When the basic requirement for oxygen forced them apart, Bette was sure she wasn’t the only one rocked by the intensity of that kiss at the State Street corner. Paul’s eyes looked opaque, with bright flecks of green against polished pewter. With his hair flaring color in the glow of tiny fairy lights, he looked almost fierce, and unfamiliar. Not at all like the man she’d come to know.
She pushed her hair back from her face in some futile instinct to reorder her thoughts along with her appearance. “I, uh, guess Dickens would be proud, huh?”
He stared at her. “Dickens?”
“The chestnuts,” she supplied weakly.
“Oh. Yeah, I guess.” He considered her a moment longer, then grinned, slowly and meaningfully, a movement of his lips unlike his usual quick humor. “I thought you might have meant something else.”
“Something else?” She heard the breathlessness in her voice, corroborating that her heartbeat had not slowed from its sprint.
“Yeah, I’ve always had the feeling that behind all those closed Victorian doors, old Charles knew a thing or two about passion.”
He didn’t wait for her answer, but tucked her back in by his side, and headed for a store entrance.
“We’ll start here with Marshall Field’s,” he said.
“It’s not Marshall Field’s anymore. They were bought out years ago.”
“It’ll always be Marshall Field’s to me. These are just some out-of-town interlopers.”
Grinning, she followed docilely, unable to remember a single thing on the list tucked in her purse, and too content to bother looking.
“I’ve got an idea,” Paul announced. “Let’s have dinner in the Walnut Room.”
The restaurant had been a tradition for decades when the store had been Marshall Field’s, especially at Christmastime when an elaborately decorated tree rose from the center of the room to a point some two stories higher. She opened her mouth to say she’d love to eat there, but before she could get a word out, he jumped in.
“I know, I know. You have a lot of things to do. But there’s always a line. I’ll stand in line while you shop. So you won’t be wasting any time.” He slanted a look at her that reminded her of their first few dinners together. “After all, you do eat. That’s one thing I have learned about you. Sometimes even lunch, despite the way you misled me at first.” He shook his head disapprovingly. “Telling lies.”
“Purely self-defense. I was trying to protect myself from this maniac who’d burst into my life.”
He smiled into her eyes, and she knew his voice would be low and intimate even before he spoke. “Now aren’t you glad your ploy didn’t keep me away for good?”
She couldn’t give him anything other than the truth. “Yes. I am glad.”
Though glad seemed entirely too mild, she thought as she reached the department where she hoped to find a special calendar for her father.
As she ticked off items on her list, her mind kept drifting back to the man waiting in line, and waiting for her.
Two months ago, she would have made this same shopping trip, have made the same purchases. In fact, without Paul distracting her, she probably would have accomplished more in the same amount of time. But she wouldn’t have enjoyed it half as much.
She accepted another package from the salesclerk, exchanged wishes for happy holidays, and moved aside to consult her watch. She still had ten minutes before she was supposed to return to the Walnut Room. With four more items on her list, she should make use of every minute. She really should … But she didn’t want to wait another ten minutes to see Paul.
She stepped off the escalator at the Walnut Room’s floor and scanned the line. There, at the front, she caught the glow of Paul’s hair. He turned, and then she felt the impact of his smile.
She was in love with him.
She reached him as the hostess indicated they were to follow her, and he took her hand. “Perfect timing.”
“Yes, perfect.” Perfect.
She was in love with a man who gave her laughter and joy, but could never give her what she most wanted - the promise that they would spend every Christmas together.
*
IF HER PLOT had worked, Paul was waiting, just inside his office door.
Norma had double-checked his schedule for Bette to be sure there were no conflicts - the last thing she wanted was to have one of his clients show up.
Norma had been discretion itself.
First, not asking why Bette was asking if Paul’s schedule was clear. Then, just now, when Bette had arrived, calmly gathering her things, and saying she needed to leave early for a dental appointment she’d totally forgotten about, and would Bette please inform Paul. She’d quietly locked the door behind her.
So Bette stood alone in the outer office. Facing the closed door that separated her from the inner office, where Paul worked alone right now.
If he’d believed what she’d told him earlier, he thought she was home packing for her early-morning departure for Arizona.
When she’d told him it would be better if he didn’t come to her house until later this evening because she needed time to get ready, he’d said exactly what she’d hope for - that he’d stay late at the office and use the time to catch up on some work. In fact, his ready acceptance had irked her at some level. So he thought she’d sacrifice part of this last evening with him in order to neatly fold slips and shirts?
At home her suitcase waited, already packed. She’d left work in the early afternoon to do that, and to find exactly the right thing to wear for this return trip downtown to Paul’s office.
Now she stood, just outside his door, trembling between nerves and anticipation.
It might not be the kind of spur-of-the-moment inspiration he’d have had, but he’d shown he appreciated her planning … at least in some areas of their relationship.
Areas such as soft, clean sheets, fluffy bath sheets and scented candles. And her lingerie.
Bette fought an urge to giggle. It used to be she only considered if something was clean and appropriate for wearing under a certain blouse or dress. But now she found that every morning her choices were affected not only by how she would look, but by what was easy to get into and out of … especially out of.
Maybe she wanted to give him something to remember her by while she was gone. Maybe she wanted to give herself a final memory. Just in case it was a final memory.
She sucked in a breath and turned the door handle.
Paul - tieless, first two buttons opened, cuffs rolled to mid-forearm - looked up from behind his desk as she walked in, surprise heating immediately to pleasure, and beyond. It was the look she needed to keep going. “Bette! What are you …?”
Perhaps he saw something in her face, because his question trailed off as she closed the door and leaned against it.
Without taking her eyes from his, she let her coat slide off her shoulders and down to the floor in a heap.
She smoothed a nervous hand down the wrap-front knit dress and wondered if she’d lost her mind.
Maybe.
But the look in his eyes left her very sure she hadn’t lost her senses. He knew why she’d come.
“If memory serves me, you’re supposed to be on the couch, Paul.” Nerves, and something rawer, made her voice low and breathy.
His look never wavered as he dropped his pen on the desk, and stood. Slow and deliberate, he moved to the couch and, obeying her slight gesture, sat down.
Shaking knees didn’t prevent her from taking the three steps that brought her in front of him. Trembling hands didn’t stop her from undoing the dress’s tie at her waist.
The weight of the material swung the sides open, and she knew he could see what was underneath. She knew, because she’d tested it in front of her bedroom mirror, wondering all the time if she’d feel like a fool when she did it in front of Paul.
He swallowed sharply. She watched his Adam’s apple drop and rise and she felt her own tension ease. She felt a lot of thi
ngs, but none of them was foolish.
She eased one knee onto the couch near his thigh and supported herself with a hand on the cushion by his shoulder, as her blood pulsed hotly under the lace and satin of the midnight-blue bustier. If he didn’t touch her … And damn soon.
“Uh, Bette?”
“Hmm?”
“I have a question.”
Was he going to ask what she thought she was doing? Oh, Lord, if it wasn’t obvious, maybe she wasn’t doing this as well as she thought.
“What?”
“Have you gotten me a Christmas present?”
At least his voice sounded as strained as his face looked. She moved her free leg, and one side of the dress slipped behind it, revealing more of her body to him.
“A Christmas present?” She bent to touch her lips to his temple, and absorbed the hard, demanding beat there. His skin felt hot under her lips. This close, she could feel the heat of him, holding off the chill of her state of near-undress.
“Uh-huh.” He went even stiller when she moved to the other temple, leaning across him, close enough that his breath teased the tops of her breasts. “I know you shop early, so I wondered if you’d already gotten my present.”
She noted his assumption that she would get him a present, but felt too absorbed by the way his pulse first hesitated then sprinted to comment on that.
“No. Why?”
“I know you like to save time, and I can save you some time shopping.”
“Oh?” She leaned back enough to see his eyes.
“Yeah. I know exactly what I want.”
“What’s that?”
“This.”
He pushed the dress off her shoulders and down her arms. His palm cupped her left breast possessively, testing it, molding it. His thumb hooked over the bustier’s edge, stroking the bare flesh and catching her nipple tauntingly.
“You like that, don’t you, Bette?” he asked when the nipple hardened and peaked.
Swaying a little toward him, she gave him the answer they both knew, but he seemed to need to hear. “Yes.”
“You feel so wonderful. And you look …” He pulled her forward sharply, so she fell against him while he buried his face between her breasts. She felt the rasping moistness of his tongue against her skin and shivered with it. Slowly, he eased her all the way down to his lap, and raised his head and looked at her.
She felt herself responding, her blood pooling deep in her body at the desire in his look, her lips curving at the glint of humor. He’d pulled a tighter rein on his control. For now. They both knew what pleasure there’d be in testing how much longer it would last.
“You look like the most beautiful package I have ever seen,” he said. He stroked her from hip to belly to waist to abdomen to breast, burning the feel of his touch into her through the thin fabric. He slid the narrow straps off her shoulders and freed her breasts, letting his fingers trail one by one over peaks already hard, until she wanted more, much more. He tongued each, briefly, tantalizingly. “A beautifully wrapped package, too. But you know what happens to wrapping paper Christmas morning.”
Something blazed in her, but she wouldn’t give in to it. Not yet.
When he raised his head, she forced her fingers to move slowly, deliberately. Open one button of his shirt. Then the next. And the one after. Complete one task, then start on the next.
“In my family,” she told him, pulling out the tails of his shirt, and helping him slide it off before opening the waist of his slacks, “we carefully remove the tape and fold the paper neatly.”
Her primness was marred only by a soft gasp at the end when he guided her hands under his loosened waistband and around him.
“You would,” he groaned. Quickly, he shed the rest of his clothing and dragged the hosiery down her legs. “Not me. I rip.”
One word, and he would. She knew it, and it thrilled her.
But sense prevailed - this time, she thought with a wicked grin to herself and a defiant mental promise that there would be a next time. She bent her head, dipped her tongue into his ear, then whispered, “There’s no need to rip in order to unwrap, Paul.”
“No? Then there’d better be a fast way to undo this thing.”
“There is.”
“How?” She heard the break of control in his voice, felt it in his urgent hands. “How the hell does this -”
“There -”
“But, it doesn’t -”
“Yes. It has -”
A growl reverberated against her skin in the vicinity of her breastbone, the sound a mixture of frustration eased and satisfaction anticipated. “Snaps.”
Abruptly, she felt the couch’s smooth cool leather against her back, the lace and satin bunched around her waist, the heat and weight of her man above her. Around her. Inside her.
“Ah, Bette …”
“Yes.”
“God … so good. So damn good.”
Then there were no words. But whispers. Warmth. Moist darkness. Movement. Moans. Fire. Wet lightning.
Rhythm. Explosion.
*
SHE STILL BREATHED, her heart still beat, her body still felt the damp weight of him against her, so there had to be a basic resemblance to the woman she’d been before.
But she knew. She knew she was different. She’d lost her heart.
Somehow, when she flew apart in his arms just now the piece of herself she’d been trying so hard to hold on to had slipped through her fingers and into his.
What am I going to do?
The question arose from reflex. There was nothing to do. Too late now.
“Bette?”
“Hmm?”
“Come spring, I want to take you sailing.”
He didn’t move from her, but he turned his head so his next words wouldn’t be muffled against her skin. “You’d like it. Out on the lake. You can skim along the coast, watching the city. You know there’s traffic, noise and people with problems, but you’re far enough away that all you see is the beauty of the city, the strength of the skyline, the green of the parks. Or we can go way out, where there’s nothing but us and the water and the sky. Out in the middle like that, it’s a place to tell dreams and secrets.”
“It sounds magical.”
“It is.” Her content ruptured as he raised his upper body from hers. “Well?”
“Well what?” Without his body as a blanket, she felt the room’s chill.
He was nearly glaring. “Will you?”
His impatience fueled hers. “Will I what?”
“Will you go sailing with me next spring?”
The direct question surprised her, but also made her wary.
She’d accepted his comments as vague daydreams in the afterglow of lovemaking. Paul Monroe didn’t make dates for spring when winter hadn’t even started.
If she pushed the point, he’d surely back off. That would hurt, but it wasn’t as bad as the alternative. Because if she didn’t push the point, she’d be seduced by the mist of hope, with nothing substantial behind it.
“When?”
“The first fine Saturday in May.” No hesitation. Almost as if he’d been planning the answer before she asked.
“Yes, I’ll go sailing with you the first fine Saturday in May.”
A smile lit his eyes, setting the green-tinted flecks glinting against the gray. “Then it’s a date,” he promised, kissing her with intent.
What had she done?
What did it matter?
The hope was so woven into her life, her heart, that she had no chance of holding herself apart from him. She loved him. Completely. Undeniably. And maybe, just maybe, her hope would pay off.
“You know, there was just one thing wrong with this.”
She had a hard time taking in his words. “Wrong?”
“Uh-huh. You know, different from my fantasy.”
She’d caught the gleam in his eye. “Oh? What was that?”
“We were supposed to make slow, lazy love.”
“Hmm. You don’t think that qualified?”
“Not a chance. Guess we’ll just have to try again.”
She made a move as if to get up, although with him sprawled atop her she couldn’t budge. “Well, let me know when you want to give it another try, and I’ll see if I can schedule you in.”
He gave her an insolent look. “You don’t look too busy to me right now, and I think -” he flexed his buttocks and rolled against her where they were still joined, grinning wickedly at the moan she couldn’t suppress “- now would suit me just fine.”
*
“I STILL DON’T think we’ve gotten that quite right. It doesn’t quite match my fantasy.”
Paul sat behind his desk, pulling on his socks, while she retied her dress. She gave a deeply martyred - and utterly fake - sigh. “You mean we’ll have to do it again?”
“Afraid so. We’ll just have to keep at it until we get it right.”
“Maybe we’re doing something wrong, Paul. Are you sure it was the couch?”
“Now there’s a thought!” He snagged her wrist and pulled her onto his lap. “Maybe we should try the desk.”
Fighting laughter, she twisted away from him. She spread her hands wide on the desk to try to regain some balance. A printout of a letter lay open in front of her, next to the legal pad he’d been making notes on when she came in. The letterhead and a few phrases in the letter caught her eye.
“What is this, Paul?”
“What’s what?” He looked over her shoulder, but seemed uninterested. “That’s a letter from the Smithsonian.”
“The Smithsonian?”
“Uh-huh. They want me to be on a panel of consultants they’re forming.”
“They just asked you?” But the letter was dated more than a week ago, and then she saw another phrase, and she knew this was not the first time the offer had been made.
“They’ve been asking for a while. Middle of September, I guess they made the official offer.”
September. He’d known all fall. He’d been thinking about it all fall, and he hadn’t told her. An amazing opportunity, the chance of a career, a credential in his field that could make a resume.
Good Guy Heroes Boxed Set Page 137
