by Francis Ray
Sweet Temptation had been an instant success when it opened in Austin a month ago. If things continued to go as well, she planned on publishing a catalogue next year.
He glanced up the moment the door opened. Surprised delight shone on her lovely face as her gaze touched the huge slice of wedding cake, succulent slices of roast beef, smoked salmon, rolls, and champagne. “You always think of me.”
“And I always will.”
Lush flowers in the deepest hues scented the salt-tinged night air. A gentle wind rustled the palm trees. Standing on the stone terrace leading to the private beach two hundred feet away, Julia listened to the sounds of the waves crashing against the shore. Overhead, a full moon shone.
The secluded cottage was perfect for a honeymoon, Julia thought. As soon as they had arrived, she’d changed into her nightgown. After sharing a glass of champagne they had gone outside to enjoy the night. Happiness flooded her. No woman could be happier.
Chase’s strong arms slid around her waist from behind and pulled her up against him. His cheek rested against hers. “You want another glass of champagne?”
Snuggling closer, she felt the warmth and security and, yes, the temptation of his hard muscular body through her long sheer white robe and nightgown. Soon she could freely explore those temptations, but for now she was content. They had a lifetime ahead of them. She shook her head. “I have everything I want.”
His hold gently tightened. “Same here.”
“The wedding was beautiful.”
He slowly turned her and stared down into her face. “You’re beautiful.”
“Oh, Chase. You make me feel so special.”
“You are.” He kissed her forehead, her nose, her lips. “Not many women could open a new store and find a town house in a strange city while coordinating a big wedding hundreds of miles away.”
She grinned. “These past eight months have been busy, but my mother and sisters helped. I had a strong incentive to get everything done by May. Once we were married I didn’t want to be away from you.”
“Me neither. There’s nothing in the world more important than us. I plan to spend the rest of my life loving you.” His hands tenderly palmed her face. “Ever since you started down the aisle toward me, I’ve asked myself the question of how deeply could a man love a woman.”
“D-did you find an answer?” she asked, her voice tremulous.
“Partially.” Picking her up in his arms, he went into the bedroom, then placed her on the four-poster bed and came down beside her. “I finally figured out that discovering the answer will take a lifetime of loving you, watching our children grow inside you, growing old beside you, and it all begins now.”
“It all begins now,” she repeated, lifting her face to meet his kiss. Their journey was about to begin, a journey that had all started with a sweet temptation and would last a lifetime.
southern Comfort
ONE
Charlotte Duvall was a charmer. She was the kind of woman men noticed, and women aspired to emulate. It was impossible to remain detached and impersonal once you saw her and had been graced by her eloquent presence.
Vincent Maxwell had heard the flowery accolades often from his cousin, Brian, so much so that Vincent often wondered if his young and still highly impressionable twenty-four-year-old cousin was half in love with Charlotte. Vincent hoped not. Especially since Brian had recently announced his engagement to Emma Hamilton, a rather shy kindergarten teacher.
Vincent had liked Emma immediately when Brian brought her by his office several weeks ago. Sweet-faced with a lovely smile, the woman obviously adored Brian. She even laughed at his lame jokes. They seemed so right for each other. They were the same age and attended the same church.
However, in the weeks that followed, Brian had become increasingly vocal in his adoration of Charlotte. When Vincent mentioned his concerns to Brian, he always laughingly denied any romantic interest in Charlotte and assured Vincent that he would understand once he met her. With Brian’s wedding six weeks away, Vincent, as Brian’s best man and eldest cousin, felt it past time for him to meet this paragon of virtue and desire.
“I’m so glad you and Charlotte’s schedules have finally worked out so you can meet each other,” Emma said with a smile, her nut-brown face glowing with love and happiness. “I was afraid you two wouldn’t meet until the wedding rehearsal.”
“So am I,” Vincent said, sipping his tonic water. As tired as he was after a ten-hour day, if he drank anything alcoholic, he’d be asleep in an hour. In his briefcase, which he’d left in his car, was a three-inch stack of paperwork he needed to go through before a meeting at eight the next morning. He’d never been late with a report and he didn’t intend to start now. He’d pulled an all-nighter before. He could do it again. It was in Brian’s best interest that Vincent meet this Charlotte Duvall person ASAP. Even the name sounded seductive and mysterious.
Although Vincent hadn’t been around his cousin for years, he doubted Brian had much experience with women. Vincent had. Women could be as vicious and as devious as men in getting what they wanted.
His mouth tightened as he thought of Sybil Lamount. Beautiful, cunning, and heartless. A viper if ever there was one. She could ruin a person’s career and never lose a moment of sleep. Spoils of the game, she always said.
Vincent took a sip of his tonic water and found the taste as bitter as his thoughts. Forget her, forget the past, he chided himself. He had survived when others had not. His mind had to be on one thing and one thing only: re-engineering Ora-Tech Petroleum Company’s entire financial structure. The task was monumental, but in his three-month-old position as vice-president of finance, it was his job, and what he had been wooed away from Standard Securities in Boston to do. As with every job Vincent undertook, he planned to do it and do it well, no matter what.
“Charlotte works as hard as you do,” Brian put in from his place on the far side of Emma.
“Mmmm,” was all Vincent said. He doubted that very seriously. Women simply didn’t have the force of will or the single-mindedness that a man had. Most were too easily distracted by emotions. Of course, a few had made it to the top, but in doing so, in Vincent’s humble opinion, they had to compromise in some way. Their path was littered with broken relationships, rebellious children, and antacid bottles. Working sixteen hours a day or being gone ten to fifteen days out of a month didn’t go very well with caring for a family. Something went lacking. He’d seen it happen too many times in the past.
Or if they were as heartless as Sybil, they didn’t worry about any emotional attachments or the people they stepped on on their climb up the corporate ladder. The job was all that mattered and to hell with anything or anyone else. That was something of which he had personal knowledge.
“Charlotte’s almost as fantastic as Emma,” Brian said, his handsome face wreathed in a boyish grin.
Vincent easily shifted his thoughts back to the present. His onyx eyes narrowed on his cousin. There it was again, that open praise bordering on worshipfulness in Brian’s voice.
Even as a boy Brian had been impressionable. He’d been reared by easygoing, good-natured parents who believed the best of everyone. Vincent’s father, his namesake, often commented that William, his younger brother and Brian’s father, was every con man’s dream.
Vincent’s father had worried when William Maxwell moved his family from Connecticut to Dallas twenty years ago to teach philosophy at Southern Methodist University. Vincent’s father, a high-powered banking executive, was pragmatic. Vincent’s mother, the quintessential executive’s wife with a liberal arts degree from Vassar who could hold her own with Martha Stewart or B. Smith, was sensible. No one got to them. They had reared Vincent to be the same way.
“Oh, look. Charlotte’s here.”
Vincent glanced in the direction Emma was staring, but all he saw was the broad, black-tuxedoed back of the maître d’. Then the man moved and Vincent, renowned for keeping his calm in any situation, bar
ely kept his mouth from dropping open.
Surely he wasn’t seeing what he thought he was. No woman would be that bold. But as he stared all he could see was a smooth toffee-toned body draped in an oversized fringed shawl. The soft, iridescent material in shimmering bronze tones slipped off one golden brown shoulder revealing more bare skin and the lush swell of Charlotte’s breasts.
A hot ball of healthy lust rolled through Vincent. It seemed he had been right to be concerned about Brian. Few men would probably be immune to such an obvious temptation.
Smiling warmly, Charlotte said something to the overly attentive maître d’, then turned toward them, waved and started in their direction. For a long moment the man she walked away from stared wistfully after her, only looking away when a waiter came up to speak to him. Vincent could understand why.
The view from behind was probably just as enticing as the one in front. Her walk was a mixture of strut and saunter on impossible high-heeled leopard sandals that bared her feet and showed off trim ankles.
“Charlotte.”
Charlotte glanced around at the white linen-draped table-for-two she had been about to pass, then stopped abruptly and bent to hug the matronly woman in pearls and diamonds who had greeted her. Nimbly, Charlotte scooted around the table to the gray-haired man who had risen and gave him a hug as well.
In the three months Vincent had been in Dallas he’d noticed that people in the South were high on hugging and emotionalism. Bostonians as a rule weren’t so enthusiastic or demonstrative.
However, at the moment he was annoyed to find he also noticed how the deep fringe on the shawl lazily parted to provide a tantalizing glimpse of Charlotte’s shapely brown leg each time she bent over. It annoyed him further that as he glanced away he saw the rapt attention of several other men in the restaurant doing the same thing. It wasn’t difficult to see the open speculation in their faces as to what, if anything, lay beneath the shimmering shawl and if the material would rise further to give them the answer.
Vincent sat back against the leather booth, picked up his glass and studied the small fresh-cut floral arrangement on the table. He’d met that type of flamboyant woman before. Women like that held little interest for him. He preferred his women to be feminine and demure. Provocativeness belonged in the bedroom. Apparently no one had told Charlotte about subtlety. He would be civil to her because he had no choice. She was Emma’s maid of honor. He didn’t have to be her new best friend.
“Hi. Sorry I’m late.”
Despite his best effort to remain detached, the slow, husky Southern drawl stirred something within Vincent. It was the kind of voice lovers used when they were hot and sweaty and tangled in moonlight and each other. Because of his hectic schedule those nights were a distant memory.
“I’m just glad you’re here.” Laughing, Brian stood, his long, lanky arm curving affectionately around Charlotte’s slim waist as he kissed her offered cheek. Vincent cut a look at Emma to see if she disapproved of her fiancé kissing a woman who wore seduction so brazenly. To his surprise, Emma was smiling warmly.
“I’m just glad you and Vincent are finally meeting each other,” Emma said, her hand reaching out for Brian’s. He grasped it immediately. “The wedding is only six weeks away.”
“I wish it were tomorrow,” Brian said, squeezing Emma’s hand.
For a moment the two of them had eyes only for each other. Vincent almost breathed a small sigh of relief. Charlotte wasn’t an issue as he had suspected.
“I think they’ve forgotten about us,” Charlotte said lightly, her voice a smooth mix of silk and honey and magnolia blossoms. The pouty lower lip fit the seductive image the voice evoked—and so did the rest of the face, with its sharp cheekbones, thick black lashes over slumberous hazel eyes, and dainty nose.
Emma and Brian laughed, then he finished the introductions. “Charlotte Duvall, political fund-raiser extraordinare, long-time friend of the bride and maid of honor, meet Vincent Maxwell, financial wizard and Vice-President of Finance for Ora-Tech Petroleum Company, my favorite cousin, and best man.”
Vincent slowly came to his feet. It had been rude not to do so earlier, but he had reached that point in his life when he followed his own dictates in his personal life. “Ms. Duvall.”
A smile spread across Charlotte’s beautiful face. He noticed a tiny mole near the corner of her mouth. The top of her head barely reached the middle of his chest. She was smaller and daintier than he realized. More trouble. A man would feel protective toward a small woman, and he just bet Charlotte Duvall used that to her best advantage.
She held out her slender, French-manicured hand. “Please, call me Charlotte. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I was afraid you were a figment of Brian’s imagination.”
The way she seemed to center her attention entirely on a man had probably caused many to succumb and throw themselves at her feet. Vincent was made of sterner stuff. Courtesy, not interest, dictated his next movements. Her soft hand barely settled in his before he released it and stepped aside. “If you’ll have a seat, we can order.”
Charlotte kept the smile on her face with difficulty. She earned her living by being able to read people quickly and correctly. She’d bet the platinum card tucked in her Hermés bag that Vincent Maxwell didn’t like her. The limp handshake, the slight curl of his sensual upper lip, the disapproving black eyes all told the story. His loss.
She reached for her shawl. His broad shoulders stiffened.
Her brows puckered, then cleared as the reason came to her. She smiled to herself. The attire was designed to draw a man’s attention. It did the job extremely well and as her mother had always said, why wear something that no one notices?
The first time she had worn the outfit at a fund-raising dinner for the Sickle Cell Anemia Foundation, she’d been inundated with requests from women to have the designer’s name. She’d happily given them her sister’s name and address in Charleston, but the dress was one-of-a-kind, as were most of her clothes.
Charlotte smiled into Vincent’s tight face and slowly pulled the shawl from her shoulders, knowing that as she did she’d reveal her bare skin inch by inch until the light material slid over the low bodice of the leopard-print strapless dress. His eyes rounded.
After twenty-nine years she had gotten used to men’s reaction when they saw her breasts: She was top-heavy, but she no longer slumped her shoulders or wore oversized tops to hide what God had given her. Women went under the knife to get what she had naturally.
Sure the disapproving expression on Vincent’s face would vanish, she watched and waited expectantly. If anything, his mobile lips tightened even more. She admitted the bustier-style of the clinging dress plunged a bit, but it was in no way indecent. Stuffed shirt, she thought.
Only an uptight Yankee would think a Southern woman would appear in public so improperly dressed or disapprove of a little cleavage. To think, she had looked forward to finally meeting him. Dismissing Vincent, Charlotte slid into the booth. “Emma, I told you the meeting might run late and to order.”
Emma waved Charlotte’s words aside. The two-carat round diamond on the third finger of her left hand reflected a rainbow prism from the crystal chandelier several feet away. “It’s only a little past nine and since tomorrow is Friday, I can sleep in late on Saturday.”
Charlotte shook her head of shoulder-length auburn curls. She hated to be the bearer of bad news, but she had to do her duty. A duty that she had performed eight times in the past four years. With difficulty she shook away the unsettling memory of people’s comments at the last wedding where she had been the maid of honor, wanting to know when she was going to be a bride. She wondered the same thing.
“Saturday you and Brian are meeting at your parents’ house at ten to go over the final guest list and get the wedding invitations in the mail. Then at two you meet with Pastor Bailey in his study to confirm the ceremony details.”
Emma’s brown eyes sparkled with humor. “Sleeping late for me is any
time past eight. I get up at six on school days.”
Charlotte shuddered delicately. “You always did get up with the chickens. Brian, why don’t you get the waiter?” The words were barely out of her mouth before the waiter appeared. Somehow she knew the reason was the silent man sitting next to her.
“Please bring another menu,” Vincent requested.
“If you all know what you want, that won’t be necessary.” Charlotte smiled up at the waiter. “Hi, Louis.”
A flush climbed upward from the banded collar of the man’s white shirt. His Adam’s apple bobbed. “Good evening, Ms. Duvall. It’s nice to have you dining with us again.”
“Always a pleasure.” Putting her elbows on the table, she linked her slender fingers. “My friends were waiting on me. Please tell Pierre I’d consider it a favor if he’d do his magic and get our orders out as soon as possible.”
“Certainly, Ms. Duvall.”
She sent the young man another hundred-watt smile, then turned to Emma, who had a tiny, knowing smile on her own face. “You first.”
In less than a minute the waiter had hurried away to put in their orders, then returned almost immediately with Charlotte’s white wine. In less than two minutes their mushroom appetizers appeared. Aware that another customer’s order would be late, Charlotte guiltily speared one. But as was her understanding with the chef, the other customer’s appetizer was now complimentary and the cost billed to Charlotte’s account. While she enjoyed the ability to pamper her clients, she understood that the integrity and high standards of the five-star restaurant had to be maintained.
Although this wasn’t business, for some perverse reason she wanted to show Mr. Stuck-up he wasn’t all that. Just because he was an executive with a large firm didn’t mean squat. So what if he didn’t approve of her? There were plenty of people who did. She had clout, too.
But as the meal progressed and they were served their entrées, Charlotte became aware that not once had Vincent spoken directly to her. He smiled and chatted with Brian and Emma, but acted as if she wasn’t there. When she tested her theory and asked him a question, he gave the answer in precise diction as if he were reciting to his English teacher. One he didn’t particularly care for.