by Anne Stuart
She looked at him. “There are tons of Americans overseas. You must hear it more often than you think.”
“Then it’s your accent I like. Pacific Northwest, I’m guessing.”
Now that was unnerving. “I don’t have an accent.”
“Of course you don’t,” he said soothingly. “People in the US don’t think they do. I like regional accents—I can usually tell where someone came from, if not the actual state. And in some cases, like Texas or Massachusetts, it’s easy enough to even place what part of the state that person comes from. For the Pacific Northwest accent, it’s a bit of Scandinavian with a touch of Venice, and I’m talking California, not the gorgeous city to the north of us. Which I hope you’re going to see on this trip. There are obviously no walls, but lots of medieval architecture.”
He was probing so delicately, and she wasn’t sure whether it was wise to tell him her itinerary. “Depends how much time I have,” she said carefully. “Venice has been overdone. And I grew up in Port Townsend, Washington.”
“One can never have too much of Venezia.” He leaned back, a faintly ironic smile on his mouth. The mouth she kept glancing at and then jerking her gaze away. He really was something else, she thought, momentarily distracted, dreamy. If he really put his mind to it he might be almost impossible to resist.
Except he wasn’t going to put his mind to it. This was simply to ease his boredom, listen to an American accent, and maybe even make a desultory attempt to get her in bed, but it wouldn’t really matter. She was used to men like him, though she seldom spent time in their company. Now she was glad she hadn’t.
Because he unnerved her, seducing her when he probably didn’t even realize it. Despite the emptiness in his dark, dark eyes, he had the most devastating smile, a soft, drawling voice that made her want to curl up inside it, a mouth so luscious it didn’t bear thinking about. Maybe she should just give in, assuming he did make a pass at her, which was still up in the air. It wasn’t as if she were frigid, or a prude. She’d had enough therapy to get past any lingering . . . issues, and her sexual relationships had been satisfactory. She knew the rudiments of self-defense if he got kinky, and besides, she’d read Fifty Shades of Grey with horrified fascination. It might be interesting . . . no!
“What in heaven’s name are you thinking about now?” Bishop demanded good-naturedly. “You do tend to wander off when I’m talking to you. I never realized how boring I am.”
She met his gaze, that dangerous, ironic gaze. He was trying to unsettle her, surprise her. Well, two could play that game. She gave him a stern look. “You know perfectly well how seductive you are, and you don’t hesitate to use it,” she said flatly, “and don’t pretend you don’t. You reeled me in like I’m some poor salmon, gasping for air, and even if I struggle I’m still flapping around on the floor, fighting to survive.”
He laughed. “Do you think you’ll need mouth-to-mouth? I’ve never kissed a fish before.”
Trumped again. She fumbled for her lemon drink. She didn’t need to be thinking about kissing him. Thinking about how she wanted to kiss him. She raised her eyes again. “I’m not quite sure what game you’re playing, but I should make it clear that I’m not the type who goes in for one-night stands or hops into bed with any man I happen to find attractive.”
“You find me attractive? That’s a step in the right direction,” he said lightly, and she could still feel the intensity of his gaze. “So what kind of woman are you? What kind of man do you hop into bed with?”
This was getting entirely out of hand. Why had she used the word “seductive”? Why had he talked about kissing her? “I got my PhD when I was twenty,” she announced abruptly.
He raised his eyebrows—dark, arched, almost satanic eyebrows. “A prodigy, then. So if you’ve already got your doctorate, why are you scrambling around Italian ruins on your own?” He took her change of subject with equanimity, and she breathed a small sight of relief.
“Publish or perish,” she said. “Besides, how can I teach if I don’t have firsthand knowledge of what I’m talking about?”
“One should always have firsthand knowledge,” he said innocently. “Do you like teaching? Do you like your students?”
“I do,” she said, surprising herself. “They can be pains in the ass, but every now and then you find one who’s genuinely passionate about learning, and if I can find the right hook I can draw the slackers in as well.”
She couldn’t keep from staring at his mouth, and the smile that flitted across it was different than the others—it somehow seemed more honest. “I can imagine,” he murmured. “So tell me how you do it.”
It was an odd interlude—she knew he was drawing her out just as she did with her students, and yet she was helpless to resist. No, that wasn’t true. She’d never been helpless in her life, not if she could do anything about it. But he smiled at her, spoke in that low, easy drawl, and she could feel all her caution and doubts melt away beneath his practiced charm. She found herself telling him things she’d never told anyone—her stage fright when it came to teaching, her perfect older sister, her remote parents. She told him about the beauty of the Pacific Northwest, a beauty she’d left for Massachusetts, where she was alternately freezing and roasting, and he listened, his eyes on her, his attention never straying, and she felt herself slipping, slipping, underneath his lazy, tempting charisma.
No one could be that seductive by accident—he had to have had lots of practice, and he was exerting everything he’d learned on her. She knew it, and even though she did, it worked. She was melting, and she slapped down that tiny warning voice inside. Other women did this, all the time, and she could count it as another milestone in her goal of putting the bad things of the past behind her. She was hardly a romantic—sex was a pleasurable, physical sensation, one that was much more enjoyable with a partner. She suspected he’d be a very good partner. He knew what she wanted to drink, he’d ordered for her, and he’d chosen perfectly. He was attuned to what she liked, what she wanted, picking up subtle cues, and he asked just the right questions, ones that had her telling him far too much, more than she’d ever told anyone. They say the real opposite of talking isn’t listening, it is waiting. Waiting to get in your own two cents, your opinion, your experience. Not with James Bishop. He seemed content with listening to her, gently prodding to keep her talking.
Having sex with someone like that, someone so keyed in to her, could be quite extraordinary, she thought, gazing at his elegant, unreadable face. Maybe too extraordinary. She considered herself an ordinary young woman, a little stubborn, perhaps maybe even boring. She was too practical, too wary. She wasn’t made for grand passion, for throwing caution and responsibility, and even duty, to the wind for the sake of a man. She’d worked hard to get where she was, and she had more hard work ahead of her that she couldn’t afford to jeopardize, even for one night, especially one that could go disastrously wrong given how skittish she could be.
But this man might be worth it.
“Now what are you thinking about?” he said lazily, leaning back as he stirred his espresso. “You haven’t said anything since they brought dessert.” The tiny, perfect pastries sat between them, delectable, and she had the sudden thought that she’d rather lick him. Color flooded her face—she must have had too much to drink.
“Just what a lovely evening this has been,” she said with a good stab at nonchalance. It failed, but she deserved credit for trying.
Once more he gave her that enchanting smile, the one that didn’t meet his eyes. “You’re looking nervous again. I thought you’d gotten over that.”
“I’m not!” she protested. What would his hands feel like on her body? No one had touched her in almost a year, and Lester had been more enthusiastic than skilled. This man would be both.
Wouldn’t she like to have just one time with someone who knew what he was doing? She could feel the color mount her
face again, and she was ashamed of herself. Of course Lester and the others had known what they were doing, and she’d been fine, orgasmic, once she’d gotten over her initial fears. She’d just longed for something . . . more.
She suspected the man across from her was an expert at providing that elusive more, if it even existed. Except that he didn’t seem to be making much of an effort to offer her more—his gently teasing manner, his flattery, was probably unconscious on his part. It was just what he did. She was sitting there in an absolute pool of irrational longing and he was leaning back in his chair, sipping his espresso and smiling, perfectly relaxed. She felt like a tightly wound violin string, ready to snap, and he didn’t even seem to want her.
Which was a relief, she told herself. Depressing, demoralizing, but a relief. She wasn’t up to dealing with someone like him. She preferred safety, reliability. And besides, he wasn’t interested.
She realized another silence had fallen while he watched her, a speculative expression in his unreadable dark eyes. She laughed, just a little nervously. “I’m sorry,” she said, taking a sip of her own cappuccino. For some reason he’d known she’d prefer it to espresso. “I’m drifting off again.”
“You won’t be drifting off with that coffee in your system,” he pointed out pleasantly. “And it’s early. I’d suggest we go for a walk but I think the storm is about to hit.”
She hadn’t been paying attention—not when there was something else so gorgeous to look at. She glanced overhead into the night sky. The stars were gone, hidden by the black, scudding clouds, and the poplar trees swayed in the breeze. She could feel the ozone in the air, the approach of the rain, and she wondered how long it had been like this, and whether he knew she’d been too mesmerized by him to pay attention to an imminent downpour.
Here they were, sitting out in the open, about to get soaked. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve been talking my head off and you’ve been wanting to get in out of the weather. I’ve kept you . . .”
“Why do you keep apologizing?” he said lazily, not moving from his relaxed position. “You haven’t done anything wrong.”
Yet, she thought. If she didn’t get away from him she was going to make a complete and utter fool of herself. She couldn’t tell whether he was sending her mixed signals or if she was looking for signs that didn’t exist. Italian men flirted. European men flattered. James Bishop had lived here long enough that he would have picked up both habits.
“Sorry,” she said, and then gave a little laugh, annoyed with herself. “It’s a bad habit of mine.”
“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” he mimicked lightly. “Come to bed with me.”
For a moment she thought she’d misheard him. “I beg your pardon?”
“I said come to bed with me,” he said, still that lazy voice that signaled no strong interest at all. “I could teach you not to be sorry about anything.”
The words hit her directly between her legs, an odd sensation. Words had never been that arousing in her life. Odd, because her few healthy relationships had been with fellow graduate students and academics, supposedly good with words.
She stared at him in shock, but at least her mouth wasn’t agape in astonishment. That was about the only blessing. “You’re kidding,” she blurted, feeling utterly stupid.
“Oh, I never kid about sex. You’re the most delicious creature I’ve seen or talked to in so long I can’t remember, and I’ve wanted to fuck you since I saw you in that church, which was very unholy of me.”
“But I . . .” Whatever she was going to say was lost, as the gorgeous woman who’d been by James’s side that afternoon suddenly appeared, dropping down into one of the empty chairs as if she belonged there.
“We’ve got a problem,” she said abruptly. And then, as if she suddenly realized she was intruding, she turned to Evangeline and gave her a dazzling smile. “Hello, there. I’m Claudia Facinelli, James’s associate. You’re the young woman we saw at the church earlier, aren’t you?”
The woman had just the trace of an Italian accent, and her eyes were a bright metallic blue as she surveyed Evangeline. The glance was slow and assessing, but there was no identifiable judgment in it. It was just that she was so elegant in a lean, flat-chested, greyhound kind of way that Evangeline immediately felt plain and clumsy.
“Claudia, you’re interrupting,” James said, sounding bored. “Whatever it is, it can certainly wait until tomorrow morning.” He made no effort to introduce her to his partner, and Evangeline wondered whether she should do it herself.
“I don’t think so,” the woman named Claudia said. “Apparently our recent efforts came to someone’s attention, and repercussions are going to be very unpleasant unless we do something about it. Now.”
James didn’t move, but Evangeline knew he’d tensed. “I’m sorry,” she said, and then could have kicked herself for another stupid apology. “I’ll let you two deal with business. Thank you for the lovely meal, James. I don’t expect I’ll see you again—I’m leaving early tomorrow morning for the north, probably long before you wake up. But I’ve had a lovely time, even though all I seemed to do was talk about myself. But maybe that was why I had such a good time,” she added, knowing she was babbling. She pushed away from the table and at that James immediately rose as well. The woman stayed where she was.
“Claudia has a habit of exaggerating things,” he said, unruffled, ignoring the fact that Claudia was watching the two of them quite closely. As if there was anything to see, Evangeline thought morosely. She shouldn’t have had the second glass of wine at dinner, nor the liqueur before coffee. “I thought we might go for a walk before the storm hits . . .”
“I told you this had to be dealt with now,” Claudia hissed. He didn’t even glance at her, moving from behind the table to take Evangeline’s elbow with a light touch that made her skin burn with longing. Damn it, what was wrong with her? She didn’t like being touched by strangers, and yet the feel of his hand on her arm made her want to lean against him.
Claudia finally rose, putting herself directly between them, breaking their contact, and for a brief moment Evangeline wondered why the woman seemed so determined. Evangeline was hardly any kind of threat to James’s associate. She was just a fellow American he’d taken pity on.
No, there had been no pity in his dark, mesmerizing eyes. She wasn’t sure what she’d seen there, but whatever it was, it made her nervous. Had he meant it when he asked her to go to bed with him? He’d sounded almost casual about it, like he was suggesting an aperitif.
She slipped away from him quite easily. “The storm is coming,” she said. “Thanks again.” A moment later she was on her own.
Bishop watched Claudia out of narrowed eyes. “Was that really necessary?” he murmured. He wasn’t about to let Claudia see how much she annoyed him. “I was making progress. I’m almost certain she saw nothing, suspects nothing, but as you said, we can’t afford to leave any loose ends.”
“She’s already a loose end,” Claudia snapped. “And Corsini’s body has been discovered by a couple of hikers. Someone came tearing into town a few minutes ago, and all hell is about to break loose while you’re busy trying to get into that girl’s pants. Shoot her and get it done with, and then let’s get the hell out of here.”
“So we disappear in the middle of the night when a murder victim is found, and you think that will throw suspicion off us? You’re being ridiculous. We have nothing to worry about—we were at business meetings all day. Our alibis are already set up and they’re airtight.”
“Airtight unless your American plaything decides to put two and two together, something she seems entirely capable of doing.”
“So she’s found dead, bringing attention to the guests at this hotel?” he suggested. Claudia hated to be thwarted, but he wasn’t about to let her get her way this time.
“Don’t be foolish—we’d move her. Or I would, if
you’re too squeamish to deal with it. I’ve never known you to be sentimental before, Bishop. Or has she got some kind of supernatural pussy that’s got you hypnotized?”
“You overestimate my charms, darling Claudia,” he purred. “I haven’t gotten her in bed yet.”
“Either you kill her or I will.”
He gave her a long, measuring look. Claudia enjoyed killing, and she used every excuse she could think of to do it. She’d wanted Evangeline dead since she first saw her, and the more arguments he came up with, the more determined she was. In the end there would be very little he could do to stop her.
“I’ll take care of her,” he said in a flat voice, evading a direct answer. “In the meantime you need to go up to bed, take someone with you who can vouch for your presence, and I’ll do the same. No one can trace us to the church but Evangeline, and the more skittish you act, the more suspicious we’ll seem.”
“I’m never skittish,” Claudia said haughtily. “And I can’t pick up just anyone. You know my tastes are . . . specialized.”
“It’s up to you. I’ll take care of Evangeline and arrange my own night’s entertainment. Find someone and spend the night talking to them if they aren’t fuckable by your standards. I don’t care.”
Her face was like marble, hard, white, beautiful, with no emotion or life in it. “Do not, I repeat, do not make the mistake of lying to me, Bishop.”
He smiled down at her lazily. “I lie to you all the time, my sweet. It comes with the territory.” The wind had picked up, and waiters appeared, clearing the table as the empty wine glasses were tipped over. He cast a gaze at the roiling night sky. “Evangeline is right—there’s a storm coming. Best take care.”