Читать книгу His Forbidden Fiancee - Christie Ridgway - Страница 6

The only thing the first-class-all-the-way log house lacked was a sexy female in the master bedroom’s quilt-covered sleigh bed. Make that a naked sexy female. Blond. Curvy.

Make that lots of curves.

Coat hangers with legs didn’t interest Luke Barton. He liked his women built for pleasure. His pleasure.

“Did you say something, Mr. Barton?”

He started, then tore his gaze from the decadent bed to frown at the caretaker who was showing him through the home that was his for the next month. Had he been talking out loud? Luke shoved his hands in his pockets and tried out a noncommittal smile before trailing the woman toward the adjoining bathroom.

She was attractive enough, he supposed, and somewhere in her twenties as well as sort of blondish, but it wasn’t her who had sparked his imagination. It was that luxurious bed, he decided, glancing back at it over his shoulder. That quilt-covered bed with a mattress wide enough to rival the sizable slice of Lake Tahoe that he could see through the room’s tall windows.

There was a stone fireplace near the bed’s carved footboard with wood neatly laid inside and Luke could imagine the logs burning brightly, licking golden color along the naked, fair flesh of his fantasy woman. He’d follow suit with his tongue, tasting her warm—

“Mr. Barton?”

His attention jolted to the caretaker again and he realized he was standing, frozen, in the middle of the room. “Call me Luke,” he said.

“What?” The caretaker frowned. “We were expecting Matthias Barton this month.”

Perplexed, Luke stared at her for a moment. Matthias?

Oh. Matthias. Matt. That luxurious decadent bed was making him forget everything. It wasn’t often that Luke Barton forgot his bastard of a twin brother, Matt. And it was never that he did his bastard of a brother a favor.

Except for now.

Damn Matt.

When his assistant had called Luke’s assistant he’d wished like hell he could have turned the cheating, thieving SOB down flat. “Your brother has to take care of some unexpected business and he wants to know if you’ll switch months with him,” Elaine had imparted, as if it wasn’t damn strange that identical siblings refused to speak to each other.

But for once, Luke had been unable to refuse his brother’s request.

“I’m sorry. I meant to mention it right away,” Luke told the caretaker. Apparently she hadn’t noticed the cryptic note Nathan left behind had been addressed to him. “Something came up and my brother and I had to trade months.” The ol’ twin switcheroo.

“Oh, I suppose that’s all right,” the woman replied, then gestured him forward. “So, as I was saying, Luke, you must spend the next month in the lodge in order to fulfill the requirements of Hunter’s will. Your friend Nathan was here last month and your brother Matthias will then take your place in the fifth month.”

Luke knew all that. A while back, letters had been received by each of the remaining “Seven Samurai” as they’d called themselves in college. The six had lost touch after the death of Hunter Palmer and graduation, but with the arrival of those letters they’d been reminded of the promise they’d once made to one another as they closed in on getting their diplomas. Though they were from families of distinction and wealth, they’d been determined to each make their own mark on the world. In ten years, they’d vowed.

Over a table filled with empty beer bottles they’d pledged to build a lodge on the shores of Lake Tahoe and in ten years, each of them would take the place for a month. At the end of the seventh month, the plan had been that they’d all come together for a celebration of their friendship and the successes they’d achieved.

But after Hunter’s illness and subsequent death, that dream had died with him.

Though apparently not for Hunter. Even aware he wouldn’t be there to share it with them, he’d made arrangements for a lodge to be built at the lake. The letters he’d written to each of the friends said that he expected them to honor the vow they’d taken all those years ago.

The caretaker stepped aside as they reached another arched doorway. “And here’s the master bathroom.”

As Luke stepped inside, the fantasy blond popped back into his thoughts. The light of a fire was tracing her skin again, all that pretty, pretty skin, as she lowered herself into the deep porcelain tub that was surrounded by slate and butted up against yet another fireplace. The ends of her hair darkened as they swished against her wet shoulders. Bubbles played peekaboo with her rosy nipples.

“Do you think you’ll be comfortable here?”

Sidetracked again by his enticing little vision, Luke was jolted once more by the sound of the caretaker’s voice.

Damn! What was the matter with him? he wondered, firmly banishing the distracting beauty splashing in his suddenly sex-obsessed brain.

“I’ll be just fine here, thank you.” Even though he was going to be “just fine” three months early, all for the sake of his brother.

He must have been scowling at the thought, because the woman’s eyebrows rose. “Is something wrong?”

“No. Not at all.” There was no reason to expose the family laundry to a stranger. “I guess I’m just thinking of…of Hunter.”

The woman’s gaze dropped. “I’m sorry.” The toe of her sensible black shoe appeared to fascinate her. “I think…I think he intended this as a nice gesture.”

“Hunter Palmer was a very nice man.” The best of the seven of them. The very best. Luke let himself remember Hunter’s wide grin, his infectious laugh, the way he could rally their group to do anything from nailing all the furniture in the freshman-dorm rec room to the ceiling to organizing a charity three-man basketball tournament senior year.

Hunter had been part of Luke’s squad. They’d won the whole shebang, too. What a team they’d made, Hunter and Luke…and Matt.

In those days, like never before and never since, Luke and Matt had played on the same side.

But it was Hunter who Luke had been thinking of when he’d agreed to take his brother’s place for the next month. Their dead friend’s last request had been for the six other men to spend time at the lodge he’d built. If they fulfilled his request, then twenty million dollars and the lodge itself would be turned over to the town of Hunter’s Landing, here on the shores of Lake Tahoe.

Luke wasn’t going to be the reason that didn’t happen, no matter how he felt about his brother.

So he followed the caretaker through the rest of the rooms, keeping his mind off the fantasy blond by thinking of the twin switcheroo and how he was replacing Matt Barton, #1 bastard. He spent little time looking on the framed Samurai photos mounted in the second-floor hallway. If he were really playing the part of Matt, Luke thought, it would mean keeping his tie knotted tight, his smiles as cold as Sierra snow, and his mind open to how he could take advantage of any situation without regard to kith, kin or even common decency.

That was how his brother operated.

Finally the caretaker gave him the ornate keychain that contained the house key and departed, leaving Luke alone inside the big house with only his grim thoughts for company. The place was quiet and absent of any signs of Nathan Barrister—who had been staying here the month before—unless you counted the hastily written note Luke had found from him. But Nathan hadn’t gone far. He’d fallen for the mayor of Hunter’s Landing, Keira Sanders, and now they were flitting between the Tahoe town and sun-filled Barbados, where his old friend was presumably mixing business with pleasure.

Jacket and tie discarded, Luke found a beer in the overstocked fridge and settled himself by the window of the great room. Through the trees was another spectacular view of the lake. It wasn’t its famous clear-blue at the moment, not only because it was settling into evening, but also because gray clouds were gathering overhead.

Dark clouds that reflected Luke’s mood.

What the hell was he going to do with himself for a month?

Nathan had done okay here, apparently. His note said it wasn’t “exactly the black hole I thought” and he’d occupied himself by jumping into a full-on love affair. Luke didn’t wish that potential quagmire on himself, though a visit from that blond sweetheart of his imagination might make the month pass just a little bit faster. It was too damn bad she couldn’t stroll out of his fantasies and straight into this room.

Yes, that would make the thirty days more interesting.

Except it wasn’t going to happen unless Matt had invited someone to join him here. And even if that were the case, blond sweethearts just weren’t Matt’s type. Being identical twins didn’t mean they had identical taste when it came to women.

Luke hooked his heels around a nearby ottoman and dragged it closer as the first drops of what appeared to be a heavy spring rain started to hit the windows and roll down like tears. Yeah, he’d be crying, too, if the vision from his daydream showed up on his doorstep looking for Matt.

Though he shouldn’t rule that out, come to think of it. His brother might set up just such a thing to shake Luke’s cage. Matt ruined Luke’s life any chance he got.

To be fair—unlike his brother—Luke had to admit that it was their father, Samuel Sullivan Barton, who had sowed the seeds of their ugly rivalry. He’d run their childhood like an endless season of The Apprentice, with himself playing Donald Trump, constantly orchestrating cutthroat competitions between his two sons.

Their enmity had abated in college. But after Hunter had died, so had their father, and he’d left behind one last contest that rekindled his sons’ competitive fire. Whichever twin made a million dollars first would win the family holdings. Both of them had separately gone to work on developing wireless technology—Luke doing it hands-on, using his engineering degree, while Matt tapped into his undeniable business acumen to hire someone to work with him.

When it came to any kind of gadgetry, his brother was all thumbs. But when it came to building a successful team, Matt was a master.

Of course, that time he’d ensured his mastery by bribing a supplier and knocking Luke right out of the running. Matt had made the first mil and won all the family assets, to boot.

Luke hadn’t spoken to his brother since, though he’d gone on to do a damn fine job with his own company—a meaner and leaner version of what Matt continued to build upon with the Barton family wealth behind him. That was Luke in a nutshell these days: a leaner—okay, maybe by only a pound or two—but definitely meaner version of his brother Matt.

Working his ass off had a way of doing that to a man, Luke thought. And maybe bitterness, too. He couldn’t deny it.

The rain was really coming down now, and the house took on a chill. He got up and lit the fire laid in the great room’s massive fireplace—it took up one huge stone wall—and the flames set him thinking about his blond again.

When he got back to his own condo in the San Francisco Bay Area he was going to have to make a few phone calls, apparently. This fantasy woman was a new fixation for him. Work usually was his only obsession—work and finding some way to pay back his brother at some future date—so his sex life was more sporadic than people believed. It looked as if he needed to be paying more attention to his bodily needs, though.

Or maybe the blame rested on this house, he thought. Or the fireplaces. That bed.

The blond continued insinuating herself into his thoughts. He could practically smell her now. Her scent was like rain—clean, cool rain—and he’d sip the drops off her mouth, her neck, her collarbone.

Closing his eyes, he rested his head against the back of the chair. As his fantasy played on, his heart started to hammer.

Except that it wasn’t his heart.

His eyes popped open. He stared out the windows, trying to determine if the pouring rain or the waving trees were causing the loud drumming.

He decided it was neither one.

Luke set his beer down and rose, following the noise to the front door. Who the hell would be here now and in this spring deluge?

He jerked open the door. As he took in the dark shadow of a figure on the porch, a chilly blast of wind and a spray of rain wafted over him. Suppressing a shiver, he fumbled for the light switches. Brightness blazed over the porch and in the foyer.

The shadowy figure became a woman.

Her white blouse was plastered to her body. Wet denim clung to her thighs.

She raised a hand to her hair and tried fluffing the drenched stuff. A few locks gamely sprung from straight strands into bedraggled curls that hinted at gold.

Luke looked back at her clothes again.

More accurately, he looked at the curves cupped by all that wet cloth.

Her nipples were hard buds topping spectacular breasts.

Even from the front he could surmise she had a round backside, too, just the way he liked it.

She was exactly how he liked it.

Bemused, he continued to stare at her as he tried figuring out what combination of beer, rain and rampant fantasy had brought such a sight to his front door.

Could she possibly be real? And if so, whom did he have to thank for such a surprising gift?

She frowned at him. Her lips were generously pillowed, too. “Matthias, aren’t you going to invite your fiancée in?”

Fiancée? Matthias?

Luke spent a few more long moments staring at the wet blonde on his doorstep. When another cold blast of air and rain slapped him, he blinked and finally stepped back to let his brother’s fiancée inside.

As she moved forward, questions circled in his mind. Was this some joke? That trick he hadn’t put past his brother? Or could Matt really be engaged? If so, it was news to Luke. He’d thought his brother was the same kind of workaholic confirmed bachelor he was. And when had Matt’s taste turned to blondes?

Inside, with the door shut behind her, the young woman wrapped her arms around herself and licked her bottom lip in what seemed a nervous gesture. “I, um, know you weren’t expecting me. It was sort of an—an impulse.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. I jumped in my car and before long I was almost here. Then it started pouring rain and now…” Her voice drifted off and she shrugged, her gaze going to her feet. “And now I’m dripping all over this beautiful carpet.”

She was right. She was as wet as his bathtub fantasy, and probably cold, too. He gestured up the stairs toward the great room and its crackling fire. “Let’s get you warmed up and dried off.”

He tried to be a gentleman and keep his gaze above her neck as she preceded him into the other room but, hell, he knew he was no gentleman. So he confirmed what he’d already suspected by running his gaze from her nape to her heels. She was just his type.

Except she was his brother’s fiancée. Or was she? It could still be a trick…

Stopping in front of the roaring fire, she faced him again. Another rush of words spilled out, giving him the idea that she chattered when she was anxious. “My mother would kill me if she knew I came up here. ‘Lauren,’ she’d say in that disapproving tone of hers, ‘is this another one of your Bad Ideas?’ That’s just how she says it, with capitals. Capital B, Bad. Capital I, Ideas. ‘Another one of Lauren’s Bad Ideas.’ ” A nervous laugh escaped before her hands came up to try to suppress it.

Lauren. Her name was Lauren. It didn’t ring any bells, but Luke didn’t keep tabs on Matt’s social life. Maybe he should, if his brother was really going around snatching up just the sort of women that Luke liked. For God’s sake, Matt shouldn’t be allowed to have everything Luke wanted.

She shivered and he spotted a wool throw draped over a nearby chair. He grabbed for it then brought it to her. As she took it from his hand, she looked up at him, all big, blue eyes. Her pink tongue darted out to wet that pouty lower lip.

“You’ve got to be wondering why I’m here, Matthias.”

“I’m not—” Matthias. But something made him hold that last word back. He ran his hand through his hair, buying himself some time. “I guess I am a little surprised to see you.”

She gave another small laugh and then turned toward the fire. “This whole engagement thing has been a little surprising, don’t you agree?”

“Yeah.” He could be honest about that, anyway. “I suppose so.”

She continued to study the fire. “I mean, we don’t know each other that well, right? You’ve worked with my father and Conover Industries for years, of course…”

Hell, Luke thought. She was Conover’s kid. Ralph Conover’s daughter. Ralph Conover, who’d been the first to cozy up to Matt after he’d cheated Luke out of his fair chance to win the Barton family holdings.

“…but there’s the fact that we haven’t talked that much or ever really been…um, alone together.”

What? Luke stared at the back of her head and the gold curls that were starting to spring up there. His brother was engaged to marry a woman he’d never been alone with? Luke had a guess to what that was code for and, if he was right, it meant Matt hadn’t suddenly developed a yen for cute curvy blondes.

Instead, it meant Matt had developed a yen to more tightly cement his relationship with Conover Industries. Luke’s mind raced ahead as he imagined all the implications this could have for Eagle Wireless, his own smaller company. With Conover Industries and Barton Limited “married,” Eagle could find its own perch in the wireless world very precarious.

God. Damn. It.

Lauren turned toward him again, clutching the throw at her chest. “You haven’t said what you think about that, Matthias.”

Because Luke hadn’t had enough time to think it through completely. He cleared his throat. “I suppose some people would find it a bit odd that we haven’t…” Since he didn’t know precisely what Matt and Lauren had or hadn’t, he let the sentence hang.

“Touched?” she conveniently supplied. “Even kissed, really?” Then color reddened her cheeks. “And we certainly haven’t made love.”

Staring into her big, blue eyes, suddenly Luke could picture—in vivid detail—doing just that very thing with her. He saw it on his mind’s high-def big screen, the two of them making love in that big bathtub upstairs, Lauren’s soft, wet thighs wrapped around his hips. Or on that quilt-covered bed, her blond curls spread out against the pillowcase.

Her eyes darkened and he heard a tiny gasp as her breath suddenly caught. Was she reading his thoughts?

Or did she feel that same sharp tug of attraction that he did?

Could she possibly share the images dealing out like X-rated playing cards in his mind?

Blond, curvy Lauren, and Luke, the mean twin.

The cheated twin.

He lifted his hand and trailed one knuckle along the downy softness of her cheek, wondering if she would taste as sweet as she looked. His fingertip touched the center of her bottom lip and he saw her eyes widen.

Oh, yeah, the message in them made it clear that she felt the attraction, too. And the bit of confusion he could read as well told him she hadn’t felt it for Matt.

Luke ran his thumb over her bottom lip this time, moving inside just a little so that he grazed the damp inner surface. She stood frozen before him, trapped between the fire and his touch. In the sudden heavy silence of the room he could hear the light, fast pants of her breath. Color ran high on her cheeks.

God, she was beautiful.

And we certainly haven’t made love.

She’d said that, and that’s where Luke’s brother had slipped up. If she were Luke’s, he wouldn’t have wasted any time before taking their engagement—even one motivated by business reasons—to a more serious level.

Okay, be honest. He wouldn’t have been able to stop himself.

The pulse along her throat was racing, begging him to touch it with his mouth. And now that her hair was starting to dry, he could smell her shampoo, something flowery, but not cloying. It was a fresh smell and he wanted to rub himself against it. He wanted to smell her on his own skin.

Really, it came down to one very simple thing. He wanted his brother’s bride-to-be.

“M-Matthias?” she whispered.

Luke didn’t flinch at the wrong name. Instead, he tucked a damp curl behind her ear. At the sight of the goose bumps that raced down her neck in response, he smiled, careful to keep the wolfishness out of it.

But he felt wolfish.

Smug, satisfied and ready to eat Goldilocks up in one big bite.

And then he’d want to do it again, this time taking his time to savor every taste.

His hand lingered near her shell of an ear. He’d mixed up his fairy tales, hadn’t he? The wolf was Little Red Ridinghood’s nemesis, wasn’t he? But no matter. Lauren was most certainly Goldilocks and Luke hadn’t felt this predatory in a long, long while.

Catching her gaze with his, he grazed his thumb along her velvety cheek.

She released her grip on the wool throw. It fell at her feet as she circled his wrist to pull his hand away from her face. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Goldilocks wasn’t quite so ready to test out feather mattresses as he’d thought. But that was okay. He needed some time to process all this himself. “Nothing you don’t want,” he reassured her, stepping back and trying on another smile.

She shivered again.

Frowning, he ran his gaze over her, noting that her wet clothes still clung. He shoved his hands in his pockets to disguise the effect her curves had on him and cleared his throat. “Why don’t you take a hot shower? Warm up.”

So he could cool down. Think things through. Decide what to do with all the sexual dynamite in the room, especially when they were standing so close to the fire.

Especially when the woman who had walked out of his fantasies was his brother’s bride-to-be.

“Take a shower here?” She was already shaking her head. “No, no, no. I only came to talk and then—”

“What?” Luke interrupted. “Go back out in that?” He gestured toward the windows and the full-on storm and wilderness-level darkness beyond them. “Now that would definitely be a Bad Idea, Lauren.”

She made a face. “Oh, thanks for reminding me.”

He allowed himself a little grin. “Fair warning, kid. Never show me your weakness. I’ll use it against you.”

“Kid.” She made the face again, though he could see the appellation relaxed her. “I’m twenty-six years old.”

“Be a grown-up then. Go upstairs and take a hot shower. Then we’ll put your clothes in the dryer, I’ll rustle us up some dinner and after that we’ll reassess.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Reassess what?”

She was a suspicious little thing, but God knows that was sensible of her. He shrugged. “We’ll reassess whatever occurs to us.” Like whether he should let her know who he really was. Like whether he could let her drive away from him tonight.

After another swift glance at the scene outside the windows, she appeared to make up her mind. “All right.” She bent to retrieve the throw.

As she handed it to him on her way toward the stairs, he used it to reel her closer.

“What?” she said, startled. Round blue eyes. Quivering curls.

“We haven’t had our hello kiss,” he murmured.

Then, curious as to what it might be like, he placed his mouth on top of hers.

At contact, his heart kicked hard inside his chest. Heat flashed across his flesh, burning from scalp to groin.

Lauren had the softest, most pillowy lips he’d ever encountered in thirty-one years of living. Eighteen years of kissing. His biceps were tight as he lifted his hands to cradle her face.

He took a breath in preparation, then touched the tip of his tongue to hers.

Pow.

They both leaped away from the sweet, hot explosion.

She regained her breath first. “I’ll…I’ll just take that shower,” she said, her gaze glued to his face as if she were afraid to turn her back on him.

“Sure, fine, go on up,” he managed to get out, when he should have said, “Run, Goldilocks. Run as far and as fast as you can.”

As if he wouldn’t run right after her if she tried.