Flirting With Disaster (7 page)

The pierced girl shrugged. “Depends on what you want out of the hook-up—sex or pregnancy.”

Jude smiled. “Oh, I’m looking for impregnation. An orgasm would only be an added perk. Are there different cadence options available on the ‘Majik Mike?’ I should condition my muscles to produce an orgasm.”

“What the
hell
do you think you’re doing?”

Jude flinched. Beckette, The Beast.

She turned as she tucked the buzzing vibrator behind her back. “Mr. Beckette. Hello.”

The whirring continued no matter how hard she held it. She fumbled blindly for the power switch, but couldn’t find it. “I was shopping for…”

His lips thinned. His body crowded her as he reached behind her and grabbed the vibrator. Of course, a professional like him would know exactly where the power button was, and he adroitly turned it off and slammed it on the counter. “You won’t be needing that.”

He had the audacity to move her out of the way. “Or this, or this, or this…” He tossed her pornographic magazines, feminine wash and, finally, her Marvin Gaye CD toward the cashier. The Beasts eyes lifted. “And you definitely don’t need this.” He shoved
The Art of Orgasm, How To Get Your Lover to Understand The G-Spot
video clear across checkout.

You deserve more.
Nola’s words rang in her head. No paid gigolo was going to tell her how their encounter was going to go. She was the customer and the customer was
always
right.

The Beast tossed the edible panties back into her basket. “These you can keep.”

Her blood boiled. She jumped up and leaned over the counter, backside in the air, and reached beside the cashier’s feet to collect the items. “I will not be treated like a child. Maybe these aren’t for you. Maybe I found someone else. Someone more capable of meeting my needs. Like Mr. Fantome.” Jude threw the items over her shoulder and back onto the checkout counter.

“I’m more than you can handle, Baby. You won’t be propositioning anyone else.” Beck pulled her off the counter by the hips and threw her over his shoulder like she weighed nothing at all. He threw down a twenty, grabbed the edible panties and marched out the door.

Oh, this
was
going to work out superbly.

* * * *

“Beckette?”

Beck looked over his shoulder to find Liam and Alana Fitzgerald approaching down the sidewalk. Liam glanced up at the sign to the goddamned sex shop Jude had been exploring for the sake of
research
.

Beck cringed.

“Hello Liam, Alana. I was just helping Ms. Duffy over this puddle.” He kept the witch on his shoulder regardless of her protests. He didn’t dare give her a chance to speak. God only knew what would come out of her mouth.

“Miss Duffy needs to get back to the resort and prepare for dinner. Mr. Fantome has requested she be seated with him. And don’t you have to check the pipes in Ms. Carmichael’s suite?”

Jude stiffened in his arms. Damn the woman and her intelligence. She’d figured him out.

“Put me down this instant!”

Beck dumped her on her feet. She straightened her jacket and tucked her hair back into its pristine predicament. She had a thing for severe and tidy that called to him to mess her up.

She glared at him, her back to the owners of the resort. “Check the pipes? Is that what we’re calling it now?”

The woman really did have a flair for dramatics. He crossed his arms, hiding the edible panties.

“Miss Duffy.” Alana tapped Jude’s shoulder and she turned to face the meddling matchmaker. “I do hope you’re coming to dinner. Mr. Fantome was very taken with you and made special arrangements to dine with you.” She winked.

Alana frowned at Beck, shooting him a warning. He was just an employee. Not to be fraternizing with the guests.

“Beckette, the finishing touches also need to be put on the patio pergola for the Monster Ball at the end of the week.”

Jude swiveled her head to Beckette. “Mr. Beckette works for you?”

“Yes. He’s our maintenance man.” Alana smiled like a proud mother. Or a mischievous, manipulative, leprechaun. “Our poor Beckette is a widower, you know. Six years now.”

A storm brewed in Jude’s eyes. “You… You deceived me!”

The shock of hearing his personal life spilled like a cheap tabloid story, pissed him off. “Now, Miss Duffy. You came to your conclusions all on your own. I simply went along for the ride.”

The hellion’s jaw tightened and those sparkly greens shot daggers at him. She grabbed the panties from his hand. They fell out of the box, landed in a puddle, and began to dissolve like cotton candy in the rain. She stared at the disintegrating confection, jaw unhinged as if her dreams were going up in smoke.

She said goodbye to the Fitzgeralds, then turned and stomped away.

Why this woman was so hell bent on losing her virginity was a mystery to him. A mystery he’d uncover, long before she plotted her next hair-brained scheme. He’d ruined her life once. He’d be damned if he let it be ruined anymore.

Eight

“Never do anything against conscience

even if the state demands it.”

Albert Einstein

J
ude shoved her bag from
Between the Sheets
to the bottom of her closet behind her suitcase.
Thank goodness she’d had time to go back and collect her research materials.

A maintenance man. A widower, for Christ’s sake. He’d deceived her. She needed a man with no morals, no heart. One she could simply exchange monetary funds with, for the excitement of learning about sex and, as a bonus, a pregnancy he’d never care about. Not some charming, grieving artisan.

“You don’t look very thrilled about dinner.”

Jude jumped at Nola’s mysterious appearance in her room, once again. She shrugged and turned back to her frumpy clothing. “It’s not that.” She ran her hand over a celery cashmere sweater and sighed. “I had everything planned. He was perfect, but he went and ruined it. Now I need to start over.” A smidgen of guilt knotted in her chest, but she pushed it away.

“I’m not sure if I want to hear this.” Nola sat on the bed and crossed her legs.

Jude’s lips twisted. “I had this plan, you see. A harmless one, if all went well. I was going to sleep with Mr. Beckette, the profligate one, and check off two birds with one stone. I’d finally understand what all the fuss is about regarding sex, and I’d most likely get pregnant, considering my current menstruation schedule.” Jude glanced away. The loneliness in her heart pushed a tear from her eye. “I know this is ludicrous, unscrupulous even, but I may never get another opportunity like this. I’ve always wanted a child. Someone to love and nurture and spend my life with. If this doesn’t work out, I’ll be alone forever.”

“Aw, honey.” Nola stood and wrapped her arms around Jude. She pulled back, holding Jude’s shoulders. “But tell me. Why
not
Mr. Beckette?”
 

Jude bent to gather a tidy pair of pumps to match her outfit. She walked toward the bed and laid out her staid, stodgy suit, then stared out the window, defeat permeating her being. “He’s real now,” she whispered.

“He’s always been real, Ms. Duffy.”

“He was just an unfeeling playboy before.” Jude walked into the adjoining bath. “Nothing but a mindless body I could pay for sex and leave with no further compunction. Now…” She dropped her arms from trying to reassemble her French twist. “Now, he’s a real man with a real past and real emotions. He’s a widower, for goodness sake. And smart and funny, and I find myself inexplicably emotionally attracted to him.” She stared at her pale features. “And I can’t have sex and get pregnant when my emotions are involved. I need an emotionless, indifferent specimen.”

She touched up her makeup and brushed her teeth as Fantome’s taut, tan face popped into her mind. She reentered the main suite to dress. “Someone who doesn’t have the power to hurt me.”

Nola sat on the bed, eying her. “Believe it or not, I understand your crazy thought pattern here. But don’t you want to find love?”

Jude laughed. “Love? For me? Nola, look at me. I’m boring, aging and suffering from a slight case of obsessive-compulsive disorder.”

Nola’s eyebrows rose.

Jude slumped. “You see what I mean? I fall, they don’t, and I get hurt. Love is not, and never has been, in the forecast for me. But a child…” She glanced longingly at her make-believe Fairy Godmaid.

Nola smiled. “Anything is possible, Miss Duffy. You just have to believe in yourself.”

Jude did believe in herself…the few times she’d been with Beckette. She didn’t even know him but, in the short time they’d been together, she’d felt different. Safe and secure and worthy. Those were all things she’d never had before in any relationship. Except with Aunt Aggie, but that didn’t count. She was gone now too.

In all her previous relationships, Jude had been required to prove herself, consistently feeling less, not part of the crowd, as if she were an afterthought. “Well, regardless, there’s no harm in a single woman wanting to have sex with a single available man. It is the twenty-first century. Anthropologically speaking, casual sex has been around since the beginning of time. Only since the development of religious organizations and their doctrines to control societies, has sex been looked down upon when not practiced within the confines of a marital situation.”

Nola’s innocent eyes widened. “But you do want love, don’t you?”

Jude sank to the bed as a small tear slipped down her cheek. For all her bravado, she did want love. “Yes. It would be nice. But, statistically speaking, an illicit pregnancy is so much more attainable for me. I have to take what I can get.”

* * * *

Beck stood in his room, examining the skin graft scars along the left side of his back and arm.
He’d never have any feeling there, which was fine by him. He didn’t deserve to feel. He’d been cursed long ago for the transgressions of his youth. The plane crash that had killed a young Jude Duffy’s parents, his first flight as a new pilot, was only one sin that would haunt him forever.

Being an angry, rebellious, twenty-one-year-old son of a bitch, he’d been busy partying and screwing the airport manager’s daughter. He’d rushed his pre-flight check and they’d encountered problems at ten thousand feet. He’d lived, scarred and burned for life, but his trusting cargo had died, his drunken secret kept hidden behind his guilt all these years.

Sixteen years later, he’d killed his wife with his deadly, heartless curse.

Beck rammed his arms into his shirt and tugged it closed. Regardless of the last year of rehab, he was still cursed, still making bad choices.

Like getting involved with Jude Duffy while misleading her about his identity.

It was selfish. He knew damn well if she realized who he was, she’d run for the hills.

But he wanted her like no other woman before.

Beck grunted. The world was a funny place. Putting Jude and Beck together here, now. But, why?

Fate was an evil bitch.

He could tell himself he wasn’t interested. He was a pro at being uninterested. But with her, in this place, he couldn’t resist.

She was stern and bossy and crazy. Her offbeat buoyancy and zest for learning was refreshing. It drew him like a bee to honey.

And that body and face. Like an angel from Heaven, made just for him.

Beck shook his head and pulled on his boots. If he didn’t know better, he’d think the ghost stories about the castle were true. Destined lovers brought together by the ghosts of tragic lovers from the past.

Why the hell she chose this week to lose her virginity, under his watch, was a mystery. He straightened his tie. For Christ’s sake, it was none of his business. Except for slimy Richard Fantome. He had to be here, sniffing up her skirt. How could Beck step aside and let her be ruined by that asshole?

She had no idea what she was getting herself into.

He owed her, in some strange penitential way. Didn’t he?