A Seductive Proposal (2 page)

Ah. The scent-enjoyment-thing was mutual.

When he opened his eyes, his gaze caught hers and held tight.

She drew in a sharp breath and only at the last second refrained from putting her hand on his chest. Her gaze dropped and stayed for way too long on his oh-so-sensual lips. “You’ll like riding shotgun,” she said at last. Her words came out crushed.

He lowered his voice about an octave. “Wouldn’t want to be anywhere else right now.”

Her heart rate skyrocketed as she met his clear blue eyes once more. She released a breath, which skipped out of her throat. Her lips parted. He touched her hand. Sparks flew off his fingers and pierced her skin.

He smiled and nodded, a single slow dip of his chin.

Desire pooled between her legs. She had one regret at this moment, that there were five other tour guests, all buckled up in the back seat, ready to be driven to the Rim.

If Quint had been alone, she would have driven him straight to her house.

Damn, Carly. Get a grip.

She drew her hand from beneath his fiery fingers and took the long way around the back of the vehicle so that she could calm down.

What was she thinking?

Oh, she knew what she was thinking—his body, her bed.

But she never had one-night stands.

Never.

As she took her seat behind the wheel, she worked her gloves on and spoke in her tour-guide voice. She told everyone that the first mile or so would take them back through town but after that they’d hit an oil-pan-gouging road, littered with boulders and bouncing would be the order of the day. “We’ll be climbing two thousand feet and seeing some of the most amazing buttes and rock formations in the world.”

She glanced at Quint. “Hold on.”

He drew in a deep breath, nodded and smiled. He set his gaze in front of him. His eyes had grown half-lidded, a mountain lion basking in the sun, satisfied with his command of his world, perhaps in his belief he would command her.

She pressed her suede hat down on her head a little farther. She turned the key and brought the engine to life. She put the Jeep in motion.

June had never been so full of danger.

* * * * * * * * *

Let’s put this beast on the trail.

Had the tour guide actually said that?

She made a few shifting turns through town, drove the Jeep by a Spanish looking upscale village called Tlaquepaque, took another turn heading north and pretty soon a rough-hewn road appeared so rock laden that he started to laugh.

“Well you did say oil-pan-gouging…” he said.

“Yes I did. Hold on.”

He wanted to
hold on
and then some.

And what was her name? Oh, yeah, Carly.

Carly.

Quint let her name roll over his tongue a few times. His nostrils flared…again. Right now, he was a beast and he was on
her
trail.

He took a slow breath. Her scent drifted into his brain. What was that? Something like salty ocean and exotic flowers, a strange combination for desert high-country. Whatever it was, the sweet, sage-like smell tightened his abdomen.

He loped after her now, behind her, sniffing and chuffing. He growled. He ran faster.

He wanted to bring her down, to pull her under him, to be inside the promise of her scent.

He crossed his arms over his chest trying to contain the powerful sensations. He stared through the windshield and forced his body to relax. He had a job to do in Sedona that didn’t include seducing a Jeep driver. The owner of Jumpin’ Jeep Tours had a winery he intended to wrest from her any way he could. A one-nighter with one of her drivers could affect his bargaining position if the driver chose to confide in her boss.

Her scent once more caught him low across his groin. He gripped the door jamb and looked up the side of the hill at cactus, ancient junipers and manzanita. He took deep breaths.

He hadn’t been this susceptible to a woman in years. Maybe never. Damn. He wanted her the way a man crawling through the desert would give his eyesight for a drop of water. He had to have her, damn the consequences. Just once.

Okay. That helped.

Just once.

Then he’d get the winery and get the hell out of Sedona.

An uneasy sensation stole through him, maybe the change in altitude. He glanced at Carly. She had her right gloved hand on the stick and her eyes glued to the road. She slowed through a rocky patch. The Jeep bounced like a pogo stick, but she kept the vehicle under tight control. One slide of rocks to the left and they’d go over the cliff.

He’d never met a woman like her before. Maybe that accounted for the way his ribs felt squeezed tight.

When she glanced at him and smiled he had the strangest impulse to offer to drive the rest of the way up the hill for her.

He laughed at himself. What the hell was wrong with him? Next, he’d be asking her on dates and buying her a ring.

Like that would ever happen. He had long ago made peace with his inner-bachelor. He had as much interest in happily-ever-after as a grizzly did a fur coat.

He was the independent sort and always would be. He’d watched his father battle his way through four marriages. He’d kept the last one but only because he dulled his senses with a six-pack every night.

Marriage made no sense to Quint, maybe because it was so
normal
. Very little of his childhood had been
normal
and the poverty he’d grown up with had shaped his beliefs as well as his drive.

No one knew the truth, not even Brad, that he’d been a hair’s breadth away from homelessness, ten months out of twelve from infancy. He’d lived without running water, without heat, without electricity most of his early life. He’d lost his mother to pneumonia in the midst of moving yet again, just after he’d started sixth grade.

But his determination had been born of the chaos, a furnace to his drive to do everything he could to build solid companies and provide excellent wages for as many people as he could. That was his mission, not setting up house and making babies.

Besides, he enjoyed his single life.

A lot.

But with ocean and flowers humming in his brain, he could understand why some men committed. The way he felt right now made him think of building a house, locking Carly inside and keeping her there forever.

He smiled at the image. He could lose the
forever
part, but the idea of locking her up had a certain appeal.

He glanced at her again. His gaze slid over her body. She wore snug blue jeans that clung to just the right curves.

He could tell she liked what she did. She radiated that kind of confidence and enjoyment. Damn, she was beautiful, large brown eyes, delicate features, high graceful cheekbones, arched brows, the faintest indentation at her chin. Her dark brown hair, covered in a rust-colored hat, hung past her shoulders. Despite the dry, sunny climate, her complexion looked like she bathed in cream. He’d like to see her bathing in cream.

He cleared his throat and fixed his gaze elsewhere.

He hadn’t expected
this
on a Jeep tour in Sedona at the hind end of June. He hadn’t even wanted to take a tour. Trekking up to the Rim had been Brad’s idea.

Now he thought Brad might just be some kind of genius.

But he needed his thoughts elsewhere. He had a critical reason for obtaining the winery. In a little over a month, he had prospective clients out of the Napa Valley wine country coming into town. He’d been working the contact for the past eighteen months and had secured a commitment from three couples to visit Arizona at his invitation. Their combined investment portfolios amounted to just over two hundred million, even after the ups and downs on Wall-Street in recent years. Red Canyon Vineyards would provide the best environment to bring the deal home. He knew it in his gut the way he knew summer storms brought lightning.

Tomorrow he’d secure a meeting with the owner of Jumpin’ Jeep Tours and make an offer way beyond her expectations.

His executive assistant, Sheila, had already had a proposal rejected about a month ago, which had told him the direction he needed to go. He wasn’t concerned about the woman’s initial refusal. A first ‘no’ meant nothing.

Sheila had since collected some general data on the owner. He had the file in his trunk but hadn’t looked at it yet. He would tonight then he’d put the finishing touches on his offer.

Although, as he glanced at Carly, he thought there was a good chance he wouldn’t get to that file until
much later
tonight.

Who would have thought?

Something so extraordinary in Sedona.

And she drove a Jeep.

He fixed his eyes on the road.

“You take this trip every day?” he asked.

“Five days a week, four times a day.”

“Do your teeth ever rattle?”

“Five days a week, four times a day.”

He laughed.

“Hold on,” she called out.

He wanted to hold on and then some.

* * * * * * * * *

Carly shifted and urged her Jeep up the winding, gutted road. She told the tour that dynamite had forged the route in the early nineteen hundreds. Those were the days when ordinary citizens could just light up stick after stick, blast away at a hillside, and make a road. Who could do that today?

Schnebly Hill pointed the way to Flagstaff, which in turn had been a lumber town that purchased the fresh fruits and vegetables grown in Sedona. Flagstaff now housed a university and supported the trucking industry along Interstate 40.

The Japanese tourists chattered in quick bursts. Quint turned around and addressed them in their language. He spoke for some time. Carly saw in her rear-view mirror that the foreign tourists now smiled and nodded.

“Did you just translate for me?” she asked.

He said, “Sure,” just like that.

Her mind fired up in several directions all at once. What kind of man knew Japanese? Where had he learned it? When?

She spoke French
un petit peu,
but he had translated words like
dynamite
and
produce
. She didn’t even know
plate
and
rug
in French. That he knew Japanese did something to her.

She shifted and coaxed the vehicle over one of the many boulders that jutted from the road. She shifted again and hurried through another low patch. She knew every rut, bump and boulder of the road by heart. As she worked her gears, she talked about the ancient junipers and Ponderosa pines. Quint offered a few words to the group in back.

“How do you know what ‘juniper’ is in Japanese?” she asked.

“I lived in Tokyo for a year.”

Carly felt a little dizzy…again. Quint had been places, had adventures, had the drive to strike out and accomplish the extraordinary.
Needful
sensations moved through her, powering her desire, beating at her resistance. She admired him. She envied him. Not that she felt discontent with her life in Sedona,
au contraire,
but he had moved out into the world.

She pulled over to give the tourists a chance to take pictures of the red towering buttes. Camcorders and cameras filled her rearview. Even Brad Hansen lifted a digital and took some shots.

Quint appeared to have little interest in photography. She felt his hand settle on her arm. Her gaze shot back to him. He leaned so close that her lungs ceased working.

“Problem?” he asked, his eyes half-lidded. He glanced down at his hand and gave her arm a squeeze.

Ooo, that mountain lion appeared again.

She scrambled another breath. He stroked her arm and her gaze fell to his lips and his half-smile. Desire tightened within. She struggled to find a protest but instead shook her head.

“Good,” he murmured.

How was this in any way wise?

His lips twitched. He searched her eyes for a long moment. When Brad’s laughter floated forward, Quint released her arm and sat back in his seat.

Carly focused on the road ahead as she once more stepped on the gas. Too many thoughts jammed her mind to do much more than recite a few pieces of trivia about javelinas and their penchant for eating prickly-pear cactus.

She pulled over several times on the jolting drive up the hill to allow for pictures. Quint took possession of her arm each time and still she couldn’t find a protest with which to rebuke his sudden ownership. Instead, she found herself searching for new places to pull over.

What was she thinking?

Once.

Tina’s wicked encouragement had taken hold of her mind.

When she pulled over again, his hand slipped off her arm and drifted in lazy circles over her stomach. Her bra felt too tight and her jeans chafed her. Her skin prickled like she had a mild sunburn. Now she really couldn’t breathe.

If they’d been alone, she would have started pulling her clothes off and begging.

At last on the Rim, she had thought to remain by the Jeep. Maybe she could cool off. Maybe there was still a chance she could be rid of these overwhelming sensations. However, Quint, who had taken several steps from the vehicle turned back and waved her forward.

Her feet moved without one hint of reservation, a pair of traitors.

When she reached him, he took her right arm and wrapped it around his, then, as he held her gaze, he pulled her right glove off. He slipped the glove over
his
belt then took her bare hand in his. He smiled.

Damn. He had so just claimed her.

He led her away from the rest of the group and took her to the edge. He never let go of her hand, but laced his fingers through hers.

He shifted his gaze to the view beyond. She heard a deep murmur of approval as he scanned the beauty rolling for miles and miles to the distant horizon.

She knew the view, every bold, magnificent butte and the layers of peaks unfolding one after the other. This time of day the sun sat low in the west and cast a violet haze over the back-and-forth of the canyon below. It was a primeval land of soaring red, mountainous outcrops, of tall Ponderosa pines climbing the steep canyon walls, of terrain that bore the unique stamp of ancient seas that once covered this part of the world.