by Joanne Rock
Giselle's voice sounded in his ear over the phone line. "As the matter of fact, I wanted to talk to Christine about the landscaping and run a few ideas for the wedding photos by her. Is she around?"
Damn. He couldn't very well keep Giselle from making her plans. Even if she was a pain in the neck, she was still his sister and he'd been ready to marry her off ever since he caught her necking in the driveway with Billy Spears.
"Yeah, she's here."
"Oh, and Vito?"
"What?"
"You do realize you have to invite her to the wedding after she's done so much hard work for me, right?"
He refused to argue with her because good manners said she had a point. And he sure as hell wasn't going to admit to toying with the idea of inviting her as his personal guest anyhow.
"I know. Hang on a minute." He passed the phone to Christine and tried not to eavesdrop while he finished making breakfast. Actually, it was pretty damn easy not to eavesdrop since his sister did ninety-nine percent of the talking while Christine nodded a lot and agreed.
By the time she was finished, he had the table set with their eggs and toast.
"So?" He couldn't deny being a little curious about what had taken place. Especially since Giselle seemed as ready to play Cupid as their uncle—even if it involved matching Christine up with someone else.
A fact which seriously compromised his appetite.
"Your sister just wants me to test out a few locations for photos." She clicked off the phone and flipped her napkin into her lap. "Thank you for making breakfast, by the way. It smells fantastic."
"You're welcome." He slid into his seat at the table. "What do you mean 'test out locations'? The gardens are almost finished. She can't possibly expect you to swap anything around at this point, can she?"
"Apparently she just wants us to take a few digital photos at late afternoon so she can see how the light will look in a few different spots around the yard." Christine shrugged. "Not a big deal. She said you have a camera?"
Vito wondered what the catch was. Was Giselle just that curious to see Christine? "We've got one somewhere."
"And it has a timer?" She asked between bites of omelette. "A timer?"
"If she's testing out locations for her wedding photos, I'm sure she'd like to see two people in each shot to give her a better preview."
"Ahh."
"What, 'ahh'?"
"She's joined forces with Uncle Giuseppe to coerce the two of us to do things together. Don't you see?" Damn but his family was transparent.
"I'm afraid I don't." Christine cleaned her plate and then stole two more bites of omelette off his plate. "She said she wants a spot with lots of flowers or greenery in the background. It made perfect sense to me."
Vito shoved his plate closer to her so they could share the last of the eggs. "This week we need to pose for bogus photos together. By next week she'll be expecting us to announce our engagement. It's all very diabolical."
Standing, she carried her plate to the dishwasher. "Did it ever occur to you that maybe you're not as surrounded by scheming matchmakers as you seem to believe? Frankly, I'm less inclined to believe your sister is diabolical and more inclined to believe you're just a tiny bit paranoid about the possibility of losing your single-guy lifestyle."
"Paranoid?" Where did she get that from? "You don't know my family."
"Maybe not. But just the same, let me reassure you again—you don't have a thing to worry about when it comes to me." She rinsed out the frying pan and put it in the sink. "I'll be out of here by the time your sister marches down the aisle and you can go back to being the Cesare family's most eligible bachelor."
Drying off her hands, she headed for the kitchen door to start her day in the gardens, her long, tanned legs making his mouth water.
"Wait." He reached over her head to keep the door shut. Needing her to stay with him for a few more minutes. Hours. Did she have to be so committed to this damn job for his uncle?
He inhaled her flowery fragrance as he leaned in for a quick taste of her neck. Her pulse pounded fast and furious beneath his lips.
"What?" Her voice sounded throaty and breathless, just the way he liked it. But her body was still taut, rigid. Ready to get to her work outside that was so damn important to her.
"Don't go yet." He couldn't think how to convince her to stay a little longer, so he licked his way up her throat. Tugged on her lower lip.
"Vito, I can't get behind on this job." She sounded as disappointed as he was, her breath coming in little gasps as he skimmed his hand over her hip.
Hell. He'd have her later. When he could take as many hours as he wanted to explore every last inch of her.
"Vito?" She stared at him now, her lips swollen from his kiss while she waited to see what he wanted.
And since he wasn't going to admit to attempted seduction over the breakfast table he thought fast. Remembered Giselle would be pissed if he didn't invite Christine to the wedding soon, right?
Better now than never. After a week of her keeping plenty of boundaries in place despite the fling, he realized he wanted something more from her anyway. Maybe he'd find out what if he spent a little more time with her when they weren't both horizontal.
There were sexy-as-hell spots of color in her cheeks, her shallow breaths making her chest rise and fall in a way that couldn't help but catch his eye. Still, he forced himself not to start undressing her then and there. Instead, he forced words from his mouth.
"I don't want you to leave before the wedding."
* * *
Christine was obviously experiencing some form of sex-crazed dementia because there's no way determined bachelor Vito Cesare had just asked her to stick around for his sister's nuptials.
Deciding that playing ignorant and waiting for him to spell out what he meant would be the least embarrassing course of action, she leaned against the door and stared up at him in the sunny kitchen.
"What do you mean?" She licked her lips and caught his flavor still lingering on her mouth.
"I mean I'd like to you to stay a little longer and go to Giselle's wedding with me in two weeks." His hazel eyes darkened to golden brown as he stared down at her, his voice going soft and low.
Her heart turned over in her chest at his invitation, his words appealing to every romantic bone in her body. Still, she hesitated.
By agreeing to a fling with Vito she'd somehow signed on for the most physically intense, sensually satisfying week of her whole life. And while she'd loved every minute of uncovering her inner sex goddess, she'd also begun to realize that she couldn't undertake all that hot and steamy sex without engaging her emotions. Every night as she lay next to Vito, whether it be strewn over the living-room floor or curled securely beside him in bed, she'd started feeling those old pangs of romanticism, that deep-seated longing for a real family complete with smiling kids, an overzealous golden retriever and neighbors who baked cookies for each other on special occasions.
She'd been fighting those feelings tooth and nail every day, but she didn't stand a chance of battling them if Vito did things like invite her to attend family celebrations with him.
"I don't know." She didn't want her heart broken. A fate that was assured if she started feeling all mushy inside about a certain avowed bachelor.
She probably would have been better off forgetting about planting her bird of paradise flowers today and just enjoying the way he'd been touching her earlier. Right now she could be experiencing multiple Os instead of battling a major attack of romance.
"Attending a wedding together doesn't sound like an appropriate activity for people having a fling, does it?" She was already beginning to wonder how she'd survive the next two weeks with Vito, let alone if their time together was capped off by orange blossoms and "Here Comes the Bride."
Way to stab a romantic in the heart.
He seemed to appreciate her point because he nodded slowly as if deep in thought. "You're right. But Giselle really wants you th
ere after you've worked so hard to make her big day special."
"I'm sure I can think of some excuse. We can say I contracted food poisoning or something equally hideous." It beat being heartsick, that was for sure.
Vito continued as if he hadn't heard her. "Besides, if you're not there, I'll have to wade through a hundred people asking me when I'm going to settle down. If you go with me, everyone will just smile at us and leave us alone."
She could see his reasoning. But it still managed to sting just a little when she'd sort of hoped he wanted to go with her for more personal reasons.
"Are you suggesting you'd like me to do this as a favor?" Because that could sway her. If she based a decision on what was best for her, she'd have to decline.
But Vito had just made her breakfast. And he'd spent two hours yesterday helping her figure out how to re-program the complex sprinkler system she'd installed for the yard. Since she'd bought it on clearance because of the bargain rate she'd given Giuseppe, the system didn't come with any instruction manual and it turned out Vito had a real talent for computerized gizmos. Despite his penchant for race cars and fast living, he was a really nice—and, it seemed, supersmart—guy.
"Depends." He leaned a shoulder against the door, his big body still blocking her exit. "Would you consider that a breach of friendship if I did?"
She considered the question and had to admire that he'd bothered to check with her first.
"No. I guess I wouldn't."
He grinned. "Then I'm asking. Please go with me, Christine."
Ignoring the erratic beat of her heart, she stifled that damn romantic streak of hers and nodded. "I'll go with you."
"Thank you." For a moment, his eyes locked on hers, inciting the tingling warmth in her veins that usually preceded a kiss. But then he stepped away from the door to clear her path. "I'll bring out the camera this afternoon so we can take care of those photos my sister wants."
Nodding, Christine hurried out the door to get away from the intimacy of shared breakfasts and shared wedding plans. They were proving even more dangerous than shared kisses.
And at this rate, her heart would be lucky to survive their fling.
* * *
Vito felt damn lucky when it started to rain later that day.
And it wasn't just any rain. This was a southern Florida rain. A no-holds-barred, subtropical downpour that made it impossible to shoot photos and even made it impossible for ever-industrious Christine Chandler to continue working outside.
Shutting down his computer program for designing custom racetracks, Vito slid into his shoes and sprinted outside to help her put her tools away. The rain was so loud she had to shout instructions to him for covering up a flat full of new annuals she was planting just for the wedding.
By the time they finished stowing the tools in the workshop, they were drenched. Christine's navy-and-white T-shirt with the words All Natural scrawled across the front clung to her curves invitingly. Her chin-length hair molded to her scalp as water streamed from the strands down her neck.
She stood in the open doorway of the workshop and stared at the house through the sheeting rain. "You ready to make a run for it?"
Christine watched Vito peer around the wooden building, mostly vacant except for garden tools and the utilitarian desk at the back bearing her duffel bag. Then he looked at her with a wicked gleam in his eyes. "It's not raining in here."
"There are also no blankets to play tent with and no bed to burrow in." She shivered—partly from the cold but mostly at the thought of bedroom games with Vito. Propping the door open with a wooden block, she turned to him. "I vote we make a run for it."
His hand slid around hers and before she knew it, he had her in his arms. "If I play tent with you, do you think this could be the day you spend the whole night in my bed?"
Thunder rumbled ominously in the distance and she could have sworn the sky outside the half-open door went a few shades darker.
"I don't know about that." Actually she did know about that, and it was a bad, bad idea. But it was difficult to remember why when her hips were fitted up against his this way, her breasts molded to that hard male chest of his.
He caught a drop of water on her cheek with his thumb. "This fling didn't pull down many barriers for you, did it?"
"And who are you to complain, Mr. Spontaneous?" She kept her words light as she smiled, unwilling to reveal any more of herself to this man who knew too much already. "The fling made the barrier of our clothes go away." She splayed her fingers along the solid muscle of his abs. "That ought to count for something."
He sucked in a sharp breath as her finger dipped below the waist of his shorts. "It counts for a hell of a lot."
"Then there's no need to push for more since you told me yourself you want to keep things uncomplicated." She feathered kisses across his chest and the damp cotton T-shirt that covered him.
She'd hemmed and hawed for nearly a week over whether to have a fling in the first place. He couldn't change the ground rules on her now.
He cupped her chin in his hand, tipping her head to look at him. "Then you don't have to spend the whole night in my bed. But please know that I want you there."
The suppressed dreamy sigh whistled through her with gale force, making her knees weak with want. If she stared into those expressive hazel eyes of his any longer she would fall right inside.
The storm blowing outside looked positively tame compared to the unwanted emotional firestorm blazing through her. Better to brave the raindrops today than risk teardrops at a later date. She was getting out of the workshop before she made any promises she couldn't keep.
"I'll keep that in mind." She called up a smile to diffuse the lingering sense of want inside her. Nodding toward the open door and the downpour outside, she winked. "You ready to race, hotshot?"
Vito wasn't used to being last out of the gate, but as he watched Christine race through the downpour, he consoled himself that at least he knew how to pace himself. She might be a novice at the whole racing game, but he had the feeling he could convince her of the merits of taking her time once he got her inside.
Fueled by her challenge and the heat in her eyes, he closed the workshop door behind him and then made tracks across the new, lush green sod toward the house.
But when he reached the door to the kitchen and shut out the wind and rain, she was nowhere in sight. The house was quiet. Still.
For a moment he wondered what this summer would have been like here without her. His days would have been filled with running errands for Giselle and tweaking his rudimentary attempts at software for a racing game. And, as much as he loved his sister and enjoyed messing around on the computer, he had to admit he would have been bored out of his mind in no time.
As he slid off his shoes and dried his face on a clean towel, he spied Christine's wet boots parked on the green rug by the door. Obviously she'd come in the house.
She was just hiding.
Or maybe lying in wait for him.
Anticipation fired through his blood at the thought of her stretched out in his bed, naked and waiting for him. Tossing the towel on the counter, he stalked through the house. Without a doubt, this was his best trip home ever.
He listened for telltale signs of movement outside her closed bedroom door but could only hear his own heart pumping with aggressive force. All else remained still. Bypassing her door for his, again he listened. Waited. Nothing.
He'd lose his mind if he didn't find her soon. Foregoing all attempts at stealth, he barged into his room. Found her.
She was naked all right, but she wasn't draped over his bed like a centerfold. She was tucked under his covers and curled up tight, with only her bare shoulder peeking out of the blankets to clue him into her Lady Godiva state.
"Took you long enough," she taunted from her reclined position. Her damp hair looked all the darker against the crisp white pillowcase. "I was beginning to think maybe you needed more incentive."
Her wicke
d grin told him she knew damn well she'd lured him here.
Stripping off his shirt, he tossed the damp fabric into a heap on the floor near her discarded clothes.
"I had plenty of incentive watching you frolic around the yard in a wet T-shirt."
"I was not frolicking." She propped herself up on an elbow in the bed, the blankets slipping dangerously low on her breasts.
By accident? Or by design?
He was beginning to appreciate that no matter how much she seemed like the home-and-hearth type with her green thumb and penchant for helping out all his neighbors, she hid a sensuous streak a mile wide. And for some reason, the fact that she kept her wild side under wraps, revealed to him alone, was ten times more appealing than if she paraded around in stilettos and French lingerie. He liked the contrast of her leather work boots with a come-hither stare.
"Then how about some frolicking now?" He ditched his shorts before stretching out over her, his body already humming with need. "It sounded like you had some games in mind involving a bed and a few blankets, and here we are."
Her scent drifted up to him, clean and rain-washed. Her cheeks were flushed pink from their mad dash outside, her lips soft and beckoning in the dim light filtering through the windows from the stormy sky.
She wound her arms around his neck, tugging him closer. "If I can't get any work done today, then I might as well play."
Something sweet and honest and real flashed in her blue eyes before she closed them, shutting him out of whatever she was feeling.
Just as well, he thought, given that he'd be leaving town after the wedding and most likely would never see Christine Chandler again. But even as the thought formed in his head he hated it. Hated the idea of not seeing her. Regretted not giving her the kind of wine-and-roses fling she deserved.
Promising himself he'd at least make their last two weeks together the best they could be, Vito slanted his mouth over hers. Tasting the hot sweetness of her, he savored the way she moaned in the back of her throat. The way she speared her fingers into his hair to draw him deeper. Closer.
Desire already flooding his veins, he inched down the covers between them. He still wanted to take his time tonight, lavish every square inch of her with pleasure. But first he needed to feel her naked against him.
