She nodded and stared around her. “I can see something like that.” She turned and motioned toward the open doorway. “What about the dining room?”
“What about it?”
“It's so blah, too,” she said as she walked toward the room.
He followed her, only to regret every step once he reached the entryway. She was up to something, all right.
Up to her neck in chocolate.
His gaze swept the table and the numerous dishes filled with all sorts of chocolate goodies. A candelabra flickered in the center, reflecting off the silver dishes. An old eighties tune drifted from the CD player.
“It's chocolate,” she announced, a smile on her face.
“I can see that. What's it for?”
“I, um, was hungry and I thought you might be hungry and so here it is. Pick your poison. I like the brownies myself. They just melt in your mouth.” She took a bite, her white teeth sinking into the dark treat, and his groin tightened with the beginnings of a massive hard-on. “Try one.” She held it out to him.
He shook his head. “I'll pass.”
“It's okay. There's plenty. Sit down and have something and we'll, um, talk about that corner.”
“The corner?” His gaze swiveled to the far part of the room and the empty area.
“It needs something, don't you think?” She took another bite and eyed the space.
“Maybe a built-in curio cabinet. Or a china hutch.”
“Good suggestions. Let me just soak this in and try to picture it.” She made a big show of eyeing the wall. “In the meantime, you might as well help yourself.”
“I couldn't. I might spoil my dinner.”
“I insist.”
“I don't really like chocolate.”
Her gaze swiveled then and collided with his. She stared at him as if he'd just confessed to kicking her favorite animal.
“But it's chocolate.”
“I can see that.” He shrugged. “I'm just not really into chocolate.” Or he hadn't been until he'd seen her take a bite of the brownie. Now he had the sudden urge to stretch her out on the table and lick the crumbs from her lips. “Too rich.”
“That's the point. It's dessert.” She planted her hands on her hips. “You do eat dessert, don't you?”
“Not really. I worked out a lot in college and followed a pretty strict diet to keep up my strength and my energy. I did it at first so that I could handle working and going to school. But then it took on a twofold purpose thanks to the nature of my business. Customers want to hire a hunk of a guy, not a hunk of fat. I usually just do the basics—meat and vegetables and fruit.”
“So you never splurge with dessert? Ever?”
“Once in a while.”
“With what?”
“Popcorn balls.” At her disbelieving look, he added, “They taste good. Not too salty. Not too sweet.” He shrugged. “And they feel good.” At her questioning glance, he added, “My mom used to make them every year for my birthday until she died. I would stand next to her and scoop out a handful of stuff while she was mixing it up. She would frown at me and tell me to scat, but I knew she wanted to smile. That's one of my few memories of her. Not that that has anything to do with this. I appreciate the offer, but I'll have to pass. This is all too much for me.”
“But I've got mousse,” she told him when he started to turn. “That's a little lighter. And flambé. You have to at least try the flambé.” She reached for a small blowtorch and turned the gas knob.
“I wouldn't turn that so high if I were you. I've seen blowtorches take out a pair of eyebrows just like that.”
“This isn't a blowtorch. It's a kitchen torch. Chefs use them and they're not nearly as dangerous as the ones you and your guys use.” She flicked the lighter and held it up. “They only emit a very small, controlled flame.”
A loud whoosh punctuated her sentence as fire ballooned from the mouth of the torch and rushed toward the wall. The edge of the curtain ignited and a flame erupted.
Beau pushed Xandra out of the way in that next instant, grabbed the tablecloth and yanked it from the table. Dishes clattered to the floor as he slapped at the flames. After a few frantic seconds, the fire died. Black paint curled around the edges of the window seal and the smell of smoke filled the room.
“Are you okay?” he asked as he turned back to her.
“My face feels weird.” Her gaze met his, her green eyes lit with worry. “Hot.”
If Beau had half a brain, he would have turned and walked the other way right then. The fire was out. No real harm had been done. Nothing that a few weeks and a can of Solarcaine couldn't cure. But he'd never been able to think clearly where Xandra was concerned. So instead of walking the other way, he stepped toward her.
Stepping, not touching or comforting or any of the other things he wanted to do at the moment. “You just had a flame rush at you. It stands to reason.”
“Tingling and hot. Like something's wrong.” She reached up, but her fingers stalled midway up her cheeks. Her eyes brightened. “They're gone, aren't they?”
“Sort of.”
“Meaning?”
“Have you ever seen a dog's eyebrows?”
“Dogs don't have eyebrows. They're furry all over and they just have one or two hairs sticking out on their brow bone—Ohmigod.” She closed her eyes for a moment and a tear slid from the corner of her eye.
Beau had the sudden urge to reach out and wipe the moisture away. Instead, he balled his fingers and did the next best thing.
“Look on the bright side,” he told her. Her eyes opened, her gaze fueled with hope, and he said the only thing he could think of to make her feel better. “Think of the money you'll save on waxing.”
Xandra eyed her reflection in her small compact and touched up her eyebrows for the countless time that morning.
While she'd singed off most of the hair, she did still have the basic shape left, thankfully. It was just a matter of filling in the bald spots.
At least that's what she told herself.
She snapped the compact closed and retrieved her purse. It wasn't even lunchtime, but she was calling it quits in the name of research.
Most women would probably give up when faced with three hundred dollars'worth of fire and smoke damage and a man who hated chocolate and a pair of singed brows, but Xandra wasn't most women.
When she'd fallen off the wagon during her senior year dieting mission, she'd simply picked herself up, traded the homemade pancakes her grammie made for breakfast every morning for two cups of black coffee, and gotten right back on track.
When she'd designed her first vibrator only to have it short-circuit just shy of the Big O, she'd blinked back the tears of disappointment, finished herself off with a few hand techniques, and turned back to the drawing board to find a more durable plastic that wouldn't crack during the most intense masturbation session.
Likewise, she hadn't thrown in the towel when she'd found her first gray hair last weekend. Sure, she'd whined to Albert and thrown a pity party, but then she'd outlined a step-by-step solution to her problem. A painful solution that still made her wince when she walked, but an effective one nonetheless.
Seducing Beau was no different from any other difficult task she'd faced in her life. She simply had to come up with a list of possible fixes and try them one by one until she hit pay dirt.
Fix number one had involved finally hitting up Kimmy for the secret to her successful social life.
“A cookbook?” Xandra asked when Kimmy smiled and handed her what she considered to be the single girl's answer to snagging any and every man.
“Haven't you heard that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach?”
“I don't want to get to his heart. I want to go about four inches lower.” Xandra shook her head and eyed the book. “A cookbook? You haven't discovered some new sexual position? Or come up with a one-of-a-kind blow-job technique? You don't have some sort of anomaly that makes your vagina vibrate at w
ill?”
“Don't I wish.” Kimmy shrugged and gave the book an affectionate hug. “This is it. My complete arsenal when it comes to men and sex. That Cherry Chandler really knows her stuff.”
“That's what Albert said.”
“You can't go wrong with a New York Times best seller—Say, is there something different about you?”
“Nothing I know of.” Xandra busied herself flipping pages. “Why?”
“I don't know…Your eyes just look different. I thought maybe you were using a new eye shadow.”
“No, no. Say, this is a really detailed cookbook.”
“This isn't just a cookbook. It's a step-by-step guide to seduction. All of the recipes include foods that have proven aphrodisiac qualities. You make one of these for a guy and he'll be putty in your hands.” At Xandra's smile, Kimmy added, “Sorry, wrong image. Let me put it this way, he'll be so turned on, he won't be able to keep his hands off you.”
“I just hope this is going to be enough. I mean, I would sell my soul for a piece of homemade lasagna and some tiramisu, but what if this guy isn't as easy?”
“All men are easy when it comes to food. It's just a case of finding the right food.”
“Okay,” Xandra said. “I'll give it a try.”
“On one condition,” Kimmy eyed the Mabel samples sitting on the corner of Xandra's desk, “you let me have a few of those.”
“I thought you had a long line of satisfied men at your beck and call?”
“I'm satisfying them, but that doesn't mean they're satisfying me. They're all nice and devoted and they try really, really hard, but sometimes my orgasm just isn't that great. Mabel might be just the boost I need.”
“Two samples.”
“Four.”
“Three.”
“You're on.”
By the time Xandra arrived home from work just after lunchtime, she was armed and ready, packing two overflowing grocery bags and an idea sure to lure Beau right out of his clothes and into her bed. Or at least off her front porch and into her kitchen.
Hey, a girl had to start somewhere.
“Should I keep the fire extinguisher handy?” Beau asked as she mounted the stairs. “Just in case I need to rescue another wall?”
“My walls are safe tonight because the only fire I'll be lighting is the one on my stove.” Liar. “But if you're interested in self-preservation, you might want to keep it close by.”
“Look—” he started.
“Got to get to work,” she cut in as she breezed past him. “Happy painting.” She disappeared into the house and set about putting her plan into motion.
That had been the trouble last night. She hadn't really had a solid, well-thought out plan. Just a germ of an idea sparked by Albert and his chocolate seduction. That's why the evening with Beau had completely backfired.
Literally.
Her gaze swiveled toward the dining room and the charred spot on the Sheetrock. Her nose wrinkled at the burnt aroma that lingered in the air.
First things first, she doused the dining room with Lysol after depositing her stuff in the kitchen. A few minutes later, she sat at the kitchen table, opened her leather briefcase and extracted the key to tonight's success. The one thing that kept Kimmy's dating card filled with devoted men and her closet overflowing with Prada suits and Manolo Blahniks—Cherry Chandler's best-selling Seductive Foods.
She turned to the first recipe and retrieved a large mixing bowl from an overhead cabinet. She'd ruled out the Chocolate Love Balls—Xandra wasn't any more interested in love than Beau was in chocolate. Instead, she'd come up with a menu that focused solely on stirring his libido.
Starting with melt-in-your-mouth Buns of Seduction.
After mixing and kneading a bowlful of dough, she divided it into twelve round shapes, arranged them on a lightly buttered and floured baking tray, and left them to rise while she proceeded to the second recipe.
Four hours later, she'd finished six dishes, all fairly healthful and completely free of chocolate.
She'd made a passion fruit and yogurt salad consisting of peaches, fresh figs, cherries, bananas, and mangoes—almost all of which contained significant amounts of phenylethylamine, the pleasure-inducing hormone released during sex. The main dish consisted of black pepper steak seasoned with cumin and coriander—spices rumored to boost the libido. She'd also made a variation of paella, a Spanish rice dish made with lobster tail, white fish, oysters, and mussels—ingredients with a reputation for supporting and enhancing the libido—just in case Beau wasn't a beef eater. Dessert consisted of vanilla ice cream sprinkled with cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and ginger—also to rev the libido. To round out the meal, she had the Buns of Seduction complete with honey butter and a beverage made with spring water, ginseng, lime, honey, and yohimbe, the bark from a tall evergreen tree medically proven to increase blood flow to the erogenous zones and, by constricting the veins, help keep it there.
She smiled.
Beau didn't stand a chance.
Chapter Fourteen
She was up to something.
Beau knew it even before she waltzed out onto the porch, told him to say “Ahhh,” and popped a piece of bread into his mouth.
The way she was looking at him, her eyes glittering with determination and desire, was lethal to a bad boy desperately trying to be good. As if she meant to tempt him beyond reason.
As if.
She could tempt away, but he wasn't giving in. He was a man on a mission, his brain completely focused on finishing this project in time for the competition deadline. To top everything off, he had to replace the charred Sheetrock in her dining room, which meant even more work.
Besides, he didn't just suspect she was up to something anymore. He knew with dead certainty. His gut told him as much. And then, of course, he'd overheard the truth when he'd been finishing up the staircase inside the house earlier that day. The phone had rung and her answering machine had picked up. He'd been minding his own business when a man's voice had filled the air.
“Hey, Xandra. It's Albert. I missed you at work and so I just wanted to call and find out how last night went. Did you get a chance to test out the new product? I tell you, it's a stroke of genius testing your product on the five-minute man. If you can have a good orgasm with him, then we'll know we're on the right track.”
He'd realized then that Xandra didn't just want sex from him. She wanted bad sex.
He'd been embarrassed at first. Then angry. Then really, really pissed.
Now he was more amused than pissed.
As much as he would like to prove her wrong and shoot his five-minute reputation to hell and back, he couldn't afford any distractions right now.
He had to resist, and he knew just how to do it. If she was going to pull out all the stops to turn him on, then he was just going to have to shift into overdrive and go the extra mile to turn her off.
That's what he told himself, but then his brain switched to neutral as the taste of warm bread and sweet honey melted in his mouth. His stomach grumbled and his heart kick-started as he savored the mouthful for a few delectable chews before it disappeared and he was left wanting more.
“You like?”
He shrugged. “It's bland.”
“Bland, huh?”
“And stale. Very stale.” He made a big show of clutching at his throat, as if swallowing had taken superhuman effort.
“It wasn't that bad.”
“You weren't the one being tortured.”
Xandra frowned. Beau could tell she wanted to tell him where to get off and how far south he could go. He wanted her to. At least then she would be busy putting him in his place rather than seducing him.
“So it's bland and stale, huh?” she finally said through clenched teeth. “I suppose I could spice it up a little and make sure I walk faster so the next batch doesn't get as much time to age between the oven and your mouth.” She disappeared inside and he grinned.
Mission accomplished.
“Better?”
“Not bad.” She smiled and his heart revved. “I mean not too bad, as in it's still bad but marginally better than the first. Your first time in the kitchen?”
“For your information, I'm an experienced hand in the kitchen.” At his surprised expression, she added, “Yes, I know how to cook. I don't get the chance too often since I'm busy at work, but I do know my way around, and there's more where that came from if you're interested.”
No. The refusal was there, along with an insult that would surely put another frown on her face, but damned if either made it from his brain to his mouth. As much as he wanted to offend her, as much as she deserved it after trying to manipulate him, he still felt like a heel when he did or said something that wiped the smile off her face.
He liked seeing her smile.
“More?” she prodded, drawing him back to the question at hand. “I've got plenty.”
His stomach grumbled its own response. He'd worked clean through lunch on the staircase inside the house, determined to be done and out before she came home. He'd finished in record time, and now he was hungry.
For food, that is, and she obviously had plenty. He set his sander aside and followed her inside.
Plenty didn't begin to describe the spread laid out on her coffee table in the living room—the dining room was obviously off-limits thanks to the previous night's fire. “You normally cook this much?”
“I'm, uh, planning a dinner party and I thought I would try my hand at a few new dishes.”
Beau ignored the warning bells going off in his head. Leather groaned as he sank to the edge of her couch. She filled a plate and handed it to him.
It tasted even better than it looked.
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