Читать книгу Matchless Millionaires: An Improper Affair - Elizabeth Bevarly - Страница 13

Kelly found that the next week passed in a blur of work, decorating and, above all, Ryan and more Ryan.

By the following weekend, she realized somewhat surprisingly that her work at the lodge was nearly done. She also knew she couldn’t have done it without Ryan’s help.

She hadn’t heard anything more from Webb Sperling, but she pushed the thought aside.

She had time, she told herself. Deep down, though, she knew she didn’t want to upset her newfound accord with Ryan.

As she prepared to leave the lodge late that Sunday afternoon, Ryan surprised her by saying, “Why don’t you come on in? We’ll sit on the deck and watch the sunset.”

“I should be getting back.” The words flew out of her mouth in automatic response.

“Why?” he asked bluntly. “We both know Distressed Success is closed on Mondays.” He smiled. “In fact, since you’ll want to be working here tomorrow, it makes sense for you to stay the night.”

She felt a strange fluttering sensation in her stomach, then caught the teasing glimmer in his eyes.

“After all,” he drawled, “you’re already familiar with the guest bedroom.”

She held her palms up. “I didn’t bring any clothes—“

His smile widened. “Do you really want to hear my solution to that problem?”

She felt herself heat in response. She still wasn’t used to his teasing.

The past week had been wonderful, but he hadn’t tried to kiss her again. He hadn’t done anything, in fact, that could be interpreted as a come-on, even by her fevered imagination.

She, on the other hand, had become attuned to his every breath, every expression, every stretch of hard, lean muscle.

Ryan reached out and touched her arm. “Hey,” he said soothingly, “come on. Let’s just open a bottle of wine and contemplate the meaning of the universe.”

She relaxed a little. “Okay.”

Minutes later, they stepped out onto the deck, Ryan holding two wineglasses in one hand and a bottle of red wine in the other.

She tried not to look at the hot tub, remembering how she’d first spotted him at the lodge.

“I can vouch for its relaxing properties,” he murmured.

“What?” she asked, startled.

“The hot tub. It’s great.” He paused, a glimmer in his eyes. “Want to try?”

“No, thanks!”

Her response was immediate and automatic. Just the thought of getting into a hot tub with Ryan Sperling sent her senses into overdrive.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never been in a hot tub,” he teased.

“Some of us weren’t born into the hot-tub-and-wine set.” Then she added, relenting, “In any case, I have nothing to wear.”

His eyes crinkled. “Why let a lack of clothing stand in your way?”

At her look of forbearance, he shrugged. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.” He paused, then added thoughtfully, “I could lend you one of my undershirts and a pair of boxers. You could even keep your bra and underwear on underneath.”

His lips twitched. “I know how important underpants are to you.”

She wondered how much of his sexually charged teasing she could withstand, then asked suspiciously, “And what will you be wearing?”

“Swim trunks.”

“I shouldn’t agree to this.”

He grinned. “But you are.”

They headed back inside. He handed her some clothes and, after they’d both had time to change, she met him on the deck again, padding outside in bare feet and shivering in the cool night air.

Soft jazz filtered out from iPod speakers set up on a table.

He stood holding two full wineglasses and swept her a look from head to toe, his gaze heating. “I had no idea my shirts and boxers could look so sexy.”

She flushed. It felt impossibly intimate to be wearing his clothes, albeit over her own.

He’d already started the hot tub, and the tub’s jets created frothy water, illuminated from below by recessed lights.

It looked so inviting, she thought as she shivered again.

He set the wineglasses down on a small tray at the side of the tub, then straightened and held his hand out to her. “Come. Let’s warm you up.”

He warmed her just by looking at her with his hot eyes, she wanted to say. Instead, she put her hand in his and stepped into the tub.

“Careful,” he cautioned, but she knew she was being anything but—with him, with anything.

He followed her and settled on an underwater ledge across from her.

She sighed as the hot tub’s jets pounded her gently, massaging her muscles. She closed her eyes and leaned back, relaxing against the tub’s side.

“Better?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

After a few moments, during which she heard him lift and sip from his wineglass, he instructed, “Look up.”

She did, and gazed at the inky black sky. Dozens of little stars twinkled back at her.

“My guess is that you haven’t had much time to stargaze in your life,” he commented.

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Neither have I.”

She looked down at him, and asked, “Why do you think Hunter wrote a stipulation in his will that you and his other college buddies have to stay at the lodge?”

“Why didn’t he just give the money to charity, you mean?” She nodded.

“We’d made a promise to one another all those years ago, on a night after too many beers. We’d vowed to become huge successes—on our own, not riding on our families’ coattails—and then reunite in ten years. Once Hunter got sick, the rest of us forgot that crazy night. But Hunter never did.”

He looked heavenward. “Maybe he knew we’d need to do this. And somehow he knew it would be up to him to get us to come here just to take a moment and look up at the stars.”

“I guess he was right, because it’s been a while since you’ve taken time to look at the stars.”

“Ages,” he answered absently, then he lowered his head to look at her. “How about you?”

“Ages,” she concurred.

A companionable silence followed. She sipped her wine and looked off into the dark trees, then out at the dark waters of Lake Tahoe.

Finally, she asked, “So you and Hunter were close friends?”

He shrugged. “Yeah. I didn’t have siblings, so all six of the guys from college were like brothers to me.” A wry smile touched his lips. “We called ourselves the Seven Samurai.”

She laughed. “Who came up with that name?”

“Blame it on too many late nights chowing down on bad pizza and watching Kurosawa movies. We studied hard, but partied harder.”

“You talk about it as if it’s one of the better times in your life.”

“It was.”

“Did you find it difficult being an only child?” “Did you?” he countered. “It was more difficult being Brenda Hartley’s daughter.”

He raised his wineglass in silent salute. “I felt the same way.”

“It was as if the college partying days never ended for Brenda,” she elaborated, “except she never went to college….”

“But you did,” he prompted.

“Yes,” she said, looking at him in surprise. “How did you know?”

He shrugged. “A good guess.”

“I worked my way through community college in Reno to get a degree in business administration.”

The conversation moved to the challenges of starting a business. Kelly found herself fascinated by the tales he had from his climb to the top of the cable-communications world.

After a while, he said, “Now I have a question for you that I’ve been wondering about. Why did you settle around Tahoe or, more specifically, Hunter’s Landing?”

She sighed. “How I got where I am is a lot less interesting than how you got where you are.”

“I’m all ears.”

She regarded him. He really did seem genuinely curious. “I knew I had to get out of Clayburn,” she said eventually. “I knew I didn’t want to go to Vegas, but Reno wasn’t too far. Once I found a job in Reno, I enrolled at a community college and, on weekends, I’d take cheap day trips to Tahoe.”

She shrugged. “I fell in love with the area and, since there’s a big tourist trade here, not to mention lots of seasonal residents, it seemed like the perfect place to try to open a business.”

“You’ve got good instincts,” he said.

They’d both finished their wine by this time and the music had died away, replaced by the stillness of the night.

She looked around. “I could lie in here forever, but I’d be a wrinkled prune!”

“Ready to head in?” he asked.

“I think so.”

They’d been having such a relaxed, quiet conversation, she’d started to forget they were barely dressed.

Now, however, she was nervous about emerging from the tub.

He placed the wineglasses and wine bottle to one side on the deck and rose. Water sluiced from his body as he climbed out of the hot tub, and awareness shimmered through her as she got a close-up of sheer male virility.

He turned then and made to help her.

She took his outstretched hand and stood up, stepping on the tub ledge, then out onto the deck.

He picked up a couple of towels and handed one to her.

“Th-thank you,” she said, and attributed her stutter to chattering teeth caused by the cold.

Except when her eyes accidentally met his, she’d noticed he was looking fixedly at her body.

She looked down at herself, and realized what he saw.

His white shirt was dripping wet and clung to her like a second skin, defining all her curves. Her nipples, made hard by the cold air, were pronounced against the thin cotton of her bra and his shirt. She looked more top-heavy than she did under her own carefully chosen clothes.

She shivered, and his eyes narrowed.

He dropped his towel and slowly reached up and brushed back wisps of her hair.

Then instead of withdrawing his hand, he trailed the back of it along the curve of her jaw, down her neck and lower….

His hand traced the curve of her breast, then moved up to touch a lock of her hair. “Tempting curves, siren hair.”

She sucked in a breath.

He looked as if he was still waging a battle with himself, caught between desire and something else.

“I should hate you,” she whispered. It was a desperate last bid to avoid what was happening between them.

“No, you don’t. Not really. Not anymore,” he whispered back.

“I want to hate you.”

“I wanted to hate you, too,” he admitted without a trace of apology, “but I can’t. I want you.”

He looked into her eyes, his full of desire, then cupped her neck and drew her near.

He searched her face for a moment before he bent his head and touched his lips to hers.

As she let go of her towel, she thought that this moment had been inevitable since the first time he’d walked into her shop.

If he hadn’t discovered who she was, and she hadn’t found out who he was, they’d probably have reached this point long before now.

His lips claimed hers in a deep, searching kiss. Her body came up flush against his, molding to him, seeking welcoming heat where before there had been just cold.

Her hand moved to the back of his head, pulling him down to her, and she kissed him back, feeding their passion.

A voice inside her head insisted this was wrong. But the voice of scruples was faint, drowned out by the strength of their desire.

He made her feel vibrant and alluring and full of life. The clothes between them warmed from the heat of their desire.

Moments went by before he finally lifted his head and breathed deep.

“I want you,” he stated baldly.

“Yes.”

He searched her face. “Yes?”

“Make love to me,” she breathed, throwing caution to the wind.

It was all the encouragement he seemed to need.

He bent and scooped her up in his arms. “Let’s get inside. It’s freezing.”

He stepped into the house and crossed the great room to the staircase. He took the stairs deliberately, not showing the least exertion from carrying her up.

When they got to the upper level, he went down the hall and into the master suite, setting her down near the bed.

As he lowered her feet to the floor, she brushed against him, doing a slow slide to a want that went bone deep.

“Kiss me,” he said, and she complied because it was the only thing she felt she could do.

The kiss went on and on. Their labored breathing filled the stillness of the room and their bodies moved against each other, straining to be closer.

Liquid warmth pooled between her legs.

He pulled his lips away from hers finally and groaned against her mouth. “I want you badly.”

“Yes.” She felt the same way. A faint tremor shook her hand as she raked it through his hair.

He sat back on the bed and bent to take the tip of one breast into his mouth, groaning as he did so and bending her backward.

She gasped and grasped his shoulders in order to anchor herself. The sensation of him heating her wet and tender flesh was delicious. “Ryan …”

When his mouth moved away, she was burning with hunger for him.

He pulled the shirt over her head and she raised her arms to assist him. Then he tugged down the boxers she was wearing—his boxers—and did the same for her panties. Both pieces of underwear dropped to the floor. Then he pulled her down on the bed for another searing kiss.

When her hand accidentally brushed against him, she stroked his erection and he groaned. Finally, when it seemed as if he couldn’t take any more, he pulled his swim trunks off.

She wrapped her hand around him without invitation and his breath hissed out.

A faint smile touched her lips. It felt wonderful to have Ryan Sperling in her grasp, literally, and on his knees, figuratively.

“What are you smiling at?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she denied, but caught the sudden urge to tease him. “Just thinking about giving you pleasure … having you in the palm of my hand—“

He tilted his head, his eyes heavy lidded. “Oh, yeah?”

In the next instant, he pushed her back on the enormous bed and came down beside her, anchoring her.

She squealed and he nuzzled her breasts.

“That first day at Distressed Success,” she said, striving to keep her train of thought, “before I knew who you were, I was immediately attracted to you.”

He lifted his head, his expression roguish. “I wanted you like crazy.”

Her eyes widened. “You did?”

He nodded. “I already admitted I was hitting on you. Of course I had the hots for you.”

“I thought—”

“What?” He smiled. “You think I hit on every young female entrepreneur selling mismatched china?”

She pretended to look offended.

With a grin, he looked at her bra and slid a finger under the band. “Are you going to take this off for me?”

“It’s front closure.”

“In that case—” He raised himself up and undid the clasp between her breasts, allowing them to spill free.

“You’re beautiful,” he said reverently, tracing the outline of one breast.

Then he kissed her and caressed her all over, bringing her to a fever pitch. When he dipped a finger into her damp heat, she went dizzy with sensation.

“Ryan,” she said hoarsely.

But he pressed, making rapid little movements, like the beating of butterfly wings.

She moaned, mindless with pleasure.

Then, all at once, she went up and over and into the vortex, her grip on his arm the only thing anchoring her to the world.

He pressed his mouth against her damp heat, making her gasp again and jerk, even as her fingers threaded through his hair.

She felt the tension within her build again and she trembled against him. Turning her head to one side, she pulled a pillow toward her, trying to muffle the way he made her feel.

Within moments, however, he pulled the pillow from her grasp.

“I want to hear you,” he said hoarsely.

And then he enjoyed her until she felt liquid fire dance along her nerve endings.

Her release was fiery and rapid, bringing tears to her eyes.

She lay limp afterward and thought dimly that her limited experience had not compared to this … had not prepared her for Ryan Sperling.

He pressed kisses to her inner thighs, then levered himself up off the bed. He pulled open a dresser drawer and retrieved a foil packet.

“Because you just never know when you’ll need it,” he explained.

“I’ll do it,” she responded, and watched his eyes flare.

She’d never done this before, but he made her feel daring and bold.

She took the foil packet from him, but when he lay back on the bed, instead of rolling the protection on him, she pleasured him with her mouth.

He tensed with surprise, then relaxed and groaned. “Kelly …”

She heard the warning in his voice but, knowing she was undermining his control, she kept on going.

“I’m about to lose it,” he said hoarsely.

When she raised her head, he gave her a quick hard kiss.

“Bold in bed,” he said, smiling. “I like that.”

It took them a long time to roll the protection on him. In the end, neither of them could wait any longer.

He rolled her under him and parted her thighs. Then, holding her gaze, he slid into her slowly and came down into her arms.

The buildup was slow—and he toyed with her, increasing her pleasure—but when her release came, it was in a rush of sensation so that she gasped and cried out, grasping his hips as she moved against him.

His release came on the heels of hers and he spilled himself inside her.

She held him afterward, knowing that in this moment he was totally hers.