Notorious

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  His first reaction was to move in and take control. He fought not to do that, because if he took control, he’d never know Keely’s plans for this kiss. He had a strong feeling she had plans…and he grew dizzy with anticipation.

  Gradually she increased the pressure, coaxing his lips apart. The gentle flick of her tongue was slow and lazy, seducing him by degrees. His head spun as the kiss grew deeper…and deeper yet.

  He cupped the curve of her hip and reaction surged through him. Her thin dress was so damp from the mist that she might as well not have been wearing it. He flexed his fingers, tightening his hold a fraction, and heard the change in her breathing.

  They should stop this. They really should. But she smelled like raspberries and tasted wicked and delicious, like the candy he’d swiped from the corner store when he was six. He’d eventually had to pay for that candy. He had a hunch he’d have to pay for this moment, too. Something so good always came with a price tag.

  Her mouth was moist and hot against his, and the spot where his hand rested began to grow warm. He stroked her in a gentle, circular motion and felt her tremble beneath his palm.

  The steady drumbeats coming from the sound system vibrated the steamy air around them, and his blood seemed to pump in the same rhythm as it gathered in a very predictable area. But no matter how hard he became or how much he ached, he felt safe from temptation—safe to explore her hot mouth and dream of her hot body without worrying they’d get totally carried away.

  After all, they were in a public place. They were hidden from view, but not even Keely would dare go further when they were a dozen feet from a sidewalk full of people. Not even Keely would make love in broad daylight in the middle of the hotel’s landscaping.

  Then she guided his hand from her hip to her breast, and he wasn’t so sure.

  Time out! his mind warned. Too late. Natural reflexes took over as he touched one of Keely’s perfect breasts for the first time. Although he’d tried to ignore her breasts ever since she’d turned twelve and they’d begun to show, he’d dreamed about them anyway, long before they’d been displayed in full color for the world to admire.

  The magazine picture had only confirmed what he’d suspected—Keely’s breasts were a national treasure, a living work of art. Only a dead man wouldn’t squeeze that handful of heaven when it was offered. He groaned with the tactile pleasure of closing his hand around so much ripeness.

  With a low, throaty chuckle she arched toward him. Maybe there was a note of victory in that chuckle, but he was too lost in the bliss of fondling her to care. Then the front of the dress loosened, and he vaguely realized she must have pulled at the laces, untying them. While his racing pulse was still reacting to that development, a soft pop filtered through his dazed state, and he felt the taut material of her bra go slack.

  Framing his face in her smooth hands, she leaned away from his kiss. “Be my guest,” she murmured.

  This was a mistake. A definite mistake. But he couldn’t not look. Slowly he let his gaze travel downward. Her breasts, kissed golden by the sun, lightly freckled as if dusted with nutmeg, spilled out of her dress. Of course this woman wouldn’t wear anything when she decided to sunbathe. He imagined her lying on her back, warm and relaxed by the heat, her body glistening with oil, the scent of raspberries heavy in the air.

  Moisture gathered in his mouth. He was so hungry for her. As he continued to look, heart pounding, the mist gathered in tiny droplets on her skin and her nipples tightened and darkened to a deep rose. His breath caught. This was a mistake. And he was going to make it.

  Slipping a quivering hand under the velvet weight of one smooth breast, he leaned down to taste paradise.

  Snip, snip, snip. Noah froze. The sound of hedge shears was unmistakable. And it was coming closer. Snip, snip, SNIP.

  He released Keely instantly. “Cover up!” he whispered urgently, getting his feet back under him and clamping his hat back on his head.

  With a lazy smile, she casually pulled the cups of her pale blue bra over her breasts and snapped the front fastener. She seemed in no hurry whatsoever as she adjusted the straps.

  The sounds of the gardener came even closer, yet Noah couldn’t stop admiring her cleavage and wishing he had a little longer to enjoy it. But the guy would be upon them any minute. “Faster!” he urged.

  “What’s the matter?” Her eyes gleamed with mischief as she slowly pulled the laces of her dress closed. “Afraid of getting caught?”

  He stared at her and realized that discovery didn’t seem to bother her at all. Maybe once she’d taken off all her clothes for the camera, she’d discarded the concept of shame right along with her clothes. She possessed a freedom that he could only imagine. To his amazement he envied her. He was also incredibly turned on.

  Here was a woman who wouldn’t balk at anything.

  Keely tied the laces of her dress at the same moment an olive-skinned man in khaki work clothes came around the boulder pushing a small wheelbarrow mounded with clippings, a pair of hedge sheers resting on top of the cut greenery.

  “Madre de Dios!” the man exclaimed. He nearly tripped over a giant fern as he backed up a step.

  “We were just leaving,” Noah said. He held out a hand to help Keely up and wished he looked as composed as she did. But he could feel the heat climbing up from his collar and he couldn’t meet the gardener’s shocked gaze.

  Instead, he glanced at Keely, who was nonchalantly swishing bits of dirt from her shapely knees. She had never seemed more beautiful to him. The flush in her cheeks obviously came from pleasure, not shame. When she finished brushing herself off and peeked up at him, her eyes sparkled with remnants of desire.

  He’d kissed off all that satiny peach lipstick, and her dress was rumpled, giving testimony to exactly what they’d been doing. Yes, he was embarrassed that they’d been discovered here, but in a way he was proud that he was the guy this gorgeous woman had been making out with.

  While the gardener stared, Keely picked up her purse and the bag containing her drugstore purchases as calmly as if she were leaving a restaurant after a meal and the gardener was the busboy waiting to clear the table.

  Noah thought of the boxes of condoms inside that bag and wondered what would have happened if the gardener hadn’t come along. Noah suspected that if he’d been willing to make love to Keely’s breasts, chances were he might have been coaxed to make love to the rest of her. The thought of the gardener coming upon them later and catching something even more involved made him break out in a cold sweat.

  Swinging her purse strap over her shoulder, Keely flashed a winning smile at the gardener. “Qué pasa, Jose?”

  For one startled moment Noah thought she might know the gardener, but then he glanced at the man’s breast pocket and noticed the name embroidered on it.

  Jose’s shock and disapproval seemed to melt in the glow of Keely’s smile. Slowly he grinned back and gave a little shrug. “Nada, señorita.”

  She winked at him. “Bien. Adiós.” Then she picked her way carefully around the edge of the rock and headed for the sidewalk.

  As Noah followed, he heard the gardener sigh with longing. Keely had made another conquest.

  She was waiting for him at the edge of the sidewalk, and naturally she’d attracted a number of glances, both of the curious and of the lecherous kind. The way the damp dress clung to her was close to indecent and the moisture had turned her wavy hair into a mass of ringlets. She looked delicious.

  When he stepped out from behind the foliage, several people stared openly. He tried to act as if prowling around in the hotel landscaping was a perfectly normal thing to do.

  “Dr. Livingston, I presume?” she said with a grin.

  He figured he had to get things straightened out right away. “Keely, don’t get the wrong idea. What happened back there was—”

  “All my fault,” she said. “I know. I was a bad girl.” She didn’t look particularly sorry about that.

  Bad girl. Damn, bu
t that phrase made his blood race. But he had to control those impulses from now on, or he might as well forget about his plan to rehabilitate her. “No, it wasn’t all your fault. After all, I’m the one who dragged you back there in the first place. From now on, I don’t intend on anything like that happening again. I just want you to know that.” He looked into her eyes so he wouldn’t be tempted to notice how the dress molded to her figure. Fortunately, sunlight filtered down to the sidewalk and the material was beginning to dry already.

  “All right.” She looked far from convinced.

  “I mean it, Keely. No fooling around. We’re going to get your résumé in shape.”

  “And I really appreciate that.” She gave him a saucy look. “I’m just worried that my résumé’s not very well suited to what you have in mind. But if you’re willing to massage it a little, maybe there’s hope. I’m looking forward to your input.”

  Heat flooded through him. “Stop that.”

  “Stop what?” She widened her eyes in innocence.

  “You know perfectly well. Your choice of words. Like massage and input. You’re trying to make me think about—” He realized the more he talked, the more aroused he was getting. “Never mind. Let’s go in.”

  “Yes. Let’s.”

  Noah clenched his jaw and started toward the entrance. He would do this. The object was to set Keely on the right path, while being careful not to amble down the wrong one himself. They were only talking about three days. Surely he could manage to keep his pants zipped for three days.

  THREE DAYS IN A PLACE like this would give her plenty of time and opportunity to corrupt Noah, Keely thought as they walked through the glittering lobby toward the reservation desk. She didn’t need to win the war in the first two hours. She should probably cool it.

  All things considered, she shouldn’t have allowed matters to proceed so quickly in the underbrush. A kiss would have been plenty for this stage of the game. A kiss would have been quite enough of a sampling, thank you very much. But no, she’d gone completely out of her mind.

  Apparently all those years of wanting Noah had created a powerful backlog of needs. If dear Jose hadn’t shown up she would have given away the farm right on the spot, behind a boulder in the front landscaping of the Tahitian. And despite what Noah thought of her shady past, that sort of stunt would be a first for her.

  She wouldn’t call it a bad idea, though. In fact, it was a pretty good idea. Extremely creative. But the timing was all wrong. Moving that fast, that soon, would have scared Noah to death, once he’d done the deed and come to his senses. She’d nearly blown her opportunity by overreacting. If she wasn’t more careful, he might reconsider his weekend plan to save her.

  And she so didn’t want him to reconsider. After that kiss, if she were a pinball machine she’d be on tilt. The heavenly way his mouth had felt on hers had naturally made her think of how perfect his mouth would feel on her breasts. And she’d charged straight for that goal without thinking of the consequences, forgetting that she might be sacrificing a long-term gain for a short-term thrill.

  Yet he was walking toward the reservation desk as if he still had every intention of asking for another key. Maybe after that last demonstration he was even more convinced that he had to save her. Maybe letting her impulses get the best of her hadn’t been such a mistake, after all. Now he really believed she was bad, through and through. Eventually, he wouldn’t be able to resist being bad with her.

  Feeling better about the future of the weekend, she decided to cut him some slack. “Why don’t I wait over by the potted palm?” she said. “That way you don’t have to feel so uncomfortable about asking for the extra key because I won’t be standing right beside you looking like your babe-for-the-night.”

  He glanced at her, a gleam in his eyes. Then he looked away, and when his gaze found hers again, the gleam was gone. “That’s okay. After the incident with Jose, this will be a piece of cake.”

  “Really?” Now, this was an interesting development. She had the urge to dampen her finger and chalk up a point on an invisible scoreboard. In a very short time, she’d raised Noah’s sexual daring a sizable notch. That was something to be proud of. At this rate, no telling what sort of adventures he might be willing to undertake by Sunday night. And though he’d tried to disguise it, she’d seen that gleam of desire when she’d mentioned being his babe-for-the-night.

  Noah walked up to the desk, gave his name and asked for an extra key “for the lady.”

  Keely was majorly impressed. He hadn’t even tried to pretend she was a relative.

  “Certainly, sir.” The desk clerk, a wholesome type of guy, didn’t even blink as he called up Noah’s account on the computer. But whatever he saw on the screen made his eyes widen. “Oh, boy. Good thing you stopped by the desk, Mr. Garfield. There’s been a small problem with your room.”

  “What sort of problem?”

  The clerk frowned at the screen. “I need to get the manager out here to talk with you. Excuse me a moment.” He picked up a phone and punched in a number. “Mr. Garfield’s at the desk. No, I don’t think he’s been up there yet. Right.” He hung up the phone and turned to Noah. “Sorry for the inconvenience, sir. The manager will be right out.”

  Keely wondered if the delay, whatever was causing it, would make Noah more self-conscious about his request for a spare key. Apparently not, because he turned to her and shrugged.

  “Mr. Garfield.” A guy only slightly older than the desk clerk arrived and held out his hand over the counter. “I’m Martin Ames. Could we step down to the end of the counter for a moment? I need to inform you of our problem.”

  “Okay.” Noah looked at Keely. “Let’s go see what this is all about.”

  She hesitated. “Are you sure you want me to—”

  “Yeah.” He smiled and angled his head toward the end of the counter. “Come on.”

  “All right.” Congratulations, Noah, she thought as she followed him. From all appearances he was bringing a call girl up to his room, but he didn’t seem to care whether the staff assumed that or not. His friends were a different story, of course, but his reluctance there was understandable.

  Ames came out from behind the counter and glanced pointedly at Keely before returning his gaze to Noah.

  To Noah’s credit, he made no effort to explain Keely’s presence. “What seems to be the problem?” he asked.

  The manager looked uncomfortable. “We’re a new hotel, as I’m sure you know, and in the rush to get it open on time, apparently the hiring process wasn’t…what I mean to say is, the screening of applicants might not have been quite thorough enough. At least in the housekeeping department.”

  “And you would be telling me all this because…?”

  “One of the housekeepers vandalized your room.”

  Keely gasped.

  “What?” Noah stared at the manager in obvious disbelief.

  “It was a case of mistaken identity,” Ames said quickly. “The woman’s in custody, and we’ve learned from the police that she’s mentally unbalanced. It seems she formed an imaginary attachment to one of our guests, and when her interest wasn’t returned, she attempted revenge by damaging his room and its contents. That would be bad enough, but she became confused and hit your room by mistake.”

  “What about my stuff?” Noah asked.

  “I’m afraid it’s pretty well ruined. She took a knife to your clothes and suitcase and smashed your toiletries. The police took it for evidence, so I’m not sure how soon you can retrieve it. But from what I saw, there’s not much point in getting your things back.”

  “My God.” Noah shook his head.

  “We take full responsibility, of course,” Ames continued. “If you’ll give us an estimate of what you lost we’ll write you a check immediately. And of course we’ve moved you to a new room, and you won’t be billed for your stay. If you should choose to move to a different hotel, we’ll pay for that.”

  “No, I won’t move. My friend
is getting married here tomorrow night.”

  “Ah.” Ames nodded. He seemed to be avoiding looking at Keely. “Then let me take you back to the desk and issue you a new key.”

  “Two keys,” Noah said.

  “Oh.” The manager slid a glance over toward Keely. “Of course.”

  Keely could see that the discussion was drawing to a close. She was outraged on Noah’s behalf. Her L.A. apartment had been vandalized once, and she knew the sick, violated feeling he was probably dealing with right now. Given the mental anguish, she didn’t think a different room and some money to replace his belongings, some of which might be irreplaceable, was enough.

  She cleared her throat. “Excuse me, but are you moving Mr. Garfield to another room that’s similar to what he had?”

  “Exactly like what he had,” Ames said with a satisfied smile. “And there will be no charge, of course.”

  “I think he should be given a substantial upgrade,” Keely said.

  Ames blinked. “An upgrade?”

  “Now, Keely,” Noah said, “the same sort of room will be—”

  “I don’t think so,” Keely cut in. “You’ve been traumatized, whether you’re willing to admit that or not. And I’ll bet your feelings about this hotel are very negative right now.”

  Noah gazed at her. “I wouldn’t say I’m overjoyed with the place.”

  “See?” Keely turned to Ames. “I would suggest that you give Mr. Garfield an outstanding experience to take away with him, something that will at least partially cancel out the horrible thing that happened. I’m sure you have some luxury suites in this hotel. I would imagine at least one of them is vacant.”

  Ames straightened his tie and glanced toward Noah. “How do you feel about that, Mr. Garfield?”

  Noah met Keely’s gaze.

  She lifted her eyebrows in a silent challenge. There was no doubt in her mind that he deserved this perk, but the Noah she remembered probably wouldn’t have taken it. He would have scoffed at the idea of “luxury” accommodations, as if a rough-tough cowboy didn’t need that kind of pampering. She’d love the chance to show him how wrong he could be.