Sleeping with the Playboy

by Julianne MacLean

  “It’ll cost you.”

  “Not a problem.”

  They jogged down to the lights and crossed the street.

  “First,” she said, “let’s start with your penthouse. Do you want me to arrange every improvement possible? Or stick with just the alarm system? Either way, I’ll need to see your deed to ascertain if there are any conditions of occupancy that might limit what we do.”

  “I’ll get you the deed right away, and if we can, let’s go the whole nine yards. The only thing I ask is that you keep the improvements from standing out too much. I don’t want my home to look like Fort Knox.”

  “That can be arranged. I already put together some ideas last night with that in mind, since I figured cosmetics would be important to you.”

  Donovan swerved around a spilled ice-cream cone on the sidewalk. “There you go again.”

  “What do you mean, ‘there I go again’?” Her voice got a little haughty, and Donovan couldn’t deny that he liked it. She was inching off that rock of indifference.

  “The way you figured cosmetics would be important to me. Now you’re implying that I’m shallow.”

  She laughed out loud, and it was everything he had hoped it would be—throaty, from the heart and unbelievably sexy. “I implied no such thing!”

  They crossed the street and headed toward Lincoln Park, their running shoes tapping the ground in perfect unison. Donovan had to admit he enjoyed needling her to open up a little, and he wasn’t sure why. He never felt the urge to prod the women he usually dated and get to know more about what they were like deep down. It was usually the other way around.

  She was quiet for a moment. “Can we get back to the contract now?”

  They jogged onto the running track in the park, and passed other runners along the way. “Sure. You were talking about the penthouse.”

  “Yes. I’ll act as your contractor, hiring the appropriate experts to install a new alarm system, as well as to come in and make your doors and windows more secure. As far as personal protection, I’ll accompany you everywhere for a daily fee, which will be payable every thirty days.”

  “Even to work?”

  “You said you wanted the highest level of protection.”

  “I do, but I’m a heart surgeon. You’ll have to sit in the waiting room all day. You won’t find that tiresome?”

  “It’s my job, Dr. Knight.”

  “What about days off? Surely you’ll need holidays.”

  “I take holidays between jobs.”

  “What if you get sick?”

  “I have colleagues I trust with my life, and we spell each other off in emergencies like that.”

  Donovan felt sweat cooling his back between his shoulder blades. Jocelyn had a healthy glow on her face, too, but she wasn’t working too hard, not by a long shot. She was clearly in great shape. “I thought you worked alone.”

  “I do, but I didn’t always.”

  “These colleagues…buddies from the Secret Service?”

  “You got it. There are a number of us who work privately now. We contract each other out whenever we require team details.”

  They jogged in silence along the water, in perfect sync with each other, enjoying the fresh, early morning air. For a long time neither of them said anything, until they came to the end of the park.

  “Ready to turn back?” Jocelyn asked.

  “Yeah, I usually go that way.” He pointed.

  She stopped and bent forward, her hands on her knees as she tried to talk through deep breaths. “Really? We should go a different way then, and run somewhere else tomorrow.”

  He understood what she was getting at—it was a security thing—and nodded in the other direction. “That way through the park’ll take a little longer, but we’ll end up back where we started.”

  “Great.” They began to run again, both of them covered in a shiny film of perspiration, but still keeping perfect pace. When they arrived back on Donovan’s street, they walked for a bit to cool down before going inside. They passed by the security guard, who politely waved.

  Jocelyn got on the elevator first, and like before, checked the ceiling before letting him get on.

  “What are you checking for?” he asked, as he stepped inside.

  “If the hatch is ajar, there could be someone up there.”

  On the way up to his penthouse, Donovan was intensely aware of the silence between them, and had to stop himself from gazing down at her just for the sheer pleasure of it.

  God, she smelled good. Like the outdoors and fresh, clean sweat. What he wouldn’t give to touch her now. To rub his fingers along her slick, bare shoulder.

  His blood began to pulse in his veins, and for the first time in years, he felt nervous around a woman.

  “Maybe on the way to your office this morning,” she said, “we could talk about suspects.”

  He tried to imagine that. “We could, if you don’t mind people listening in.”

  “What do you mean? What people?”

  “The people on the El.”

  The doors opened, and he stepped off, but Jocelyn stayed on the elevator. Donovan had to put his arm in front of the door to keep it from closing while she was still inside.

  “You take the train to your office?” she asked, sounding more than a little shocked.

  Donovan couldn’t help smiling, and this time, she smiled back.

  “I’m doing it again, aren’t I?” she asked.

  “Yes, you are. I suppose you expected me to drive a Jag? Or maybe have a limo and driver?”

  At last she stepped off the elevator and held her hands up in mock surrender. “Okay, I’m guilty this time.”

  Donovan paused in the vestibule. “Why do you have those impressions of me, anyway? Is it because I was wearing a tux last night? Do you think my life is one big cocktail party?”

  She shrugged. “Something like that. You have to admit, though, appearances haven’t exactly made you out to be Blue Collar Joe.”

  Laughing quietly, Donovan bent down to get his key out of his shoe wallet, then straightened. “I’m a pretty normal guy, you know.”

  “Sure. A normal guy who has the best of everything in one of the most expensive penthouses in downtown Chicago.”

  “You’re very observant, I’ll give you that, but what you see is not always all that’s there. You can’t possibly know what’s going on inside a person, by seeing what kind of beer they drink or what kind of house they live in.”

  She rubbed her perspiring forehead. “Appearances speak volumes about a person. Already I know that you like things to be perfect in your physical life, and you lack depth in the relationships in your personal life.”

  Donovan felt his hackles rise. “Lack depth? God, it’s one insult after another! Why would you think that about me?”

  “Because I see how perfect everything is in your penthouse, and clearly with all the exercise and working out you do, the perfection of your physical appearance is very important to you. You don’t have any close friends or family who visit you, and you have seven women on your answering machine, all waiting to be called back.”

  He brow furrowed. “You listened to my messages?”

  “You said I could go through your underwear drawer if I wanted. I didn’t think your messages were too far a stretch, and I was looking for clues about possible stalkers.”

  “And you think you found them.”

  She shrugged again. “Disgruntled ex-lovers are classic suspects.”

  Donovan inserted the key into the lock but didn’t open the door. There was a lot he could tell her about his personal life to correct her on her impressions, but the last thing he wanted to do right now, while he was boiling mad, was become defensive and pour his soul out on the floor at her feet. Instead, he turned the tables on her.

  “You think you’ve got me figured out, but what I want to know is, who are you to judge me, when you are clearly hiding inside a tough, cold exterior that shouts to the world to keep out?
Answer that, Ms. Mackenzie, and I promise I won’t ask you any more personal questions for the duration of our professional relationship.”

  He took some pleasure when he saw that he’d knocked her composure off-kilter. Her full lips were parted in astonishment, as if she had no idea what to say.

  Then he added with a bite, “That is, if this relationship lasts beyond a day. Cuz I sure as hell didn’t intend to hire a bodyguard who thinks she’s a therapist.”

  Four

  Hiding behind a tough, cold exterior that shouts to the world to keep out? Was that how he saw her?

  For a few uncomfortable seconds, Jocelyn reflected upon his assessment of her. God, when had she turned into such a cold fish? Had she been alone too long and forgotten how to connect with people? Or was she dispassionate because she’d been dragged through the dirt by the people she’d allowed herself to trust in her life?

  Her heart stung suddenly with a memory of being about five, climbing onto her father’s lap for a hug, and being shoved off and yelled at because her fingers had been sticky.

  Was that why she’d stopped trying to be close to people? Because of all the times like those in her childhood?

  Jocelyn gazed up at Donovan, then consciously swept away any concerns about her personality or demeanor, for it was not in her nature to feel sorry for herself, nor was this the time to be reflecting on her less than perfect childhood.

  And hey, it was her job to be tough and cold!

  She would have liked to tell him that, but she decided it would be completely unprofessional to enter into a debate with a client about the workings of her inner self. Best to just back down.

  “I’m guilty again,” Jocelyn said, holding her hands up in surrender as they stood outside his door. “I judged you, all right? I admit it. You’re right, I don’t know you very well and I’m sorry. Obviously there’s more to you than I thought.”

  A great deal more, or you wouldn’t be so interested in what’s going on with me, her inner voice added.

  “Now you’re just trying to please your client.”

  “I’m sorry, all right?”

  He looked taken aback. “You give in awfully easy for a tough bodyguard.”

  Jocelyn huffed. “It’s my job to prevent showdowns, not engage the enemy unless absolutely necessary.”

  “And now you’re calling me the enemy.”

  She shook her head. “No, I’m not.”

  “Well, I’m glad we got that clear.”

  They stood in the vestibule for a long time, staring at one another.

  Jocelyn looked up at his finely chiseled cheekbones and smoldering green eyes, and felt her insides quiver with pleasantly erotic responses—responses she had no right feeling, especially when he had just tried to interrogate her about her personal life.

  She wasn’t used to questions like those. Clients never wanted to know about her situation. They always wanted to remain apart.

  She was still shaken. Her belly was fluttering with nervous butterflies.

  God, what was it about him that made her react like an adolescent schoolgirl when that’s not how she wanted to react? What was it that made her forget who she was—an untouchable, invisible Executive Protection Professional—and want to melt like hot cream into his capable hands?

  Obviously, he was well-practiced in the art of seduction. That’s probably what those questions were about. He looked for a woman’s weakness and leaped on it.

  He blinked slowly at her. “You should give in more often, you know.”

  A sudden image of giving in to him on his bed burned in her brain. “I beg your pardon?”

  Get a grip, Jocelyn. You’re reacting to his masculine appeal and reading too much into everything he’s saying. He isn’t making a sexual reference.

  “Your face…” He reached one hand up to touch the center of her forehead with his thumb. “All the tension right here. It’s gone. You look…softer.”

  His thumb feathered along her eyebrow while his warm palm cupped her cheek, and her knees, damn them, turned to pudding. Who would have thought a man touching her eyebrow would have such a debilitating effect on her?

  She didn’t know what to say. The line had been crossed, and she wasn’t used to being on this side of it—weak-kneed and foggy-brained with a client, after an inappropriate conversation about her character, a conversation that had left her contemplating the ramifications of her childhood.

  She wet her lips and struggled to keep her breathing steady, struggled to keep herself from wondering what it would feel like to kiss those beautiful full lips of his.

  “You can relax,” he said, “I’m not going to fire you.”

  “I’m perfectly relaxed.”

  “Yeah? I don’t think so.” He gave her an amused grin that told her he was arrogantly aware of his ability to reduce women to happy blobs of jelly whenever he felt the urge.

  Jocelyn tried to steel herself against his liquefying effect. “I’m not one of your girlfriends, you know.”

  “I never thought you were.”

  Why wasn’t he lowering his hand? He was tickling her ear now, and goose bumps were shimmying their way down her entire left side.

  “I mean,” she said in her best tough-girl voice, reaching up to gently remove his hand from under her hair—and it was one of the hardest things she ever did—“you’re my client and this isn’t exactly appropriate conduct.”

  That look of amusement never left his eyes. His mouth lifted in a wicked, sexy grin. “I knew that was coming. Maybe I should fire you after all.”

  “And risk opening that door to your stalker?” she said in a deep throaty voice.

  Something had taken over—the same flirtatious spark that had bucked when she’d made that remark in the elevator the night before, about going to get her jammies and toothbrush. Her voice had taken on that teasing tone again. Now she was sounding seductive!

  Where was this coming from? This was nothing like her. She wasn’t acting professionally; she was playing hard to get.

  He glanced at the door with the key still in the lock, then back at her face. His gaze dropped to her lips.

  She could see he was impressed by her “apparent” immunity to his charms. And tempted. He wanted to kiss her. For a heart-stopping moment, she thought he might, and she was glad in a triumphant sort of way that she was turning him to jelly, too.

  She quickly reminded herself, however, not to get cocky, when she wasn’t entirely sure she would be able to resist him if he did try to kiss her.

  Thank God he backed off. He tilted his head as if he were disappointed she’d stood her ground. “I guess not.”

  He pushed the door open, but she wrapped her hand around his firmly muscled upper arm to stop him from going in first. It was damp with perspiration and the intimacy of touching his warm, wet skin at that moment—after what had just occurred between them—was painfully erotic. She felt the heat of the connection straight down to her toes.

  Pushing those feelings down into the deepest reaches of her being, and summoning her acute, well-honed bodyguard senses, she went through the door first. “Mrs. Meinhard? Are you here?”

  “In the kitchen!” she heard the woman call out.

  “Is everything all right?”

  “It’s fine!”

  Nevertheless, Jocelyn had Donovan wait inside by the door while she checked out the penthouse. “It’s all clear,” she said when she returned.

  But it wasn’t all clear. Not by a long shot, because her heart was still pounding out a cacophony in her chest. All because of her client’s blatant sexual appeal, his discerning ability to see through her tough-girl image and her own inability to keep her head on straight about it.

  That night, after a long day in the hospital, Donovan changed into a pair of faded old blue jeans and a T-shirt, then sank into his plush, white sofa. He crossed one leg over the other on the glass and wrought iron coffee table. He had just ordered Chinese food, and Jocelyn had gone into her room for
a few minutes to make sure the alarm system would be installed tomorrow as scheduled.

  He stared at the dark windows, enjoying the silence for a moment, thinking about their conversation in the vestibule that morning.

  When he’d gone up against all her judgmental observations with one of his own, he had completely disarmed her. She’d backed down quicker than a spooked rabbit.

  What was her story? She didn’t want him getting into her personal life, yet she was perfectly comfortable and eager to get into his.

  She would probably argue that it was the nature of her job—to learn everything she could about the people she was sworn to protect—but he didn’t buy that. When he’d asked her about her personal life, the shock and fear on her face had come from deep down inside. He’d seen panic in her eyes, as if no one had ever tried to reach in and pull out her soul before. It had been disturbing to her.

  Why also, he wondered, did she have such strong negative opinions about his lifestyle? He wasn’t a criminal, yet she looked upon him—and everything he owned—with disapproval and disdain.

  He stood up, went to the CD player and inserted Eric Clapton, Unplugged, to try and clear his head. Sounds of a jazzy guitar filled the large room, and within seconds, Jocelyn came down the hall, still wearing her brown trousers and white blouse, though she’d unfastened the top few buttons. The blazer was gone, the part in her hair was crooked; her blouse was slightly untucked. To be honest, she looked a little bedraggled from the day.

  She was completely adorable.

  There was a different expression on her face tonight, one he hadn’t seen before. It was…mellow.

  She raised her eyebrows. “You listen to Eric Clapton?”

  “All the time.”

  Jocelyn stood in the arched entry to the living room with her hand on one of the white columns, listening for a moment, then she began to move slowly, languidly into the room. Her voice was nostalgic and lighthearted when she spoke. “I haven’t heard this in ages. I used to listen to it in my car. I drove to Florida once for a vacation, and played it over and over. It was great.”