder.

  “You know what we have to have, don’t you? Hot chocolate. It’s the only thing that will do after a morning like this one.”

  She heard him call out for her to go ahead. She turned around, frowning when she realized he wasn’t following her to the kitchen. She kept going, though, knowing he’d be along soon. She was just lighting that front burner he’d had trouble with earlier when he came into the room. She lifted her gaze, smiling. “I bet it’s been a long time since you’ve had real, homemade hot chocolate, too.”