Kiss and Tell (19 page)

Up. Down. Up. Down.
Hmmm
.

"They thought it was time. I was of marriageable age, and malleable, and willing, to say the least. I just couldn't find the One – that's with a capital letter. Anyway, the boys got together and decided I was taking too long – which is amusing, since
they're
in their thirties and still single – but that's a whole other subject. They decided I needed someone nice and steady. No humongous ups and downs. No huge upheavals."

In fact, just the opposite of themselves.

"They figured you were enough excitement for any one couple, right?"

"Me?" She stared at him. Was he nuts? "Jake, I'm the most boring person I know! I'm a wanna-be artist working as a programmer at my dad's company. You can't get geekier than that. I've worked for him since high school, and all through college. Then nine to five. Time off for good behavior. That's one of the reasons I came up here. To decide just what I'm going to do to change things."

"What things?"

"My life. I want to be an artist. I
am
an artist." She picked up the top sheet of paper and showed him her sketch. "Look at this foot! It's a
fabulous
foot. I can draw. I'm good at it. I
love
it. What am I doing working nine to five for my dad?"

"What
are
you doing working for your dad?" Jake asked obediently.

"Taking the path of least resistance, that's what. Not making waves. Being a good girl... Get that look off your face. I can't help myself, I behave strangely around you. After this weekend I'm going to know where I'm bound. Like the Cowardly Lion, I'll find my courage and act accordingly."

Jake frowned. "The Cowardly Lion?"

The poor man was having a hard time following the conversation. She picked up her drawing and shaded his crooked baby toe. It was very cute. She wondered if his children would have crooked baby toes.

"
The Wizard of Oz
. Remember? The Cowardly Lion was searching for courage, the Tin Man was searching for his heart, the straw guy was looking for his brain."

His lips twitched, and he got a funny glint in his eye. "Ah. And what do you need more courage for? You seem to have it in spades."

"Not. I am one major cluck. Ask my dad. Ask my brothers. No, on second thought, don't. They'd tell you my life story, and you'd be bored to tears, I assure you."

Duchess trotted over and laid her head on Marnie's shoulder. She reached up and stroked the dog between her eyes. "While I adore them, the Four Musketeers have always treated me—"

His eyes narrowed. "The
who?
"

"My brothers. That's what we call them. Why? What's the matter?"

"I had a bunch of fr – guys. We were known as the Four Musketeers."

"Wow. How cool is
that
for a coincidence? Where are—"

"You were saying?"

Marnie shook her head, then put down her papers and dislodged Duchess's head to get up and refill Jake's mug from the pot on the counter. "You and my brothers would get on great. Or kill each other," she muttered under her breath. She came back and sat down again, cradling the steaming mug. "They t—"

"Is that my coffee?"

She took a quick sip, then another, before stretching out to hand it to him. Their fingers brushed, and her heart gave a crazy thump. "Would you..."

His gaze fell to her mouth, then seemed to lock on for eternity. Very slowly he dragged his gaze back to meet hers.

"Would you like another refill?" she asked absently, watching his pupils dilate. Her heart leapt, then started to speed up. Intimate body parts started to tingle. Wow. This man was potent.

"The question is moot, since you're the one who keeps drinking it," he said tightly, putting the mug on the trunk coffee table. A muscle twitched in his jaw. "Finish the story."

The princess had been asleep for a hundred years, and the prince kissed her
... "They treat me like spun glass." She leaned back in a vain attempt to escape his force field.
Faint hope
. "Like some dinky, fragile little kid. I love them madly, but it drives me bonkers."

His focus was on her lips as he said raggedly, "So you had to kiss a few frogs to find a prince?"

She wanted his mouth on hers so badly her lips itched. She rubbed the back of her hand over her mouth and shifted in her seat. If this wasn't the most ridiculous situation she'd ever encountered...

She felt like a fly at a window.
Thump. Thump. Thump.

Was she destined to want a man who didn't want her? How ridiculous was this? Perhaps it was some sort of weird cosmic joke. Now that she knew she didn't need a man, she'd suddenly met a man she wanted?

Get a clue, girl
.
This guy is made of steel
, she reminded herself. Her heart felt like a runaway train in her chest. He might have a will of iron, but right now his eyes were as hot and sharp as lasers. Her throat felt extraordinarily dry. "It's getting warm in here."

"The temperature's a steady sixty-four degrees. It hasn't changed. Get on with the story."

"Yeah, well, I like fairy tales just fine, but the reality was, most guys are attracted to Daddy's money, and my brothers made them
very
nervous. I dated what I hoped were princes – some were nice guys, others were frogs. My brothers brought me their version of prince look-alikes. But they still looked green and warty to me."

"You appear to be pretty damn self-sufficient to me. Why are your brothers so protective of you?"

Oops
. He was the last person on the planet she wanted to tell. Too late, she realized she'd talked herself into a blind alley.

"Um...I had this heart thing when I was a kid."

Jake sat up. "
Heart
thing?"

"A little heart thing. No biggie. But I was sort of puny until I was about fifteen."

Jake swung his long legs off the couch. "And this 'little heart thing,' it's fixed now?"

Marnie waved a hand. "Oh, sure. I was all done with the surgeries by my fifteenth birthday."

"Surgeries?"

"I had stenosis and had a couple of valve replacements."

He went pale, and she was sorry she'd told him. Very sorry. People
always
reacted that way. She dredged up a grin. "Wanna see my scars?"

"Yeah," he said softly. "Show me."

Marnie made a face. "I was joking, Jake."
Sort of.
"But of course the Four Mutineers have never gotten over all the time I spent in the hosp—" She felt a little leap, part fear, part anticipation, as he rose from the couch and stalked toward her. "What are you doing?"

"Have to check something out."

"What?" The wheels screeched as she scooted back. She looked up at him suspiciously. "Are you going to kiss me?"
And if so, could you hurry up? The anticipation is killing me
.

"Hmmm," Jake said softly, walking around the trunk toward her, his eyes so dark they appeared black. "This could go either way."

Grammy used to tell her to be careful what she wished for, because she might get it. She swallowed. "If you had a mustache, you'd be twirling it."

"I don't."

She closed her eyes. "Yeah, I know, but—"

He snagged her foot as the chair bumped into the long console behind her. She let out a huff of air.

"We were talking about you." His fingers slipped up to wrap around her ankle, effectively stopping her retreat. "So they protected you?" His hand skimmed from her ankle up her leg.

"Yes."

"You used my razor last night."

She felt a flutter zing up her spine. "Yeah, that's why my skin's so dr— Jake, what are you doing?"

His smile was slow, dangerous, and heart-stoppingly sexy. "I wanna see that scar."

"It's on my chest."

"I'm getting there." He slipped his hands under her arms and swung her off the chair as if she were a doll.

Marnie clutched at his shoulders as he carried her over to the couch. He laid her down as carefully as if she were a land mine ready to detonate. And by the way her heart pounded off the seconds like a timer, perhaps she was.

The soft fabric was still warm from his body. Her head found the indentation his head had made in the cushion. She licked dry lips and watched his eyes smolder as he followed the movement.

He sat down beside her and started unbuttoning her shirt. Very, very slowly, his eyes never leaving her face.

"They insist on taking care of you now, and don't particularly like the men you keep choosing for yourself?"

"That a-about sums it up."

Cool air bathed her chest as he used both hands to slide open her shirt. Inch by inch. Marnie felt a ridiculously Victorian urge to grasp the fabric closed over her bare boobs and closed her eyes. Instead she lay back, muscles twitching, lungs aching for a breath, body thrumming with need, as Jake took his sweet time.

Her blood became a slow fire as he parted the shirt, his hands brushed against her skin with maddening slowness. Her breasts tightened and ached as the path of his gaze seared her skin everywhere it touched.

She didn't stifle the moan of pleasure when his fingers brushed her tight nipple.

Her hands slid up the satin, heated skin of his upper arms. Solid muscle. Tensile strength. Her fingers kneaded with restless, hungry urgency.

He was a large man. Well muscled, strong. Yet she felt completely safe in his hands. He savored her with his eyes, making her senses simmer and churn with pleasure. The musky maleness of his skin filled her senses as he leaned over her. She closed her eyes on a whimper. Just the scent of him turned her on.

"Jaaake," she moaned, her voice shaking with urgency.

*

He arranged the edges of her shirt so he had a nice full view of her chest. She had a beautiful chest, small plump breasts, creamy pale skin. The scar was a pearl-white streak on smooth satin.

"Is there a metal valve operating under this soft flesh?"

"Metal? Oh." She tried to refocus. "Yeah, metal. They tried the other. Didn't w-work."

"Your heart was stopped." Judas Priest. They'd stopped this heart he felt under his fingertips. Stopped it, and inserted an obscene, life-giving piece of metal.

"Can we change the subject, please?"

"Sure."

Hell, yeah. Let's have something life-affirming to take away the taste of her lying on a table in a sterile room
. "Judas, woman. I had you running all over God's creation, to hell and beyond. Why the hell didn't you – I should have – damn it!"

"Calm down, Jake. I've been exercising and running for years. I'm fit as a fiddle, really."

He traced the path up her sternum with one finger. He wanted her so badly he thought he'd explode, but he couldn't get enough of touching her. He
needed
to touch her. Absorb her. To feel the throb of her heart, the ebb and flow of her lifeblood.

It had been a long time since he'd had a woman. Suddenly fiercely glad the woman he was with was Marnie, Jake opened his hand flat between her breasts. Finger and thumb practically spanned her chest.

Her pupils dilated as she stared up at him, lips parted. Her fingers flexed on his arms.

Light from the monitors bathed her as a weak noonday sun made a brief appearance, turning her skin pale gold. Her nipples puckered. She breathed a sound somewhere between a sigh and a vibration of pleasure.

She was as responsive as he'd known she'd be. Jake focused his mind down to a pinpoint. Marnie. Soft, passionate flesh and bone. He stroked his hand up over the gentle inner swell of her breasts until he could put two fingers on the unsteady pulse at the base of her throat.

Vibrantly alive.

"The gospel according to Michael, Derek, Kane, and Kyle," she said breathlessly. "Thou shalt not touch their baby sister until they have folded, stapled, spindled, or mutilated you f-first."

"Is that so?" Jake drawled. Motor mouth was at it again.

"Yeah, that's so," she echoed, eyes glazed. She licked her lips. "My life story to date. Let's hear yours."

Her nipples were the same pale pink as her lips. He lowered his head and touched the tip of his tongue to one hard peak. She jerked and gasped his name. Heat spiraled through him in a shocking burst.

Jake felt her fingers on the back of his head tunnel through his hair.

"Thirty-six years old."

He skimmed his other hand up her narrow rib cage, feeling the goose bumps on her skin.

"Born, Chicago. Navy at sixteen."

God, yes
. Jake thought on a curse and a prayer. She did make those sexy little noises. He filled his palm with the sweet plumpness of one breast while his mouth laved the other, and she moaned and whimpered.

"T-FLAC from twenty-one." Her body vibrated under his mouth. "Never been engaged or married. That's it."

Her fingers tightened in his hair. "No!"

He chuckled. He'd meant,
That's it. I'm done talking.
He skimmed his knuckles down her hot cheek. She made a noise somewhere between a sob and a whimper.

His heart skittered crazily. "You don't want me to stop?"

"Can a mermaid do the splits?" she asked unsteadily.

The sound he made was part moan, part laugh. He bent his head and brushed his mouth over hers.

A thought streaked through his mind.
Ah, hell.

"I don't have protection."

"It doesn't matter. I don't care. Oh," she said softly, closing her eyes, fingers tightened in his hair as he stroked her breast. "It feels so
good
having you touch me like this."

He bent the last half inch and kissed her hungrily. The only truly effective way he'd found of shutting her up.

When the time came, he'd pull out. It wasn't perfect, but right now it was that or abstinence. And abstaining would be like trying to hold the dam back with his tongue.

She rose to meet him, wound her arms tightly about his neck, and opened her mouth to greet him.

Her tongue was scorching, insatiable. A blatant simulation of the more intimate act. She kissed him with hot, sweet abandon, a low hum in the back of her throat. Nothing held back, no artifice. Her tongue active, insistent, ravenous. Frantic hands brailled his back and shoulders. She managed to get his shirt pulled from his waistband.