"Anne,"
"Hmm,"
"I don't think you should ask for your money back on that fancy underwear."
And that was another thing she hadn't known— that laughter could be a part of the mix.
Anne came awake slowly. The first thing she noticed was that she was too warm, and she frowned fretfully at the weight of the covers around her waist and hips. Why on earth would she have piled so many covers on the bed in the middle of summer? Barely awake, she moved to push them away, but what she touched wasn't soft linen and wool but warm, hard muscle and sinew. Memory rolled over her in a wave, her breath rushing out as her eyes flew open to stare at an unfamiliar ceiling.
Neill.
She was with Neill, in Chicago, in the suite he'd brought her to the day before, in the bed where he'd made love to her the night before. Several times. Cautiously, half-afraid she might have dreamed it all, she turned her head on the pillow. He was sleeping on his side, one arm thrown across her stomach, one leg resting between hers with a casual intimacy that made her flush with pleasure and a touch of embarrassment.
Not that she had any business feeling embarrassed after the night just past, she thought, her flush deepening as the memories rushed over her, warming her skin. It seemed incredible that a man like this could want her so much, but she'd had unmistakable proof in the way he'd reached for her again and again during the night. The last time had been somewhere near dawn, because she remembered the pearl gray light seeping through the windows, shadowing his face as he moved above her, the newly familiar weight of him pressing her gently back into the yielding mattress as he loved her with long, slow strokes that seemed to reach all the way to her soul, making it last until she was clinging to him with damp hands, his name leaving her on a sob as he took her over the edge, burying his face in her hair as he fell with her.
Oh yes, he definitely wanted her.
She smiled at the thought, a small, feline curve of her lips. So this was the morning after. She'd always wondered what it would be like to wake up in a man's arms, to know herself wanted. Now she knew, and it felt simply incredible. Her skin felt sensitized, as if his touch had brought new nerve endings to life. There was a delicious tenderness in her breasts and between her thighs. With every breath, she could smell the warm, musky scent of sex, a scent she knew on some primal level.
Her fingers moved gently on Neill's arm. She felt different, not just physically, but within herself. She felt...womanly. Her smile took on a sheepish edge. It seemed a ridiculously old-fashioned idea, like something out of an old novel where the heroine loses her virginity and suddenly, in an amazing transformation, changes overnight from girl to woman. But it wasn't the loss of her virginity that made her feel different. It was what this weekend represented. She'd finally stepped outside the cushioned box in which she'd spent most of her life. She was taking a chance, actually having a life. It was a heady thought.
Neill stirred beside her, and all her newfound courage vanished in a flash. A giddy wave of panic surged through her at the thought of facing those clear blue eyes this morning. Cautiously, she eased her way out from under the weight of his arm and leg, sliding toward the edge of the bed. She started to swing her legs over the edge of the bed, only to feel a hard arm slide around her waist and drag her back to land against the pillows in a flushed heap.
Sleepy, sapphire eyes smiled down at her. His voice was a husky rasp. "Where were you sneaking off to?"
"I...um...just to. ..I wasn't sneaking," she lied, staring at his collarbone. It had been easy to be bold last night, riding high on his kisses and maybe just a little on the wine, knowing she looked her best It was something else altogether this morning, with the memories of the night just past tumbling through her brain and both of them naked in the sunlight that spilled through the curtains that neither of them had thought to pull.
"You were definitely sneaking,'' he accused. He lowered his head to nuzzle her neck. His jaw felt rough against her tender skin, a new, unfamiliar intimacy that sent a shiver up her spine. "Sneaking is a punishable crime in Chicago."
"Is it?" He was nibbling his way down her throat, sending every logical thought spinning out of her head. "Don't I...oh!" Her back arched as his mouth slid across her breast, his tongue swirling over her nipple. "Isn't there some sort of trial?" she got out breathlessly.
"In the case of sneaking, the victim gets to hand out whatever he feels is a fitting punishment.'' Neill's tongue probed the shallow indentation of her belly button, his mouth curving against her skin as he felt her arch, her legs parting in unconscious invitation. She was so incredibly responsive— warm and trembling and his. Only his. After the night they'd just shared, it hardly seemed possible, but he was as hard as if he'd never touched her, every muscle quivering with the need to have her again.
"What...what sort of punishment?"
"This," he whispered, lowering his head to taste her sweet, moist flesh. She jerked in shock, her breath exploding from her.
"Oh my God! Neill, you—" Her fingers slid into his hair, tensed as if to pull him away, but he lifted her, opening her more fully, his tongue stabbing into her, and her hands dropped away in mute surrender.
By the time he gave in to the howling demands of his own flesh and slid up her body, Anne was limp and trembling beneath him. Her big gray eyes held a glazed look as he positioned himself against her, entering the first tiny bit and then stopping long enough to wrap his hand in her hair, holding her eyes as he thrust his aching hardness into the yielding warmth of her.
"Mine," he whispered gutturally and bent to kiss her, letting her taste herself on his mouth as he drove her ruthlessly to climax.
It seemed a long time later when he summoned every ounce of strength left in him to roll to the side. She was definitely going to be the death of him, he decided, listening to the ragged sound of his own breathing. But what a hell of a way to go.
"If that's what I got for just trying to sneak out of bed," she said huskily, "I can't wait to see what happens if I actually make it out of the room.''
Laughing a little shakily, Neill pulled her close against his side. "Don't make me get tough with you. At least, not until I've had time to recover."
They ordered lunch from room service. Neill grinned at Anne's obvious delight in having a white-clothed table rolled into the room with everything covered by silver-domed lids. He'd spent enough time in hotel rooms that he took such things for granted, but her pleasure made him remember the publicity tour for his first book and the wonderful novelty of having a black-jacketed waiter bring breakfast to his room.
After lunch, he resisted the urge to take her back to bed and swept her out to see something of the city. The weather was in a cooperative mood. It was summer, which meant heat, but the humidity was down and clear blue skies arched over the city.
He took her to the Miracle Mile, where they window shopped, along with hordes of tourists and residents. He bought her a bumper sticker that said "I Love Chicago" and a tacky plastic figure, purporting to represent Mrs. O'Leary's cow, presumably in the days before it kicked over the lamp that started the Great Chicago Fire. He saw a dozen other things he wanted to buy her— a dress she admired, a diamond bracelet that made her sigh— but, even if she would have accepted them, expensive gifts would mean explanations, and that was the last thing he wanted.
Sometime during the night, he'd decided that explanations could wait. It might have been when she'd told him she was wearing lingerie that came with a guarantee. Or maybe it was before that, when they'd stood suspended high over the city and he'd kissed her. Or maybe he'd never really intended to make explanations until the weekend was over. He was no longer sure what his thinking had been, and it didn't really matter. He didn't really care about anything right now except seeing the happy glow in Anne's eyes. The real world would simply have to wait a day or two.
***
Neill didn't tell Anne that they were having dinner at his brother's restaurant until he was pulling the Vette into a parking place marked Employees Only.
"I knew parking would be at a premium on Saturday night," he explained as he handed her out of the low-slung car. "But Tony promised not to have the car towed."
"I didn't expect to be meeting your family," Anne said, hanging back.
"Just my brother." He tugged on her hand. "If it was going to be the whole bunch, I'd have provided you with earplugs. We tend to be a little noisy when we get together."
"I didn't really dress for meeting people," she said uneasily. The thought of meeting Neill's family, even if it was just one member, had nerves fluttering in the pit of her stomach.
"You look great," he assured her truthfully. The apricot-colored dress, with its nipped-in waist and gentle scooped neckline, suited her. She'd pulled her hair up into a soft knot, leaving little curls free to tease the nape of her neck. It was a style that never failed to make his fingers twitch with the urge to pull the pins loose and see her hair tumble down around her face. Then again, just looking at her made him twitch with the urge to do any number of things, all of them highly unsuitable at the moment. "You'll like Tony and his family.''
"I'm sure they're very nice." But she still hung back, eyeing the building nervously.
"You owe me," Neill said. "I ate dinner with your parents and survived to tell the tale."
Reluctantly, Anne let him pull her forward. She could only hope that his brother wasn't as intimidating as her mother.
The sign on the restaurant read "Devlin's" in neat black script. The interior was rough-cut wood and sawdust on the floor, but there were fresh flowers on every table, and the wait staff wore trim black trousers and crisp white shirts. It was an interesting mix of cafe casual and understated elegance. Judging by the fact that almost every table was full, Anne assumed that business was good.
When Neill gave his name to the girl standing behind the wooden podium near the front door, she smiled and immediately led them to a table near the kitchen door.
"Most popular table in the house," she said, running an expert eye over it to make sure everything was as it should be. "Tony had us hold it for you. I'll let him know you're here."
As they sat down, Anne gave Neill a questioning look. "Since when is a table right next to the kitchen the most popular one in the house?"
"Since you're eating at Devlin's." He pulled a long bread stick from the glass in the middle of the table, broke it in half and handed one half to her. "People don't just come here because the food's great, which it is. They come here because Tony makes them feel like their presence was the one thing he needed to make his life perfect. He makes it a point to leave the kitchen and meet the customers, talk to them about what they like, what they don't like, ask how their grandmother in Cleveland is doing and how does their daughter like the new school. He has an incredible memory, and he never forgets a face.
"This table is the best in the house because he always stops here, and, if he's working out a new dish, there's a pretty good chance that, whoever is sitting here is going to get to sample it and offer comments. Not that he pays any attention to what they say," he added with a grin. "When it comes to his food, Tony doesn't listen to anyone but himself, but it makes people feel like they're a part of things, like they're—"
"Family," Anne muraiured.
"Exactly."
Before he could say anything else, the kitchen door swung open and a horde of people spilled out. Grinning, Neill shot to his feet. For a few minutes all was laughter and chaos, at least to Anne's dazzled eyes, but after a bit she managed to sort the horde into three people—four if you counted the big-eyed baby perched on the woman's hip. Neill reached out to catch her hand, drawing her out of her chair.
"Come meet the guy who made my childhood a living hell."
"That's the privilege of being an older brother." Tony Devlin smiled as he said it, but the look he gave her was assessing, questioning. "Don't believe everything he tells you," he advised. "The truth is, he was always my mother's favorite, and she spoiled him hideously. I was just trying to balance things out a little."
"Jealousy rears its ugly head," Neill said, shaking his head sadly.
Anne shook hands with Tony, his wife Mary Ellen, their daughter, Sophy, who had just celebrated her fourteenth birthday the previous month, and received a toothless smile from the baby, who was six months old and named Timothy.
"We believe in spacing our children carefully," Mary Ellen said, chuckling.
It was like being swept up in a cheerful tornado. Sentences were started, interrupted and finished later without anyone ever seeming to lose track of who was saying what. By the time Tony announced that he had to get back to the kitchen or risk ruining his business, Anne's head was spinning with a whirlwind of impressions.
The two brothers shared the same coloring but not much else. Tony was shorter and stockier, the blue of his eyes was not quite as brilliant, and his features hovered between ordinary and pleasantly homely. Until he smiled. When he smiled, you couldn't help but smile back and wonder if maybe he wasn't much better looking than you'd originally thought.
His wife was comfortably forty and comfortably plump. At Neill's insistence, she and Sophy had joined them for dinner.
"Of course, if I keep eating Tony's cooking, I'm never going to lose the extra weight I put on with the baby, but I guess that's what I get for marrying a chef," she said, patting one ample hip. "Sometimes I wish I'd fallen in love with a stockbroker, but then I figure he'd probably make enough money for me to be able to afford to buy Tony's cheesecake and I'd end up fat anyway."
"And divorced," her husband said, coming up behind her in time to catch the last comment "Because the first time I delivered a cheesecake and saw you, I'd have to steal you away from your husband."
"You don't do deliveries," Mary Ellen pointed out, tilting her head back to look up at him. "Ernie does."
"But when Ernie told me about the beautiful, lonely woman who kept ordering my cheesecake, I'd have to meet you."
"Maybe I'd end up with Ernie instead," she said haughtily.
Since Anne had already met Ernie—a painfully thin seventeen-year-old with royal blue hair, a nose ring and sticklike arms and legs that looked too long for his body—she couldn't suppress a quick snort of laughter. Neill didn't even bother trying to suppress his own laughter, and Tony grinned down at his wife.
"You see, everyone knows we were destined to be together," he told her, pressing one hand over his heart and lowering his voice to a dramatic throb. "Nothing could keep us apart. Not a stockbroker, not even Ernie, could stand between us." Grabbing her hand, he placed a passionate kiss in her palm.
"I forgot to tell you that, right after the cowboy phase, Tony joined the drama club at school," Neill said, plucking an olive from the antipasto plate. "For weeks he went around the house with a sheet draped over his shoulder, declaiming 'a rose by any other name.' Mom was impressed that he'd suddenly become interested in the arts, but what he was really interested in was getting a chance to play Romeo to Alison Sinclair's Juliet. He spent most of that school year trying to get her to notice him."
"Alison Sinclair," Tony said reminiscently. "She looked just like Marcia Brady. Half the boys in class had the hots for her."
"Da-ad." Sophy dragged the word into two syllables. "Puh-lease."
"What?" Tony arched his brows. "You don't think I should admit to having once had my heart broken by a tempestuous beauty with hair like spun gold and eyes the color of emeralds? Your mother understands and forgives me, don't you, honey?"
"Of course I do." Mary Ellen patted his hand absently. 'Especially since she brought her girlfriend to your high school reunion."
Her uncle's shout of laughter nearly drowned out Sophy's agonized plea of, "Mo-om."
Taking pity on her, her mother handed her the baby. "Would you take him upstairs and change him for me, sweetheart?"
"She's at that age when just having parents is humiliating," Mary Ellen said as Sophy disappeared up the stairs, where Tony kept his office. "If she could, she'd stuff us in a closet and only let us out to cook meals and pay for her clothes. When her father and I told her that we were having another baby, she seemed to think it was part of a deliberate plot to humiliate her."
"Why would you having a baby humiliate her?" Anne asked.
Mary Ellen raised her eyebrows in mock horror. "The idea that her parents might actually be having sex. At our age!" She shook her head, her soft brown eyes sparkling with laughter. "Parents aren't supposed to have sex, you know."
"Aren't they?" For as long as she could remember, Anne's parents had slept in separate bedrooms. She doubted if the door between them had even been opened in her lifetime.
"Everybody goes through the same phase, I guess," Mary Ellen said comfortably. "And Sophy's very good with Timothy."
Anne let the other woman take her smile as agreement. She'd never gone through that phase. When she was Sophy's age, she could remember waking up with a knot in her stomach that didn't ease until she got to the breakfast table and saw that neither her parents nor her brother had disappeared during the night.
A waiter appeared just then, bearing plates of linguine in white clam sauce and a basket of crisp garlic toast. The first bite of garlicky sauce told Anne why Tony's restaurant was a success. When she said as much, Tony slapped Neill on the back and told him that he was glad to see his taste in women was improving.
"The last woman he introduced to the family was a brunette, about six foot tall and weighed maybe ninety pounds," he told Anne. "She ate two lettuce leaves, sipped a glass of water and said she was stuffed."
Neill considered jabbing his elbow into his brother's stomach to shut him up. He should have known that Tony wouldn't be able to resist the chance to embarrass him, which was the price you paid for family. But he wasn't sure Anne would appreciate hearing about some woman he'd dated in the past.
"If you were cooking, then she didn't know what she was missing," Anne said, and, when her eyes met Neill's, he saw nothing to suggest that his brother's mild indiscretion had bothered her.
If he'd asked, Anne could have told him that hearing that he'd once dated a tall, slim brunette might have bothered her even yesterday, but the fact that he'd spent the whole night—and part of the morning—making love to her had made it pretty clear that—for now, at least—he wasn't thinking of another woman.
It was after ten when they left the restaurant. Anne's mood was pensive, and Neill didn't press for conversation. From the things he'd said, she'd known that his family was very different from her own. When he spoke of them, it was with affection and warmth and genuine liking—words she could never apply to her own family. She loved them, and she thought—she hoped—that they loved her, but she couldn't honestly say that she knew them.
It had taken Lisa pointing it out for her to see that Jack had a drinking problem. Once it was pointed out, she had to admit that the signs had been there, but she'd never really looked at what he was doing. Because no one in her family every really looked at each other. And even now that she'd seen the problem, she didn't know what to do about it. The thought of saying something to Jack about it boggled the imagination. There simply wasn't enough of a personal connection between them. He was her brother, but the ties were of blood only.
She tried to imagine what Tony would do if he thought Neill had a similar problem. Probably cuff him alongside the head and drag him to counseling, she decided, smiling a little. From what Neill had told her, she thought the rest of the family would have a similar reaction. They were...there for each other.
It hurt to realize how far short of that ideal her own family fell.