by Joanne Rock
The woman who was now her partner.
Who would have guessed a man named Robert Flynn would be married to a woman named Lainie Reynolds? In her family of old world values, women always took the man’s name when they got married. Geesh. She was so freaking naive.
Combine the different last names with Robert’s lack of a wedding ring, and before she knew it, she’d slept with another woman’s husband.
“That was it, wasn’t it? Robert Flynn?” Hugh tilted his head as if to meet her gaze even though she stared at the sandy floor of the open hut.
“Yes.” She closed her eyes for a long, bracing moment, unwilling to let Robert cheat her out of something good with Hugh. She’d already lost more than enough to Robert Flynn, thank you very much. “That’s him. He’s one of the men they never captured.”
Giselle met his gaze, read the interest in his eyes.
“Sometimes renewed coverage by the media can lure criminals out of hiding. Ever see America’s Most Wanted? It’s the same premise.” He reached behind the minibar and pulled out two glasses, then poured them both a glass of water from a jug on the counter.
Giselle accepted the offering even though this pseudo-date was rapidly crashing and burning. She couldn’t allow Hugh to write any story that would “lure” Robert Flynn back to town. Having that man within a fifty-mile radius of Club Paradise would have explosive consequences for them all. She needed to squelch the idea as soon as possible.
“Apparently Flynn is living in comfort in the Cayman Islands and local authorities don’t have a prayer of extraditing him.” End of story.
Too bad the chemistry between her and Hugh—and her growing desire to learn much more about this man—wasn’t as easily dismissed.
NOW SHE WAS TALKING his language.
Hugh had made a name for himself in journalism by delving into stories full of problematic foreign ex-traditions and crooks in hiding.
He’d parlayed that talent into something even bigger and more important as far as he was concerned. He wouldn’t trade his specialty of shedding light on harmful foreign policy for anything. No woman would ever decide lightly to enter a foreign country hostile to females with her young son in tow again if Hugh could help it. Information about frightening foreign customs hadn’t been readily available when his mother had decided to pack him off to a little known Middle Eastern hellhole at a young age, but Hugh had made it his mission in life to ensure things were different now.
For as long as he was a journalist, he would always choose to write those kinds of stories over some fluff piece on the local tourist scene. But if he had to write something about Club Paradise, at least he finally had an intriguing angle.
He’d have his story written and his path cleared to Giselle’s bed within the week. And if the article broke the way he anticipated, there would surely be a few follow-up pieces that needed to be written. A fact which would keep him in South Beach long enough to revisit that bed.
Often.
“Looks like I’ve found the angle I need.” He downed the rest of his water and set the glass back on the wooden bar inside the small tiki hut. Now he was ready to start his research. Sleep could wait once adrenaline started fueling him this way.
Giselle, on the other hand, seemed to have grown quiet over the last hour since the sun had fully risen. She was probably feeling the effects of having been up so long since she didn’t have the benefit of a new journalistic undertaking to keep her going.
She looked ready to speak, but Hugh swooped closer to spare her the effort. He kissed her with all the longing that had been plaguing him since he’d laid eyes on her. She molded to him, her soft curves and pliant limbs conforming to the hard angles of his body.
A vision of the pastry she’d fed him flitted through his brain as her breasts flattened against his chest. He couldn’t wait to see the real thing, to taste her nipples instead of the bright red cherries she’d served him.
And just like that he wanted her naked. Needed her naked.
With a groan of regret he pulled away, knowing he wouldn’t be able to fulfill his end of their bargain if he continued to kiss her. Especially since a lush hotel full of exotically decorated bedrooms loomed fifty yards away from their tiki hut retreat.
“I’m going to write this story faster than I’ve ever penned anything in my life.” He stroked a hand through her mane of thick, glossy curls and calculated the days until he could feel that hair spilling over his bare chest. “If I come by later, do you think you could answer some questions for me?”
She blinked, hesitated.
“I can ask someone else if today isn’t a good time. It’s just that I usually end up with a handful of simple questions after my first round of research. You might be able to answer them faster than I could scout around for the information.”
Biting her lip as if weighing indecision, she finally nodded. “Okay. I’ll probably be awake around two this afternoon. I’m living at the hotel for a few months while we build our business, so you can just ask for directions to my room at the desk.”
Picturing the two of them together in a hotel room—especially a room at the hedonistic singles playground Club Paradise—painted wicked visions in his mind.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea considering our deal to wait until after the story runs?” He was having a hard time keeping his hands to himself in broad daylight on a public beach. How would he ever maintain distance in a decadent bedroom?
“We can head to the kitchens if we get too tempted. Where are you going now?” She smoothed her palms over the lapels of his lightweight jacket.
Even that simple touch set him on fire. Something about this woman lit a torch to his insides in a way no one else ever had.
He backed away before he gave in to the urge to scoop her off her feet and beg her to tell him the exact location of her hotel room. Right then. “I’m going to head into the Herald offices to check out the archives.”
She looked distraught but Hugh didn’t dare to hope that was because he had to leave. He might know a hell of a lot about luring criminals out of hiding by hitting the right story buttons, but he was man enough to admit he didn’t have a clue when it came to understanding female emotions.
Scrambling for a gesture that would make it all okay, he reached for her hand and kissed the back of her soft, bronze skin. Inhaled the perfumed scent at her wrist that lingered even in the growing heat of another South Beach scorcher. “Until later.”
As he straightened, he spied a hint of a smile at her lips. A trace of the woman he’d seen dancing around the kitchen while singing Sinatra at the top of her lungs.
Something inside him shifted. Lightened. For a chef who baked erotic pastries for fun and liked dancing barefoot, Giselle Cesare had a surprisingly deep, potent effect on him. An effect he couldn’t wait to explore in detail as soon as he finished this story.
Robert Flynn would be headline news before the guy knew what hit him, and Hugh could get back to what he’d wanted to do ever since he’d glimpsed Giselle’s bright red panties.
Indulge in pure and simple uncomplicated sex that would leave them both hungry for more.
4
GROGGY WITH SLEEP AND HUNGRY for more of the delicious dreams she’d been having about Hugh, Giselle blinked her way awake in the Pleasure Parthenon later that day. Disoriented, it took her a moment to realize the phone was ringing beside her bed.
Squinting at the clock in Club Paradise’s Grecian-inspired theme room, she could see it was already almost 2:00 p.m. Hadn’t she told Hugh she’d be awake by then? She really should get up. Shower.
Too bad the damn phone kept ringing.
“Hello?” She balanced the receiver against her ear, determined to remain horizontal for as long as possible. Sun filtered past the heavy white drapes and a set of sheer white curtains dotted with scattered gold beads, but not enough to keep her eyes open.
“Were you still sleeping?” The sexy male baritone was no longer just in her drea
ms. Hugh’s voice floated over her sleepy senses, stoking steamy fantasies that still danced around the edges of her brain.
“Yes.” She shifted beneath the covers, her bare skin sliding against the silky soft cotton sheets. “In fact, you interrupted a very nice dream.”
“You have my apologies.” His voice soothed her, the unhurried rhythm of his speech encouraging her to sink deeper into the pillows and simply listen. “From the tone of your voice, I’m guessing this dream was of a sensual nature.”
“My, my, but you have very acute hearing if you could figure that out just from the way I sound.”
“But am I right?”
She twined the white phone cord around one finger and twirled the length in small circles, heat swirling through her veins. “You are one hundred percent correct, Mr. Duncan. Care to keep guessing what exactly I’ve been envisioning in my dreams?”
He whistled low on the other end of the phone. “Definitely. I’m usually damn good at guessing since it goes with the job. But you’re the kind of woman who serves erotic pastries to total strangers. Who knows what sort of sensual terrain your unconscious mind might cover while you’re sleeping? I have the feeling there wouldn’t be many fantasies off-limits to you.”
“You’d be right again.” Her voice hit a husky note that had nothing to do with sleep and everything to do with Hugh turning her on.
It had been far too long since she’d played provocative games with an enticing male. And frankly, she couldn’t remember ever playing with a man quite so intriguing.
“Can I ask one question before I start guessing?” His voice sounded so close, she could almost imagine him lying right there beside her, his hands on her bare skin.
“Ask me anything.” The phone made her feel even more bold, daring.
“What are you wearing right now?”
Her whole body shivered in answer. Her breasts tightened, ached beneath the sheets. Licking her lips, she told him the naked truth. “Nothing.”
The strangled sound on the other end wasn’t quite discernible.
“Hugh?”
“Sorry.” He sighed out a long breath. “That particular mental image blew me away. But it also helped clue me in to what you’re dreaming about.”
“Really?” She shifted to her back, the light touch of silky sheets antagonizing a body that craved the sure possession of a man’s hands.
“If you’re lying there, warm and naked and all alone between the sheets in a hedonistic haven like Club Paradise, what could you possibly be thinking about besides having someone lying there next to you?”
Her hips twitched at his words, heat flowing deep within her belly to warm her thighs and awaken her sex. She pressed her legs more tightly together, but instead of helping ease the ache, the movement only intensified it.
“You’re right so far,” she admitted, needing so much more from Hugh than words. “But that’s not the half of it. Are you going to be here soon? I’m all alone in the Pleasure Parthenon, and I’d be happy to show you.”
Another strangled sound. “I’m going to be a little delayed because of work, although the Pleasure Parthenon sounds like a great place to be right now. You think you could be my hands until I can get there?”
Her heart thrummed in her chest at the thought of him being with her later. She didn’t want to think about the fact that they’d made smart plans to postpone getting involved with one another until after he’d finished his story. With her body set to slow burn and Hugh’s voice sizzling through her consciousness, she wasn’t overly concerned with making smart decisions at the moment.
“I don’t think I could ever mistake my hands for your hands.” Not that the knowledge could stop her pulse from fluttering wildly at his wicked suggestion.
“But if I guided your every move, then it would be me doing the touching.” He paused, his breathing deep and rhythmic in her ear. “Come on, Giselle, let me slide beneath those covers with you.”
She arched her back, mentally welcoming the idea of Hugh’s taut, lean body stretched out beside her. “Mmm.”
“You know where I want to touch you first?”
She shook her head, unconcerned he couldn’t see her. In her mind, he was right there with her anyhow.
“You’ve got this unbelievable waist—a sweet little curve that I was dying to put my hands on this morning.”
Her hand slipped beneath the covers, skimming down her hot skin to curl around her waist, inciting unexpected pleasure and wrenching a moan from her lips. “That feels good.”
“What about if you travel a little farther south? I would definitely want to touch your hip next.”
“Really?” Extending her arm, she slid her hand down to one hip, her fingertips grazing the swell of her bottom. “And then what would you do? Would you be so lust-ridden that you’d have to kiss me?”
“Oh, I’m definitely kissing you by now.” He lowered his voice another notch, his words funneling straight in her ear, intended for her alone. “And I’m reaching up to those amazing breasts of yours to cop my first real feel.”
Giselle twisted to her side, her breasts tight and aching for that touch. Her hand cupped one mound, rolling the taut nipple between two fingers. A sigh hissed between her teeth, her thighs twitching with restless need.
“That feels so good.” She snuggled deeper into her pillow, burying the phone in the fluffy down as she made herself more comfortable. “But can you…touch more of me?”
There was a pause on the other end. “I don’t know how much of you I can touch without…losing it. You don’t know what the idea of you naked right now is doing to me.”
Her hands danced down over her belly, traced her hip. “Then can’t you leave whatever it is you’re doing and come over here?”
She would gladly throw away caution to have Hugh with her. Above her. Inside her.
“It’s not as easy as it sounds.”
“It’s very easy. Walk away from what you’re doing, get in the car and take the first causeway to Miami Beach.” What better setting for a tryst could there be than the Pleasure Parthenon? They could feed each other grapes and turn on the wine fountain. She could dance naked for him before they engaged in every conceivable sex act.
“But I can’t get to my car when I’m cruising over the Atlantic at forty thousand feet.”
Hazy images of her entwined with Hugh faded.
“You’re what?”
“Remember how we decided we could be together as soon as I turned in my story? Well, I followed up on the lead you gave me about Robert Flynn and, you’re right, he’s in the Cayman Islands. I’m headed down there now to try to find him.”
The sensual tide that had been flowing through her moments ago dried up to nothing, leaving her suddenly cold and empty. “You’re on a plane to some remote island in the hope of finding Robert Flynn?”
She barely managed to push the name from her lips.
“Who knows? Maybe I’ll get lucky and find the right piece of information that will drive him back to the States. But I need to talk to him. Sometimes crooks like this are so arrogant they think it can’t hurt to talk to the media.”
How could a woman’s life go from so damn promising one minute to absolute shambles the next? And if Robert Flynn came back to Miami the consequences would be devastating for everyone involved in Club Paradise. No doubt about it, the man was the key to many hidden wounds.
But the new man in her life seemed hell-bent determined to resurrect her former lover.
HUGH WAITED. AND WAITED.
“Giselle?” He hadn’t wanted to change the topic of their phone exchange earlier, but he couldn’t exactly engage in full-fledged phone sex when he flew on the Herald’s private jet. He might be the only passenger, but there was a pilot in the cockpit a few yards away.
“I’m here.” Her voice sounded a million miles away when moments ago she’d seemed right there with him. She’d turned him on so thoroughly with her sexy phone play he would probably still be
willing away the hard-on an hour from now. “I’m just…surprised.”
Hugh straightened in his seat, determined not to alienate this woman he had set his sights on. He’d never been the kind of guy who would make do with any willing woman, and could count the women he’d been with on one hand. Giselle Cesare was special. Different. And this stupid story he had hanging around his neck like an albatross would definitely not come between them before they even got started.
“There’s no need to worry. With any luck I’ll be back in twenty-four hours.” Or twelve if fate really smiled on him. And damn it, he’d carved a reputation as one of the most respected journalists in the Western World because he was both talented and lucky. A small-time embezzler like Flynn wouldn’t elude him for long. “I’ll write my story on the plane ride home so that when I return, my first stop will be the Pleasure Parthenon.”
Where he would discover every pleasurable secret Giselle and her goddess body had to offer before he returned to his real assignments overseas.
Odd that he already wondered if merely exploring her body would be enough. Somehow with Giselle he found himself intrigued by her mind, her playful sense of adventure.
“Don’t you ever sleep?” She sounded distracted, as if she was already slipping away from him when he hadn’t even begun to know her yet.
“Not when I’m on a quest.”
“Then I guess I’d better let you get back to it, Hugh. Maybe we’d better not—”
“Wait a minute.” He refused to hear whatever else she might have to say until he’d clarified one important point. “Just so we’re clear on this, the quest is not my story, Giselle. The quest is you. I only want to get this taken care of so I can get back there and follow this attraction wherever it might take us.”
“But there’s a lot you don’t know—”
Whatever Giselle was saying was cut off by the pilot on a tinny speaker about two feet from Hugh’s ear. The volume had been turned up to full blast.
