by Alice Gaines
He couldn’t help but laugh as he gestured around him. “You have all this, and I have to build a fire?”
“For the brick oven.” She gestured to a side wall where there was, indeed, a brick oven. “This resort is going to be famous for the best pizza outside of Italy.”
“Why pizza?”
“Because it’s delicious and nutritious and you can grab a slice and keep on going,” she said. “It won’t slow you down.”
He appeared to consider that, gazing around him. “You’ve done a good job here.”
“Coming from you, that’s a great compliment.” She went to him and snuggled up against him, running her arms around his ribs. “I’ve been dying to show all this to someone who can appreciate it.”
She wasn’t the innocent young thing he’d fallen in love with back then. She’d grown into a woman, but she still had the sense of wonder that had always made him smile. Back then, he’d seen the world through her eyes, and it had become a place where you could laugh and love without reservation, instead of constantly being challenged to fight—either a person or the whole damned system. Then her father had ripped all that away from him. And she’d helped him.
He walked her back toward one of the butcher block tables and then hoisted her up onto it. Now her head was above his as he eased himself between her legs and gazed up at her. “Real Neapolitan pizza, huh?”
“The stand mixer has to beat the dough for the crust for half an hour, and then it has to rest for at least four hours.”
“After a beating like that, I can see why it has to rest.”
She draped her arms around his shoulders. “I don’t remember you having a sense of humor.”
“Neither do I.” He didn’t laugh or smile a lot. He was too busy. The other players claimed he was too intense. You had to be, in such a competitive industry.
She bent and pressed her lips to his. It wasn’t the sort of kiss that said “have sex with me now,” but more the kind that suggested she could do it anytime she wanted and the urge had just struck. Of course, that got him thinking about the tube top and how easily he could tug it down to bare her breasts.
“I can’t make pizza dough sitting up here,” she said.
“Do you have to do that this very minute?”
“It has to rest four hours.”
He sighed and helped her down off the table. The tube top would have to stay in place, at least for now. But she wouldn’t have any excuse for those four hours.
What had made him so randy all of a sudden? As much as he and his friends got lucky with women regularly, he didn’t crave sex constantly. If he was busy on a project, he could go weeks without thinking about his next bed partner. He’d been little more than a kid when he’d known Nicole before, so naturally, he’d been horny all the time. He shouldn’t be that way now.
They definitely had magic in the sack, and he could get addicted if he wasn’t careful. She’d burned him once, but he wouldn’t let that happen a second time. Besides, if she found out about his silent partner, she probably wouldn’t want to have anything to do with him. Yeah, Vivian would definitely sour her on him.
While he’d been pondering that, she’d gone to a cabinet and was now hefting a large mixer.
“Whoa,” he said. “Let me do that for you.”
“I can carry it. It’s not that heavy.”
“Not while I’m around.” He took the mixer. “Where do you want it?”
She pointed toward a workstation by a wall. “Over there. Near the plug.”
She hadn’t lied about its weight. She could have carried it, but what kind of gentleman would that make him? He’d worked like hell to lose his reputation as Mrs. Morrow’s scruffy, no-good kid, and his manners had to be the best. He set the mixer on the workstation and plugged it into the electrical socket.
“This is my own machine. The restaurant will use the industrial-sized one.” She nodded her head in the direction of a huge appliance in the corner. “I’ve been visiting here trying things out before my chef arrives.”
“All alone?”
“There are usually construction people around, and the maintenance crew.”
He walked up behind her. “Where are they now?”
The back of her neck got red. She was blushing. “I told them to take some time off.”
The confession embarrassed her. Cute. “You seemed pretty certain I’d come here with you.”
She shrugged and began nonchalantly measuring flour from a container. He wasn’t fooled. “We’d agreed to have sex.”
“A one-night stand on your yacht.”
She shoved a measuring cup into his hand. “Would you get me some warm water?”
“Sure.” He went to the sink and turned on the tap to let the water heat up a bit. “At least, I thought it’d be a one-night stand.”
She didn’t answer. She didn’t even look at him. So he collected her warm water and brought it back to her.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?”
She glanced up at him. “About…”
“Did you go to the reception with a plan to kidnap me?”
She took the water, measured some out into a small bowl, and opened a packet about the size of a condom. “Yeast.”
“You’re avoiding the question.”
Again, not looking at him, she stirred the yeast into the water. “I knew you’d be at the reception.”
“How?”
“My assistant has connections to the bridal party.”
Interesting. She had been stalking him. But just to have sex?
“I only planned to confront you about why you wouldn’t give me an appointment to see you,” she said.
“That was it?”
“I thought we could discuss things as adults.” She put the flour into the mixer bowl, added some salt, and turned the mixer on.
“So, you didn’t deliberately set out to seduce me?”
She rolled her eyes. “Me, seduce the notorious womanizer?”
“Surely, I’m not that notorious.”
She didn’t roll her eyes again, but neither did she look convinced. “You’ve been linked with a long list of women.”
“Friends,” he said.
“With benefits.”
“In some cases.” He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned a hip against the table. “You’ve been following me.”
“Your exploits.” With the mixer still running, she slowly added the water and yeast to the bowl.
If he remembered correctly, she’d said the dough had to get beaten for half an hour. You could do a lot in that amount of time, too. He put his hands on her hips and drew her to him. “Then you must have hatched your plan to bring me here while you were standing on the terrace.”
“If you’ll recall, you did more of the seducing. I was the seducee.”
“How do I know that?”
“Really, Adam.”
“Really, Nicole,” he echoed.
“You were always the more experienced lover,” she said. “Back then and now, too.”
That was technically true, but he’d developed a soft spot for her from day one. She could get under his skin like no other woman ever had. Yes, she could have seduced him. She most likely had, whether she’d meant to or not.
“When we’d agreed to go to my yacht, I decided I’d keep you for a bit longer.” She stared up at him out of her clear, green eyes. “Are you enjoying yourself?”
“Don’t I make noises like I am?”
She shoved his chest. “I meant Savvy.”
“So far, I’ve seen a beautiful cabin and a beautiful kitchen.”
“I’m going to show you a lot more,” she said. “So now I’ve answered your question. Let me ask the same. Did you set out to seduce me?”
“I didn’t know you were going to be there.”
“Now you’re the one not answering.”
Of course he had, with the encouragement of his friends. One more encounter to see if they still had magic.
Little could he have known they still had that and more. They were both probably better because of experience, but that didn’t fully explain the bone-melting pleasure they couldn’t seem to find with anyone else.
“Yes, I decided to see if you still wanted me,” he said. “Truthful enough?”
“For now.”
Now for the big question. He probably shouldn’t ask, but especially with this particular woman, the answer mattered. “Do you have sex this good with other men?”
She laughed, and her cheeks turned a dark pink. “Adam!”
“Tell me.” What a stupid, juvenile thing to ask her. But damn it, if he didn’t have anything this good with his other lovers—and he’d had some very passionate and beautiful ones—she should feel the same way.
“I’m not an innocent young thing any longer,” she said. “We’ve been apart for ten years.”
Time meant nothing. They still came together like a force of nature. Maybe that was what had spurred this line of questioning. It might be nothing more than male ego, but if she only responded this way with him, he’d like to know. It would make him happy. No, it would make him damned happy.
“You’ve had other lovers,” he said.
“Of course I have.”
“Anyone currently?”
“What’s all this about?” she said. “I brought you here so you could see Savvy. I’d hoped you might wish me well.”
Not when it involved her father’s company. He’d spent almost ten years building a plan to take Westmore Hotels down. He had a lot invested in it. But bringing that up would only endanger whatever truce they might have arrived at.
“I don’t want anything bad for you,” he said. Not a complete lie.
“But you want to know about my sex life.”
“If there’s another man, I shouldn’t be here with you, don’t you think?” Besides, she wasn’t the sort of woman who cheated. Or at least she hadn’t been.
“There’s no one else,” she said. “And the box of condoms was almost completely full.”
That would change before they left this island. “Thank you.”
“What about you?” she asked. “Perhaps I shouldn’t be having sex with you.”
“My latest serious friend returned to Australia.”
“The clothing designer.”
“Kristen, yes.” God, did everyone know everything about his sex life?
“And there’s no one else on the horizon?” she asked. “Between conquests?”
“I haven’t been celibate,” he said. “But, I don’t conquer people.”
“I’ll bet you’ve used more condoms than I have,” she said. She seemed jealous, although she’d probably never admit it. He’d started the discussion, so he’d have to live with it.
“I have,” he said. “That’s not the point.”
She gestured with her hands. “Then, what is the point?”
“I’m trying to figure out…” Ah, shoot. How did he put this? If we’re better together than we are with other people? If we make magic? All the things that made whatever this was more important than he could let it be. He still had his business and Vivian’s demands to worry about. She had hers. They were competitors. That had to be all there was between them.
“When we were apart, I was faithful to you,” he said. Crap, where had that come from? Maybe out of years of simmering resentment.
She cocked her head and stared at him. “What did you say?”
“I said I was faithful to you, that first year in business school.” His roommates had teased him about it. Endlessly.
Her brow furrowed. “You were?”
“Of course I was. I told you I would be.”
“I always assumed…that you…”
“And I had opportunities.” His prof had ridden him hard that year, and he hadn’t had much time for sleep, let alone dating. But he’d had urges, and there was the fiery brunette friend of his roommate’s girlfriend… She would have been happy to stay the night in his room.
“Can you say the same?” he asked.
She stiffened. “Of course. I was in love with you. You were the only man who’d ever touched me.”
He’d known that in his gut, even if his temper had screamed she’d betrayed him by becoming engaged to another man. Nicole had told him often enough that she wanted to be with him when she’d called. He’d figured she’d understand that they had to wait a bit more. He hadn’t counted on her father whispering venom about him in his absence.
“I never even had sex with Holst, and I was engaged to him,” she added.
“So, when did you?”
“Is it really important?” She stared into the mixer bowl as if the rotating dough hook held the secrets of the universe.
“No, I guess not.” He didn’t need to know the details of her sex life. Maybe he ought to fill her in on his, since she seemed to believe he’d screw any woman who got near him. He wasn’t like that, no matter what the tabloids printed. But he didn’t have to justify himself to her. He wasn’t the one who’d broken off their relationship without telling him to his face.
Maybe they’d had enough revelations for one day. “So, why don’t you tell me about how I build the fire for the oven?”
“I was kidding about that. We do use wood, but there are gas jets to light it.”
“Anything else you’ve been kidding about?”
She gave him a smile that wasn’t completely innocent. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
Chapter Six
He’d remained faithful to her. A young man with a powerful sex drive. Good-looking, too, and with great potential. Women must have offered themselves to him all the time, but he’d kept himself for her. She was still marveling about that at dinnertime. He really had loved her, and he really had waited for her…for a while, at least. If only she’d known. If only he’d told her.
The pizza came out exactly the way Nicole had planned. A thin, flavorful crust with fresh tomato sauce, lots of melted mozzarella, and a chiffonade of the basil she’d planted in one of the boxes behind the hotel. They sat on the terrace facing the ocean as the sun cast long evening shadows and drank wine as they finished the last slices.
Adam had left his shirt with the top two buttons open. Just enough to give her a glimpse of his chest, which tempted her fingers. For now, at least, she’d sit across the table from him and simply enjoy his company.
Holding his glass, he rested back against his chair. “So, tell me everything that’s happened with you since I last saw you.”
“You mean this afternoon?”
“You know what I meant.” He studied her, almost as if he was sizing her up as an opponent. She guessed he was, in a way.
“Ten years is a long time,” she said.
“We’re not going anywhere.”
She had no reason not to share her history with him. She didn’t have anything to hide. “I dropped out of college after two years.”
“Earhardt?”
That was the small women’s college her father had chosen for her. He’d made a sizable donation to assure she’d be accepted, even though she could have gotten in on her own merits. “Yes, Earhardt.”
“You’re intelligent,” he said. “You could have gone to any university you wanted.”
“Earhardt was fine. I wasn’t ready to be out on my own.”
“So, what did you do?” he asked. “After you dropped out.”
“I went home for a while,” she said. “I sat around the house. Swam a lot.”
“No friends? No man in your life?”
“I’d been at a women’s college.” That had probably been her father’s intention—to keep her from falling in love with another “unsuitable” man. “I didn’t have much of a social life.”
Until the loss of her father, those months had been some of the most miserable of her existence. She’d been so full of shame for failing at college. So full of loss, without even the hope that Adam would return to her. So isolated.<
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“So, Father fell back on old-school ways and decided to marry me off,” she continued. It was laughable, actually—the idea that her father could pick the most advantageous match for her to solve the problems of a young woman with no direction in life. But that was her father—doing his best for her, even if his best was antiquated and not any realistic way to make her happy.
“You went along with him,” Adam said.
“I was miserable. You’d deserted me.”
He sat straight up in his chair. “I did not desert you, Nicole.”
“It felt as though you did,” she said. “You were so…distant.”
He put his fist on the table. “I did everything I possibly could.”
“Really, Adam? You couldn’t have done anything more? Anything at all?” She’d gone over this, time and time again. If someone truly loved you, he’d move heaven and earth to be with you. “You promised me nothing could keep you from coming back to me. But when things got difficult, you didn’t.”
His mouth drew into a straight line, his jaw tense, but he didn’t speak. If he was being truthful with himself, he’d have to admit he could have done something to make their relationship work. He could have answered her old-fashioned letters. Something as sentimental as writing his love on paper, putting a stamp on it, and dropping it into the mailbox might have convinced her he hadn’t moved on without her. Men didn’t do that sort of thing easily, but if he’d loved her as much as he’d claimed to, he would have found a way.
“I was lonely. I felt like a failure all around. At least, if I did that one thing, I could make my father proud of me,” she said.
“Marry yourself to a man you didn’t love?”
“Holst was charming and funny,” she said. “Besides, arranged marriages used to work.”
“In the nineteenth century,” he said. “Nicole, what were you thinking?”
“I was young and stupid.” She hesitated, toying with her napkin. “Then he turned violent.”
“And your father ended the engagement,” he said. “Would you have done it if your father hadn’t?”
“Of course I would have,” she answered. “I wasn’t that stupid.”
“I’m happy to hear it.”
