It hadn’t been enough to make her parents support their only daughter when she’d gone against their wishes and followed her own dreams.
And it certainly wasn’t enough to change the inevitable. Val was leaving, headed for the Afterlife as soon as Harvey came through with some news on Emma. It was only a matter of time.
There would be no marriage and babies in their future. No big wedding, no nice house in the suburbs, no Lamaze classes or Little League or junior ballet lessons. No traditional family.
The funny thing was, Veronica Parrish had never wanted any of those things. Until now. Until Val.
Talk about really rotten luck.
The thought plagued her as she headed home around two in the morning. Val was in his usual spot in the recliner, his gaze fixed on the TV. She said hello, then headed straight to her computer and spent the next hour trying to work on her spreadsheets for her tax class. Trying, but not succeeding. Not with Val sitting so close, her feelings so ripe and new and totally inappropriate.
He was a ghost, for heaven’s sake. They had no future. She shouldn’t want a future. She didn’t. She wanted her degree. Her career.
Forget about him, she told herself Wednesday morning as she sat in Guidry’s class, after a sleepless night worrying and wondering and watching Val watch TV. She jotted down the notes Guidry gave about the female reproductive system, and forced herself to face reality. The future looked dismal, the relationship was hopeless … Duh, what relationship, Einstein?
Just forget him.
She fixed her gaze on the drawing on the chalkboard.
Ovaries.
Which reminded her of babies.
Which reminded her of Val.
So much for forgetting.
The only thing left was to acknowledge what she felt and deal with it.
She loved Val. While he might not return her feelings he was attracted to her. She saw proof when she caught him staring at her when he thought she wasn’t looking. A simmering heat filled his gaze, a combination of longing and lust and love.…
If only.
But with the way her luck was playing out, she wasn’t placing any bets that he returned her feelings. Still, he did feel something for her, and that gave her the courage she needed to take the initiative. She was a few steps shy of the Ultimate Fifty and the time had come for her to put all she’d learned to the test. Just to be sure, Ronnie spent Wednesday afternoon reviewing her notes and formulating a strategy. If Val thought she’d been bent on seduction before, he had a big surprise coming. That had been the inexperienced, I-barely-have-time-to-breathe-much-less-fall-in-love Ronnie. Now she was Madame Ronnie—ready and armed with knowledge and sex appeal—and a woman in love, and she was determined to make the most of the time she had left with Valentine Tremaine.
Starting tonight.
Chapter Seventeen
Despite what Val had said about dressing for success—namely, that it was unnecessary when a woman had it going on from the inside out—Ronnie stopped off at a local lingerie shop on her way between school and receptionist duty at Landry & Landry. While she didn’t have any firsthand experience, she seriously doubted there was a man alive who could resist a woman clad in a black lace teddy, thigh-high black stockings, and a garter belt that read Danger! Curves Ahead. At least, that’s what Paulette of Paulette’s Pleasures guaranteed her as she plopped down her hard-earned babysitting money—putting up with the Hades twins for the past few years had finally paid off.
With her bag of X-rated goodies, she left the library that night when her shift ended at ten. By ten-thirty, she was begging Suzanne for the use of her bathroom on the pretense that Ronnie’s didn’t have any hot water. While Val wasn’t at his solid best until midnight, he was still there, a shimmering, observant apparition, and Ronnie didn’t want him to get a look at her until she was primed and ready.
She showered and changed, pulling on a pair of fuzzy slippers and a thick terry cloth robe that covered her from head to toe—as far as Suzanne knew she was just getting ready for bed. Then she spent a half hour reading to the twins, who were down with a cold and a fever—probably the same bug she’d had—before she kissed them goodnight and padded down the hall to her apartment at exactly midnight.
Perfect timing.
Her hand paused on the doorknob and she closed her eyes.
Step one. A sexy mindset. Just as Val had taught her, she envisioned the dream and concentrated on the details. The scent of Val teasing her nostrils, the soft cotton sheet slithering down her bare legs, the touch of his warm fingertips on her body, gliding down…
Her breaths came quicker and her hands started to tremble. She wet her lips and opened her eyes. “Just do it,” she told herself, and then she opened the door.
Two vital things registered in Val’s brain when he saw Veronica framed in the open doorway. One, she was home early and two, she was definitely up to something.
When she ignored him completely, and proceeded straight to the stereo to pop in a CD, his suspicions escalated. He started to rise from the chair, but she turned on him, pinned him with a hot stare, and started to sway to the sultry tune drifting from the speakers.
He poised on the edge of the chair. “Shouldn’t you be at Jake’s?”
“It’s final exam time.” Despite the nervous light in her eyes, she slipped off her slippers and moved lightly trembling hands to the belt holding her robe in place and a wave of panic bolted through Val.
She was undressing. Right here. Right now. In front of him.
Get up, man! Get up and run for cover! But he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe as white terry cloth pooled at her ankles, and left nothing to cover her but the skimpiest black lace underwear he’d ever seen, as sparse as any corset, and infinitely more revealing.
The black lace patterned her skin, making her look all the more pale and perfect. Thigh-high black stockings encased her long legs. A stretch of creamy white thigh started where the stockings ended, and stretched tantalizingly to where the black lace rode high on her hips. He saw the faintest whisper of red silk peeking through the black lace that covered the triangle between her legs before he forced his gaze up, where it snagged on her barely concealed breasts. Her puckered nipples pressed against the lace, pale pink shadows beneath the skimpy covering. His mouth went dry.
“Merde!” His voice was raw and choked. “You’re not … that is, your clothes aren’t …” He fought for words as she stood there, so close, so tempting. “Christ, where are your clothes?”
“These are clothes.” She fingered one scanty shoulder strap of the black underwear. “Sort of. They cost as much as clothes, but they’re a lot more uncomfortable.” She smiled, her full lips parting just enough to make his groin tighten. “It’s a good thing I won’t be wearing them for long.”
Funny, but it wasn’t the sight of her half-naked body in all its pale perfection or her sultry promise that stalled the air in his lungs. It was the fierce gleam in her golden eyes. The look hit him like a shot of whiskey, fireballing through him, pinning him in place for a long, burning moment in which he couldn’t move, much less think or breathe.
“Steps two through five,” she murmured as she moved toward him. “How to entice a man with my eyes.” She fixed her gaze on him, lowered her lashes, and gave a sultry wink. “And my mouth.” She licked her full, pink lips. “My hands.” She touched one hand to her throat, trailed a fingertip down her deep cleavage, over the skimpy material covering her lush breast, to tease one nipple. The tip hardened in response, protruding through the lace pattern. She gasped at the sensation and breathed, “Am I enticing you?”
Yes!
The answer echoed through his head, stirring his survival instincts, summoning the fear that lived and breathed inside of him.
“Y-you shouldn’t,” he managed. “Don’t.” Doubt chased determination across her features and he thought she might actually heed his words.
She didn’t, and he realized, in a shattering instant, tha
t he was more thankful than afraid.
He didn’t want her to stop.
“I have to do this,” was all she said as she thrust out her breasts, swayed a bit more to the music, and stepped toward him.
Fifteen breathless seconds later, after a seductive strip and tease that left her in nothing but skimpy panties and the sheerest black bra, Ronnie stood inches away. So close, he had but to reach out.
He needed to reach out. He wanted her so badly. Just one touch, he vowed to himself.
But he knew, deep inside, one touch wouldn’t be enough. One would lead to more and she would lose her virginity, and he would lose his soul. His peace. Everything.
Her hands disappeared behind her, to the clasp of her bra, and he bolted to his feet.
“Don’t!” He reached to stop her and she backed up.
She pinned him with a desperate look. “Just stay back. I’m doing this.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am.” She worked frantically at the hooks as she stumbled backward. “This thing…” She gritted her teeth. “It’s supposed to release—” she struggled “—at the flick of a finger. … I—” she gritted “—I think I want my money back.—There,” she declared. Hooks popped, Ronnie smiled, and Val lunged forward.
“No!” His hands closed over the black lace cups, holding them in place and pinning her to the wall as the straps collapsed on her shoulders.
A moment of heart-pounding silence passed as Ronnie glanced down at his hands, then back up at his face. She burst into a fit of giggles.
“Why are you laughing?”
“Because you look so desperate not to see me naked, and if I don’t laugh, I’m liable to cry.”
His gaze went to his hands covering her chest, pinning the bra cups into place. A smile teased his lips before he became conscious of the heat of her skin through the skimpy covering the ripening of her nipples against his palms.
His eyes locked with hers and the humor drained from the moment. “Why, Rouquin? Why are you doing this to me?”
“Because I want you.” She swallowed, some of her determination faltering beneath his searching gaze. “I want you to be the first.”
The only, a voice whispered. Her voice. Inside his head, battling his defenses. You. The plea stirred something beyond fear, something that welled up inside him and swamped everything but the need to please this woman. His woman.
Ronnie watched the indecision play over his features before a distinct frown drew his mouth tight.
“That was the worst striptease I have ever seen,” he declared, pricking her ego and stirring her anger.
Her jealousy. “And I’ve bet you’ve seen plenty.”
“A fair share.”
Her temper calmed beneath a wave of self-consciousness. “And mine was really the worst?”
“It cannot begin to compare with the others.” A slow, sensual smile slithered across his face. “I loved it.”
His words sang through her heart, feeding her determination. But she was still too new to the art of seduction to be completely convinced. “Love is an awful strong word. Maybe you just liked it.”
“Loved,” he assured her, so much feeling in the one word that it sent a spurt of heat through her. “You are truly one of a kind.”
He dropped his hands and the bra fell away, but he didn’t look at her freed breasts. He looked at her face, her eyes, her mouth. “Back to the lesson plan, chérie. Where were we? Oh, yes. You were about to review step ten. The kiss.”
He bypassed the first nine kisses, steps ten through eighteen, and went straight for step nineteen. The full, open-mouthed French kiss.
His lips captured hers, his tongue plunged deep, stroking and coaxing until she joined him, her tongue tangling, giving as good as she got. And boy, did she get good.
Her toes curled, her nerves came alive, and a sizzling heat swept through her, starting where his lips touched hers and spreading outward in a search and destroy mission until she all but melted in his arms.
Her hands snaked around his neck, pulling him closer. Her aching breasts pressed against the soft material of his shirt, desperate to feel the heat of the man beneath.
And he burned so hot.
He felt every bit a real man, but there was something else. He vibrated. Everywhere she touched, she felt a prickling sensation, his energy alive and humming. The sensation stirred her nerves, set them to spinning until she felt as charged, as vibrant as the man touching her.
He splayed one hand at the base of her spine, pressing her closer while his other slipped inside her lace panties to cup her bottom and knead the soft flesh. He kissed and fondled her until she knew beyond a doubt that he’d loved her striptease.
That he wanted her.
That he meant to have her. Finally. Thankfully.
The knowledge sang through her and she broke the kiss long enough to slide her mouth along his stubbled jaw, to his ear, determined to do some reviewing of her own now that he was a ready and willing subject.
Steps twenty through twenty-eight consisted of fantasies, and Ronnie proceeded to whisper an enticing story about him and her and a tub full of strawberries and cream. Then she nibbled his earlobe and licked a delicious path down his neck, through a forest of silky hair. She suckled a brown male nipple, explored the rippled expanse of his abdomen as she moved into the thirties and proceeded down.
Eager fingers grazed the bulge beneath his pants and she felt a surge of female empowerment as he groaned long and low and deep. She dropped to her knees in front of him, just as he’d done with her the night in the bathroom.
She touched the waistband of his pants and slid the buttons free until his erection sprang hot and greedy toward her. A drop of pearly liquid beaded on the ripe purple head and she reached out, catching his essence and spreading it in a sensual stroke of her fingertip down the throbbing length of him, clear to the base surrounded by a thatch of sand-colored hair.
A throaty growl rumbled in his chest and she smiled before wrapping her hand around him. He arched into her touch, his iron-hard sex dark and forbidden against her long, pale fingers. Inviting. Like the fruit in the Garden of Eden, and she no stronger than Eve.
Her gaze trailed up, over a ridged abdomen, a broad, hair-dusted chest, a corded neck, the chiseled perfection of his face. His eyes burned as fierce as the center of a flame, so hot and bright and blue.
“Don’t,” he said, but his gaze whispered something altogether different.
Ronnie couldn’t help herself. She took him in her mouth, suckled and licked and gave him the pleasure he’d given her so freely the other night. His hands cradled her face, so delicate considering the tension gripping his body, carving every muscle until the veins in his forearms bulged.
He grew harder, hotter, heavier and she took all of him until he gasped and jerked back.
“No.” His hands closed over her shoulders, forcing her away.
He was stopping again. Desperation collided with a wave of disappointment and insecurity. “I didn’t do anything wrong, did I—?”
The question ended as he drew her to her feet and crushed her to his chest, his lips claiming hers in a fierce kiss that sucked the air from her lungs.
Chest heaving, breathing harsh, he pulled away long enough to murmur against her lips, “I want to taste you, chérie. I want to pleasure you. I need to…”
His words faded and he went rigid. Ronnie’s eyes fluttered open to see him direct a murderous glare at the door behind her.
“What is it?” she gasped.
“Someone’s here.”
Through the heat gripping her senses, the words registered, along with the faint thud of footsteps. She closed her eyes. “Not now.” Of all the rotten timing. Her first instinct was to pretend she wasn’t there. They could knock a little while, then go away.
But what if it was Suzanne? What if the twins had gotten worse? What if it was Mr. Weatherby? What if Pringles had had a relapse?
They’ll liv
e without you.
She pulled Val close and laid another kiss on him, and while the sheer contact of his lips on hers was enough to scramble her common sense, she still heard the creak of wood and felt the presence on the other side of the door.
She pulled away, drew in a deep draft of air. “Just give me a few seconds. I’ll get rid of them,” she vowed.
Val didn’t say anything. His gaze swept her from head to toe, pausing at all the important places in between, then he shimmered and faded.
She retrieved her robe and turned to see the doorknob jiggle as someone tried to open it from the other side. Open it? The question registered as she shoved her arms into the sleeves, belted the waist, and stomped toward the door, but she was in too much of a hurry, too hungry, to wonder why whoever it was wasn’t bothering to knock.
“This had better be life or death,” she muttered as she hauled open the door.
In the blink of an eye, she came face to face with Mr. Hunk-a-hunk-a-burnin’-love. Only tonight he was “Mr. Viva Las Vegas.”
And he held an ax in his hands.
Chapter Eighteen
Okay, this definitely involved life and death.
Her own.
“What are you doing here?” Viva Las Vegas demanded.
“I—I live here.”
“I know that, but you’re not supposed to be home.” He frowned, yanked a spiral notebook from his pocket, and started flipping through it. “You’re supposed to be with your friends at that dessert place.”
“J-Jake’s,” she stammered, her gaze fixed on the ax, her heart shifting gears and nearly busting out of her chest.
“That’s right. You’re supposed to be at Jake’s tonight. You’ve been there every night this past week. Six days in a row.”
Her fear took a spur-of-the-moment vacation as his words registered in her head. Jake’s. Every night. Six days in a row.
“How do you know where I’ve been …?” The question faded as the pieces started to click together in her head. The numerous times she’d seen him around campus. The strange instances when she’d felt someone watching her.
In the Midnight Hour Page 23
