Beauty vs. the Beast

by M. J. Rodgers

  Kay nodded at Marc’s suggestion. “Yes, I think Adam should say something direct and simple, like Justice Inc. believes in Dr. Steele’s complete innocence, and we are confident that a trial of the facts by the jury, and not of innuendo by the press, will vindicate him of all these ridiculous charges.”

  “Are we confident of that?” AJ asked from her position at the back of the room.

  “Of course,” Kay answered without hesitation.

  Adam turned to address his sister. “What’s the full story on this Vince Boson business?”

  “I sent an investigator over to talk with the police. His preliminary report is pretty sketchy. He was still looking for the original officer who took the complaint eight months ago.”

  “Was Dr. Steele arrested after Boson’s complaint?” Marc asked.

  AJ shook her head. “We know he was taken down for questioning. Right now, that’s all we know. We’ll have to wait for my investigator to get back with the rest of the story.”

  Kay stood up and headed for the door. “You might, but I don’t. I’m going to call Damian and ask him right now.”

  “You really believe it’ll be that easy, Kay?” AJ asked.

  “Why shouldn’t it be?”

  “He didn’t tell you about Vince Boson, did he?” AJ said.

  “So?”

  “What makes you think he’ll come clean with you now?”

  AJ’s continuing questions were beginning to annoy Kay. “I just know.”

  “You just know?” AJ repeated. “How can you just know?”

  Kay couldn’t keep the irritation out of her voice. “You’re questioning my judgment, AJ?”

  “When it isn’t surrounded by your normal, solid, lead-proof logic, yes, I’m questioning your judgment. And you should be, too. Where is that celebrated logic, Kay? You’re not allowing yourself to get personally involved with this client, are you?”

  Kay’s back stiffened along with her words. “Of course not.” She turned and headed out of the room.

  “Are you sure?” AJ’s words challenged behind her.

  Kay yanked open the conference-room door. She swung back to AJ. “I’m sure,” she said, her words escaping through clenched teeth.

  But she was lying. And she knew it. That’s why her teeth were clenched. And she hated reading the truth of those lies in AJ’s cool, reflecting eyes.

  * * *

  “KAY, well this is a surprise. What are you doing here?” Damian asked the moment he returned to find her on his front doorstep.

  “Where have you been?” she demanded over the roar of a jet plane passing overhead. “I called for thirty minutes straight before driving over here.”

  Damian shifted the bag in his arms so he could reach his key. Seattle’s normal heavy overcast had rolled back in, casting her face in shadow, subduing what would have otherwise been the bright summer night. Still, he didn’t need to see her features to read her state of mind.

  Walking away from her and AJ in that parking lot without answering the investigator’s question about knowing Vince Boson had been rude. But he had needed some time to think. And he had wanted to see what Vince Boson would say on camera before he offered any explanations of his own.

  “Would you like to come in?” he asked as he put his key in the lock.

  “I would like to know where you’ve been,” she demanded in a voice that was as far from soft as the sound of a sledgehammer.

  He swung open the door and switched on the porch light. He began to realize that she wasn’t just upset. She was furious. And what was even more surprising was that she was showing it, from the hands on her hips to the fire in her eyes.

  Faced with all that fabulous fury, Damian’s own pulse began to race.

  “After I watched the ‘Larry Kind Show,’ I discovered the cupboard was bare, so I went out for groceries.”

  Her tone rose into the realm of incredulity. “You watch your reputation being torn to shreds on a national program, and you respond by going out for groceries?”

  He leaned inside once again to switch on the entry light and infused his tone with all the feigned innocence he could muster. “You think I should have had pizza delivered?”

  “Pizza? Delivered? Have you gone stark-raving mad?”

  Damian’s stomach muscles tightened. He’d once wondered what she would be like stripped of that cool, logical, legal persona. And here she was giving him a glimpse, and then some.

  The lady was nothing less than a keg of dynamite at the end of a lit and rapidly burning fuse. Her kinetic energy charge pulsed through him like a raw current of building need. He wanted her so badly, he ached.

  For several seconds, she just stared at him with her mouth open. Finally, it seemed to dawn on her that because she’d been in the throes of all that fury, she had missed his not giving any serious answers to her questions.

  Her hands slid off her hips. Her shoulders slumped. She groaned and put her head in her hands.

  “No wonder people are popping up out of the woodwork ready to sue you and run you down in speedboats and cars and set your clothes on fire. Who can blame them?”

  He laughed at the sudden and complete release of her fury and wrapped his free hand beneath her elbow. “Come on. You’ll feel better after you’ve had something to eat.”

  He guided her inside and then released her elbow as he turned to close the door. But he never made it.

  A sonic boom exploded overhead and something very large and very heavy hit him from behind shoving him into a very large pit of blackness.

  * * *

  “DAMIAN!” Kay yelled.

  She dropped to her knees beside his fallen body and tried to lift the iron armor that now lay across his shoulder and chest. But it weighed the proverbial ton and she couldn’t budge it.

  It had seemed so firmly anchored to the wall by that heavy chain. Had the chain rusted? Is that why the armor had come crashing down on Damian?

  He lay so quiet. So deathly quiet. Her heart twisted painfully in her chest.

  “Damian? Can you hear me?”

  The only answer was the squeaking door behind her as it swayed in a small night breeze.

  She slammed the door shut with an impatient foot and looked around for something, for anything, she could use to pry the heavy armor off him.

  The entry light was dim. All she could see was the mess of broken eggs and spilled milk and other spilled groceries.

  She could do nothing by herself. She had to get to a phone and call 911.

  But the instant she shot to her feet, she heard him groan. She dropped back to her knees and laid her hand gently on his forehead.

  “Damian?”

  He blinked as though trying to bring her into focus.

  “Kay,” he finally said.

  “Damian, are you all right?”

  “Yeah, I think so. What the hell happened?”

  “The armor fell on you.”

  “You’re kidding. It was chained to the wall.”

  “Not anymore. You’re pinned beneath it. Don’t move. I’m going to go call for help.”

  But as she attempted to get up again, his large hand shot out to halt her. “It’s all right, Kay. It’s not that heavy.”

  She sat back on her heels. “Not that heavy?” she repeated incredulously.

  Then she watched as he sat up and lifted the heavy iron armor off him as though it were only paper. He rose to his feet in one powerful, fluid movement and reached down to help her up.

  Her nerves were raw from her recent fright. She felt shaky. She braced herself by grasping his forearms. “Dear heavens,” she heard somebody say, with a voice that sounded suspiciously like hers. “You’re solid muscle.”

  He chuckled as he brought her to her feet. That enchanting psychologist’s smile drew back his lips. “And all along, I imagined the way to your heart was through an interesting legal case. If I had known it was brute strength that would get me there, I would have rigged that armor to fall on me sooner.”


  He was entirely too charming and exciting and close, and that warm sensation wasn’t just streaking down Kay’s thighs anymore. It was rushing through her back and her neck and her belly and her breasts.

  In the aftermath of the last few minutes of her roller-coaster emotions, she knew she was on the verge of forfeiting all reason and doing something totally illogical. Quickly, she jerked back, before the driving desires of her body could take control.

  But she stepped in some spilled egg white, lost her footing and he caught her against him to keep her from falling. Her body rejoiced to be so close to his again, to feel those steel hands wrapped so solidly around her shoulders. That delicious, warm sensation rushed inside her feminine core, shimmering like a scorching liquid heat.

  And then it was all just too late. Her eyes were lost in the green heat of his. Her arms were circling his iron-strong waist. Her lips were saying his name.

  And he was saying hers with a groan that sounded like a curse as his mouth claimed hers.

  His kiss was deep and hot and urgent. She melted into it, feeling the fire of his need fanning the flames of her own mounting desire. His strong heart challenged hers to a newer, faster pace. His large hands burned her flesh as he tore off her blouse and bra and threw them to the floor. He lifted her totally off her feet and wrapped her legs around his waist. Then he leaned her back as his wet, rough tongue sought and found the pink points of her nipples.

  Kay moaned as she arched her back and shook as the sharp thrills from those wet kisses shot through her. She had never allowed herself to imagine what it would be like to make love to this man. She hadn’t dared. She realized now that it was just as well. She could never have imagined this.

  For he was no man tonight. He was a beast, with his growls and groans that ripped through her body as his hands ripped off the rest of her clothing. Even his smell was different, an aroma of smoky musk permeating its clean male spice.

  An incredibly exciting, sexy smell that spilled hot juices throughout her body.

  His throaty growls vibrated in her bones, their timbre matched to the most primitive beat of her blood, bringing it to a boiling point, blocking out all reason and logic.

  If they hadn’t, she might have come to her senses and remembered all the reasons that this must not happen. But his body—not his words—was speaking to her now in the language of life’s most driving physical need and blocking out all her common sense.

  His mouth blazed hot kisses over her naked flesh. She closed her eyes and gave herself up totally to the bolts of heat rocketing through her as his fingers laid claim to her moist, eager flesh. The world whirled around a center of wanton pleasure—her pleasure—and she reveled in it as she would never have imagined she could, opening herself more and more to his incendiary touch.

  She felt him thrusting against her. She knew he wanted to be inside her and she wanted him there. She opened farther and accepted him.

  A shock wave whipped through her as she felt the full size of him, followed by a jolt of pleasure so intense that it was near pain. She cried out as she thrust against him in a violent and glorious release.

  Up until that second, that precise second, she hadn’t thought that he was exerting any control at all. But it was she who hadn’t been exerting any control.

  Because at the precise second of her release, she could feel his control shatter. He grabbed her hips and plunged eagerly, madly inside her, bestial growls ripping through his throat. He was raw hunger now, tearing want, fierce in his final taking of her body.

  He was claiming her as she had never been claimed, totally, unequivocally. His savage, unleashed need thrilled her to her very bone. This was passion as she had never known passion. This was desire so basic, so elemental, so mindless, so all-encompassing that it left no room for anything else.

  And she wanted nothing else.

  She rocked her hips to match each one of his deep, desperate thrusts. Once again she found herself caught up in the undeniable madness of those ancient mating beats embedded in a million years of memories vibrating through her cells. She joined their rhythmic percussion, in perfect tune with their timing. The pleasure began to gather again within her, spiral up, collect in the wet, hot folds of her femininity that danced so frantically against him.

  She cried out again as it caught her in wave after wave of exquisite pleasure. And this time her cry was his name.

  And then, with a tortured roar that sounded as though it was torn from the very core of his being, he erupted inside her with a final pounding plunge.

  * * *

  SHE WAS SPRAWLED over him, naked, the fingers of one hand thrumming a happy little beat against his scalp, as the top of her head nuzzled against his throat and she hummed “Climb Every Mountain” with no tune-carrying aptitude whatsoever.

  Damian smiled in pure pleasure. For a very proper, serious and logical lawyer, Kay Kellogg continued to drum wonderful, delightful surprises into his life. Not the least of which was her total lack of inhibition both during their lovemaking and now in this peaceful aftermath that pleasured him in a way that rivaled even their physical joining.

  Her humming beat drifted through his ears and his body. He knew he’d never be able to describe the sweetness of that sound or the warmth it brought to his heart.

  “Isn’t that stone floor cold on your back?” she asked solicitously.

  “Maybe a little,” he admitted as he let his fingers walk the vertebrae down her small, exquisite spine.

  Her head rose. Blueberry eyes gently touched his face. “Do you want me to get up?”

  Her skin was as pale as moonlight, her lips cherry ripe from the recent onslaught of his kisses. He could feel every soft, warm, feminine ounce of her.

  “Never,” he replied.

  She rested her head again beneath his chin with a small satisfied sigh. “Well, what can I say except that that was certainly precedent-setting, Dr. Steele.”

  He chuckled. “Precedent-setting, Ms. Kellogg? I’ve heard a lot of reactions in my time, but that phraseology is definitely a first.”

  “I see you haven’t made love with a lawyer before.”

  He chuckled once more as his hands drifted through the silk of her hair down to the satin of her bare bottom. “If I had known what I was missing, you can be sure I would have hired you a lot sooner.”

  She stiffened. “Damn. I wish you hadn’t said that.”

  Her reaction instantly alarmed him. “Kay, I was only kidding.”

  She propped her elbow on his chest and rested her chin in the palm of her hand as she looked at him. “I know. But it just reminded me of the unprofessionalism of what I’ve just done.”

  He smiled. “You mean you’ve never made love on a stone floor in a beast’s dungeon before?”

  “I’ve gone against my word to you. And against the ethics of my profession.”

  His fingers brushed a strand of hair from her cheek. He wished he could brush the melancholy from her eyes. “This is my fault. I forced this. I’m sorry.”

  “No, Damian, this isn’t Priscilla Payton you’re talking to. You didn’t force anything. I take full blame for my actions.”

  “Why take any blame at all? I’m not sorry we made love, Kay. Matter of fact, I’m planning on our doing it again very soon and as often as possible from now on.”

  He ran his hand to the back of her thighs and in a move so quick she couldn’t see it coming, he rolled forward and sprang to his feet, cradling her in his arms.

  His heart rejoiced at the small smile that returned to her lips. He planted a warm kiss there. “Only next time, I plan to have a nice, soft bed beneath us, so I can spend some time on top, too.”

  “Lusty beast,” she commented with no complaint as she wrapped her arms securely around his neck. She drew back a finger and licked it. “Hmm. Chocolate icing from a smashed cupcake, I think. You also probably have dried egg yolk and milk all over your back. Aren’t you going to take time to clean up the spilled groceries?�
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  He kissed her hair as he proceeded down the hall to the bedroom. “First things first.”

  She sighed. “We really should talk. That’s what I came over here for, after all.”

  “I don’t care why you came. I’ve wanted you here naked in my arms like this since the moment I met you. I don’t want to talk. I want to make love to you until neither of us can talk.”

  He kicked open the bedroom door, switched on the dim ornate chandelier, and felt her body stiffen at the sight of the gigantic four-poster bed topped with enormous brass lion heads and covered with a black velvet comforter over black satin sheets.

  “Typical lusty beast’s lair, I see,” she commented dryly.

  He laid her on the top of the bed and stood over her, suddenly caught by the magic of seeing her long, honey-gold hair falling free and loose over her milk-white shoulders clear down to her waist. She was more lovely than his imagination could ever have envisioned. Much more.

  He dropped to his knees beside the bed and bent to gently kiss those beautiful bare shoulders. This time he was going to take his time. The beast had been sated. Now he would show her how the civilized psychologist could and should please his lady.

  She sighed and moved away, quickly wrapping the comforter around her. “No, Damian. Please. Heaven knows I want to make love to you until neither of us can move, but we must talk business, first. We’re in serious trouble.”

  He exhaled in regret as he dropped onto the bed beside her and laid a leg in claim over hers.

  He propped his head up with his hand and tried to remind himself that he was a sane psychologist. “All right, Ms. Lawyer. We’ll talk business. See how well behaved the beast can be?”

  “Can he? Then what happened with Vince Boson?”

  Damian could hear the logical lady lawyer assuming control over the wild and warm lover of only moments before.

  “I suppose I should have told you about Vince Boson,” he admitted. “But I really didn’t think it would become an issue.”

  “Wouldn’t become an issue? Like the fact that Lee was a bit unusual wouldn’t become an issue? Damian, I distinctly remember asking you if you’d ever been involved with the police, arrested or sued. You told me you hadn’t.”