Private Relations

by Nancy Warren

  Deftly she rebuckled the watch around Kit’s wrist. “I’m not used to boring people.”

  “You’re never boring. Sorry. I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

  Piper was instantly alert. “For the right reasons or the wrong ones?”

  “We bumped into Peter at Incendiary last night,” she admitted. “He came over to my place.”

  “Mmm, tell all. Did he do delicious things to your body until the sun rose? He looks the type who knows how a girl’s put together.”

  Kit felt herself blushing, which was ridiculous. “He didn’t stay over.”

  “Okay. Nothing wrong with a quickie before bed,” Piper said, but her eyes were wary. “What’s going on with you two, anyway? Since you were less than pleased with me for my well-meaning interference re the contest, I’ve been trying to stay out of it. But it’s killing me. What’s going on?”

  “It’s—” she huffed out a breath “—weird.”

  “Okay.” Piper grinned. “My two favorite things are my sex life and the sex lives of my friends. So spill.”

  Kit laughed and reached across her desk to grip Piper’s hand. “You’re a good friend, you know. In your own interfering way.”

  “So?” Piper said, leaning a hip on Kit’s desk and staring down at her. “Details? Or is it all too complicated?”

  “No. For once, it’s simple. Peter is a man I can call if I want sex. We’re both single, live crazy schedules, and we’re compatible in bed.” Compatible didn’t begin to describe it, she thought. “So, we’re helping each other out.”

  Piper stared at her as though she’d this second grown a fig tree out of the crown of her head. “Your ex-fiancé has been demoted to a booty call?”

  “I wouldn’t have used that term. But yes. That’s exactly what he is.”

  “You do understand the unwritten rules of the booty call, don’t you?”

  “Yes. I’ve been around.” She glanced at Piper. “I’ve known you a long time.”

  “Ouch,” Piper said, clutching her chest, then she grinned. “Oh, I did have some good ones, huh? Remember that prince?”

  “Of some godforsaken country that wouldn’t let him or his family on their soil? Yep, I remember him.”

  “He may have had no country but he was great in bed.” Piper seemed as though she was wandering down her own X-rated memory lane, but suddenly she turned her attention back to Kit.

  “So, you and Peter aren’t exclusive?”

  A pang hit. “No.”

  “Who else are you sleeping with?”

  There was a pause. Kit twirled a curl around her finger and then, remembering Peter’s words from last night, dropped the hair and folded her hands in her lap.

  “I’m not sleeping with anyone else, as you know. I’ve barely got time for one sex buddy.”

  Piper gave her one of those annoying I-know-something-you-don’t-know smiles that were big on enigma. “Darling, if you sleep exclusively with a man you used to be engaged to, that is not a sex buddy.”

  “What is it, then?” Kit wailed.

  “I guess you’ll have to work that out for yourself.”

  FOR SOMEBODY whose career was on a roll, who loved her life in the greatest city in the world and who was getting fabulous sex regularly, Kit was awfully jittery. Something felt slightly off, as though her life were a puzzle where none of the pieces quite fit. In fact, some days she felt as if the picture on the box was wrong.

  Maybe she simply wasn’t getting enough sleep. She’d have incredible, mind-blowing, fly-me-to-the-moon sex and then lie awake for hours in her lonely bed thinking about her lover, her career, her life, her parents, whether she’d ever have kids. Stupid things that seemed so incredibly important at three in the morning.

  Peter’s event was less than a week away and she was knocking herself out to make sure it was memorable. The guest list had Piper salivating because she knew as well as Kit did that those same people who were being wooed by Peter’s firm were also hopefully going to be seduced by Hush.

  Since neither she nor Peter were interested in the usual dog and pony show with wine and cheese and a slide show or even worse, ye olde company video, they’d gone with Manhattan’s favorite excuse for a party. The charity event.

  There would be no hard sell. The event was sponsored by Peter’s company and she’d insisted that he be the evening’s master of ceremonies. All the guests were paying a hundred bucks a head to help restore one of the oldest theatres on Broadway. Since it was also the theatre where the Tony-nominated hit, LoveYa, Babe, was playing, Kit had been able to arrange for the two leads in the play to present a short scene from the play at the party.

  She’d decided to theme the evening around the 1920s when New York’s Stanley Theater had opened its doors. She’d borrowed some movie posters and props from the hit plays of the era, and had turned the ballroom into a kind of movie set version of a Twenties theatre.

  The dress code was Twenties, Jacob Hill and his staff were creating a light supper authentic to the period, and, in a flash of four-in-the-morning inspiration, Kit had hired actors to serve the food and drinks. Well, it wasn’t as if most of them hadn’t had experience waiting tables and tending bar.

  Each actor or actress adopted a persona from the stage or screen, and she’d told them to recite actual play and movie dialogue wherever possible.

  At one point, she’d planned to do a scene complete with aerial stunts. Hah, wouldn’t that wow the crowd? But when she thought about the logistics, she quietly put that idea away. Sometimes, she realized, she could put on a great event without flying actors or crocodiles. This time, all she wanted was for Peter to get a good profile, some decent press and, hopefully, the accounts of some prospective clients.

  The day of the event, Kit personally checked and re-checked every detail until Piper finally threw her out of the ballroom. “Go get dressed, Kit. Now.”

  “I’m running Cassie through her lines one more time.”

  “Cassie is an experienced actress, she’ll be fine.” Cassie and Roger were doing a scene from the first play ever produced at The Stanley. The play was so over-the-top melodramatic that Kit had coached the actors to play it up for laughs.

  “Right.” Kit nodded, unexpectedly nervous. “I want tonight to be perfect, that’s all.”

  Piper smacked a kiss on her cheek. “It will be.”

  And it was. When Kit came back down, she wore a vintage silver flapper dress with a beaded fringe. She wore a beaded band around her head and long jet beads. She’d had her hair and makeup done in Hush’s salon and the clever hairstylist had managed to curl her hair into a longish Twenties bob while the makeup artist had gone heavy on the eye makeup and light on everything else. She really did feel as if she’d stepped out of a different era.

  On reentering the ballroom, she was delighted to find that Peter was already there and that he’d followed instructions. He wore a crisp tux and spats and looked so gorgeous her heart did a bit of a Charleston.

  He caught her gaze on him and stopped in mid-conversation with Piper. His eyes narrowed slightly and gave her a slow once-over that made her body flame. She walked slowly toward him and he never took his eyes off her.

  “You could have been a flapper, Kit,” Piper said. Since Piper never believed in following rules, she’d gone for a Marlene Dietrich look. She may have been a decade out, but she looked stunning in a long, black evening gown.

  “I was telling Piper how much we appreciate all you’ve done. This evening is important for us. It turns out all the board members decided to come.”

  Kit blinked. “Aren’t you an international company?”

  “Oh, yeah. They flew in from Singapore, London, San Francisco, Paris and Berlin. They’re having a board meeting while they’re here, but they definitely flew in because of the party. I’m on the hot seat, all right.”

  “Nothing like a little extra pressure to add spice to an evening,” Piper said. “Excuse me, I’ll warn Trace to be on his best beha
vior.”

  “You look fabulous,” Peter said in the tone he reserved for her.

  “You look pretty fabulous, too,” she said, reaching up to straighten his bow tie.

  “How about a kiss for good luck?”

  He didn’t wait for her to agree, but covered her mouth with his. She felt the usual heat and spark flare between them. He took his time, kissing her thoroughly, then said, “I’ll collect the rest of that later, in my room.”

  “Pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?”

  He grinned down at her. “You bet.”

  “Kit, the chef wants to know…” and she was off in the usual rush of last-minute requests and minor panics that were an inevitable part of her job.

  Within the first hour, it was clear that the event was a success. She heard a lot of animated talk and laughter, and the ballroom was so full she knew almost everyone who’d bought a ticket had actually showed up.

  Excellent.

  Peter was the perfect emcee. She was so proud of him. He managed to be funny without getting carried away, to mention his company without doing a sales pitch, and in general to be so charming that she wondered if she was the only woman who dreamed of going up to his hotel room after the event.

  A flutter of possessive pride stirred her blood, though, because she knew she’d be in his bed later.

  Considering that he was the emcee, and that this event was partly to help him launch his career here in New York, he spent a lot of time with Kit. He introduced her to all the board members of his company. When she admonished him for wasting time on her, he kissed her nose. “I’d rather impress you than the entire Fortune 500,” he assured her.

  She laughed and then the laugh froze as two people she knew very well, but hadn’t seen in more than three years, approached.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Garson?” she spluttered.

  “Kit, how nice to see you again,” Peter’s mother said warmly, embracing her in a scented hug.

  “Mom, Dad, glad you could make it,” Peter said.

  “Hello, Kit,” Mr. Garson said, giving her a smacking kiss on the cheek. “When Peter mentioned in his e-mail that he was planning this, we decided it was time to take a trip to the Big Apple anyway. We haven’t been here for years.”

  She was so shocked she could barely think of anything to say. “Um, what a surprise,” she managed. They smiled at her with fondness. “Where are you staying?”

  “Right here,” Peter’s dad said.

  Her eyes widened. Did they have a clue what kind of a hotel this was?

  Apparently they did. Peter’s father put an arm around his mother’s shoulders. “It’s a good thing to shake things up now and then, kids,” he said, looking from one to the other. “You remember that.”

  Did they know that she and Peter were sleeping together?

  “John,” Peter’s mother said, giving him a reproving glance.

  “Well,” Kit said, desperate to escape, “I’d better go check on the band.” She sent them both a totally inane grin. “Nice to see you again. Excuse me.”

  The band was doing absolutely fine without her interference, so she slipped out and hid in the kitchen for a few minutes until the shock of seeing Peter’s parents for the first time since her aborted wedding had sunk in.

  It had felt so natural for a minute there, the four of them together celebrating Peter’s success. If only…She shook her head. But that was stupid. It hadn’t happened. He was a nice guy, a fantastic lover and until she met the man she still hoped was out there, he was a convenient lover.

  The trouble was, of course, that the man she hoped was out there for her was exactly like Peter except for his ability to make and keep a commitment to a woman.

  “Kit, when you go back, can you tell Roger that he has to keep his jacket on when he’s serving?” One of the sous-chefs held a white dinner jacket in his hands.

  With a gasp of annoyance, she snatched it up and marched back to the ballroom.

  She stuffed Roger back into his jacket and did her job. By keeping a careful eye out, she managed to avoid Peter and his parents for the rest of the evening.

  Until the last guest had left, and there was only her, Peter, the actors and wait staff, and the band packing up their gear. Even Piper had snuck out with Trace earlier in the evening. That party girl sure didn’t party like she used to. Not in public, anyway.

  Peter came up to her with a big smile on his face and caught her in a huge hug.

  “Success?” she asked.

  Peter glanced down at Kit and thought she was the sexiest woman he’d ever seen. Her eye makeup was heavier and somehow different than usual. He didn’t know what she’d done, but he recognized it was something to do with the flapper era. The costume was sleek and sexy, and every time he’d watched that fringe sashay around her legs, he’d wanted to speed up time to the end of the evening when he could finally take her upstairs and ease that dancing dress up over her body.

  Her brows rose slightly, and he realized he hadn’t answered her question.

  “Better than you can imagine. I’ve got a pocket full of cards from people who are going to give me a call next week, and all the board members seemed to be having a good time. Always important,” he said.

  “That’s great.” She glanced around. “Um, where are your parents?”

  “They went to bed early.” He grinned at her. “I’m pretty sure they’re having a good time at Hush.”

  “Well, that’s nice,” she said. “I wish you’d warned me they were coming.”

  “It was sort of a last-minute thing. I guess in all the craziness, I never had a chance to mention it.” He touched her arm. “They were happy to see you again.”

  She smiled faintly. “That’s nice.”

  “So, anyhow, my aged parents snuck off early, Piper and Trace cut out early and it’s finally our turn. I think you and I have a date upstairs,” he murmured in her ear.

  “I believe we do,” she said.

  “I’ve got a bottle of massage oil with your name on it.”

  “Oh, I definitely have some tense muscles that need work.”

  “Come on.”

  He was in one of the regular rooms tonight, but there wasn’t a room in Hush that wasn’t fabulous.

  He watched Kit as she entered the room ahead of him. That teasing fringe had his hands itching to get under it, to Kit, hot and willing and all his.

  She yawned as she got into the room and spied the big bed. “That mattress is going to be heaven. I think I’ve been on my feet the entire day.”

  Of course she had, and she’d worked herself ragged for him and his event. He was thinking of nothing but plunging into her willing body, and she was telling him she had sore feet. Time to show the lady that he was capable of putting her needs first.

  He pulled the covers back and motioned for her to sit. She did. He pulled off her shoes, slowly, and then, even more fun, reached under her dress for the stockings. She hadn’t disappointed him. Knowing Kit’s obsession with detail, he’d assumed she’d wear old-fashioned stockings and a garter belt, keeping even her underwear authentic. She hadn’t let him down.

  He unsnapped the stockings and let his thumbs trail the soft, warm skin of her inner thigh as he rolled each stocking down, hearing the slide of silk against her legs and feeling the silk of her skin.

  He left her wiggling her feet against the crisp sheets and flopping back on the pillows while he dragged off his jacket and tie, and then reached for the massage oil.

  “Oh,” she moaned, when he began to knead the soles of her feet. He dug his thumbs into the ridges of muscle, then rolled them gently into the tender skin of her instep. He pulled her toes, massaging the oil between and into each toe.

  Her soft sounds of encouragement kept him going. He finished the first foot and picked up the second and worked at that. Such hard-working feet. Such a hardworking woman.

  He adored her.

  When he’d worked every kink out of her feet and his hands were feeling
the workout, he rose and said, “I want to rub oil all…” He didn’t bother finishing the sentence.

  Kit was fast asleep.

  A wash of tenderness spilled over him as he looked down at her. Her face was vulnerable in sleep, and so very sweet.

  He knew her well. Once she was asleep, not much woke her. He looked at the dress and decided it wouldn’t be comfortable to sleep in. Not only that, it couldn’t be good for the dress and it looked expensive.

  He went to the bathroom and washed the oil off his hands. He caught a glimpse of his own reflection and almost laughed. Talk about a big disappointment. He’d been looking forward to making love for hours.

  Looked like he’d have to wait until the morning.

  Back in the room, he thought, up or down? Which would get the dress off easiest and without disturbing Kit? He decided on up, and eased the dress up past her hips and waist. But no way could he get it off her without raising her shoulders. He slipped an arm behind her and lifted her torso.

  She muttered something and turned her face into his shoulder. He dropped a kiss on her forehead. “I need to take your dress off, love.”

  “Mmm.” Somehow he wrestled it off her, with her sleepy help, and then she snuggled back down. She wore a slip but no bra, so he figured that was good enough.

  He took off his clothes, brushed his teeth and washed his face, then he returned to slip into bed beside her.

  He leaned over to kiss her lips lightly. “I love you, Kit,” he said.

  “Love you, too,” she murmured, so sleepy she whispered words she’d never normally say to him.

  He’d wanted desperately for them to spend an entire night in the same bed and wake together, he’d wanted it so badly it had become something of an obsession, but he’d never planned that she’d sleep all night with him because she was so tired she’d passed out.

  Tonight, he didn’t even care.

  If she was willing to mumble her love to him when her defenses were down, that had to be good. Didn’t it?

  She loved him. He knew it with every atom of his being. He had to be right.