Читать книгу From New York With Love: Rumours on the Red Carpet / Rapunzel in New York / Sizzle in the City - Кэрол Мортимер, Nikki Logan - Страница 12

CHAPTER SIX

‘I CAN’T BELIEVE you just did that!’ Thia was the first to recover enough to speak, staring accusingly at Lucien even as her shaking hands scrabbled desperately to pull the two sides of her blouse together over her bared breasts, feeling mortified by her nakedness in front of a man she already found far too overpoweringly attractive for comfort.

Her knees had once again turned to the consistency of jelly at the heat she saw in those silver eyes...!

‘I believe, if you think about it, you’ll find that we just did that,’ Lucien drawled hardly. ‘You pulled away. I didn’t let go.’ He shrugged.

Thia bristled indignantly, clutching on to anger as a means of hiding her embarrassment—and arousal—at the continued heat in Lucien’s gaze. ‘You shouldn’t have been unbuttoning my blouse in the first place!’

‘I wanted to see your bruises. I still want to see them,’ he added determinedly.

‘You saw a lot more than my bruises!’ she snapped. ‘And I believe we’ve already had one discussion about my feelings concerning what you do or don’t want. In this instance what you wanted resulted in the ruination of a blouse I was rather fond of and saved for weeks to buy.’

‘I’ll replace it for you tomorrow.’

‘Oh, won’t that be just wonderful?’ She huffed her exasperation. ‘I can hear your telephone conversation with the woman in the shop now—Send a blue blouse round to Miss Hammond’s suite at Steele Heights Hotel. I ripped the last one off her!’ She attempted to mimic his deep tones. ‘Are you laughing at me, Lucien?’ Thia eyed him suspiciously and she thought—was sure!—she saw his lips twitch.

He chuckled softly. ‘Admiring the way you sounded so much like me.’

‘Well, I certainly can’t stay and have dinner with you now.’

‘Why not?’ All amusement fled and his expression darkened.

‘Hello?’ She gave him a pitying look. ‘Ripped blouse and no bra?’

‘I noticed that.’ Lucien nodded, silver eyes once again gleaming with laughter even if his expression remained hard and unyielding. ‘We’ve met three times now, and on none of those occasions have you been wearing a bra,’ he added curiously.

Thia’s cheeks blushed a fiery red as she thought of the revealing gown she had been wearing last night—no way could she have been wearing a bra beneath that. And the intimacy of Lucien’s caresses in his office earlier today had shown him that she hadn’t been wearing a bra under her pink crop top, either. As for ripping her blouse just now and baring her breasts...!

‘I—the uniform I have to wear when I’m working at the restaurant is of some heavy material that makes me really hot, so I usually go without one and it’s just become a habit,’ she explained defensively.

‘Don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining.’

‘Why am I not surprised?’ If she were honest, Thia’s initial shock and anger were already fading and she now felt a little like laughing herself—slightly hysterically—at this farcical situation. Hearing her blouse rip, seeing the initial shock on Lucien’s face, had been like something out of a sitcom. Except Thia didn’t intend letting him off the hook quite that easily...

Oh, she had no doubt that ripping her blouse had been an accident, and that she was as much to blame for it as Lucien was. But if he hadn’t been behaving quite so badly by insisting on having his own way—again!—he would never have been in a position to rip her blouse in the first place. Or to bare her breasts. And that really had been embarrassing rather than funny.

Besides, she really did find Lucien far too disturbing when he was only wearing a pair of faded denims and showing lots of bare, muscled flesh. Her ripped blouse was the perfect excuse for her to cry off having dinner with him this evening.

‘We haven’t talked about the Jonathan Miller situation yet.’

Lucien had just—deliberately?—said the one thing guaranteed to ensure Thia stayed exactly where she was!

* * *

Lucien had found himself scowling at the idea of Thia working in a public restaurant night after night, wearing no bra, with those delicious breasts jiggling beneath her uniform for all her male customers to see and ogle.

Just as it now displeased him that Cyn was so obviously rethinking her decision about not having dinner with him only because he had mentioned the Jonathan Miller situation.

The other man had physically hurt her, was responsible for her having had nowhere to sleep last night other than that disreputable hotel, and yet Miller hadn’t given a damn what had happened to her when he’d thrown her belongings haphazardly into a suitcase this morning and handed them over to Lucien.

Worst of all, Lucien now knew, from his conversation with Miller, that the other man had been using Cyn for his own purposes. He had believed—wrongly, as it happened—that her presence in his apartment in New York would give the impression that his affair with Simone Carew, was over. Something Cyn was still totally unaware of...

‘Well?’ he rasped harshly.

She gave a pained frown. ‘Perhaps you have a T-shirt I could wear? And maybe you could find one for yourself while you’re at it?’ she added hopefully.

How did this woman manage to deflate his temper, to make him want to smile, when just seconds ago he had been in a less than agreeable mood at how distracted he had been all afternoon? Because of this woman...

But smile he did as he crossed his arms in front of his chest. ‘It really bothers you, doesn’t it?’

‘All that naked manly chest stuff? Yes, it does.’ She nodded. ‘And it isn’t polite, either.’

‘That was a rebuke worthy of my mother!’ Lucien was no longer just smiling. He was chuckling softly.

‘And?’

‘And far be it from me to disobey any woman who can scold like my mother!’

‘You’re so funny.’ She eyed him irritably.

He gave an unconcerned shrug. ‘I’ll get you one of my T-shirts.’ No doubt Cyn would look sexy as hell in one of his over-large tops!

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘You’re being very obliging all of a sudden.’

Lucien quirked a dark brow. ‘As opposed to...?’

‘As opposed to your usual bossy and domineering self—’ She broke off to eye Lucien warily as he dropped his arms back to his sides before stepping closer to her.

‘You know, Cyn,’ he murmured softly, ‘it really isn’t a good idea to insult your dinner host.’

‘Would that be the same dinner host who almost ripped my blouse off me a few minutes ago?’

The very same dinner host who would enjoy nothing more than ripping the rest of that blouse from her body! The realisation made Lucien scowl again.

This woman—too young for him in years and experience, and far too outspoken for her own good—made him forget all his own rules about the women in his life—namely, only older, experienced women, who knew exactly what they were getting—or rather what they were not going to get from him, such as marriage and for ever—when they entered into a relationship with him.

He’d had little time even for the idea of marriage after his parents had separated and then divorced so acrimoniously, and making his own fortune before he was even twenty-one had quickly opened his eyes to the fact that most women saw only dollar signs when they looked at him, not the man behind those billions of dollars.

So far in their acquaintance Cyn Hammond had resisted all his offers of help, financial or otherwise, and that pride and independence just made him like her more.

‘Good point.’ He straightened abruptly. ‘I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

* * *

Thia admired Lucien’s loose-limbed walk as he left the room, only able to breathe again once she knew she was alone. She knew from that determined glitter in Lucien’s eyes just now that she had only barely—literally!—managed to avert a possibly physically explosive situation. Just as she knew she wasn’t sure if she had the strength of will to resist another one...

The truth was her breasts tingled and she grew damp between her thighs every time she so much as dared a glance at all that fascinating naked and bronzed flesh!

Lucien was without doubt the most nerve-sizzling and gorgeous man Thia had ever seen. His whole body was muscled and toned but not too much so, in that muscle-bound and unattractive way some men were. And as for the strength and beauty of that perfectly chiselled face...!

All that wealth and power, and the man also had a face and body that would make poets of both sexes wax lyrical. Hell, she was writing a sonnet in her head about him!

And now she was completely alone with him, in his fiftieth floor apartment, with her tattered and ripped blouse pulled tightly across her bare breasts...

She should have kept to her earlier decision to leave. Should have made her escape as quickly and as—

‘Here you go—what is it?’ Lucien questioned sharply, having come back into the room and seen how pale Cyn’s face had become in his absence. Her eyes were dark and troubled smudges between those sooty lashes. ‘Cyn?’ he prompted again concernedly as she only continued to look at him nervously, with eyes so dark they appeared navy blue.

Her creamy throat moved as she swallowed before speaking. ‘I think it would be better if I left now, after all...’

Lucien frowned. ‘What have you eaten today?’

She looked puzzled by the change of subject. ‘No breakfast, but I bought a hot-dog from a street vendor on the way to the Empire State Building for lunch.’

‘Then you need to eat. Put this T-shirt on and then we’ll go into the kitchen and see what Dex has provided us with to cook for dinner.’ He held out the white T-shirt he had brought back for her to wear, having pulled on a black short-sleeved polo shirt over his own naked chest. A naked chest that had seemed to bother her as much as she bothered him...

Her eyes widened. ‘Does Dex do your food shopping for you, too?’

‘When necessary, yes.’

‘What else does he do for you...?’

‘Many, many things,’ Lucien drawled derisively.

‘You probably wouldn’t know how to go about buying your own groceries anyway,’ she dismissed ruefully.

‘Probably not,’ he acknowledged easily. ‘Does it bother you that we’re eating here?’

Cyn shrugged. ‘I just assumed you would be ordering hotel room service this evening.’

‘Most of the time I do.’ He nodded.

‘But you decided tonight would be an exception?’ she said knowingly.

‘I just thought you would prefer to eat here. Don’t tell me.’ He grimaced. ‘You don’t know how to cook?’

‘Of course I know how to—’ She broke off, eyes narrowing suspiciously. ‘You’re challenging me to get your own way again, aren’t you?’

He quirked a brow. ‘Is it working?’

Some of the tension eased from her expression. ‘Yes.’

He nodded. ‘Then that’s exactly what I’m doing.’

Cyn eyed him frustratedly. ‘Why are you so determined to keep me here?’

Lucien had absolutely no idea! Especially when he had initially made the suggestion of dinner in his apartment just to see what Cyn’s reaction would be. Boy, had that backfired on him! ‘Why are you so determined to leave?’ he came back challengingly.

‘Yep, the face of an angel and the wiles of the devil...’

Lucien heard her mutter the words irritably. ‘Sorry?’ he said. He knew exactly what Cyn had said—he just wanted to see if he could get her to say it again. Especially the part where she said he had the face of an angel...

‘Nothing.’ Cyn refused to humour him and gave a rueful shake of her head. ‘Okay, give me the T-shirt.’ She took it out of his outstretched hand before holding it up defensively in front of her breasts. ‘Why don’t you just disappear off into the kitchen while I slip off my blouse and put this on?’ she prompted as he made no effort to leave.

‘And if I’d rather stay here and watch you slip off your blouse...’

He enjoyed the flush that instantly coloured her cheeks. Enjoyed teasing Cyn, full-stop. So much so that, despite her being so disruptive and stubborn, teasing her was fast becoming one of Lucien’s favourite pastimes. Exclusively so.

‘Life is just full of little disappointments!’ she came back, with insincere sweetness.

‘Oh, it wouldn’t be a little disappointment, Cyn,’ he assured her huskily. And it wouldn’t be; Lucien could imagine nothing he would enjoy more than to see Cyn strip out of her blouse, allowing him to look his fill of those pert little breasts and plump, rose-coloured nipples.

‘Go,’ she instructed firmly.

‘And you accuse me of being bossy...’

‘You’ve made a fine art of it. I’m just doing it out of self-defence.’

Lucien gave a wicked ‘wiles of the devil’ grin. ‘Do you need defending from me?’

She eyed him irritably. ‘Now you’re deliberately twisting my words.’

He shrugged. ‘Maybe that’s because you’re trying to spoil my fun.’

She gasped. ‘Because I won’t let you stand there and gawp at me while I change my blouse?’

‘I never gawp, Cyn,’ he drawled derisively. ‘If I stayed I would just stand here quietly and appreciate.’

Her face warmed. ‘You aren’t staying.’

Lucien gave another appreciative grin; she really was cute when she got her dander up.

Cute? He had never found a woman cute in his life!

Until now...

Because Cyn, all hot and bothered and clutching his T-shirt tightly to her as if it were her only defence, was most definitely cute.

‘Okay, I’ll leave you to change,’ he murmured dryly. ‘I’ll take the bottle of wine and glasses through with me.’

‘Fine.’ She nodded distractedly.

Anything to get him out of the room while she changed her top, Lucien acknowledged ruefully as he collected up the bottle of wine and glasses before leaving. As if such a flimsy barrier—any barrier!—could have stopped him if he had decided he wanted her naked!

* * *

‘Did you have Dex follow me today...?’ Thia prompted huskily when she entered the kitchen.

Lucien turned from taking food out of the huge chrome refrigerator that took up half the space of one wall in what was a beautiful kitchen—white marble floors again, extensive kitchen units a pale grey, a black wooden work table in the middle of the vast room, silver cooking utensils hanging from a rack next to a grey and white cooker. No doubt there was a dishwasher built into one of those cabinets, too.

He hadn’t answered her question yet...

‘Lucien?’ she said softly as she lifted her replenished glass from the table and took a sip of red wine.

‘I got so distracted by how sexy you look in my T-shirt that I’ve forgotten what the question was,’ he came back dryly.

No, he hadn’t. This man didn’t forget anything. Ever. And his prevarication was answer enough. He had instructed Dex to follow her this afternoon. And Thia wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Annoyed that he had dared to have her followed at all, but also concerned as to why he continued to feel it necessary...

And sexy was the last thing she looked in Lucien’s white T-shirt. The shoulder seams hung halfway down her arms, meaning that the short sleeves finished below her elbows, and it was so wide across the chest it hung on her like a sack, so long it reached almost to her knees. Well...it didn’t hang completely like a sack, Thia realised as she glanced down. Colour once again warmed her cheeks as she saw the way the T-shirt skimmed across the tips of her breasts. Across the hard, aroused thrust of her nipples!

Even so, ridiculous was the word Thia would have used to describe her current appearance, not sexy.

‘Did you have Dex follow me today?’ she repeated determinedly.

‘I did, yes.’

‘Can I ask why?’ she prompted warily.

‘You can if you can make salad and ask at the same time.’ Lucien seemed totally relaxed as he placed the makings of a salad down on the kitchen table before returning to the fridge for steaks.

Thia rolled her eyes. ‘I’m a woman, Lucien. Multi-tasking is what we do best.’ She took the salad vegetables out of the bags and put them in the sink to wash them.

‘That sounds...interesting.’ He turned to arch mocked brows.

She was utterly charmed by this man when he became temptingly playful. And she shouldn’t allow herself to be.

It wasn’t just those twelve years in age that separated them, it was what Lucien had done in those twelve years that set them so far apart—as evidenced by all those photographs of him online, taken with the multitude of women he had briefly shared his life with. Or, more accurately, his bed.

And at the grand age of twenty-three Thia was still a virgin. Not deliberately. Not even consciously as in ‘saving herself’ for the man she loved and wanted to marry.

She had just been too busy keeping her life together since her parents died to do more than accept the occasional date, and very rarely a second from the same man. Jonathan had been the exception, but even he had become just a friend rather than a boyfriend. Thia had never been even slightly tempted to deepen their relationship into something more.

And yet in the twenty-four hours she had known Lucien Steele she seemed to have thought of nothing else but how it would feel to go to bed with him. To make love with him.

Weird.

Dangerous!

Because Lucien might desire her, but he didn’t do falling in love and long-term relationships. And why should he when he could have any woman—as many women as he wanted? Except...

‘What are you thinking about so deeply that it’s making you frown...?’ he asked huskily.

Thia snapped herself out of imagining how it would feel to have Lucien Steele fall in love with her. A ridiculous thought when she so obviously wasn’t his type.

And yet here she was, in this apartment, with a relaxed and charming Lucien, and the two of them intended to cook dinner together just like any other couple spending the evening at home together.

She took another sip of wine before answering him. ‘Nothing of any importance,’ she dismissed brightly as she put the wine glass down to drain the vegetables. ‘Do you have any dressing to go with the salad or shall I make some?’

‘Can you do that?’

Thia gave him a scathing glance as she crossed the room to open the vast refrigerator and look inside for ingredients for a dressing. ‘I’m a waitress, remember?’

‘You’re a student, working as a waitress in your spare time,’ he corrected lightly.

She straightened slowly. ‘No, I’m actually a waitress who’s working for a degree in my spare time,’ she insisted firmly. ‘And you still haven’t answered my original question.’

‘Which was...?’

‘Why did you have Dex follow me today?’ she repeated determinedly, knowing that Lucien was once again trying to avoid answering one of her questions.

He shrugged. ‘Dex suggested it was necessary. I agreed with him.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means that he was obviously as concerned about your walking about New York on your own as I was. You might have been robbed or attacked. Speaking of which...’ Lucien strolled across the kitchen, checking her wrist first, which was only slightly reddened from where Jonathan’s fingers had twisted it, before gently peeling back the sleeve of the white T-shirt. He drew in a hissing breath as he saw the livid black and blue bruises on the top of her arm.

‘They look worse than they feel.’ Thia pulled out of his grasp before turning to take down a chopping board and starting to dice vegetables for the salad. ‘Isn’t it time you started cooking the steaks...?’ she prompted dryly.

‘Deflection is only a delaying tactic, Cyn. Sooner or later we’re going to talk about those bruises,’ he assured her grimly.

‘Then let’s make it later,’ she dismissed. ‘Steaks, Lucien?’ she repeated pointedly when she turned to find him still watching her from between narrowed lids.

He gave a deep sigh. ‘Okay, Cyn, we’ll do this your way for now,’ he conceded. ‘We’ll eat first and then we’ll talk.’

‘It really is true what they say—men don’t multi-task!’ She smiled teasingly.

‘Maybe we just prefer to do one thing at a time and ensure that we do it really, really well?’ Lucien murmured huskily, suggestively, and made a determined effort to damp down the renewed anger he felt at seeing those bruises on Cyn’s delicately lovely skin.

Colour washed over her cheeks. ‘You’re obviously wasting your talents as an entrepreneur, Lucien; you should have been a comedian.’

But what Lucien was actually doing was mirroring her own deflection...

Because he was once again so angry after seeing Cyn’s bruises—bruises inflicted by Miller—that he didn’t want to have to answer her question as to why he’d had Dex follow her on her outing this afternoon just yet.

Oh, he accepted that he would have to answer it some time—just not yet. Talking about the reason Dex had followed her to the Empire State Building earlier, and how his concern was directly linked to Jonathan Miller, was not conducive to the two of them being able to enjoy cooking and eating a meal together. And, despite Lucien’s earlier irritation, he was totally enjoying Cyn’s company.

‘How do you like your steak?’ he prompted as he moved to turn up the heat beneath the griddle, hoping he remembered how to cook steaks. Cyn’s assumption earlier had been a correct one: it had been years since Lucien had cooked for himself or anyone else.

‘Medium rare, please,’ she answered distractedly as she put the salad into a wooden bowl. ‘Are we eating in here or in the dining room?’

‘Which would you prefer?’

Her brows rose. ‘You’re actually asking for my opinion about something now?’

Lucien turned to lean back against one of the kitchen cabinets. ‘Smart-mouthed young ladies are likely to get their bottoms spanked!’

Her eyes widened. ‘Dinner hosts who threaten their female guests are likely to get cayenne pepper sprinkled on their half of the salad dressing. What is it?’ she questioned curiously as Lucien began to chuckle. ‘You aren’t used to being teased like this, are you?’ she realised slowly.

‘No, I’m not,’ he conceded ruefully, unable to remember the last time anyone had dared to tease him, let alone argue with him in the way that Cyn so often did. ‘My mother does it occasionally, just to keep it real, but only mom/son stuff.’ He shrugged.

Cyn eyed him wistfully. ‘Have you remained close to both your parents?’

He nodded. ‘I don’t see either of them as often as I could or should—but, yeah, I’ve stayed close to both of them.’

‘That’s nice.’

Lucien looked at her searchingly. ‘Don’t you have any family of your own?’

‘None close, no.’ She grimaced. ‘Don’t feel sorry for me, Lucien,’ she added lightly as he still frowned. ‘I had great parents. I lost them a little earlier than I would have wished or wanted, but I still count myself lucky to have had them to love and be loved by for seventeen years.’

The more Lucien came to know about Cynthia Hammond, the more he came to appreciate that she really was unlike any other woman he had ever known. So obviously beautiful—inside as well as out. And that outward beauty she could so easily have used to her advantage these past six years, if she had wanted to, by snaring herself a rich husband to support her. Instead she had chosen independence.

No feeling sorry for herself at the premature death of her parents. She was just grateful to have had them for as long as she had. And instead of bitching about the necessity to fend for herself after their deaths she had picked herself up and started working her way through university. And instead of bemoaning the fact that Jonathan Miller, a man she had believed to be her friend, had let her down royally since she’d come to New York she had done all she could to remain loyal to him.

It was fast becoming an irresistible combination to Lucien when coupled with the fact that she was so bright and bubbly she made him laugh, was mouthwateringly beautiful, and obviously intelligent.

She also, Lucien discovered a short time later—once the two of them were seated opposite each other at the small candlelit table in the window of the dining room, where they could look out over the city—ate with such passionate relish that he found himself enjoying watching her, devouring her with his eyes rather than eating his own food.

The expression of pleasure on her face as she took her first forkful of dessert—a New York cheesecake from a famous deli in the city—was almost orgasmic. Her eyes were closed, cheeks flushed, pouting lips slightly moist as she licked her tongue across them.

Lucien groaned inwardly as his erection, having remained painfully hard and throbbing inside his denims during the whole of dinner, rose even higher, seeming to take on a life of its own. To such a degree that he had to shift on his seat in order to make himself more comfortable!

Not that he was complaining. No, not at all. His thoughts had turned to the possibility of taking Cyn to his bed, of making love to her until he saw that same look on her face over and over again as he pleasured her to orgasm after orgasm.

* * *

‘That was...indescribably good.’ Thia sighed her pleasure as she placed her fork down on her empty dessert plate. ‘Aren’t you going to eat yours...?’ She hadn’t realised until now that Lucien was watching her rather than eating his own cheesecake.

Dinner with Lucien Steele had been far more enjoyable than she had thought it would be. The food had been good, and the conversation even more so as they’d discussed their eclectic tastes in books, films, television and art. Surprisingly, their opinions on a lot of those subjects had been the same, and the times when they hadn’t been they had argued teasingly rather than forcefully. Thia liked this more relaxed Lucien. Too much so!

Lucien pushed his untouched dessert plate across the table towards her. ‘You have it.’

‘I couldn’t eat another bite,’ Thia refused, before chuckling huskily. ‘I bet you’re doubly glad now not to be seen out in public with me. I’ve realised since I’ve been here that it isn’t really the done thing in New York for a woman to actually enjoy eating. We’re supposed to just pick at the food on our plate before pushing it away uninterestedly. I’ve always enjoyed my food too much to be able to do that.’ She gave a rueful shake of her head. ‘Besides, it’s rude not to eat when someone has taken you out for a meal or cooked for you. And I’ve enjoyed this much more than going out, anyway. Cooking dinner is probably the first normal thing I’ve done since coming to New York! Do you think...?’ Her voice trailed off as she realised that Lucien had gone very quiet.

An unusual occurrence for him, when he seemed to have something to say on so many other subjects!

‘Lucien...?’ Thia eyed him warily as she saw the way his eyes glittered across at her with that intense silver light. His mouth had thinned, his jaw tensed—all signs, she recognised, of his displeasure.

What had she said to annoy him? Perhaps he hadn’t liked her comment on the expectations of New York society? After all, he was a member of that society.

Whatever she had said, Lucien obviously wasn’t happy about it...