"Oh," he said, pulling his mouth away from hers. "Oh, Lily."
He let her have her way with him for another moment, and she enjoyed another leisurely, thorough, damp exploration of him. Then with a sudden, quick gesture, he moved himself away. With one swift action, he shed his trousers and socks, then hauled her up and into his arms and carried her toward his bed. With one hand, he jerked down the spread and blanket and sheets, then he lay her on her back in the middle and followed her down. Before she could say a word—not that she necessarily wanted to say anything at all—he covered her mouth with his in a heart-stopping kiss. She circled her arms around his neck and to pull him closer, and he nestled his big body alongside hers.
He nestled one of his legs between both of hers as he kissed her, pressing his chest against her breasts. His soft hair tickled her sensitive breasts, and the heat of his entire body seemed to surround her. Instinctively, Lily arched her body against him, an action that pushed her against his leg. She gasped at the contact, then repeated it, again and again, until his leg was damp with her desire.
With one final kiss, he turned her onto her side, facing away from him, and spooned himself against her. She started to object, but he began kissing her along her shoulder and covered her breast with one big hand. Then she felt the hard length of him nestling into the cleft in her fanny, and she couldn't quite form the words to say anything at all. He caught her nipple in the V between his index and middle fingers, rolling the taut little pebble as he squeezed her tender flesh hard. His other hand had flattened against her belly, but now crept lower, down to the dewy curls between her legs.
She caught her breath as he furrowed her, dragging his fingers through her damp, heated folds, penetrating her with one long finger over and over again. Lily moved a leg backward, hooking it over his calf, and a second finger joined the first, plowing deeper and more insistently than before. She reached behind herself, cupping her hand over his head again, and for a moment could only lie there as burst after burst of heat shot through her. Then, without warning, a white-hot explosion of sensation rocked her.
Before her orgasm could even begin to ebb, Leo turned her so that she lay on her back beneath him, then he knelt between her legs. In the next moment, he was sheathed in a condom and thrusting deep inside her, and the explosion that she had thought was ending doubled in its intensity.
Again and again he pumped inside her, and again and again she crested that wave only to ride it once more. Finally, when she thought she would die from the wanting, the craving, the needing, he lunged one last time against her, propelling himself deep, deep, inside her. As one, they cried out when he arched his back and emptied himself inside her. For one long moment, it was as if the two of them were suspended in space, unburdened by gravity or obligation or time. Then, slowly, Leo relaxed against her, withdrawing from her and rolling onto his back beside her.
All Lily could do was lie there motionless, with her eyes closed, wondering what had happened and why she suddenly felt as if she had no body, no mind, no soul. Then she remembered that she had just given all of them to Leo. Instead of alarming her, however, the knowledge of that comforted and gladdened her. Because she knew he had given freely of those things himself, to her, as well.
He turned his head and brushed a chaste kiss along her temple. "I'll be right back," he said before rising and making his way to a bathroom that adjoined his bedroom.
Lily wondered where he found the strength to move. She was overcome by a languid sense of peace and lethargy, and she never wanted to leave this place again. Never before had she made love to a man and felt so utterly full, so completely sated, so wonderfully right afterward. Yes, there were still things that she and Leo needed to work out, she thought vaguely, things she had to tell him and make him understand. But somehow, she was confident that he would understand. No two people could make love the way they just had and not be willing to make allowances for things they might not comprehend.
It was going to be okay, she thought. Whatever Leo was hiding from her, and whatever she was hiding from him, they would talk about it, and they would work through it. Whatever it took to make sense of things, whatever it took to forgive and move on, she was confident they would be able to manage it. They would both be honest with each other, and they would both understand. Of course they would.
Of course they would.
Leo propped himself up on one elbow to watch Lily as she slept beside him in his bed—in his bed, he marveled yet again—and couldn't help reaching out to touch her. With the index finger of one hand, he lightly traced her bare shoulder, drawing his fingertip along her collarbone, dipping into the elegant hollow at the base of her throat. She murmured something quiet and incoherent in her sleep, but didn't awaken. Reluctantly, he withdrew his hand, so that she would continue to sleep, so that he could continue to gaze upon her.
He would have thought that by now, he would have had enough of touching her, at least enough to get him through the night. They had made love twice, after all, the second time even more urgent than the first. But he simply could not resist reaching for her again, thumbing with feather-like lightness the fringe of dark bangs that brushed her forehead.
She lay on her side facing him, one hand loosely gripping his pillow, the other folded over her bare breasts. The sheet dipped low on her body, riding on the highest curve of her hip, and her skin shone like ivory in the pale light of the moon that filtered through the window beyond the bed. Her hair was a heavy black curtain of silk that spilled across her pillow and onto his, and, as if they couldn't quite help themselves, his fingers wandered into the dark tresses, sifting carelessly through them, threading lightly among them.
She was, without question, the most extraordinary woman he'd ever known. He still wasn't entirely sure why that was, but no woman had ever reached inside him and seized his heart the way Lily Rigby had. Certainly he'd met women as beautiful as she was—well, almost as beautiful—and he'd known women who were as much fun as she was—well, almost as much fun. He'd dated and made love to women who were intelligent, attractive, articulate and enjoyable. Yet none of them had come close to stirring up inside him the things that Lily Rigby had stirred up.
And she wasn't even honest.
He remembered all the things he'd learned from Eddie Dolan prior to her arrival, all the things that had made him want to turn around and run away from whatever it was that had sprung up between him and Lily. But whatever it was between them had grown much too large to be avoided. And really, in spite of everything, Leo had simply wanted her too much, for too long, to ever turn away from her.
So she'd hidden some aspects of her character from him, he thought now. So what? Nobody was ever entirely honest about themselves when they first met another person, were they? It took time to build a relationship—and for some reason, the eruption of the word relationship didn't bother Leo nearly as much as it usually did—and time for people to open up to each other. And, hey, it wasn't like he'd been entirely honest about himself.
But he still had work to do before he could come clean with Lily and tell her about who he really was, and explain why he'd misrepresented himself the way he had. As much as he hated to do it, he still needed to access her computer files without her knowledge, to see if they might offer him some insight into where Kimball—or whoever—had hidden the missing money.
Leo reassured himself that his motives in prying into her personal affairs were based on his suspicions about Kimball or someone else, and not about Lily. Because even though he'd started to feel a little edgy when Eddie had told him the things he'd discovered about Lily's past, even though she had motive and opportunity enough to rise to suspect status, Leo knew now that there was no way she could be capable of filtering millions of dollars from her employer.
Yes, she may be hiding some things from Leo, and yes, there might be some questionable reasons for why she had been doing so. But no woman could make love with the total freedom and lack of inhibition that Lily
had shown and be a dishonest person. There was no way he would ever believe that a woman as giving as she had been tonight would be able to hide a theft of the magnitude that had struck Schuyler Kimball. She was, quite simply, not that kind of girl. He had good instincts, he reminded himself. And his instincts told him that although Lily was almost certainly hiding something, it wasn't something illegal or dishonest or immoral.
Regardless of the fact that the two of them definitely had things to talk about, things to straighten out, things to settle, Leo was confident that they would do just that. He'd never been in love before, and truth be told, he wasn't positive that love was what he felt for Lily Rigby right now. But by God, whatever he felt for her must be damned close. Because suddenly, he couldn't imagine ever having a life that didn't include her.
Once again, he reached out to touch her, a little more insistently this time. Gently, he moved her arm and covered her breast with one hand, thumbing the taut nipple to life. She moaned with pleasure as her eyes fluttered open, then she smiled like a woman who wasn't quite satisfied yet, and reached a hand toward him.
Yeah, Leo thought as he lowered his head to cover her mouth with his, they had some baggage to unload before they could be entirely free to enjoy each other. But he was certain that, eventually, they'd both work through all the things they needed to work through. Sure, they would. Sure, they would.
* * *
Chapter Sixteen
Lily's room at Ashling was a lot like Lily herself, Leo noted the following day, when he entered her bedroom with all the stealth and silence of a sneaky little fink. As he closed the door behind him, he tried not to think about the fact that, in his need to perform his damned job, he might be potentially—and irrevocably—damaging any chance he had for happiness with Lily. Because if she caught him in here snooping around without her permission, especially after the night they'd just spent together, she was going to be just a tad surprised, just a tad peeved, just a tad totally unforgiving.
But it was four o'clock, he reminded himself, a time that she always, always, set aside for tea. Of course, usually, she enjoyed her tea perched on the edge of Kimball's big desk, flashing Leo with a breathtaking hint of thigh while he enjoyed a cup of coffee. But there had been a couple of occasions over the past two weeks when he'd been so immersed in his work, that she'd politely excused herself to take tea alone in the kitchen.
Today, he had feigned just such immersion. And now, he was going to take advantage of her absence—and her trust—to delve into—and violate—her private domain.
He tried to forget about the way they had awakened beside each other that morning to enjoy yet another sexual encounter—using their mouths to please each other that time, he recalled with a wave of almost unquenchable need. They had showered together and breakfasted together, then had driven to Kimball's estate together—well, with Leo following on her bumper every mile, which sort of constituted together, since they'd been on their cell phones the whole way—and then they'd snuck in the back way just before dawn together.
They'd been like two teenagers who had stayed out all night when they'd been expressly forbidden to see each other, he thought. He hadn't had that much fun since he was a kid.
And they had giggled like kids as they'd tried to maintain their silence through the garden, had been forced to stop more than once so that they could enjoy another fierce, all too brief, embrace. Leo had nuzzled Lily's neck as she'd fumbled for the key to the back door, and they'd almost tumbled to the floor once they were inside, tempted to make love one more time. Instead, they had brewed a pot of coffee before Mrs. Kaiser, the cook, had even come in to work. Then Lily had gone upstairs to change into her Miss Rigby clothes, and Leo had gone to work.
Work, he muttered to himself now. Lying and scheming and sneaking around was more like it. Man, he was a creep.
Pushing the thought away, he crossed silently to the writing desk that was situated exactly where Halston Man had said it would be. Instead of being obscured by Beanie Babies, however, Lily's laptop was switched on and unfolded, as if she'd been using it very recently. It hummed softly in the otherwise silent room, the screen saver dancing almost eerily. It almost seemed as if she were inviting him to investigate, he thought, heartening some, as if she had absolutely nothing to hide.
He'd brought a stack of blank diskettes with him, just in case, and set them beside the state-of-the-art laptop before thumbing the mouse and scattering the screen saver. What appeared on the screen was a list of e-mails she had evidently recently downloaded, and he was surprised by the number and variety of senders. He shrank that screen and noticed that a variety of other programs were running simultaneously, and he moved the mouse to one titled Receiving, feeling sick as he did so. This was going to be too easy, he thought as the screen expanded.
And Lily was never going to forgive him for it.
His nausea doubled, however, when he saw what he had opened. He wasn't sure, at first, exactly what it was, but it appeared to be something pretty heavy duty for a social secretary to be concerned about. As he scrolled down, Leo's suspicions were confirmed. What Lily had running on her laptop was a list of Kimball Technologies' many suppliers, and all of the materials that were coming in that day. Okay, so that wasn't as heavy duty as he'd initially thought. It was still something that shouldn't concern a social secretary.
Curious, he pulled up her e-mail again and began to scan it, opening one or two for a flagrant read. The more he read, the sicker he became. Because he realized it wasn't Lily's e-mail he was reading. It was Schuyler Kimball's. Every last item was addressed to [email protected]. And although the majority of it concerned business, much of it was explicitly noted as confidential. Several items clearly did not involve a social secretary where their need-to-know status was concerned. Nevertheless, somehow, and for some reason, Lily had accessed her boss's mail. God alone knew what she was planning to do with it.
He shrank the e-mail program again and pulled up the other programs that were running. Along with the one titled Receiving, there were others titled Shipping, Production, P&L, and Personnel. None of them seemed like the kind of thing that would find their way into the busy day of a social secretary. But all of them seemed like the kind of thing in which someone interested in, oh, say… stealing fifty million dollars would most assuredly take an interest.
His pulse pounding in his chest, in his throat, in his ears, Leo tugged open the desk drawer and found it full of diskettes. Full of diskettes that were each clearly labeled with what appeared to be bank account numbers.
Oh, Lily. Oh, no…
It was then that Leo forgot all about what had happened the night before. He forgot about his certainty that Lily was an honest woman. He forgot about how much his instincts urged him to trust her. He forgot about the fact that he had fallen in love with her.
And, pulling up a chair to seat himself at her desk, Leo scooped her diskettes out of the drawer, unbanded the blank ones he'd brought with him, and then he went to work.
It was going on six o'clock when Lily, surprised that Leo hadn't sought her out before now, went in search of the bookkeeper to see if he wanted to join the family for dinner. A long shot, to be sure.
After all, why would anyone want to join the Kimballs for dinner if their paycheck didn't require it? And seeing as how Miranda was insisting on bringing both Laurel and Hardy to dinner tonight, it could only bode badly for the evening.
Then again, judging by the fury and concentration with which Leo had been working when she'd stopped by earlier to see if he wanted to join her for tea, he would probably need a break by now. Not to mention a good laugh. And heaven knew dinner with the Kimballs always delivered in that respect.
Recalling his decline of coffee that afternoon, Lily tried not to feel stung by his unwillingness to visit with her. He did have work to do, after all, she reminded herself. Even if she still had no idea what that work involved. And just because the two of them had spent the better part of the night locke
d in each other's arms, in each other's bodies, well, that didn't necessarily mean that their work habits would change the following day, did it?
It didn't matter, she told herself as she approached Schuyler's office, growing warm with the anticipation of merely seeing Leo again. All that mattered was that the two of them had finally acknowledged and accepted the fact that they were meant for each other, and that now they could work toward building a relationship that would ultimately include honesty and trust.
"Leo," she said as she pushed open the office door and strode through to find him—
—gone.
Well, it hardly seemed prudent to extend an invitation to dinner now, did it? Telling herself there must be an explanation for why he had left Ashling without even telling her goodbye, Lily started to close the door, then noticed his suit jacket still hung on the back of Schuyler's chair.
Oh.
So he hadn't left Ashling without telling her goodbye. Well, of course he wouldn't, she told herself now. How silly of her. She was just feeling a bit unsure about what had happened the night before, that was all. In spite of her certainty that the two of them did indeed belong together, their budding relationship was still too new, too fragile, for her to be utterly confident of his feelings for her. It made perfect sense that she would worry about his abandoning her, even if such a worry were totally unfounded. Right?
She closed the door behind herself and wondered where he'd gone. He was probably looking for her, she thought. And if that were the case, if they both took to wandering around Ashling trying to find each other, it could be years before they stumbled upon each other again.
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