by Lisa Plumley
“Because when you see me in my apron fashion show,” Gabriella explained, “you won’t be able to help ravishing me.”
He smiled. “You’re sexy wearing anything. And I do like the way you look in that one, I’ll admit.” Shane indicated the apron she’d slung on earlier, while they were in the kitchen. “After all those times getting busy at the pizzeria while you were in your whites, I think I’m developing an apron fetish.”
“If you haven’t, you will after tonight,” she promised.
At that, Shane’s eyes flared. He kicked off his shoes.
“That’s better.” Full of affection for him, Gabriella waved her armful of aprons. “You get comfortable. I’ll be right back.”
Gabriella had the best intentions of treating Shane to an unforgettable impromptu apron fashion show, just as promised.
She did. Honestly. It wasn’t her fault that the show began and ended with the first ensemble—a waist-tied little ruffled number printed with virginal-looking vintage cherries, worn with a pair of red stilettos she smuggled out of her spare bedroom.
That was where she kept the infrequently worn pieces of her overflowing wardrobe. It was also where, tonight at least, she excitedly shucked her clothes and her inhibitions, all at once.
Because, all at once, it wasn’t enough that Shane wanted her. She wanted him to love her again, the way he had at the waterfront. She wanted him to feel her feelings for him and know that they, at least, were real and dependable—unlike his father.
What kind of man adopted a child and then shunted him off with a trust fund, not caring who he was or what he did?
Gabriella wanted to erase all the hurts Shane had experienced in the past. She wanted to love him. She did. But she was wary and independent and strong-minded, and she wasn’t the type of woman for eloquent speeches. Romantic declarations didn’t come easily to her. This did. This sexiness with Shane.
What she couldn’t say with words, Gabriella vowed to herself, she would say with a sexy fashion show—and with the inevitable romp in her bed that would follow. She didn’t know if she loved Shane. Not yet. She’d been too mistrustful for that.
But she did want him. And she intended to show it.
It wasn’t her fault she was too damn successful.
Wearing her cherry-print apron and heels, nude from the waist up except for her ever-present necklaces and a smile, Gabriella paused in the hall outside her bedroom. She breathed.
“Ready or not, here I come!” she called.
With a cheeky sashay, she entered her bedroom. She struck a pose in the doorway, suddenly wishing she’d brought a prop.
A feather duster, maybe?
No, that went with a French maid’s uniform.
A cocktail shaker? No, that wasn’t right, either.
A fan? Sunglasses? A mixing bowl and spoon? A hat?
For a full thirty seconds, Gabriella puzzled over it.
Then, giving up on a prop, she looked at Shane.
His naked body and huge erect penis were all the props she needed. Newly breathless, Gabriella smiled at him.
“If you like this,” she said, “wait till you see the prize of my collection.” Leaning away from the doorjamb, she strolled sexily toward Shane’s position on her bed. She lingered out of reach. “I saved the best for last. It’s a vintage design patterned on an apron Jane Wyatt once wore on TV. You know—”
On Father Knows Best, in all its kitschy glory, she meant to say. But Shane beat her to the punch, wholly uninterested in nostalgia TV and its innumerable apron fashions.
“I like this one.” He was on Gabriella in a heartbeat, proving it by silencing her patter with a long, passionate kiss. When it was over, he held her cheek in his hand. “You look—”
“Ready to mix up trouble?” Brightly, Gabriella looked up at him. She seriously needed that mixing bowl prop. “With you?”
“—incredible, and you know it,” Shane breathed. He looked down at her, taking in her bare breasts, her hardened nipples, her scarcely long enough ruffled apron and heels. “Supersexy.”
“Really? You haven’t even seen the back yet.”
Deliberately, Gabriella flounced away. This apron, of course, was completely backless. She’d decided against a thong.
Shane’s long, low groan was ample reward for her show.
“You’re killing me,” he said. “But not for long.”
“Oh?” Pretending innocence, Gabriella turned around. Her derrière felt twice as naked because of her movements—because of the fresh air swirling against her exposed skin. Her nipples perked up with additional interest. “Why is that?”
“Because I’m going to give you what you want,” Shane said.
His next motion brought her down on the bed. With a surprised whoosh, Gabriella landed with him on top. Her extra soft bed linens billowed around them, cushioning their fall.
“Nice try,” she goaded. “But how do you know what I want?”
“I just do.” His smile flashed again. “Here it comes.”
He kissed her, and everything inside her lifted toward him. In a heartbeat, Gabriella felt desire engulf her, making her want Shane more than she would have believed possible a second ago. If touching him intoxicated her, then kissing him drugged her. She couldn’t get enough of his mouth, his lips, his tongue …
“See?” Cruelly, Shane levered upward. His eyes were dark, his voice hoarse, his body hard and strong. “You want that.”
Gabriella couldn’t deny it. Even now, she was straining to be closer to Shane. At some point, she’d wrapped her arms around him and pulled him closer. Her hands still stroked his back, searching for more … more, more, more. Her hips arched upward; even her toes sought his, rubbing against his big bare feet. Only her meager apron separated the rest of her from what she wanted.
“I want you,” she corrected, but what she really meant was …
“I love you,” Shane murmured, gazing down at her as he stroked her face, her hair, her breasts. She wasn’t sure why he’d said it or if he’d meant it, but there it was. “I need you.”
“I need you,” Gabriella echoed, realizing that it was true. She did need Shane. She needed his strength, his encouragement, his advice, and his help. “I need your mouth on me.”
Her last-second racy redirection didn’t change the facts, though. Even as Shane sat up to lazily straddle her, even as Gabriella toyed with the ruffle on her apron to deliberately tease him, she realized that she needed … him. Pretending this was all about sex between them wasn’t working anymore. It wasn’t.
Maybe she hadn’t tried hard enough. Maybe she was still confusing bed-quaking orgasms with true love. Maybe she needed …
“Kiss me,” Gabriella commanded, lifting her apron a few inches higher. She looked at Shane. “Kiss me … right here.”
His gaze went straight to her thighs and to all the hot, slippery-feeling, needful places between them, just the way she wanted. Just the way she’d demanded. Gabriella should have been satisfied—especially as Shane very willingly lowered his head.
But that wasn’t enough. She knew it, all the way through.
That didn’t mean she didn’t intend to deny it.
“Love me,” Gabriella gasped, nearly swept away by the pleasure of Shane’s mouth on her, his lips gentle, his tongue swirling, making her crazy and needful and lusty. “Yes! Ah …”
“Mmm,” he responded, suddenly managing to have his hands all over her, everywhere at the same time. He moaned, clenching her apron, reminding her of the dangerous game she’d begun.
Shane’s evident enjoyment almost tipped her over the edge right there. Gabriella clutched the bedclothes, desperate to keep her head. Suddenly, it seemed very important that she not lose control with Shane. That she remember … something.
But all she knew were desire and need. All she could think about were Shane’s talented mouth, his hard, waiting cock, the sensual things they would do to each other after she came.
Desperately, G
abriella tried to hang on. “Yes,” she breathed again, writhing and panting. “Yes, just like that. Then I’ll—” She broke off as an early tremor shook her. “I’ll—”
“Yes?” With excruciating interest, Shane quit touching her.
She knew he was trying to drive her insane.
Tossing her head against the pillows, Gabriella searched for words. “I’ll love you,” she cried. “I’ll love you!”
She tried to focus on the naughtier aspects of what she’d said, pretending that loving him was just a euphemism—that she’d merely promised to return the favor and kiss him this way next. She tried to concentrate on the remembered feeling of Shane filling her mouth, sliding inside, pulsing as she swirled her tongue around him. She tried to think about sex. Nothing but sex.
Even as her legs quivered with tension and her heart threatened to explode from her chest, Gabriella tried to resist.
But as Shane delicately lowered his mouth to her again, as he stroked her again, as he whispered something sweet and explicit and erotic against her skin, she just … couldn’t resist.
“I love you,” she moaned at last. “I do. I love you! I—”
I can’t speak, Gabriella realized, caught on a wave of pleasure so intense that she couldn’t even remember where she was. With a helpless cry, she reached out for Shane. Yes. Yes.
“I need you,” she finally gasped, still pulsating, and Shane knew exactly what she meant. He knew her. “I need you.”
“Take me,” he said, unconsciously repeating what she’d said to him earlier—but adding to it a whole new measure of command. “Take me,” Shane groaned, husky and intent. “Take all of me.”
He left her no choice, and Gabriella didn’t care. Because by then Shane was inside her. By then he was filling her, pleasing her, giving her everything she needed whether he knew it or not. Thrusting and gliding, driving them both higher with every hard stroke, Shane brought himself to the brink.
He pushed past it with a yell, clutching her to him.
They collapsed together, all hammering hearts and boneless limbs and dizzy delight. They fell against the bedclothes in each other’s arms, silent and united and utterly satisfied.
Beneath Shane, Gabriella shook her head. She exhaled.
She had a terrible feeling she might have said too much.
When Shane raised his head and kissed her, he confirmed it.
Maybe she could still bluff her way through this.
“You look … smug,” she observed. “You liked my show.” With a wry grin, she stroked his cheek. “And you were skeptical.”
“I was a believer early on. You were the skeptical one.”
“Huh?”
Shane blinked. “You love me, you cynic. You just said so.”
Oh, God. She really had said that out loud. She’d been trying so hard not to. When it came to Shane, though …
“I guess I couldn’t help it,” Gabriella confessed. “You were there. I was there. It was the spur of the moment.”
Shane’s self-assured look wavered. “Spur of the moment?”
Nope. She couldn’t bluff her way through this. Not the way she had his declaration at the waterfront. Shane’s unexpected defenselessness rocked her to the core. As much as Gabriella had tried to deny her feelings for him, it seemed that sex with Shane brought out the real her in ways that nothing else did.
“And I meant it,” Gabriella admitted truthfully, feeling her own heart swell with vulnerability as she did. “I did.”
“Of course you did.” Playfully, Shane waggled his eyebrows at her. “After all that, how could you possibly resist?”
But despite his sexual swagger, there was still a vulnerability in him that moved her—maybe because it matched hers. With a final exhalation, Gabriella gave in completely.
“I couldn’t resist,” she said honestly. “I never could. You had me hooked from that very first night at the brewpub.”
“You should probably say it one more time,” Shane suggested magnanimously, “just to cement it in your mind for good.”
Seeing right through him, Gabriella couldn’t help smiling. It turned out that Shane’s most soul-deep vulnerabilities were part of what made her love him the most. She’d simply needed a steady dose of mind-scrambling sex to unlock that truth for her.
“I love you, Shane,” she told him. “I think you definitely have a weird kink about aprons, and you kinda need a haircut—”
“Going off track. Try again.”
“—and I love you, all right? I do. So there. Face it.”
“All right. Let’s not get crazy.” With a gruff tone, he leaped out of bed, treating her to a prime view of his round masculine glutes. Shane offered her his hand, looking boyishly pleased—even while trying to seem tough. “Shower time.”
“I’m getting pruney fingers from all the showers we’ve shared,” Gabriella complained.
“Price of love, baby.” As she got up, Shane smacked her behind, sending her hurrying toward the shower. “Face it.”
Then, laughing, they both headed down the hall together, newly unified and ready to face whatever came next.
Chapter Thirteen
Standing in the hallway of his luxury apartment building, Shane danced around on the balls of his feet, feeling like a prizefighter about to go into the ring. After last night, with Gabby, he knew he could win. At everything.
All he had to do was give up on his father.
But he should have done that a long time ago, Shane told himself as he impatiently eyed the closed apartment door in front of him. He should have recognized a lost cause when it continued berating him and bailed out for good. He’d been holding on for years, stubbornly and naively believing that if only he did the right things, his father would come around.
His father would love him. Would be proud of him.
Would respect him and care for him and maybe (if Shane was extraordinarily lucky) admit that he’d been a complete tool all these years—ever since the single-malt whisky and the hope it had stoked. As a teenager, Shane hadn’t expected the neglect that had come next. He had taken on the blame for it, though.
After all, he’d always been bad. It had been no different after he’d been adopted by the Walthams than it had before. Shane had still been lonely. He’d still been driven to misbehave. He still hadn’t found anyone to rely on.
But not anymore. Now, today, Shane was throwing in his chips with Gabby. He was trusting her to be there for him.
In return, Shane planned to be there for her.
Just as soon as Lizzy opened her damn door and let him get on with it. Shooting that slab of polished wood a scathing look, Shane raised his fist. He gave the door another solid pound.
It opened. Lizzy appeared in the gap, sporting a monster case of bedhead, a flimsy wrapped robe, and her eyeglasses.
She frowned at him. “What the hell, Shane? It’s early.”
“Let me in.” All but vibrating with edginess, Shane rubbed his palms together. “I need your help with something.”
“Later.” His assistant shook her head. “After coffee.”
“Now.” Shane put his hand on the door, intending to bulldoze his way in. “You’re supposed to be available twenty-four /seven, remember?”
“Yeah, well … you’ve been preoccupied lately.” She was plainly referring to Gabby. “And I’ve been taking advantage.”
“Vacation time is over, then. Let me in.”
Lizzy’s eyes narrowed. “I have company, all right?”
Automatically, Shane squinted over her head. In the slice of deluxe high-rise apartment he could glimpse beyond her, everything looked … not like a secret love nest. What the hell?
Was Lizzy dodging him? He was trusting her by coming here, too. After everything his dad had said about knowing Lizzy …
Well, Shane would have been an idiot not to have doubts about his assistant’s supposed loyalty.
“I’ll come over to your place later.” Lizzy held fast to the door
, eyeing him implacably. “Let’s make an appointment.”
“An appointment?” Shane boggled. “Who do you work for, anyway?” He waited a beat. “Oh yeah. It’s me. I’m coming in.”
“Look, there are things you don’t know about me.”
“Fine. You can start by telling me what they are.”
“I’m not going to do that.”
“No?” Fully fed up with having this conversation through a ten-inch gap in the doorway, Shane put his hands on his hips. “Then tell me how you know my father and Waltham Industries.”
Guiltiness washed over Lizzy’s expression. “He told you?”
“Not everything. But enough.”
His assistant nodded. “All right. Come in.”
Long after her usual wakeup time, Gabriella became aware of the sun shining on her face. Startled, she opened her eyes.
It was late. She was due at the pizzeria soon.
Why hadn’t Shane awakened her? Sure, they’d stayed up late last night. Really late. After their shower, they’d padded into her kitchen, fixed twin cups of cocoa, then drank them while curled up on her sofa, talking long into the night. Shane had told Gabriella about his teenage years with his friend Casey Jackson, another kid from the foster-care system; she’d told him about her years of studying for exams while bussing tables at the pizzeria and crushing on the cute summertime waiters.
They’d swapped dreams and mistakes, hopes and failures. They’d revealed their fears (who would have guessed that big, burly Shane was phobic about spiders?) and laughed at their idiosyncrasies (Gabriella took a drubbing for refusing to eat melon in any shape, form, or variety). They’d come together in ways that had nothing to do with sex or bravado or secrets.
Afterward, they’d slipped between her sheets and cuddled there, spooned together, then fallen asleep in each other’s arms. It had been an idyllic night. Gabriella hadn’t regretted for a second finally revealing her true feelings for Shane.
In fact, she’d reveled in them. Because it was hard for her to trust people. It was difficult for her to let go of control and just … be with someone. But with Shane, she’d done that.
It had been incredible, too. The only thing Gabriella hadn’t done was confide her short-lived suspicions to Shane that he’d been sabotaging her pizzeria. But last night—as now—those suspicions seemed to belong to bygone days. Shane had disproved them. He’d accidentally restored her faith in him by revealing his unwanted trust fund. Now that Gabriella knew he wasn’t some kind of merciless corporate raider, she was ready to take things even further between them. But if he wasn’t there …
