He had given his family strict orders to stay away from his place to give him time to get settled in with his houseguest. Of course, everyone was anxious to meet the woman he’d brought home with him.
“This should be an interesting thirty days,” she said, admiring a huge painting on the wall.
“Why do you say that?”
She shrugged. “Well, all those markers I saw getting here. Jason’s Place. Zane’s Hideout. Canyon’s Bluff. Ramsey’s Web. Derringer’s Dungeon. Stern’s Stronghold… Need I go on?”
He chuckled. “No, and you have my cousin Bailey to thank for that. We give her the honor of naming everyone’s parcel of land, and she’s come up with some doozies.” He picked up her luggage. “Come on, I’ll show you to your room. If you aren’t in the mood to climb the stairs, I do have an elevator.”
“No, the stairs are fine. Besides, it gives me the chance to work the kinks out of my body from our long flight.”
She followed him to one of the guest rooms on the third floor. They hadn’t slept together since that one night he’d spent with her after they’d met on the staircase. Even after he’d taken her dancing, he had returned her to her room at the villa, planted a kiss on her cheek and left. The next day had been extremely busy with them packing up the lab’s equipment and finalizing reports.
They had been too busy to spend time getting naked on silken sheets. But that hadn’t meant the thought hadn’t run through his mind a few times. Yesterday they’d taken the plane here, and sat beside each other for the flight. The twelve hours from India to Washington, and then the six hours from Washington to Denver had given him time to reflect on what he hoped she would get from her thirty days with him and his family.
“Wow!” Kalina walked into Micah’s guest bedroom and couldn’t do anything but stare, turn around and stare some more.
The room was done in chocolate, white and lime green. Everything—from the four-poster, white, queen-size bed, to the curtains and throw pillows—was perfectly matched. The walls of the room were painted white, which made the space look light and airy. Outside her huge window was a panoramic view of the lake she’d seen when they arrived. There was a private bath that was triple the size of the one she had in her home in Virginia. It had both a Jacuzzi tub and a walk-in shower.
She wasn’t surprised Micah had given her one of his guest rooms to use. He wanted to shift their relationship from the physical to the mental. She just wasn’t so sure she agreed with his logic. She could still get to know him while they shared a bed, and she didn’t understand why he assumed differently. She watched him place the luggage by her bed. He said nothing as she continued to check out other interesting aspects of the room.
“I can see why Gemma used your house as a model home,” Kalina said, coming to stand in front of him. “Your house should be featured in one of those magazines.”
He chuckled. “It was. Last year. I have a copy downstairs. You can read the article if you like.”
“All right.”
“I’ll leave you to rest up and relax. I plan on preparing dinner later.”
She raised a surprised brow. “You can cook?”
He laughed. “Of course I can cook. And I’m pretty good at it, you’ll see.” He reached out and softly kissed her on the lips. “Now, get some rest.”
He turned to leave, but she stopped him. “Where’s your room?”
He smiled down at her as if he had an idea why she was asking. “It’s on the second floor. I’ll give you a tour of my bedroom anytime you want it.”
She nodded, fully aware that a tour of his bedroom wasn’t what she was really interested in. She wanted to try out his bed.
* * *
A few hours later, Kalina closed her eyes as she savored the food in her mouth. “Mmm, this is delicious,” she said, slowly opening her eyes and glancing across the dinner table at Micah.
After indulging in a bath in the Jacuzzi, she had taken a nap, only to awaken hours later to the smell of something good cooking in the kitchen downstairs. She had slipped into a T-shirt and a pair of capris, and, not bothering to put shoes on, she had headed downstairs to find Micah at the stove. In his bare feet, shirtless, with jeans riding low on his hips, he’d looked the epitome of sexy as he moved around his spacious kitchen. She had watched him and had seen for herself just how at home he was while making a meal. She couldn’t help admiring him. Some men couldn’t even boil water.
He had told her he could cook, but she hadn’t taken him at his word. Now, after tasting what he’d prepared, she was forced to believe him. Almost. She glanced around the kitchen.
“What are you looking for?” he asked her.
She looked back at him and smiled. “Your chef.”
Micah chuckled. “You won’t find one here. I did all this myself. I don’t particularly like cooking, but I won’t starve if I have to do it for myself.”
No, he wouldn’t starve. In fact, he had enough cooking skills to keep himself well fed. He had prepared meat loaf, rice and gravy, green beans and iced tea. He’d explained that he’d called ahead and had gotten his cousin Megan to go grocery shopping for him. She’d picked up everything he’d asked her to get and a few things he hadn’t asked her for…like the three flavors of ice cream now in the freezer.
“Do you ever get lonely out here, Micah?”
He glanced across the table at her and laughed. “Are you kidding? I have relatives all around me. I try to catch up on my rest whenever I’m home, but they don’t make it easy. Although I’m not here the majority of the time, I’m involved in the family business. I have a share in my brother’s and cousins’ horse-breeding business, in my cousin Ramsey’s sheep business and I’m on the board of Blue Ridge Land Management.” He then told her how his father and uncle had founded the company years ago and how his brother Dillon was now CEO.
Kalina immediately recognized the name of the company. It had made the Forbes Top 50 just this year. She could only sit and stare at him. She’d had no idea he was one of those Westmorelands.
Not that having a lot of money was everything, but it told her more about his character than he realized. He worked because he wanted to work, not because he had to. Yet he always worked just as hard as any member of his team—sometimes even harder. She couldn’t help wondering how he’d chosen his field of work and why he was so committed and dedicated to it.
Over dinner he told her more about his family, his brothers and cousins, especially the escapades of the younger Westmorelands. Although she tried not to laugh, she found some of their antics downright comical and could only imagine how his cousins Dillon and Ramsey had survived it all while still managing to keep the family together.
“And you say there are fifteen of you?” she asked, pushing her plate away.
“Yes, of the Denver clan. Everyone is here except Gemma, who now lives in Sydney, and the few who are still away at college. Needless to say, the holidays are fun times for us when everyone comes home.”
Getting up to take their plates to the sink, he asked, “Do you feel like going horseback riding later? I thought I’d give you a tour of the rest of the house and then we can ride around my property.”
Excitement spread through her. “I’d like that.”
He returned to the seat next to her. “But first I think we need to have a talk.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “About what?”
“About whose bed you’ll be sleeping in while you’re here.”
And before she could respond, he had swept her out of her chair and into his arms. He carried her from the kitchen into the living room where he settled down on the sofa with her in his lap.
* * *
Micah smiled at the confused look on Kalina’s face. She brushed back a handful of hair and then pinned him with one of her famous glares. “I didn’t know there was a question about where I’d be sleeping.”
She wasn’t fooling him one bit. “Isn’t there? I put you in the guest room for a reason.”
<
br /> She waved off his words. “Then maybe we do need to talk about that foolishness regarding your no-sex policy again.”
He’d figured she would want to discuss it, which was why he’d brought up the subject. “It will be less complicated if we don’t share the same bed for a while.”
“Until I really get to know you?”
“Yes.”
“I disagree with your logic on taking that approach, especially since you want me. Do you deny it?”
How could he deny it when he had an erection he knew she could feel since she was practically sitting on it. “No, I don’t deny it, but like I said when I invited you here, I want you to—”
“Get to know you,” she muttered. “I heard you. More times than I care to. And I don’t think us sharing a bed has anything to do with what we do outside the bedroom.”
“Well, I do. Last time we had an affair it was strictly sexual. Now I want to change the way you think about me, about us.”
Now she really looked confused. “To what?”
He wished he could tell her the truth, that she was the woman he wanted above all others. That he wanted to marry her. He wanted her to have his babies. He wanted her to wear his name. But all the things he wanted meant nothing until she could trust him. They would never come into existence until she could believe he was not the man her father had made him out to be. This time around, Micah refused to allow sex to push those wants to the side.
“I want you to think of things other than sex when it comes to us, Kalina,” he said.
She frowned. “Why?”
He could come clean and tell her how he felt about her, but he didn’t think she would believe him, just as she still didn’t believe he had not betrayed her two years ago. “Because we’ve been there before. Even you said that our relationship was starting with the same technique. I want you to feel that it’s different this time.”
He could tell she still didn’t know where he was coming from, but the important thing was that he knew. A dawning awareness suddenly appeared on her features, but he had a feeling, even before she opened her mouth, that whatever she was thinking was all wrong.
“Okay, I think I get it,” she said, nodding.
He was afraid to ask, but knew he had to. “And just what do you get?”
“You’re one of the older Westmorelands and you feel you should set an example for the others.” She nodded her head as if her assumption made perfect sense.
“Set an example for them in what way?” he asked.
“By presenting me as a friend and not a lover. You did say your cousin Bailey was young and impressionable.”
He had to keep a straight face. He forced his eyes to stay focused even though he was tempted to roll them. Once she met Bailey she would see how absurd her assumption was. First of all, although she was twenty-three years old, Bailey probably didn’t have much of a love life, thanks to all her older, overbearing and protective brothers and male cousins. And she had gone past being impressionable. Bailey could curse worse than any sailor when she put her mind to it. He and his brothers and cousins had already decided that the man who fell for Bailey would have to be admired…as well as pitied.
“The key word where Bailey is concerned is was. Trust me. I don’t have to hide my affairs from anyone. Everyone around here is an adult and understands what grown-ups do.”
“In that case, what other reason could you have for not wanting us to sleep together? Unless…”
He stared at her for several long moments, and when she didn’t finish what she was about to say, he prompted her. “Unless what?”
She looked down at her hands in her lap. “Nothing.”
He had a feeling that again, whatever was bothering her, she’d figured wrong. He reached out, lifted her chin up and brought his face closer to hers. “And I know good and well you aren’t thinking what I think you’re thinking, not when my desire for you is about to burst through my zipper. There’s no way you can deny that you feel it.”
She nodded slowly. “Yes, I can feel it,” she said softly.
So could he, and he was aware, even more than he’d been before, of just how much he wanted her. Unfortunately, pointing out his body’s reaction made her aware of how much he wanted her, as well.
She stuck her tongue out and slowly licked the corner of his lips. “Then why are you denying me what I want? Why are you denying yourself what you want?”
Good question. He had to think hard to recall the reason he was denying them both. He had a plan. A little sacrifice now would pay off plenty of dividends in the years to come. Remembering his goals wouldn’t have been so hard if she hadn’t decided at that very moment to play the vixen. She purposely twisted that little behind of hers in his lap, against his zipper, making him mindful of just how good his erection felt against her backside. And what the hell was she doing with her tongue, using the tip of it to lick his mouth? She was deliberately boggling his mind.
“Kalina?”
“Mmm?”
“Stop it,” he said in a tone he knew was not really strong on persuasion. It wasn’t helping matters that he’d once fantasized about them making love in this very room and on this very sofa.
“No, I don’t want to stop and you can’t make me,” she said in that stubborn voice of hers.
Hell, okay, he silently agreed. Maybe I can’t make her stop. And he figured that reasoning with her would be a waste of time… .
At that moment she moved her tongue lower to lick the area around his jaw and he groaned.
“Oh, I so love the way you taste, Micah.”
Those were the wrong words for her to say. Hearing them made him recall just how much he loved how she tasted, as well. He drew in a deep breath, hoping to find resistance. Instead, he inhaled her feminine scent, a telltale sign of how much she wanted him. He could just imagine the sweetness of her nectar.
He thought of everything…counting sheep, the pictures on the wall, the fact that he hadn’t yet cleaned off the kitchen table…but nothing could clear his mind of her scent, or the way she was using her tongue. Now she had moved even lower to lick around his shoulder blades. Hell, why hadn’t he put on a shirt?
“Baby, you’ve got to stop,” he urged her in a strained voice.
She ignored him and kept right on doing what she was doing. He tried giving himself a mental shake and found it did not work. She was using her secret weapon, that blasted tongue of hers, to break him down. Hell, he would give anything for something—even a visit from one of his kin—to interrupt what she was doing, because he was losing the willpower to put a stop to it.
Hot, achy sensations swirled in his gut when she scooted off his lap. By the time he had figured out what she was about to do, it was too late. She had slid down his zipper and reached inside his jeans to get just what she wanted. He tightened his arms on her, planning to pull her up, but again he was too late. She lowered her head and took him into her mouth.
* * *
Kalina ignored the tug on her hair and kept her mouth firmly planted on Micah. By the time she was finished with him, he would think twice about resisting her, not giving her what she wanted or acting on foolish thoughts like them not sharing a bed now that she’d come all the way to Denver with him. He had a lot of nerve.
And he had a lot of this, she thought, fitting her mouth firmly on him, barely able to do so because he was so large. He was the only man she’d ever done this to. The first time she hadn’t been sure she had done it correctly. But he had assured her that she had, and he’d also assured her he had enjoyed it immensely. So she might as well provide him with more enjoyment, maybe then he would start thinking the way she wanted him to. Or, for the moment, stop thinking at all.
“Damn, Kalina, please stop.”
She heard his plea, but thought it didn’t sound all that convincing, so she continued doing what she was doing, and pretty soon the tug on her hair stopped. Now he was twirling her locks around his fingers to hold her mouth in place. N
o need. She didn’t intend to go anywhere.
At least she thought she wouldn’t be. Suddenly, he pulled her up and tossed her down on the sofa. The moment her back hit the cushions he was there, lifting her T-shirt over her head and sliding her capris and panties down her legs, leaving her totally naked.
The heat of his gaze raked over her, and she felt it everywhere, especially in her feminine core. “No need to let a good erection go to waste, Micah,” she said saucily.
He evidently agreed with her. Tugging his jeans and briefs down over his muscular hips, he didn’t waste any time slipping out of the clothes before moving to take his place between her open legs.
She lifted her arms to receive him and whispered, “Just think of this as giving me a much-deserved treat.”
Kalina would have laughed at his snort if he hadn’t captured her mouth in his the moment he slid inside her, not stopping until he went all the way to the hilt. And then he began moving inside her, stroking her desire to the point of raging out of control. She lifted her hips off the sofa to receive every hard thrust. The wall of his chest touched hers, brushing against her breasts in a rhythm that sent sensations rushing through her bloodstream.
Then he pulled away from her mouth, looked down at her and asked in a guttural voice, “Why?”
She knew what he was asking. “Because it makes no sense to deny us this pleasure.”
He didn’t say whether he agreed with her or not. Instead, he placed his hands against her backside and lifted her hips so they would be ready to meet his downward plunge. She figured he probably wasn’t happy with her. He wouldn’t appreciate how she had tempted him and pushed him over the edge. She figured he would stew for a while, but that was fine. Eventually he would get over it.
But apparently not before he put one sensuous whipping on her, she thought, loving the feel of how he was moving inside her. It was as if he wanted to use his body to give her a message, but she wasn’t sure just what point he was trying to make. She reached up and cupped his face in her hands, forcing him to look at her. “What?” she asked breathlessly.
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