by Julie Leto
“Stealing is a misnomer,” Pilar emphasized. “I was borrowing. I would have told you, Reina, but if my scheme came to the attention of the authorities, I didn’t want you blamed as an accessory. When the royalties arrived, I had every intention of repaying you three times over. But then you came into her life,” she said, staring daggers at Grey, “and decided to play Hercule Poirot. And you!” She sneered at Claudio. “Eavesdropping like the commoner I always knew you to be.”
Reina stood, ending her mother’s tirade before she went too far. She now knew the truth—at least, she knew all she needed to know. Claudio di Amante was her father. He’d chosen her to restore his collection as a means to make up for the years he’d missed and to counteract her mother’s terrible scheme. Pilar had orchestrated the robberies to fill her own coffers and had been caught because Dahlia had a wave of conscience and had contacted Claudio and because Grey had a talent for finding out the truth.
What more did she need to know?
“I’m tired,” Reina admitted. “I’d appreciate if you’d both leave now.”
Claudio had come to his feet the minute Reina had. He leaned across and placed a soft kiss on her cheek, then headed toward the door. “May I call you tomorrow?”
Reina smiled. The man may have only known her for a few days, but he knew how to ingratiate himself, didn’t he?
“Yes.”
Pilar wouldn’t be dismissed so easily, stamping her foot the minute Claudio closed the door behind him. “That’s all you have to say?”
“Actually, I have nothing to say to you, Mother. I’m too angry. I need time to decide what to do.”
“What to do?” Pilar stalked toward her, incredulous. “Do you plan to call the police?”
Reina didn’t move or react. She wondered if she should reassure her mother that she could never betray her as coldly as her own mother had betrayed her, but figured a night’s worth of worrying would do Pilar some good.
“I don’t know what I plan, Mother. But if you ever want to repair all the damage you’ve done, you’ll stick around and find out. Find Judi a new job and leave Dahlia alone. She tried to do the right thing, which is amazing when you take into account all the years she’s spent under your influence.”
Pilar didn’t respond, but a quick flash of regret darkened her eyes, making Reina believe, if only for now, that she’d made her point. She’d forgive her mother, of course. She’d make sure those royalties went straight toward restitution to both the insurance company and the clients who’d lost their valuables. She’s also do whatever she could to find the originals and return them to the rightful owners. If she could keep things quiet, she could set everything right without ruining any more lives or careers.
With nothing left to say, Pilar left the house in the same manner in which she came—like a storm. As the door closed behind her, Reina was certain the pressure in the air hissed out like a punctured balloon.
Only she and Grey remained. He stood near the doorway, looking as wiped out as she felt. She ached to fling herself into his arms, experience skin to skin the warmth he radiated from his tired half smile.
“Thank you,” she said.
He slung his hands into his pockets with a humble shrug. “For what? Turning your life inside out? Exposing your mother? Outing your father before he was ready? You need to be more specific. The choices are endless.”
Reina couldn’t contain a grin, or the instinct to slip her arms into his and listen to his heartbeat with her ear pressed to his chest. His heat instantly ensnared her. His scent acted like an aphrodisiac, injecting her body with just enough energy to become aroused.
“I think I’m most grateful for you causing me to lose my cool. Disaffected ennui may be very fashionable and sexy—” she glanced up at his face in time to catch his burgeoning grin “—but it does a hell of a number on your insides.”
“Tell me about it. I think that’s the best lesson I learned about being Zane. There’s an incredible freedom that comes with not putting boundaries on your life.”
She nuzzled her nose just a little closer to his chest. “Don’t kid yourself. Zane has boundaries and walls just like you and I do. His might even be tougher to break through. I hope this Toni Maxwell woman is up to the task.”
Grey bent down and kissed the top of her head. “Why are we talking about my brother and his lover?”
“Because if we do, we don’t have to talk about us.”
“What’s so bad about that?”
She stared at him, surprised he didn’t know. “We’re not exactly good at it.”
“We don’t suck,” he quipped.
“Speak for yourself.” She licked her lips and pressed her body against his, instantly aroused by the hardening length of him.
“You’re trying to distract me,” he said with a groan.
“Am I succeeding?”
“Chère, you know you are.”
“Make love to me, Grey?” she asked, wondering if she’d ever spoken those words aloud to any other man. In her lifetime of lovers, she’d never had to ask. But in that same lifetime, she’d never wanted a man for anything other than what he could do to her body. With Grey, she craved what he did to her soul, what he’d done to her heart—showing her the emptiness and then offering her a way to fill it up. She took his hands and led him toward the staircase.
He hesitated at the bottom step.
“Wait,” he said.
She turned. “Why?”
“Because I love you.”
Reina shouldn’t have been surprised to hear his confession. He’d showed her the depth of his feelings in so many ways. Now she had to show him. The minute she coaxed her lungs into cooperating again, she reached out and touched his cheek. “All the more reason to come upstairs.”
His eyes narrowed, his lips turned down at the corners. She thought a moment, realizing returning the words might have been a better choice of things to say. Funny, but it never occurred to her to say her feelings out loud. She’d rather show him.
“No more hiding, Reina,” he challenged. “No more pretending to be someone you’re not.”
She raised an eyebrow. “This coming from you? It wasn’t so long ago that you pretended to be your brother.”
“I’m not pretending now. I’m Grey Masterson, and I’m in love with you, Reina Price. I don’t know how it happened, since only a few days ago, I was completely certain that most women couldn’t be trusted, and the few who could were related to me. Sexy, alluring women like you were the least trustworthy of all. But you’ve been clear about what you wanted and what you didn’t want. I even managed to break several of your rules, and still, I’m here. Care to explain?”
She pressed her lips together, her body quivering, her head spinning. She felt, almost…could it be…shy?
“You want to hear me say it, don’t you?”
His grin, triumphant and irresistible, bordered on smug. “Yeah, I do.”
She glanced up at the bedroom. “I’m so much better at expressing my emotions through my art.”
“I’m not a piece of jewelry.”
Why couldn’t she say it? Because she never had? Hell, she’d done countless things with Grey in the past three days that she’d never done in her lifetime and she hadn’t hesitated then. What kept her from being honest now?
She danced from foot to foot, tugged at her sash, felt hot and confined. Suddenly inspired, she jogged down the stairs, grabbed his hand as she passed and pulled him out into the garden.
Sharp cricket song filled the thick humid air with music. The night-blooming jasmine kicked in the sweet perfume. A crescent moon bathed a silver glow over the wild foliage that crept across old stone walkways, tickling her bare feet as she led him toward the center, where a small stone bench sat beside a fountain she’d planned to restore when she’d first moved in, but had never found the time.
She undid the sash and dropped her robe to the ground. She combed her fingers through her wild, tangled hair then spread
her arms to the side and inhaled deeply.
“What are you doing?”
“I’ve never made love outside before. Have you?”
“You know I have,” he said with a grumble.
“No, I don’t. I never read Lane’s book. I promise I never will if you’ll promise to let me do this my way.”
“Do what?”
She answered by sashaying toward him and unbuttoning his shirt. First, the cuffs. Then she tugged the material out of his waistband and worked the buttons from the bottom up. She placed her hands against his hot skin, then kissed a languid path from his nipple to his shoulder, loosening one sleeve, then the other. Her mouth then blazed a trail down the center of his belly, over his washboard pecs and silky navel. She undid his belt, removed his pants and shorts, then his shoes, which, surprisingly, he wore with no socks.
Seeing him in his “Grey” attire hadn’t sunk in when he’d first appeared in her bathroom. She had other things to think about. But now? She glanced up at him, surprised at the casual touch.
“Some of Zane wore off on me,” he explained.
She smiled, knowing that the more the brothers “wore off” on each other, the better they’d both become. They’d been living in the extremes, playing their “good twin, bad twin” roles for way too long. She wanted to make love to the real Grey Masterson as much as he wanted her to be honest about her feelings for him. And tonight would be her first chance to make both their wishes come true.
“Some of you, I think, wore off on me.” She kissed his palm, then led him to the stone bench, which she cushioned with her fluffy bathrobe.
“How so?” he asked, sitting back and patting his lap.
She climbed over his thighs, invigorated by the way her breasts brushed against his hard chest, by the special fit of his sex against hers. A wet warmth connected them, a conduit for the electricity simmering beneath the surface of their skin.
But confessions first, sex later. Not much later, Reina thought wryly, but she needed at least a few minutes to tell him what he wanted to hear, what she so desperately wanted to say.
“I love you, Grey Masterson.”
“You had to get naked outside in your garden in order to admit that?” he asked with a laugh.
The sound rumbled from his chest to hers, but she was ready to laugh at herself, ready to see the image she projected to the world. Grey had discovered the real woman within, the one who wanted to find love, but who hid behind her sensuality in fear she’d actually encounter the real emotion and then wouldn’t know what to do. She’d be out of control, uncertain, as she was now. Yet in Grey’s arms, the lost feeling wasn’t so difficult to face.
Grey had worked beyond her persona, sneaked past the sentries she’d posted to keep anyone out. Luckily his craftiness could be easily forgiven. He was, after all, one fine specimen of a man, from the inside to the outside and everywhere in between.
“Are you complaining about our attire? Our location? Or both?”
“Chère, I’m not complaining.”
“You’re a man of words. An artist, in a way. Don’t you see the symbolism?”
“All I see is a beautiful, amazing woman. You’ve been through so much tonight.”
She wanted to shrug off the sound of his concern, but she couldn’t deny that she’d been twisted and tugged in one hundred emotional directions over the past few days. Maybe she shouldn’t be making life-altering decisions without taking some time, but she had to go with her instincts this time. For once.
“Enough to know that I’d be a fool not to treasure love once I’ve finally found it. I won’t be like Viviana, willing to share my one true love. I’m in this for the long haul, Grey. If that’s not what you want, let me know right now.”
She grasped his cheeks in her hands and ended her confession with a long kiss. He allowed her to set the tempo, but he quickly took control of the melody. His tongue to her tongue, his taste to hers. Sensations ripped through her body like a torrent, washing away the last of her fears, cleansing a path to her heart that Grey could take if he chose to. And if he didn’t, she’d survive. She knew her heart well enough to have that courage now. All thanks to him.
Grey couldn’t believe the irony, couldn’t grasp all that had happened over the past few days with Reina. He’d discovered his true self, his truest desires, by stepping into his brother’s life. He’d walked away from the business he’d always seen as a birthright more than an ambition, but found a way to make the newspaper his—with the news supplement he’d created in his quest to bring Reina the truth about her father.
And best of all, he’d found Reina. A woman as sexually exciting as any of his secret conquests, a woman he wouldn’t want to hide from the world any more than il Gioielliere had wanted to sequester Viviana away. If CNN came into this garden right here and now and caught them making love then broadcasted the news to the four corners of the universe, Grey wouldn’t give a damn. He wanted her, he desired her, he loved her, and he didn’t care who knew.
“I want to be with you, Reina. For always.”
She tried not to look smug, he could tell. He also determined that smug was a look she wore incredibly well.
“I want to be with you. Amazing, huh?”
“Not quite yet.”
He shifted their position, easing inside her body with tender slowness, closing his eyes as their bodies merged, wanting to memorize each and every sensation, though he knew this wouldn’t be the last time he’d experience such heaven.
“This. This is amazing. Making love to a woman you love and who loves you back.”
She shifted her feet on the bench, lifting her soft bottom, testing her balance, driving him wild. “Hmm…could be very, very amazing. And we don’t need any jewelry or toys to double the pleasure.”
“Not that I’d ever complain if you wanted to experiment. We can’t forget our beginnings.”
Reina moved until Grey’s body and hers were joined center to center. She’d never felt so complete, so matched, like a precious gem placed in a perfect setting. “I won’t forget if you won’t.”
And from the climaxes that soon followed, both knew they never would.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-7148-1
DOUBLE THE PLEASURE
Copyright © 2002 by Julie Leto Klapka.
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