by Leigh, Jo
He wanted this woman in every way. He just couldn’t get enough. His hands wanted to touch her back and her thighs and her knees, all at once. He wanted to taste her sweet breasts, but it was inconceivable to stop this kiss.
Her hands made it all worse. He felt her explorations, felt the urgency and the heat. She wanted him as he wanted her, but they were standing in the middle of the street with open windows all around them or he would have pulled her to the ground right there.
She broke the kiss and leaned her head on his shoulder for a second, breathing deeply. He closed his eyes, forcing himself to get it together. It wasn’t easy. He was hard as a rock, straining against his pants, and every time she moved it was agony.
“Holy cow,” she whispered.
“You can say that again,” he said.
“Holy cow.”
He smiled. “So, uh, isn’t your house just down the block? Shouldn’t we be heading there? Very, very quickly?”
Dani moved back, stepping out of his embrace. “I don’t think so.”
“Why?” he asked, amazed at how quickly his body reacted to the hesitant, apologetic tone in Dani’s voice. His erection wasn’t an urgent problem anymore, although one look from her and it would be a national emergency in a heartbeat.
“We shouldn’t have done that,” she said.
“Why not? It was pretty spectacular.”
She shook her head. He kept staring at her mouth, the taste of her so present it made him ache.
“It was still foolish,” she said. “It can’t go anywhere.”
“Why not, Dani? What would be the harm?”
“You’re leaving.”
“Not right now.”
“Soon.”
“Then let me leave you with a memory. A damn good memory.”
“I’ve got enough of those, thanks.”
“Not the right kind,” he said. He reached over and touched her cheek with the back of his hand. Her eyes closed and she leaned into the caress. Her skin was magically soft and fragile. His want of her so powerful he was nearly knocked senseless.
Dani knew if she didn’t do something soon, he would kiss her again. And if he kissed her again she would kiss him back. If she did that, she wouldn’t be able to stop. She’d take him to her bed, and she’d make love with him and it would be wonderful and then what? She’d have memories all right. Memories that would torment her each long night she slept alone.
“I can’t,” she said.
“Why not?” he asked as he dropped his hand to his side. His gaze never left her, though, and the question there, the confusion, made her look away.
“I take these things pretty seriously,” she said.
“You don’t think I’m serious?”
“Yes. But not in the way I mean. You want to have sex. Which is fine. But I only want to make love.”
He studied her for a long moment. She let him, wanting him to see that she wasn’t condemning him for his desires. Wanting him to see her own regret.
“Dani?”
“Yes?”
“The only thing I’d ever want to do with you is make love.”
He looked so earnest. If she hadn’t known better, if she hadn’t already learned this lesson the hard way, she would have believed him. “I’m not the kind of woman you’re used to,” she said. “I can’t love someone for one night, and forget about it the next day.”
“I know that.”
“Then you know why I can’t...” She couldn’t finish the sentence. Not with him looking at her that way. So hurt. So hungry.
He leaned forward quickly and brushed her lips with his. It was a quick kiss, almost not a kiss at all, yet she felt that spark between them. The pull to go into his arms was like a force of nature.
“Hey,” he said. “It’s all right.” He took her hand in his and started walking again, heading toward her house at a leisurely pace. “But for the record, I’m not the playboy of the Western world. I do know the difference between having sex and making love.”
“I’m sure you do.”
“Uh-uh. There’s that cynical tone again. Don’t believe everything you read in the papers, Dani.”
“You’re telling me you’ve never had sex for sex’s sake?”
“No.”
“That you’ve never had a one-night stand?”
“ No.”
“Then what?”
He pulled her to a stop. They were just a few feet from her house. As she turned to look at him, she saw that her neighbor’s window was open. She could hear the soft strains of classical music. Then she looked into Alex’s eyes, and the rest of the world disappeared.
“What I’m telling you is that I know the difference,” he said. “I know what it is to make love. To want to be close with your heart as well as your body. I know what it’s like to have a lover in my arms. To care more about her than I care about breathing. You’re not the only one with memories, kiddo.”
“Who was she?”
“Someone a lot like you. Feisty. Beautiful. Soft.”
“What happened?”
He smiled with such melancholy that it made her sorry she’d asked. “I sent her away.”
“Why?”
His eyes closed. The creases in his forehead deepened with a long remembered pain. “Because she didn’t fit in to the plan,” he said. “Loving her broke all the rules.”
“Rules?”
He opened his eyes, and looked at her once more. “Honey, you have no idea.”
“So tell me.”
“Maybe sometime. Now, I need to get you home. I think Chloe might be upset that I’ve kept you out so late.”
“If Chloe is up, she’s not the one who’s going to be upset.”
He smiled. “Come on, Doc. Let’s call it a night.”
Dani let him lead her to the door. She wondered what he’d meant when he talked about the rules. What kind of rules could a man like him have to live by? The world was his oyster. She couldn’t imagine him bending to anyone’s standards but his own.
She entered the house, and the first thing she noticed was that too many lights were on. If all was well, the hall would be the only space lit, with the possible exception of the living room, if Mimi had decided to read instead of watch TV.
Dani looked quickly at Alex, then hurried toward Chloe’s room. She never got there. Instead she stopped dead in her tracks at the entrance to the dining room. Mimi stood by the table. She was staring hard at a very large, very green iguana, who was looking right back at her from the vantage point of the center of the dining room table. The iguana had a leash, and Terry Redmond, a single mother of two who lived on the other side of town, was holding on to the other end. Dani happened to know the iguana. Better, in fact, than she knew Terry. The iguana’s name was Filbert and he belonged to Terry’s fifteen-year-old son.
But that wasn’t all. Sitting next to Terry was Maureen Westbury. Maureen was also single. She ran the aerobics studio on Fourth Street, and normally dressed in either leotard and tights or jeans and a T-shirt. Tonight, she wore a black dress so tight there wasn’t enough room for a breath of air between the dress and the woman. Maureen had a small fishbowl on her lap. With a single goldfish swimming idly in a circle.
To top off the spectacle, Keelyn Porter, a woman Dani had known all through grammar school and high school, was also sitting at the table. Keelyn, who Dani knew reasonably well, didn’t own a pet. She didn’t care for pets, and had told Dani that many times. Yet she had a cat on her lap. A live cat who didn’t seem very pleased to be on her lap.
“They decided to wait,” Mimi said, her voice sounding strained and anxious.
“I see,” Dani said. She looked at the three women, ready to tell them that she had a clinic for a reason, but they weren’t paying attention to her. Every eye was focused on Alex.
As she watched, three pairs of lips smiled. Three hands shot up to adjust three hairstyles. Three pairs of cheeks got pink and rosy.
Alex cleared his t
hroat.
Then Filbert decided he was bored.
Iguanas can move pretty fast when they want to. So can cats.
Filbert darted across the table, heading right for Keelyn, jerking the leash out of Terry’s hand. Mimi screamed first, which caused the cat to leap off Keelyn’s lap and run straight toward Dani. Dani tried to head him off, and he veered left, then doubled back as Keelyn screeched. The cat went between Maureen’s legs, causing her to jump to her feet and drop the fishbowl on the floor. The crash was loud enough to scare the hell out of Filbert who used Keelyn’s back as a path to the ground.
Mimi continued screaming, as did Keelyn and Maureen. The cat found the drapes and scaled them, only to find that there was no immediate escape.
The fish flopped on the floor, and just as Dani was going to attempt that rescue, Alex moved. He scooped up the goldfish and headed for the kitchen. Dani only got a brief glance at him, but she could see his body shake. Wondering why he was so afraid of goldfish, she darted around the table trying to locate the ever popular Filbert.
Mimi ran from the room, straight down the hall and out the front door. Dani found Filbert eyeing the cat who was still hanging by his claws from the drapes. Just then Chloe wandered in, a look of abject fear on her face.
Dani abandoned the iguana to take care of Chloe. But Chloe was too busy staring at Keelyn, who continued to screech like a badly tuned violin.
“Keelyn!” Dani shouted. “It’s all right. The fish will be fine.”
Keelyn stopped her caterwauling and stared at her. “Who cares about the fish. The damn lizard went to the bathroom on my back!”
Dani froze. She looked at Chloe, who looked so confused she just might start crying. Then she heard the laughter come rolling in from the kitchen, and she lost it herself.
She laughed so hard she started crying, and when she tried to get the cat from the drapes, she couldn’t do it. The cat hissed, Dani snorted in a most unladylike fashion, and then she turned to see Alex standing in the doorway, tears running down his contorted face, trying to hold a water glass with a goldfish in it.
She couldn’t stand it. The laughter hurt her stomach and her sides, and she just kind of sat down on the floor. She definitely couldn’t look at Alex. Chloe came up to her, still confused and scared, and Dani held out her arms.
Chloe blinked, then sat down, too. At least the screaming had stopped, although now Keelyn was trying to get the cat down by stomping her feet and shouting, “Come! Heel!”
Maureen walked over to Alex, her back quite straight and stiff, and snatched the water glass from him. She sniffed once, turned and walked out of the dining room to the door and out.
Terry was trying to corner Filbert. The cat growled from the drapes. Keelyn looked at Dani as if this was all somehow her fault.
Dani took a couple of deep breaths and wiped her eyes. “Whose cat is it, Keelyn?”
“My nephew’s.”
“Is something wrong with it?”
“How the hell would I know?”
“Why did you bring it here?”
Keelyn stopped. She turned to look at Alex who was just starting to breathe normally again. He, too, wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “Think about it, Dani.”
“Yeah,” she said, climbing to her feet. “I suppose it’s the same thing with you, Terry, right?”
“Just help me get this monster back in my car, okay?” Terry said in a stage whisper that Alex was sure to hear. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“That’s okay with me.” She held out her hand to Chloe, who took it and stood. “You, young lady, need to go back to bed.”
“I’m too awake now.”
“I think you ladies were looking for this?”
Dani turned. Alex had Filbert in his hands, which were stuck out quite far in front of him. The iguana didn’t seem to mind. He just blinked one eye, then the other.
Terry blushed and hurried to fetch Filbert. She managed to grab him without once making eye contact with Alex. Then she practically ran out of the house, her high heels clicking noisily on the tile.
Only one more to go. Keelyn. With her very damp dress and her embarrassed frown. Dani walked over to the woman and put her hand on her arm. Quietly, trying to preserve some dignity for the poor thing, she said, “Don’t worry about the cat. You can tell your nephew to fetch him tomorrow at the clinic.”
Keelyn nodded. She started to say something, then she stopped. Dani took that second to glance over at Alex. He was smiling broadly, watching her. His hair was mussed, his jacket off. He leaned against the doorjamb as if he’d been there a hundred nights. His look at her was deeply amused, and very intense. She thought of his kiss, and his invitation, and she wanted him all over again.
“How do you do that?” Keelyn whispered.
Dani had forgotten she was still there. “What?”
“Get these gorgeous men to lust after you like that?”
“What?”
“He looks so much like Randy it’s scary. And man, does he ever have the hots for you.”
Dani straightened immediately. Keelyn’s words were like a cold slap in the face. “You’re way off base.”
Keelyn shook her head. “Nope. It’s high school all over again. And you’ve got the captain of the football team in your living room. I just don’t get it...” She gasped a little and stepped closer. “I didn’t mean it the way it sounded. I mean, you’re so cute and smart and all, of course any man would like you. It’s just that—”
“The clinic opens at nine,” she said. “Good night, Keelyn.”
The woman backed up some more, clearly anxious to get out after her faux pas. “I mean it, Dani. You’re just darling. Honest.”
“Good night, Keelyn.”
Dani watched her old high school acquaintance leave. Boy, some things never changed. How the girls in class used to wonder, aloud, in front of her, how she, plain little Dani Jacobson, could possibly have attracted Randy, of all people. It was a mystery gone unsolved until the day Randy had walked out of her life. That was a move everyone seemed to understand. Herself included.
Chapter Seven
Alex tried to remember the last time he’d laughed so hard he cried. He couldn’t. He continued to smile, even as Dani left to put Chloe back to bed. The cat was still on the loose, but other than that, the house was quiet once more, and Alex debated going up to his room. Dani may not come out again, but he hoped she would. He wanted to talk to her. To see her laugh.
An odd feeling of déjà vu swept over him, and he remembered a girl he’d known as a child. Denise Gillard. She’d been his first best friend. They’d played in the woods behind his house every day all summer long. She’d been chubby, and pretty, and she’d laughed like no one he’d met since. Well, until Dani. It was infectious laughter, the kind that grew and grew until they’d had to simply lay down on the grass because their legs wouldn’t hold them anymore.
Dani had laughed that way tonight. He’d seen her on the floor, unselfconscious, abandoned. He tried to picture her doing that in the dining room of his house. No, she wouldn’t have. His place was too formal for sitting-on-the-floor kind of laughter. When had that happened? At what juncture of his life had he opted for formality over comfort? Polished over casual?
He hadn’t been like that in college. His fraternity room had been a typical hodgepodge of beer bottles, empty pizza boxes and babe posters. Then he’d moved to the Green Hill apartment. His father had sent that decorator. Alex hadn’t objected. Hell, he’d been thrilled. The apartment was a young man’s dream. Good leather couches, framed artwork on the walls. Matching towels. He’d been comfortable there, pleased that he could have such a nice place right after graduation. The girls had loved coming over.
But even then, he’d given something up. Some little piece of himself. The babe posters had gone, the beer bottles relegated to the wet bar, and the maid had disposed of any pizza boxes before they had a chance to hit the floor. College may have been ove
r, but his education had just begun. He was the prince regent, the next in line to inherit his father’s millions, and that meant doing things the Bradley way.
Alex went to the fridge and studied the contents. He got out the carton of milk and found himself a glass. He poured, grabbed a package of Oreos, then went back out to sit at the dining-room table.
He remembered sitting at the table in his brand-new apartment all those years ago. His father had taken the seat across from him. Alexander, Senior, had told him then that while it was fine to have fun with all kinds of women, it was not fine to get serious about just anyone. He’d laid out the rules, clearly, definitively.
Alex’s own mother had fit the criteria for a Bradley wife to a T. She’d been beautiful, extraordinarily so. A sterling hostess, and an attentive—if somewhat distant—mother. She never interfered in business, never seemed to mind that her husband had a constant stream of other women on the side. She shopped a great deal, did her charity work and made the circuit of parties from Beverly Hills to Monaco to Switzerland.
Felicity Bradley had died five years ago in a car accident. She’d been in Park City, Utah, on a skiing trip. When Alex had flown out to get her body, he’d discovered she’d had her own lover: a ski instructor a year younger than him.
It hadn’t shocked him. On the contrary. He’d felt happy for her. At least she’d gotten some joy of her own.
Was he going to have to get his joy from affairs? Would a woman like Dani ever agree to being the other woman? He doubted it.
Funny thing. The rules had been a part of his life since before puberty. He’d accepted them, just as he’d accepted that he would go to Harvard, that he would take over the business. But now, sitting here dunking his cookie, waiting for a small town vet to leave her daughter’s bedside, he was actually thinking that maybe, just maybe, the rules of the father didn’t have to be the rules of the son.
“Where’s my glass?”
He turned. Dani stood in the doorway, smiling at him. He had to smile back. “Pull up a seat,” he said as he stood and headed for the kitchen. “One glass, coming right up.”