Secrets of a Playboy

by Janice Maynard

  “Maybe.” She pursed her lips, her gaze fixed on his erection.

  The way she looked at him made his sex jerk and swell a millimeter more. His hands fisted. For some reason, it was very important that Frannie come to him and not the other way around. He didn’t want to seduce her. This was a full-participation sport.

  At last, when he was ready to beg, she climbed onto the mattress and scooted over to his side. She was still wearing the robe, but he could deal with that. Besides, she appeared to be naked underneath.

  He held out his hand. “I want to touch you, Frannie.”

  She came down beside him and rested her cheek on his shoulder. “Ditto.” She ran her hand over his chest, testing his collarbone, brushing his nipples, tracing his ribs, playing with his navel. “You are a beautiful and sexy man, Zachary Stone. I could feast my eyes on you for a very long time.”

  He swallowed hard, overcome with emotion. This was Bug, his sweet Bug. Suddenly contrite, he asked the question he should have asked long before now. “Does it bother you when I call you Bug?”

  Frannie lifted her head and stared at him. “Actually,” she said with a bashful smile, “I like it. It makes me feel closer to you. As if what we had back at Glenderry was something special.”

  “It was, wasn’t it?” How could he have missed that truth so long ago? It was only having Frannie back in his life that made him realize how very special she was.

  He reached for the sash of her robe and fumbled with the knot. It was tied so tightly he was tempted to cut it. Finally, he worked it loose.

  With one hand, Frannie held the lapels of the robe together. Her eyes, almost indigo in this light, were wide. “I’m nervous,” she said. “I read parts of the Kama Sutra once, but it made me laugh. I don’t think that’s the right reaction. I don’t want to disappoint you.”

  Her bald honesty cut the sand from under his feet. Made him stumble. Lust roared through his veins. Something else kept the lust bridled. Zachary couldn’t put a name to that other feeling. Didn’t want to, in fact. So he concentrated on the lust.

  “That’s impossible, Frannie. Together, we’ll make a night to remember.” It was a big promise. Once he’d given it, he wondered if she thought him arrogant. He was confident. That wasn’t the same thing at all. He couldn’t wait anymore. With Frannie helping, he slipped her out of the silky robe and tossed it aside.

  Her body was a miracle of divine engineering. High breasts. A narrow waist. Hips that curved like the best valentine in the world. And legs? Lord help him, those long, wonderful legs that could wrap around his back and squeeze...

  He rose up on one elbow and leaned over to kiss her. His pulse rate was in the stratosphere. When Frannie curled her arms around his neck and whispered his name, he was a goner.

  Frannie wasn’t content to let him be in charge. Perhaps it was inevitable given their history. “I want you,” she said. She kissed him back, raked his shoulder with her fingernails, tugged on his earlobe with sharp teeth.

  That last one got to him. Had his earlobe always been an erogenous zone? It never had before. He shuddered hard, telling himself not to come. “We have to slow down,” he groaned. The whole damn thing was going to be over in sixty seconds.

  Frannie chuckled, the low, feminine sound filled with sensual intent. “Fast is fun,” she said.

  Suddenly, he was reaching for the paper sack, ripping open a condom and covering his sex. What would it be like to take her with nothing between them? The dazzling idea stopped him for a moment, made him fumble. Then reason returned.

  “Come here, woman.” Kama Sutra be damned. He wanted Frannie under him. Helpless. Yielding.

  She tugged a pillow into place and scooted onto her back. “You’re the one being slow,” she taunted. “Are you sure you’re a stud?”

  He shoved her legs apart and mounted her roughly. His mind went blank. Need roared like a freight train, drowning out the sound of sanity, pushing him to take and take and take. But Frannie was taking, as well.

  She matched him thrust for thrust, nearly strangling him with her arms around his neck, scratching, biting, demanding. He fucked her hard, so hard the bed shook. “Tell me you want me,” he gasped, barely able to catch his breath.

  “I want you. More than this. All night. Don’t ever stop.” Frannie’s words stoked the flames, sent him unbearably higher.

  He shouted her name, and then he was over the top. He shuddered, emptying himself, giving her everything he had to give. Just when he thought he might have failed her, Frannie arched against him, let out a keening cry and found her release, as well. He held her as aftershocks shivered through her body.

  In the seconds that followed, the room was quiet, save for their labored breathing.

  When Zachary could move, he reached for the sheet and comforter and covered their damp bodies. Frannie was on top of him somehow. When did that happen?

  Her body was limp, her face buried in the curve of his neck.

  He pinched her butt. Not hard. Just enough to get her attention. “You okay? I’ve never known you to be this quiet for this long.”

  She put a hand on his sternum and levered herself upward. “I was wrong,” she said soberly. “You are a stud. I’m all tingly everywhere.”

  “I can live with that.” He reached out and played with one of her pale pink nipples. “I bought a dozen condoms,” he said. “In case you were wondering.”

  Nine

  Frannie wallowed in bliss. A comfortable bed. An inventive lover. The promise of a long night to come. What more could a woman ask for?

  Years ago, when she was ten, maybe eleven, her austere, academic parents had broken character and agreed to take their only daughter to the county fair.

  Frannie could still remember the sights and sounds and smells. Most of all, she could recall riding a dozen rides, eating cotton candy and feeling as if she was part of the most wonderful place on earth. It was inconceivable to her that in a few days, the entire entourage would pack up and move on to the next town.

  In the car on the way home, she had dozed in the back seat, understanding for perhaps the first time that some experiences were magical, in part because they were rare.

  Now, almost two decades later, here she was in a generic hotel room, feeling as if she was atop the Ferris wheel again. Nothing could take away this feeling. But there was a very good chance this was as good as it got.

  Zachary stirred, nuzzling her cheek with his stubbly jaw. “That was amazing, Bug. You destroyed me.”

  “We should probably get some sleep,” she said. “And what about your ankle? We need to get it propped up. Farrell told me you’re going back to the doctor Monday. I don’t want to be the reason you get a bad report.”

  Zachary yawned and pulled her closer. “My foot is fine. Quit worrying. Sleep, Frannie. Relax. It’s all good.”

  Amazingly, she did sleep. Having a man in her bed was a novelty. If she had thought about it at all, she would have assumed she would lie sleepless while Zach snored, unconscious. Instead, the night was perfect.

  She awoke feeling rejuvenated, though a bit sore in places. They had indulged twice more during the wee hours. The first time slow and sleepy and lazy. A second time near morning was as hungry and wild as the first.

  Now it was dawn. Frannie slid out of bed quietly and grabbed clean undies from her bag. In the bathroom, she wrapped her hair in a towel to keep it dry and took a quick shower. When she dressed in the clothes she had worn last night and returned to the bedroom, Zach was sitting up, running his hands through his hair.

  He eyed her, unsmiling. “You have too many clothes on,” he grumbled.

  She knew she had to stand her ground. Otherwise, he would persuade her to spend the day in bed. As good as that sounded, she was afraid to indulge. Her willpower was shaky, and that scared her. She could handle a little fun and games with Zach. But sh
e had to keep it light.

  “You need to go home,” she said firmly. “And I have to work on my report.”

  “You said you would be at SRO headquarters Monday through Friday nights. So you’re not ready to write the report yet, correct?”

  “I add to it each day. While the info is fresh.”

  “You can work at my place. Move in with me, Frannie. While you’re here in Portland. It will be fun.”

  While you’re here in Portland.

  Those five words were the difference between fantasy and reality. But she had gone into this with her eyes open.

  Sucking up her courage and any latent acting skills, she sat on the mattress at his hip and leaned over to kiss him lightly. “Last night was great, Zach. But I’m not on vacation. I’m here to work. What if I grab us coffee from the kiosk in the lobby? And a Danish, maybe? I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

  “Translation, get your butt in gear and be ready to leave.”

  “Something like that.”

  “You’re a cold woman.”

  “Not in the slightest. But I am very serious about my work. And I can’t do what I need to do with you hanging around tempting me.”

  “So, you admit I’m a temptation?”

  His cocky smile amused her. “Yes, Zach. You tempt me.”

  She grabbed her purse and headed downstairs. Last night had been an eye-opener. So much so that she was already rethinking her decision to get involved with Zachary Stone. Despite the fact that Quinten had married recently, and Farrell was engaged, the middle Stone brother was not like his siblings.

  Zachary navigated life on his own terms. Though he was not a hermit by any stretch of the imagination, he kept a part of himself walled off from genuine involvement with the rest of the world.

  Frannie knew that because it was a familiar behavior. The cost of being different. All her life, she had wanted to belong. Those years at Glenderry—and her friendship with Zach—were the closest she had ever come to having a tribe. Her people.

  She isolated herself in her adult life, because so many times, friends and lovers had disappointed her. She was too different. Too weird. No one took the time to understand her world and her point of view. Frannie was always the one giving and getting little in return.

  What would it be like to have a man who appreciated her intellectual capabilities, valued who she was and complemented her, as well? Two halves of a whole. Not even her parents knew their daughter’s wants and needs.

  For a brief moment, Frannie had thought Zachary might be the one. Reconnecting with him delighted her. Seeing remnants of the teenage boy he had been and learning nuances of the man he had become was fascinating. The chance to spend time with him was one she couldn’t pass up. Sex was something else again.

  Men knew how to do recreational sex. Lots of women, too. But not Frannie.

  She grabbed coffee and pastries and rode the elevator upstairs, all the while debating how to handle the morning after.

  Thankfully, Zachary was dressed and ready and sitting in an armchair. Somehow, despite his crutches, he had pulled a second chair and the small table into a cozy circle by the window.

  “I’m back,” she said, wincing inwardly at the perky note in her voice.

  Zachary smiled. “Smells wonderful.”

  They ate breakfast in silence. The coffee was hot and strong, the pastries fresh and satisfying. This was as good a time as any to ask a question that had been nagging at her from the moment she knew SRO had hired her and that she would be seeing Zach again.

  “May I be nosy?” she said.

  He waved his coffee cup at her. “Knock yourself out.”

  “I know that your father’s death meant you having to take an active role at Stone River Outdoors as CFO.”

  “Yep.”

  “But I get the impression your job is more of a responsibility than a challenge. What are you doing to exercise your brain, to use your abilities?”

  He scowled. “Why do you always have to do that, Frannie?”

  “Do what?”

  “Even when we were kids, you were always ragging my butt about reaching my potential. I am who I am. Not everyone is as smart as Frances Wickersham.”

  His bullheadedness made her angry. “You are, Zach. You’re every bit as smart as I am and then some. It’s wrong on so many levels to have a brain like yours and to waste it. Some people would even say it’s a sin. You’re a brilliant man, but you skate by with your charm and your good looks, and you want everyone to believe that’s all there is to Zachary Stone. I thought by now your creativity and your inventiveness would have taken you down an exciting road or two.”

  By the end of her impassioned speech, his jaw was granite. “It must be nice to live in a world where you have all the answers,” he said, the words tight with fury. He stood abruptly, grabbing his crutches, his coffee and Danish unfinished. “I’ll leave you to your report, Ms. Wickersham. Maybe you and I should agree to disagree. You stick to analyzing computers, and I’ll handle my own damn life.”

  When the door slammed behind him, Frannie winced. She’d really done it now. None of what she’d said to him was false. But seeing Zach’s reaction made her wonder if deep down she wanted to push him away. She didn’t know how to handle an affair with the all-grown-up Zachary Stone. So after a wonderful night, she had sabotaged things.

  Maybe she wasn’t so smart after all.

  * * *

  Saturday afternoon, she emailed her first report to the Stone brothers. Two of them responded. One didn’t.

  Zachary’s silence made her sad and conflicted, and yes—angry, too. She wanted him to be something he wasn’t, apparently.

  Next week was Thanksgiving. A short week. She hadn’t told anyone that she planned to work right through the holiday. That was her business.

  Saturday evening, she went to a movie. Sunday, she enjoyed brunch at a fun restaurant near the hotel. Spending time alone had never bothered her before. Now, though, any time her thoughts were free, she replayed the night with Zachary in her bed over and over.

  It was easy to confuse a physical connection with emotional intimacy. What had been cataclysmal for Frannie was she was just another notch in the bedpost for Zach. While she understood that truth on an intellectual level, she yearned to believe he’d been as involved as she had been in the magic.

  Now she would never know for sure, because she had deliberately severed the newly formed tie between them.

  Monday night, she was back at work. She and Stanley, the security guard, had struck up a cautious friendship. The older gentleman was not much of a talker, but they exchanged a few words here and there. She thought it was sweet that he looked out for her well-being. Truth be told, it was comforting to know someone else was in the building.

  By Wednesday evening, she had picked up a disturbing trail. She wouldn’t jump to conclusions too soon. Too little information had the potential to create a false narrative. She’d learned that painful lesson the hard way in one of her early jobs. Before she presented a theory or even an outright accusation to the Stone siblings, she would have her facts crystal clear. No doubts.

  When she shut down the final employee computer at midnight on Thanksgiving Eve, she exited the building surreptitiously. She didn’t want to run into Stanley and have him question her about her plans for the holiday.

  When she stepped outside, the night was silent and damp. Just enough sprinkles to make the air wet on her cheeks. Instead of calling for a ride, she decided to walk. It was five long blocks. Not terribly far, but far enough to get some exercise.

  She pulled up the hood on her raincoat, buried her phone in an inside pocket and set out. The empty streets said everyone was home preparing for the holiday. Loneliness was relative in her opinion. She had long ago made peace with the fact that her family was different. Both of her parents were older
and came from small families. Grandparents on either side had long since passed. Thanksgiving was never a big deal, particularly since her mother was an indifferent cook.

  Even Christmas was low-key. And Frannie was okay with that.

  She liked her own company. The world was full of entertainment. Books. Movies. Research on the internet. She’d never understood people who complained about being bored. How could a person be bored when there was more to learn?

  Even so, she couldn’t deny that sometimes on nights like this one, she felt a hollow space in her chest. That same yearning to belong.

  By the time she made it back to the hotel, she was chilled to the bone. Either the temps were dropping, or she was underdressed for the cold.

  With her head down, facing into the wind, she rounded the final corner to her destination. Suddenly, she ran smack-dab into something hard and unyielding. A tall, built-like-a-tree man. One particular man. When she looked up at him, his features were shuttered, his lips pressed into a tight line.

  Despite his body language, her heart leaped with joy. She was so damned glad to see him. “Zach,” she said breathlessly. “Why are you here?”

  He took her by the wrist. “Come in out of the rain. I’ve been waiting for you. You should have called a car service. Walking in this weather is nuts.”

  Inside the hotel, he tugged her to a far corner, a cozy grouping of armchairs sheltered by a grove of large plants. “Sit, Frannie.”

  She didn’t like the tone of his voice, but she was tired, so she sat. When she removed her raincoat, she had to smooth her hair with both hands. She couldn’t imagine what it looked like. Her hair and humidity didn’t mix.

  “I don’t understand, Zach. Why were you waiting for me?”

  He looked the slightest bit guilty as he sprawled in the seat beside hers. “Stanley said he saw you leave the building at midnight. I assumed you would have flown out this morning for the holiday weekend. What’s going on, Frannie?”

  Her eyebrows went up. “You’ve been spying on me?”