Wrapping one arm around her waist and the other under her bottom, Beckett stood with Hope in his arms. Without a word, he strode over and shut the bedroom door. The only light in the room was coming from the twinkly lights that were still on outside. He walked them over to his bed and lay her down on top of it before taking a step back.
Hope began to squirm under the intensity of his gaze. Never in her life had a man looked at her like this. Boldly, she reached out a hand for him and smiled when he accepted it and came down beside her on the bed. “That’s better,” she said and cupped his face in her hand.
“I can’t believe that you’re really here,” Beckett said, his own hand now skimming her face.
“I really am.”
“If you’d like, I can light a fire in here. This one’s a gas fireplace so I only have to flip a switch.”
As much as she hated the thought of him getting up, the thought of the fire was a little too enticing. “I think I’d like that.” She watched as Beckett got up and walked over to the stone fireplace and flipped a switch that seemed to be hidden within the stone and then he was back beside her and then rolling onto his side and pressing closer to her.
“We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,” he said, his voice low. “I’d be happy just to have you here beside me so I could hold you all night.”
And in that moment, Hope knew she was lost.
There was no doubt that he was as turned on as she was and there was no doubt that two minutes ago, they were ready to get naked and devour one another. But to hear him say that he wouldn’t mind just holding her, that meant more than anything else Beckett could have said. And looking up into his eyes, Hope knew he was speaking the truth.
“I want you to hold me, Beckett,” she said slowly, “but not until you’re done making love to me.”
The smile that washed over his face was one of wonder and relief. “My pleasure.”
***
Hope felt positively boneless.
And in the best way possible.
True to his word, Beckett was holding her close – her head nestled on his shoulder, her hand on his bare chest. She sighed with contentment and smiled when she felt him kiss the top of her head. They had been lying there like this in the firelight without saying a word for quite some time. For Hope, she was quiet because there were no words to describe exactly what she was feeling. Everything she and Beckett had done in this room, in this bed, had been mind blowing.
It wasn’t simply about orgasms, although there were many; it was about the way he made her feel inside. Every touch of his hands, every move of his body was everything she’d ever dreamed of in a lover. It was as if he knew her, really knew her, because it seemed to be Beckett’s sole intention to please her. Any time she’d tried to reciprocate, he’d somehow maneuvered them until she was crying out with pleasure.
Definitely not a bad way to spend the night.
They’d made love for what seemed like hours and Beckett’s eyes had never left her face. He’d already told her how expressive her face was but now, after watching his just as intently, she could say the same for him. This wasn’t only about physical release, Hope felt like she could see clear to Beckett’s soul.
And it scared the heck out of her.
***
The snow had finally tapered off and the skies were clearing and if he was guessing correctly, Beckett would say that the moon was fully visible now. He glanced over at the clock and saw it was after one in the morning. Hope was asleep in his arms and he closed his eyes and just enjoyed the feeling of having her there.
He wasn’t lying earlier when he admitted that he’d wanted her ever since he first saw her. The problem was that he knew how much she hated him. Never in his life had Beckett had to lie about who he was, but with Hope, it was the only way for her to give him a chance. Women threw themselves at him all the time, and for the most part, Beckett was flattered by the attention. He’d grown up as a shy, computer geek and to see and have all kinds of beautiful women vying for his attention was a real ego boost for a long time.
Then he realized it wasn’t him they were throwing themselves at, but his money.
But with Hope, knowing how things started out with them and seeing how they were right now, he knew that his money had nothing to do with it. She was here because of him. Beckett. Not G.B. James or James Enterprises, but just him. His heart seemed to lurch at the thought of it. Without conscious thought, he held her a little bit tighter.
This was something that he never did, spend the entire night with a woman in his own bed. Hell, who was he kidding? He never spent an entire night in any bed with any woman. Because his relationships tended to lean toward the superficial, it wasn’t unusual to get up and leave once they were done. And Beckett never – never! – had a woman back to his place and certainly not in his bed.
Until Hope.
Why it was her? Beckett couldn’t say. The attraction was instantaneous, but even when she mentioned her dislike of the head of the company, Beckett didn’t take it so much as a challenge but more of a desire to get to know her. It was never about changing her mind. Well, maybe it was a little, but the more time they spent together, and it wasn’t much, it became more important for him to be the person who he used to be, the person who he truly wanted to be and, deep down, still was. And would probably still continue to be if the population as a whole wasn’t out to try and get something from him every time he blinked.
Employees wanted favors – extra time for projects, to leave early, to come in late…the list was endless. Friends had started to look to him for some of the perks her could afford – VIP seats to concerts and sporting events, entry into the newest clubs and restaurants. Some had even asked for cash to start up businesses or to buy a car or a house.
But the worst had been his own family.
When his father passed away, as the oldest child in the family, Beckett had inherited the company that his grandfather began more than forty years ago. It wasn’t only because he was the oldest that he got it, however, it was because he was the only one in the family who actually had taken an interest in it and had worked there.
For as long as he could remember, Beckett used to love to go and tour the hotels with his grandfather. They’d walk the properties, inspect the rooms and talk about where to make improvements that were needed, but most of all, his grandfather had taught him how to see the potential in a property and how to turn one around.
Luckily, Beckett had a natural inclination toward business management and it had helped him to take James Enterprises from being a little-known name in the hospitality industry to one in the top ten. As the success of the company grew with Beckett at the helm, his siblings had suddenly started to take interest.
Or so he’d thought.
First, his brother Logan had come to see him. Beckett had always thought that they were close but Logan never wanted to be involved in the business. He thought that hotels and hotel management wasn’t a masculine kind of career and instead had become a mechanic. Logan presented a very loosely-planned idea of having mechanics on-site at some of the hotels.
Like the ones that Logan lived near.
He’d be the resident mechanic and if a guest was having car trouble, Logan would be given the business. All he wanted in return, besides all the money for the repairs, was for Beckett to set him up with a state-of-the-art custom garage and a list of all of the hotel guests so that Logan could reach out and market to them.
Except, he expected Beckett’s marketing department for the hotels to handle that for him.
Beckett had quickly told him that there was no way the company was going to do any of those things and Logan had stormed off while calling him every name in the book and telling him to go to hell.
No one else in the family mentioned it, but there was one less person at Christmas that year.
Not long after Christmas, his sister Julie had invited him to dinner to meet her fiancé Colton. His sister was al
ways his weak spot. Because she was the baby of the family and she reminded him so much of his mother, Beckett always seemed to overcompensate wherever she was concerned. And he never minded doing it. Why? Because Julie always seemed to feel bad about the things Beckett did for her and she never asked for anything.
Until that night.
Colton started his sales pitch as soon as Beckett had walked in the door. He’d barely had his coat off before the man started asking about the hotels and the supplier for clothes with the hotel logos on them. Seriously? Beckett had played it cool and tried to get a feel for where it was all leading. Then Colton mentioned that he did silk screening on t-shirts out of his garage and thought he’d be the perfect guy to do apparel for the hotels. When Beckett had asked him how he expected to do that kind of quantity of merchandise, Julie chimed in by saying that Beckett could set them up with a printing shop.
Um…no.
And that was the last time he’d seen or spoken to his sister.
Hope hummed in her sleep and Beckett placed a light kiss on her forehead. It was because of his family that he didn’t extend favors to anyone and he certainly didn’t like to mix business with his employees’ family members.
He wasn’t stupid. He remembered Ted coming to him with Hope’s proposal to do a small café in one of the newer hotels they were opening in the Raleigh area and Beckett had turned her down. She had a solid business plan with the exception of not having enough startup capital and if she and Ted weren’t related, he actually might have considered it. But he’d learned the hard way that you can’t mix the two, ever. Eventually, things were going to go south and it was just easier to have no real connection to your tenants, employees, suppliers…any of them.
Of course that meant that he was cutting himself off from a lot of people. To date, James Enterprises owns over one hundred resorts worldwide. The office in Raleigh housed over five hundred employees. And the amount of suppliers they had on the payroll was endless. Suffice it to say, he kept his distance from them all for the sake of self-preservation.
Until now.
What would happen tomorrow? What would happen when, and if, Ted returned? Would Hope expect him to give her brother his job back? Would she expect him to reconsider her business proposal? For a brief moment, his mind filled with negative scenarios and then he felt her lips softly kissing his chest.
Beckett could admit that he didn’t know everything there was to know about Hope Cooper, but what he did know was that she was fiercely independent and didn’t look for handouts. She’d created her own business when most people would have been satisfied collecting a paycheck for having to do an easy job. She was generous to a fault and if anything, she encouraged her brother to stand up for himself rather than sitting back and letting others dictate to him how to live.
No, Hope wasn’t going to make any demands on him, of that he was certain. But there was no doubt that things were going to change once her brother showed up. The weather gave them a slight reprieve, a chance for them to actually get to know one another and to explore the relationship that had begun weeks ago. He knew she was going to leave and so was he. They both had lives back in Raleigh and this was just a chance opportunity.
He just didn’t want her to leave so soon.
A yawn escaped before he could stop it. He needed sleep. It had been a long day and even though he normally didn’t sleep very much, for the first time in a long time, his mind wasn’t going a million miles an hour with work stuff. He was kind of feeling mellow, relaxed.
“Beckett?” she whispered in the dark and immediately, his body seemed to rejuvenate itself. Hope’s hands began to wander, along with her mouth, and this time, Beckett let himself simply lie back and let her lead.
****
The next time Hope woke up, she was alone.
The room was bright due to the sun being up and reflecting against the crisp whiteness of the snow. She slowly sat up in the bed and looked around the room. The clock on the bedside table showed that it was after nine. She couldn’t even remember the last time she had let herself sleep in.
A little bit thankful that she was alone, Hope climbed out of the bed and quickly gathered her clothes that were scattered all over the floor and got dressed. She had no idea where Beckett was but hopefully she’d be able to leave the room and go upstairs to her own so she could shower and change before seeing him.
Or anyone.
Slowly opening the door, she looked out into the study and didn’t see him. Feeling like she was a spy in stealth mode, she made her way across the room, out to the entryway and up the stairs and breathed a sigh of relief when she made it to her room without seeing either Beckett or Norma. Her heart was beating rapidly and she leaned her back against the door and slid to the ground and wondered what she had done.
She had slept with the enemy.
That thought immediately felt wrong and she shook her head. Beckett wasn’t the enemy and she needed to stop thinking of him like that. He ran a huge company that spanned who-knew how many places and he had a right to run it any way that he wanted or needed to. Hope was ashamed at the way she had judged him all these years. Now that she was getting to know him, she knew that there was more to him than just being the head of a major corporation.
He was a man who she enjoyed being with.
A man who made her smile.
A man she was falling in love with.
Uh-oh…
That was the first time she allowed herself to even think such a thing but now that she had, Hope knew it to be true. She was falling in love with Beckett. Not Ted’s boss or the CEO, but the man. Wow. Now what was she supposed to do?
A man like Beckett was probably used to dating debutantes and socialites, not computer geeks who played video games and went to Comic-Con. Yikes. She was in so much trouble and way out of her league. Jumping to her feet, Hope went and pulled her phone out of her purse and tried calling Ted. She needed him to come and get her no matter what, before she made an even bigger fool out of herself and told Beckett how she felt.
Of course the rat-fink didn’t answer his phone. She tried dialing Merry’s number but it went to voicemail too. At least Merry had an excuse. Ted, on the other hand, was going to be on the receiving end of a major hissy fit when he finally decided to show his face.
With nothing left to do, Hope tossed her phone back in her purse and went and took her shower. Thirty minutes later, she felt a little more in control of herself. A hot shower, fresh clothes, and no more morning breath meant she could face the day with at least a little bit of confidence.
When she arrived down in the kitchen, she found Norma sitting and having a cup of tea and reading a book. “Good morning,” she said shyly and smiled when Norma smiled.
“Oh, good morning, Hope. I trust you slept well,” Norma said as she stood and walked over to the stove. “Would you like tea or coffee? There’s juice in the refrigerator if you’d prefer.”
“Um…juice would be fine.” She turned to get it herself, but Norma playfully swatted her away and told her to sit down. “You don’t have to wait on me. Seriously. I don’t mind getting things for myself.”
“Nonsense. You’re a guest here.”
“Not really. More like an accidental tourist.”
Norma laughed. “Either way, you’re here and I don’t mind waiting on you. I baked some muffins this morning. I’ve got blueberry and banana chocolate chip and…”
“Ooo…banana chocolate chip sounds wonderful!”
“Believe me, they are. Those are Beckett’s favorite too.”
It was starting to get a little eerie how much they had in common and how in sync they were with one another. “Do you think I could just have a glass of milk with that instead?”
Norma laughed again.
“What? What’s so funny?”
“That’s exactly how he has his too!” She shook her head as she poured Hope a glass of milk and then went and put a muffin on a plate. “I’m just going to warm th
is up for a few seconds in the microwave. They should still be a little warm, but…just in case.”
“Thank you.” When the timer beeped, Norma took the plate and placed it on the table along with the glass of milk. Hope thanked her again. “So, any update on the roads? Are they cleared and open?”
“Actually, I didn’t watch the news this morning. We have a television in the common area and down in the game room…or even up in your room but I think most of the morning news shows are over by now. Maybe you can ask Beckett to go online and check for you.”
Sure, that was one way she could go but right now she still didn’t feel confident in facing Beckett. What they had shared last night left her feeling weak and needy and totally wanting more. She knew he’d see it in her face immediately. For now, she was happy to hide out in the kitchen behind this softball-sized muffin and stay uninformed about the road conditions.
“I hope you don’t mind, but I moved all of your cookie tins to the dining room on the buffet. This way they're accessible if either you or Beckett want them.”
“You’re welcome to have some too, Norma. There’s obviously enough for a small army there.” They laughed. “I’ve been baking for weeks and as much as I enjoy it and I love all of the cookies that I make, I really don’t want to take any back home with me.”
“I’m sure Beckett wouldn’t mind you leaving some with him.”
“Leaving some of what?” he asked as he strode into the room.
At just the sight of him, Hope felt her heart go crazy and her cheeks heat.
“Cookies. I told Hope that I moved all of her cookies to the dining room and she said that she didn’t want to take them back home with her. I figured you wouldn’t mind her leaving some behind for you.”
Beckett smiled at Norma and then at Hope and in that minute she knew…he knew.
And there wasn’t a muffin big enough to hide behind.
Chapter Seven
Stranded: A Winter Romance Duet Page 12