Gina took a deep breath. “No one for me, either. No time for any of that stuff.”
“Good.” The word was rough.
He moved before she knew it, and his mouth brushed hers, careful and slow. Gina made a lost sound. Somehow her fingers were locked around his strong shoulders and there was no space between them. With her thigh to his, she felt the sudden tension of his body.
“Hell,” he whispered.
“What?”
“This. You. It shouldn’t be happening.” His tongue slid against hers, hot and searching, and Gina’s fingers tightened. He kissed her hard as if he couldn’t stop himself, but had to try. His arousal was unmistakable.
The suggestive pressure at the base of her stomach made her greedy for more.
The sharp vibration of her cell phone jolted her back to reality. She shouldn’t be doing this. She had never been interested in casual sex. She hadn’t been too good with long-term relationships, either. But the slick, damp feeling between her legs told Gina that her body was making up for lost time.
The vibration continued, and she dug in her purse, found her cell phone and answered breathlessly. “Yeah.”
“Chief, where are you?” Andreas sounded worried. “I’ve got Reggie at bat, but the natives are restless. You’ve got four food critics and six reporters up here, and they want you, not us.”
“I’m on the way. Ask Reggie to grab an extra white jacket in my size and leave it out, okay?”
“Why—”
“Don’t ask. Just stall. I’ll be there in five.”
“You got it. There’s a television crew here, too. Someone from the home office set it up and forgot to let us know.”
Gina coughed back a sound of dismay. No need to worry Andreas more than he already was. “Not a problem. We’ll start with the bed recipe—I mean, bread,” she said quickly.
Great.
Silence. “Gina, are you okay? You sound…strange.”
She struggled through a haze of major lust and stared up at Trace. He was focused on her entirely, his hands open on her shoulders. His attention—and his control—were nearly tangible.
Another major turn on, she thought. How long since a man had listened to her, watched with that kind of total focus and concern?
Never, a small voice whispered.
“I’m fine, Andreas. See you in five.” She powered off her cell phone and shoved it into her pocket. There was so much more to say, so much more that could have happened then.
But her time was up.
“I have to go.” Her voice was strained. “I can’t let them deal with this without me.”
He nodded as if he understood. “The elevator is beyond those stairs. Make a left and then a quick right. You can’t miss it.”
“How do you know where the elevator is?”
“I memorized the hotel floor plan. It’s a habit of mine.”
She frowned, suddenly aware how different his life was from hers and how unlikely it was that they’d ever met.
That knowledge made her push to her toes and rest her palm against his cheek, savoring the heat of his body. “Thank you.”
She felt his jaw flex. “I did nothing special.”
“Wrong. I’d forgotten there could be giving with no strings. I’d forgotten—a lot of things. You just reminded me.”
She brushed her mouth across his, feeling the instant rise of heat.
Him. Her.
They both felt it. His body left no mistake about that.
Wrong place, wrong time.
Gina forced herself to climb the stairs. No point in dragging things out. “After I change, I’ll leave your jacket upstairs in the kitchen. It’s just off the ballroom. Good luck with the champagne.” She smiled briefly. “I’ll…see you around.”
But she wouldn’t. They both knew that.
CHAPTER EIGHT
HE WATCHED HER GO, her hair swinging, her steps fast. Great legs, he thought. A woman with places to go and people to see.
He wanted her to stay.
She was mouthy and stubborn, but he liked her energy. He also liked her sense of loyalty to her kitchen team. Trace knew all about the importance of team loyalty.
But five hours to make one cake?
He felt a dull ache at his shoulder and grimaced. He was regretting his wrestling match with the big mixer, but he hadn’t done any real damage. Any pain had been more than offset by her smile of thanks and gentle kiss.
Great mouth, too.
Then he shrugged off the memory. She wasn’t his type. He’d always favored leggy blondes or sultry brunettes, women who liked to feel a man’s body fast and hard, without much discussion.
He rubbed his neck and wondered why the other women he could remember suddenly seemed pale and uninteresting.
He glanced at his watch.
Vintage champagne, he thought wryly. But first he was going to chew someone’s butt for closing the loading door without maintaining direct visual contact with the area. There was probably an override switch somewhere, but it was nowhere in sight, and someone could have been killed beneath the heavy door. The hotel was damned lucky that their only casualties were a forklift truck and a Hobart mixer.
After he retrieved his uniform jacket from the kitchen, he’d report that problem to security.
“LOOKING FOR SOMEONE?” Wolfe stole through the crowd, his smile forced.
“Just an escape route. I found the missing champagne. The senator’s wife seemed very happy.” Trace set his untouched glass of punch on a nearby table. “Is it just me or do these things keep getting worse?”
“Yes,” Wolfe said cryptically. “Don’t look now but the senator is gesturing. We should go make nice-nice.”
Trace uttered a sound of pain and eyed the open bar wistfully. “I didn’t sign up to play nice. I signed up for det cords and delayed rocket rounds.”
“Welcome to the New Navy,” Wolfe muttered.
TEN MINUTES LATER Trace stood at the back of the crowded room finishing a shrimp canapé that tasted like cardboard. To his left a journalist was trying to draw Wolfe into an argument about the necessity of collateral damage during wartime operations. Not that he’d succeed.
Finally Wolfe broke away, looking harassed as a woman slid a business card with her phone number into his pocket. “If I’m not brain dead, I will be in another five minutes.” Wolfe glanced at his watch, then examined the thinning crowd. “We’re done here. Let’s roll.”
“Hallelujah.” Trace headed to the door without a backward glance. He and Wolfe said polite goodbyes to the senator and his wife, then breathed a sigh of relief when they reached the elevators.
Trace consulted his memory of the hotel floor plan and hit the elevator button down.
“Fourth floor?” Wolfe raised an eyebrow as Trace pulled a bright pink sweater out of a brown paper bag. “I don’t think pink is your best color, O’Halloran.”
“I have to drop this off at a lecture downstairs. I won’t be long.”
The elevator doors opened at four.
“There’s a story here somewhere.” Wolfe stared at Trace, then shrugged. “None of my business, though. Downstairs. Five minutes. There’s a beer back at our hotel with my name on it.”
“Roger that.”
ALMOST DONE, Gina thought.
The crème brûlée demonstration had received wild applause, with her cake decorating tutorial a close second. She was pretty sure she had flecks of buttercream frosting in her hair, but she was too tired to care. All she wanted was to get back to the ship, kick off her shoes and unwind.
Then she saw the white uniform at the back of the room and all thoughts of relaxing vanished. He’d actually tracked her down. She’d expected him to be distracted and forget all about her.
She tried to focus on the food critic in the front row. The man tugged at his small goatee, launching into his third convoluted question.
Meanwhile, Trace was handing her sweater to Reggie. The two spoke quietly and Reggie nodd
ed.
Please get his phone number, Gina prayed.
She cleared her throat. “I think this will be our last question.” She smiled but made a point of glancing at her watch.
“Ms. Ryan, the New York Times recently quoted a food writer who said that imported chocolate is the new sex. Any comment?”
Gina waited a beat and smiled. “Was something wrong with the old sex?”
When the laughter stopped, she cut to a brief review of quality, artisanal imported chocolates, outlining her personal favorites. Then she wrapped up the session.
When she glanced at the back of the room, Trace was staring at her, smiling.
He raised his hand.
“Yes? The man in the uniform,” Gina said a little breathlessly.
“Don’t get me wrong, ma’am. I like good chocolate as much as the next guy. But the way I see it, sex is always going to have it over chocolate.”
Laughter broke in another wave.
He gave her a calm two-finger salute that sent the dark flutter nose-diving through her chest. Before Gina could answer, a man with a camera cut in front of her and she was caught in a TV interview.
When she looked up, Trace was gone.
CHAPTER NINE
One day later
THE SHIP’S LOWER DECKS were packed. While passengers lined up for entrance upstairs, uniformed workers raced past the lower loading areas with cans, food boxes and equipment.
Gina leaned against a rail, watching huge drums of cooking oil being rolled toward the ship’s stores. The head of beverage services stood in the middle of the chaos, looking perfectly made up and very smug. Gina wasn’t up with all the fashion trends, but she suspected that Blaine Richardson’s cropped red sweater was a Prada original. How you could afford designer clothes on a head of beverage service’s salary was a mystery to Gina. Then again most things about Blaine were a mystery to Gina.
As a seabird circled overhead, she rubbed her neck, smoothing knots of tension. All she wanted to do was sit down and close her eyes for a few minutes before the dinner madness began, but that clearly wasn’t going to happen.
Blaine was gesturing to her from the deck, and talking to Blaine was never a good thing.
Gina crossed the deck warily. “You wanted something?”
“No, but you will.”
The mysterious act again. “I don’t see any problems, Blaine. I logged all my stores in the ship’s computer three days ago. I’m good to go.”
Blaine studied a crimson nail and yawned. “Really?”
Whenever Blaine struck a casual pose like this, disaster always waited right around the corner.
“There’s no problem for me. But you’ve definitely got one. You should have been here earlier when the men began to load. There were space issues inside one of the refrigerated units. You remember when the thermostat started acting up, don’t you?” Her voice was sweet.
About as sweet as poisoned fruit, Gina thought. “That thermostat was supposed to be replaced here in California.”
“Afraid they couldn’t find the right parts.” Blaine studied another crimson nail. “That means no repair and no guarantees on anything stored in that unit.” She yawned dramatically. “Lucky for me that I’m an early riser. I made sure that all my stores were put in the functioning units. Since you weren’t here…”
The workers had diverted her food to a malfunctioning unit?
Gina stiffened, hit by a wave of anger. The day before she had been busy doing a favor for the cruise line bigwigs. Earlier in the morning she had had to catch up with her work on board. Meanwhile, the Wicked Witch of the West had been here sabotaging her pastry stores. Any pastry chef knew that chocolate was very temperature-sensitive, with an ideal storage temperature between fifteen and eighteen degrees centigrade. Fluctuations in temperature could result in melting and subsequent recrystalization of the cocoa butter fat. The surface powder or “bloom” was death to good pastry, requiring a new round of tempering.
Now Gina would have to beg, wheedle and trade favors to find adequate space for her sensitive chocolates and edible flowers in the ship’s already tight refrigerated areas. There was no way she’d ask Blaine to share her space.
Not that asking would help.
Never pleasant, Blaine had lapsed into full bitch mode after she learned that Gina was being considered for a food series on national TV. Since that day three months ago, it had become Blaine’s sole goal in life to beat out Gina with her own wine series, and her sabotage efforts were becoming more difficult to avoid. Gina had spoken to the head of food services twice, but he had been no help.
No surprise there. Blaine was boffing the man every chance she got. There was little that didn’t get noticed aboard a crowded ship, and crew gossip had pinpointed the spots and times, right down to the noise level and positions involved.
Ugh. Some details you just didn’t want to know.
“Thanks for all your help, Blaine.” Gina’s voice was icy. “You’re a real team player.”
Blaine buffed another nail. “Nobody said it was a team sport, honey. Just remember. If I don’t get a TV series, then nobody on board does.”
“Wow. Now there’s a healthy adult attitude.”
Much as she would have liked to, Gina didn’t stay around to trade insults.
She had a pallet of varietal semisweet chocolate to rescue before it started to sweat.
WHEN GINA TURNED into the corridor to the rear storage area, she nearly ran into her Brazilian sous chef. Andreas looked exhausted and worried. “He wants you and it’s not pretty.”
“Who wants me?” Gina ran through any recent problems with personnel, management or the captain and was relieved when she found none.
“Tobias Hale from security. He was down at the kitchen ten minutes ago. And ten minutes before that. He said you were to go straight to his office as soon as you came aboard.”
“Can’t. Gotta go save a ton of expensive chocolate from imminent peril. The Wicked Witch sent them over to the malfunctioning cooler.”
Andreas muttered a string of harsh words in Portuguese street slang. “You want me to help you with this transfer?”
“I can manage. But come back when you’ve finished checking on the tarts for dinner. We may have to work fast.”
“Nothing to sweat for, boss.” Andreas’s English was very good, but he occasionally mixed an idiom. “I will come soon. But Tobias—”
“Can wait.” The ship’s security chief was six feet five inches tall, built like an oak tree and had the smooth, dark features of a slightly younger James Earl Jones. He stopped fights with one glance and shot fear into the hearts of boisterous travelers and drunken crew alike. Because of him the ship never had security problems. The crew scuttlebutt said that he was a former CIA operative; others said he was ex-Delta Force. Maybe both were right.
His orders were never ignored.
But Gina did that now. She had her food to protect.
She was racing along the corridor to the galley so fast that she didn’t see a hand truck half hidden by a box of cleaning supplies. Her ankle hit metal and she went flying headfirst, skinning her palms, elbows and one cheek.
Closing her eyes to the sudden burst of pain, she sat up slowly.
A worried face loomed over her. The cleaning man shoved his hand truck back against the wall. “You okay? I had to use the bathroom. Sorry about that. Hey, you’re the one who made the rum cake for my birthday last month. Man, it was great.” He offered her his hand and tugged her to her feet.
Gina blinked, feeling a little dizzy. “Glad to hear you liked it.”
“Ma’am, you don’t look so good. You want me to get someone—like a doctor or something?”
“I’ll be fine. Just be sure you store that hand truck so no one else trips over it.”
“Sure. Real sorry about that. By the way, Tobias Hale is looking for you.”
Great.
Gina dug a tissue from her pocket and limped off. Most of the blood wa
s gone by the time she located her chocolate pallet, just in time to keep it from being loaded into the cooler with the unreliable thermostat. After fifteen minutes of mixed pleas, promises and threats, she found an alternate berth in a different unit, but it meant volunteering to prepare special desserts for staff dinners the following month.
Next time she’d definitely beat Blaine to the dock. And until then she’d remember to watch her back.
When Gina finally reached the kitchen, she sank wearily into a chair, kicked off her shoes and pressed a bag of ice against her bruised cheek.
“Want to tell me what you are doing?”
“Resting?” She didn’t look up. She knew that deep voice, and there was no ignoring its edge of anger. “I had to rescue some chocolate.” She sighed. “And after that I was trying to avoid running into you.”
“In my office.” There was steel in Tobias Hale’s order. “Five minutes, Gina. Otherwise I’ll put you on report.”
If she hadn’t been so tired, she would have jumped up and saluted. “Aye-aye, sir.”
“Don’t bother sounding nice and obedient. We both know you’d like to insert one of your favorite knitting needles up my…nose. So stop smiling and get over to my office.”
One more fire to put out, Gina thought wearily. What had she done to piss off Tobias so royally?
She rubbed a fresh trickle of blood off her cheek and wiggled back into her shoes. Whoever thought cooking was glamorous needed to have a serious mental evaluation.
CHAPTER TEN
“YOU SHOULD HAVE told me.”
“Told you what?” Gina paced Tobias’s small office, watching seabirds rocket past the porthole. The ship was two hours out of San Francisco, following the curve of California south to Mexico. Given the hum of the big engines, she put their speed around fifteen knots.
Funny how she’d picked up the maritime life. Now it seemed like second nature. She was going to miss all of this when she left.
When she had to leave.
She prayed it wouldn’t be soon.
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