by Patti Berg
“I don’t know if I want to find out.”
“Hush, Adriana,” he said softly. “Just put your arms around my neck and don’t let go. When I want you to talk or do something else, I’ll let you know.”
He carried her as if carrying women was something he did every day. Of course, he’d held a woman while swinging from one ship to another. He’d cradled a woman in his arms as he rode across the desert’s blazing sands. He’d carried a woman up a flight of curving stairs, taken her to his bed, and made love to her.
He’d been the brash and adventurous hero in so many movies. He was playing that role again right now, and it was so easy to let him.
Stars were shining overhead when Trevor stepped onto the beach. A light breeze wrapped around them, and a calm tide lapped back and forth.
The stretch of sand was deserted, as it usually was this time of night, and she was thankful for the solitude.
She wondered, again, what Trevor had planned to heighten the intense pleasure she was already experiencing. But she dared not ask. No, he’d only tell her to trust him. And she wanted so much to trust.
She wove her fingers into his hair as he walked toward the water. She could feel the strong beat of his heart, the warmth of his breath against her cheek as he carried her across the sand.
“This is where the pleasure begins,” he said in that deep, bad-boy voice.
Was he going to take her into the ocean? Was he going to make love to her in the pounding waves?
Slowly he lowered her to the ground, her toes digging into the sand as he let her slide over every hard, muscular plane of his body.
Beside them sat half of an old wine barrel, and even in the darkness she could see the moonlight shining on the pale green grapes.
“What are the grapes for?” she asked, but he put an index finger to his lips and shook his head, silencing her question.
He leisurely caressed her arms, her hips, her thighs, then slowly, ever so slowly, he slid his fingers under the waistband of her trousers.
Adriana came to her senses. What was he doing? She didn’t want to make love. She wasn’t ready. Not yet. Maybe never.
She grabbed at his wrists, but he looked at her once more with those smoldering brown eyes and smiled. “Trust me, Adriana.”
Trust him, she repeated to herself. Just give in to the feeling.
She gasped for air when his fingers skimmed over her belly and expertly unfastened the button at her waist and slid open the zipper.
The trousers were baggy and the moment he let go of the band they fluttered to the ground in a pool around her feet.
The cool ocean breeze wrapped around her legs, but the look in his eyes as he perused her body warmed her completely. “Do you trust me?”
Somehow she nodded. She was standing before him in only the briefest black bikinis, a white silk tee with a lace camisole beneath. She shouldn’t trust him at all, but she did.
In an instant he again scooped her up in his arms, his fingers sliding over the sensitive skin of her bottom, her thighs and under her knees as he adjusted his hold and stepped into the barrel.
Tenderly he kissed her ear, her cheek, the corner of her lips. “Close your eyes now.”
Her eyelids felt heavy, her entire body felt, once more, as if she’d been hypnotized. He had her under a spell, and at the moment she hoped she’d never come out from under it.
For the longest time he held her, kissed her, teasing her tongue with his, then all too soon he released her, easing her ever so slowly over his hips, his thighs. Her toes slid along his legs until her feet touched the grapes.
They were standing in nearly a foot of cold, wet grapes that squished between her toes. If Trevor’s strong hands weren’t holding her waist, if her fingers weren’t tightened about his neck, she was sure she would slip.
“Don’t open your eyes, Adriana. Just crush the grapes nice and slow. Don’t think about anything but what you’re feeling right now.”
His fingers lightly circled her hips as she cautiously moved her feet up and down. It was the most decadent thing she’d ever done. He was right. It did feel good. It took her mind off every worry and every care she’d ever had.
He kissed the tip of her nose and her eyelids. The sound of her heart pounding in her chest and the rush of blood through her veins nearly drowned out the sound of the grapes being smashed, the birds’ wings fluttering overhead, the outgoing tide, and even Trevor’s breathing.
He pulled her hips close to his. She could feel the strength of muscular thighs, the hardness of his need. It frightened her, but she didn’t pull away. Again he stroked her waist, the small of her back, and the swell of her breasts beneath the silky blouse.
His eyes were open when she peeked.
“Close your eyes, Adriana. Just relax and enjoy all the sensations.”
It was easy to give in, to let him show her so many new things.
His fingers brushed down her arms, capturing her wrists and gathering them together behind her back. He could bind her hands and feet and tie her to a stake, but she’d never be any more a prisoner to him than she was at this moment.
“Kiss me, Adriana. Don’t open your eyes, don’t use your hands, just kiss me.”
Slowly, ever so slowly, she leaned forward and kissed the roughness of his cheek. She could sense him tilting his head and she nibbled on his earlobe, traced the edge of his ear with the tip of her tongue.
His fingers tightened around her wrists. A low moan sounded deep in his throat. She’d never known such power. She liked what she was able to do to him; she wanted to do even more.
She trailed a path of kisses across his jaw, feeling his muscles tighten as she kissed his dimple, the cleft in his chin, the base of his throat. Blindly, she found her way back to his lips.
She pulled away and opened her eyes to see his blazing dark with passion. “Don’t stop, Adriana. Don’t ever stop.”
Again she closed her eyes and captured his lips which opened easily and let her explore.
He released her wrists and his hands found her hair, weaving through the strands. He pulled her mouth even closer, as all the fire of his desire exploded in his kiss.
A sudden flash, like the one in the cemetery, jerked her back to awareness.
“What’s going on?” she asked, when she saw the photographer she’d seen at Sparta and in the cemetery.
“You wouldn’t give me access to the rancho, so I figured I’d come in the back way.” The man lingeringly eyed her up and down. “Nice outfit, Miss Howard.”
Trevor jumped from the barrel and grabbed the photographer by the collar. “You have no business here. Get out.”
“There’s a law against manhandling people,” Paxton declared boldly. “I suggest you let go now.”
Adriana rushed to Trevor’s side, gripping his arm. “Let him go. Please.”
Trevor stared at her. She heard him exhale a gasp of pent-up air as he shoved Mr. Paxton aside.
“I want you off this property, and I want you off now,” he bellowed.
The photographer laughed. “I’ve got just as much right here as you do.”
“This beach is private,” Trevor insisted.
“Sue me, then.”
Adriana shivered in the cold, embarrassed at being caught, upset with herself for having let down her guard and allowing a photographer to catch her half-dressed and in the arms of a man. The only saving grace was that the moon had gone behind a cloud, and the beach was darker now.
Still, she stood behind Trevor for cover and glared at the prying photographer. “We have no desire to sue you, we’d just like some privacy. Please, I’d appreciate it if you’d leave.”
Mr. Paxton capped his camera and pulled a cigarette from his pocket. “I suppose I could. I’ve got all the pictures I need, anyway. Stomping grapes. Wandering around a cemetery. Pretty impressive stuff. The gossip ought to be buzzing around town any day now, Ms. Howard.”
“Please. Don’t print them,” Adriana pl
eaded.
Paxton grinned. “It’s the way I make my living.”
“Then I’ll pay you for them.”
Mr. Paxton took a long puff on his cigarette. “That might be worth thinking about.”
“We’re not paying anything,” Trevor informed Paxton before turning to Adriana. “You’ve been blackmailed before. Don’t let it happen again.”
A tear rolled down Adriana’s cheek. She couldn’t stand to be in the papers again. She couldn’t bear living through the stares, the gossip. “A thousand dollars?” she asked.
Paxton only laughed. “I can get far more than that from half a dozen tabloids.”
“Ten,” Adriana stated flatly, but Mr. Paxton shook his head.
Trevor gripped her arm and made her face him. “You won’t give him a penny. You have nothing to hide.”
“I can’t live through the gossip again. I told you that before.”
Adriana looked at Mr. Paxton. ‘Twenty thousand.”
Trevor shook his head. For a moment she thought he was going to walk away and let her deal with Paxton on her own, but suddenly he had Paxton by the shirt. He ripped the camera from the photographer’s hands.
“You want money?” Trevor asked, as he flung the camera for out into the waves. “We’ll send you a check for that, but nothing else. Now get out of here.”
Paxton stumbled in the sand when Trevor jerked his hands away from the man’s shirt. He stared toward the ocean as if the camera would float back to him on a wave, but it and the film were gone for good.
Paxton’s eyes burned with anger when he faced Trevor and Adriana. “I have other pictures. Take my word for it, they’ll show up on the newsstands in a day or two.”
Trevor’s eyes narrowed in controlled rage. “I’ll haunt you from now until doomsday and make your life a living hell if they do show up.”
“Go right ahead and threaten me. I’ll just snap more photos, and the next time the price to keep them out of the papers will be even higher.”
“Get out of here,” Trevor shouted. “Next time I call the police.”
“Yeah, we’ll see about that.”
Paxton gave Trevor a two-fingered salute and strolled nonchalantly down the beach.
Adriana stared after him. “He’s going to cause trouble,” she whispered through her tears.
Trevor shook his head. “He’s not going to hurt you, Adriana. Neither are his pictures. You can’t let people like him push you into hiding.”
She wanted to believe him, but it was too difficult to forget the photos and words that had been printed about her in the past. She’d been branded a gold digger, a child paramour, and the press had had a field day with any and all pictures they could find, innocent or not. She hated scandal, but her life had been wracked with it. Now it was going to start all over again.
All because she’d allowed Trevor Montgomery into her life. She should have known he’d bring her trouble. She should have remembered her father’s lectures.
She jerked away at the sudden feel of Trevor’s fingers near her cheek. She didn’t want him touching her again. It was too easy to fall under his spell. Too easy to be seduced. It wasn’t right to want him the way she did.
“Don’t pull away from me,” Trevor pleaded. “I’m not the one who’s hurt you.”
“You’re wrong,” she tossed back. “None of this would have happened if you hadn’t come into my life.”
She ran into the ocean, standing knee-deep in the water, and let the splash of the tide wash away her tears, wishing they could just as easily wash away the photographer’s intrusion in her life and all her other fears.
She never should have allowed Trevor to stay with her. She never should have made that crazy wish.
He’d disrupted her life.
He was causing too much trouble.
A wave slapped at her, splashing its cold, salty spray over her face. And, like a much-needed slap, it brought her back to reality.
Trevor Montgomery had changed her life—for the better. He made her feel alive. He was the dream she’d always wanted.
And she needed him.
He was gone from the beach when she turned around. How could she have expected anything else? She’d pulled away from him one too many times, and he had every right to be angry, every right to leave.
Maybe she should just let him go.
That thought made her heart ache. In spite of his drinking, in spite of his womanizing, in spite of the agonizing thought that he could have murdered a woman, she wanted him.
And she needed him to want her just as much.
She ran from the water, scooped her trousers from the beach, and headed for the stairs.
He was in her bedroom, throwing clothes into a suitcase when she found him.
“What are you doing?”
“We’re getting out of here,” he stated, as he ripped a dress from her closet and draped it over the other clothes in the case.
“Why?”
“Because I’m tired of intrusions. I’m tired of Maggie, and Stewart, and photographers. Every time I think you trust me, something happens to make you pull away. I want to be alone with you. Just you and me and no interruptions.”
“I have a business to run. I can’t just pack up and leave.”
Trevor glared at her, opened one of her drawers, tossed a handful of lingerie into the bag, closed the lid, and latched it.
“I’m going to take a shower. That gives you ten minutes at the most to get ready.”
“I have to let people know where I’m going.”
His eyes burned into hers, and in two long paces he was across the room. One hand shoved through her hair, the other grasped her waist, and he jerked her toward him.
“I don’t want anyone knowing where we are. We’re going to be alone, Adriana. No phones. No business. Just the two of us.”
His mouth slanted over hers, hard and passionate. She didn’t want to like it, but she did. The roughness of his face that needed a shave, the pressure of his kiss that she hoped would never stop.
But all too soon he drew away, leaving her limp, wanting and needing more.
“Ten minutes, Adriana,” he said as he walked toward the bedroom door. “When we’re alone, I’ll seduce you all over again.”
And Adriana realized as she watched him go, that that time couldn’t come too soon.
Chapter 16
Trevor relaxed one hand on the Duesenberg’s green steering wheel and let the cool sea breeze whip through his hair. The last time he’d driven north along the coast he’d contemplated ending his life. Now all he could think of was drawing Adriana into his arms.
His efforts to seduce her had been thwarted at every turn. It wasn’t going to happen again, even though she’d sat silently throughout most of the drive, staring at the illuminated lines in the road.
“Good evening, Miss Howard,” the uniformed guard said, looking over Trevor’s head, when they reached the main gates at Sparta.
“It’s nice to see you again, Kevin,” Adriana said, breaking her silence. “This is a friend of mine, Mr. Montgomery.”
“Nice to meet you, sir.”
Trevor smiled at the gray-haired gentleman as Adriana continued.
“Elliott’s expecting us, but I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t let anyone else know we’re here.”
“Is there some trouble I should be aware of?”
Adriana smiled, shaking her head. “A nosy photographer. I’d prefer that no one, not even the Rosenblums, be told that I’m here.”
“Of course, Miss Howard.” He opened the massive wrought-iron gates. “If there’s anything I can assist you with, please let me know.”
“Thank you, Kevin.”
“Nice meeting you,” Trevor said to the guard as he drove the Duesenberg through the gates and up the winding cobblestone drive.
He pulled the car to a stop near the garages where Harrison had kept his Bentley, his Rolls, and half a dozen other vehicles Trevor had admired. There
were plenty of places to park the Duesenberg where it couldn’t be seen. As soon as that was done, he planned to hide away with Adriana.
During the drive she’d told him about Elliott, who’d make sure they were left alone, about Juanita, the cook, who’d fix whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted it, put it in the dumb waiter, and send it up to Adriana’s suite. They could easily hide away for months.
Right now that sounded perfect. He’d make love to Adriana good and proper and hold her tight for the next thirty days. But that would be just the beginning. After the month was up, he’d make love to her forever.
oOo
“It’s astonishing! You’re the very image of your father,” Elliott told Trevor as he sipped a cup of steaming cocoa at the kitchen table. “He cut quite a figure here in the thirties, especially with the ladies. He had an eye for them. Of course, they had an eye for him, too—young, old, it didn’t seem to matter. He was everyone’s hero.”
“You couldn’t have been much more than a child,” Trevor said, wrapping his hands around the pottery mug.
“In my teens, actually. The perfect age to learn a few lessons from a master with women.”
“Trevor Montgomery—my father—was a master?” Trevor questioned, trying to keep a straight face as he listened to tall tales about himself.
“I thought so at the time. I was very much in awe of his power over women. I even told him so.”
The incident was fresh in Trevor’s mind. It had happened just a few weeks before when the old man sitting across from him had been a gangly, pimple-faced boy Harrison Stafford had met at a soup kitchen in New York. Newly arrived from England, the boy had no money, no place to live, and a growling belly. Trevor had been in pretty much the same condition when Harrison had rescued him, too.
“Still telling stories, I see.”
Trevor turned at the sound of Adriana’s voice. She was wrapped in a robe, her hair was mussed, and she looked as if she’d attempted to sleep but couldn’t. He’d asked her not to run off to her bedroom right after introducing him to Elliott, but she’d wanted to be alone for a while, and Trevor hadn’t tried to stop her. She’d been nervous, on edge, and she had to work that out of her system before he could start his seduction all over again.
