At Your Service

by Amy Jo Cousins

  Grace was still blushing with pleasure at his compliments to her. She'd always made sure to let the staff of her restaurants know when they were doing an especially good job, but she hadn't realized how much she missed having someone do the same for her.

  It's only human to want someone to praise you for a job well done. I just haven't had anyone around me who bothered to notice, except Grandmother, and once she became too ill...

  In the middle of these thoughts, she noticed the silence of the room and then the focus of Tyler's attention on her. Her chin was still cradled in his palm and his face was only inches away from hers. The awareness she had of his mouth was overwhelming.

  "My mother told me to stay away from you," he murmured, tracing his gaze over her face like a caress and brushing a hand over the top of her head. When she didn't protest as he pulled the first pin from her hair, he tugged them all out, one by one, until the weight of her hair spilled down around her shoulders. He ran his fingers through the waves to loosen them, and flexed his fingers gently against her scalp. "She said you didn't want to kiss me again."

  "She's right," Grace said, even as she leaned in closer to him, narrowing the gap, her eyes drifting shut. "I don't." And it turned out that the last step was so easy, she couldn't remember why she'd been afraid of it. "I just can't seem to remember why."

  His mouth was soft against hers, his lips gently welcoming her, coaxing her mouth gradually open until his tongue found hers and teased. A gentle dance of seduction that felt as calm and safe as the comfort of home.

  Why his kisses should feel like home to her was a question she was beyond asking at this point. But she didn't fight it when she felt herself relaxing beneath his touch, the tension magically draining from her neck and shoulders as his fingers stroked her there. When she sighed on an arch of pleasure beneath his mouth, she didn't care that he could hear how much he affected her.

  Her soft, broken sounds of pleasure, though, triggered a change in his caresses, one that had her gasping at the sudden rush of heat through her veins. His lips raced over her face, leaving heat blooming in flushed flowers everywhere he touched, until he came back to her mouth and the fierceness of his kiss, the strength in the pressure of his hand on the back of her head, arched her deeper into his kiss.

  This wasn't home. It was a wild, crazy, whirlwind tour of damp jungles and sun-soaked beaches, sparkling flavors bursting in her mouth and a million sensations she'd never felt, sights she'd never seen, compressed into a kiss that exploded in her body at mach speed.

  He'd let go of her hands along the way and now she found herself bracing them on his knees as she leaned across the gap between them. In a second, he'd grabbed them again and with a sharp tug, pulled her out of her seat and over to him. The kiss didn't break and it was the most natural thing in the world for her to straddle his thighs with her own, as he sat in the chair, and climb onto his lap,

  Tyler groaned beneath her. "You're killing me." He pressed his face into her chest and took a deep breath. His arms wrapped around her and held her tightly to him. When he looked back up at her, his eyes were laughing. "I imagined you like this when you first walked in here and straddled that bar chair." He pulled one hand between them and traced a path down her throat, past the open neck of her blouse, stopping at the highest button. He popped it open and raised an eyebrow. "Of course, you were naked." Another pop. "In my fantasy."

  "I was, was I?" For once her eyes were on a level with his and she read in them a dark desire for her that had her draping her arms languidly over his shoulders, her hands curving back to play idly in the hair at the nape of his neck. A reckless kind of power filled her as he tipped his head forward, encouraging her to let her fingers roam more widely. She danced her touch lightly over the warm skin just beneath the collar of his shirt. His hands fell to rest gently on her hips. She tipped his head up with a gentle pressure beneath his chin and raised an eyebrow at him in teasing question, "But I'm not naked now. How disappointing that must be for you."

  "That can be fixed." The lightening surge of energy as he seized her mouth was exactly what she needed to make her forget. Forget why this was wrong. Forget who she was. Who she was pretending to be.

  Just let me have this right now, she begged and didn't know to whom she was pleading. Herself. Tyler. Let me have this heat, this mindless sensation. Let me just be Grace. No questions, no lies. And let me have this man.

  Then words left her and she was pure driven sensation alone, swallowing his breath as she chased his mouth with her own. She bit his lip gently when he dragged his mouth away from hers for a moment, and then gasped as his tongue thrust again into her mouth. She pushed her hands frantically through his hair, grasping the strands forcefully to hold him still as she attacked his mouth.

  His hands pulled at the front of her blouse, the backs of his fingers brushing her bare stomach as he tugged the tails of her shirt free and pulled the last buttons through. The air was cool on her flushed skin as he pushed the lapels of her shirt wide open, baring her silk bra. He tore his mouth from hers and pulled back, capturing her eyes with his own for one hungry moment. Then he lowered his gaze, and so did she.

  She watched him as, ignoring the bra clasp, he pulled the cups of her bra down and bared her breasts. Her nipples were hard, craving his touch, as the bra lifted them, pushed them higher to his waiting mouth. He lowered his head.

  Heat burst through her and an aching bloomed between her legs that was almost painful with the wanting of him. His mouth was warm and wet as his tongue stroked her, the breath he blew on her wet nipple both cold and fiercely hot at the same time.

  When he trailed his fingers feather-light over the outside curve of her other breast, she cried out on the breaking wave of pleasure.

  His words, when he spoke without lifting his head, broke through the haze of heat and need like a rock through a plate-glass window.

  "Am I taking you home with me tonight, after all, Grace?"

  Four

  The last time he'd suggested it, she'd hit him on the head with a ditty spoon.

  Awake now, as if from a dream, Grace imagined what she would look like if she could see herself in a mirror, and nearly groaned out loud in frustration and embarrassment. Straddling Tyler's lap in a dimly lit restaurant, shirt open, bra tugged down beneath her breasts. The picture of wanton invitation.

  She wished he hadn't asked the question, had simply continued the silent seduction that would let her pretend that she was just Grace and he was just Tyler. That the rest of the world and its problems didn't exist.

  But she wasn't just Grace. And she couldn't pretend that sex with anyone, even Tyler, would make her problems go away.

  Sex with anyone, especially Tyler, was only going to complicate matters.

  What on earth was she doing on his lap?

  She realized that he was still waiting silently for her answer and dropped her forehead down to rest it wearily against his. "No, I guess you're not."

  "I was afraid of that." The words were muffled against her breasts. She smiled gently although she knew he couldn't see it. The quiet was calming. She felt at rest, oddly enough, peaceful sitting half-naked across this man's lap. When he spoke again, his voice was halfheartedly hopeful.

  "You're sure about that?"

  This time she did laugh. "I'm afraid so."

  When his thumbnail scraped swiftly down the center seam of her pants, passion flared sharply through her and she nearly fell to the floor in her backward scramble off his lap. She gained her footing awkwardly and stood, glaring at him.

  He had the grace to look sheepish, until he grinned. "Just checking." He watched as she tugged self-consciously on her bra until it once again covered her breasts. "I didn't know if you were going to try to pretend again that you didn't feel anything."

  Damn, the man could be annoying. "You know perfectly well that I felt something."

  "Something?"

  Heat. Lightning. Crashing waves and starlight. Passion and nee
d.

  The word she settled for was close enough.

  "Plenty."

  The crack of his laughter shot loudly through the stillness of the empty room. "Plenty, huh? Well, I guess I'll have to settle for that."

  Her feeling of awkwardness grew as she fumbled with the buttons of her blouse and he simply sat there, watching her. The irritation running through her should only be directed at herself, she knew, but her voice was still sharp when she spoke.

  "Appearances to the contrary, Tyler..." she began.

  He shushed her. "I know. You don't normally do this kind of thing."

  That stung. "Is it so obvious?" She'd been called cold before, by men who didn't appreciate her lack of interest in them. When she'd made it plain to Charles that, despite her family's intentions, she had no desire to go to bed with him, he'd started referring to her as the Ice Queen. But cold was the last word she would use to describe how she felt around Tyler.

  "Why do you think I asked if you were coming home with me?" His smile was wry as he stood and walked over to her. He stopped far enough away that she managed to keep herself from backing up a step. "I knew that if you stopped to think for a moment, you'd figure out where we were headed. And say no."

  "Then why did you? Ask, I mean." Honesty compelled her to find out.

  When he reached out to run a hand lightly over her hair, she didn't pull away. "Because I like you, Grace. And I want you, too. Enough to have taken you home to my bed and made love to you until the sun rose and reminded us of a new day." He paused, and she waited silently. "But I want you badly enough to want more than one night. I'm afraid that you'd wake up tomorrow feeling like you'd made a mistake, and decide to disappear.

  "And that is not something I want."

  His words frightened her.

  She turned her back to him and finished buttoning her blouse. Shoving the tails ruthlessly back beneath her waistband, she considered what to do next. Tyler's footsteps echoed lightly on the quarry tile floor as he walked back behind the bar and shut off the last of the lights. In the dark, she could admit to herself that he was right.

  If she'd gone home with him—

  She interrupted her own thoughts. Let's be honest. If we'd finished what we started, right there on the chair in the middle of a deserted restaurant, I would have regretted it. And regretting it, might have walked away from it.

  I walked away from my own family, didn't I? My so-called fiancé, even. Why on earth should Tyler be any different?

  But he was, even if she refused to acknowledge why. She couldn't have walked away from him. And that would only make things worse in the end.

  She felt him approach, a physical source of warmth at her side, as he returned to her. He handed her oversize leather purse to her. She slung it over her shoulder. She still hadn't said a word to him.

  "Come on. I'll walk you to Sarah's."

  She nodded her assent and they left the bar together and walked home in the dark.

  She'd been afraid to fall asleep.

  Afraid that in her dreams she would see herself again, sliding onto his lap. Wrapping her arms around him and watching him undress her. Afraid that in her dreams, she would cover his mouth with her own and stop him from saying the words that broke the spell and instead let herself fall all the way into the ecstasy of him.

  She'd been afraid of waking up and wanting him even more.

  She dreamed, instead, of the walk they shared in the night.

  Their footsteps on cement had sounded loud in the utter stillness of the neighborhood streets at 3:00 a.m. The arching limbs of trees overhead caused the streetlights to cast shifting shadows in the yellow light. It was strangely intimate, this wordless walk past the houses of sleeping families and people alone in their beds. When they passed a honeysuckle bush, its sweet scent resting heavily on the warm night air, he snapped off a stem of blossoms and buried his face in their bloom before passing them to her.

  She inhaled and breathed in both the honeysuckle and him. The flowers would soon be gone, she knew.

  In her dream, she felt his voice like a physical force surrounding her.

  What happens next, Grace?

  Nothing, she answered and felt an unbearable sadness. Nothing happens next.

  As Grace tumbled out of sleep and into wakefulness, gradually becoming aware of the sun lying in stripes across her body where it shone through the blinds, higher in the sky than it ought to be, she remembered with fading dream warmth his answer to her.

  Not possible. And when you change your mind, I'll be right here.

  So she woke with a smile on her face. Of disbelief, admittedly, that the man could be so unbelievably arrogant, but a smile nonetheless. She couldn't remember the last time she'd done that.

  She could, however, remember the last time she'd awakened and felt safe in her bed. On this morning she was incredibly grateful to feel such simple comfort again.

  The night before she hadn't even turned on the lights in her new room before falling on the bed, fully dressed, and most of the way to sleep before her head hit the pillow. She rolled over now to take a look at her temporary home and her smile broadened in gladness at the sight.

  The room was small, tucked under the eaves on the third story of an old house built like a clapboard castle, with turrets and all. The ceiling sloped sharply above her bed, creating an atmosphere of cozy warmth. Someone had painted the walls a butter yellow that glowed in the morning sunlight. The hardwood floors shone richly beneath scattered rag rugs and there was, wonderfully, an actual window seat built into the outside wall. A quilted cushion and several throw pillows made it an inviting place to curl up with a book and tea. Grace could picture it on a rainy day and hoped she'd be here long enough to enjoy that pleasure.

  An antique-style fan whirred softly in one corner, blowing the warm morning air pleasantly throughout the room. She'd slept beneath a single cotton sheet, which she threw back now as she rolled out of bed and onto her feet. When she reached over her head in a long stretch, her fingers brushed the slope of the ceiling and she grinned.

  Sarah had left her bags on top of a long, low dresser that sat tucked beneath the lowest eave. Next to it, she'd also left a note folded on top of a blue towel and facecloth.

  Grace—

  Hope your first night's rest was a good one. The bathroom is down the hall on the left. Use anything you need, and feel free to take the same liberties in the kitchen. If you can find anything worth eating, that is.

  Tyler said last night to tell you not to show your face in the bar before 4 p.m., but to bring the stuff you need to complete the paperwork. I'm at work, will see you at Tyler's later.

  Welcome,

  Sarah

  Grace sat on the edge of the dresser with a thump. How could she have forgotten so quickly? Clearly, that hadn't been a problem for her boss. The small matter of her registration with the federal government as an official employee of Tyler's Bar & Grill was still hanging over her head.

  Like a guillotine, she thought morbidly.

  I'll just have to figure out how to build that bridge when I need to cross it. But right now, what I need is a shower. A long, hot, wash the smoke out of my hair, shower. Tyler and his paperwork can wait.

  In the bathroom, she scrubbed and soaked and refused to notice the dark chestnut roots growing in at the base of her honey-blond hair. She'd paid a ridiculous amount of money to have it done at a downtown salon no one in her circle visited, on the day she'd run away. Something about the drastic change in hair color, and the new, softer cut she'd requested, had shifted the whole shape and feel of her face. She looked younger, and more vulnerable, than she had in years.

  Looking at herself in the mirror, she felt sure that no one who knew her previously would recognize her, as long as they didn't get more than a casual look. With her current lack of funds, she'd have to wait awhile before touching up the roots, but she didn't think anyone would notice for at least another couple of weeks.

  Thoughts
of being recognized, though, had spoiled her morn- ing as thoroughly as thoughts of the upcoming confrontation with Tyler. Pacing the kitchen in her bathrobe, she scooped some debatably dated lemon yogurt out of a carton and tried to think her way out of either of her dilemmas.

  Tyler first. If only because her problems there were more concrete. No ID, no job. But how to get around that catch-22 was the question. Could she fake a mugging on her way to work? Pretend that her wallet had been stolen and hope to ride for a week or two on that story, too busy to go to the D.M.V. to get another driver's license?

  But what good would that do her, really? In a week, she'd just have to come up with another story, and although Tyler might bite once or even twice, surely it was too much to expect a third time.

  You know, in spy novels it's always ridiculously easy to get a fake passport or driver's license made, she thought, angrily recalling her favorite authors. They make it sound like all you need is five hundred bucks and a phone book and it's goodbye Grace Haley, hello Grace Desmond.

  I bet John LeCarre has never actually been on the run in his life, or he would have realized it just isn't that easy. At least not when you're without underworld connections.

  As she got dressed in an outfit nearly identical to the one from the previous evening, she settled unhappily on the mugging story as her best of several bad options. She laced up her shoes and packed her apron back in her bag after removing her tips from the night before. The money she tucked in a dresser drawer, except for a twenty-dollar bill that she put in her wallet. She trusted Sarah, and there wasn't a lock on her door here in any case. Nor could she go and deposit the money in a bank, unless she wanted to provide her family with a way to track her down.

  She locked the apartment door behind her and headed down the interior stairs. On the walk home last night, she thought she'd spotted a pay phone at the corner convenience store.

  Indeed, there was a phone bolted to the exterior of the brick building, and the clerk inside was more than happy to give her change, after she bought a bottle of lemon ice tea and a copy of the Sun Times and the Tribune. If her family had made any announcement about her disappearance, she'd find it in one of the two Chicago dailies.