Melting the Millionaire's Heart (5 page)

“The bastard.”

“Exactly!” She looked at him closely. “Wait a minute. Are you mocking me?”

“No. Your Steve truly does sound like a bastard.”

“He’s not ‘my Steve’ anymore,” she corrected.

“Good thing, or I’d feel guilty about having your head on my lap.” She smiled and dried her tears at that. “But think for a minute. You seem more upset about the kind of wedding he had than that he married another woman. Don’t you think that if you’d really loved him, the way you should love someone you’re going to marry, you’d be upset about
that
, not where the wedding was or what his bride wore?”

She scowled. “Maybe. But that doesn’t mean he’s not a jerk.”

“‘Jerk’ is putting it mildly as far as I’m concerned. ‘Size Nine Asshole’ comes closer to the mark.” A rueful smile broke across her face. “You deserve someone way better than him. And as for myself, I’m glad you’re still single.”

“Really?”

He wondered at the skepticism he saw in her eyes. Had nobody ever seen before what a treasure she was? Smart, funny, pretty, and she loved kids.

She also happened to detest rich guys like him, but hey, nobody was perfect.

“Yes, really. If you weren’t single, I’d feel bad about doing this.” He leaned down to press her lips to his, but she evaded him.

She rolled away and sat up.

“Kayla?” Damn. His jaw tightened. He thought he’d had a good read on her, thought she wanted him, too. What was with the dodge? Could he have misunderstood her signals?

“My friend Carolyn—that’s who I called on the phone—she’s got this theory.” She didn’t look at him, sitting back on her heels and toying with the hem of her little pleated skirt. The motion drew his attention, making him want to slide his hand under it to explore the hollow behind her knees.

“What’s her theory?” he asked, tearing his gaze away from her legs.

Her brown eyes flickered up to his, wide with a mixture of innocence and forthright seduction that shot straight to his groin. She nibbled thoughtfully on her upper lip.

“She thinks I need to go to bed with someone else to put the whole Steve debacle behind me forever. Get back in the swing of things, so to speak.”

He blinked at her. This was the problem? Lord, he had to be the luckiest son-of-a-bitch on the planet. “What do you think?” he asked, hoping he sounded calmer than he felt. It would be no big deal if she said no to sex. He’d just sit there all night with his giant hard-on, and they’d part the best of friends in the morning, no harm done. Right.

“I’ve always said I’m not the type, but she says that’s not how it works.”

He brushed a wisp of red-blond hair back and tucked it behind her ear. “And how does Carolyn say it works?”

“She says that you are whatever kind of person you say you are. If you say you’re the type who can handle walking away after a night of sex with someone you just met, then you are. Do you think she’s right about that?”

God, this girl’s straightforward trust and honesty was killing him. He’d lied about who he was. The least he could do was answer this honestly. “I don’t care what Carolyn thinks. I only care what you think. And if you’re not comfortable being intimate with a guy you just met, you shouldn’t do it.”

A part of him couldn’t believe he’d just said that. He ought to get some kind of a freaking medal for discouraging this gorgeous girl from sleeping with him.

Her lips curved in a soft smile. “Funny, I had just decided she might be right.” She leaned forward and kissed him, her mouth tasting of melted chocolate and Riesling, and all of his higher impulses vanished like a puff of smoke.

The heat that exploded between them at the first touch of their lips nearly incinerated him. Need infused him, body, heart, and soul. He leaned back against the sofa and hauled her onto his chest. Sliding his hands down the small of her back, he felt her heat through the thin fabric of her blouse. The contact only made the ache worse.

He dragged his lips away from hers. Her flushed face tilted up, her lips seeking his. “Kayla,” he said on a ragged breath. “I have to know if you really want this. Don’t let it go on any further if you don’t.”

Her eyes opened, calm and intent, such a contrast to the chaos inside him. “I want it. And I’m going into this with my eyes wide open. Tonight, we enjoy what’s left of the year. And in the New Year, well—” She shrugged. “We worry about next year, next year. If we never see each other again, then we never see each other again. Agreed?”

If this was just for one night, it didn’t matter who he really was.

Take it one day at a time. Don’t plan ahead. Do what feels right in the moment. It might be novel to Kayla, but it was the way he’d always lived his life. And right now, nothing felt more right than Kayla in his arms. “Agreed.”

Chapter Four

“Just a minute,” RJ said, lifting her off of him. He went to the foyer and unzipped his overnight case. In a moment, he returned with something in his hand. He opened his fingers and a strip of condoms tumbled down.

She lifted her eyebrows, suddenly feeling a bit out of her depth. “Do you always take condoms on a business trip?”

He smiled and sat down beside her, tossing the condoms onto the rug. “Like a good Boy Scout, I believe in being prepared. I didn’t use any on this trip, or the trip before that. I guess I’m guilty of wishful thinking, if that makes you feel better.”

It did make her feel better, for some reason she didn’t care to examine, and her relief let her be generous. “We’re living in this moment, remember?” There, that sounded sophisticated, the kind of thing that a woman who did this kind of thing all the time might say. Yawn. Just another night of passion with a gorgeous guy. BFD.

“Right.” His eyes darkened as he pulled her into his arms. “I like this moment.”

“Me, too,” she confessed.

He put his hand on the back of her head and pulled her close. His kiss rocketed right to her core, drawing a moan from her. She leaned in, pressing her breasts against him and letting one hand roam across his chest. She felt the hardness of his nipple through his thermal shirt and smiled slightly, remembering when she’d been too shy earlier to touch him there.

RJ pulled back slightly and pressed his forehead against hers. “Why are you smiling?” he asked, his mouth just a hair’s breadth from hers, so close she could feel the exhalation of his words on her tongue.

“Nothing. I’m just happy. It’s a happy moment,” she said, and his lips curved in an answering smile.

“It
is
a happy moment.”

She glanced down and watched her hand explore his chest: the solid curve of his pectoral muscle, the flat plane of his abdomen.

“I have to admit, though,” he said, pulling back a bit. “It would be a happier moment if you weren’t wearing this.” He reached down to undo the first button of her blouse.

She reached to assist him, but he brushed her hands away. “Let me. It’s like I’m unwrapping a present.”

“I’ve never thought of my breasts as a gift before.”

“You should. They’re the best present I’ve ever gotten,” he said fervently. He dipped his head and pressed a kiss where her flesh swelled above the cup. Her bra was nothing special, just plain white cotton with a little knot of ribbon between the cups, but his rapt expression made her feel like she was tricked out in black lace.

He pulled her blouse off and let his tongue run across the swell of her breasts. She tipped her head back and he took instant advantage, slipping his hands around her back and letting his tongue run up the curve of her throat. He worked up to her ear and took the lobe between his teeth, worrying it until heat seared down the side of her body, making her restless to be filled.

All that, just from a few kisses and a nibble on the ear. God help her when he really got started. She slipped a hand under his shirt, desperate to touch his bare body. She made a noise of frustration when his shirt, caught between their bodies, prevented her from making much progress. He let go of her earlobe with a final tug that wrenched a groan from her. Rising above her, he pulled the offending shirt off.

The firelight threw the planes and curves of his chest into shadow. She reached for him, eager to explore his beauty with her hands as well as her eyes. She brushed a thumb across his nipple and then let her hands roam across the faintly delineated six-pack that led down to his waistband.

“I think it’s time for me to open a present of my own.” She eyed the metal button on his jeans.

His grin, oh, it was wicked and yet sweet at the same time.

Come on and do something bad
, it seemed to say, and she was in no frame of mind to resist. He lifted his hands up, almost as if she were going to search him, and tipped his pelvis toward her. “Happy New Year’s Eve,” he said.

She slipped her hand inside his waistband behind his button and savored the feel of soft skin and hard muscle against the backs of her fingers. He sighed, and the impressive swell beneath his fly twitched. She looked up at him.

“What can I say? He likes you.”

She laughed. “The feeling is mutual, I suspect.” She let her other hand run down his solid ridge, wresting a groan from him.

She popped the button open and eased his zipper down halfway, revealing the waistband of his black briefs. She smiled at the irony.

“What’s so funny?” he whispered, his voice tight.

“You’re wearing sexier underwear than I am. I just went with white cotton.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. Just so happens I have a white cotton fetish. The mere sight of a pair of Hanes for Her gives me a huge boner.”

She tsked disapprovingly. “Very kinky stuff. I may be too vanilla for you.”

“Never.” His laugh turned into a groan when she slipped her fingertips into his briefs and stroked his cock. She loved how strained his voice sounded, as if he could barely form words through his excitement. With his help, she pulled his jeans and underwear down and off. He tossed them to the side and sat down again, legs bent, bracing his arms across his knees, looking at her as if the next move was up to her.

Her breath caught at his attractiveness, an everyday kind of male beauty you didn’t see in photos of man-candy models or movie stars: long, leanly muscled legs, fine-boned feet and hands, a swell of muscle at the top of his shoulders. “Your arms are tanned,” she said, brushing her hand across the dusting of freckles she saw there.

“I did some surfing in California.”

“You like to surf?” That fit, now that she thought about it. He had the lean musculature of a water athlete.

“Every chance I get.”

She didn’t know much about him, just a jumbled collection of the few facts he’d told her in the last hour or so. Apprehension rose but she forced it down.

It doesn’t matter. Stay in the moment
. She reached behind and unclasped her bra, the motion thrusting her breasts forward.

Her bra dropped and his eyes darkened. He moved onto his hands and knees and lowered his head, taking one pink nipple into his mouth and sucking.

“God,” she whispered, leaning back to give him room. She propped herself up on one hand and brought the other to the back of his head to urge him on. Not that he needed any encouragement. He seemed to be doing just fine on his own. Never stopping his attentions to her breast, he eased her onto her back on the soft rug and moved over her. His erection brushed against her hip and she reached for it, letting her hand roam up and down while he nibbled and sucked. She savored his heat and silkiness against her palm.

The softness at the apex of her thighs melted, making her crazy. He aroused her like no one ever had. She gripped his erection harder, squeezing and rubbing her thumb across the wet tip, smiling at his gasp of pleasure. He straddled her knees, moving out of her reach.

This prelude was so delicious, she shouldn’t rush through it, yet she couldn’t wait to feel him inside of her, surrounding her. She lifted her hips to unfasten the button at the back of her skirt, wanting to be completely bare against him, but he stopped her.

He lifted his face, eyes unfocused with lust, lips shining. “Not yet. I have a thing about that skirt.”

A thing? What did that mean? “Okay,” she said, unsure how to take that.

He knelt between her knees and flipped up the pleated hem. His heated breath seared her through her underwear. “Mmm, that is some hot white Egyptian cotton,” he teased, sliding his hands up her thighs.

“Shut up!” she said with a snort of laughter, flipping her skirt back down over his head. The image that created, of his head moving under her skirt, made her hotter. She moved restlessly on the rug, desperate to have him inside her.

That had never happened before. In the past, she usually had to beg for more foreplay to give her body time to get ready, but RJ seemed determined to delay until she was frantic with desire. Then he pulled her panties to one side and touched his warm tongue to her sweetness, and she forgot all about everything except the hot, wet, lovely sensation. Her hips jerked.

He tugged the panties down her legs and threw them aside, pulling her skirt back up and getting down to business. His attentions were relentless, exploring her thoroughly with his tongue and fingers. “Oh, yes.” Digging her heels into the rug, she braced herself.

God
. Could she keep him between her legs forever? She scrambled halfway up onto her elbows. Her climax approached at light speed. She was used to working to enjoy herself at sex, but this… This was beyond effortless. Her pleasure ratcheted up uncontrollably like a spring being coiled too tight.

“Inside me, now,” she panted, knowing it was rude but unable to phrase it more delicately.

He lifted his head. “Why the rush?”

“I can only have one orgasm and I don’t want to waste it.” The frank confession embarrassed her, and left her feeling naked and vulnerable, despite the fact that he’d had his head between her legs for the last few minutes.

“A good orgasm is never wasted.” He lowered his head again, pleasuring her with his hands and tongue until she came with a stuttering cry. She rested her head on the rug, closing her eyes, rotating her hips to ride out the aftershocks and savor the warm bursts of pleasure that pulsed through her body.

He pulled back and kissed the tender skin inside one thigh and then the other. “Did that feel like a waste?” he asked, his gaze warm. He didn’t look at all like a triumphant sex god, although that would have been justified, considering the unparalleled intensity of her climax.

She shook her head, taking a swipe at a tear that had rolled down her temple. She’d just had the sweetest sexual experience of her life. Why was she crying? She’d never done that before. She should have cried all the other times she’d had sex, after all the other tepid orgasms that she now knew were scarcely worthy of the name.

“You okay?” he asked, his eyes sharp with concern.

She nodded. “Yeah. I just cry when I get emotional sometimes. Good emotional, bad emotional, doesn’t matter. This was good emotional,” she hastened to add.

“I’m glad,” he whispered, helping her pull off her skirt. He donned a condom and entered her with a strong thrust.

“You’re wonderful,” she said, meaning it in every sense she could think of.

“Oh, God, you’re pretty wonderful yourself.” The tension in his voice heated her blood. He sounded as close to losing control as she felt.

He gave himself to her in a steady rhythm, somehow hitting buttons she’d never known she had. Surprisingly, the tension returned, building with every thrust of his hips. She brushed her hands across his chest, never taking her eyes from his, seeking every point of connection she could find. He reached between them and rubbed her bud between his thumb and finger. She let out a cry.

The pleasure grew so intense it bordered on pain, yet she wouldn’t have stopped him for anything. She shifted just a bit to ease the pressure and he read the signal. He pulled back, and without breaking their connection, he knelt and lifted the backs of her thighs against his chest. Her calves bracketed his face in a sight that turned her face and neck hot. He closed his eyes now, intent on a fast, hard rhythm that left no time for subtleties and required none.

The taut lines of his face told her he was near his own climax. She reached beneath her leg to cup him in her palm, stroking with one thumb. The simple caress broke him and his eyes flew open. He came hard, pumping into her. “God, Kayla,” he groaned, his eyes never leaving hers, and the sound of his rough voice speaking her name with such feeling sent her tumbling over the edge with him. For long seconds, the harsh rasp of their breath was the only sound.

In the hallway, the grandfather clock came to life with a click and a whirr. The chimes played as Kayla caught her breath. RJ lowered her legs and collapsed atop her, letting her feel his full welcome weight as the twelve strikes of midnight began.

“Happy New Year, Kayla,” he whispered in her ear.

Awash in pure bliss, she let her hands roam across his back, his warm body a bulwark against the cool air. “Hmmm, happy New Year,” she whispered into the curve of his throat, pressing a tender kiss where she could feel his pulse beat. Her eyes drifted closed and she reveled in the moment.

…

Sometime in the night, Kayla woke to the doleful chimes of the grandfather clock. Cold and thirsty, she pulled a blanket tighter around her and sat up. Beside her, RJ slept, cocooned in the blankets and pillows he’d brought down earlier. The pleasant ache between her thighs, a reminder of the best kind of debauchery, brought a smile to her face. With a whir and a click, the chimes wound down and the clock struck three in the silent house.

She shivered in the baggy sweatshirt RJ had loaned her. The fire had burned down to a mass of glowing embers, leaving the house cold as a tomb. She crawled to the fire and hunched in front of the cold hearth. Stoking the fire, she added another strip of paper. When the fire flickered to life once again, she added kindling and small logs.

The blaze caught. She stood in front of it for a moment, warming her hands and bare legs.

Last night had been completely out of character for her. She didn’t get into cars with strangers and she certainly didn’t go to bed with them just hours later. She supposed she should feel regret. The minute buzz she’d gotten from the Riesling had long since faded away, leaving her with a cottony mouth and a stiff neck. The heat of the moment had cooled. No longer desperate to have him assuage the needs he’d struck in her, she could be rational, dispassionate, smart. He was just another sleeping guy, who probably hogged the blankets and had bad breath in the morning. Nothing special. She’d had her one night of passion with a gorgeous stranger, and now it was the morning after, or practically so. Back to dismal reality.

Except she didn’t feel that way at all. She couldn’t regret a thing, except that she’d promised to make this a one night only affair. The more she had of him, the more she wanted. The more he showed her of himself, the more she liked him. Problem was, she was only six months out of a relationship that had wrecked her heart, and she’d told RJ she only wanted one night. Who knew if he would ever want to see her again?