Bemused, Nell looked from the door that Delia had just closed to the dresses lying in an untidy heap atop her binder and lists.
She took them by the hangers and smoothed them out, intending to just move them out of her way. But then her gaze fell on the shoes, pretty confections of narrow, velvety black straps with just a hint of sparkle on the delicate buckle.
They were pumps, all right. Closed toe, which would cover her naked, unpainted toenails, but otherwise as different from her chunky-heeled plain Janes as they could get.
And they were a size eight.
She hung the dresses on the back of the door and then kicked off her own shoes, tossing them to the corner.
Then feeling oddly trepidatious, she stepped into the black shoes and worked up the little zippers on the backs, then fastened the sparkling buckles that held the straps wrapped high around her ankles.
She straightened. She wouldn’t have had a single female cell operating inside her if she’d been unable to appreciate the shoes. They were beautiful. Sexy, without being anywhere near as flashy as Delia’s ruby reds.
She brushed her hands down her shapeless dress.
Then she made an impatient sound and whipped it off her head. It landed in a heap atop the shoes banished to the corner and she turned to the dresses Delia had brought. They were both black. One had spaghetti straps and a slit that went up the thigh. The other looked like a tuxedo jacket, with a softly shining satin collar and buttons that ran all the way down the front of it.
She undid the buttons and pulled the lined dress over her shoulders, certain that it would be too tight. Particularly if it had come from Delia’s own closet. The younger woman was shorter and smaller.
But when Nell buttoned the first button, it fastened easily. And so did the next. And the next.
She wished she had a mirror. But even without one, she knew the front of the dress was too low cut for her plain beige bra, so she quickly pulled that off, too. She yanked the elastic band out of her hair and raked her fingers through it with one hand while she began the task of rebuttoning with the other.
She heard the door open behind her and automatically took a few steps away so Delia could enter. “I can’t believe it fits.” She was bent forward a little in order to reach the bottom buttons near the thigh-length hem. “When you said you’re never wrong, you meant it.”
“I appreciate the vote of confidence.”
She whirled, then nearly tripped herself on the unfamiliarly high heels.
“Whoa there, Nelly.” Archer’s eyes were glinting as he caught her shoulders, steadying her before she landed against him. His green gaze ran over her from head to toe, leaving her feeling extremely flushed in all the parts in between. “Whoa there, Nelly,” he repeated, a lot more softly.
Her breath felt so uneven, she might well have just run up and down a few flights of stairs. With the additional height of the heels came a brand-new vantage point on Archer’s face. Her eyes were almost level with his. “I thought you were Delia.”
His fingers tightened against her shoulders. “As you can see—” his gaze dropped for a moment and her lips tingled “—not so much. I recognize her influence, though. You look...different.”
A warmth centered somewhere in her midriff began spreading. Upward. Downward. The lining of the dress felt cool and slick against her skin. Her bare breasts. It wasn’t a familiar sensation. But it was one worth savoring. Particularly when he was looking at her the way he was.
She moistened her lips, knowing the answer even before she asked, but wanting to hear him say it anyway. “Good different or bad different?”
“What do you think?”
She thought that not sleeping on the cleanest sheets in his house the night before was one of the biggest mistakes she’d ever made. Bigger than any mistake she’d feared she’d make by doing so.
She leaned two inches closer and pressed her mouth to his.
She felt the fast breath he drew. Felt his hands go from her shoulders, down her arms, then up her hips to her waist. Pulling her closer while memories and sensation exploded inside her cells and he angled his head, deepening the kiss that went on and on and on.
She felt his hair sliding through her fingers. Cool. Slick. Felt the brush of his cheek against hers as his head dipped and he kissed her jaw. Warm. Rasping. Felt the linen weave of his shirt when she ran her palms down his chest. Crisp. Hot.
Her head was heavy on her neck and her fingers found purchase in one of his denim belt loops as she lowered her head over him and his head dipped even farther.
He kissed the pulse raging in her throat, the valley of skin just above the low-cut first button of her borrowed dress. His hands cupped her breasts through the fabric and she couldn’t stop the moan rising in her throat. A moan that was his name. “Archer.”
His mouth trailed fire up to her mouth again. “Cornelia,” he whispered and kissed her again and she felt his fingers tangling in her hair and her mind simply blanked out anything other than him. Other than the warmth of him. The taste. The scent. The wonderful, wonderful feel of him. Again when it had been so, so very long—
Then she felt the hard, cold surface of her desk beneath her and sanity reared its head.
Vivian’s cocktail party was waiting.
She couldn’t be doing this with Vivian’s grandson! Not when there were probably guests already driving up to the house. When Montrose was hopefully putting aside his arrogant sneer as he showed the guests to the patio and the not-quite-ostentatious flowers and maybe, maybe some food—
“Wait, wait.” Gasping, she grabbed for Archer’s hands.
And realized with a start that was fueled far more by thrill than dismay that those hands were on her skin.
Her bare skin.
Her borrowed dress was gone altogether. His shirt was unbuttoned, hanging loosely off his broad shoulders, his jeans undone.
When had that happened?
“Archer,” she tried again. And then gasped because his hand was sliding over her, finding her center right through her panties. She was so wet and so empty and had been for so long, that instead of reason, she embraced the insanity. She held his hand even tighter against her as she shuddered and tried to bite back her cry while his breath sounded even rougher against her ear as he urged her on.
But even as pleasure racked her, it wasn’t enough.
Not giving a thought to anything else, she kicked off her panties and slid her legs along his hips, dragging him closer, wrapping her hand around him. Thrilling at the hard, pulsing heat of him.
“Now,” she managed throatily. Begging. Demanding.
Either way it didn’t matter, because he was there, there where she needed, pressing, filling, and she surrounded him with her legs and her arms. His mouth was open against her throat, his breath just as ragged as hers, her name just as much a groan on his lips.
“So long.” His voice was a deep growl that stroked over her nerves as surely as he stroked her so deeply inside. “Too long.”
Then she was beyond hearing anything because he was at the core of the world tightening inside her, tightening until there was no more room to give and every cell she possessed exploded outward in shimmering, brilliant perfection.
Afterward, she didn’t know how long she lay there on her desk, Archer’s head against her breast while their panting breaths finally quieted. While the bells inside her veins stopped jangling. The cymbals in her nerves stopped crashing.
She was vaguely aware of something sharp digging into her right shoulder blade. Of an ache in her left knee where it was still hooked around him.
“I may never move again,” Archer mumbled against her. But he put lie to those words by cupping her breast in one hand and running his tongue over her nipple.
The shaft of sensation streaking through her was almost painful in her satiated state and sh
e laughed weakly. “Don’t. Torture.”
He braced his hands on either side of her and pushed upward. His hair was messy and falling over his brow and his bare chest bore a sheen of sweat. And his eyes, so deeply green, were almost enough to make her pull him down to her all over again.
Particularly when the corners of his lips tilted in a wicked smile. “What’s a little torture?”
“This was completely unprofessional.” She winced a little as she unlatched her ankles.
He dropped a kiss on the point of her shoulder. “Then it’s a good thing I wasn’t looking for a professional.”
She found enough energy to glare at him. “Funny.”
“I thought so.” He straightened a little more, too, then winced himself and swore softly. “Your dorm room floor was softer than the edge of this desk.” He finally straightened all the way with a faint grunt. “I may never stand straight again.”
“At least you haven’t been tattooed by a computer keyboard.” She dragged the offending object from beneath her shoulder blade and weakly shoved it aside. It was easier to keep talking than to let the momentousness of what they’d done sink in. “And I don’t recall you protesting too much.” She slid off the desk, only then realizing that she was still wearing those sexy tall shoes.
His arm hooked her around the waist and he pulled her up flush against him. His gaze held her just as certainly as his arm did. “Neither did you, sweetheart.”
Her fingers curled against his chest and her skin prickled. “This, uh, this doesn’t change anything.”
One of his eyebrows went up. “Like what?”
She felt stupid for having said it. “I don’t know. But it just, you know. Doesn’t.” Brilliant, Nell. Just...brilliant.
“You’ll still feed the cat, then?”
“What? Why?”
He dropped a hard, fast kiss on her lips and gave her a decidedly inappropriate swat on the behind. One that caused an equally inappropriate zip of excitement to race right through the center of her.
“I need to be in Colorado for a few weeks. Maybe longer.” He hitched up his jeans and leaned over to grab his shirt off the floor. “Have a couple cases coming to a head and I need to be there.”
She felt a jab of unwarranted unease. His schedule had nothing to do with her. Nor did she want it to. He was Archer Templeton, for God’s sake. Just because he hadn’t said a word about clients needing him in Colorado the night before when he was busy making her his “succession plan” didn’t mean he was making them up. “You don’t have to explain anything to me.”
The look he gave her was so mild it would have alarmed her if she’d been the alarmable sort. It was the kind of look that said he knew she thought he was making excuses.
She looked away and picked up the tuxedo dress from the floor. She would have much preferred to pull on her own dress still heaped in the corner, even though it was just as shapeless now as it had been when she’d purchased it. But she couldn’t. Not with him watching her. So she pushed her arms into the long sleeves once again and began buttoning that long row of buttons.
She hadn’t even reached her waist when he brushed her hands aside to take over.
She damned the need that clutched at her insides when his knuckles brushed against her bare skin.
He obviously knew it, too, because he seemed to deliberately slow the task, and devilment was glinting in his eyes again. “The only reason I came here this evening was to tell you I had to leave town.”
“There’s this thing called a telephone.”
“Yeah.” He pushed through the button right below her navel. “But think of the fun we’d have missed.”
She willed the wobbliness out of her knees. “Your grandmother will be disappointed. She was expecting you here for her cocktail party.”
“She has you. She’ll be fine.”
At any other time, Nell might have appreciated his easy confidence of that fact, but it wasn’t any other time.
“You going to wear your panties?”
Her skin went hot all over. “Excuse me?”
He leaned over again and when he straightened, her plain cotton panties were dangling from his finger.
She snatched them away, then balled them in her fist behind her back when the door suddenly opened and Delia stuck her head in.
She looked surprised for a moment to see her cousin there. Then speculative as her gaze bounced from Archer to Nell and back again.
“Knew the dress would fit,” she said, and closed the door again.
Archer laughed softly. “Good thing she wasn’t here five minutes earlier.”
Nell just covered her face with her hand and wished the world would swallow her whole.
Chapter Twelve
The cocktail party was in full swing when Nell finally made it down to the patio some time later. She’d freshened up as much as she could in the powder room next to her office. She was still wearing the tuxedo dress, but at least her hair was back up in its familiar knot.
There was no sight of Delia among the people on the patio. As for Archer, he’d escaped the mansion.
As long as Delia never mentioned seeing him, his grandmother would never know that he’d been there at all.
Fortunately, Delia had been correct about Montrose. The buffet tables were positively glorious with their artful arrangements of meats and cheeses, fruits and breads. Wine was flowing. All of the guests were smiling and soft violin music—Vivian had been strangely specific about that—was coming from the speakers built into the covered patio. In the grounds beyond the patio, lights were beginning to shimmer among the trees bordering the sea of green grass, and Rambling Mountain’s peak seemed to glisten in the fading light.
As beautiful a sight as it was, Nell couldn’t appreciate the mountain. Not when it reminded her of how easily she’d let Martin manipulate her. And now, after Archer’s revelations, how he’d manipulated Meredith and Ros, too.
She turned away and grabbed a bottle of wine, working her way around the guests, topping off glasses as she went. Vivian, looking elegant in a gold tunic and black palazzo pants, was capably holding court.
It was still hard to believe she had any health problems at all.
Wine bottle emptied, Nell returned to the linen-draped table for another, then smiled when she saw Nick Ventura stepping through the opened glass doors between the solarium and the patio.
The sight of the tall, iron-haired man following on his heels made her eyes widen, though.
Everyone else seemed to have the same reaction at the sight of Squire Clay walking onto Vivian’s patio, because all the easy chatter suddenly died, leaving only the strains of Vivaldi from the speakers and the chirp of crickets from the grounds around them.
The elderly man pulled off his dark gray cowboy hat and gave them all an irksome look. “Put your jaws back on their hinges.” His gaze seemed to land on Vivian, who looked genuinely shaken.
So shaken that Nell quickly went to her. “Why don’t you have a seat, Vivian.” There were dozens of them—fancy ironwork things with deep custom-made cushions. And only some were actually being occupied. “I’ll bring you a small plate and Nick can get started on his presentation.” It was earlier than they’d planned in their timeline for the evening, but it would be a good way to distract attention away from Squire’s arrival. She pulled out the nearest chair. “Right here.”
“I’m not an invalid,” Vivian said with enough spirit that Nell’s concern dialed down a few notches. But her boss did sink onto the edge of the seat cushion a little less regally than usual. “Tell Montrose to bring me a Tom Collins.”
Then she looked at Squire and waved her hand imperiously toward the vacant chair across from her. “Do you have a cocktail preference, Mr. Clay?”
“Cut the bull, Vivian,” Squire said tersely. He yanked out the chair and folded his le
ngth into it. “You don’t want to drink cocktails with me any more ’n I want to drink ’em with you.”
Vivian gave Nell a pointed look and she quickly went in search of Montrose to prepare Vivian’s drink. They hadn’t planned on a full bar. Just wine and beer.
The chef was in the kitchen scooping tiny helpings of caviar onto equally tiny but elaborate edible structures. He gave her a heavy-lidded glare when she entered his domain.
“Vivian would like a Tom Collins.”
He sniffed. “I’ll get to it.”
“Now,” Nell said firmly. “Squire Clay just arrived and—”
Montrose lifted his bald head and something that might have been surprise entered his supercilious eyes. He set down the minute spoon and the tin of caviar and opened a glass-fronted cabinet filled with bottles.
A few moments later, he handed Nell a tall, slender ice-filled glass topped with a lemon twist and a cherry, and returned to his caviar task. “Now please leave,” he said haughtily.
With pleasure. “Thank you for the drink,” she said and left.
When she reached the patio once more, at least the two individuals seated alone together at the table no longer seemed to be quite the focus of everyone else’s attention. Particularly since Nick had his presentation projecting onto the white screen Nell had arranged for that purpose.
She set the cocktail at Vivian’s elbow, then moved quietly around to the buffet table.
“So.” Delia appeared seemingly out of nowhere and Nell nearly dropped the two plates she’d just picked up. “Archer.”
Nell flushed. She jabbed several pieces of cheese onto both plates. She kept her voice as low as Delia’s. “What about him?”
“You’re not his usual type.”
How well Nell already knew that. “I’m not interested in being anyone’s type.” She quickly added meats and two small arrays of crackers. Ignoring Delia, she returned to Vivian, placing one plate near the cocktail and the other near Squire. The two didn’t seem to be doing much besides glaring at each other, and Nell couldn’t help wondering what had made the water under their bridge so murky.
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