The Ultimate Seduction

by Janelle Denison

  She jumped back with a gasp, while he stood there in the doorway, the cut near his temple oozing blood down the side of his face. His features were filled with violent rage.

  Fear swelled within her. "I'm expecting Noah back any minute," she blurted out, hoping and praying it was true. "I suggest you leave before he returns."

  Chad strolled into the room, seemingly unfazed by her threat. "Ahh, Noah, your fiance," he drawled in a chilly tone, and smirked. "Do you really believe that lie he told you?"

  She shook her head in confusion as she backed toward the far side of the room to keep distance between them. Knowing conversation was her best stall tactic until she could figure out an escape, she asked, "What he?"

  "The two of you aren't engaged." He waved an impatient hand in the air. "I've been watching you long enough to know that the two of you weren't ever an item, at least not before the night of your accident."

  His comment rippled through her mind, and denial rose fast and furiously. Of course she and Noah were engaged! They lived together. She'd given him her body, her soul. She loved him.

  But along with that denial came snippets of conversations she'd had with Noah, of him skirting the issue of their engagement, no ring on her finger, no wedding date set, and no straightforward answers to the many questions she'd asked about them as a couple.

  More vague images appeared in her head-Noah at the bar, talking and flirting with her, walking out with her the night of the accident, and her playfully fending off his flirtatious advances. They'd been friends, acquaintances, nothing more. The memories were fresh and real and gave her no choice but to believe Chad's words.

  She and Noah weren't engaged.

  The truth crashed over her in waves, shaking the very foundation of her relationship with Noah, which in essence had been nothing more than an affair. No wonder so much hadn't made sense to her.

  "I thought you'd finally changed," Chad went on bitterly, touching her personal items on the dresser, taking a whiff from her perfume bottle before continuing toward her. "But being the slut that you are, you moved in with him, slept with him and now you're his whore."

  Whore. She winced, remembering Chad cursing her with that exact word the night he'd attacked her after work in Reno.

  He'd claimed she was a tramp for using her body as a showgirl, and he didn't like other men looking at her, lusting after her. Memories of her tumultuous past with Chad deluged her mind, overwhelming her-memories she would have been happy to keep suppressed. But this confrontation triggered a release of recollections she couldn't stop or escape.

  Swallowing the whimper of panic rising to the surface, she kept inching backward, until her spine pressed up against the wall and she found herself cornered by Chad and the king-size bed to her left.

  Knowing she was trapped, Chad continued to approach her like a savage animal anticipating pouncing on his prey. "I've had enough of watching you with him. Now I'm going to take back what's mine."

  Her chance of escape was slim, but she wasn't going to let Chad bully her anymore. She refused to be a victim any longer, refused to allow this man any power over her mind or body-as he'd had in her past.

  Resolute and more determined than she'd ever been before, she sprinted to the left and dove for the bed so she could scramble across the mattress. She made it halfway across before she felt a large hand clamp around her ankle and yank her back. She flipped over just as Chad started to move on top of her, his intent clear.

  He was going to assault her.

  And she was going to fight for her life, without remorse or hesitation. Just as he let go of her ankle, she kicked, hard, and aimed high. Her foot connected with his jaw with a loud crack, and his head snapped back from the impact. Her other foot landed in the middle of his chest, knocking him off balance and giving her the reprieve she needed to get the hell away from him.

  "Goddamn whore!" he bellowed furiously, the agony of her dual attack radiating in his eyes.

  She rolled away from him and off the bed. As soon as her feet hit the floor she was running out the door and down the stairs. He was seconds behind her, cursing her and promising retribution every step of the way. Before she could reach the foyer and front door, shards of glass be damned, he grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled her to an abrupt stop.

  She yelped in pain but didn't stop moving, her arms swinging, hands punching, and legs and feet striking any body part she came in contact with. They stumbled into the living room, and she kicked him in the shin, expecting his instant reflexes to cause him to let her go.

  No such luck. Another explicit curse filled the air and he shoved her down onto the floor between the couch and coffee table, pinning her there with the weight of his body. He straddled her thighs, taking away any chance she might have had to knee him in the groin.

  She wanted to scream in frustration but didn't waste her energy on something that would be of no help to her predicament.

  He stared down at her, his nostrils flaring with each labored breath he took. "I'm going to take what's mine. Right here. Right now."

  "Go to hell," she said through gritted teeth. "You're nothing but a hypocrite! You call me a whore, yet you have no qualms about using my body to slake your lust!"

  He clenched his swollen jaw and narrowed his gaze to tiny slits. "It doesn't matter. You're used goods, anyway."

  Grabbing the neckline of her shirt, he ripped it right down the middle, exposing her breasts encased in a thin cotton bra. She fought to fend him off, then ceased her struggles when she caught sight of the bronze statue on the coffee table next to her. As much as it revolted her, she let his hands grope her and didn't issue a protest when his mouth touched down on the upper slope of one breast.

  Swallowing the nausea rolling in her belly, she sank her fingers into his hair in the pretense of enjoying his kisses, feigned a sigh of surrender and reached for the bronze statue. As soon as her fingers curled around the cool metal she jerked Chad's head back and bashed the statue against the side of his head. The first hit merely dazed him. The second strike rendered him unconscious.

  He slumped on top of her, and with a deep sob she immediately shoved him off and crawled away from his lifeless form, the statue still clutched in her hand. She pressed her back up against the wall just as the sound of a vehicle skidded to a stop in the driveway. Seconds later, two uniformed police officers charged into the house, guns drawn-no doubt sent by the security company when she hadn't answered the phone.

  They took one look at her ripped shirt and devastated expression, coupled with the man crumpled on the floor, and came to all the right conclusions. They made sure she was physically unharmed, then proceeded to take care of Chad, locking him in cuffs and rendering him immobile so he'd be no threat when he gained consciousness.

  As they called for backup and an ambulance for Chad, Natalie buried her face in her hands. She finally broke down, allowing her emotions and tears to flow freely and releasing the fear, anxiety and pain she'd kept bottled up inside of her for too long.

  But mostly, she wept for the empty future without Noah that awaited her after today. She understood now that their relationship had been based on a lie, a fabrication she'd fallen for, deeply and irrevocably, when in reality she'd been merely a responsibility for Noah. He'd taken her into his home to protect her from Chad since she couldn't recall her past, and she'd fallen for the protective ruse. But Noah had never truly been hers. Their relationship, his family, the sense of belonging she'd experienced-it had all been a false sense of security that had now been shattered by the return of her memory.

  Despite his tale that they were engaged, she couldn't blame Noah for the affair they'd had, since she'd been the one to allow her own suppressed needs and desires to blossom and take flight. She'd tempted and teased him, instigating those first few erotic encounters and ultimately seducing him into making love to her.

  She'd just had no idea how intimately involved her heart, body and soul would become with Noah-in a way she'd n
ever given to another man. And while she harbored no regrets for loving him, neither did she expect him to make her promises of forever. As she now remembered, he'd been a confirmed bachelor before her memory loss, a man who enjoyed his freedom and carefree, uncomplicated lifestyle.

  And she was a woman who'd never let a man as close as she'd allowed Noah, for fear of losing her sense of self, as she almost had with Chad. The amnesia had loosened her inhibitions and left her much too vulnerable to love. To Noah.

  She swiped at the moisture beneath her eyes and on her cheeks and shored up her resolve. With her memory back and the crisis of being stalked over, it was time for her to move on and start out fresh-no matter how much she dreaded a life without Noah.

  Chapter Eleven

  The moment Noah pulled into his driveway and saw a patrol car and ambulance parked in front of his house, fear nearly strangled him. He jumped out of his vehicle and ran.

  The broken window next to the front door and the shards of glass crunching beneath his sneakered feet as he bolted into the foyer sickened him, adding to his anxiety and dread that Chad had finally gotten to Natalie.

  In his living room, he came across the paramedics strapping Chad to a cot, and Noah's stomach lurched when he caught sight of the blood on the other man's face, and his lifeless form. His gaze frantically swept the general area for Natalie, and his chest tightened with apprehension when he didn't find her.

  Where in the hell was she? Had they already taken her away in a separate ambulance? Or, God forbid, had she been fatally hurt?

  Desperate to know something before he went insane with worry, he grabbed the arm of a passing EMT, and the young man looked up at him in startled surprise. Now that Noah had the technician's attention, he released him.

  "Where's the woman?" he asked, his voice hoarse.

  The man hooked a finger toward the adjoining room. "She's in the kitchen with the police."

  "Thank you," he muttered, and strode into the kitchen, instantly finding her sitting at the table in the corner nook with two police officers taking her statement. Relief at seeing her alive mingled with a stabbing pain in the vicinity of Noah's heart as he took in her disheveled hair, puffy eyes and the dried tears streaking her cheeks. Her shirt was torn, and she was holding it together with one hand.

  Guilt swamped him, making him weak in the knees. She'd been attacked, and he hadn't been there to protect her. The realization hit him like a swift punch to his gut. He knew what Chad was capable of and had sworn to keep Natalie safe, yet he'd left her alone and vulnerable to the other man.

  Would she ever forgive him for being so careless with her life?

  Natalie glanced beyond the police officers in front of her, her eyes widening when she saw him standing there. Both men followed her line of vision, and perceiving Noah as a threat, they placed a hand on their holstered weapons and narrowed their shrewd gazes on him.

  "Who are you?" one of the blue-uniformed men asked.

  Noah raised his hands, making sure that the officers saw that he was carrying a revolver beneath his untucked shirt so it didn't come as a surprise to them later. "I'm the owner of the house, and Natalie is my fiancee."

  "Are you Licensed to carry a concealed weapon?" the other officer demanded.

  "Yes, sir." Very slowly, Noah withdrew his wallet, showing the men his identification and his P.I. badge. "Can I have a few moments alone with her, please?"

  Still skeptical, one of the officers asked Natalie, "Do you know him, ma'am?"

  She nodded jerkily, apparently still in shock from all that had happened. "Yes, I do. I'll be fine with him."

  As soon as the two men exited the kitchen, Noah pulled Natalie up from the chair and wrapped her in his arms. He felt the steady beat of her heart against his chest and absorbed the warmth of her body, the scent of her skin. Then he pulled back and searched her face, needing confirmation that she was unharmed, despite the harrowing way things looked.

  "Did Chad hurt you in any way?" he asked, his muscles tensing at the possibility.

  "Mostly, he just scared me," she said softly, and managed a slight smile, though her body language was too guarded with him compared to her open, candid personality of the past week.

  She sat back down and smoothed her tousled hair away from her face. "Did you happen to get a look at Chad?" she asked, a teasing inflection in her tone. "He's in worse shape than I am."

  He heard the pride in her voice, that she'd fought Chad and won the battle. But where did that leave them? The emotional distance he felt growing between them frustrated him, and he hoped her reserve was because of the recent trauma she'd suffered, and not because she was withdrawing from him.

  "Yeah, I saw Chad." He took the chair next to hers. Desperate for some kind of connection to her, he reached for her slender hand and pressed it between his palms. "Can you tell me what happened? "He needed to know what she'd gone through, if she was truly all right-mentally, emotionally and physically.

  She inhaled a deep breath, but didn't back down from reliving the nightmare she'd just endured. "He broke in right after you left and tried to attack me," she began, and filled him in on all the details, right up to the point where Chad had pinned her to the living room floor with the intention of raping her. "When I saw your bronze statue on the coffee table, I knew it was my last chance, so I used it to knock him out cold."

  Noah grinned as he kissed the tips of her fingers, amazed at her tenacity. "You are so incredibly brave, and I'm so proud of you."

  Her chin lifted stubbornly, her internal strength shining through. "I wasn't about to let him get away with terrorizing me this time."

  "This time?" he echoed, catching her deliberate choice of words. "You remember your past with him?"

  "Bits and pieces came back to me," she said, and shuddered delicately. "Enough for me to recall that he'd had control over me in the past, that he'd been possessive and jealous to the point of being smothering."

  He wondered what else she recollected during the course of the attack. He rolled his shoulders, which did nothing to ease the tension bunching his muscles. "I'm so sorry, Natalie," he said, his sincere apology a heartfelt plea for her forgiveness.

  Her gaze met his steadily, her irises a stunning shade of blue. "What for?"

  Her question was too pointed, delving deeper than the surface reasons for his apology, as if she knew much more than she was letting on. There was a wealth of confessions he owed her, but he went with the most obvious reply. "I never should have left you alone."

  "There's nothing to forgive." Her smile was sad as she touched her fingers to his cheek in a loving caress. "You can't protect me forever, Noah. Chad was intent on getting to me, and it was all a matter of time. If not today, then tomorrow, or next week, or next month. And there's no way you could have known that he'd break into the house."

  Still, guilt ate at him, along with so many regrets. He'd let her down, and in turn had let himself down, as well.

  "I'm just glad everything is finally over," she said with a sigh. "Now we can go back to living normal lives."

  She was glad everything was over? Including them? And what the hell did she mean by them going back to living normal lives-with or without each other? Doubts, uncertainties and old fears flared bright and hot within him, raising his anxiety a few notches.

  She gently but firmly pulled her hand from his grasp. "By the way, you don't have to pretend anymore," she said quietly.

  He stared at her beautiful features, his outward calm belying his inner turmoil. "What do you mean?" His voice was low and rough.

  Her shoulder lifted in an attempt at a casual shrug. "About you being my fiance, and us being engaged."

  Unable to help himself, he winced. "Has all of your memory returned?"

  "Enough to remember that you and I weren't in a relationship before the car accident," she replied, her cheeks coloring a light shade of pink. "Not an intimate one, anyway."

  Anxious and jumpy at her revelation, he stood and pa
ced the small area in the kitchen. Natalie wasn't angry, just resigned and accepting of the choices he'd made on her behalf. Choices that had made her intimately his, body and soul.

  "I never should have touched you, or made love to you," he said, even as he knew he never could have resisted her. He'd tried, only to fail. He'd gotten inside her body, and she'd found her way into his heart.

  "I didn't give you much choice in the matter, Noah," she said wryly. "I wanted you, and I don't regret a thing about our affair."

  So, she was going to chalk up their relationship as an erotic, illicit tryst. The thought made him want to haul her over his shoulder again, carry her up to his bedroom and make love to her until she admitted she couldn't live without him.

  "Noah," she said, interrupting his thoughts and making him realize that she was standing, too. "Why didn't you tell me the truth about us?"

  He released a long breath and explained. He owed her at least that. "It all started at the hospital, as a way for me to get into your room and get information from the doctor about your condition. Once I told him that you were my fiancee I gained access to your room, along with your prognosis. And from there, the fabrication snowballed. The doctor said it was best to let you remember things on your own, and then when I realized you were being stalked, it was the best way to keep you safe and in my care without you insisting you could handle things on your own-which you tried to do a few times, if I remember correctly."

  She ducked her head sheepishly, obviously remembering the way she'd argued with him about going back to work and school. The woman was stubborn and independent-traits that both frustrated and aroused him.

  Closing the distance between them, he tucked a finger beneath her chin and lifted her gaze back to his. "Except I didn't do a very good job of protecting you, did I?"