by Leslie Kelly
“So,” he said, shaking his head hard in an effort to change the subject, “with five older brothers, I can see where you get your mouth.”
Her shocked expression told him he’d succeeded in redirecting the conversation. “I beg your pardon?”
“Tell me,” he asked, as if she hadn’t spoken, “any of them ever spank you to get you to behave?”
Her eyes widened. “Spank me? Are you kidding?”
“I bet you could have used a spanking a few times in your life.”
“It’d take a man a whole lot stronger than any of my brothers to give me a spanking.”
He should have known better than to taunt her because suddenly Lottie licked her lips. “Unless I wanted him to.”
Naughty girl. He almost laughed but the heat in her eyes changed his mind.
Knowing he should change the subject, steer back into neutral territory, he instead took the card she’d thrown down and upped the stakes. “Is that what you’re into?” Damn, it had been a long time since he’d played these kinds of wicked word games with a beautiful woman. And something wouldn’t let him stop. Instead, he inched closer. “Kinky pleasures? Pain? Domination?”
She swayed closer, too. Her deep, even breaths indicated an internal reaction…desire. Arousal. “Were you trying to find out when you bit me?”
He lifted a hand to her neck and brushed back a bit of hair, trailing the tips of his fingers on the vulnerable spot near the base of her throat. “I didn’t bite you.”
Her head dipped to the side slowly as she arched into his touch, pleading for it though not saying so out loud. “What would you call it then?”
“A taste.” Unable to stop himself, he leaned down and pressed his mouth to the warm skin on the side of her neck, just above where it met her shoulder. “Just a small taste.” Opening his mouth, he sampled her skin, licking lightly, then nibbling with his teeth until she hissed and started to quiver.
“Taste me again, Simon,” she said, her voice throaty and insistent. And before he could reply, she’d taken what she wanted, twining her hands in his hair and tugging his head up so their mouths could meet.
This wasn’t lazy and sweet, a kiss of thanks like the previous evening. Lottie thrust her tongue into his mouth, exploring ravenously, all the while pressing her body against him. She was wild, determined, and when she shoved his jacket off his shoulders and slid her hands beneath his shirt, he couldn’t manage a protest.
Her fingers were cold, her touch blazing. Never letting the kiss end, she sucked his bottom lip into her mouth, sinking her teeth into it in retaliation for yesterday.
He thought the cliffs had begun shaking beneath his feet, but he couldn’t focus enough to be sure. Unable to resist, he dropped his hands to her hips, sliding his fingers beneath the heavy sweatshirt she wore to stroke the fine, smooth skin of her waist. Again, she demanded more. Covering his hand with one of hers, she tugged it up until his thumb was brushing the bottom curve of one lush breast.
She wriggled, reaching up under her own sweatshirt and obviously unfastening her bra, because suddenly the constricting fabric loosened and that big warm mound of flesh dropped into his palm. He groaned, savoring the intimacy.
“Oh, Simon, yes,” she whimpered against his mouth, arching harder, as if begging for a firmer touch.
This should stop. He needed to stop it. But he couldn’t, not without going just a little bit further.
Finding her puckered nipple, he caught it between his fingers and squeezed lightly until she sobbed in the back of her throat. Every stroke brought a quiver to Lottie’s body. Every gentle tug made her moan.
“Taste me there,” she whispered hoarsely, her mouth lifting just barely from his.
God it was tempting. She was tempting. But the sudden shift of a few pebbles tumbling down over the cliff brought him back to reality with a quick snap.
Sometimes he really hated reality. He’d have given anything to continue. Having touched her, he wanted desperately to see her, to cover that hard nipple with his lips and suck it until she begged.
As she was nearly doing now.
But they were outside on a cold autumn morning, standing at the edge of a mountain, not far from one of the most hellish spots he’d ever known.
That, more than anything, enabled him to regain control.
Dropping his hand, he pulled her shirt back into place. “Lottie,” he whispered, “enough. That’s enough.”
“Like hell it is.” Her fingers clutched his shoulders, her nails digging into his muscles there.
He caught her hands and forced himself to step back. “This was a very bad idea.”
“Nothing that feels this good could be bad.”
She was wrong. Because he was bad—bad for her, bad for himself. He’d fallen so far he didn’t know if he’d ever be able to pull himself out of his emotional pit, and the last thing he needed to do was drag her down into it with him.
So with one final, regretful squeeze of her hand, he turned on his heel and walked toward the house.
7
Lottie
FUNNY, I’VE BEEN IN this drafty, shadowy old hotel for a couple of days now but my reasons for being here have slowly changed. I thought I was here for work—to find out anything I could about Josef Zangara and his wicked life in order to help the professor with his book. And in that regard, I’d had a little success. Another visit to the attic—with the key tucked safely in my pocket, and a bench propping the door open—had provided some interesting information this morning. Information I wanted to share with Simon.
But if something happened and I had to leave here tonight, it wasn’t the work that would be so hard to leave behind. It wasn’t even the sexual attraction I’d felt for Simon Lebeaux since the moment I’d stumbled into his arms.
It was the man himself. He was the real reason things had changed. Oh, sure, I still wanted him as much as ever. When he opened the attic door last night and let me out, a part of me considered doing a whole lot more than giving him a thank-you kiss. A take-me one would have been much better.
And this morning on the cliffs? Whoa, mama, I still shook when I thought about it. I sensed the man could play my body like a virtuoso could a fine instrument, wringing out every last, perfect note I was capable of reaching.
But—and this is the ironic part—something has changed. I am now living under the same roof with a dark, sexy, mysterious stranger. And the me-so-horny-me-love-you-longtime lust I’d been experiencing since, well, forever, has sort of been replaced by something else.
I’m worried about him.
I hadn’t liked seeing him standing silhouetted against the early morning sky today at the edge of those cliffs. Now that I know his uncle had died there, I especially didn’t like it.
He thought I’d been out jogging or something. Ha. Me. Jogging. The only reason I’d jog is if it was five minutes before closing time at the supermarket and I’d run out of Ben & Jerry’s.
In actuality, I’d heard him leave. I’d slept like crap so I was wide-awake early this morning when I heard the front door to the building slam shut. Peeking out the window of my third-floor room—the still freezing one, by the way—I saw him striding across the lawn and just had the impulse to follow him. I’d already been dressed, wearing the sweats I’d slept in—cold room, remember? I’d totally given up on the idea that he’d stumble into my room by mistake so I’d ditched the filmy white nightgown my second night in the place. So I’d just yanked on my sneakers, and, of course, a bra, and had taken off after him, practically racing out of the house.
Like something bad would happen to him if I didn’t get there fast enough.
How weird was that? To be so protective of a man who, despite his leanness, was muscular enough that he could probably break me in half? Why did I want to wrap my arms around him and tell him he wasn’t alone, rather than stripping naked and begging him to do me?
Well, okay, I still wanted to do that, too. Fortunately, I guess the two aren�
��t mutually exclusive. Nothing said I couldn’t be naked when I wrapped my arms around him and told him he wasn’t alone, did it?
But right now, I couldn’t say what I wanted more. As much as I longed for him—especially after that deep, languorous kiss we’d exchanged outside the attic door yesterday and the more frenzied, passionate one today—I wanted to help him, too.
I wanted him to confide in me. I wanted him to trust me. I wanted him to unburden himself to me.
And I wanted him to make love to me.
“This can’t go on,” I whispered that afternoon as I finished typing some notes into my laptop. I’d been working all morning in the attic, running to the top of the stairs, to peer down and make sure the door was still open. But, getting hungry, I decided to go downstairs for lunch, detouring to my room to make some notes first.
Fortunately, Simon had a wireless Internet network set up in the house and I was able to hop onto it to send some of my findings to Professor Tyler right away. When I’d realized the network was completely unprotected, with no firewall at all, I’d given Simon a hard time about it. But I hadn’t been able to deny the truth he’d pointed out: who around here was going to hack in to it?
He was right. But considering some of the weird stuff that happened in this place, I personally thought he should be a little more careful. No, I hadn’t seen any white filmy ghosts floating around, and I hadn’t been locked in the attic again. Still, one or two times I’d found myself listening intently, certain I’d heard the sound of a woman’s laughter coming from somewhere else on the third floor. And today, when I’d come back to my room to type my notes, I’d found my bed made. Perfectly made. Like quarter-bouncing perfect, as if the room were completely unoccupied.
Now, I’m not a total pig, but I’m not exactly a neatnik, either. I had felt nearly certain that I hadn’t made the bed this morning.
Laughing as I told myself the ghost of a former maid must have done it, I still made a point of locking my door when I left. Silly, I know, but I had to do it. This house was huge—somebody could slip in here and pick up anything they liked. My laptop, for instance, and neither Simon nor I would ever notice them.
Shrugging off my worries, I decided to go downstairs, make a good meal and get Simon out of that damn office and away from that damn computer where he was constantly working. Writing, he’d said, though he hadn’t elaborated.
It was time to get his attention. Nothing was coming of me being quiet, staying out of his way and trying to remain beneath his radar. I couldn’t keep tiptoeing around the house, hoping he wouldn’t notice me so that I could stay and worm my way into his life. And I wasn’t about to lock myself in the attic again and wait for him to rescue me—even for another one of those crazy, hot, sexy, kisses.
Funny. He’d rescued me. When what I so wanted to do was rescue him.
I couldn’t do that if he didn’t let me get close. “So maybe I need to make him let me get close. In a very dramatic—personal—way,” I mumbled.
If I wasn’t going to be the pursued, then I needed to be the pursuer. In the past, during my NYU days, I hadn’t had to do much more than smile at a guy or wear a tight, low-necked sweater to get what I wanted.
Simon…well, he wasn’t some on-the-make college kid. He was a strong, serious man in full control of his desires. Usually. There’d been a few moments—intense, hot ones—where I’d seen a hungry look in his eyes. He sometimes watched me when he thought I wouldn’t notice. The way he’d kissed me told me he was not unaffected by me. Not at all.
So maybe it was time for me to pull out all the stops, go into vamp mode and try to seduce him. Seduce my way into his confidence—and his life—by way of his bed.
Gee. Tough job.
“I’m up for the challenge,” I said, smiling as I shut down the laptop and headed downstairs, going straight to the kitchen. As I dug out some fresh veggies and pasta to make lunch, I thought out my plan for seduction.
It probably wasn’t nice, using a man’s own innate weakness against him. But considering I was every bit as weak as a man when it came to libido, I didn’t consider it beneath me.
My mother would be shocked. She shouldn’t be, though. Because while she’d like to think I’m a lady, I think even she knows it’s a lost cause.
God knows she and my grandmothers had tried to make me a good girl. You know the kid with the funky tartan jumper with the thick, black, patent leather straps that buckled over the shoulders? And the matching black, patent leather shoes? Yeah. That was me. Complete with pigtails.
In eighth grade.
And I’m not talking about the typical school uniform everybody had to wear. Oh, no, they took me out in public like that. I hadn’t owned a pair of jeans until I was fourteen and I’d had to save up the money I’d earned busing tables in the restaurant to buy them myself. Even then, I had to wear them under my skirts whenever I left the house, then tear the skirt off as soon as I got down to the street.
The older women in my family seemed as if they were from the dark ages. Honestly, though, they were just very old-school, second-generation Americans. My grandparents had all come over before my parents’ births, but just because their houses had been on U.S. soil didn’t mean those households weren’t entirely immersed in Italian culture. None of the older Santori females ever wore pants, much less dungarees, as Mama calls them. I don’t think I’ve ever seen my mother in anything other than a dress.
Clothes didn’t make the girl, that was for sure. Despite everyone’s best efforts, I’d been hell on wheels from childhood on, and my brothers knew it better than anyone. Once when the twins had laughed at me for having to wear a frilly hat on Easter Sunday, I’d pried open the boxes of Raisinettes they’d gotten in their baskets and replaced them with look-alikes from our pet rabbit’s cage.
I’m damn good at getting even.
Which, I guess, confirms that I’ve never been a lady. And I’ve always been willing to fight dirty to get what I wanted.
I wanted Simon. Now it was time to stop goofing around and get him.
“You’re making a real lunch?” a voice said. Simon had entered the kitchen while I was busy planning my seduction campaign and I hadn’t even heard him.
Painting a serene look on my face to hide the excitement I knew must have been lurking there, I nodded. “Pasta primavera. Sit down and eat before I shove you down and spoon-feed you.”
Part of me was hoping he’d threaten to do something about my bossiness again, just like he had yesterday.
I wasn’t that lucky.
“Why are you so determined to make me eat?”
“Why are you so determined to resist? In case you didn’t know it, the thin, pale look went out with Byron and Shelley.”
“With girlie names like Byron and Shelley, they deserved to be thin and pale.”
He didn’t smile, but again there was that twinkle in his eye. I liked his quick comebacks. I liked him. And he was in no way thin and frail-looking. Just lean. And hard. Like an uncoiled length of steel wire.
But I’m Italian. My family owns a restaurant. If a man’s not eating, I take it very personally.
“Well, Simon Lebeaux does not. It is much too sexy a name to fit a tragic romantic poet.”
“Lottie Santori, on the other hand, suits the bossy, mouthy broad scenario very well.”
My jaw fell open. He’d called me a broad. Furthermore, the man was smiling.
“With that charm, it’s no wonder you have ladies lining up here to keep you company.”
“Who needs ladies when I’ve got you?”
“Whoa, zing,” I said, unable to prevent a grin, especially since I’d just been thinking the same thing. I wasn’t a lady—and we both knew it. “Who would have guessed there was a smart-ass under that dour, frowning face?”
“I’d say takes one to know one but it sounds so third grade.”
I laughed, liking this side of him. He was relaxed, leaning one shoulder against the doorjamb as he watched me
finish off the Alfredo sauce and toss it in with the pasta and veggies.
Without being ordered again, Simon sat at the table, watching as I brought two plates over and sat across from him.
“Mangia, mangia,” I said, as I’d heard my mother say several times a day every day of my life.
Still smiling, he dug in and ate the way a man should eat my fine Italian cooking. I’d learned at the apron strings of the best, and if he hadn’t devoured the huge plate of pasta I’d put in front of him, I’d have been highly insulted.
Realizing his approachable mood was providing an opportunity to learn more, I decided to take a chance on getting him to open up. “So what is it you’re writing?”
“A book.”
“Don’t tell me,” I said. “A story about a scary hotel?”
He smiled wryly. “No, definitely not.” He didn’t elaborate until I gave him a pointed stare, then he admitted, “I write destination guides for a publisher that caters to the tourist industry.”
“Cool.”
“Plus a syndicated column called ‘Tales of the Traveler.’”
I sucked in a surprised gasp. “Oh, my gosh, I’ve read that column! The Trib carries it.”
He nodded.
“I haven’t seen it for a while.”
Turning his attention to his plate, he forked a heap of pasta and muttered, “I’ve been on sabbatical.”
Recovering. He didn’t have to say the word, I knew it.
But I wasn’t about to push it, so I instead said, “So you do a lot of research, too. That’s something else we have in common.”
“Aside from our ebullient personalities?” He didn’t even crack a smile, but continued to eat as if he hadn’t made such a huge exaggeration.
“Yeah. Sure. Right.” Remembering some of the paperwork I’d found in a trunk in the attic this morning, I said, “Speaking of ebullient personalities, your great-grandfather was apparently a real piece of work.”
Simon finished his lunch, put the fork on his plate and leaned back in his chair. I resisted the urge to smile when I saw him glance toward the pot on the stove. “Why do you say that?”
