Landon stopped short in the hall and, lost in her thoughts, Kimber nearly plowed into him. His hands landed on her shoulders and she halted inches from his toes, narrowly avoiding scuffing shoes that had cost as much as her entire outfit. Jewelry included.
His lips pursed and he dropped his hands, leaving the imprint of his heated palms on her bare skin and her thoughts tangled in a knot of attraction and longing.
“My room is there”—he pointed to the end of this corridor—“and Lyon’s is right here.” He gestured to the door before them.
She fervently ignored the part of her brain squealing, Landon’s bedroom! and focused on the panel in front of her instead. No sound came from behind Lyon’s door.
“Is he always this quiet?” she asked.
Landon let out a loose laugh before tucking it behind his schooled expression once again. A rush of heat coiled in her belly. Oh yes. She’d have to see about getting him to laugh some more while she was here.
“He’s never this quiet. He had trouble falling asleep last night and I didn’t want to wake him.” He slid his sleeve forward and studied a shiny, large-faced watch. “But,” he said with a sigh, “looks like I’ll have to wake him after all. My apologies if he’s grouchy today.”
He popped open the door to reveal a room the same size as hers, decorated with neutral bedding and curtains. Lyon’s dark mass of curls laid on top of a red and blue pillowcase, and a comforter with the likeness of Superman on it was tucked under his round, mocha-colored cheeks. He opened a pair of dark eyes rimmed with impossibly long lashes when Landon pulled a cord and opened the blinds.
“Kimber is here to meet you, buddy.” Landon’s official tone had been replaced with a soft, deep tenor. Meant to soothe. She had no idea if it was soothing Lyon or not, but it was working on her. She was already feeling swoony.
He sat on the edge of the bed and placed a palm over his nephew’s small shoulder. The scene tugged at her heart, surprising her. She’d never considered herself to be particularly enamored with kids.
“Kim?” Lyon asked, his voice groggy.
“Kimber,” Landon corrected. “Do you want to meet her?”
The boy yawned and blinked at her like a sleepy puppy. “Yeah.” He slid out of the bed and she bit back a smile at his Superman pajamas, complete with a red “S” emblazoned over his chest. He rubbed his eyes and inspected her, yawning again.
All of a sudden, Lyon’s eyes lost their haze. His limbs struck out to grab the nearest toy on the floor and, with a shout, he shot over to her like a bolt of lightning. The blur came to a stop at her feet, sword drawn, and she was nearly downed by his cuteness. From his mussed curls to his wide eyes, to the look of sheer determination drawn across his chubby face, Lyon Downey was a-freaking-dorable.
“Hi,” she said on an exhale of laughter.
His expression grew severe, and he thrust the weapon and growled, “You gonna make me breakfast?”
“Lionel,” Landon said with enough authority that Lyon dropped his elbows slightly. “That’s not how we greet a guest. Especially a lady.”
Lyon lowered the sword and squinted up at her. Kimber wasn’t sure if he was wondering what a lady was, or wondering if she qualified. She gave him her best demure eye-blink in order to allow Landon to dispense a valuable life lesson.
“Especially one this pretty.” Landon had spoken so low, she thought for a moment she’d imagined the compliment. Her heart fluttered. Seriously. Fluttered. Once again she was sixteen, peeking out of Angel’s bedroom window and watching Landon do push-ups on the dock outside their rented lake house. She’d longed for him so much back then. Even when he wore a sweat-soaked white T-shirt and navy gym shorts. She glanced at him but, like back then, he didn’t notice her now, either. She still longed for him. That would make this, the choice to come here and stay the week, her latest entry in a diary of bad decisions.
“What am I s’posed to do?” Lyon asked his uncle, sounding inconvenienced that he couldn’t charge her, then demand sustenance.
“First,” Landon said, taking the toy from Lyon’s grip and tossing it onto the bed. “You don’t challenge her to battle.”
She bit her lip to stifle a laugh.
“You say hello. Introduce yourself.” Landon faced Kimber to demonstrate, offering his palm, not in handshake mode, but like he might kiss her hand. She slid her palm into his warmer one and he wrapped his fingers around hers gently, but with enough strength that her every body part recognized him as a man. “Landon Downey,” he said, his voice like velvet and as warm as the sunshine streaming in from the window behind him. He tipped his chin, and a shadow dipped into a small cleft there. Had she never noticed it until now? Or, like his eyes, had she simply forgotten the detail over the years?
“Kimber Reynolds,” she said on a sigh. He lifted her hand and her breath caught expectantly.
But rather than his firm lips grazing her knuckles, instead he turned her hand to the side and gave her arm two short, professional pumps. The warmth in her palm receded the instant he pulled his hand away. “Nice to meet you.”
Before she had a chance to realign her frittering hormones, Lyon clasped on to her and gave her arm a vigorous shake. “I’m Lyon Downey.”
She stiffened her muscles and managed to regain control of her arm. Barely. “Nice to meet you, Lyon.”
“Now will you make me breakfast?”
Kimber spent the next half hour getting acquainted with Lyon, which basically involved him showing her every toy he had, which was a lot of toys. She wondered if Landon bought them especially for this visit, or if he kept them here for whenever Lyon came over. After Lyon had tired of show-and-tell, and Landon was satisfied that Kimber would not cook up his nephew and have him for dinner, Landon stood from the bed, pulled his phone from a pocket, and motioned for her to follow him out.
She smoothed her dress as she stood from the pile of superhero figures Lyon had dragged from the closet.
Landon didn’t look up from his phone. “You’re good, then?”
Lyon threw a toy in the air and nearly put his own eye out. She forced a steady smile. “Yep. We’re good.”
“Great. Lyon, I’ll see you after dinner, okay? Be good for Kimber.”
“Okay,” he answered in a sweet little-boy voice that warmed her heart. Goodness. The kid had more personalities than Dr. Jekyll.
“Walk with me,” Landon murmured to her as he strode by, still fervently avoiding her eyes. She followed him into a den or office of some sort where he gathered his briefcase, head down. “You know about Lyon’s mother?”
She nodded, then answered aloud since he still wasn’t looking at her. “Yes. Angel told me.” Rae Lynn Downey had died when Lyon was three. Poor Rae. Poor Evan. Poor Lyon. Tragedy struck everyone in one form or another, never granting immunity even to those most deserving.
“Just wanted to be sure you knew,” he said quietly. “Sometimes he talks about her.” Then he added in a harder voice that was all business, “I will be home at eight. Lyon’s bedtime is eight thirty. I’ll say good night to him when I get in.” He stopped at the doorway where she lingered. She took in his stubble-free face. The crisp, clean smell that wafted off of him. Aftershave, maybe? “Any questions?”
She licked her bottom lip, the only questions entering her consciousness a string of highly inappropriate requests. He lifted a sandy-colored eyebrow, his eyes flickering to her mouth.
“Actually, yes,” she said, pausing to clear her throat. “Do you have a map of the penthouse so I can find my room?”
His lips twitched and smile lines bracketing his mouth appeared before disappearing just as quickly. Her eyes lowered to the shallow dent in his chin, and she could swear her breasts grew heavy. She definitely did not remember that cleft. Meow.
“Trust me,” he said, his low voice ticking down her vertebrae. “Lyon is as good as a bloodhound.”
Even sexier when he teases back.
Landon walked for the front door and she t
urned the opposite direction, impressed that she’d avoided ogling his backside as he walked away. She’d noticed earlier he looked as good coming as going… which made her have a brief, dirty thought she had to force from her mind as she neared Lyon’s room.
At the threshold, it appeared a rogue cyclone had struck the six-year-old’s bedroom in the time it took for her to wind her way through the maze of corridors and hallways. She blinked at the mess.
“Ready to play?” Lyon asked, a huge toothy grin on his face. Well, toothy save for the one missing from the front.
Kimber took in her dress and black and white spectator pumps, then glanced over at the pile of uncapped magic markers on the carpet. She’d dressed to impress Landon, but it was apparent that she needed to change her clothes… and her expectations.
As fun as it was to flirt with her charge’s uncle, as much as she wanted to coax a smile to Landon’s lips and the knee-weakening laugh from his chest, she was not here for him. Her focus, her priority, was the little boy in front of her.
Not Landon, she reminded herself as a pang of loss shook through her chest. Not even if he sprouted a pair of dimples to go with that sexy divot in his chin.
* * *
Landon parked in his private garage, lifted his briefcase from the floorboard of his BMW, and stepped out. If not for the cardboard box stuffed with Windy City potato chips he’d brought home for Kimber, today might be like any other weekday. A day where his only plans would be a glass of scotch and a long night of work ahead of him. Hell, it’d been a long night already.
Picturing Kimber caused a smile, albeit a tired one, to inch across half his mouth. He juggled the box, the briefcase, and his keys, and walked to the elevator. Once inside, he nodded at Tony, the security guy, and inserted a key for the private penthouse on the thirtieth floor.
He met his haggard reflection in the steel doors of the lift as it carried him up. He looked like hell. Tie offset, jacket crumpled over one arm, five-o’clock shadow decorating his jaw. When he’d gotten into advertising, he’d imagined gliding around pristine offices and efficiently checking items off his to-do list. What he ended up doing most of the time was working from dawn well into the middle of the night, hammering away at an idea contented to stay underdeveloped.
He’d always had a precise, specific style when it came to design. Clean, crisp organization on a page. Blame it on his perfectionist streak, or on the control-freak-first-born characteristic alive and well within him. The style suited him. It also suited high-end products in the industry, part of the reason for Downey Design’s success in a short period of time. He’d experienced further success since having paired with his successful cousin. Shane’s business had shooed in several accounts and they hadn’t yet celebrated their first year together.
Not that Landon hadn’t done well on his own. Downey Design had created advertising packages for private airlines, liquor companies, and fancy electronics. But, as profitable as ads were for companies like Bose and Apple, he’d coveted a chunk of the ever-profitable food industry. Windy City had landed in his lap, whetting his appetite further.
Food was the commonality between all classes. Food owned the highest percentage of all aired commercials, and not just during big football games, but during every hour of every day. Windy City was his opportunity to break into the industry. The elevator doors opened on his private floor. He intended not only to succeed in that endeavor, but knock the potato chip company’s ad design right out of the park.
Regardless of how many nights I come home after ten o’clock, he thought with a weary sigh.
He walked through the open, empty foyer to his front door and unlocked the deadbolt. His penthouse didn’t appear much different from most nights he returned from work. The small dining room table gleamed, a pile of mail neatly stacked in one corner. The contemporary lighting fixtures over the kitchen island were on, casting a soft glow onto the cabinets and reflecting off their glass doors. He dropped his briefcase and jacket onto the chair and edged the box of snacks onto the table.
The house was silent as he pocketed his keys. No apparent sign of either of its inhabitants. Then, a flash of copper waves and skin appeared in his peripheral vision.
A lot of skin.
Kimber entered from the hallway, head down as she punched what was likely a text into her phone. She wore short cotton shorts, the cuffs tickling two of the most delicious-looking thighs he’d ever laid eyes on. His mouth went dry.
There it is again.
The jolt that shot down his spine and made his pants grow tighter. Awareness, pheromones, or maybe good old-fashioned attraction sizzled in the air between them. She looked up, her green eyes widening before she slid the phone into the minuscule pocket of those tight shorts. With Herculean effort, he dragged his eyes to her face.
Well. Sort of. He was distracted on the way up by her shirt: a faded image of the robot from the movie Short Circuit, the word “Input” silk-screened over her left breast.
“You’re home.” Her eyes strayed to the clock on the wall. “Late.”
He palmed his neck. “I know.” A shimmer of regret wafted over him. He’d wanted to tuck his nephew in tonight. “How did things go today?”
She moved to the fridge, looking comfortable opening the appliance and poking around inside. “Good.” She came out with a bottle of water. “Lyon is a bottomless pit of energy, but after I figured out your fancy espresso machine, I was able to cope. Probably why I’m still awake.” She cracked the top off the bottle and took a drink. He watched her delicate throat work as she swallowed, feeling another surge of awareness zip through his bloodstream. “He finally went down after I read him Green Eggs and Ham three times.”
Landon’s features pulled into a tired smile. At least he hoped it was a smile. After the long day, he may be grimacing at her for all he knew. “Three times? That’s too bad.”
“Not really. It’s my favorite book, too.” Her eyes strayed to the box of potato chip bags on the table. “What’s that?”
He lifted a random bag of chips by the corner and pulled out the jalapeño ranch flavor. “You said you liked potato chips.”
A smile spread her luscious lips. “For me?” She no longer wore the red lipstick or the retro dress, but damn, she looked good enough to…
But you’re not “going to” anything, so don’t bother finishing that sentence.
“I assumed we’d share them,” he joked, gesturing to the twelve bags he’d brought home from the office. Windy City had delivered fifty cases of chips to Downey Design today. One would think his employees had won the lottery for how happy they were to get free potato chips. A spark of a thought for their campaign snapped, then fizzled, his brain too tired to lock on to another idea.
He dropped the bag back into the box. “I happen to be in the middle of reimaging the best potato chip brand on the planet.” He sat heavily in one of the kitchen chairs, and she came around the island to stand at the table in front of him.
“You look exhausted.”
“I am.”
“Having branding issues?” She rifled through the box, inspecting the different flavors. Either because she was hungry or checking out the artwork, he couldn’t tell.
Thrown by a woman’s apparent interest in anything he did from nine to five… or ten, he hedged. “It’s a process.” Not that he’d launch into it if she pressed. He preferred to chase problems around in his head until he found the answer. It was in there. Somewhere. Hopefully it’d surface before tomorrow’s team meeting.
“I made spaghetti. Are you hungry?”
The air shifted, no longer crackling with just sexual energy, but with something else. Something familiar and foreign at the same time. She leaned casually on the table, waiting on his answer to her offer of leftovers. If he said yes, would she microwave him a plate? Bring him a fork? Sit with him while he ate and make idle conversation about his day?
The domesticity of the moment hit him front and center, nearly causing him
to clutch on to the table to ground himself. Not only about the dinner and casual way Kimber watched him now, but also the discussion about Lyon, almost as if they were a couple and were discussing a child of their own.
Hi, honey. How was your day?
Good, thanks. How was the kiddo? Get anything good in the mail?
Man. It was weird. Weird and sort of wonderful. Landon was suddenly dizzy… and concerned he was far more tired than he’d realized.
Scrunching his eyes closed, he shook his head. “No, thanks. I’m not hungry.”
“Oh. Okay.” She fiddled with the water bottle, her fingers intimately stroking the condensing water that had settled in its plastic ridges.
His voice taut with attraction, his next sentence came out harsh. “I don’t expect you to cook my dinner.”
She blinked at him, her lips parting slightly.
Dammit. He had to get a hold of himself. “That’s not what I’m paying you for,” he added, wincing at his tone. Now he sounded mean. A visual of him in a hole, digging for China, popped into his weary skull.
“I’m… um, I’m going to go to bed.” Her lips lifted into an unsure smile, making him feel like a grade-A jackass.
“Kimber, wait.”
She stopped short of walking down the hallway, wrapping her fingers around the wall and leaning back into the open doorway. Her teeth stabbed her bottom lip, her eyes were wide and innocent, her cinnamon-colored brows raised in curiosity.
Every last cell in his body wanted to rush across the room and fold her against him, sample her lips, and bury this… this bizarre, but unmistakable need in her fiery hair and plush mouth. He blinked, stunned and overwhelmed by his thoughts.
The Millionaire Affair (Love in the Balance) Page 4
