Sweets to the Sweet (3 page)

“Yes?”

He’d taken off his coat, and the baby was perched face-down under his arm. Laura said politely, “You’re holding Mari as if she were a football.”

He glanced down. “I haven’t found a baby yet who doesn’t like being held like a football.” He paused. “Where’s your corkscrew?”

She hadn’t the slightest idea, but finding it at least gave her something to do with her hands. Owen trailed her to the kitchen, peeking into the freezer and refrigerator.

“Do you really have six brothers and sisters?”

“Yes. Spread out all over the country these days, except for Gary—I think I mentioned him—and a sister, Susan. They both live nearby. I think my parents intended to have only one child… I was seven before they went on a one-a-year binge.” He lifted a package from her freezer. “The youngest finally reached twenty this year, and the confusion at family gatherings seems to get worse every year. Most of them are married and have kids of their own.”

“Hmm.” She couldn’t find the corkscrew anywhere. Funny, that. Normally she could lay her hands on anything in the kitchen. The room was a joy, with hanging pots and fresh greenery and an old-fashioned raised hearth big enough to cook in. She had hung the Dresden blue curtains yesterday, and a splash of white hyacinths now sat in the center of the oak table. There was ample space for everything…except that a broad-shouldered, dark-haired man seemed to be everywhere.

“You have fresh asparagus,” he commented.

She heard him but deliberately didn’t answer. She watched her baby, ready to pounce whenever Mari let out the first scream. Mari hadn’t been this good since she’d been born.

“A couple of chicken breasts, marinated and broiled? Does that sound good for dinner?”

Laura brandished the corkscrew and flashed a brilliant smile. “I
knew
I had one, but I haven’t had anything alcoholic in so long…” She could hardly wait to hand him the bottle. He’d
have
to give Mari back while he uncorked it; no one could do that with only one hand…but he managed, flipping Mari over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. The baby gurgled, oblivious of her mother’s look of horror.

“Wineglasses?”

She found one for him. He reached into the cupboard and took down a second glass, filled both, wandered to the window with the baby, and stared out at his bashed-in car.

Laura sighed mentally. “Would you like to stay for dinner?”

“Thank you, yes.”

Whether he knew it or not, she thought darkly, she wasn’t letting him manipulate her, bashed-in car or no. For keeping Mari happy, she would have given him fortunes. Dinner was cheaper.

An hour later, Laura peeked nervously under the kitchen table. Mari was settled in the triangle of Owen’s crossed knee.

“Laura. She’s
fine.
”

“I don’t understand it. She’s not crying. She
always
cries when I try to eat dinner.” Laura’s face peeked over the edge of the table. “Did I tell you that dinner was delicious?”

“Four times.”

“How did a bachelor from a large family learn to cook like that?”

He chuckled. “Learning to cook was a matter of survival, not choice. I still haven’t mastered the art of following a recipe.”

He’d mastered a few other things, though, she thought idly. A stranger shouldn’t be sitting at her kitchen table, and yet he was. She’d never meant to drink the glass of wine, and yet she had. Owen had the gift of making odd things seem natural. He’d kept her laughing through dinner with stories of his large, unruly family. He also had wonderful dancing eyes, the most seductive tenor she’d ever heard, and an easy way of making himself at home.
Laura, what is this man doing in your house?

“Owen, what
are
you doing here?” she asked determinedly.

He raised a dark eyebrow quizzically.

“Saving a stranded woman. Chauffeuring her around. Cooking her dinner. You make a habit of this?”

“I’ve been exiled from my own family,” he said gravely.

“Exiled?”

“It’s difficult to explain. You see, chocolates are the family business—did I tell you Reesling is my last name? And for the last seven—”

“
Reesling?
Reesling Chocolates?”

For an instant, he couldn’t stop looking at her. Sheer lust filled her eyes, vivid and uninhibited. She had let her guard down for those few seconds. Mischief sparkled from her. And if he’d had the least idea that chocolates were her nemesis, he’d have brought up the subject an hour before.

“My dad used to buy them for special occasions,” Laura confessed. “Thirty dollars a pound, all wrapped in satin boxes, those beautiful little shapes…” Abruptly, she came back to earth. “Wait a minute. Let’s get back to why you’re ‘exiled’ from your family.”

He would have preferred to talk chocolates. In her bedroom.

He settled for answering a gentle stream of questions and watching her eyes change from the blue-green of the sea to the turquoise of the gem. She had a most disturbing habit of…listening.

And he had a long-standing policy of not talking about himself, but she coaxed the family history from him. For the past seven years, he’d run the business single-handed, while his dad retired and his younger siblings were busy getting educated—and married. The Reeslings owned cacao plantations in Brazil, transported the beans to New York and manufactured chocolates from their own secret recipes. Like most of the good chocolate firms worldwide, Reesling’s wasn’t a massive corporation, but it was a complex international business. Running it, Owen had discovered, was both satisfying and challenging, particularly since he had been determined to double production.

“Which you’ve done.” Laura had no doubts.

“Which I’ve done,” he agreed. And he’d turned into a workaholic in the process. Of his six brothers and sisters, only Gary and Susan were interested in the business. Both were well educated and skilled in managing the business, and they had been indispensable to him. “Only, according to them, I’ve turned into a domineering, autocratic tyrant,” he explained to Laura glumly.

“Have you?”

“Hell, yes.”

She chuckled, but her smile was compassionate. “There’s more to it than that, though, isn’t there, Owen?”

He nodded. “Family businesses don’t work unless each member is willing to sink or swim alone. Any firm that takes on all of Uncle Johnny’s forty-seven nephews out of family loyalty is going to go down the tubes unless each is prepared to pull his weight. And I have two siblings who are dying to pull their weight. Gary’s got good marketing ideas; Susan has a degree in chemistry and wants to try a dozen new products. Neither of them wants the top chair, just a chance to try out their management wings. And that just wasn’t happening…”

“Because you couldn’t let go of the controls,” Laura guessed quietly.

“I told you I was a tyrant.” He shook his head. “I pulled the plug for about six months—not totally, but I’m trying to stay away unless they actually ask for help. They’ve got an experienced staff behind them, but they need time and freedom, without me constantly telling them what to do. They need their chance—and, frankly, I need to change. Anyway, enough of talking about myself.”

The baby let out a sharp, piercing wail, and Owen gently handed her to Laura. “I’m afraid the princess just ran out of patience.”

“Owen…” She wanted to say something reassuring but wasn’t sure how. In spite of his dry humor, Laura guessed he’d never meant to share a personal crisis. Still, he was a relative stranger and she didn’t have the right to reassure him. He’d labeled himself a domineering workaholic, but dominating wasn’t the same thing as domineering. He was a man who naturally took control, but he didn’t seem to lose any of his humanity in the process. If he saw himself as a tyrant, Laura didn’t. To her he’d shown caring and compassion for her baby, and she didn’t like to see him being so hard on himself.

She wanted to say something, but in a minute her arms closed around the pink-wrapped bundle, and her attention was distracted. Softness glowed on her features. Mari was her world. For an instant, she’d been so immersed in Owen’s story that she’d almost forgotten that. Impossible. The baby was her life.

“I’ll clear the table while you nurse the baby. And it’s cooled down so much I’ll lay a small fire—if you had the chimney checked out before you moved in?”

“I…yes, and there’s even a little wood on the back porch, but you don’t have to do—” Mari let out another furious wail, and Laura looked at Owen nervously. All right, so he wasn’t quite a stranger anymore. Maybe she’d even enjoyed the past few hours, and maybe she even felt unwillingly drawn to a man who’d shouldered heavy responsibilities for too long. Still, the bottom line was that no man belonged in her living room.

His eyes met hers. “If you’d just turn your chair around,” he suggested gently. “Laura, I won’t intrude on your privacy.”

She flushed; he knew she was embarrassed to nurse in front of him. Paying no attention to her, he brought in an armful of twigs and knelt by the hearth, stacking them together with a few small logs. By the time he flicked the match, she had turned the chair around and bent her head away from him.

He moved toward the kitchen, shifting plates to the counter, a faint smile on his mouth as he watched her. The fire was little more than ribbons of flame, its amber glow dancing in her hair. He heard her murmur softly to the baby, saw her fumble with her blouse buttons. The infant wailed, then fell silent. Laura’s face was only a fire-warmed shadow against the paneling, but he saw the sudden wince when the baby latched on, then the sensually radiant smile as she leaned her head back.

He envied the baby.

After he had disposed of the dishes, his eyes narrowed on the space around him. The clutter of packing boxes bothered him; her half-empty refrigerator bothered him. Laura clearly had too much on her plate.

Financially, she was obviously solvent. Her property was expensive; the baby gear was the finest quality; her antiques were worth a small fortune. She was just so…alone.

And Laura was a woman who shouldn’t be alone, if any man had sense in his head. She was proud and warm and intelligent; her eyes had a sensual incandescence when she looked at her little one. Such a great capacity for love.

Why
was she alone? What kind of fool had her ex-husband been?

Carrying his glass of wine, he returned to the fire and crouched down to add another log. Orange sparks flew up the chimney, hot and crackling. He sensed that she’d quickly drawn up the baby blanket to cover herself. There was no need; he wasn’t looking.

He didn’t need to look. In his mind he carried an indelible picture of her bared breast bathed in the warmth of the fire’s glow. He settled on her couch and sipped the wine, seeing images he had no business seeing…and willing them anyway.

Laura shifted the baby to the other breast. “Owen? You live in Ridgefield?”

“I bought a house here about three years ago. Truthfully, though, I haven’t spent more than a few months in it in all that time. It needs some work…” He swirled the golden liquid in his glass. His house was the last thing on his mind. For once, even the business wasn’t on his mind. His conscience was reading him a riot act. Licentious thoughts were inappropriate around a woman fresh out of the hospital, but his mind wouldn’t stop filling up with…images.

When Laura shifted the baby to her other breast, he knew that the flame would cast amber and shadow on her supple skin.

“Owen?”

He saw the shadow of the baby’s fist flailing, then curling possessively on her mother’s breast. He gulped the last of his wine and fumbled for the track of conversation. She’d asked something about why they grew the cocoa beans in Brazil. “Most beans are grown in either West Africa or Brazil. Soil and climate affect their taste. A blend of Brazilian beans produces the sharpest, clearest flavor…though I doubt you’d get our competition to agree.”

He hoped that answered her question, because he’d already forgotten it. She propped the baby on her shoulder to burp. For an instant, her bare breast was silhouetted in the shadow of the fire.

Owen felt abruptly more rational when she finished buttoning up her blouse. At least until she turned around, and he saw the natural, sensual sweetness of her face.

The baby was sleeping on her shoulder, very full and contented. Owen felt hollow and frustrated, and could only hope he didn’t look that way.

Laura stood up. “I’m going to lay her down,” she whispered.

When she took the baby upstairs, Owen rolled down his shirtsleeves, buttoned the cuffs and glanced around for his suit jacket. He wasn’t staying; he refused to allow himself to stay. She was exhausted and needed rest. But the first thing he said to her when she came back down was “Would you come outside with me for a few minutes?”

“Just for a few minutes,” Owen promised her.

Laura glanced uncertainly up the loft stairs. “I can’t leave Mari.”

“We won’t go far. You’ll be able to hear her.”

Laura stepped outside ahead of him, her arms folded tightly under her chest. Her kitchen door led to a cedar deck overlooking the ravine.

The night was cool. A faint breeze murmured through the new summer leaves. In the distance, she could hear the gurgling rush of the creek, and all around her the rain had intensified all the smells of early summer—grass and pungent earth and the sweet hyacinths.

Behind her, Owen leaned against the cedar rail.

She could feel his eyes on her, and when she turned, the breeze tossed a wisp of pale hair across her cheek; she brushed it away. Moonlight touched his features, the lines of strength and purpose, the opaque shine of his eyes. Away from the firelit room, away from Mari, alone with him in the darkness, she suddenly felt aware of him as a man.

Her tongue was inexplicably tripping itself, trying to find something to say. “I love this place,” she said lightly. “All the time I was growing up, I loved traveling and never really missed having a home. But since Mari…”

“You picked a beautiful site. Come here, Laura.”

She smiled, a cool, bright smile that denied the strange little shiver that raced up her spine.
Come here, Laura.
That was all he’d said. Nothing…dangerous.

“It probably would have been more practical simply to find another apartment in New York, but…” She saw his hand reach out to her in the darkness, and smiled brilliantly again. “I wanted a home. Something of my own. My grandmother set up a trust for me, so I could afford it. Between that money and the fees I earn from my work—”

His hand closed on hers, pulled her inexorably closer. She suddenly couldn’t remember what she’d been talking about. He looked down at her for a long moment, and then simply wrapped his arms around her. He smelled like the wine, like wind. Laura stiffened, feeling awkward and strange and…helpless. Human contact could be so terribly comforting. A hug. The warmth of arms around her. She’d been alone for months now, and afraid of so many things.

His heart ticked with the steadiness of a clock in the darkness. His white shirt was soft against her cheek. The warmth of his body protected her from the night’s chill. “Lord, you feel good,” he murmured.

Long, firm fingers stole under her hair, and his thumb soothingly rubbed the tense cord of the nape of her neck. Where an overt pass would have freed her to move away, his gentle touch hypnotized, disarmed. “We’ve both been alone,” he whispered. “I don’t mean away from people, I just mean…alone. Temporarily uprooted, changing our lives…I know what it feels like, Laura.”

She tilted her head back. Her skin was so soft, her eyes so luminous. Owen sensed her wariness, and summoned thirty-three years of willpower to keep from kissing those delicately curled lips…but lost. His mouth hovered, then blocked the streak of silver moonlight on her face. Cool and smooth, his lips covered hers lightly. A kiss of softness, of hello, of simple sharing.

Slow and shy, her hands gradually moved to his waist, seeking something to hold on to.
Laura, don’t be a fool.
She heard the voice and ignored it. Owen was warmth and strength; this was just a lost moment in time; and as long as she felt nothing sexual…it was all right. Surely there was nothing so terrible in needing to be held?

His lips strayed from her mouth to her cheek, into her hair. The wind died; the rustle of leaves stilled above their heads. The hush was sudden and soft and…alluring. The tips of her breasts just grazed his chest; her skirt brushed his thighs, teasing her into awareness. Then his lips pressed against hers again, this time not quite so gently. This time he deliberately made her aware of the shape of his mouth, the taste of him, the coaxing seductive power of a man who knew how to kiss.

Once, she had, too. Once, she’d blithely invited kisses, the primal tease and parry of tongues. Once, she’d believed herself a vibrantly sexual woman, relieved to be married, so she could unashamedly express that secret well of sensuality without fear.

She knew better now. She knew better than to relinquish an ounce of control over her emotions; it was easier to feel nothing. But Owen…his lips kept rubbing over hers, coaxing a response she knew wasn’t there. She didn’t want it there, yet her heart was suddenly pounding, an ache welling up inside her that was impossibly huge and thick and painful…

She was no child, no virgin anymore. She knew what he wanted. His mouth was hungry, lonely, reminding her that nights alone could be endless. Her hands climbed his arms, tightly clutched his shoulders, and suddenly she was wildly kissing him back. Trembling lips sought the security of his, possession by his. Anything that would make that terrible ache go away.

Owen’s tongue drove deeper into the darkness of her mouth. So sweet, so warm…she was all abandoned fire in the black of night, a fierce flame, as bright as life, as woman. He’d sought only a simple kiss, but he needed more now. He needed Laura.

His hands slid in a rush down her spine, her sides, wanting to learn the touch of her, feeling the soft crush of lace where he wanted to feel skin.
Mine,
said his hands. The primal need to claim, to establish possession…every male instinct intuitively recognized this woman as different. Laura felt right in his arms as no other woman had felt right. Rationally, he knew it wasn’t going too far, not here, not now. That didn’t matter. It only mattered that she feel as he did, that this richness of touch was rare and sweet and special.

His palm strayed to her ribs; he heard her sudden intake of breath, savored it. His fingers stole higher, gently rounding on the firm, taut thrust of her breast.

Like a startled fawn, Laura stiffened, jerked back. The roar of a dozen memories filled her ears like the sound of an angry ocean’s surf. Peter might as well have been looking over her shoulder.
“You’re much too abandoned,”
he would have said.
“Do you have to go at it like a hellcat?”

God, the shame. Heart pounding, Laura would have fled if Owen’s hand hadn’t swiftly, firmly closed over hers, forcing her to face him.

His eyes wouldn’t leave her alone, searching her face. His touch, fiercely passionate moments before, was suddenly infinitely gentle, yet he wouldn’t free her hand. He could feel her captured fingers trembling. “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said quietly.

“No. You didn’t.”

“Laura—”

She couldn’t look at him.

His voice was barely a whisper. “What the hell did that man do to you?”

As if he knew she wouldn’t answer, he released her hand. She might have imagined the brush of his fingers in her hair; his touch was that swift, that elusive. Seconds later, he was gone, the throaty purr of his engine the only sound in the night, and then even that was gone.

Don’t come back,
Laura thought fiercely.
Just…don’t come back.

Laura glanced at the clock as she laid the sleeping baby back in her crib. Five-thirty. The sun was just thinking about getting up; a faint lavender haze hovered in the treetops outside.

Mari usually slept after her last feeding; Laura never could. Yawning, she pulled a yellow crinkle blouse on over white pants. Barefoot in front of the mirror, she twisted her hair back and fastened it with a rubber band, then pinned it in a loose coil, out of her way. Her father used to say that the old-fashioned look suited her. Lace and cameos and antiques, she thought wryly; none of them were part of the twenty-first century.

Before tiptoeing downstairs, she flicked a blanket and sheet over her bed. She had decorated Mari’s room first; her own had not seemed important. The mattress and box springs were still on the floor. The William and Mary four-poster frame was leaning against the wall, waiting until Laura had the time—and the strength—to put the bed together.

That could wait, but she
had
to find the energy today to unpack her files, make business calls, shop for food, do some laundry… Her mind buzzed with a dozen plans, until she passed the hall mirror and noted her own rueful expression.
You’re willing to think about anything but Owen this morning, aren’t you?

He won’t be back, she assured herself as she puttered around the kitchen, brewing coffee, watering her plants. She finished off a banana and a slice of melon before there was a knock on the door.

Owen’s suit was pale blue with a gray stripe, very elegant, very subdued on his tall, lean frame, and his eyes hadn’t changed from that unreadable gunmetal that had so disturbed her the night before.

“Good morning, Laura.”

Just like melted butter, that voice. “Well, good morning!” The surprise in her voice was totally fake. She had known he’d be back. And for the first time since Mari was born, she desperately wished the baby would wake up, even if she cried. Laura didn’t want to be alone with him.

“May I come in?”

As far as she could tell, he was already in.

“I knew you’d be up,” Owen said easily. “I have to leave for the city in an hour, so I won’t stay long. Mari sleeping?”

“Yes, but she’ll be up any minute.”
Mari, wake up.

“I rented a car for you. It’ll be here this morning. Your insurance money will come through in a day or two, but in the meantime you have to be able to get out.”

“I… That was kind of you.” She stood there, aware she was smiling foolishly.
We both know we talked about that yesterday. The thing is, Owen, yesterday I believed I could handle anything. I doubt you would even believe what I’ve handled this last year alone. But yesterday I also discovered that there’s one part of my life I can’t handle at all…

“I brought coffee cake. And something else.” He handed her a small, wrapped package, tied with a bright silk ribbon, marked unmistakably Reesling.

“Owen, for heaven’s sake…”

“Just open it.”

Inside was a white chocolate rose, its stem in dark chocolate, a very tiny, perfectly molded flower far too exquisite to eat.

“You said chocolates were your nemesis, didn’t you?”

Laura looked up, confusion in her eyes.

“Relax,” he said softly. “Six o’clock in the morning is no time to worry about anything.”

She took a breath. “True,” she murmured.

“I’m desperate for a cup of coffee.”

She said swiftly, “As long as that’s all you want.”

His smile was dangerous, but he simply sat down and poured himself a cup of coffee. Laura groped for something to do with her hands, and came up with the brilliant idea of dragging a laundry basket up to the kitchen table and folding diapers. No man could get…ideas while watching a woman fold diapers.

To her shock, he watched her fold a few diapers and then reached for a stack and began folding them himself.

Ten minutes later, she was transported five hundred years into the past, to the time when Montezuma, the Aztec emperor, considered chocolate so precious that a golden goblet was filled only once with a cocoa brew and then destroyed.

“Chocolate was used as currency by the Aztecs,” Owen explained conversationally. “Around the time Cortez was exploring Mexico, a hundred cocoa beans would buy a slave. Being a greedy man, he figured he’d found a potential gold mine, so he took cocoa beans with him on the rest of his travels, planting them in Haiti and Trinidad and Bioko—”

“Bioko?” she questioned.

“An island near West Africa. Keep in mind that Europe hadn’t even heard of cocoa or chocolate by the fifteen hundreds…”

She kept it in mind. Actually, she was trying to keep a lot of things in mind, but it was hard. Chocolates had been her weakness since she was six, and she couldn’t quite bring herself to kick the man out when he was doing nothing more than idly talking about a subject that fascinated her. She poured him a second cup of coffee, then pushed the folded diapers aside and reached for a pile of size-newborn undershirts. As Owen continued to answer her steady battery of questions, the mound of unfolded laundry diminished and finally disappeared.

Owen immediately stood up, reached for his suit jacket and glanced at his watch. “I’ve got a train to catch this morning.”

Laura couldn’t prevent a small smile. “I thought you were learning how to relax and stay away from work.”

“I
am
relaxed. But cocoa futures dropped five points last night…” He hesitated, giving her a rueful look. “Some people can’t learn patience all at once.”

“No.”

“And I’m only going to stop in the office for a minute. I’m not going to say a word, even if Gary’s reorganized every marketing plan I’ve set up in the last five years.”

“No?” Laura chuckled as she followed him outside. Sunshine caught in his hair, glinted in the dark strands, sparkled in his eyes when he turned to her. For a moment, she simply studied him, surprised at how much she liked the man. “Every instinct tells me you trained your brother and sister exceedingly well, long before you temporarily gave up the reins of control. And you said you had an experienced staff.”

“True. I still can’t stand it,” he murmured. “I have to
see
that things are going well.”

She laughed; he delighted in the sound and reluctantly moved toward the door. He was leaving—and not because of work, though he’d deliberately given her that impression. To stay any longer simply wasn’t wise. It had taken an hour to erase the wariness in her eyes, an hour to make her comfortable enough to tease him.

His family kept telling him he needed to learn to play again, and he knew they were right. Business crises and challenges and competition had always been puzzle pieces on a board for Owen, the tougher the better. His mistake had been to make work his whole life, and it wasn’t enough. Not anymore. He wanted and needed a private life.

And a woman. He’d had a variety of relationships over the years, and some of them had been good. None had filled that elusive niche, but perhaps that had been his own fault. It was too easy for him to take charge of a relationship, to keep the controls, and he’d always seemed to gravitate toward women who wanted just that from him. Strength, though, could be a double-edged sword. No man was always strong, and dammit, he had more faults than most.