Mr. Right Now (11 page)

Mason grunted. “Me either. You could have left me behind with the cash, you know. It’s not every day someone leaves me thirteen thousand dollars.” Then, he posed a question of his own. “Are you going to tell me why we just ran through this ship like people fleeing the
Titanic
?”

How much did he really want to know? She looked into his sea green eyes, seeing a lot of curiosity and a hint of...was that compassion?

Couldn’t be. Curiosity was the length of his involvement. It must seem ridiculous that she would leave all that money in a slot machine. Whoever sat at the machine next would get one hell of a surprise. She shook her head and began to laugh. This whole situation was absurd. If she didn’t know any better, she would think the ship was outfitted with hidden cameras and she was the focus of some television show.

“Casey?” He smoothed his hand down her arm, and the heat inside her body ratcheted up a notch. He probably thought she was crazy. Really, had she done one sane thing since meeting him in the boarding line?

“What are you running from?” The words were quiet. Gentle sounding. Concerned. He spoke as if afraid she would break if he let a harsh word enter the room.

That only made her laugh louder. The real question was what
wasn’t
she running from? A big fat nothing.

How much did she want to tell him?

Her heart told her to trust the man. Tell him everything. Maybe if she let the story out, it would make more sense.

The laughter slowed to a few hiccups.

Her head told her she didn’t know him. He would never understand. She needed to get his plumber-psychology out of her life.

Moving back inside the room, Casey shut and locked the door again. “How long have you worked with your family?”

For a long moment, he didn’t answer. Her skin cooled when he removed his hand from her arm. Sitting beside her on the wooden bench, he folded his hands together. She watched as one thumb worked against the other.

She remembered how his hands felt against her body. For a man who worked with his hands, they were so smooth. Some woman somewhere must have taught him the benefits of lotion. The bitch.

With one touch of those hands he could stop her mind from thinking about anything but him. Only, she didn’t want him for that reason this time. She wanted him because he was Mason, and he made her feel alive.

“Worked with my family?” No hint of emotion. Just flat words.

She nodded, finally daring to look him in the eye. Curiosity was the only expression she saw this time. Pulling the card from her bag, she handed it over.

“This got mixed up with my clothes...earlier.” She shrugged her shoulder. “It must be interesting, working in the family business.”

Her own father hunted termites for a living. Her brothers, too. She had run as far and fast as she could from their life. Only lately she wondered if she made the right choice.

Her life was out of control. She couldn’t write. Would it have made a difference if she’d stayed in their small town instead of moving to New York City?

She wouldn’t have met Nate. Wouldn’t be avoiding reporters on a cruise ship. Wouldn’t be making the one man in the world who seemed to be interested in Casey instead of Cassandra think she was certifiable.

She stepped toward him, wanting to be in his space more than anything else at that moment. “My family is in the bug business. As the only girl I was not expected to de-termite a house once I was out of school. Do you like working with your family?”

He held the small rectangle of paper between his thumb and index finger, unmoving. Finally he said, “My dad, two of my brothers and one brother-in-law all work together. Sometimes I think that’s a little too much family in a confined space.”

Was that sadness in his voice? She reached out, taking his hand in her own. “Did you always want to be a plumber?” Or did he have other dreams? Did he wonder about that other road he could have taken?

Twining their fingers together, he pocketed the card. “I never wanted to be a plumber.”

She thought there was more to his answer than what he said. Family issues were hard to deal with. His problems could probably dwarf hers. She needed to turn her pop-psychology mind off. He wasn’t asking for therapy; he was just talking. “What was your dream?”

“Why did you leave thirteen thousand dollars in the casino?” He stood, walked to the door and turned around. “Thirteen grand. That’s rent for a couple months in New York. A nice cushion in your bank account, and you left it behind. What for?”

His eyes burned into hers, and still, she didn’t know how much of the truth to tell him. She didn’t want him to think she was nuts, or run screaming off the ship. How did she tell him her secrets without that happening?

“Why do you keep seeking me out?”

“I’m not.” But she could see the lie reflected in his eyes.

The heat inside the room magnified, causing a catch in Casey’s throat. “You came on to me like a freight train earlier.” She placed a quick kiss on his lips. “Sought out my stateroom.” She increased the pressure on his mouth this time, flicked her tongue against closed lips. “Had some pretty amazing sex with me on deck and then mysteriously bumped into me in the casino. And you could have left this room a hundred times already, but you haven’t. Why not?”

Mason stepped back, putting a fragment of space between their bodies. “Look, I know there’s something going on with you. Up on the deck earlier you were...different,” he said, running his hands through her hair. They were only inches apart. “What are you running from?”

“Maybe I just wanted to be alone with you.”

This time, he nipped at her lips. “Liar.”

Everything faded away. He was so close she could smell the soap he used in the shower. The scent of his cologne, and underneath it all, him.

“I’ll tell you my secrets if you tell me yours,” she said against his mouth. She knew there was something he wasn’t telling her. Something about his own past that he was keeping from her. It really shouldn’t be this important to know his secrets, at least not yet. She was jumping in too far and too fast.

She couldn’t stop.

Casey pulled his shirt from the waistband of his jeans and pushed it over his shoulders.

His hands lifted her t-shirt from her body as he backed them into the sauna again. Hot air touched her skin, made her nipples pucker.

“Who says I’ve got a secret?” He stood, pulling her with him. He went to work on the button and zip enclosure on her hip. In a second, she stood before him, naked. His eyes burned as he looked at her.

She felt the air suck from her lungs. The room was too hot or he was; she couldn’t decide which.

“Everybody has at least one secret,” she said, concentrating on bringing air to her lungs and reaching out to open his zipper. She was not going to pass out. She was going to enjoy the moment. And this time, she was going to look at him.

Pushing his pants over his hips, she took a step back.

Holy Mary, Mother of God.

She had had
that
inside her before? He speared out from the black hair between his thighs, looking nearly as long as her forearm.

Pulling a condom from the pocket of his pants, he said, “Like what you see?”

She felt her cheeks burn.

Definitely she liked what she saw. Nodding, she turned to the bench but before she could relax her gelatin-filled legs, he wrapped his hands around her arms and pushed her against the wall.

He found her breast, taking it in his mouth like he was starving. Her nipple pebbled as he teased the distended tip with his tongue. She wrapped her legs around his waist.

She buried her hands in his hair as a slow groan escaped her.

“Casey.”

Vaguely, she heard her name. “Mmm?”

Raising his mouth from her breast, he smiled and kissed her mouth. “Nothing. I just like saying your name.” Then his tongue plunged inside her mouth, matching her own thrust for thrust.

He trailed his fingers from her neck, down her torso and finally to the soft flesh of her thighs, making every muscle in her body come alive with the soft touch. Her belly quivered. Another touch, no matter how innocuous, and she would be lost.

His fingers caught in the cotton around her hips and he tugged it down, pushing her feet to the floor. He followed the movement with his mouth down her body. His tongue found her moist center and feasted. She clutched his shoulders as waves of pleasure radiated through her.

“Mason, now.” She wasn’t sure if she said the words aloud, but he stood, pulling her legs to lock around his hips and thrust inside her. For a few seconds he was still, and then slowly began to move.

Inch by inch, he withdrew and then pressed into her body. With every movement, the pressure inside her began to grow until they were riding the wave together. She wanted more. More time to forget. More time to get to know him. They had a week, technically, but this really had to be the end. She couldn’t avoid the reporter by banging Mason in any open room on the ship. This was it. Their encore.

She dug her fingernails into his shoulders, and her body began to quake. His hands tightened on her hips and he barked his release.

They rested for a few seconds, still connected in the most intimate of ways. He rested his forehead against hers and their breathing returned to normal.

“Sweet lord, you’re going to kill me,” he said.

She smiled, thinking the same thing. “But it will be a beautiful death,” she replied.

The moist air of the sauna kept Mason’s body temperature in the warmer-than-normal range, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. If he had to, he could spend the rest of his life right here. The room felt nice. Better than nice. He shifted to a more comfortable position, allowing Casey’s head to rest on his shoulder.

What the hell was he doing?

Making love to a beautiful woman, that’s what. Curled around Casey’s body on the narrow bench in the sauna, he knew exactly what he was doing. When her head had fallen forward to rest on his shoulder, he’d carried her across the room and settled there. What he couldn’t figure out was why.

He was either sleeping with a married woman or a liar. Mason Drury didn’t normally do either. To top that off, he was lying to her, too.

There was no reason for it. Sure, he was a reporter, but he wasn’t writing the story on her. He wouldn’t be allowed to write obituaries once he talked to Haynes. If he just came clean, he could explain about the white flashes she was running from. The flash wasn’t high-powered enough for the cameras professional photographers used. Most likely, some of her fans had seen her in the casino and decided to get a few snapshots, sending Casey into a panic.

But he didn’t tell her that. He acted like he hadn’t seen anything unusual at all. He was digging a hole he wasn’t sure he could escape.

Casey slept soundly with his arms tight around her midsection. Her back pressed to his chest, using his arm as a pillow, she looked so peaceful, the haunted look gone completely for the first time since he’d seen her in the boarding line. His heart softened a bit.

He was sabotaging this...whatever it was with her.

Adding her to his list of lovers-turned-friends had seemed fine earlier. Why was he having doubts about it now? This was a love cruise. People were supposed to do crazy things with practically perfect strangers.

She snuggled closer into his arms, her bottom burrowing into his pelvis, and he immediately hardened.