Winter Kisses

by A. C. Arthur

  He’d brought her to release too many times to count, until she felt the way he was stroking inside her now was the grandest of all finales.

  Sex had never been this way for her. In the beginning it was exciting, then it was just there, a chore or deed that had to be done, but nothing to this magnitude. She felt something when she was with Alex, something that she’d never experienced before. She couldn’t put a name to it, didn’t dare to, but recognized its importance just the same.

  He’d shifted them so that they were now on their sides, her legs still wrapped tightly around him, one of his hands in her hair, the other splayed securely at her back. He rocked back and forth inside her, keeping their connection and building a slight friction that made her want to scream. It was slow, this lovemaking session, not rushed or fevered like their previous ones. This time was different, Monica knew without a doubt. It was lovemaking this time and not sex.

  That thought had her eyes opening.

  Alex’s were open, too, watching her. His gaze seemed to worship her, to pull her in as if she were the only thing in this room. It was gentle and yet intense. Impulsively she used a finger to trace the outline of his lips, the line of his jaw, his eyebrows, down his nose. She wanted to familiarize herself with every part of him, to dedicate this exact moment to memory in case it never happened again.

  “You’re beautiful,” she whispered.

  “So are you” was his reply.

  “You see me differently than anyone ever has.”

  “I see the real you.”

  His words sounded sweet. They washed over her, coating the intense pleasure he was already giving her. Her eyes fluttered closed as she clung to them, to him.

  When he lifted one of her legs, holding it high, and plunged deeper, harder into her, Monica gasped.

  “You are my queen,” he whispered as he thrust. “All mine, Queen. All mine.”

  “Yes,” she managed to chant over and over again. “All yours.”

  It wasn’t a defeat, she thought as his heated thrusts grew faster, her own pleasure rising higher and higher.

  She wasn’t giving in, wasn’t sacrificing herself. She was accepting, wanting, believing.

  And as they reached their release together, Monica realized she was also running. Even as he let her leg slide against his thigh and dropped a parade of kisses along her shoulder, up her neck, on her lips. She was taking all that Alex Bennett had to give and she was running with it, probably away from it. Because she didn’t know how to do anything else.

  Chapter 16

  “I don’t want her hurt.” Yates sighed with exasperation. “I thought I’d made that perfectly clear.”

  “You said you didn’t like that she was in the mountains with another man and you wanted me to bring her back. That’s what I tried to do.”

  “By almost running her off the road, then breaking into her hotel room? That doesn’t sound like what I told you to do.” The other man started to speak but Yates waved his words away and interrupted. “She’s returning tonight. She’ll probably get my package tomorrow, then she’ll call me.” He looked out the window as he spoke. He was still in New York, still in this crowded and dirty city when he really wanted to be home going about his business. But Monica had broken the rules; she’d done what he’d specifically told her not to do. She should know better. She should know that eventually she’d have to pay for her disobedience.

  “I’m booked on the same flight she is,” he said as if that made up for the debacle he’d already caused.

  Glaring at the phone with growing impatience, Yates sighed again. “No. Just get back here and tail her to her place. If he stays with her, you call me immediately.”

  “Gotcha. I could just take care of him for you. For a small fee, of course.”

  “No. Do what I’ve already paid you for and that’s it,” Yates said adamantly. Good help was so very hard to find, or, in this case, buy.

  Telling Alex she didn’t need him to ride all the way to her apartment with her crossed Monica’s mind as they waited at the curb after grabbing their bags at the airport. But once she slid into the back and looked out at the familiar scenery a slight unrest settled over her and she began silently thanking him for being there. Although she couldn’t quite put her finger on what was bothering her Monica knew that something wasn’t right.

  Alex told the cabdriver to wait as he helped her out of the car and retrieved her bags from the trunk.

  “Lead the way,” he said with his now-familiar smile.

  She went through the glass doors, speaking to Miguel, the doorman, then heading straight to the elevators. Her mail could wait until morning, she decided as suddenly her body felt beyond tired. Everything seemed to be lagging. Try as she might, her steps even seemed slower than normal as they stepped off the elevator on the eighth floor and moved toward the end of the hall.

  She lifted a hand to put her key into the lock then stopped. Knowing his gaze would be on her, she looked at Alex.

  “You okay, Queen?” he asked.

  She blinked then took a deep breath. Why she was acting so strange, Monica had no idea. But with a shake of her head she unlocked the door and stepped inside.

  “Thank you,” she said, motioning for him to put her bags down just inside the doorway.

  Alex did just that, then stepped inside and pushed the door closed behind him.

  “You look a little off. Are you sure you’re going to be all right staying here alone? I can stay if you want.”

  She shook her head quickly before her mind changed and she said something that would continue the unthinkable between them. He was rubbing his hands up and down her arms as he spoke. Telling him to go became one of the hardest things she’d ever had to do.

  But she did it.

  “No. I’m fine. You can leave. I know you have a lot to do to get ready for your big meetings next week.”

  On the plane they’d talked about business, which was a first for them since they’d been together. But it was senseless to keep avoiding a subject that both of them shared a huge interest in. Alex told her about their newest venture in the cell-phone arena and Monica had to admit she was excited for them. She would be one of the first to buy the new phone when it hit the market next week. Likewise, she’d told him about their upcoming exhibits and how they were looking at opening galleries in Miami and Atlanta later this year. It felt really good to be able to talk to someone about her work and have them look as interested in her business as she was in theirs. Just another reason why she should make a clean break from him—and another reason why she hesitated doing so.

  “You’re more important to me than work, Queen. If you’re not comfortable I want to be here for you.”

  In an attempt to keep things light she lifted the cell phone she’d stuffed into her pocket. “You’re only a phone call away,” she said with a smile.

  “At home I’m about an hour and ten minutes away. If I stay here—”

  She put a hand on his chest. With the other she put a finger to his lips. “Shhh. I’m fine. You can go and everything will go back to normal. You’ll see.”

  Alex kissed her fingertips and Monica pulled her hand away from his lips, chastising herself for doing it in the first place.

  “By everything you’re trying to tell me, we’ll go back to normal, as well.”

  She inhaled deeply and let it out with a flurry of words. “I think it’s for the best. We’re from two different worlds. We don’t even live in the same city, and you know the probability of long-distance relationships working.”

  “You’re not normally an excuse maker, which tells me the thought of us being together still makes you uncomfortable.”

  “It makes me uncertain,” she blurted out, then bit her bottom lip to keep anything else revealing from escaping. “Look, Alex,” she said finally. “You don’t understand. My life is hectic, to say the very least. Yours is busy, as well. Now is just not a good time.”

  “You can stop at any time,
Queen. None of your arguments are convincing me.”

  Monica sighed and walked away from him. “I’m just not ready for this,” she admitted with her back to him. “I haven’t thought about being in a relationship in a long time and in three days I’ve been intimately involved with you and thinking thoughts that I shouldn’t be thinking. It’s just not how I work.”

  “Because you didn’t plan it? Because it wasn’t on your agenda? You of all people should know that you can’t plan every aspect of your life. And that’s what makes it worth living. The unexpected, the surprises that bring you more joy than you could ever contemplate having.”

  Monica remained quiet, looking out the window at the darkening night sky. “The meter’s still ticking in your cab.”

  When his hands touched her shoulders she jumped because she hadn’t heard him come up behind her. She thought he was still standing in the doorway.

  “Until you tell me no and mean it with your heart I’m going to keep trying.” Turning her to face him, he kissed her forehead lightly, touched his lips to her eyelids, the tip of her nose, then finally her lips. “If you can’t sleep tonight remember you said I’m just a phone call away.”

  A soft smile touched her lips as she nodded her agreement.

  “Good night, Queen.”

  “Good night, Alex.”

  Alone in her apartment, Monica unpacked her bags and was about to head into her bathroom for a shower when she noticed a small box on the nightstand by her bed.

  She hadn’t had a chance to shop in Aspen and all the Christmas gifts she’d given or received had been opened already. So the box wrapped in gold paper with a huge red bow on top was a new arrival.

  “Open the damn box, Monica, and stop being childish.” Chastising herself was something Monica was used to doing. Tonight it seemed unnecessary as a part of her thought she had every right to be a little jittery. Ignoring that part, she reached for the box and forced herself to rip it open quickly.

  With the wrappings tossed on her bed Monica tore into the box then stopped cold as she saw the contents.

  Staring up at her were glass blue eyes that looked all too realistic. The eyes were a bright contrast to the pure white of the fur. When she had swallowed once, then twice, she finally had the courage to pull it out.

  It was a stuffed rabbit.

  Similar to one she’d received before. A long time ago.

  There was only one person who would give her this again. The only person who’d ever called her Bunny.

  “Yates.” His name was a whisper on her lips and a pounding to her heart.

  Chapter 17

  “So give us all the gory details,” Renny said, propping his feet up on the edge of the glass-and-marble coffee table in Alex’s living room.

  Alex wasn’t surprised that both his brothers and his brother-in-law were in his apartment waiting for him. He’d told them all the time his flight was coming in but only Sam knew about the two incidents that had occurred in Aspen. Both of his brothers had keys to his place, just as he had keys to theirs. After the incident where the entire Bennett family was stalked and attempts on Renny’s and his wife’s life were made a couple years back, they all exchanged keys for safety reasons.

  “A gentleman never kisses and tells,” Alex said, dropping his bags near the bar and reaching for a glass to fix himself something to drink.

  Rico laughed. “That’s why we’re asking you.”

  Alex returned his brother’s grin. They knew him very well, both his brothers—Renny, the tallest of the three Bennett men with his close-cut curly hair and seductive eyes, and Rico with his slanted eyes, thick hair and football-player build.

  “It’s good to see you made it through the stay in Aspen without a scratch,” Sam, the most sober of the group, said with a small smile.

  “Who says he doesn’t have scratches? They may be carefully hidden,” Renny joked.

  Meanwhile, amid all the banter, Alex fixed himself a rum and coke and took his first swallow. When the cool liquid coated his throat and he didn’t feel as if he was about to jump in a cab and return to Monica’s house, he finally spoke. “We had an enjoyable time despite your sorry attempts at matchmaking.”

  “So there was no match made?” Renny asked.

  “You forget I’d already met Monica, long before your little setup scheme. Which, by the way, I want to know, who came up with the idea in the first place?”

  Each male stared at each other then back at Alex with fake clueless looks.

  “Right,” Alex said with a nod. “It must have been the womenfolk, Bree and Gabriella, right?”

  Rico chuckled. “Partially. His wife was in on it, too.” He pointed at Sam, who simply shrugged.

  “The other two Lakefield sisters thought it was an excellent idea,” Sam said.

  “I’ll just bet they did,” Alex mumbled, taking another sip from his glass. “For the record, neither Monica nor I thought it was a good idea. We’re adults. If we wanted to hook up we would have.”

  “Yeah, in about six or seven months at the rate you two were going,” Rico interjected. “All we did was speed up the inevitable.”

  “So is she really as bad as she seems?” Renny asked, only to receive wan looks from both Alex and Sam.

  “What?” he asked, shrugging his shoulders. “That woman can be a real bitch.”

  Sam grimaced. “She’s my sister-in-law, man. Show some respect.”

  “And she’s not a bitch. So I’ll ask you to show me some respect, as well.”

  All eyes fell on Alex after he said that.

  “Thanks to you guys I had the opportunity to get to know her a little better and she’s not as bad as she makes people believe she is.”

  “I don’t understand. Why go through the trouble of making people not like you?” This was Rico, who had always asked a lot of questions since his childhood years.

  “That’s what I want to pick Sam’s brain about,” Alex said as he walked around the bar to sit on one of the leather chairs in his living room.

  “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about what you said in the email. So a car tried to run you off the road then somebody broke in to Monica’s room at the hotel. I don’t think the incidents are coincidences.”

  Alex nodded. “I don’t, either. And when she finally calmed down enough to talk about it, Monica agreed with me. She thinks it could be either of us being targeted for our job or social connections.”

  Sam chuckled. “That sounds just like something Monica would say.”

  “Wait a minute, somebody want to clue us in to what’s going on? Somebody tried to run you off the road, Alex? When?” Renny asked, concern lacing his voice.

  “When we were driving from the cabin into the small town where the hotel was located. Then, after we checked into the hotel, someone broke the balcony doors to Monica’s room.”

  “You’re kidding,” Rico exclaimed. “Did you call the cops? File a report?”

  “Yeah, at the hotel the cops came, asked a couple of questions then went down to the New Year’s party. They weren’t overly concerned, just thought it was some partygoer already drunk and celebrating.”

  “Guess they didn’t catch him, then?” Sam asked.

  “No. He disappeared into the cloud of folks getting ready for the party.”

  “Convenient,” Renny replied. “You think somebody’s after her?”

  That was exactly what Alex didn’t want to think. “I don’t know.”

  “It sounds like it to me,” Sam confirmed. “But who would have known she was there?”

  “Maybe her assistant told someone,” Alex offered but Sam was already shaking his head.

  “Negative. She called Karena the other night asking where Monica was and when she would be back. Apparently Monica didn’t have time to even tell her assistant where she was going.”

  “So what did her assistant want Karena to do?” Rico asked.

  “She wanted Karena to call this guy because he’d been calling persistently f
or Monica and sent her some kind of package.”

  “That sounds like your guy right there,” Renny said. “He’s calling her and sending her gifts. An old boyfriend maybe?”

  Alex sighed. “I asked her that and she told me no. Her old boyfriend wouldn’t want her back.”

  “She’s probably right about that,” Rico quipped.

  “Hey,” Alex warned. “That’s enough.”

  Rico looked at Sam, who only shook his head.

  “I’ll get the name and number from Karena tonight and look into it first thing tomorrow. Where’s Monica now?”

  “I dropped her off at her apartment,” Alex replied.

  Rico sat up in his chair. “Alone? You just left her there?”

  Alex frowned. “Make up your mind—either you like her or you don’t.”

  “I don’t like you leaving a woman who might be a target alone,” Rico argued.

  “Then that makes two of us. I didn’t want to leave her, either. But she insists she’s all right.”

  “Her building’s pretty secure,” Sam added. “But just in case I’ll call and see if I can get someone to keep an eye on her until she gets to work tomorrow.”

  “I’d appreciate that,” Alex said. He’d appreciate that a lot. He’d also appreciate finding out who this man was who was so adamant about getting in touch with Monica. It didn’t matter how much she protested, his protective instincts where she was concerned had already kicked into overdrive.

  “Hello?” Karena answered her house phone at a little before midnight. Sam was still out, no doubt having a rollicking good time welcoming Alex back home. She’d thought about going to see Monica but figured she’d see her at work tomorrow at their meeting.

  “Karena.” Monica’s voice sounded weak, distressed. Definitely not the normal Monica.

  “What’s the matter?” Karena asked, instantly thinking of their parents or Deena.

  “I ne— Can you come—” She sighed. “Something’s happened.”