by Lori Foster
Seth stalked back to her, dragged her into his arms and pressed her full and tight against his body. In two days, he’d learned how to caress her shoulders so that she cooed. How to trail his hand down her spine before cupping her backside until she shivered with need. He knew how to flick his tongue deep into her mouth, to elicit the sweetest sounds of sheer surrender.
Only Lacey didn’t surrender. She pushed against him, breathless, her eyes glossy, but adamant. “Not here, Seth.”
He grinned, knowing from the kiss that this was not the end. “Fair enough. See you around, Lacey.” He winked. “And sooner than you think.”
LACEY PULLED UP IN FRONT of her apartment building. She pressed her forehead against the steering wheel, resisting the urge to bang some sense into her muddled brain. How she’d managed to conduct a successful field training course for college-age interns this week, she had no clue. She’d operated on automatic, with none of the joy and sense of accomplishment she usually felt when a training program concluded.
Three weeks had passed since she’d left Seth in Atlanta. And for those three torturous weeks she’d experienced all the distractions and emotional upheavals she’d insisted a relationship would bring into her life. Yet here she was with no relationship and all the complications. Despite the turmoil, she’d managed to do her job admirably. And if anyone she worked with had the slightest clue that she was operating with only half a brain, they never let on.
Only it really wasn’t her brain that was all confused—it was her heart. The heart that knew without a shadow of a doubt that in two days, she’d fallen helplessly in love with Seth Kingston, and then she’d let him go.
She’d expended all of her willpower resisting the urge to use her contacts to discover Seth’s phone number and address. Yet try as she might to put him out of her mind, her heart clung to him like fibers to wool. None of her efforts, no matter how violent or persistent, were going to brush Seth out of her soul. In two days, he’d set up shop in her psyche and she doubted he’d ever let go.
She grabbed her purse and briefcase, scanned the parking lot and exited the car, her senses on alert as always. She waved to a neighbor and her child playing on the swing set in the small playground surrounded by a chain-link fence. She jogged up the open stairs to her third-floor apartment, thankful that the sun was still up, though inching toward the horizon.
She knew the minute she touched her doorknob with her key that something was wrong inside. She dropped her briefcase noiselessly to the ground and extracted her gun from her purse. As quietly as she could, hoping she was overreacting due to her overloaded nerves, she turned the key. Before she had the door open two inches, she heard Seth’s voice calling from her kitchen.
“I’m not armed, except with a rather sharp kitchen knife. I can put it down if you order me to.”
An expectant thrill shot through her body at the same time she relaxed. She dragged her things inside, pocketed the gun and strode into her apartment, where Seth had not only set her never-before-used dining room table with china and crystal she knew she didn’t own, but he stood at the counter of her small galley kitchen, chopping carrots and whipping up what she was certain would be a gourmet meal.
“Let me get this straight,” she said, hands on her hips to still the quaking of her fingers. Standing on the other side of her pass-through, she wondered if Seth had really come to Virginia or she was having a very realistic dream. “You dance, you bring amazing presents, you are incredible in bed…and you cook?”
“I told you I was one hell of a catch,” he said before tossing a disk of carrot into his mouth.
“How’d you get in my apartment?”
“Tricks of the trade,” he assured her.
“Why are you here?”
“Because you missed me.”
“And you know this…how?”
He put the knife down and joined her in the dining room. He didn’t sweep her into his arms like he had during their last encounter in Atlanta, but his presence shocked her system all the same. His scent, leathery and warm, teased her nostrils. His hair, so dark and rakishly long, curled just behind his ear, as if beckoning for her touch. And his eyes. God, those eyes. Fathomless green and wicked with that impudent gleam she’d missed so dearly.
“I know because I missed you. I considered the possibility that I was just a sap fixated on a woman who truly wasn’t interested, but the logic didn’t hold up. Who wouldn’t want me?”
“Not me,” she said, tired of denial. How could she lie now, with him so close? She had to face the truth—for both of them. “I’m the sap, Seth. I’m the fool for thinking I could walk away from my other half without suffering for it.”
Her voice cracked and with all the chivalry Seth possessed, he gathered her into his arms. His warmth surrounded her like a second skin and for the first time in her life, Lacey knew she was home.
“I don’t want you to suffer, Lacey. That’s not what love is about.”
“Love?” She sniffled, surprised by the moisture on her face.
“Yes. Love. I love you, Lacey Baptiste. Maybe it doesn’t make sense that I could fall so hard so fast, but we both know that stranger things have happened in this crazy world.”
They kissed for a long time, and somewhere during a pause for breath, Lacey admitted to Seth that she loved him, too. She wasn’t exactly sure what her confession meant, but speaking the words lifted her soul to the brink of nirvana. God, this felt so right. She had to make this work. She had to.
A sizzle and pop from the kitchen sent Seth dashing from a pan smoking on a burner. Lacey giggled, suddenly back in her own apartment and not in some fairy tale world. Seth salvaged the crispy sautéed mushrooms while Lacey poured them both generous servings of wine and set them on the table.
“Now what?” she asked, remaining out of the kitchen so she wouldn’t contribute to any damage.
“I finish making dinner.”
“And then?”
“We eat,” he said, assurance ringing in his voice.
“And then?”
“We make love. What are you getting at, Lacey?”
She hated to ask, hated to think he might disappear as unexpectedly as he’d shown up tonight. “How long are you staying?”
“As long as you want me to. I applied for a license to work in Virginia.”
“But your life, your family are in Georgia.”
Seth poured the mushrooms into a sauce bubbling on a second burner, then leaned on the counter, snagging her hands through the pass-through. “I’m a flexible guy, Lacey. I didn’t used to be, but my forced retirement gave me a chance to change my ways a bit. Virginia and Georgia aren’t that far apart. I can keep in touch with my old life without sacrificing my new one.”
Lacey swallowed, her throat burning with unshed tears. He was offering so much—but at what price?
“I don’t want to retire, Seth. I love my job. I’m good at it.”
“I know you are, from personal experience,” he added with a grin. “Look Lacey, I’m not saying it will be easy to work things out so we can stay together. And you might have to make some of those sacrifices and compromises you were so afraid of. But what I’m hoping is that you’ll think I’m worth it. Because I know you are.”
Lacey launched herself onto the counter, locked her arms around his neck and pulled him close. She could lose herself in this man so easily…but she knew she didn’t have to in order to love him and receive his love in return. They could work this out. They were both smart, stubborn and inventive. If anyone could find a way to bend the world to their will, they were the couple for the job.
“I love you, Seth. I’m going to have to rethink a lot of things, but I know I can’t live without you. Not and be happy. How you made me fall in love with you in two short days is a mystery I know I’ll never solve.”
“I know how I did it,” he said, ever-confident.
Lacey tangled her fingers in his hair. “Care to share?”
“Nope
. Don’t want you figuring out a way to counteract the effect. Sorry, but my lips are sealed.”
Lacey grinned, then kissed Seth with all her soul. He could keep his secret, as long as she got to keep him in return.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-7153-5
LIP SERVICE
Copyright © 2004 by Harlequin Books S.A.
The publisher acknowledges the copyright holders of the individual works as follows:
TANTALIZING
Copyright © 1999 by Lori Foster
MY LIPS ARE SEALED
Copyright © 2004 by Julie Leto Klapka
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and TM are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.
Visit us at www.eHarlequin.com