by Anne Stuart
He’d just turned the corner, the tall male figure obscured in shadow, when Laura’s voice halted him.
“Don’t come any farther,” she said, her voice tight with strain. “Why don’t you go back upstairs and take the elevator? I really don’t think I can face you.”
He didn’t move, and Laura turned around and sat on the bottom step, her back to the figure on the landing. “Please, Jeff. I’m sorry about tonight. It was all my fault. A stupid mistake on my part, and I’m sorry you got caught in it. Let’s just leave it at that. Nice to know you, have a good trip home, and goodbye.”
Still not a word, not a movement from the man behind her. Laura sighed, setting down the coffee on the step beside her and drawing up her knees close to her body. “You want an explanation?” she guessed, frustrated by his refusal to just leave. “I suppose I owe you that much. I thought we could be right for each other, but I was wrong. I thought you’d be the perfect man for me, someone I could fall in love with, someone who wouldn’t demand anything of me, someone who’d give me babies and let me run my business. A friend and companion who wasn’t too demanding.
“God, I sound like Dubrovnik. I told him he was cold and calculating, but I’m just as bad. I’m just like him,” she said, testing the notion and finding it unpleasantly applicable. “I don’t want to be, but I am. No, maybe I’m not quite so bad. I couldn’t go through with sleeping with you. Not when I realized that it wasn’t you I wanted at all. It was him.”
The man behind her moved, but she held up her hand, forestalling him, her eyes trained on her stockinged feet. “I know just how ridiculous that sounds. Susan tried to tell me, but I refused to realize it. I can’t understand how I could prefer a cold, ruthless wolf of a man to someone who’s kind and gentle and decent. How I could be falling in love with a man who wants to destroy me, and running away from a man who’d give me everything a woman could want?
“But I am. It doesn’t make sense, but I am. So instead of making one of the major mistakes of my life and sleeping with you, I’m going to continue with my life of celibacy. I’m smart enough not to go to bed with you, and I’m smart enough not to go to bed with Dubrovnik, even if he offered. If I just don’t think about it, if I concentrate on what a rotten, deceitful snake he is, then maybe I’ll forget all about falling in love with him.”
Still the damned man didn’t leave. The coffee beside her was cold, the twist of lemon peel spinning and floating like a dead leaf on the wind. For a moment that was what she felt like. The helpless prey of fate, twisting and turning in the wind. But she wasn’t. She was Laura de Kelsey Winston, strong, invincible, mistress of her own fate, owner of the Glass House, in control of her own emotions.
She rose, feeling very small without her heels, very tired of the battle she’d been waging in her own soul. “Goodbye, Jeff. I’m sorry I used you, but I won’t be using you again. I’m not going to bed with you.”
She turned, looking calmly up the stairs at her stubborn guest, expecting Jeff Carnaby’s mild eyes. Instead she found she was looking into Michael Dubrovnik’s blazing blue ones.
He was only a few steps above her. He was wearing jeans and a cotton sweater open at the throat, and he looked very dangerous indeed. “Oh yes, you are,” he said, his voice low and rumbling.
She was immobilized with horror and embarrassment. If she hadn’t felt like such a fool she would have moved, would have run before he could reach her. She could have hidden once more in the Petronellis’ office, and in the light of day this whole, surreal confession would cease to have any power. But he moved down the steps so swiftly that she only had time to take a step before he caught her, his hands hard and unyielding as he held her arms.
For a moment she was beyond rational thought. She hit at him, struggling, but he was inflexible, subduing her without much effort at all. She’d be bruised tomorrow, she thought distantly. Maybe she could charge him with assault.
“Why didn’t you say something?” she hissed, glaring up at him.
“And miss that interesting confession? You have a much higher opinion of my sense of honor than I would have thought. I’d been wondering what you were doing with Carnaby. Now I know.”
“Just what you were doing with Marita,” she snapped.
There was a small, reckless smile playing about Dubrovnik’s mouth. “Exactly. I left her at the door of her hotel room, without even a kiss. Did you kiss Carnaby?”
“None of your business!” His hands were like manacles on her wrists. The more she struggled, the tighter they grew.
“No, I suppose not. Since you’re ending up in my bed, not his. Still...” Before she realized what he intended, he pulled her into his arms, tightly against his body. He was far more aroused than Carnaby had ever been, and the tension and strength vibrating through him effectively wiped out any other considerations. When his mouth met hers she was absurdly ready, hungry for him despite all her better judgment.
She moaned when his tongue touched hers, pushing him away with her freed hands as her mouth answered his. Ignoring her hands, he cupped her face, holding her still for the scorching power of his kiss, and her fists grew feebler, batting at him weakly.
Scooping her up into his arms, he started back up the stairs, toward her apartment. “We might as well use your bed. It’s all set for a seduction, isn’t it?” Her apartment door was open, left that way by the thoughtful man she’d been fool enough to reject, and Dubrovnik kicked it shut behind him. The radio was still playing, the dishes still littered the walnut table by the smoked glass panels. “Very nice,” he muttered. “You’ll have to do this for me sometime. Where’s the bedroom?”
“Put me down and get out of here,” Laura said, her voice shaky with emotions she didn’t dare define. That was the second time a man had held her in his arms and asked that question. This whole evening would seem ridiculously unreal, if it weren’t for the heat and muscle of the arms carrying her.
Dubrovnik ignored her demand, heading with unerring instinct for the bedroom door. “We shouldn’t waste such a setup. Unless you’d rather come down to my place?”
“I’ll have you charged with assault and rape,” she hissed. “It’ll give me just the ammunition I need to stop you.”
He halted by the huge bed, letting her down slowly, her silk-clad body rubbing against his. “Oh, really?” His hands were already on the zipper at the back of her dress.
“You’ll lose every chance you’ve ever had at the Glass House,” she said, trying to ignore the hands at her back, their touch scorching her chilly flesh.
“What if you stop objecting?”
“I’ll lie. If you do this, you’ll lose everything.”
His expression was reckless and determined as he pushed the dress off her shoulders. “It’ll be worth it,” he murmured, baring her breasts. “More than worth it.”
Chapter Fifteen
Laura stood there in her darkened bedroom, her arms trapped by the silk dress Michael had pushed down. Looming over her he seemed huge, dark and dangerous, and she had a sudden moment of complete and utter panic. She’d delayed this moment for almost fourteen years, the trauma of her rough initiation wiping out any desire to repeat the experiment. She’d always known that sooner or later she’d try it again, preferably later. She’d always thought she’d pick someone gentle, sweet, pliant. Someone who could work up to it in stages, take no for an answer, woo and court and flatter and cherish her.
She hadn’t expected to get caught up in a whirlwind. And caught up she was. The distant, rational part of her brain was protesting, fighting, manipulating. But the rational part of her brain no longer had any connection to her mouth, to her lips, to any other part of her body. While the sensible parts of her said no, the rest of her said yes...yes—
Michael pushed the dress the rest of the way, so that it settled in a silky puff around her ankles, leaving her wearing nothing but black clocked stockings, a black lace garter belt and a thin wisp of silk panties. She could feel a flush
start across her cheekbones, and looked up at Michael out of dark, haunted eyes.
“To think you almost wasted this on Carnaby,” he muttered. His hands came up to touch her breasts, to cup them with surprising gentleness, and she shivered in response, leaning into him slightly. His fingers were deft, stroking her, and she felt her nipples harden against his hands, felt a knot of desire tighten in her stomach, felt the heat of longing burn between her legs. His hand left her breasts, sliding around her as he kissed her, her body pressed against the soft cotton sweater, and his mouth opened on hers, demanding a response.
She still wasn’t ready to give it. She stood passively enough in the circle of his arms, initially unprepared for his next move. He pushed her down and across the high wide bed, but she was too fast for him. She started to scramble away, out of his hypnotic reach, but he caught one ankle, yanking her back, moving to cover her body with his fully clothed one, trapping her beneath him. She bit her lip rather than give in to him, but he ignored it, covering her mouth with his, coaxing, teasing, until it opened beneath his, allowing his tongue the entry it demanded.
With a moan she gave in, putting her arms around his waist, holding on, shaking with both fear and anticipation. It was no longer her choice. He wouldn’t let her leave, he wouldn’t stop, therefore she didn’t have to take responsibility. It was up to him, everything was up to him. He’d either prove to her that she was right in avoiding sex, or he’d show her what was missing. Either way, it was no longer her decision.
Her hands were trapped between their bodies. He must have sensed her acquiescence, for he released her mouth, angling his body off hers, enough to free her hands. Now that she had them back, she wasn’t quite sure what to do with them. She wanted to touch his hair, the thick, black pelt that tumbled over his dark blue eyes; she wanted to touch his chest, that smooth, golden, muscled flesh she’d seen all too briefly. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to touch anything else at this point. Sooner or later she’d have to, but she didn’t think she was quite ready.
Taking her hand in his, he placed it on the insistent bulge beneath his zipper, holding her there when she tried to pull away. He felt hard, heavy under her hand, powerful in ways she didn’t know how to deal with. Slowly she allowed her fingers to relax, to gently trace the rigid outline, curiosity and the confusion of desire burning away her fear.
The growl in the back of his throat signaled his approval even as he shifted his body out of her reach. He moved his own hand down her legs, stopping at the rosette-studded garters. He unsnapped them one by one, his mouth kissing the flesh beneath as he deftly rolled down her black silk stockings, and she could hear her own moan in the quiet of the bedroom. Reaching behind her, he unfastened the garter belt with the skill of a man with either great manual dexterity or too much practice. She didn’t want to think about that. She just wanted to think about the mouth that had moved from the top of her thigh to the triangle of her panties, nibbling at her through the thin silk.
And then the silk was gone, stripped off her legs before she even realized it, and she was lying naked, vulnerable on her bed with a man who was fully clothed and frighteningly powerful. She no longer had the inclination to try to escape—she’d accepted her fate, willing to find out if she’d been missing anything. But for a moment Michael pulled back, sitting up and watching her, his shadowed eyes unreadable.
“Aren’t you going to ask me to leave you alone?” he asked, his voice a deep growl. “Aren’t you going to plead one last pitiful time? It’ll be easier to make the charge of rape stick if you put up some form of protest.”
Somewhere she found her voice. “I’ll lie.”
A ghost of a smile lighted his face in the darkened room. “Why don’t you ask me to go?”
Her lips were suddenly dry as she realized what he was demanding of her. Something much worse than the physical surrender he was expecting. He wanted more than a tacit agreement. And she didn’t know if she had the nerve to give it.
Her bedroom had never felt so foreign. She’d spent the last ten years of her life sleeping in this room, alone in this bed, the smoky glass panels letting in the lights of the city below, the tall buildings around her, the moonlight overhead. Now her space, her privacy, and eventually her body would be invaded. And he wanted her soul, too.
He couldn’t have it. Gathering all her determination, she looked up at him, her eyes far more eloquent than her words. “Go,” she said.
He stood up, swift and graceful, and headed for the door. She had to bite her lip to fight back the moan of protest, but even so he stopped at the open doorway to look back at her. His face was lost in the shadows, but hers was illuminated by a shaft of moonlight. She didn’t move, didn’t care that she lay sprawled naked across the huge bed, her clothes scattered around her. He was going to leave, and she had never felt so bereft in her entire life.
She shut her eyes against the sudden sting of tears. The quiet closing of the door released the final hold on her tenuous self-control, and a small, miserable sob escaped her only to be swallowed as she heard his footsteps approach the bed.
She looked up again, trying to school her expression into one as enigmatic as his. “I thought you were leaving.” Her small hiccup betrayed her.
He looked down at her for a moment, then stripped the sweater over his head and tossed it onto the floor. “I was waiting for you to tell me not to leave.”
“I won’t ever do that.”
“Yes, you will.” His hands dropped to his pants, and with one swift move he shucked them.
She quickly shut her eyes again, waiting for the expected weight of him on the bed. Still nothing. He couldn’t walk out on her stark naked. Or could he? There was nothing a man like Michael Dubrovnik wouldn’t be capable of doing.
She opened her eyes, keeping them trained on his face and shoulders, biting her lip.
“That’s better,” he murmured. “Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a naked man before—I won’t believe you.”
Briefly she let her eyes drop before yanking them upward again. “I’ve seen scores,” she said flatly. “I run a modeling agency, remember. The human body holds no mysteries for me.”
“Uh-huh. So why are you looking like Bambi when his mother was shot? It’s just a body.” He dropped onto the bed beside her, too near, not near enough. He put out a surprisingly gentle hand, pushing her spiky black hair out of her face. “Is it me you’re afraid of, or sex in general?”
Now wasn’t the time to lie, much as her pride demanded it. “Both,” she said.
“Why are you afraid of sex?”
She wanted to nuzzle against that hand like a kitten starved for affection. “It’s been a while since I’ve been involved with anyone,” she said lamely, hoping that would cover things.
“How long?” He’d moved closer, his mouth gently nibbling at her neck, his breath warm and tingly on her skin.
“Fourteen years.” His hand was on her arm, gently stroking, drawing it over himself to rest lightly against his waist. The shock of his bare skin made her start to pull away, but then she let her hand drop, let it rest against the smoothness of his flesh.
He didn’t seem shocked by her answer. He was too busy nibbling on her shoulder. “And what did this involvement cover?” he whispered.
“Once.”
“One night?”
“No. Once.”
She could feel his mouth against her skin, could feel the unexpected grin. When he lifted his head to look down at her he was still grinning, an expression both possessive and rampantly sexual. “Good.”
“Mischa...” The name came easily to her tongue. “Please be gentle with me.”
He appeared to consider the notion. “Did this other man rape you?”
“He was just a boy,” Laura supplied with the last traces of bitterness. “No, he didn’t.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“No. It just wasn’t very...nice.”
Michael shook his head. “Sex isn’t nice,
Laura. And it isn’t always gentle.”
“It would have been with Jeff,” she protested lamely.
“Then why did you run from him? Why are you here with me?”
“Because I’m an idiot.”
“Wrong answer. For once in your life you’re showing some brains. You’re with the man you want, not the man you think you should want. No, Laura, I won’t be gentle with you. I’m not a gentle man, and you know it.” And his mouth dropped onto hers, drinking in any protest as his tongue thrust deep into her mouth. Instinctively her arms went around his neck, pulling him closer, and her tongue answered his.
His hands swept the length of her body, deft, arousing hands, dancing over the fevered silk of her flesh. He moved his mouth away from hers, capturing one tightly budded nipple and drawing it deeply into his mouth, sucking hard. She cried out as a knot of desire spasmed through her, and one of his hands slid down her flat stomach, curved around her narrow hip, and moved between her legs.
For a brief moment she tried to close her legs to him, but he ignored her attempt. His fingers found her, the damp, heated center of her, and his first touch made her arch off the bed in surprise and panic. She reached down to push him away, but he ignored her, his mouth moving to her other breast as his fingers began to stroke her, taking possession of the most private part of her body, making it his, so that instead of trying to pull his arm away, her hands were clasping his wrist, her fingernails digging in, and she felt the unbearable, wonderful sensations begin to spiral out.
He released her breast, and her skin felt damp and cool compared to the feverish flush that covered the rest of her body. “This is a game for two players, Laura,” he said, his voice rasping in the darkness. “Touch me.”
She released his arm, reaching up to tentatively caress his shoulder. He was covered with a fine sheen of sweat, and she could feel the tension pulsing through him. “No,” he said, his voice hard. “Touch me.”
