Naturally Naughty (14 page)

Lord help her, she still wanted him so much she could barely stand up. She wanted to nibble on his neck, to taste his earlobe, to feel his body get all sweaty again—preferably while it was on top of hers. Inside hers.

“You ready?” he asked, letting his hand fall to his side.

She nodded dumbly. “Uh-huh.”
Ready for just about anything.

“Do you like it spicy?”

Spicy? Oh, yeah, she
loved
it spicy. “Yeah. Real spicy.”

“I think there’s Tabasco sauce in the fridge.”

Tabasco? Kate shook her head, hard, and realized Jack
was watching her with an amused, knowing look on his face.

He’d been talking about hot and spicy eggs.

She’d been thinking about hot and spicy sex.

Please, floor, open up under me and swallow me whole.

“Kate?”

She raised a brow, trying to pretend she hadn’t been picturing some of the spicy things the two of them could do on the kitchen table. Or counter. Or floor. “Huh?”

He reached for her, his hand brushing past her hip as he touched the handle on the refrigerator door. She jumped out of the way, noticing the way his hand tightened on the handle, as if he were exerting some great effort. Possibly for control? Was he as affected as she by their closeness?

There was only one way to find out. She reached out and touched the thin scar on his neck. He flinched and glanced at her. “It must have hurt,” she said softly.

Jack didn’t pull away as she moved closer, standing on tiptoes until her lips brushed his neck. Remembering the way he’d kissed her hip in the shower, she couldn’t help kissing that hot, damp, male skin. Slipping her tongue out, she savored the faint salty flavor of sweat from his workout. She sighed at how good he tasted to her. Her touch elicited an answering groan from him, but he didn’t move away. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to kiss it and make it better,” she murmured as she moved her lips higher, kissing a path up to his earlobe. She stepped closer, for better access, sliding one foot between his, until his thigh was nestled between her legs. Kate closed her eyes briefly at the very intimate contact.

He muttered a soft curse, as if he could take no more. Catching her around the waist, he lifted her higher, pressing his leg tighter against her sex as he lowered his mouth to hers. Their kiss was explosive. Hot and wet. Deep and hun
gry. Kate met every thrust of his tongue, loving the way he tasted, the way he explored her mouth as if he couldn’t get enough of her. She jerked her hips, needing the strength of his hard thigh against the crotch of her jean shorts.

When they finally broke apart, Jack stared down at her, warmth and tenderness shining through the passion of his gaze. “I invited you to breakfast. I didn’t intend to leap on you at the first opportunity.”

To be honest, she’d done the leaping. But she didn’t point that out. “I wasn’t playing any get-back-at-you games,” she admitted softly. “Like Friday.”

“Good. I wasn’t playing games, either. But I think we should probably sit down and eat.”

Nodding, she took a few deep breaths, trying to forget the way he’d kissed her, the way the strong muscles of his thigh had felt against her still-aroused body. She was too thankful that he wasn’t going to tease her about her momentary lapse into mindless lust to argue.

As they sat to eat, Jack apparently looked for a quick way to change the subject. “Hey, I know what I forgot to tell you. I heard some news about the Rialto yesterday.”

“Really?”

“Apparently the city now owns it, due to a loan default. It’s sat there empty for years, but now a group of concerned citizens has announced they’re going to work on renovating it, then open it as a public playhouse.”

She smiled. “Wonderful.”

“It gets better. Rose Madison is leading the effort.”

“Miss Rose?”

He nodded. “She’s the one who told me about it. I ran into her. I mentioned we were both happy to see some work being done on the old place.”

“Did she remember me?”

“Yes. She said if you want to pay for those free movies, you’re welcome to come down anytime with a paintbrush.”

“I think I can wield a paintbrush.”

“Hopefully better than you can crack an egg,” he said with a grin as he picked a tiny white piece of shell off his tongue.

“You got me. I’m a lousy cook. But if you want me to tell you how to save money at the grocery store, I’m your woman.”

“Absolutely,” he said softly.

Absolutely? What did that mean? Absolutely he wanted to learn how to save money grocery shopping?

Or…absolutely, she was his woman?

Too chicken to ask which he meant, since she wasn’t sure what she wanted his answer to be, Kate finished her breakfast, thanked him and then left.

But she wondered about his comment all day long. Not to mention their kiss.

J
ACK SPENT THE AFTERNOON
out of the area, visiting some of his late father’s properties in nearby towns. They were mostly rentals, small tract houses for young families. His father hadn’t been a slumlord, but some of the buildings were old and in need of repair. The agent who was handling the sales told him he’d take care of it.

When he got back to Pleasantville that afternoon, he found the duplex empty. Kate’s SUV was not parked outside. She’d probably gone back to her cousin’s place on Lilac Hill, which was the reason Jack decided not to go to his mother’s house.

He told himself he wasn’t avoiding
her.
No, he was just trying to avoid temptation. He hadn’t been kidding in the kitchen when he’d said he wanted things to change between them once they got back to Chicago. That day couldn’t
come soon enough for him, particularly after that kiss they’d shared.

He had also been fully aware of her desire for him. Hell, she’d worn it as if it were perfume, oozing from her every pore. So staying away from her seemed to be the smart choice.

Needing something to do, he remembered Rose’s request for help at the Rialto. He’d developed a real affection for the old theater, particularly since the day he’d met Kate. Changing into some old clothes, he drove downtown and pulled up outside the Rialto.

Right behind a silver SUV.

Drive away
. Of course he didn’t. Seeing her might be foolish, since he already spent way too much of his time thinking about her, but he parked and got out of his truck, anyway.

As he entered the building he heard loud music blaring from a boom box and saw a pair of bare legs, complete with paint-speckled sneakers, dangling from a scaffold. “What do you think you’re doing?” he asked, recognizing the curve of Kate’s calves.

He realized he probably should not have startled her only after he saw her drop the paintbrush. Right toward his head.

A quick step back saved his skull, but not his shorts.

“Jack,” she cried as the brush careened down his leg, leaving squishy beige marks in its path.

“I’m really sorry,” she muttered. She shimmied on her hands and knees across the wood plank of the scaffolding, doing very interesting things to her black gym shorts. Well, black and beige gym shorts, considering all the paint stains.

She reached the built-in metal ladder on the side of the scaffold and swung around to it. Not wanting her to drop anything else—including herself—Jack went over and steadied her as she descended.

“Did you get any paint on the walls?” he asked her, looking down at her speckled clothes. And her skin. Not to mention her face and hair. “You are a complete mess.”

“That’s what long showers are for.”

Oh, great. Kate was taking another long shower. Maybe he should just shoot himself now.

Looking around the empty lobby, he said, “You here alone?”

She nodded. “Miss Rose and her brother were here when I arrived. They were just getting ready to go for a dinner break, but said if I wanted to I could keep working on this wall.”

Jack followed her gaze and looked at the interior wall that she’d been painting. It extended up all the way to the top of the open, two-story lobby. Where Kate had been working, he saw a big circle of paint. “Didn’t anyone teach you to do the trim first?”

“Since you’re the construction genius, why don’t you do it?” She bent, grabbed another brush and tossed it to him. Though not paint covered, the brush was wet and as he caught it on the bristle-side, it oozed beige-tinged water between his fingers.

“Nice,” he said as he shook the moisture off. “I think you’ve been selling body paint at your store too long. This kind doesn’t come off so easily.”

She stepped closer, a laugh on her lips. “Oh, so you’re saying I shouldn’t do…this?” She lifted her completely white hand and cupped his cheek.

He cringed, then realized he didn’t feel moisture against his skin. “If that paint on your hand had been wet, I’d be turning you over my knee and spanking you right now.”

Her eyes widened. “Oooh, sounds kinky. I didn’t know you were into that sort of thing.”

“I’m not,” he replied. He had to know. “Are you?”

She turned her head slightly and peeked at him through lowered lashes. “Light S and M? Well, lots of my customers are.”

He couldn’t resist asking, “
Light
S and M? How, exactly, would that differ from the heavy variety?”

She shrugged. “It’s more playful, not for seriously weirded-out people. We don’t sell whips, belts or paddles. But some couples enjoy the occasional black leather dominatrix outfit.”

He had a sudden mental picture of her wearing black leather and clenched his jaw.

“And, of course, there’s also light bondage. Handcuffs, silk scarves, blindfolds. It’s all part of the fantasy.”

“Fantasy?” God help him. Even though it might give him another long, sleepless night, he really wanted to know her fantasies. “Like?”

“Like being overwhelmed,” she admitted softly. “Letting yourself be overcome by passion, even made helpless when you’re with someone you can trust.” She bit the corner of her lip, as if deciding to continue. “Exploring every possibility, going as far as your body can go, without being able to stop, because someone you know would never hurt you is in complete control.”

Kate was nearly covered with paint from head to toe. Her thick, dark hair was pulled haphazardly into a ponytail at the back of her neck. She wore no makeup and she held a drippy paint roller plopping little drops of paint on the plastic drop cloth every time she moved it.

He’d never wanted her more.

Jack had walked hip-deep into this conversation, so he had no one else to blame. And he couldn’t quite find a way to get out of it. Nor was he sure he wanted to.

“Is that your fantasy?” He heard the thick tone in his voice. “Being overwhelmed? Letting someone you trust
give you pleasure without any mental barriers, any restrictions, taking because you have no other choice but to take?”

“I think so,” she murmured. “Being free to wring every ounce of gratification you can because it’s beyond your control to stop it.”

In twenty seconds Kate had just made him understand the appeal of silk scarves and handcuffs.

“You must be really good at your job,” he said softly. “Though, I still don’t get the whole spanking thing.”

She gave him a wicked grin. “Well, I don’t particularly care for pain, but I have to say you are
very
good at kissing and making all better.”

Remembering kissing her hip in the shower the other night, he knew exactly what she meant. His body reacted instinctively, another sudden rush of heat rushing southward from his gut to his groin. “Now, I
could
take that the wrong way and be offended,” he said, stepping closer.

“Oh?”

He nodded. “You just basically told me to kiss your ass. I could take it as an insult.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Or a really tempting invitation.”

Her lips parted and her tongue snaked out to moisten them.

“Which do you think it was?”

Unable to resist, he lifted a hand to her throat, running his finger down and touching its hollow. “I think if this were a week ago, it’d be an insult. Today, I’m not so sure.”

She closed her eyes, tilting her head back as he traced a path around her neck, to her collarbone, touching her only with the tips of his fingers. “Me, neither,” she admitted.

Needing to feel her in his arms again, Jack tilted her chin up and caught her mouth with his own. She moaned, parting her lips, inviting him deeper, and he accepted her invitation.

He loved kissing Kate. Every time was better than the last, hot and sweet, carnal and tender. He made love to her
mouth, tasting her, drinking of her, making no effort to step away to disguise his body’s reaction. She pressed against him, moaning again as he moved his mouth to press kisses on her jaw. “It’s hard to find a clean spot,” he said with a chuckle.

“Here’s one,” she whispered, pushing the sleeve of her tank top, and her bra strap, to the edge of her shoulder. A naughty invitation, which he immediately accepted. He kissed down her neck, to her collarbone, and right below it.

“Where else?” he asked, nudging the cotton top down even lower. She answered with only a soft sigh and an arch in her back, telling him to proceed. He did, scraping his tongue down to the top curve of her breast, then sliding it lower to flick at her pebbled nipple.

She quivered in his arms, and leaned back against the old refreshment counter. Appropriate. He wanted to completely gobble her up. But first he wanted to see her.

As if he had no control over them, his hands moved to the waistband of her shorts and tugged her shirt free. He lifted it up, slowly, watching as the toned, creamy-colored skin of her stomach was revealed inch by inch. Until finally he saw the lace of her bra and the bottom curves of her breasts. His mouth went dry with hunger. “You are so beautiful,” he whispered as he moved his hands higher. She didn’t reply, just arched into his touch, twisting until he slipped his fingers beneath her bra. She hissed when he touched her nipples, tweaking them lightly, stroking and teasing the way he knew she’d liked when they’d made love before.