“Leave it loose,” he said quietly. “It’s beautiful.”
She blinked up at him, surprised by either his words or his tone…or both. Pleasure shone in her eyes and battled with the spark of confusion he could read in her expression.
“Thanks, but when I’m cooking it just gets in the way.”
“Right.” Lucas nodded and told himself to get a grip. Yes, he was trying to seduce her, but he was also trying to stay clear of the web he already felt her spinning.
Women like her were dangerous, and Sean’s warnings came flying back into his mind suddenly. Things like…no way does this end well.
Damned if he’d back away now, though. He took an emotional step back and changed the subject entirely. “So, what’s the menu?”
She frowned, probably wondering why his tone had shifted so abruptly. But a moment later, she seemed to push aside any misgivings and said, “We’re making steak quesadillas, Mexican rice and roasted asparagus.”
“Well, you had me up until the asparagus.”
She laughed. The sound rippled from her and seemed to drift through the kitchen. Lucas smiled and realized that he’d really missed her over the last couple of days. He hated like hell to admit that even to himself. But when she wasn’t here, the big old house he loved felt…empty, in a way it never had before.
Easily explained, he assured himself silently while she gathered her hair into a ponytail, then moved around the kitchen with a familiar air.
Normally, he didn’t bring women to his home. When he had a woman in his life, they either met at her place or wound up at a luxury hotel for the night. He didn’t bring them here, because an invitation to his house sent out the wrong signals. The minute a woman started getting comfortable, she’d begin to think of what she had with Lucas as something more than temporary.
And it never was.
It wasn’t just that, though. His gaze swept the kitchen quickly, taking it all in. This house was his sanctuary. His man cave, he guessed. And sharing it with a parade of women would only make it less than what it was to him.
“Serious thoughts?”
Caught, he glanced at her and shook his head.
“No,” he lied. “Just watching the teacher. Making mental notes.”
“Ah,” she said with a quick smile. “Then step right up, student, and let’s get to work.”
Six
“That was great,” Lucas said, lifting his glass of red wine for a long sip. “Seriously good.”
“Thanks.” Rose smiled to herself at the compliment. The dinner really had turned out well. “I hoped you would like them. You’ll have to get a good cast-iron pan and then season it before you use it.”
“Season it?”
“I’ll show you how. But the cast iron makes all the difference when you’re frying the quesadillas—makes them crisp and keeps the cheese-and-steak filling nice and hot. And when you make them for yourself, remember you can add diced green chilies if you want to spice them up a little.”
“Nothing wrong with spicy,” he said softly.
Rose got a chill just from the look in his eyes and the timbre of his voice. Any spicier right now, she thought, and she just might burst into flames.
He set his glass down, leaned his forearms on the table they shared beneath the big bay window and said, “You’re a terrific cook, Rose. Why’re you doing this when you could be running your own restaurant?”
“Oh…” She sat back, looked at him and sighed a little. “I admit, the thought of owning a restaurant and creating amazing dishes is wonderful. I actually wanted to go to the CIA—”
“And be a spy?”
She laughed. “Culinary Institute of America.”
“Ah. Entirely different sort of classes then,” he said, smiling.
“Completely.”
“Why didn’t you go?”
“Lots of reasons,” she admitted, though she wouldn’t go into specifics. What would be the point of telling him that at first her father and then Dave had submarined her plans. And then she had married Henry for all the wrong reasons, trapping herself in a marriage that was way less than happy. No, she didn’t want to talk about any of that, so she said only, “Mainly, money. It’s expensive, and I just can’t do it right now.”
“I don’t get it,” he said softly.
She read the confusion on his face and knew what he was thinking. Why would money be a problem for one of the Clancys? She had grown up wealthy and could be still, if she was willing to give up being her own boss and slide back under the protective and suffocating cloak her big brother wanted to throw over her.
“Doesn’t matter,” she said.
“Sure it does. You’re a Clancy, Rose.”
She didn’t want to get into this. It was no one’s business, after all. But sitting here in the dimly lit kitchen across the table from a gorgeous man looking at her with sincere interest in his gaze was hard to ignore.
“The truth is, I could go to the CIA if I were willing to move back into the family home and have Dave dictate my life for me.”
“What?”
“Wow.” She blew out a breath and laid one hand against the fluttering nerves in the pit of her stomach. “I can’t believe I said that out loud.”
“Well, you did,” Lucas said, “and you can’t leave it like that. Explain.”
“Now that I’ve started,” she agreed, “I really should explain. Look, I know you and Dave don’t speak anymore…”
His features iced over in a blink.
“And, I can tell by your expression you don’t want to talk about that. But let me just say, I love my brother. He’s always been good to me. He’s just a little…”
“Overbearing?” Lucas supplied.
“Overprotective,” she corrected. “And since Dad died, Dave’s gotten worse.”
“I was sorry to hear about your dad,” Lucas murmured.
She looked up into his eyes and did read genuine regret there, and she was pleased. Whatever had gone wrong between Lucas and her brother, at least he wasn’t taking it out on her. Staring at him across the table now, she felt at ease with him as she didn’t with many people—men, especially.
Usually the men she met were after something. They wanted to use her to get to her brother. Coming from money wasn’t always the happy thing that most people imagined it would be. For one thing, you never knew if someone liked you for yourself or for your bank account.
Which, she admitted with a rueful inner smile, wasn’t a problem for her these days. Not since she’d cut herself off from the family coffers to go her own way.
“Anyway,” she said, inhaling sharply to bring her mind back into line. “The bottom line is, after my divorce I told Dave what I wanted to do and he actually tried to tell me no. That I should do volunteer work—not that there’s anything wrong with that at all,” she added quickly. “But I wanted more. I wanted to build my own business. Be my own boss. And Dave thought it was too risky to invest in.”
He snorted his disgust.
She appreciated the gesture even though she had the strangest urge to defend her brother. Shaking her head free of that notion, she said simply, “So I took the small trust fund my grandmother left me, opened my own business and am now alternately sinking and swimming all by myself.”
“Good for you,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “I can admire someone who knows what they want and goes after it.”
“Thanks. Wish Dave felt the same,” she admitted and felt a ball of tension in her stomach disappear.
“Yeah, well, Dave’s a special case, isn’t he?” Lucas muttered.
Studying him, she said softly, “I told you my deep dark secrets…why don’t you tell me what happened between you and my brother to break up your friendship?”
“No.”
“Just ‘no’?”
“Get Dave to tell you,” he said.
“Yeah, he won’t talk about you, either,” Rose told him. She tossed her ponytail back over her shoulder
and said, “Secrets usually come out though. Eventually.”
“Not if you’re careful,” Lucas said, meeting her gaze until she was forced to look away from the heat she could see in those deep blue eyes.
“And you are?” she asked. “A careful man, I mean?”
“Always,” he said, leaning toward her. “I’m a King. We might make mistakes, but we never make the same ones twice.”
She looked up at him and tried to read what she saw in his eyes, but there was an emotional barrier there that she couldn’t see past. There was more to his statement than she knew, Rose told herself. But getting any more out of him wouldn’t be easy.
There was a warm, intimate feeling between them right now, she thought. Maybe it was the soft lighting, or the darkness beyond the windows. But it felt as though they were the only two people in the world. And that was a dangerous feeling, she realized.
Lucas King was temptation personified. Even his usually gruff manner wasn’t enough to dispel the fantasies that seemed to arise with more and more frequency lately. Then Rose thought about everything Dee had said about maybe just “living a little.” Why not enjoy Lucas in the short term?
Her stomach spun as she actually entertained the idea of seducing Lucas King. Could she do it? Hah! Of course she could do it. She’d seen the way he looked at her. She felt the heat pouring from his body into hers every time they so much as brushed against each other.
Oh, more and more dangerous, she thought, and said abruptly, “You know, I really should straighten up.”
She bolted from her chair and with her back to Lucas, she grimaced tightly at her own cowardice. She had thought about this man for years and now that she had the opportunity to do something about it, what did she do? The dishes.
Flipping the water faucet on, she was grateful for the rush of water into the sink. At least the soft roar filled the silence. Then she heard Lucas walking up behind her and she braced herself. Be strong, she told herself silently.
“Don’t,” he said.
Startled, Rose wondered if she’d actually spoken aloud, but in the next moment, Lucas reached past her, turned the water off and said, “Don’t hide from what’s happening.”
“Lucas…”
“You don’t want to do the dishes, Rose,” he murmured into the strained quiet. Then he laid his hands on her shoulders and turned her around to face him.
Stomach swirling, mouth dry, she lifted her gaze to his and inhaled sharply. Desire played out in those cool blue depths and he was making no effort to disguise his need for her.
“I’ve wanted to do this since that first night we kissed,” he whispered and bent down slowly, lowering his mouth to hers.
Rose felt her heartbeat jump into overdrive as Lucas got even closer. Her hands were braced on the edge of the counter behind her, her chest heaving with each shallow breath she took. Heat zoomed through her until she felt like a sudden fever had slapped her.
His mouth was just a breath away from hers when her mind started racing.
Did she dare risk a very good-paying job for the momentary satisfaction of having the night she’d always dreamed of with Lucas King?
Did she dare not do it when she had the chance?
Did she want to live to be a hundred and go to bed every night, filled with regrets, asking herself, Why didn’t you sleep with that man?
No. She really didn’t.
“Rose?”
He had stopped, his lips a fraction of an inch from hers. Waiting. Waiting for her to be the one to decide. For her to put a stop to this or welcome him with open arms.
He lifted one hand, smoothed his fingertips across her cheek and instantly, wild heat skittered through her body. Want and need clawed at her.
Lucas King’s touch was magnetic. Electric.
And just like that, her decision was made.
“No more hiding,” she whispered and leaned into him, offering her mouth up to him. And as his lips closed over hers, she sighed.
She was ready for the electricity.
She was more than ready for Lucas King.
He cupped her face in his palms and kissed her so thoroughly, so completely, Rose was lost in the sensations whipping through her. If she hadn’t already made up her mind to do this, the kiss would have convinced her. This kiss shook her completely, even more than the one they had shared only the week before, and, until that moment, she wouldn’t have thought that possible.
A desperate sort of longing filled her. This was what she’d been looking for most of her life. This…magic that sent waves of pleasure crashing through her. Rose leaned into him, wanting more, wanting it all. Heat pooled in her center along with a throbbing ache that pulsed in time with the ragged beat of her heart.
Rose’s skin hummed with anticipation as her tongue tangled with his. Lucas growled low in his throat and that rumble of sound awakened something vital inside her. His response to her was every bit as intense as her own. Knowing that, feeling that, gave her a heady sense of feminine power like she had never experienced before.
Always, she had been the good girl. The one that men treated like either a friend or a nun. Even her ex-husband had never really wanted her. But tonight, Lucas was changing all of that. Until him, no one had ever made her feel so sensual. So desired. Her dreams of Lucas from so long ago were now splintered beneath the reality. His hands slid down her neck, over her shoulders and around to stroke frantically up and down her back as if he couldn’t touch her enough. She shivered with pleasure, yet wanted more. She wanted to feel his hands on her skin. Feel the hard brush of his palms against her naked flesh.
Crazy, her mind whispered.
Quiet, her body answered.
He tore his mouth from hers and lowered his head to nibble at the line of her throat. Rose arched her neck to one side to give him easier access. A second later, he groaned, lifted the hem of her shirt and pulled it up and over her head. She raised her arms to help, needing to feel his body against hers.
She didn’t care that this was all happening too fast for her to think her way out of it. She didn’t want to stop and be rational. For once in her life, Rose simply wanted to surrender to the thing she craved.
“I need you, Rose,” he whispered, shifting his hands to cup her lace-covered breasts. His thumbs and fore fingers toyed with her sensitive nipples and even through her bra, the sensations were almost too much to bear.
He couldn’t have said anything more perfect, she thought. Rose opened her eyes, looked up into his and said, “Yes, Lucas. I need you, too. Now.”
“Good. That’s good.” He kissed her, hard, fast. A half smile curved his mouth briefly before intensity filled his gaze and he said, “Be sure, Rose. Once we start, neither one of us is going to want to stop.”
“Nobody’s stopping,” she promised him, reaching out to stroke her hands over his chest.
He sucked in a gulp of air, gritted his teeth and said, “Thank God.”
Reaching behind her, he unhooked her bra in a smooth, practiced move and then pushed it down and off her arms. He took a long look at her then and Rose felt his gaze as surely as she would have a touch.
“You, too,” she said, tugging at his T-shirt. He nodded, yanked it off and tossed it to the floor behind him.
Rose sighed and enjoyed the view briefly before Lucas grabbed her and pulled her in close.
Skin to skin.
The friction was almost unbearable. He dropped his head to her shoulder and then pulled her head to one side so he could kiss and lick and nibble at her throat again. Rose couldn’t breathe. With his hands on her, his mouth moving over her, she couldn’t find any air and, oddly enough, she didn’t care. Nothing mattered beyond the next kiss. The next caress. Time slipped away. The world disappeared.
All that existed was this moment.
This man.
Her mind went blessedly blank under the furious assault of too many sensations to keep track of.
“You feel so good,” he murmured, splaying
his hands against her back before letting them drop to the curve of her behind. He pulled her in close, aligning her body along his until she felt his hard length pressing against her abdomen and knew he was swamped by the same desperate need as she was.
“Not in the damn kitchen,” he muttered.
Rose didn’t care where they were. They could have been outside under the streetlights with neighbors sitting on their front porches watching and she wouldn’t have cared. She just wanted his hands on her. His body moving inside hers. “Doesn’t matter.”
“Yeah, it does. Upstairs,” he ordered, grabbing one of her hands and pulling her behind him as he headed for the hallway and the stairs.
Half-dressed, wild with desire, Rose kept up with him, but just barely. His long legs covered a lot more territory than she could. She stumbled, and wasn’t surprised since her knees felt wobbly enough to collapse on her at any moment.
“Slow down,” she finally said.
“Not an option,” he groaned and whirled around to face her. “I already feel like I’ve been waiting years for this. No slowing down,” he told her, jaw clenched. “No rethinking. No backing out.”
His gaze was blue fire. Burning, glittering with more heat than she had ever seen before and everything in her roared to the surface to meet it.
She shook her head and said only, “You’re walking too fast, I can’t keep up.”
He flashed her a quick smile that was born and gone again in an instant. “Why didn’t you say so?”
He picked her up and swung her into the cradle of his arms, and Rose was absolutely romanced down to her soul.
He took the stairs two at a time, reaching the landing in a few long strides. Held close to his chest, Rose glanced briefly at his face as he stalked down the hall to the closed door at the far end. Even in her sexual haze, she noted her surroundings as they passed. Cream-colored walls, cherry-wood crown molding and a gleaming wood floor, covered by a deep red floor runner that muffled Lucas’s steps as he relentlessly headed for their destination.
“Almost there,” he murmured and Rose nodded, lifting one hand to smooth it over the sculpted muscles of his chest.
Ready for King's Seduction Page 7
