by Leslie Kelly
But was he also the kinky sexual predator and heartbreaking love-’em-and-leave-’em dog Grace had described?
Hmm…
“Sabrina?”
“I’m coming,” she called, smiling pleasantly at Mr. Fitzweather—don’t look down, don’t look down, don’t look down—before walking away.
The backyard was enclosed by a high, wooden fence, which afforded Mr. Fitzweather privacy for his naked frolicking, at least from everyone except his paying customers. Max, however, was tall enough to peer over the top of it. When he saw her, he smiled, but quickly looked side to side—as if making sure she was unaccompanied.
“The coast is clear,” she said, jerking her head toward the spa. “He’s busy working on the hedges.”
“Whew,” Max said as he opened the gate for her, closing it as soon as she’d joined him on the gravel driveway just outside the fence. “I couldn’t believe it when the maid said you were out back. You’ve got guts. Believe me, I have had enough of seeing people naked who I don’t want to see naked to last my whole life.”
His vehemence was almost funny. And if Sabrina hadn’t been feeling like she had to go wash her eyes out with soap, she would have laughed at it. “What are you doing here?”
“Came to invite you to go flying with me.”
Her heart dropping somewhere in the vicinity of her heels, she opened her mouth to reply. Then she saw a sparkle in his eyes that said he’d been teasing her.
Before Max, no man had teased her for a very long time. She wasn’t sure whether she liked the fluttering sensation it brought.
Bull. She liked it. A lot.
“What do you really want to invite me to do with you?”
A boyish grin tugged at his lips, and Sabrina almost kicked herself for handing him that line. But he played the gentleman and didn’t lob it back with a sexy response to her unintentional innuendo.
She told herself she was not disappointed.
“I actually came by to ask if you want to tour the town today. We seem to keep getting interrupted by sheikhs, fighting grannies and…unexpected kisses, whenever I’m about to offer to show you around Trouble.”
The way his voice lingered over the words unexpected kisses, caressing them almost, made Sabrina shift a little. She was dressed in perfectly adequate clothes, with a really stylish pair of knockoff gaucho pants that looked just like some she’d seen in a fashion magazine, and a sleeveless blouse that was so simple it looked like it had to be expensive.
Why, then, did the silky fabric of the blouse feel so scratchy against her sensitive nipples? And why, in heaven’s name, did the loose pants suddenly feel so tight in the most intimate of places?
It wasn’t hard to figure out. She was turned on—het up, as her mechanic uncle would say. Crude description, but true. She was reacting as strongly now, to Max’s simple words, as she had to his kiss yesterday. Stronger, really, because she’d had twenty-four hours to remember that kiss and build up a whole lot of anticipation for another one.
Not to mention whatever came after it.
That, she suspected, was why today she’d put on this sinfully sensuous top with nothing underneath. Sabrina didn’t particularly need one, but she always wore a bra. Always. But this morning, after a long night of dreams that had left her frustrated and restless, she’d wanted something silky and seductive touching her with intimacy. Even if it was nothing more than her own damn blouse.
“What do you say? Will you spend the day with me?” he asked.
He stepped closer. Sabrina stepped back, until she hit the closed gate and was left with nowhere else to go.
“You don’t have any other plans, do you?”
She managed one slow shake of her head.
“Is that no, you don’t have any other plans?” he asked, lifting his hand to her face and rubbing the side of his thumb across her jaw.
Oh, Lord, she loved the way he touched her face.
“Or, no, you won’t spend the day with me?”
She couldn’t answer. His touch had effectively sucked the vibration right out of her vocal cords and they were incapable of making any noise. She could only stand there and exist.
“I promise I won’t try to tempt you into—” he leaned even closer, letting his fingertips drift to the hair at the nape of her neck and sift through it “—flying.”
Flying. Oh, she wanted to fly. Wanted to soar with him.
Playboy or not, she wanted Max Taylor. Wanted him badly. Much more than she had when he’d been merely a wicked character in an erotic book. Now that she’d tasted his mouth and felt his hands on her skin, she could no longer deny the truth…even to herself.
She’d come here to nail him—and she didn’t mean legally.
This whole trip to Trouble—despite the explanations she’d made to Nancy, and to herself—had always, deep down, been about the heated fantasies she’d had about Max. Fantasies she’d had since the first time she’d read his name on Grace’s manuscript and pictured being the one he’d tied up and sensually tormented for hours.
She’d told herself she could expose him, stop the lawsuit and save the book—all while being careful to keep her heart guarded and her panties on. But after that kiss yesterday, she wasn’t so sure she could. Or that she wanted to. At least, wanted to keep the panties on part, not the heart part. Because she’d never let herself actually fall in love with a guy like Max.
But sleeping with him, now that sounded pretty much okay.
Are you insane? a little voice in her head asked.
Maybe. Probably. Given her track record, the last thing she should even be considering was a fling with a playboy. But, oh, it had been a long time since she’d had a man’s rough hands touching her. And his were so very, very tempting. Her body had tingled all day yesterday whenever she’d thought of the warm scrape of his fingers across her spine and the strength of his hand cupping her bottom.
“What do you say?” he asked. He stepped close, so that the front of his body brushed against hers. Suggestively…not threateningly. Just a gentle slide, a casual stroke.
A silent invitation to pleasure.
“If you don’t say you’ll go sightseeing,” he murmured, his warm breath touching her temple, “I might have to convince you to come fly with me.”
“I don’t think that’s a great idea.” Her voice sounded about as firm as a kindergartner’s saying no to a cookie. She cleared her throat and tried again. “I mean, after what happened yesterday…”
“When we kissed?”
She nodded.
“You didn’t like it?”
“Does the Pope like praying?” she murmured back before she could think better of it.
He laughed softly. His lips were now touching her skin, so his laughter turned into a series of tiny kisses pressed along the top of her cheekbone. She sighed, the gentle sound turning into a moan when she felt his hand touch her hip.
“I doubt the Pope likes praying more than I liked kissing you.” He toyed with her hip, his fingers drawing tiny lines on her waist, then her midriff. His touch remained light, almost teasing, which only built the hunger more.
Almost breathless with anticipation, Sabrina waited for his hand to move even higher so he could continue those maddeningly delicious caresses across the sensitive tips of her breasts. She’d been aching for just such a touch yesterday, when they’d practically made love on a public sidewalk.
Yesterday—think of yesterday. The thought raced through her brain as she tried to find some well of inner resolve against letting this happen again. Letting him happen again.
After their encounter, she’d been angry at herself—furious at how easily he’d gotten around her defenses and at how utterly wanton she’d become with a mere kiss. That was the real reason she’d told Max she’d never go flying with him—not that she didn’t trust him, she didn’t trust herself. He made her crazy and reckless and she’d already proved she had no willpower around the man. So she needed to keep both feet on the
ground. At least until she found out for sure whether he was the swinging playboy or the fabulous, funny, adorable and sexy guy she was falling for.
Falling for. Oh, you fool.
But, like yesterday, none of those protestations seemed to matter a damn when he was so close and so big and so perfect. When he whispered such sweet words and his tone was so playful, and his masculine smell so heady. Just as it didn’t seem to matter that they stood outside, only partially blocked from view by the house and the thick honeysuckle hedge running along the fence.
Because she wanted him. Was dying for him. This man made her forget everything else, even her promises to herself. Made her long to say yes to any wicked thing he suggested, to indulge—to take—whatever she wanted.
Just as he took whatever he wanted—like that kiss yesterday. And now…another one?
Lifting his hand to cup her face, Max tilted her head up until they shared a breath. “You know you taste like strawberries?” he asked.
And he tasted like heaven.
So she tasted him, slid her arms around his neck, pressed against his body and opened her mouth on his for a deep, wet, lazy kiss. It was as if they were picking up where they’d left off yesterday after only a brief pause.
Kissing Max was like stretching out in the sun, slowly soaking up physical delight. There was nothing frenzied, nothing demanding. Just a sweet, languorous mating of lips and tongues and breath.
Wanting to feel that strong chest, she lowered one hand and scraped the backs of her fingers across his shoulder. Max was so solid, so muscular, and she was dying to see him without his clothes, knowing he had the kind of body women fantasized about but usually never saw in real life.
Well, that wasn’t entirely accurate. Because seeing him naked wouldn’t be quite enough. No. What she really wanted was to feel him, stroke the man, smear him with massage oil and roll all over him.
Max reacted to their kiss in the most elemental way. Sabrina felt him, big and hard against her hip. Oh, so big and hard. And she could think of something else slick and wet—something other than massage oil—that she wanted to rub on him. On that part of him. She was drenched. Aroused enough not to protest if he yanked her clothes off and made sweet, wild love to her right out here in the sunlight, Trouble be damned.
“I have to have your hands on me, Max,” she groaned. Drawing him back into the shadowy corner where the fence met the house, she quickly realized they were completely hidden from view. This private spot was blocked from the street not only by the fence but by the trees and shrubs the landlord spent so much time taking care of.
Max apparently realized just how secluded they were, too. His eyes glittered in the shadows of the leaves and his playful smile had faded into one of pure sexual desire. Which somehow fit, in the dangerously public yet somehow private setting. Because the anticipation was enormous and the danger of exposure real. But she didn’t give a damn. And neither did he.
The air was thick and ripe with the scent of earth from the garden and the sweet perfume of honeysuckle vines cascading over their heads along the fence. Sabrina breathed in, wondering how far they could go. How much they could risk.
Bending to press a hot kiss against the side of her neck, Max tugged at the bottom of her blouse. She shifted and let him pull it free of her loose pants, wanting his touch more than she wanted the sun to keep on shining.
Hissing as her skin was bared to the coolness of the shadows—such a contrast to the hot, sunny day—she arched toward him. When his hands brushed against her flesh, she cried out, indulging in sensation as Max played a melody on her stomach with the tips of his fingers.
He continued to kiss her neck, her throat and her jaw. Though his warm mouth skimmed close to her own, he wouldn’t kiss her, which only built the tension more.
“Please, Max,” she whispered, reaching up to twine her fingers in his hair. Tugging his lips toward hers, she added, “I’ve got to taste you.”
He brushed his mouth across hers, not giving her the deep, carnal kiss she hungered for. “And I’ve got to feel you,” he replied, as if he wanted her focused purely on his touch.
And she wanted to be felt.
Sabrina cried out in pure satisfaction when his hands slid a path from her waist up her midriff to cup the bottoms of her breasts.
“You feel amazing,” Max muttered as he caressed her, tweaking her nipples with his thumbs. “Tell me you’re not wearing anything under this blouse because you wanted me to show up.” He kissed her jaw, the tender spot below her ear. “You wanted this.”
Closing her eyes and leaning her head to the side to give him access to her neck, she nodded. “Yes. I wanted this. Your hands.” He nipped at the tender spot where neck met shoulder. “Oh, please…your mouth.”
He gave her what she wanted, kissing and tasting his way down her throat, then dropping to his knees in front of her. Sabrina opened her eyes, wanting to see, to imprint every moment on her brain. She held her breath, enjoying the caress of her silky blouse—and his strong rough hands—as Max slid it up her body.
His every move was slow and deliberate. He was savoring it.
She wanted to rip the damn thing off. She was dying for it.
“Beautiful,” he murmured as he uncovered her. Once she was bared to him, he stared at her breasts, a slow smile of satisfaction making him appear almost predatory. Sabrina shivered, loving that hungry expression, thrilled that he’d seen her admittedly average curves and wanted her anyway.
“You are absolutely perfect,” he whispered as he toyed with one puckered nipple.
His touch was firm, not tentative—there was nothing tentative about this man. He stroked her with just enough pressure to make her gasp, causing a molten, lava-flow of pleasure to wash through her body. When Max leaned closer and covered her nipple with his mouth, that lava flow erupted with volcanic insistence between her legs.
She tangled her hands in his hair, dropping her head back against the wall as he sucked the sensitive tip of one breast while stroking and plucking the other. The intensity built, spiraled, and she wanted more…more pressure. More roughness. More insanity.
As if knowing that, he plumped her breast with his hand to suck even deeper, devouring her. She felt every pull of his mouth like a rocket shot to her wet, hungry core.
Sabrina began to shake, wondering if she’d be able to remain standing—knowing without a doubt that he could make her come by doing little more than moving his face lower and breathing on her hard.
“You ready to fly with me now?” he whispered against her skin as he moved over to pay deliberate attention to her other breast. “Because if you’re not, I’d be happy to try to…persuade you some more.”
Oh, yes. She was ready to beg and thrust and give and take right here and now. Anything, everything, as long as he just…didn’t…stop.
“I think you could talk me into just about anything right now,” she admitted, nearly sobbing out the words. “I’d probably strip naked and take you on a table in Tootie’s Tavern.”
But at that moment, with the image of how easily she could let herself go with him—how easily she had let herself go with him, twice now—she remembered a passage of Grace’s book. Where the woman had described a man—this man—seducing her in the bathroom of an expensive restaurant.
Cold reality flooded her as if someone had doused her with ice water. Her whole body stiffened, growing frigid where it had been warm and pliant.
Max appeared to sense her change in mood. Without a word, he stood, reaching for her to draw her into his arms, but Sabrina put a hand on his chest to stop him. Stepping to the side, almost to the point of risking exposure to anyone on the street, she stared at him. Physically unable to prevent the image of Max with Grace Wellington—or some other woman susceptible to his charm and his kiss—from invading her brain, she felt like crying.
“I think that’s enough,” she said, wishing her voice didn’t sound choppy. Weak. She managed to yank her blouse back on, c
overing herself and grabbing a moment to think.
“Sabrina?” He sounded confused, but instantly serious, as if he knew something important had just happened but wasn’t sure what.
Something important had just happened. For a moment, Sabrina had allowed herself to forget everything she knew about this man. Or thought she knew.
Max was doing what she’d hoped he’d do when she came to this crappy little town: trying to seduce her. Only, the objective was to make him try it…not to let herself fall for it. Yet she had come so close to falling.
Is that such a bad thing?
She honestly wasn’t sure. Before meeting him, she’d been certain she knew who he was. In the past few days—before he’d kissed her—she’d begun to revise her opinion.
But now, with proof positive of the man’s abilities as a seducer, she just didn’t know what to believe anymore.
The sexy sweetheart she was getting to know? Or the near-reprobate Grace described in her book?
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
The words rushed to her mouth, almost spilling out. Who are you really?
Before they could escape, however, the sound of a voice—a voice that she simply could not be hearing—interfered.
“Sabrina? Is that you?”
Her heart stopped beating. Her mind stopped working. Because it wasn’t possible—that could not be who she thought it was.
“Oh, my God,” she muttered when an absolutely unfathomable sight came into view.
She blinked a couple of times, but the apparition did not disappear. Despite everything she’d done to keep her location a secret, her very pregnant sister, Allie, had followed her to Trouble.
PETER PRESCOTT hated being back in Philadelphia.