Just Trust Me…

by Jacquie D’Alessandro

A hard time…thanks to her slowly roaming fingers, he knew all about a hard time. “Not the lottery. But after years of research, I reached a personal and professional goal. Sort of a scientific breakthrough.”

  “That sounds like a good thing.”

  “I agree. But I found out very quickly that a lot of bad stuff came with the good.”

  Understanding dawned in her eyes-which he nearly missed because her fingertips brushed beneath the hem of his khaki shorts, glazing his eyes over. “Everyone suddenly wanted in on your breakthrough,” she said, and he thanked God his hearing was still operating. “Professional jealousy and all that.”

  “Um, something like that, yes. And, like the person who wins the lottery, I suddenly found myself with lots and lots of ‘friends.’”

  Her eyes twinkled. “Ah-ha. So you did win the lottery. Are you sure I won’t try to hit you up for a loan?”

  “If you keep touching my leg like that, I’m apt to give you anything you want.”

  Her fingers slid a bit higher on his leg and he sucked in a breath. “Good to know,” she murmured, drawing slow, drugging circles around his inner thigh.

  “But to set the record straight, I didn’t win the lottery, and you’d be sorely disappointed in my bank balance.”

  “So then these false friends are trying to ride your professional coattails and share in your glory?”

  He nodded even though it was only half of the problem, the other part being the relentless pursuit by the cosmetics companies, but her touch was rapidly depleting his ability to prolong the conversation. “I felt as if I was being pulled in a dozen directions, and I was losing sight of what was important. Of who I was and what I wanted. I needed to get away. Far away. Clear my head.”

  “No change, no gain.”

  “Exactly.”

  “So what other aspects of your life were out of balance?” she asked.

  “Family and friendships are fine, and since I’m not married, that’s not an issue.”

  “What about love and sex?”

  “I’m completely unattached.”

  Deciding two could play at this game, he leaned forward and reached beneath the table to lightly grasp her ankle, enjoying her quick intake of breath. “And one of the first people I meet is from the same city I just flew nearly four thousand miles to escape. Unbelievable.”

  “Sorry. If I’d known you were trying to escape all reminders of home, I wouldn’t have said hello.”

  He stroked his fingers up her silky calf, a move she answered by stroking her palm higher up his thigh. “If you hadn’t said hello that would have been my very great loss.”

  “Maybe not. I think I probably would have said hello anyway.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Fishing for compliments?”

  He slipped his hand over her knee. “Shamefully.”

  Her gaze roamed his face, then said softly, “Something about the way you were sitting there, your expression. You looked…” She shook her head. “I’m not sure how to describe it other than to say that you looked how I felt. Glad to be here, yet somehow…lonely.”

  He studied her eyes and his stomach seemed to swoop downward, as if he were falling. Which, crazy as it sounded, was precisely how he felt-as if he was in an emotional free fall. He’d gone from zero to lust to halfway in love with this woman in a millisecond.

  “I was lonely,” he said, softly stroking her knee, “although I hadn’t even realized it. But I’m not anymore.”

  “I’m glad. But I would have said hello to you anyway because I also thought you were really cute.”

  “Right back at ya. Except I don’t think cute really does you justice.”

  “Oh? What would you say does?”

  “Fishing for compliments?”

  “Shamefully.”

  After considering for several seconds, he said, “You possess an abundance of millihelens and microhelens.”

  “Whatever that means.”

  “You’ve heard of Helen of Troy?”

  “The woman over whom the Trojan War was started?”

  “That’s the one. It’s said that her face launched a thousand ships. In the Troy system of units, a millihelen is the amount of beauty required to launch one ship. A microhelen is roughly the amount of beauty needed to motivate one sailor.” His fingertips skimmed behind her knee. “You possess enough of both to launch an entire armada of ships and motivate an entire army of soldiers.”

  A slow, sexy smile curved her lips. She tickled her fingertips across his thigh and he damn near forgot how to breathe. “Thank you. Looks like I’ll be giving you some more points for originality.”

  “Excellent. How can I earn a few more?”

  “You could dazzle me with some interesting scientific facts.”

  “One square inch of skin contains six hundred and twenty-five sweat glands.” He edged his hand higher under her skirt and slowly traced his fingers up her thigh. He noted with satisfaction that her own fingers stilled on his leg and her pupils dilated when his fingers drew leisurely figure eights on her exquisitely soft skin.

  “I believe it,” she murmured in a breathless voice. “I feel like every one of mine is pumping steam.”

  Without taking his gaze from hers, he rose, then gently pulled her to her feet. Hidden in their private alcove in the back room, he drew her into his arms and slowly skimmed his hands down her back. “In the adult human body, there are forty-six miles of nerves. The most sensitive cluster of nerves is here…” He lightly massaged the small of her back, urging her closer, until their bodies touched from chest to knee. “At the base of the spine.”

  “Fascinating,” she murmured, skimming her hands up his chest then looping her arms around his neck. “What else?”

  “Minks have sex that lasts about eight hours.”

  “Oh…my.”

  “Moose intercourse usually lasts about five seconds.”

  “Note to self…would much prefer to be a mink.”

  Leaning forward, he nuzzled the warm, smooth skin just below her ear with his lips. God, she smelled delicious.

  “Bats have sex in the air.”

  She breathed out a sigh then tilted her neck, affording him better access. “Sounds…adventurous.”

  His teeth lightly nipped her earlobe. “A female praying mantis devours her partner while they’re mating.”

  “Mmm. Depending on your definition of devour, that could also sound adventurous.”

  “A female ferret can die if she goes into heat and can’t find a mate.”

  Her fingers fisted in his hair and with a groan, she tugged his mouth towards her. “I know exactly how she feels,” she said in a husky whisper against his lips.

  His mouth covered hers in kiss that drained every thought from his head. He’d intended to kiss her gently, seduce her slowly, savoring each touch, but the instant their lips met, a flash-fire reaction the likes of which he’d never before experienced sizzled through him, incinerating him where he stood.

  She tasted as seductively delicious as she smelled, and, with a low growl, his arms tightened around her. He stepped backwards until his shoulders hit the wall, then he spread his legs, settling her in the V of his thighs, pressing her tighter against his erection, and feasted on her lush mouth, while his hands roamed restlessly up and down her back.

  His tongue mated with hers, an erotic friction that quickly depleted whatever control she hadn’t already stolen. His hands skimmed over her lush curves, settling on her bottom. She shifted against him, dragging another growl from his throat. His hips involuntarily thrust into her feminine softness, and he knew they needed to stop this now…before he stood in real danger of not being able to stop at all.

  Expending an effort that required all his will power, he lifted his head. Breathing hard, he looked down into her flushed face. Her hair was beautifully messed from his impatient hands, and with her lips parted and moist from their frantic kiss and her eyelids droopy, she looked sinfully aroused and sexy as hell.<
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  Her tongue peeked between her lips, a flick of pink that spiked his temperature another few degrees. She blinked twice, a look of utter confusion filling her glazed eyes. “What was that?”

  He shook his head, feeling as bemused and jumbled as she looked. “Damned if I know.”

  “I…I’m at a loss to explain being so carried away.”

  “Scientifically, I’d describe it as an instantaneous exothermic reaction.”

  “Which means what, to those of us whose brain cells seem to have melted?”

  “Basically, it’s a very fast, strong reaction that gives off heat-like when firecrackers explode.”

  “Yes, that explains it very well. Although I’d have just called it ‘magic.’”

  “Magic works for me.”

  “Exactly what sort of science is your specialty that you know all this?”

  He tucked a stray strand of shiny auburn hair behind her ear. “Chemistry. The study of matter and the changes that it undergoes…or what’s happening between us.”

  “Can’t argue with that.”

  “I don’t suppose you know how to say ‘Can we get our meal to go?’ in Spanish?”

  “No, but adios means goodbye. Probably if we said that, the waiter would get the point.”

  “I’m willing to give it a try.” His hands lightly kneaded her bottom and every reason why he didn’t have the time or inclination for a relationship melted under the onslaught of heat between them. Relationship? his inner voice scoffed. No problem-this is just sex. Part of his mind instantly disagreed, but he ignored the warning.

  Swallowing a moan of raw want, he said, “We either need to stop this or get out of here now. I know which one gets my vote. How about you?”

  She looked at him with those beautiful green eyes smoldering with arousal, with the same wild need racing through him, and his heart performed a crazy rollover maneuver.

  “Let’s get out of here,” she said. “Now.”

  5

  WALKING ACROSS the Plaza de Armas, her fingers entwined with Brett’s, Kayla drew several deep breaths and waited for her sanity to return. For her common sense to override her screaming libido. For her better judgment to cough to life and tell her that going to the hotel room of a man she barely knew wasn’t a good idea.

  But instead of any of that, her heart simply whispered, I know enough for now. And I want to know more.

  Never had she experienced such a wild, instant attraction. Or felt so carried away, so unable to think beyond the desperate need to get naked with a man. It was a fiery, heady, impossible-to-ignore sensation she couldn’t deny herself the pleasure of seeing through to the end.

  Still, she felt compelled to say, “Brett, I want you to know…I don’t normally do this.”

  He slowed his pace and turned to look at her. “This?”

  “One-night stands. With someone I just met.”

  He halted, set down the bag containing their boxed pizza, then framed her face between his hands. Serious golden-brown eyes studied hers for several long seconds. She wanted him to voice the words swimming through her mind-that somehow this didn’t feel like a one-night stand. That it felt intense, and unsettling because of that intensity. Instead he asked softly, “Did we just meet?”

  Her throat went dry and for a panicked instant she wondered if he’d seen her at La Fleur. Before she could even think of a plausible reply, he continued, “Because it doesn’t feel like it, Kayla. As crazy as it sounds, I feel as if I know you. As if I have known you. For a long time.” A humorless sound escaped him and what looked like confusion passed over his features. “It’s illogical and unscientific, but…”

  “Undeniable?”

  He nodded, still regarding her as if she were a puzzle he was trying to solve. “I know chemistry when I see it. Hell, I know it when I feel it. But at the risk of sounding like I’m tossing out a line from some love song, I’ve never felt it like this before.”

  “Thank God it’s not just me.” She settled her hands on his chest. “Maybe it’s the altitude.”

  “Maybe. But I think it’s my molecules just really, really liking your molecules.”

  She smiled. “How lucky for my molecules.”

  “And mine. And if it makes you feel any better, one-night stands aren’t my usual thing either. Besides, since we’re on the same tour, this might turn into a two- or three- or even four-night stand.” He brushed his thumbs over her cheeks. “Any more second thoughts?”

  Kayla looked into his eyes and a tremor of pure want shook her. She’d come to Cusco because of Dr. Thornton, but she was here, wrapped in these strong arms because of Brett. Being with him, like this, had nothing to do with La Fleur and everything to do with her. And him. And how much they wanted each other. Making love with him would be the first thing she’d done just for herself in a long time. Indeed, it didn’t matter where she might have met this man-here, New York, Timbuktu-she would have made love with him. The chemistry between them was just too strong to ignore.

  “If I had any other second thoughts,” she said, “the fact that you’re making my knees shake by just looking at me kinda shoves them to the background.”

  He brushed his lips over hers, stopping her breath. “To repeat your phrase, thank God it’s not just me.”

  Her fingers curled, clutching his shirt. “Do you have condoms?” she asked, praying he did.

  “Yeah,” he whispered against her lips. “Anything else you want to know?”

  “Yeah. How fast can we get to your room?”

  After a brief, pulse-quickening kiss, he snatched up the pizza then grabbed her hand. “Let’s find out.”

  They started off at a brisk walk which turned into a jog. By the time they neared the small hotel, Kayla was breathless with a combination of anticipation, laughter and exertion from the high altitude.

  “I think I’ve exhausted myself,” she gasped, climbing the last two steps to the second floor. When she reached the top, he handed her the pizza, swung her up in his arms and strode swiftly down the hallway.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “I have enough energy for both of us.”

  Kayla wrapped an arm around his neck then leaned forward to nibble his earlobe. “I didn’t know scientists were so strong.”

  “Obviously you’ve been hanging out with biologists. Or physicists. Bunch of weaklings those guys are. Now chemists-we know how to build muscles.”

  “Obviously,” she murmured, running an appreciative hand over his wide, solid chest. “Probably I’ll get a second wind.”

  “If not, I’ll do my best to revive you.”

  “You know CPR?”

  He shot her a wink. “Sweetheart, I know all sorts of ways to jump-start your heart.”

  Her pulse quivered at the mere thought. “Lucky me.”

  He stopped in front of the last door. “Hang on,” he said, letting go with the hand that was wrapped around her waist. “Gotta find the key.”

  “You could put me down,” she suggested, her lips continuing their exploration of his jaw.

  “Not a chance. I’m not letting go. Do you know why men carry women over thresholds?”

  “No clue. But I bet a genius boy like you does.”

  “It’s to protect them from being possessed by the evil spirits that hang around in doorways.”

  “And here I thought it was just an amazingly romantic gesture.”

  “That, too.” She gently bit his neck and he groaned. “You know, you’re not making the key search any easier.”

  “Good. I want it hard.”

  “Sweetheart, if it gets any harder-” His words ended on a strangled sound and she heard the metallic jangle of a key. The door swung open and he stepped inside, pushing it firmly closed with his foot. Then he set her down.

  The instant her feet touched the floor, Kayla dropped her canvas tote and the pizza box. His eyes glittered with so much sensual heat, even the soles of her feet felt hot.

  “If it gets any harder…what?” she ask
ed, leaning against the wall, her gaze flicking pointedly down at the impressive bulge in his shorts.

  He reached out and locked the door. “It can’t. Get any harder. Impossible.” With each choppy sentence, he moved closer, until he stood directly in front of her, then braced his hands on the wall, caging her in. Mere inches separated them and she could feel the heat emanating from him. Smell his skin, warm, clean and musky, mixed with the subtle fresh scent of his soap. His eyes, intense and darkened with arousal, met hers, and fiery tingles shivered to her every nerve ending.

  “Oh, I bet it can get harder.” Reaching out, she pressed her palm against his erection. He sucked in a breath, then released it in a long groan as she gently squeezed him.

  “I won’t last long if you keep doing that,” he said, lightly grasping her wrist.

  “That’s fine by me,” she said, pushing the words past her dry throat. God help her, she couldn’t ever recall feeling this desperate. She was practically panting and could barely speak. “I’m not going to last long myself.”

  “Yeah? Let’s see.” In one swift move, he clasped her waist and turned them so that he now leaned against the wall. Before she could draw a deep breath, his mouth covered hers, and the magic he’d wrought in the restaurant began all over again.

  Only this was…more. Deeper. Fiercer. Hotter. More passionate. And now there was nothing to stop them. Impatience raced through her, her entire body humming with anticipation. Desperate to touch him, she yanked his T-shirt from his waistband and plunged her hands beneath the soft material.

  Warm…his skin was so warm. And smooth. Her palms coasted over rippled abs, tracing the fine ribbon of hair that bisected his rock-hard torso. Her hands skimmed higher, her splayed fingers sifting through soft, crisp curls. She pushed his shirt upward, but her efforts were distracted as his hands were suddenly…everywhere. Pulling down her stretchy tank top to expose her breasts. The clever fingers of one hand arousing her already hard nipples, while the other glided under her skirt. Hooking beneath her knee and raising her leg to his waist, opening her to his touch.

  His fingers slipped beneath her wisp of lacy panties and she groaned at his first exquisite touch of her sex. He broke off their kiss and trailed his tongue down her neck as he caressed her swollen folds with a skill that made her knees go weak.