She was so angry she was shaking. And blubbering.
Simon slid across the space separating them. She caught a glimpse of his face. He looked positively stricken. He folded her into his arms, pulling her against the wall of his chest, cradling her, rocking her back and forth. “Please don’t cry, Tawny. It’s going to be okay.”
Stern, austere, sarcastic Simon offered her solace. That this man who didn’t like her very well was reduced to having to comfort her went a long way in cooling her anger and stemming her tears. Crying when she was angry had proven a curse of embarrassment since childhood.
That was almost as humiliating as her being inadequate enough to send Elliott to seek male companionship. She ought to have some measure of pride and pull away, but somehow it felt less embarrassing to simply stay where she was, pressed against Simon’s chest. Plus it was a very nice chest.
“How amusing for me to offer you advice on your love life when mine was down the toilet and I didn’t even have enough sense to know it,” she said against his shirt. “How pathetic.”
“Tawny, never refer to yourself again as pathetic.” He cupped her face in his hands and tilted her head back until she looked at him. He gentled away her tears with his thumbs. Her skin tingled beneath his touch. His jeans-clad knee pressed against her bare leg. “There is nothing remotely pathetic about you. You’re beautiful and sexy.”
Simon could obviously lie with the best of them. She knew her eyes and nose were swollen from crying. Some women cried prettily. She wasn’t one of them. She was fairly certain she wasn’t looking her level best. And then there was the little matter of Elliott dipping his wick...definitely where it didn’t belong. “Yes, I’m so beautiful and sexy, I drove my fiancé to being gay.”
“Right now I’m very pissed with Elliott. And even though he’s my friend, he’s an idiot.” He patted her awkwardly on her shoulder.
Poor Simon. Small wonder he’d been so reluctant to broach this subject. “It was bad enough that he stuck you in the middle. You don’t have to say all of this. And don’t worry, I’m through crying. When I get angry, I cry. Charming little quirk.” She dashed away the last of her tears.
“Elliott is all kinds of a fool.”
She sniffled. This was the man she’d seen the day he’d photographed her, the man she’d glimpsed behind the wall of reserve. He really could be very nice. “It’s very chivalrous of you to say that.”
“I don’t have a chivalrous bone in my body. I’m stating the obvious. You’re beautiful and sexy and Elliott’s an idiot,” Simon said.
Tawny opened her mouth to argue the point and Simon interrupted her.
“Perhaps this will convince you,” he said, lowering his head and capturing her mouth.
* * *
Tawny tasted like exactly what she was—forbidden fruit. Sweet, hot, drugging, addictive. He felt her hesitation and surprise, tasted the brine of her tears.
Simon pulled away from her mouth and the temptation to plunder and explore. He raked his hand through his hair. “That was out of line. I apologize.”
She shook her head. “No.” She linked her arms around his neck and pulled his head back down to hers. “Please don’t apologize,” she said, her breath warming him. Her lips molded to his and a fantasy came to life. Tawny kissed him, hard and hot.
He knew she was angry with Elliott. Knew he was payback. Knew he should walk away. But while his head said one thing, his heart said another. God help him, he returned her kiss. Six months of pent-up passion unleashed within him. He’d lived with fantasies. And now he held the flesh-and-blood embodiment of those fantasies in his arms.
Her tongue probed at his lips and the last vestige of his resistence deserted him. He buried his hands in her hair and crushed her to him. She strained against him, her anger, her frustration almost palpable. And then it was gone, replaced by something less volatile—and far more dangerous. She softened, her mouth now giving rather than taking. Offering. He took and gave in return.
Simon slid his hands from her hair and stroked down the satin warmth of her bare shoulders. She moaned into his mouth and shuddered against him.
Reason took a holiday. He sank back onto the couch and she followed him, lying against him, between his thighs. Her hips pressed against an erection he couldn’t deny. Her fingers winnowed through his hair as he thoroughly explored the hot sweetness of her mouth. He plied his hands along the sexy curve of her back. He would love to photograph the lovely curve of her neck, bared by her upswept hair that led to the sinuous line of her back. He touched her with the reverence of an artist and the appreciation of a man.
The intensity of her kiss shook him. She pressed against his erection in supplication and he groaned into her mouth. He filled his hands with the full roundness of her buttocks and pulled her harder against him. She slid one leg over his, straddling his thigh, opening herself to him.
He ran his fingers along the silk of her thighs, his knuckles brushing against the edge of her panties. Oh, sweet heaven, they were wet.
“Oh, Simon,” she moaned into his mouth, “you always make me...”
She provided a voice-activated sanity check. He wrenched away from her and steadied himself on one elbow, although she remained between his thighs. What the hell was he doing? He’d been one second away from slipping his finger beneath the elastic of her panties and touching her intimately. He gulped air and sought some measure of his control that had been woefully missing a few seconds ago.
Tawny remained atop him, her body pressed intimately against his. Her arousal, mingled with her perfume, was a heady scent.
“I’m sorry,” he said. And just how sorry was he with one hand still on her delectable bottom? He jerked his hand away and rubbed his brow.
She scooted to the other end of the couch. He sat up, missing the press of her between his thighs, as if a vital part of him had been amputated.
Tears still clung to her lashes. Passion weighted her lids. His kisses had left her lips swollen and ripe.
“I’m really sorry,” he repeated. “I didn’t mean to...that shouldn’t have... I got out of hand.”
“Please don’t apologize, Simon. You didn’t exactly force yourself on me. I crawled on top of you.” She looked away from him, throwing the fine line of her nose and the curve of her cheek into shadowy relief. “You must think I’m a slut.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, contrite. He had the utmost respect for her—slut had never crossed his mind. He’d kissed her to show her how desirable she was, because telling hadn’t worked. Instead he’d further compromised her self-esteem.
“Never. You were upset, I was out of line and it won’t happen again. I never meant to take advantage of you.”
She shook her head. “You didn’t take advantage of me. I was the one out of line.” She touched his hand and then jerked back when she realized what she’d done. “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable. I won’t throw myself at you again.”
He almost pointed out that she should have a very good idea of just how much he’d enjoyed it since she had been riding the ridge of his erection. It had left him hard, but it had by no means posed a hardship. His body screamed that she could throw herself at him any day, any way, any time.
Tawny curled up, tucking one foot beneath her. She smoothed her fingers over the back of the couch. “Did you know about Elliott?”
Elliott. Much better than discussing that kiss. “No. On either count. He’s never even hinted at being gay or at being interested in someone other than you.”
Although maybe the signs had been there but Simon had been too obtuse to see them. Elliott was a bastard for cheating on her and dragging Simon into it, but Simon believed Elliott cared for Tawny. Right now she was hurt and betrayed, but she must still care for Elliott. As a friend, it was his role to ensure neither Tawny nor Elliott did anything rash regarding their future that they’d later regret. That’s how a man of honor would behave.
She huffed out a breath. “I don�
�t feel quite so stupid if you didn’t have a clue either.”
“I thought he was joking when he first told me.”
“Well, I know he couldn’t have possibly orchestrated a blackout, but how convenient for him. This way he could stick you with telling me, the scum-sucking son of a bitch.”
He bit back a laugh. She definitely had a colorful way with the English language. He didn’t want this woman pissed at him. “I know you’re hurt. I would be, too. But in the morning you’ll feel differently about all of this. You and Elliott can work this out.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, which did incredible things to her already pretty damn incredible cleavage, and directed a haughty look his way.
“Why don’t you ring him?” Simon tried again. He’d spent enough time around women to know that talking, venting, was a big deal. And Elliott, who avoided confrontation at every opportunity, certainly wasn’t going to initiate a conversation. “Talk to him. I’ll go in the other room and give you some privacy.”
She threw up a staying hand, her nose in the air. “Not going to happen. I have nothing to say to Elliott. Well, maybe a thing or two, but not while he’s there with his new lover.” She shook her head. “No, thanks. And I don’t even want to think about what they’re probably doing right now.”
“That makes two of us,” Simon said without thinking.
“And what’s there to say other than he’s a two-timer who better not have given me some communicable disease he picked up while he was out screwing around?”
“He says it was safe sex.”
“I hope he’s not lying about that,” she said.
“No. I asked him bluntly.”
“That’s a relief. So other than the satisfaction of cussing him out, I don’t need to talk to him. There’s no going back and there’s no going forward. We’re playing on a whole different ball field now. I’d had some doubts in the last couple of weeks and this just nailed it.”
Had she really been having doubts? His skepticism must’ve shown.
“I can tell what you’re thinking. Sure that’s a convenient way for me to save face, but it’s true. Ever since I started having—” she stopped as if she’d almost said something she shouldn’t “—well, second thoughts. And I’ve had an increasing sense of Elliott trying to shape me into what he wanted me to be.”
Elliott had laughingly said once on a double date that he possessed a better sense of style than Tawny. Simon also recalled another comment that Elliott needed to take her shopping. Both times Simon had thought Elliott out of line and far off the mark. Simon liked her sense of style. He wasn’t quite sure what to say. “Elliott has very specific ideas.”
“Uh-huh. Trust me. My parents have been trying to mold me long enough. I recognize the signs. Regardless, Elliott and I are history.”
Which left her a free agent and him still constrained by the bounds of friendship.
5
COULD SHE HAVE POSSIBLY made it any clearer than if she’d held up a sign inviting him to kiss her again? And again. And then take it further. To pick up where he’d left off, with his fingers brushing against her wet panties.
They both obviously wanted one another. He’d felt her damp underwear and she’d felt his rock-hard erection. And she’d just told him in no uncertain terms that she no longer had a future with Elliott.
Simon’s hair stood up at the crown where she’d run her fingers through it. She rather liked it because it made him much less intimidating and proved him human.
“People say and do a lot of things they don’t really mean when they’re angry,” he said in the tone of a peacemaker.
Was he implying she was irrational and should make allowances for Elliott’s wandering penis? Ha. She was very much in touch with rational thought. “I’m not angry.”
Simon simply looked at her.
“Okay. Maybe I’m still a little mad that he cheated on me and that it was with a man.” She cringed inside, feeling fat, ugly, lacking and unwanted. “How can I even compete when I don’t have the same equipment?”
Simon shook his head, a touch of anger marking his face and the movement. “You don’t compete. As difficult as it might be to believe, this isn’t about you.”
Freaking easy for him to say. “Have you ever had a girlfriend tell you she’d discovered her inner lesbian after sex with you?”
“Uh, no.”
“I didn’t think so. Don’t you think that might leave you feeling a little deficient? Like your equipment wasn’t up to par or you had some serious operator error going on?”
Simon looked like a man facing a firing squad. “I know it feels that way, but this isn’t because there’s a problem with you. Elliott’s the one with the problem. And I sure as hell wish he’d talked to me before he did something stupid that buggered up his relationship with you.”
His vehemence and apparent disapproval of Elliott surprised her. Usually, right or wrong, men stuck together. And she’d always sensed Simon didn’t like her, so his reaction doubly surprised her.
She picked a People magazine off the bamboo chest and fanned herself. “I’m surprised you don’t think it’s his lucky day that he’s managed to get rid of me.”
Simon sat ramrod straight. “I’m sorry you misunderstood my actions that way.”
What? As if she was some neurotic she-devil who’d misinterpreted his friendly demeanor? She was pissed and hot and sweaty. He’d picked the wrong day and the wrong gal to pull that holier-than-thou crap. She stood, bracing one knee on the couch, and planted her hands on her hips.
“Whoa. Stop right there. You’re sorry I misinterpreted your actions? If you’re going to apologize, then do it right. If you’re not, then save your breath. But don’t even think about giving me some backhanded apology.”
He had the grace to look slightly ashamed but still arrogant. And very sexy with the candlelight flickering from the table beside him. “You’re right. I’ve acted like a jerk and I’m still acting like a jerk.”
That surprised her. But then again, she never really knew quite what to expect from Simon. “I didn’t call you a jerk. Not exactly. Well, maybe that’s what I was implying. I’ve had it with all the prevarication. What’s the point? Let’s just cut to the chase. You’ve never liked me. You’ve barely managed to be civil and I’ve never known why. I thought that day you photographed me it was different.... I thought...well, never mind. I’m a big girl, and after finding out that my fiancé prefers men, I don’t suppose it can get any worse. So while we’re sitting here with nothing else to do, why don’t you enlighten me? Tell me why you’ve never liked me. They say confession is good for the soul.”
“I don’t think...”
“Oh, come on, Simon. Get real. There’s something about the dark of night that brings out the daring. You know how it is. Things you’d never think about in the light of day. Things you’d never do or say otherwise somehow seem okay in the dark.”
Their hot kiss—her tongue in his mouth and his hands on her ass, pulling her harder into his erection—still lingered between them. She saw it in his face. “We both know I’ve never had the guts to ask before and I probably won’t have the guts to ask again. In fact, after tonight our paths probably won’t cross again. So let’s get daring in the dark and have a real conversation,” she said.
The idea of not seeing Simon again was far more disquieting than the thought of not seeing Elliott again. She was needling Simon, but it was better than flinging herself at him. What she really wanted to do was lose herself in his arms, feel the heavy thud of his heart beneath hers, taste the heat of his passion, wallow in the desire that left her aching, wet and feeling like a desirable woman. She longed to discover firsthand whether the real passion between them was as potent and incredible as her dreams.
“If our paths won’t cross again, what could it possibly matter?” he said. The flickering light played tricks on her. For a brief second she could’ve sworn dismay flashed in his eyes.
“Be
cause it’ll bother me until I have an answer. My nickname growing up was Bulldog because I can’t let things go. Why you disliked me will niggle at the back of my mind and worry me—unfinished business—until ten years from now I have to track you down and demand an answer so I can take myself off Prozac.”
Simon frowned in confusion. “You’re on an antidepressant?”
Tawny smiled at him. It was sort of weird trying to charm a man into telling you why he disliked you. But nothing about the feelings Simon stirred in her was normal or comfortable. Between Simon and Elliott, her journey of self-discovery had taken an abrupt turn. “No. But if you don’t give me an answer, it’ll drive me crazy and I’ll have to start taking it. So go ahead and exonerate yourself up front.”
He shook his head but seemed to relax, stretching his arm along the couch back. He had nice arms. Just the right amount of muscle and a smattering of dark hair. Who was she kidding? Everything about him registered on her sexy meter. And—woohoo—she didn’t have to feel guilty about it anymore. She could lust up front and outright without even a twinge of conscience.
“Does everyone in your family communicate this way?” he asked.
“No.” She laughed and tossed the ball right back at him. “Does everyone in your family try to dodge the issue by introducing another topic?”
He grinned and a healthy dose of that guilt-free lust slammed her. “No. They simply don’t talk.”
It was the most he’d ever said about his family and she was curious to know more. “The British stiff upper lip?”
“Something like that. And their heads are full of ancient artifacts and civilizations.” Per Elliott, his father was a museum curator and his mother was an archaeology—or maybe it was anthropology—professor. “They find the modern world something of an inconvenience.”
It took a nanosecond for her to feel the loneliness of a little boy who had always hovered on the periphery of his parents’ attention. Tawny knew as surely as she knew her name that Simon had been something of an inconvenience, as well. She related. “I wasn’t an inconvenience, but I’ve always been a disappointment.”
Northern Rebel: Daring in the Dark Page 23