Thrill Me

by Isabel Sharpe

  Yeah, right. Grasping at straws was such an intelligent and constructive way to proceed. Especially if the one he grasped was the last for the poor camel of his career. The damn frustrating thing about creativity was that it couldn’t be forced, either into existence or to fit where it wasn’t natural. Maybe it made him too much of a “guy,” but this soften-Mack-up, make-him-fall-in-love thing was feeling like a suit handed down from a five-hundred pound man that everyone expected Beck to make flattering.

  He stalked through the double glass doors, into the large room, not a dark, leathery, men’s-club library, but airy and plant-filled and light. Comfortable cream-colored armchairs and sofas loaded with colored pillows sat randomly in singles, pairs and triples, each equipped with adjustable reading lamps and small padded foot-stools alongside. The richly polished bookcases, in a sleek two-tone wood design, held classics, reference books and a large collection of tasteful erotica.

  Beck scanned the room and immediately struck gold. Watering one of the ficus near the floor-to-ceiling windows, the grande dame of HUSH, Clarissa Armstrong. He’d met her his first day here, nearly three months ago, and they’d hit it off right away, having in common a love of old movies, fine wines and human nature. Whatever was going on in the hotel, she knew about it and was willing to tell, though loyalty and discretion prevented her from spilling anything damaging. If May was still here, Clarissa would know.

  “Good afternoon, Clarissa.”

  “Beck, hello, wonderful to see you as always.” She smiled her gracious, beautiful smile, and turned off the water. “What can I do for you?”

  “Not a thing.” He tried to smile nonchalantly, knowing if he launched immediately into the real reason he wanted to talk to her, he and May would be HUSH’s next hot-gossip item. “You look lovely today as usual.”

  Clarissa rolled her eyes, blushing at his compliment. “Save it for your younger fans. This old woman has been around too long for you to bother with. What’s on your mind?”

  He chuckled and freed the hose from the corner of the wooden planter where it had snagged. “Beautiful day.”

  She sent him a sharp look of amusement that told him she was willing to play along with the small-talk thing, but only for so long. “Yes, isn’t it. What are you up to?”

  “Just taking a walk, see if any new ideas jump at me.”

  “Aha.” She smiled and rolled the hose neatly back onto its cylinder. “And have they?”

  “Not really.” He pushed his hands into his pockets and rocked back on his heels like a nervous kid. For God’s sake, Beck, just ask her. “Any interesting newcomers to the hotel?”

  Clarissa’s delicate gray eyebrows arched; under them her eyes danced. “Would you by any chance be interested in hearing tales of a lady from Wisconsin with whom you shared a cozy drink last night?”

  He had to hold his mouth closed in order not to look as astonished as he felt. So much for avoiding being the topic of gossip. “I might be.”

  “I thought as much.”

  He rolled his eyes and grinned at her. “Okay, what can you tell me?”

  “Not that I condone spreading gossip you understand, but I believe this certain lady from Wisconsin might be open to a new escort this week if she can be convinced to stay, since hers…failed to materialize.”

  Her disdain made Beck narrow his eyes. “You know him?”

  “He is well known at Hush, yes.”

  “Let me guess…rich married playboy, brings women here while he’s supposedly on business trips…”

  Clarissa plucked a yellowing leaf off the ficus and peered up into the topmost branches, looking for more. “I said nothing of the kind.”

  He nodded. She didn’t need to. Which did two things. One, it made him want to punch the guy’s lights out for being a sleazebag, and two, it confirmed his initial feeling that May was the perfect person to help him with this first scene Alex wanted revised. Why a tiny part of him was disappointed to be proven right on this point, he was not anxious to investigate.

  Whether May had enough depth to help him with female input into the rest of the revisions remained to be seen. Falling in love might not be Beck’s strong suit, but it didn’t generally get dealt to women like May, either. Anyone who would accept the kind of relationship she’d planned for this week had seen and done it all—but would probably feel next to nothing either seeing it or doing it.

  None of which had any bearing on his immediate need, which was to find May and make sure she planned to stay at least a little longer.

  “How determined is she to leave?”

  Clarissa grabbed the wooden box planter and turned it with surprising strength, so the other side of the tree faced the light. “I believe she could be convinced to stay.”

  Beck grinned. “With the right kind of persuasion?”

  “Naughty boy.” She gave him a dazzling smile. “I don’t suppose you are interested in knowing where she is right now?”

  “Gee.” He gave a pretend nonchalant shrug. “I might be.”

  She winked and leaned close. “Not that I’m prone to snooping you understand.”

  “Of course not.”

  “I believe Ms. May Ellison was last seen heading for the hotel pool.”

  Beck shook his head. “Now how could you possibly know that?”

  “Pure chance, my dear. Happenstance. Coincidence.” Clarissa narrowed her eyes mysteriously and gave him a light tap on the shoulder. “And in this case, I think maybe fate.”

  Beck laughed uneasily. She was at it already. In a few hours, the staff of HUSH would start laying bets on him and May getting together. Little did they know his interest in her was purely—well, primarily—professional.

  He blew a kiss to Clarissa, thanked her again, and strode back out of the library, heading for his room and his swim trunks. In any case, he knew where to find May; she hadn’t checked out yet, and he had another shot at convincing her to help him. He might not be a millionaire playboy, but he wasn’t an ex-con felon, either. Everyone wanted something, everyone could be bought.

  He just needed to figure out what May Ellison’s price was, and pay it.

  4

  ROUGHLY TWO MILLISECONDS after Beck entered the pool room, clutching the fresh warm towel the men’s changing room attendant had handed him, he spotted May—though the room was nearly empty, so it wasn’t exactly a significant accomplishment. She sported a new flattering haircut, and a very plain turquoise one-piece bathing suit—not what he thought he’d see. The new haircut, sure, but on her body he’d expected a three hundred dollar microbikini, made not to touch water, but to be admired on a salon-tanned body lounging in a poolside chaise. To his eyes, the simple design of the suit, the way it followed and flattered the very graceful, very female lines of her tall figure made it sexier than the skimpiest G-string.

  Even though he was after her for professional reasons, at the moment his thoughts were taking a fairly un-professional turn.

  But then he’d always preferred women modestly clothed—relatively modestly, he was hardly a Puritan—whose sexuality simmered below the surface and erupted in a volcanic surprise behind closed doors. Women who advertised to all who cared to gawk did little for him. What did they leave for the fun of discovery?

  May hadn’t seen him; she seemed distracted, or tense; a small frown bunched her mouth and eyebrows. She walked to the edge of the water without looking around, bent and dove smoothly in, surfacing to attack the length of the pool with strong, clean strokes at a pace he probably couldn’t keep up for more than half a lap.

  At the end of ten, she executed another flawless turn and kept going.

  Again, unexpected. Not a surprise that she was physically fit; she probably had a personal trainer to keep her assets in shape for whatever millionaire she was entertaining that week. But the no-nonsense athletic determination to dominate the pool—that, he wouldn’t have expected from the languid beauty he’d chatted with last night.

  Or the lack of hesitation
to get newly styled hair wet and chlorinated.

  He tossed his towel onto one of the white chairs grouped around tables on the room’s periphery and sat on another, content for now to watch her swim. This room was one of his favorites in the hotel. Mack had discovered a body floating here, a sensational place for a ghoulish midnight drowning.

  The pool was a long, narrow rectangle in the center of the tiled gray floor, open to natural light below a glass ceiling with wooden beams that looked like the spine and ribs of an enormous geometric animal. At night, chrome sconces at wide intervals shot bright white up the walls, leaving stripes of dark in between, while underwater lights lit the pool brilliant blue in a room that at that hour looked otherwise like a black-and-white movie. On a raised platform at one end, a Jacuzzi frothed and bubbled, currently occupied by a couple blissfully unaware that anyone or anything else existed but them.

  Envy jabbed him until he remembered his last time in a Jacuzzi, with his former girlfriend, Mary Ann, who’d gotten tipsy and furious that he was paying more attention to his nearly due manuscript than to her, and why couldn’t he ever forget about that writing stuff and be with her like they used to be?

  He never knew how to answer that question, another of the many loaded ones the opposite sex hurled so effortlessly. It seemed pointless to ask why she couldn’t stop yelling at him for the career that had excited her in the first place. Did she think the books wrote themselves? That armies of elves did the work while he had hours to lounge in a Jacuzzi and tell her she was gorgeous? Didn’t it occur to her that during the beginning of their relationship he was between books and had more time?

  Lap fifteen and May swam on, maybe slowing a bit.

  Or was Beck just not a good person in a relationship, as he’d been told more than once, usually by a ballistic soon-to-be-ex girlfriend? The women he hooked up with he enjoyed, no question. Unfortunately, there always seemed to be a huge gap between how they expected him to behave and how he was inclined to. He never could seem to ascribe the level of importance to being attached they seemed to think was necessary. Not only was he apparently insufficiently involved in anticipating and satisfying their needs, but he constantly failed to notice things he was supposed to notice, and failed to say things they thought beyond obvious he should say…

  Lap twenty, May changed from crawl to breaststroke, downshifting her workout.

  At the same time, Beck wasn’t the type for short flings based merely on attraction like so many of his gender. He preferred women in his bed to be those he wanted around for a lot longer than a night or two or five. Obviously May Ellison was cut from a different cloth on that issue.

  Lap twenty-five, she gentled her breaststroke to a lazy glide forward, water building and breaking leisurely over her nose. Finally, she hoisted herself easily out of the pool and walked to the table with her towel on it, not noticing him or showing any interest in her surroundings.

  If he wanted to talk to her, this was his chance.

  Uncharacteristically nervous, he got up and sauntered over to where she stood, her back to him, pressing the towel to her face, water making her suit and body gleam.

  “May.”

  She jumped and turned, wrapping the towel hurriedly around her waist in a show of modesty that seemed out of character. “You startled me.”

  “Sorry.” He found a grin on his face where he hadn’t planned one, aware his pleasure at seeing her had too much to do with his gender. And hers. And the theoretical potential of a physical combination thereof. Not nearly enough to do with his book.

  The turquoise of her suit was right for her skin, not too bright, not too dull, and lit her eyes so their color glowed from her face. The deep scooped neckline and wide-placed straps emphasized the graceful line of her collarbone and the enticing depth of her cleavage. Hair smoothed back by her swim, a surprising blush coloring her makeup-free face, she looked nothing like a sophisticated mistress and everything like a Midwestern farm girl. Which, in his opinion, made her ten times more alluring.

  The book, Beck. This is about the book. “Had a good swim?”

  “Yes, wonderful.”

  “You look like a pro.”

  “Oh.” She glanced toward the pool, then took a deep breath. “Swim team.”

  “High school or college?”

  “Both.”

  He nodded. College-educated. Which ruled out a high school dropout getting by in life on her back. Interesting. “So have you decided to stay at Hush?”

  “I don’t—” She lifted her chin. “Yes.”

  “How long?”

  She glanced to the side yet again. “Probably the week.”

  He gritted his teeth, the elation she was staying short-lived. She was distracted. Or unwilling to talk to him. Or both. Maybe he’d turned her off last night with his request, though she hadn’t seemed bothered at the time. Maybe she thought he was coming on to her and now that she’d decided to stay, she was trying to freeze him off. Maybe she already had another billionaire lined up after the last one jilted her, and she no longer needed to waste time talking to Beck.

  All understandable. But the fact remained that he needed help on his book and she was—

  Her slight gasp made him follow her gaze.

  The pool was empty; the two other swimmers had left the room. Blue water undulated quietly, reflecting the light pouring through the glass ceiling in wobbly patterns interrupted by shadows of the thick wooden beams.

  Beyond the pool, maybe ten yards away from where they stood, he saw what she’d been glancing at, and what had made her gasp. The couple in the Jacuzzi had just stopped kissing. Not leisurely romantic kissing, but serious I-want-you-now-and-I-intend-to-have-you kissing. The woman, a dark beautiful brunette, was raised up in her lover’s arms, and by the look of concentration on his face, they were attempting to make it happen right there, right then.

  “Oh, my God.” May whispered the words beside him, though he couldn’t tell whether in anticipation or horror.

  The woman gave a low moan and closed her eyes. She began to move slowly up and down, an expression of rapture on her face. The dark man glanced toward May and Beck, then away, apparently unperturbed—or maybe thrilled—they were watching. He slowly reached up to untie the woman’s halter suit, then brought it down so her full breasts were exposed, aureoles large, nipples dark.

  Beck drew in a long breath, becoming aroused, as much by being trapped with May in the intimacy of what they were seeing as by the show itself.

  The man cupped his lover’s beautiful breasts, thumbing the nipples. She tipped her head back, full red lips parted blissfully. A soft female moan reached them; her up and down movements became faster.

  Beside Beck, May gasped again, made an involuntary movement. Was she about to leave? His instinct begged her to stay. Without her, the exhibitionism would seem empty, sleazy; he’d be embarrassed to be watching alone. With her beside him, the couple provided a tantalizing erotic interlude.

  She stayed. The woman moaned again; she was supermodel-gorgeous, sensual. Beck observed her objectively, his senses focused more on May than the woman’s movie-star perfection.

  Her lover pushed her breasts up into two lush handfuls, then bent and took the tip of one into his mouth. She cried out, clutched his head; her up-and-down movements grew wilder.

  May’s breath went out, rushed back in. Was she shocked or aroused? He couldn’t tell, didn’t want to look to find out in case he embarrassed her or intruded on her thrill.

  One of the man’s hands disappeared under the water, then the other. He lifted the woman suddenly, water streaming off them both, then turned and knelt, sitting his lover on the edge of the tub, her long legs spread wide.

  Beck took a small step back, trying to catch May in his peripheral vision, wanting to see her face, but afraid he’d shatter the freeze-frame moment, afraid he’d push something she didn’t want pushed if they acknowledged each other. He sensed her tension, saw her rock-stillness, but couldn’t tell if
she was horny or horrified.

  The man started his thrusting rhythm again, buttocks bunching and relaxing; the woman propped herself on her hands, arms straight behind her, hair swinging as she arched back.

  Beck turned to May, uninterested in seeing any more of the now totally public show. “May?”

  She turned toward him immediately as if she, too, was relieved to look away. “Yes?”

  Her eyes were bright, lips full, cheeks flushed, breath high—she was massively turned on. That fact shot his own arousal higher than it had been watching the live sex act.

  The woman’s moans increased; she panted, moaned again, building to a long cry, which the man inside her echoed shortly after, in a deeper, harsher vocalization.

  Beck waited tensely. May would look back now; she’d want to see porn-flick Romeo’s orgasmic bliss.

  She didn’t. She kept her clear blue eyes on his, and the chemistry between them leaped to life as if someone had thrown a match into a puddle of gasoline.

  His cock responded first and his brain soon after, caught in the sensual power of May Ellison’s eyes. How many other men had been trapped there? He wanted to peel her suit from her body, lift her onto the table beside them, see her skin living and rosy against the white painted wood, immerse himself hard in her slender tight body and take them both where the other couple had just been.

  “My room or yours?” The words came out low and urgent and as soon as he heard them from his own mouth he wanted them back.

  May blinked and blinked again, as if she was startled out of a delicious dream. “What?”

  He closed his eyes briefly. What was he thinking? He wasn’t. At least not with his brain. “Nothing. Never mind. Just…got the wrong signal.”