“And what’s in it for you?” she heard herself ask, thinking about her ex-husband and his family again, concern overcoming her.
“Nothing. This is straight restitution, nothing else. If you think it’s better for them not to even know it’s all coming from us, even that’s okay. If it will make them happier, you can say the house was paid off by an anonymous donor. Or I even have something else you can tell them—it won’t be true, but it might make them feel better. That’s the second part....”
“There’s more?” she said, unsure how there could be.
“You and the Bronsons opened our eyes to the needs of the elderly in general, so the Camden Foundation is developing a program to provide this type of assistance to whoever needs it. What we do for the Bronsons is separate, but I’m assuming that they have friends and know other people in their own age bracket who can benefit from this kind of program, and if you think they’d feel better believing that what’s coming to them is no more than any of their friends can access, let them think that.”
“Seems like what you’re talking about for them is more than anyone is going to get through a foundation, so they’d see through that. Plus, I think they’d like to know that you’re admitting what was done to them was wrong—”
She could tell that was a sticky subject by the arch of his eyebrows and the resignation in his expression. “We don’t need any credit, but we don’t need the negative attention stirred up either, if that could be kept to a minimum.”
Gia could understand that they were trying to live down a reputation that this generation might not deserve and that bringing up old wrongs wouldn’t help. But she couldn’t vouch for what Larry and Marion might do, so she could only say, “I’ll do what I can.”
Then, as more of what he’d told her sank in, she said, “So you set up a program that can help any elderly people who need it, and you did that with just the wave of a wand?”
He shrugged and she saw humility in the acknowledgment that yes, he had that ability. But what he said was, “The criteria are being hashed out now and put in place. By the first of the month, people can apply for help and if they qualify, it’ll be there for them.”
“For just any older people in need? No one in particular who might have some history with you the way Larry and Marion do?”
“For any elderly people in need. Before this, we just weren’t really seeing that there is a need. But my grandmother is seventy-five—I told you, the thought of her being in the position the Bronsons are in...” He shook his head a second time. “We wouldn’t want that. The Bronsons’ situation got us all thinking, so we wanted to do what we can to help. I know what you think of us, but we really are trying to do better than what was done before....”
Gia was still looking for an ulterior motive. The Grants would have had one, because they weren’t about actually doing good, they were just about cover-ups to make themselves look good.
But there just didn’t seem to be an ulterior motive here. Derek had even admitted that he and his family bore some guilt. He’d been open with her, honest. And the scope of what he was giving to the Bronsons, what he was going to provide for other people, was impressive.
She thought that she might just have to concede that the Camdens—at least the current Camdens—were different than the Grants. That they acted with ethics and integrity, that they genuinely wanted to atone for whatever was done before them and give back. That they really were a different ilk than her former in-laws.
“This is all for real? You’re serious,” she said then, the shadow of disbelief hovering.
“About it all,” he confirmed. “But you don’t have to believe me—tomorrow you can confirm with the bank and see for yourself.”
The fact that he wasn’t going to any other lengths to prove himself, that he was willing to have his actions speak louder than his words was what put it over the top for her and she finally believed him.
“I don’t think just saying thanks is enough....” she muttered as it began to genuinely register with her.
Derek put his hand on her knee then, and she instantly flashed back to having that hand on her breasts Sunday night. And to how much she’d wanted that again ever since.
But this time his touch wasn’t sexual—except in what it roused in her. It was comforting and imploring at the same time as he looked into her eyes and said, “I was also serious about how amazingly beautiful you are if you’d just stop looking at me like I pulled the rug out from under you.”
“I was afraid you had,” she said. “Out from under me and the Bronsons.”
“Nope. But I also don’t want to minimize your part in all of this—you did so much for your neighbors and you’re really responsible for showing us the overall problems. So we thought we might like to call the fund the Gia Grant Fund....”
Oh.
“The Gia Grant Fund...” she repeated.
“Within the Camden Foundation. Would that be okay?”
“I don’t know.... It seems so weird to have something named after me. This wasn’t that big of a deal—I was just trying to help Larry and Marion. Shouldn’t I be dead or something before my name gets put on anything?”
“No!” he said with a laugh. “It’s just recognition for what you’ve done. And we’d also like to invite you to be on the committee that will go through the applications so you’ll have a vote on who gets what. It doesn’t pay anything, though—to us or to anyone else who sits on our committees. We want all the money within the foundation to go toward the causes we support, so we run it, and we recruit and badger people to help out.”
“I’d...be willing to do that....” Gia said, suddenly finding herself a little misty at the thought of it all. And very impressed with this man. And with his family.
It was a turnaround for her, and Gia looked at Derek through new eyes.
Not that he looked any better to her than he had, because that wasn’t possible—he was just as drop-dead gorgeous as she’d registered the very first time she’d seen him. But she suddenly saw more substance to him than she’d given him credit for before, and that just made him all the more appealing.
“Dinner...” she said then, realizing that she needed something to get her to her feet and out of there. Because admiring him, appreciating him in new ways, only compounded feelings that had been set in motion Sunday night. And all she really wanted to do at that moment was what he’d said he wanted to do to her earlier—take his clothes off.
“Dinner...” he echoed, though in a quiet tone that lacked conviction while his eyes held hers and he began to massage her knee, sending little shards of light from that spot all through her. “Are you starving?” he asked then.
She was.
But for him....
That thought caused her to laugh a little, to smile at him, all of it infused with unintentional innuendo that he read because he mirrored that smile and a knowing look came into his blue eyes.
“The reservation isn’t for a while....” he informed her, a question in his statement.
“No?” she answered buoyantly.
“But you said no the other night....” he reminded her, making it clear they were on the same wavelength.
“I did,” she confirmed.
“The thought of committee work goes right to your head?” he joked, his smile going crooked and so, so sexy.
“I think it does.” She played along rather than say that it was him who’d gone to her head.
Which meant that she really was getting carried away, and she knew it.
But not indefinitely.
She’d thought a lot about this since Sunday. She hadn’t been able not to think about it most of the time. And the truth was that she wanted him so much that she just had to have him.
But only for right now. A little surrender without looking for tomor
rows.
As long as she wasn’t expecting anything more—no white dresses or wedding chapels or picket fences or bouncing babies—why couldn’t she indulge the way Tyson did? The way Tyson had suggested she do in order to try to get it out of her system?
Because she just didn’t know any other way she was going to get it out of her system.
That was what she’d concluded. Even before she’d accepted Derek’s dinner invitation tonight.
The dinner invitation that had provided her with this chance.
And now here he was, and she had even less reason to resist, and even with the reasons that remained, she just didn’t care. She still wanted him.
He moved a little closer on the couch, squeezing her knee and smiling devilishly. “If it helps cancel out that no, I can put you on the scholarship committee. And the arts committee. And the committee for animal rights.... You name it and there’s probably a committee for it and I can put you on it.”
“Oh, yeah—committees and committees and more committees—that gets me going,” she joked in return, putting her hand on his thigh—about where it had been before she’d shied away on Sunday night. Or maybe an inch higher...
He was more serious when he said in a voice that was suddenly deeper, raspier, “You look sooo good, it’s a shame to wreck it....”
“I kind of hate to ruin this, too....” she said, reaching with her other hand for the tie that was knotted meticulously at his throat and tugging on it.
“Go ahead, ruin it,” he urged as his free hand went to the side of her neck and glided around to the back.
He pulled her forward to meet him as he leaned in and gave her a kiss that was so much hotter than the kiss he’d given her when he’d first come in. Hot enough to let her know that Sunday night had maintained its impact on him, too.
Gia did some multitasking, kissing him back as she untied his tie, slid it free of his shirt collar and kicked off her shoes.
When his tongue came to greet hers, she took off his suit coat and felt him unfasten his collar button to aid the cause of that kiss, their mouths going wider as the hunger that was only for each other ran rampant.
His free hand came to her breast, but only on the outside of her dress and bra, and that wasn’t enough. It was something—something nice and arousing—but not enough. Not after she’d already learned the glory of having his hand on her without the filter of clothing between them.
She did some quick work undoing the rest of his shirt buttons so she could demonstrate, reaching inside once she could to lay her own hands on his chest.
Which was when she realized that that was the first time it had been bare to her....
And that it felt as glorious as it looked. Warm, smooth, sleek skin over muscles as solid as a brick wall. She couldn’t resist going from the cut and carved pectorals down to the sharp six-pack of abs that led right to his waistband....
She just unhooked his belt and the button on his pants while she was there and then sluiced her hands around his waist to his back and up again.
That back that was oh, so nice....
His shoulders were big and broad and powerful and she filled her hands with the muscles there, massaging and mimicking what he was doing to her breasts, which were still locked in her bra and dress, her nipples trying their best to nudge their way out.
In spite of the fact that his shirt was beautiful, it was just in Gia’s way, so she finessed it off him as her tongue parried playfully with his in a game that was growing ever more sexy.
And that was when he took his hand from her breast, his other hand from her nape and found the dress’s zipper.
His mouth was wide over hers as the zipper went down, as he spread the back of the dress and unhooked her strapless bra, too.
But as his hands went to her shoulders to take the dress off, it occurred to her somewhat belatedly that they were in her living room, it was still daylight so the drapes were open, and that they might be visible through the picture window.
Which meant that this needed to be taken to the bedroom.
And if she did that, it also meant that there was no turning back....
But that only gave her a split-second’s pause before she plied the tip of his tongue with the tip of hers in one parting tease and ended the kiss to take his hand in hers and tug him to his feet.
He smiled when she did, apparently knowing what she was doing, going along willingly into her bedroom, where she’d already pulled the curtains in order to dress for tonight.
Still, bright September sunlight shone through, and Gia knew how much she wanted this when the fact that she was about to be undressed with Derek without the cloak of darkness didn’t daunt her. Instead, she was just glad for the opportunity to see him when she took him to the foot of her double bed and turned to have a look at that torso, those shoulders, those biceps, that flat belly and the dark line of hair that went from navel down behind the waistband she’d left unbuttoned.
And as fantastic as he’d looked in the suit, what was underneath it was even better....
He used the hand she held to yank her to him, catching her mouth with his again in a wildly abandoned kiss that made everything that had happened in the living room seem tame. He continued what he’d begun there as he took off her dress, leaving it and her bra to drift down around her ankles.
Lace bikinis and thigh-high nylons—that was all she had on when he deserted her mouth for a look.
A look that adored and relished and came with a groan of approval as he took both breasts into both hands and recaptured her mouth with his.
Again her knees really did go weak in that first grip of big, gentle hands, of fingers that tenderly dug into her soft flesh, of palms where her nipples nestled impudently.
As if he knew he’d taken the starch out of her legs, one hand left her breast so he could wrap that arm around her and brace her as he went on kissing her into oblivion.
But not so far into oblivion that she didn’t realize he was still partially dressed. And that she didn’t want him that way.
So she did some unzipping of her own and let everything he had on from the waist down join her dress on the floor.
And then she wanted a look....
So she coyly escaped his kiss and took one.
Wow all over again....
Clothed, the man was something.
Naked, he was something else....
Hard and honed everywhere, he was the image of masculine perfection.
But he only let her have a brief glimpse before he swept her off her feet and tossed her good-naturedly onto the bed.
He joined her there, sitting on the edge and reaching for his slacks to take his wallet out and get protection—giving her a prime view of his divinely brawny back—before he turned toward her, set the condom aside and put his full attention on her again.
His mouth took hers once more, his hand reclaimed her breasts and the other curved over her head to play with her hair as one thick thigh rested atop hers.
Gia let her hands go exploring. Exploring the expanse of those shoulders she just couldn’t get enough of. The dip of his spine. Muscles and tendons that fanned from there. Tight derriere. The back of that thigh that pinned hers. The front of that same thigh. Then higher still than she’d gone before until she found that part of him that she’d only gotten a brief glimpse of.
The moan that rumbled in his throat let her know how much he liked it when she circled him with her hand. When she learned all he had to offer and teased him just a bit.
Just enough to put things into another gear.
He tugged with careful teeth on her lower lip. He kissed her chin, the hollow of her neck, and then he replaced his hand at her breast with his mouth and drove her just a bit crazy, too, sucking and nipping and running the tip of his tongue aroun
d the oh-so-sensitive outer circle of her nipple. Flicking at the eager nipple itself. Drawing her well into that hot, moist mouth that seemed to have the power to perform miracles. Miracles that awakened sleeping needs that had never been quite that demanding before.
And then he shifted up another gear when he slid his free hand down her stomach and inside her bikinis....
Her neck arched, pulling her shoulders right off the mattress when he first found her, his long, thick fingers easing into her. Slowly. Tenderly. Just asking permission for more to come later....
Her grip around him tightened in response, and that brought a sound that was part laugh, part groan from him just before he withdrew his fingers and made her panties disappear.
Then his mouth returned to hers as his hands worked the condom, and more than his thigh rose over her.
Gia opened her legs to him as he came between them, his hands on either side of her shoulders, bracing his weight, his mouth finding her breasts again—one, then the other, flicking her nipples with his tongue and tormenting her with ever-increasing need—as he rediscovered that spot he’d made friends with moments before, slipping into her gradually, carefully, tenaciously.
Sound escaped them both when he reached his destination and she could feel him fully inside of her—long and thick and hard—where he stayed embedded and motionless, as if he was relishing it, too.
But only for a moment before desire took rein and he began that primal, fantastic trip. Slowly out and in again. And again. Each time with more speed. Each time diving deeper. Each time bringing more and more awake in Gia to make her blood rush, her heart race.
Her arms were around him, her hands splayed on that back that seemed like it could bear the world, as she matched his pace, meeting him with her hips, tightening around him then releasing as they found their rhythm and harmony.
To Catch a Camden Page 16
