by Diana Palmer
She couldn’t get words out. She was too busy trying to catch her breath.
He touched her swollen lips gently. “I won’t do that again,” he promised solemnly. “I didn’t realize…quite how vulnerable you were.” He sighed, brushing back her wild hair. “Forgive me?”
She nodded.
He smiled and dropped his hand. “I’ll see you and Kurt in the morning.”
“Okay.”
He winked and walked back down the beach, totally unconcerned, at least on the surface. Inside he was seething with new emotions, with a turmoil that he didn’t dare show to her. Innocence like that couldn’t be faked. She wasn’t in his league, and he’d better remember it. That sort of woman would expect marriage before intimacy, he knew it as surely as if she’d said it aloud. She wasn’t modern or sophisticated. Like her academic parents, she lived in another world from the one he inhabited.
Of course, he was thinking to himself, marriage wouldn’t be so bad if it was with a woman he liked and understood. He laughed at his own folly. Sure. Hadn’t he made that very mistake with his first wife? He’d better concentrate on his business empire and leave love to people who could handle it.
All the same, he thought as he entered his house, Janine was heaven to kiss.
Chapter Six
The news that he was going to get to fly in a Learjet made Kurt’s head spin. He didn’t even sleep that night. The next morning, he was awake at daybreak, waiting for his sister to wake up and get dressed so they could leave.
“He won’t be here yet,” she grumbled. “It’s not even light!”
“All the more reason why we should be ready to go when he does get here,” he said excitedly. “A real Learjet. My gosh, I still can’t believe it!”
“You and airplanes,” she mumbled as she made coffee. “Why don’t you like bones and things?”
“Why do you like old books?”
“Beats me.”
“See?”
She didn’t see anything. She was wearing shorts with a white T-shirt, her usual night gear, and neither of her eyes seemed to work. A cup of coffee would fix that, she thought as she made it.
“Do I hear footsteps?” he asked suddenly, jumping up from the table in the kitchenette. “I’ll go see if someone’s at the door.”
Unbelievably it was Canton. “Why don’t you go over and keep Karie company while your sister gets ready?” he invited. “She’s got cheese danishes and doughnuts.”
“Great! Hurry up, sis!” he called over his shoulder.
Janine, still drowsy, turned as Canton came into the small kitchenette area, stifling a yawn. “Sorry. I didn’t expect you this early.”
“Kurt did,” he chuckled.
She smiled. “He barely slept. Want some coffee?”
His eyes slid down to the white T-shirt. Under it, the darkness of her nipples was visible and enticing. As he looked at them, they suddenly reacted with equal visibility.
Janine, shocked, started to cross her arms, but he was too quick for her.
As her arms started to lift, his hands slid under the T-shirt. His head bent. He kissed her as his thumbs slid gently over her soft breasts and up onto the hard tips.
She made a harsh sound. His mouth hardened. He backed her into the wall and held her there with his hips while his hands explored her soft body. All the while, his mouth played havoc with her self-control, with her inhibitions.
“The hell with this,” he growled.
While her whirling mind tried to deal with the words, his hands were peeling her right out of the T-shirt. Seconds later, his shirt was unbuttoned and they were together, nude from the waist up, her soft breasts buried in the thick pelt that covered his hard muscles.
She whimpered at the heat of the embrace, at the unexpected surge of passion she’d never experienced before. Her arms locked around his neck and she lifted herself to him, feeling the muscles of his thighs tighten and swell at her soft pressure.
He lifted his mouth a breath away and looked into her eyes from so close that she could see the faint specks of green there in the ocean blue of his eyes.
“What the hell are we doing?” he whispered harshly.
Her eyes fell to his swollen mouth. “At your age, you ought to know,” she chided with dry humor.
His hips ground into hers. “Feel that?” he snapped. “If you don’t pull back right now, I’ll show you a few more things I ought to know at my age.”
She was tempted. She never had been so tempted before. Her eyes told him so.
That vulnerability surprised him. He’d expected her to jerk back, to be flustered, to demand an apology. But she wasn’t doing any of those things. She was waiting. Thinking. Wondering.
“Curious?” he asked gently.
She nodded, smiling self-consciously.
“So am I,” he confessed. He eased away from her, holding her arms at her sides when he moved back so that he could see the exquisite curves of her body. She was firm and her breasts had tilted tips. He smiled, loving their beauty.
“I like looking at you,” he said, but after a second, he let her go.
She moved back, picking up her T-shirt. She pulled it on and brushed back her hair, her eyes still curious and disturbed when she looked at him.
He was buttoning his shirt with amused indulgence. “Now you know.”
“Know…what?”
“That I’m easy,” he murmured, provoking a smile on her lips. “That I can be had for a kiss. I have no self-control, no willpower. You can do whatever you like with me. I’m so ashamed.”
She burst out laughing. He was impossible. “I’ll just bet you are,” she murmured.
He held up a hand. “Don’t embarrass me.”
“Ha!”
“No kidding. I’m going to start blushing any minute. You just keep that shirt on, if you please, and stop tormenting me with your perfect body.”
She searched his eyes, fascinated. She’d never dreamed that intimacy could be fun.
He rested his hands on his hips. “Well, we’ve established one thing. I know too much and you don’t know a damned thing.”
“I do now,” she replied.
He chuckled. “Not much.”
She studied her bare feet. “Care to further my education?”
His heart seemed to stop beating. He hesitated, choosing his words. “Yes.”
She lifted her gaze back to his face and searched it quietly. “So?”
“We’re flying to Miami,” he reminded her.
“I didn’t mean right now.”
“Good thing. I’m hopeless before I’ve had two cups of coffee.”
She grinned at the obvious humor.
He moved close and took her by the waist. “Listen, we’re explosive together. It feels good, but we could get in over our heads pretty quickly. You’re not a party girl.”
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
“If you had a modern outlook on life, you wouldn’t be a virgin at your age,” he said simply. “You’re looking for marriage, not a good time. Right?”
“I never thought about it like that.”
“You’d better start,” he replied. “I want you, but all I have to offer is a holiday affair. I’ve been married. I didn’t like it. I’m free now and I want to stay that way.”
“I see.”
“This isn’t something I haven’t said before, Janie,” he reminded her. “If you want me, with no strings attached, fine. We’ll make love as often as you like. But afterward, I’ll go home and never look back. It will be a casual physical fling. Nothing more. Not to me.”
She felt confusion all the way to the soles of her feet. She was hungry for him. But was it only physical? Was it misplaced hero worship? And did she want more than a few nights in his arms?
He made her feel uncomfortable. All her adult life she’d spent her days and nights at a computer or with her nose stuck in books. She’d never had the sort of night life that most of her friends had. Intimacy was to
o solemn a thing for her to consider it casually. But with this man, here, now, she could think of nothing else.
He touched her cheek gently. “Do you want the truth? You’re a repressed virgin in the first throes of sexual need, and you’re curious. I’m flattered. But after you’ve spent a night in my arms, no matter how good it is, you’re going to have doubts and you’re not going to be too happy with yourself for throwing control to the winds. You need to think this through before you do something you might regret. What about the man back in Indiana? Where does he fit in? And if you have an affair with me, how will he feel about you, afterward? Is he the sort of man who’d overlook it?”
“No,” she said without thinking.
He nodded. “So don’t jump in headfirst.”
She sighed. He made it sound so complicated. Imagine, a man who wanted her that much taking time to talk her out of it. Maybe he did care a little, after all. Otherwise, wouldn’t he just take what was blatantly offered and go on with his life?
“Just friends,” she said with a grin, looking up at him. “Very old friends.”
“That’s right.”
“Okay. But you have to stop kissing me, because it makes me crazy.”
“That makes two of us.” He stuck his hands into his pockets to keep them off her. “And you have to stop going braless.”
“I didn’t know you’d be here this early, or I wouldn’t be.”
He smiled. “Just as well,” he confessed. “I wouldn’t have missed that for the world.”
She chuckled. “Thanks.”
“Get dressed, then, would you? Before all this bravado wears off.”
She gave him a wicked grin and went to get dressed for the trip.
It was a wonderful, joyful trip. Canton let Kurt sit in the cockpit with him and they talked about airplanes and jets all the way to Miami.
When they got to town, a big white stretch limousine met them at the airport. To Kurt, who was used to traveling in old taxis and beat-up cars, it was an incredible treat. He explored everything, under Canton’s amused eyes.
“It’s just a long car,” he informed the boy. “After a while, they all look alike.”
“It’s my first time in a limo, and I’m going to enjoy it,” he assured him, continuing the search.
Janine, who frequently went on tour and rode around in limos like this, watched her brother with equal amusement. She’d wanted to take him with her on the last trip, but he couldn’t lose the time from school. Only illness had gotten him this break.
“Aren’t you curious?” Canton asked her. “You seem very much at home in here.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Do I? Actually I’m very excited.”
“Are you?”
She smiled sweetly, and turned her attention back to Kurt.
Later, while Canton was in his meeting, Karie and Kurt went to a big mall with Janine, where they peeked and poked through some of the most expensive shops in town. By the time they ended up at an exclusive chocolatier shop and bought truffles, they were all ready to go home.
Canton accepted a chocolate on the way back to the airport, smiling as he tasted it. “My one weakness,” he explained. “I love chocolate.”
“He’s a chocoholic,” Karie added. “Once, he went rushing out in the middle of the night for a chocolate bar.”
“Sounds just like Janie,” Kurt replied with a smile. “She keeps chocolate hidden all over the house.”
“Hidden?” Canton probed.
“We stop her from eating it if we find any in her hiding places. She gets terrible migraines when she eats it,” he explained. “Not that it ever stopped her. So we have to.”
“She’s just eaten two enormous truffles,” Karie said worriedly.
Janine glared at the kids. “I’m perfectly all right,” she informed them. “Anyway, it doesn’t always give me migraines,” she told her brother firmly.
That night, lying in the bed and almost screaming with pain, she remembered vividly what she said to Kurt.
She lost her lunch, and then her supper. The pain was so bad that she wished for a quick and merciful death.
She didn’t even realize that Kurt had gone to get Canton until she felt his hand holding hers.
“You don’t have anything to take?” he prompted.
“No,” she squeaked.
He let go of her hand and called a doctor. Scant minutes later, a dark gentleman in a suit administered a whopping injection. And only a little later, pain gave way to blessed oblivion.
She woke with a weight on her arm. Her eyes opened. Her whole head felt sore, but the headache was so subdued that it was almost a memory.
She looked toward the side of the bed, and there was Canton Rourke, in a burgundy robe, with his face lying on her arm. He was sound asleep, half in a chair and half against her side of the bed.
“Good heavens, what are you doing here?” she croaked.
He heard her, blinking to sudden alertness. He sat up. He needed a shave and his hair was tousled. His eyes were bloodshot. He looked tired to death, but he was smiling.
“Feel better?” he asked.
“Much.” She put a hand to her head. “It’s very sore and it still hurts a little.”
“He left a vial of pills and a prescription for some more. I’m sorry,” he added. “I had no idea that Karie would take you to the chocolate shop.”
“She couldn’t have stopped me,” she replied with a pained smile. “They have the best, the most exquisite chocolates on earth. It’s my favorite place in the world. And it was worth the headache. Where did you find a doctor in the middle of the night?”
“Karie had appendicitis when we were down here a couple of years ago,” he replied. “Dr. Valdez is one of the best, and he has a kind heart.”
“Yes, he does. And so do you. Thanks,” she said sincerely.
He shrugged. “You’d have done it for me.”
She thought about that. “Yes, I would have,” she said after a minute.
He smiled.
He stretched largely, wincing as his sore muscles protested.
“Come to bed,” she offered with a wan smile, patting the space beside her. “It’s too late to go home now.”
“I was just thinking the same thing.”
He went around to the other side of the bed, but he kept his robe on when he slid under the covers.
“Prude,” she accused weakly.
He chuckled drowsily. “I can’t sleep normally with Karie anywhere around. Usually I wear pajama bottoms, but they’re in the wash, hence the robe.”
“That’s considerate of you.”
“Not really,” he confessed. “Actually, I am a prude. I don’t even like undressing in front of other men.” His head turned toward hers. “I was in the Marine Corps. You can’t imagine how that attitude went down with my D.I.”
She chuckled and then grabbed her head. “Modesty shouldn’t be a cardinal sin, even in the armed services.”
“That’s what I told him.”
She took a slow breath. Her head was still uncomfortable.
“Go back to sleep,” he instructed, drawing her into his arms. “If it starts up again, wake me and I’ll get the pills.”
“You’re a nice man,” she murmured into his shoulder.
“Yes, I am,” he agreed. “And don’t you forget it. Now go to sleep.”
She didn’t think she could, with him so close. But the heavy, regular beat of his heart was comforting, as was the warmth of his long, muscular body against her. She let her eyelids fall and seconds later, she slept.
There was a lot of noise. She heard rustling and footsteps and the clanking of metal pans. It all went over her head until something fell with an awful clatter, bringing her eyes open.
“Where the hell are the frying pans? Don’t you have a frying pan?” he asked belligerently.
She sat up gingerly, holding her head. “I don’t think so,” she told him.
“How do you scramble eggs?”
“I eat them. And you’re going to, as soon as I find a—” he expressed several adjectives “—frying pan!”
“Don’t you use that sort of language in my house,” she said haughtily.
“I’ve heard all about your own vocabulary from Kurt, Miss Prim and Proper,” he chided. “Don’t throw stones.”
“I almost never use words like that unless my computer spits out a program or loses a file.”
“Computers do neither, programmers do.”
“I don’t want to understand how a computer works, thank you, I only want it to perform.”
He chuckled. “Okay. Now what about pots and pans?”
“It won’t do you any good to find one, because I don’t have any eggs.”
He presented her with a bowl of them. “Our housekeeper came back this morning laden with raw breakfast materials. I even have bacon and freshly baked bread.”
“I hope you don’t expect me to eat it, because I can’t,” she murmured weakly. “And I’m going to need some of those pills.”
He produced them, along with a small container of bottled water. “Here. Swallow.”
She took the pills and lay back down, her eyes bloodshot and swollen. “I feel terrible,” she whispered.
“Is it coming back?”
“Yes. It’s not so bad as it was yesterday, but it still throbs.”
“Stop eating chocolate.”
She sighed. “I forget how bad the headaches are when I don’t actually have one.”
“So Kurt says.”
“There are pans in the drawer under the stove,” she said helpfully.
He opened it and retrieved a tiny frying pan. He held it up with a sigh. “Well, I guess it’ll hold one egg, at least. I have to have an egg. I can’t live without an egg every morning, and damn the cholesterol.”
“Addictions are hell,” she murmured.
He glared at her. “You have to have your coffee, I notice. And we won’t mention chocolate…”
“Please don’t,” she groaned.
He shook the frying pan at her. “Next time, I’ll go along when you shop. You’ll have to get through me to get at any chocolate.”
She stared at him with blank eyes. “That sounds very possessive.”