Lonely Millionaire

by Carol Grace

  But before she could get up, he stood and rested a hand on her shoulder, a strong, warm hand that exerted just the right amount of pressure to keep her where she was.

  "You're not leaving before dessert?" he said with mock outrage. "Do you have no feelings for the pastry chef?"

  "Does he... does it come with the dinner?" she asked, feeling the warmth from his hand radiate to the vicinity of her heart.

  "Everything is included," he assured her with a grin. "Including a shoulder to cry on," he added as if he'd read her mind.

  She looked up and he cupped her face in his hands. Her eyes met his and she saw sympathy and understanding and something else flash for just a second. Something that might have been desire. He pulled her up to face him and she knew he was going to kiss her. This time it would be no brush of the lips, this time she'd meet him halfway, maybe more.

  And she would have, if the front door hadn't opened and the Davises hadn't called to them from the living room. She reached for the light switch and suddenly reality took over. The kitchen was only a kitchen, the table was old and scarred, and she, the proprietor of a bed and breakfast, was dining with a guest and letting herself get carried away.

  As for Adam, he was staring at her as if he'd just heard an alarm bell ring.

  "Thanks for the dinner," she said, smoothing her skirt, trying to pretend nothing had happened. Nothing had, except in her imagination. "I’ll clean up after I say good-night to the Davises."

  "No, you won't. I'll clean up after I say good-night and tell them what I think of their son."

  "Don't you dare," Mandy whispered.

  "Hello? Anyone home?" came the voice of Marilyn Davis. She burst through the door, her husband a step behind her, eyes sweeping across the kitchen to the piles of pots and pans in the sink, the table set for two, the candle dripping wax on the table.

  "Oh, I'm sorry, we've interrupted your romantic little supper for two. That’s so sweet. I hope when we're married as long as you two..." She paused. "How long did you say you'd been married?"

  "We didn't say," Adam said smoothly.

  "I hope we'll be as much in love as you two.''

  "Does it show?" Adam asked innocently.

  Mandy blushed and hustled the Davises back into the living room with Adam a few steps behind her. Why didn't he go to bed? Why didn't he let her be the hostess? Why didn't one of them tell this woman that they weren't married?

  "How was your dinner?" Mandy said to break the silence once they were all in the living room.

  "Wonderful. It was everything you said it was." Marilyn Davis unbuttoned her jacket. "And how was Jeremy?"

  Before she could answer, Adam broke in. "Very lively kid you've got there, with a great pair of lungs. Has he shown an interest in opera?"

  "Not yet," his mother admitted.

  "Well, I wouldn't be surprised if he had a great career ahead of him, would you, Mandy?"

  "I wouldn't be surprised at anything. He's such a fine boy. He went to bed a few hours ago. All tuckered out," she said with a polite smile.

  "We can't thank you enough," Marilyn said, and they finally went upstairs to bed.

  Adam stood there, watching them go. Mandy could understand why he didn't go up immediately, since they were under the impression that they were married. But how long was he going to stand there looking at her as if she was the evening's entertainment?

  "Where were we?" he inquired, his eyes lingering on the soft swell of her breasts under the hand-knit sweater. "I remember," he said with a gleam in his eyes. "We were going to have dessert."

  Mandy brushed her hand across her forehead. Oh, no, we aren't. That was all she needed, to go back into that candlelit room and have him ply her with more food and drink. He'd weakened her resistance, he'd made her want to believe in love and romance again. He'd made her want to feel his arms around her, his lips on hers. He'd turned her kitchen into a romantic French bistro and himself into a dashing, romantic rogue. Which perhaps he was, even in the bright living room light. The light that let her see him for what he was—a rugged outdoorsman with a suave manner that he could turn on to make her feel soft and warm and desirable. A dangerous combination.

  Adam realized the spell was broken. The evening had come to a crashing, jolting halt, and he felt deflated. He could have gone on all night, alternating coffee with wine and dessert and bantering with this bewitching, bewildering woman. He hadn't had so much fun in years.

  He'd forgotten how much fun women were. Or maybe he'd never known. He could have sworn he wasn't missing anything. He'd thought he had it all. Or that he would once he got his new assignment, up where the wind took your breath away and the waves threatened to sweep you over the edge of the platform.

  Looking at Mandy in the candlelight, though, had almost taken his breath away a few times and if he stayed there much longer be might be in more danger of being swept away than on one of those platforms. She was right. It was time to break up the party.

  He took her by the shoulders and turned her around to face the room. "You go to bed," he said firmly. "I'll clean up. I'm the one who made the mess."

  "No, you won't," she protested. "You're the guest." She twisted out of his hold and turned to face him.

  "Then I get to do what I want."

  "All right," she said.

  The look in her eyes made his heart pound. There was hope and desire there, flickering and burning as brightly as any candle. She knew what he wanted. She wanted it, too, but neither would admit it, or make the first move. He would have, but reality had already intruded. She was, or would be, Jack's girl. Not his.

  "See you tomorrow," he said. "Wake me in time for breakfast."

  "I'll do that."

  * * *

  But she didn't do it until after the Davises had had their eggs Benedict, their freshly squeezed juice and their apple-bran muffins at her dining room table and had left with more promises to recommend the place to everyone they knew. Then and only then did she climb the stairs and knock hesitantly on Adam's door. There was no answer.

  Worried, she opened the door just a crack. A shaft of sunlight picked up the colors in the blue-and-white Navaho rug. The sea sparkled in the distance outside the large windows. Her eyes traveled to the handmade quilt in a tangled heap on the bed. A pillow sat where his head should be. Was he still there, or had he sneaked out early that morning to avoid any further entanglement with his weepy, sentimental hostess?

  "Adam?" she called softly, tiptoeing into the room.

  The blankets moved. He sat up straight and stared at her in surprise, his eyes at half-mast, his hair standing on end. The quilt fell away, revealing a bare, bronzed chest It caused her to wonder what they wore or didn't wear up there in the land of the midnight sun. She turned away, not knowing what else he wasn't wearing and afraid to find out

  "Come back here," he said with a low chuckle. "I want my breakfast. In bed."

  She looked over her shoulder to find him grinning at her, the blankets just barely covering the lower half of his body so that she still didn't know what, if anything, he was wearing under there.

  "In bed?" she croaked, more disturbed than she'd admit by the sight of a half-naked man in her upstairs bedroom. A sight she might have to get used to if she had any more single guests.

  "It says in the brochure," he reminded her.

  "I know.'' Those words were beginning to be the bane of her existence. She turned to the door and gripped the handle for support. "What would you like?"

  There was a long pause. "Whatever you're offering."

  She looked over her shoulder again. She couldn't help it, she had to see the expression on his face. What she saw was the grin that set her nerves tingling, that made her feel more alive than a spray of ocean salt water on her skin. She swallowed hard. "You're easy," she remarked.

  "That’s the first nice thing you've said to me," he said.

  "Really?" She searched her mind. If she hadn't said anything nice, she'd certainly thought it.
She'd thought about him far into the night, about how he looked across the table or across the room, about how his lips had felt on hers and how wrong it was to want more. She'd concluded about three in the morning that, once he got over his fear of commitment and his belief that all women were as shallow as his first wife, he would be perfect for someone. But not her. She wasn't perfect for anybody. If she was, she'd be married by now. At thirty-two, she'd come to terms with her limitations. And she should know by now that some men just liked to flirt. Take Adam, for example, oozing sex appeal from his bed. It took all of her willpower to open the door and march down the stairs to cook breakfast for him.

  By the time she returned, he'd probably be dressed. He'd better be dressed. There was just so much a warm-blooded woman could take. She hadn't known how susceptible she was. She'd thought that writing letters to some faraway man was a substitute for a real, Irving, breathing hunk of masculinity, but last night she'd learned that it wasn't. She'd learned she had needs that couldn't be fulfilled by long distance.

  She knew it would never happen again, someone appearing at her doorstep, cooking her dinner, entertaining her guests and looking at her as if she were good enough to eat.

  Not only did men like Adam never come alone to a bed and breakfast, no men usually came at all. For her sake, however, she hoped this wasn't the end.

  In the kitchen, she brewed a fresh pot of Guatemalan coffee, poached a perfect egg, nestled it on top of a toasted English muffin and drenched it all in hollandaise sauce. She framed the dish with homemade pork sausages and added a glass of fresh-squeezed juice before she started up the stairs. Knocking lightly on the door, she felt a tremor of breathless anticipation charge through her body. If he didn't answer soon she'd have hollandaise all over the mini-apron that partly covered her camp shirt and freshly laundered jeans.

  "Come in," he called, but she didn't have a free hand to open the door.

  "I, uh, I can't..."

  The door swung open and he stood there in plaid boxers, as nonchalant as if he was at the Hilton and she was room service. She tore her eyes away from his strapping frame and took a deep breath.

  "You still, you still want it in bed?" she asked.

  His eyes gleamed. "All of it." He made a flying leap onto the bed, pulled the striped sheet up to his waist and eyed her expectantly.

  She concentrated on unfolding the wooden tray legs so she wouldn't have to meet his blatantly sexy gaze. He seemed to enjoy having her here in his bedroom. Or was it just the novelty of having breakfast in bed? Walking to the bed, she fit the tray legs around his thighs, her fingers brushing the sheet. Then she pulled back and knotted her hands behind her.

  How could she be in the bed-and-breakfast business if she couldn't serve breakfast to a guest without coming apart at the seams? Her face felt flushed and her breath came in short bursts. She backed toward the door as fast as she could.

  "Sit down," he instructed, inhaling the steam from the coffee. "I hate to eat alone." He gestured toward the foot of his bed.

  Mandy stared at his bed as if she'd never seen it before. She pictured herself perched on the edge, feeling the vibrations from his body. Deliberately she walked to the window seat and sat down on the flat cushion. After all, he was a guest. And if guests hated to eat alone...

  He cut himself a large piece of the egg and muffin with its accompanying sauce and closed his eyes to savor the combination of flavors. "You made this?" he asked.

  "Yes."

  "What else can you make?"

  "Breakfasts, that's all."

  "That's enough," he said, cutting a sausage into pieces. "We'd make a great team, you and I. I do dinners, you do breakfasts. If you're interested in teaming up, that is." He looked at her over his coffee cup.

  "I'm not and neither are you," she reminded him.

  "Oh, that's right," he said, staring at her, noticing the way she was outlined against the window, her glorious hair that he wanted to plow his hands through, her firm, upturned breasts under her crisp shirt. Not to mention the apron that just barely covered her thighs.

  Ever since she'd appeared in the doorway looking like a French maid in Levi's, he'd fantasized about untying that little apron from around her waist and taking her to bed with him. He rubbed his free hand over his forehead and reminded himself of why he was there. To get to know Mandy, but not in the physical sense. He drained his coffee cup.

  "What are we going to do today?" he asked.

  "We?"

  "It says in the brochure," he began, holding it up as evidence.

  "I know what it says, I wrote it myself."

  "I thought so. It sounds like you, warm and kind and caring. So caring you wouldn't leave a guest on his own, would you?"

  "Well, what would you want to do?" She crossed the room and stood at the door, looking apprehensive.

  There were so many things he wanted to do, it made his head swim. And they all began with removing that little apron and went on from there. It wasn't easy seeing her stand so close, her skin suffused with a faint flush, and think about sight-seeing when all the sights he wanted to see were right in this room.

  "There are so many possibilities," he said, trying to focus on the brochure in his hands. "So much to choose from. There are the tide pools, the Winchester Mystery House, the elephant seals and whatever else you suggest." Lifting the tray aside and placing it on the floor by the bed, he stood and stretched, and she turned toward the door. "So if you want to get ready, I'll change and meet you downstairs in a half hour or so."

  She shot him a look over her shoulder that told him what be wanted to know. She was not yet bewitched, but she was definitely bothered and bewildered. And Jack had nothing to do with it. That shouldn't make Adam feel so smug and self-satisfied. It shouldn't make him look forward to a day alone with Mandy, either, so much so that his heart pounded with anticipation, but it did, and he was. But as long as he kept his feelings to himself and acted like a casual guest, where was the harm?

  Mandy threw a load of clothes into the washing machine, the dishes in the dishwasher, made up the beds the Davises had occupied, and finally outlined her lips with gloss and grabbed a sweater.

  October days along the coast were usually warm, but evenings could be chilly. Evenings? Who said anything about evenings? She was going out to show Adam the sights. A brief outing where she would give an overall view of the surroundings so he could find his own way around for the rest of his stay. She hadn't been in this business very long, but she didn't think that most hostesses actually accompanied their guests on tours of the area. For one thing, they were too busy. Why wasn't she? Good question. She must be doing something wrong.

  Adam was sitting in the front parlor when she came in from her bedroom. He was wearing khaki pants and a blue polo shirt that didn't hide the muscles in his arms, muscles acquired not from lifting weights at a health club, but from drilling for oil in the Arctic Sea. She tore her gaze away and looked at the reading material in his hands.

  He raised his arms, held out his palms and the brochures scattered over the floor. "I want to see it all. Where do we start?"

  She smiled at his enthusiasm. "I don't know," she admitted. "I haven't been to most of these places, either. You know how it is when you live someplace. You take things for granted. I don't get out much." That was putting it mildly. She didn't get out at all. She'd buried herself in her house, telling herself she had too much work to do. The truth was, she had no one to do things with. Even when her sister was home, she was never really home.

  Mandy leaned down and picked up a folder from the floor. There was a picture of a giant, award-winning pumpkin, grown right down the road in Half Moon Bay, self- proclaimed pumpkin capital of the world. "Good grief," she said, "it's almost Halloween. We can hit the pumpkin festival on our way down the coast."

  Adam rose to his feet and stood behind Mandy, looking at the picture over her shoulder, his breath warm on the back of her neck.

  "Unless you, unless you'd rat
her do s-something else," she stammered.

  The something else was becoming obvious by the brush of his lips against the sensitive spot behind her ear.

  "There's nothing I'd like better," he murmured in her ear, "than to take you," he paused and she felt his tongue trace the tender outline of her ear "to a pumpkin festival."

  Mandy felt a weakness in her limbs as if they'd suddenly turned into putty. She crumbled the folder in her hand and lurched forward. "Then let's go."

  They took his rental car. Mandy gave directions while she silently reminded herself that she was out on a fact-finding mission so she could be better informed about the attractions of the area. The problem was that the attractions of Adam Gray threatened to overshadow anything the coastal area could offer, including the famous pumpkin festival. And as they drove along the coast highway with the ocean on her right and green fields of the commercial flower growers on her left, she asked herself if all this wasn't just a little too good to be true.

  The best-looking, sexiest, most rugged hunk of manhood, right out of Yukon Man just drops into her bed and breakfast and proceeds to knock her off her feet. Things like that just didn't happen to Mandy Clayton. Not unless there was a catch. What was the catch? She slid a glance at Adam and he reached for her hand, placing it on his muscular thigh. Mandy grabbed her hand back as if she'd been burned.

  "I'm afraid you've got the wrong idea about bed-and- breakfast owners," she said, staring straight ahead, her hands knotted in her lap.

  "Maybe I do," he admitted freely with an amused glance. "After all, this is my first time. I've never stayed at one before. Do you mean all the hostesses aren't like you?"

  She felt her face flush. "No. Yes. I don't know. I just know that I don't think they flirt with their guests."

  "Is that what you're doing, flirting with me? Because I'm not looking for a flirtation, Mandy," he said, his eyes darkening.