Mating Game

by Maynard, Janice

  He pulled her forward on his chest, curling a hand behind her neck and dragging her mouth down to his. She sensed desperation in his lovemaking now, as though he were trying to prove something to her.

  He was so rough, both in his kiss and in his lovemaking, that she was confused. Marc was usually the smooth seducer. But at this moment, she sensed anger in him. And it made her sad. She wanted things to stay as they were. She wanted extravagant, playful, satisfying sex . . . the kind they always had.

  Instead, he rolled her to her back at the end and thrust hard until he was finished. He came quickly, with a curse. For the first time in their acquaintance, she faked an orgasm. She had the teary-eyed notion that this might be the last time she would be intimate with him, and the knowledge was bittersweet. When he flopped beside her, breathless, he gave her a rueful glance. “Was that boring enough for you, Nola? Is that how your Georgia bumpkins do it?”

  She pinched his arm and yawned, doing her best to mask her discomfiture. “You’re so full of it. Get dressed, please, and take me over to Billy’s store to get my car so I can go home. It’s been a long day, and I’m beat.”

  Seven

  Themusical ring of Nola’s cell phone woke her the next morning. She’d lain awake for a couple of hours last night waiting for Tanner to come home. Only when she heard his footsteps in the hall had she finally drifted off to sleep. She faced the new day groggy and out of sorts.

  The caller was Krystal, one of the tenants who shared the large loft space where Nola had her photography studio. Krystal was a gifted textile artist—her wall hangings, shawls, and blankets in high demand.

  Nola yawned and shoved her hair out of her face. Though short, it tended to undergo some kind of wild jungle transformation every night. “Good morning, Krys. What’s up?”

  Krystal was a decade and a half older than Nola. She’d been married and divorced twice and now considered men a disposable commodity. Her deep voice was a mix of cigarette smoke and the Bronx. Despite their differences, Nola considered Krystal a close friend. And though neither of them ever acknowledged it, Krystal definitely mothered Nola. Nola, who had little experience with such a warm, nurturing relationship—at least not since her parents died—soaked it up.

  Krystal prefaced her answer with a hacking cough. “I’ve got news for you, chickie.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s about your yummy, rich-as-God Marc.”

  “Do tell.” Nola sat up in bed, suddenly wide-awake.

  Krystal rasped her way through an explanation. “I had a client up in the loft yesterday. She saw that picture of you and Marc on your bulletin board. And she asked me to pass on a warning.”

  “A warning?” Nola parroted the words, a bad feeling in her stomach.

  Krys loved a good bit of gossip, and her tone was filled with relish. “You know his rep for wining, dining, and spoiling women and then cutting them loose?”

  Nola made an affirmative noise.

  “Well . . .” Krys paused for dramatic effect. “Apparently that’s an urban legend. According to this woman, who by the way was definitely a highflier all the way, very classy and money to match his, I’d wager—”

  Nola grew impatient. “Tell me. . . .”

  Krys chuckled. “She says she was the one to break things off. And she’s talked to enough of his other women to know they did the same.”

  “But why? And why the subterfuge?”

  “Apparently your dear Marc has a nasty tendency to get a bit controlling and possessive. Enough that these women decided to cut their losses.”

  Nola’s stomach churned. “Did he—”

  Krys cut off that line of thought. “He never hurt anybody, but his jealousy and his possessiveness reached a point where he became creepy. So these women bailed. I thought you’d want to know. I realize you weren’t expecting anything long-term with this guy, so maybe it’s best that you left Chicago.”

  Nola sighed. “He’s here, Krys. In Georgia. He followed me.”

  There was a long silence on the other end of the phone. “Oh, shit . . .”

  Nola’s sentiments exactly. Her earlier misgivings returned full force. “Last night I tried to convince him to go home. He’s not here at the house with me. This place is too much of a dump for his taste. But the motel where he’s staying isn’t much better. I had hoped he would hit the road this morning, but now I don’t know what to think.”

  The other woman’s voice held concern. “Be on your toes, Nola, girl. There’s nothing more dangerous than a slick, charming man who can fool the public with a really good act. You know they’re out there . . . serial killers, con men. . . .”

  Nola laughed weakly. “Are you trying to scare me?”

  “I just want you to stay safe.”

  Krystal’s troubling revelations followed Nola relentlessly as she put on her oldest clothes and heeded the siren call of the third floor. At one time, over a century ago, the single long, wide room, really nothing more than an attic, had been partitioned off for the house help who lived in. Cleaning out the dusty, cobweb-ridden piles of junk that littered the floor was one thing. But it would take a professional to install appropriate insulation and the huge skylight Nola envisioned. And even minimal heating and cooling of the ungainly space promised to be insanely expensive.

  The huge, messy area was a treasure trove of filth and junk juxtaposed with priceless antiques and irreplaceable family heirlooms. Nola dug in, enchanted in spite of herself.

  Tanner found her, sometime later, as she was picking through an old trunk of baby clothes. Today, he wore a faded gray Georgia Tech T-shirt and khaki shorts. His eyebrow went up in a familiar gesture as he spotted the smocked dress she held. “Feeling the nesting instinct, are we?”

  Nola smiled wryly, happy to see him. It was alarming that after a very short acquaintance his mere presence could give her such a sense of well-being and a sharp jolt of sexual awareness. She tried not to let it show. “No. Not hardly. But I’ve dreamed of having a photography studio up here for years. You know . . . with lots of natural light and plenty of room to spread out.”

  “Has that always been a dream . . . photography, I mean?”

  She nodded slowly, remembering with a pang of loss that it had been Billy who first encouraged her to enter a picture in the county fair. And it had been Billy who stood beside her, beaming with pride, as she was handed the Best in Show ribbon. Her winning photo was taken on a cold January morning when she was a junior in high school. She’d captured a vee of geese just cresting the chimney of Lochhaven.

  Tanner looked around at the mess. “Square footage is not a problem, but look at this over here.”

  For the next fifteen minutes, he dampened her mood by showing her termite damage, dry rot, and mold. Despite the fact that he smelled like freshly showered male and warm cotton, he was a buzz killer.

  Finally, she propped her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Must you always rain on my parade?”

  He sighed and shrugged. “I’m just trying to make you see reason. I don’t know how deep your grandmother’s pockets were, but even if she was rolling in it . . . do you really want to wipe out your entire inheritance? Lochhaven is the definition of a money pit.”

  Nola kicked a dressmaker’s dummy. It hurt her toe, but didn’t relieve any frustration. “The house is the only part of the inheritance I care about. And until I meet with the lawyer later this week, I honestly have no idea how much cash there is to throw around. Hell,” she said morosely. “For all I know, once the guy finishes digging around in all Grandmother’s financial documents, he may find that she had hidden debts.”

  “What will you do if you’re broke?”

  It was a fair question, but Nola got the feeling that he was more than casually interested . . . which made sense, because if Nola found out she was cash poor, she would be in no position to keep a sexy handyman on retainer. His fate was tied to hers.

  For a split second, she contemplated that whole “tied to he
r” thing. She swallowed and realized she was starting to sweat. “I don’t think it will come to that. The lawyer seems to think there’s a lot of money. But if he’s wrong, I could always sell my body,” she joked weakly.

  His serious expression segued from business to personal . . . really personal.

  She took advantage of his shift in mood to snag his wrist and bring him close. Tanner didn’t miss a beat. Holy crap. He had his mouth on hers, his tongue stroking hers, before she could blink.

  When his hands found her bare breasts, she wondered hazily what had happened to her shirt.

  Tanner thumbed her nipples. “No one could afford this body,” he muttered. “You know you make me crazy—right?”

  She mumbled an answer, looking around desperately for a place to get horizontal. She’d had a stressful couple of days, and Tanner Nash was the only wonderful, sexy, uncomplicated thing in her world. She wanted him. Now. He touched her as if her body were his, and that masculine confidence melted any reservations she might have had about intimacy with her big, brawny houseguest.

  She liked him. She trusted him. And at this moment in time, she really, really needed him. Where their hips were mashed together, his erection nudged nicely against her belly.

  He slid a hand inside her panties and found her wet and warm. She didn’t waste time feeling embarrassed. But when two big fingers entered her, her knees went weak and she turned her face to his chest. Her whole body was on fire.

  It was a reach, but she tunneled her hands in his hair, loving the feel of the thick, silky waves against her hands. When she toyed with his ears, stroking and tugging at his earlobes, Tanner’s arm tightened around her and he dragged in a hoarse breath.

  “Jesus, Nola . . .”

  He lifted her and their lips met, a hunger-fed duel full of panting and rough murmurs and teeth-knocking insanity.

  Her hand found the button on his shorts, but he stopped her, cursing fluently, groaning, and stepping away from her with uncharacteristic clumsiness. “Damn it, Nola. What is it about you that makes me want to strip you and nail you whenever we get within ten feet of each other?”

  He ran a hand through his hair, making it stand on end, his expression aggrieved.

  She moved closer, laying a hand on his rocklike abs. “You’re big. I’m kind of small. We could probably do it standing up.” She was practically begging—she couldn’t help herself.

  But the glaze of color on his cheekbones and the mix of sexual hunger and confusion in his eyes told her he was as ready as she was . . . Why was he resisting?

  She snaked her arms around his waist. “I’ll be gentle,” she whispered, rubbing her cheek on his chest.

  His big frame actually shook. But he was tough. He shoved her away . . . not hard, but with enough momentum to reinforce his next words. “We shouldn’t do this now. And I definitely shouldn’t have fucked you after your date the other night. You were upset. . . . I was jealous. . . .”

  She realized that he wasn’t joking, and her heart sank. “I thought we were good together,” she said bravely, wanting to re-create that wonderful feeling of intimacy they’d shared in her bed.

  He scrubbed a hand over his face, his eyes dark and troubled. “I like a little action as much as the next guy, but, Nola . . .” He sucked in a breath, clearly still off balance.

  She perched on a stack of books, her knees suddenly weak. “But what? Heck, Tanner. Spit it out. I can take it.”

  His thrust his hands in the pockets of his shorts and leaned against one of the support posts. His laser gaze made her restless. When he spoke, his words were measured and careful. “You are a very nice woman,” he said, his voice low and sincere. “I think we should get to know each other before we do anything else in terms of . . .”

  “Hot, sweaty sex?” she added helpfully.

  He winced. “Yeah, that. And I need to talk to you about some stuff . . . clear the air . . . you know.”

  Turned out, she didn’t know. And she wasn’t aware that the air was murky. “You’re confusing me. Am I missing something here?”

  Now it was his turn to kick the dummy. And from the look on Tanner’s face, he would have taken great pleasure in beating the crap out of the wire-and-fabric dress form. He stared at the mess in the attic, from the filthy windows at the end of the room to the mouse droppings dotting the floor. Apparently, he couldn’t bring himself to look Nola in the eye. “Let’s not rush into anything,” he said. Now his voice was low and sounded discouraged. “You have a lot of decisions to make, but there’s plenty of time. You and I can back off and start over. How’s that?”

  First of all, she didn’t have plenty of time, not at all. But since she wasn’t prepared to reveal the terms of the will, he had no way of knowing what a tight spot she was in. Second, what in the heck was this mysterious talking they needed to do? Tanner Nash was about as total an alpha male as it was possible to find. Men like him did not put talking high on the list of things they wanted to do with the women in their lives.

  None of this made sense. But Nola had put herself out there long enough. A girl could take only so much rejection in one day.

  “Fine,” she said, her voice deliberately snotty. She got to her feet. “I’ve got lots of work to do anyway.” She paused and gave him an angry stare. “And I hope you’re not counting this time on the clock. I’d hate to think I was paying you for nothing.”

  After a long, pregnant moment when the two of them locked horns in a bitter, voiceless showdown, Tanner stormed out of the attic. Nola tasted shame and was appalled at her own behavior. She’d deliberately set out to hurt Tanner, and despite his stoic machismo, some shadow of expression on his face told her she might have succeeded.

  God, she was a mess. Tanner had been trying his best to be a gentleman, but she, Nola, who supposedly had benefited from all the tenets of a “good Southern girl” upbringing, had metaphorically smacked him in the face. And all because he’d hurt her feminine pride by not giving in to a moment’s insanity. Had she really wanted him to screw her in this disgusting attic?

  Her brain said no, but her more truthful libido said, Hell, yeah! Something about Tanner Nash flipped her switches. And she didn’t know from one second to the next whether he was a serious candidate on her list of potential mates, or if she was simply using the delicious attraction between them to distract her from all her worries.

  She sighed and plucked a bundle from one of the open trunks. A few minutes later, back in her bedroom, she unfolded the muslin wrappings and uncovered a burgundy leather-bound scrapbook. The album must have been faux leather, because the spine was badly cracked and its edges were missing a few torn-off chunks.

  She turned the aging sheets of photographs ruefully. This particular collection had been assembled long before the days of archival paper. Though she hadn’t seen this sad, unfinished volume in almost two decades, she remembered it well. It was the scrapbook she had put together just after coming to live with her grandmother . . . a little girl’s tear-spotted attempt to document her parents, who had just died.

  Her mother and father had met their demise in a one-car accident on a rain-slicked, curvy road. No alcohol was involved. Her mother had been driving, and she lost control at a sharp bend in the highway and smashed into a telephone pole. After all this time, Nola felt nothing more than a lingering sadness when she thought of that terrible night . . . and a deep regret for what might have been.

  Nola had been afraid of the stern, sixty-plus woman who never shed a tear at the funeral. Nola knew her mom and her grandmother didn’t get along, and Nola had been to Lochhaven only a handful of times. So in addition to dealing with a child’s unimaginable grief, Nola had been forced into a relationship with a grandparent who was little more than a stranger.

  For Nola, preserving images and remembrances of her parents in the scrapbook had been an act of faith. She needed to keep their memory alive in order to survive all the changes in her life.

  Her grandmother had tolerated th
e album’s presence for six months, and then she had banished it. Though Nola had shed bitter tears, her grandmother was adamant. She thought it was morbid for Nola to cling to the past by flipping through the scrapbook every night at bedtime. The elder Grainger female had possessed little need for sentimentality, and her child-rearing skills were predicated on a toughen-them-up mentality.

  Ten-year-old Nola, feeling alone and abandoned in the drafty old house, had grown up the hard way . . . no coddling, no tolerance of weakness, no warm hugs and sugar cookies.

  In time, the two women had grown to care for each other. But it was an uneasy love, fraught with a shared but unspoken grief, and an awkward reluctance on both their parts to express emotion.

  When Nola settled in Chicago for good, she struggled with guilt for a long, long time. She dreamed about Lochhaven, and she desperately missed so many things about the South. But she convinced herself that in order to grow up and find happiness, she had to be free from her grandmother’s influence and reach.

  In those early days, Nola had guarded her heart carefully. Losing her parents and Billy had taught her to be wary of lavishing her affection too freely. And at twenty-three, she had definitely been shy and inhibited. The clandestine sex she’d had with Billy had always been tinged with guilt, and had taught her little about sensuality or her own needs. So men were a complication she tended to avoid.

  As the years passed, she did eventually stumble into a couple of long-term relationships. Neither lover treated her poorly . . . but the work required to maintain the man/woman thing was exhausting when the rewards were so few. Each time, Nola was the one to call it quits. And after the second lukewarm romance fizzled, she decided to concentrate on her career.

  She dreamed of finding a love like she had felt for Billy, but his brutal defection stayed with her, convincing her that true, long-lasting love might exist in movies and books, but not in real life.