“Tripe,” Wendell repeated weakly, after he barely managed to swallow his second bite.
“Parts are parts, my Tia always says. And we people don’t like to waste anything. Sometimes her local butcher will throw in more than the stomach lining, just for her. You know, bits of other things that will add flavor—that’s the secret of her cau-cau. Maybe the tail end of the small intestine, if you know what I mean. Or a bit of the bollocks…. Is something the matter?”
Wendell clutched his stomach and ran from the room as fast as his stubby legs would carry him.
“Was it something I said?” Alejandro asked, the barest twinkle in his eye.
WENDELL CLAIMED A twenty-four-hour stomach flu when he returned, still looking green. Kate offered, just a shade too earnestly, to make him chamomile tea, and he eyed the two of them suspiciously while Alejandro looked utterly bland and Kate did her best to be sweet. This only made Wendell’s behavior worse.
He turned down the escobeche de pescado and the salad, glowering down the table at Kate, who ignored him. She got up and put together a plate of dried fruit and goodies for Gracious and set it down in the kitchen.
Again, the pig snarled as she approached Wendell and had to pass him to get to her food.
Already cranky, Wendell drew back a leg as if to kick her, only to stop as Alejandro got up and loomed over him. All traces of social nicety had vanished from Alejo’s expression. In fact, he looked downright menacing.
“Touch that animal, hombre, and you will sincerely regret it.”
Wendell sneered at him. “Don’t you threaten me, you lowlife Spi—” He stopped as Kate whirled on him.
“It’s not a threat, I assure you.” Alejandro’s voice was quiet. “It’s a promise.” He bent down and picked up Gracious, who looked as if she wanted to charge Wendell again.
“Put her in my bedroom,” Kate told him quickly.
“I’ll take her plate in there.” She did so then returned to Wendell again. “How dare you kick a defenseless animal?”
“I didn’t actually kick it,” Wendell retorted, getting up and throwing his crumpled napkin onto the table. “Not to mention that barnyard animals do not belong in a civilized home. But then, neither do savages from the back of beyond—”
Alejandro re-entered the room and stared him down, his gaze black.
“I never claimed to keep a civilized home,” declared Kate. “Look, everyone, let’s just calm down and have dessert, okay?” She reached for her wineglass.
“I don’t think so,” Wendell said. “I’m not eating any more of his Third World peasant food.”
Alejandro took two long strides towards him, his fist drawn back.
Kate leaped towards him and planted a palm on his chest while her cousin scurried for the door, yanked it open and scrambled through. She slammed it behind him.
“Alejandro, I’m so sorry. He didn’t mean that.”
“Oh, yes, he did.”
She made a helpless gesture. “Please—I know he’s an ass. But he’s gone for the time being. Let’s just try to salvage the evening and enjoy dessert. What do you say?”
His face softened and he hesitated. Finally he nodded. While the coffee brewed, they sat down again with their wine, this time on the floor by the sliding glass door where they could take in the view of the ocean.
“So, do you have any horrifying relatives?” Kate asked him.
Alejandro shook his head. “I have an uncle in Peru who tells tall tales. And a shoplifting cousin. But other than that, they’re really not that bad. Of course, Tia Carlotta can be a handful when she wants to be….”
“Oh. Lucky you.” Kate swirled her wine. “So what do you do when you’re not balancing people’s books?”
A funny, discomfited look crossed his face. “I, uh, play futbol—soccer—for a local league. Most of us are Peruvians, but we also have a couple of Columbians and a Bolivian on the team. And I help out at Tia’s house with repairs and projects. Other than that, business school takes all my time these days.”
There was something he wasn’t telling her. She said so. “Do you have a girlfriend?”
“No.”
“A boyfriend?”
“No!”
“Then what is it?”
He spread his hands. “Nothing. What would I be hiding?”
“I don’t know.” She pursed her lips. “You don’t look like a serial killer.”
“Thank you.”
“Or a pedophile.”
“Kate! I’m not hiding anything.”
“Are you after my money? Because it’s all tied up in trusts anyway.”
He gaped at her. “You are, without a doubt, the most insulting woman I’ve ever met.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment. So, are you? After my money?”
“No. Besides, I’d have to marry you to get it, and I don’t think it would be worth the pain.”
She grinned at that, studying his face. “I think I believe you.”
“Yes?” He set down his wineglass. “Well, I think I want to leave now. I’ve taken enough mierda for one evening.”
Kate put a hand on his arm. “I’m sorry. For everything, Wendell included. Please stay.”
He relented. “Okay.”
“Tell me more about yourself.”
Alejandro picked up his glass again, tipped more wine into his mouth and thought about it. “I used to like to go out dancing. Do you salsa, Kate?”
She looked at him doubtfully. “I eat salsa. Does that count?”
He shook his head, laughing. “Do you samba?”
“Definitely not.”
“Merengue?”
She shook her head. “And I don’t hula, foxtrot, square-dance, or can-can, either. I may as well say that up front.”
“Do you dance at all?”
Kate took a large sip of wine. “I have been known, when drunk, to do the funky chicken. I used to know the steps to the ‘Time Warp’ dance from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. And I was forced to learn the waltz before my—uh, I was forced to learn the waltz.”
“Before your what? Wedding?” Alejandro grinned.
Ugh. It was worse. “No, I’ve never been married.”
“So why did you have to learn the waltz?”
“For a formal party,” she muttered, feeling her color rise. “Hey, we should get that coffee.”
“The coffee can wait,” he said. “And now you’re hiding something.”
“I don’t know what you mean.” She widened her eyes and sipped more wine.
He thought for a moment and then snapped his fingers. “You had to learn the waltz before your coming-out ball!”
She winced and felt her face flame. She tipped the rest of the wine down her throat.
Alejandro hooted. “Did you wear a lacy white dress? And a strand of pearls?”
She squirmed.
“You must have looked beautiful, my little debutante,” he said. “But doesn’t that up your shoe quota? It means you have a pair of white shoes, too.”
“I burned them,” she said darkly. “Because they hurt my feet so much. I couldn’t walk the day after the party. So I tossed them into my bedroom fireplace.”
“You had a fireplace in your bedroom?” Alejandro looked very intrigued by the thought.
“In Boston, yeah.” She got up to pour them both some coffee, only to decide on more wine instead. She pulled the second bottle out of the pantry, and when she turned to find the corkscrew, she found herself looking straight at Alejandro’s chest. His very sculpted chest.
Without thinking about what she was doing, she put out a hand to touch it, ran her fingers over the smooth muscles above his sternum and then down to the six-pack riding above his belt.
He sucked in his breath and let her explore, until her naughty fingers took a pass over a nipple—at which point he grabbed her wrists, pinned them behind her, and kissed her deeply and thoroughly.
Kate froze even as her mouth responded to his. She had no business doing this…
Spinneys didn’t grope men in kitchens…but then her body just took over. Life couldn’t be all about business, could it? And besides, she was engaged in an anti-Spinney revolution. Surely kissing a hot man while wedged in her pantry got her one step closer to being Just Kate, the kind of woman who would dance on a table.
Chapter 8
Alejandro’s lips parted hers and his mouth took command. Kate could smell sweet, mild soap and tangy, breezy aftershave and a tinge of musk. She tasted the wine they’d both drunk, and found it intoxicating all over again.
As a modern woman, she could have objected to the fact that her wrists were imprisoned. But the fact was that it turned her on, just like his tongue making love to hers and the roughness of his stubble scraping her face and his growing erection pressing against her stomach.
Her body had an unprecedented response to Alejandro’s, heat flashing through her like an electrical current. Her nipples pebbled, seeking attention, and something pulsed at the core of her.
He kept on kissing her, drinking her in, while she did that liquefication thing again. Her body loosened and warmed, molding to his.
Finally he let go of her wrists to explore the curve of her back, span her waist, and move downward to her hips. Still in possession of her mouth, he slid his big hands right down to her bottom and traced its contours.
Heat seeped through the fabric of her khakis and her white cotton panties. Alejandro squeezed, and brought her hard against his cock, rubbing against her.
Then those magic hands crept upward again. He broke the kiss, smiling as she sagged against him, her knees rubbery and her head feeling as if it could topple off her neck at any moment. He cupped her breasts—if you could call them breasts, they were more like fried eggs—and then stroked across her nipples with his thumbs, sending a streak of pure desire through her.
She inhaled sharply and pushed against his hands to encourage him. Then she wondered what the hell she was doing and pulled back.
“You started this, Kate,” he murmured. “No fair if you get to touch mine and I can’t return the favor.” So saying, he flipped up the hem of her Polo shirt and found her breasts all over again, this time unhooking her bra with a smooth, one-handed maneuver. His palms mastered the little mounds immediately, and he rubbed lightly in a circular motion. It felt so good that she almost lost her footing.
“There isn’t much there,” she muttered, embarrassed.
“Shh. They’re perfect. Bite size.” And he shoved her shirt up to her neck and took one into his mouth.
Kate cried out, which surprised the hell out of her, and he bent her back so that he had a better angle. What if he dropped her? But as his tongue laved her nipple and he suckled her she somehow didn’t care.
And fair was fair, so before he got to the other breast, she tugged his own shirt out of his waistband and finally touched his bare chest. He pushed her hands away and slipped his shirt completely off so that he stood half-naked before her, and Kate just stared.
He was beautiful. As fine as they came. She reached out to touch him, just to make sure he was real. Alejandro grinned at her, captured her hand and twined his fingers with hers. “I want to make love to you, Kate,” he said, his dark eyes half-lidded and smoky and sexy as hell. “Right here. Right now.”
Oh. Well. When he put it like that, how could she refuse? It would be…rude. Spinneys were never—wait, that was a lie. Spinneys could be exceptionally rude. Take Wendell, for example. But somehow she really wanted to mind her manners just now. So Kate blinked and then swallowed and then said, “Okay.”
The word was barely out of her mouth when she thought of all the reasons she should not sleep with Alejandro. She had to see him in classes. They had the marketing project to work on. This was a very bad idea. But before she could retract her okay, he seized her, set her on the kitchen counter and stripped off her khakis.
He whipped off her shirt, tossed her cotton bra in the direction of the stove, positioned himself between her thighs and then began to systematically devour her.
He started with her eyelids, moved to her temples, down to her neck, back up to her ears. He took her left lobe between his teeth and bit it lightly as he abraded both of her nipples with his thumbs. Then he murmured, “Kate, mi amor, we are going to need a whole box of condoms. You have some?”
Oh, no…why does protection always have to get in the way of fabulous hot sex? This was where things inevitably got awkward. She shook her head and groaned, searching for a solution. “Hey, maybe we could use plastic wrap?” She was only half kidding.
“Definitely not. It’s a good thing that Boy Scouts and Peruvians always come prepared.”
“What, you planned this?” He had closed his mouth over one of her nipples again, and while it felt exquisite, she needed to know. Kate grabbed his nose and pulled upward.
“Ow! Whad are you doig?”
“Did you plan to seduce me tonight?”
“A guy cad always hobe. Bud no, since your primo horrible was here, I did not.”
“Does primo mean cousin?”
He nodded. “Now, will you led go of by dose?”
“Okay. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.” She released her grip.
Alejandro collapsed laughing on the counter, his forehead on the cool tiles. That put the top of his head right in her most private spot. She squirmed.
“I can honestly say, Kate, that nobody has ever grabbed my nose during sex.”
“Oh.” Her mouth quivered. “Well, was it a turn-on?”
That made him laugh even harder. “Not exactly.”
“I’m sorry,” she said in a small voice. “But see, I probably would have screwed this up anyway. I’m not very good at this stuff.”
He raised his head at that. “What do you mean, you’re not very good? At what stuff?”
“Well, um, sex.”
He stared at her.
“You want to know the truth?” Kate asked, the wine obviously making her crazy. What had happened to her New England reserve?
“Yes.”
“Okay. I’ve had sex with only three men.”
He scowled. “I will kill them later. Go on.”
“Well, the first time I didn’t know what to do at all. So I didn’t do anything, and he told me afterward that I was a lousy lay. Then the second guy—well, I was determined that nobody was going to say that about me again, so I was rather, um, active.” She caught her lip between her teeth, squinted at him and asked, “Are you sure you want to hear this?”
He nodded.
“O—kaaay. Well, so I kind of bounced around a lot. And I, um, sprained his thing.”
Alejandro blinked. “You sprained it?”
She winced. “Yeah. Please don’t ask me how. I’ll die if I have to go into details.”
“So what happened with the third man, mi corazon?” His voice was unsteady with mirth.
“Hey! This isn’t funny, you know.”
“No. It’s not, you’re right. So go on.”
She eyed him suspiciously to make sure he was properly serious about her trauma. Reassured, she continued.
“It was awful. The third guy…well, he stuck it in, but it lost all its, um, steam immediately and fell out. He blamed me. He said I looked more like a boy than a girl.”
“That’s ridiculous.” Alejandro put his hands on either side of her face and kissed her soundly, even though her lower lip was quivering. “You’re one hundred percent woman.”
“Well, I’m not, exactly. My chest is practically concave, and I’m too skinny and—”
“Kate, your chest is not concave. What are these?” He held her breasts in his palms.
“Fried eggs? Twin lima beans?” She squeaked as he closed his mouth over one and gave it a thorough going-over. “What—”
He looked up at her and winked, then finally let go. “I’m just testing the seasoning,” he explained. “And I think they need…comino.”
“What?”
“Cumin. And
cilantro, maybe.”
“See, they’re not spicy enough.”
“Kate, mi amor, I was kidding. Now, listen to me. You are a beautiful, very desirable woman. In fact, I’m going to lick every inch of you, and probably twice. As for you not being good at making love, it just takes the right person. These men you have spoken about—imbeciles, every one of them.”
“Drexel wasn’t an imbecile. He was an M.I.T. graduate.”
“Wait. You actually slept with a man named Drexel? Please tell me you’re kidding. No, I can see by your face you are not. And you have a Wendell the fourth for a cousin. This should not surprise me.”
“And Kippy had a Ph.D.”
“Dios mio. Kippy?” He slapped his forehead.
“But you’re right about Stone, I must say.”
Alejandro burst out laughing. Then he pulled off her panties.
“Hey! Give those back.”
“No. You won’t be needing them for a while.” Alejandro tossed them over his shoulder and they landed in Gracious’s bowl of Mini Pig Chow. He slid his warm hands to the inside of her knees and worked the muscles there with his thumbs, easing the tension caused by her position but creating more tension inside her. She was open to him, he could see everything and she wasn’t sure she was quite ready for that.
Instead of going straight to her radio dials, so to speak, to play with the knobs, he surprised her. His eyes grew dark, intense and carnal as he looked at her there, but he simply said, “Pretty,” and moved his hands to her right calf, which he massaged all the way down to the ankle. Then he took her foot into those hands, and performed magic on it. Pure magic.
Kate had never in her life thought of her foot as a sexual organ until now. What he did to her toes, the ball, the instep, the arch…oh, heaven, the arch! And back down to the heel…it was indescribable.
“You like, mi amor?” he asked with a smile.
She was unable to speak; just nodded and moaned.
Alejandro seemed to appreciate her answer, since he bent and kissed her right there, and she almost came on the spot. But then he was massaging her other foot and she fell into the bliss of that. When he finally stopped and kissed her on the mouth again, she murmured, “Alejo, you could be a professional!”
Midnight Touch Page 7
