Bayou Bad Boys (23 page)

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Authors: Nancy Warren

BOOK: Bayou Bad Boys
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And aren't I getting ahead of myself!
Dane didn't want a relationship; he wanted sex, neat.
He couldn't have been more clear, yet here she was divorcing him already. She laughed. At herself. At the situation. She stopped laughing abruptly when she thought of the other possibilities. The sexual ones. Dane, the heat of him, his long, lean body. What they might have . . .
Sex with no strings attached. Sex for sex's mind-numbing, universe-tilting sake. Stop-the-world-I-want-to-get-off sex.
She sighed, closed her eyes a moment.
Sex in a king-size bed on black satin sheets.
Sex with candles burning, their flames twisting in the air to cast shadows over naked straining bodies.
Sex with a man who looked like a god.
Sex with a man who turned her on by touching her cheek.
Making love with a . . . stranger.
The last made her frown, but the heat, rising now, encircling her throat, made it difficult to draw a full breath, more difficult still to smother the concern. Esme had always been careful, discerning, about her lovers—and she'd at least known them for more than twenty-four hours!
She straightened abruptly.
A week; she'd give it a week. That would give her time to decide for sure if she wanted Dane in her bed, and if she was ready for a short-term affair.
She smiled and picked up her pencil and sketch pad; she'd speak to him tonight, set some ground rules—give him time to cool his too-arrogant heels.
Yes, I'll give it seven days . . .
Esme stood in the patio doorway. It opened westward toward the Gulf, and the panoramic view of the silvered waters beyond took Esme's breath away.
Then she saw Dane.
Dressed in casual khakis and a blindingly white shirt, he eclipsed the view and weakened her knees. He was pouring wine when she arrived, stopped when he spied her standing in the open patio door. The wine bottle clasped in his hand, his glance slid over her, slowly, hot and invasive, from her head to her sparkling sandaled toes. Esme's mouth went dry, and she stepped onto the cobblestone terrace, determined to play the game as a sophisticated, poised woman. Which, considering inside she was more of a bitch in heat, would be a challenge.
“You look wonderful.” He held her gaze a moment, then returned to pouring the wine. He brought her a glass and held it out to her.
His scent, a subtle musk and citrus, overpowered the mysterious aroma of the aged burgundy in her glass. She breathed deeply, took in more of him to savor, before he tipped her glass with his, and she took a sip of the smooth, expensive wine. “Hmm,” she said, her tone a hard-won mild one, “You have great taste in wine.”
“You're still here,” he said, ignoring her comment, his expression unreadable.
Esme glanced around the patio. There were several tables, some larger than others, the smallest abutted the railing. It was set for two in multicolored earthenware; a nest of candles burned at its center, fighting a timid battle with the brightness of the setting sun. “It doesn't look as if you doubted I would be.”
“The result of wishful thinking.” He looked at her over the rim of his glass.
She smiled at him. “Thank you.”
He arched a brow in question.
“For not being sure. A woman needs to retain some mystery.”
“Every woman is a mystery. Impossible to solve. And endlessly intriguing.” He took her glass, then her hand, and drew her to the terrace rail. Looking down at her, he added in a low voice, “You, most of all.”
“Ah . . . the seduction begins.” And not too badly either. Her knees suddenly felt as though they'd been built from matchsticks and paste.
“Seduction?” He smiled—or nearly did—and Esme couldn't take her eyes off the easy mobility of his mouth, the promise of it. “Maybe. Or just a simple truth? Because you definitely intrigue me.” He touched her chin, turned her face from his to the seashore. “Look. I don't want you to miss it.”
The sun, low in the sky, and now a deep shimmering orange, turned the Gulf into burning glass, set it aglow as if it were seeded with flaming coals.
Dane stood beside her, his shoulder touching hers. “Something, isn't it?”
Esme looked up at him, reached up to stroke his clean-shaven face. “So are you, McCoy. So are you.” When he turned to look at her, she stood on her toes and kissed his mouth, a feather kiss, a stolen taste, because, for now, that was all she'd risk. She stepped back.
His eyes were an inky burning blue when they met hers. “You sure you want to eat . . .”
Ignoring her breathing, which came perilously close to a most unladylike pant, she forced a light laugh. “Oh, yes. I definitely want to eat . . .” Not above a little seduction of her own, she ran her tongue over her lower lip, touched his mouth with one finger. “. . . Peggy's wonderful cooking.”
“Jesus!” he murmured on an extended breath. “This is going to be the longest meal of my life.”
She cocked her head, looked at him from under her lashes. “Good sex is all about patience, the art of anticipation.”
He rolled his eyes, gave her another brief smile. “If that's true, I probably do need therapy.”
“Which I'll be happy to provide”—she tapped his chin playfully—“after we eat.”
And if I can get down enough to sustain a hummingbird, it will be a miracle.
Maybe seven days was asking too much . . .
As if on cue, Peggy came out with a tray, laden with a large salad and an array of tantalizing finger food. Delicate scents drifted toward the sunset, fused with the aromatic spices of cajun cooking and the fiery kick of Mexico.
“I didn't know what you liked.” Dane gestured toward the table. “So I asked Peggy for a selection.”
“Perfect.”
He pulled out her chair, filled her wineglass, and took the seat across from her, turning away from the table and stretching his long legs in front of him, apparently in no hurry to eat.
The setting sun shadowed half his face and burnished the other side to pale copper.
“I'm glad you stayed,” he said, settling his unearthly blue eyes on her in a very earthy way.
“I'm not certain I can say the same. Not yet.”
“Then I'll have to make you certain.”
Four
An hour later a breeze blew in from the Gulf, light but laden with chill. When Dane saw Esme rub her bare shoulders to warm them, he rose. “It's turning cold,” he said, stating the obvious, and looking for any opportunity to move, escape the sexual hunger twisting his gut like a badly applied tourniquet. “Let's go inside.” The last interminable hour had rattled Dane, and he'd learned something. He'd forgotten how to wait, forgotten how not to have what he wanted when he wanted it, and forgotten how to make charm-talk.
And he'd underestimated Esme's effect on him. Jesus, he'd gone hard, then harder, watching her simply savor an oyster . . . or a goddamn cracker. Esme was trouble—and he couldn't wait to get into it.
Unless he missed his guess, she was playing him, and even knowing it, he enjoyed it. He might not trust her, but when his cock left him brain enough to think on it, he discovered that while he was frustrated, he was enjoying himself for the first time in what seemed forever.
“I'd rather take a walk.” She stood beside him, dropped her napkin on the table.
He ran a finger along her collarbone. “Upstairs?” He felt the pulse jump in her throat. The breeze, not so cold now, blew between them.
“Not tonight,” she said, her mouth warm, her gaze half-lidded. She placed a hand on his chest, rubbed lightly. The heat of her hand burned through his white cotton shirt. “Not that you're not tempting.”
“I didn't know I was in for an exercise in willpower.”
“You're not, but . . . look,” she added, and gestured toward the sweeping seascape. “It's so beautiful.”
He looked, saw a pale ribbon of moonlight crossing a wind-rustled sea to touch and brighten the sand on the beach. Beautiful. Yes. A detour from the bedroom? Definitely. Esme wasn't through torturing him yet. “I'll get you a jacket.”
“No, thanks. I'm fine.”
He offered her his hand and she took it. Hers felt small, cool, and strong in his, and he lifted it to his mouth, turned her palm to his lips and kissed it. “You're
very
‘fine.' And if you were a business deal, this . . . transaction would already be in the completed column. I think you know that.”
She frowned, and for the briefest moment she looked uncertain. “I'm not a business deal, Dane. I'm a woman who intends to take her time. A woman who likes to be sure of what she's getting herself into.” She squeezed his hand, smiled at him. “No matter how potent the temptation.”
He didn't miss the determination in her gaze and revised his original estimate.
Three days.
“Let's go, then.” He made an immediate decision to provide some sexual torment of his own. “I'll show you the
Too Much
.”
“The
Too Much
?”
“My boat. I bought it last year.”
“Interesting name.” Her look was curious. “What does it mean?”
He hesitated. “Nothing.”
A few minutes later Dane helped her board
Too Much.
The boat wasn't big—maybe thirty-five or forty feet—which, considering Dane's fortune, surprised Esme. It also wasn't new and appeared to be in the process of being restored . . . beautifully.
“A Chris-Craft from the sixties,” he said. “She's a work in progress.” He ran a hand lovingly along the polished wood railings, gave her a lingering look. “Like you.”
“First I'm a business deal. Now I'm a boat?” She couldn't help her grin. “That's a move forward. I guess.”
He took her hand. “Come with me.”
He led her to the front of the boat, stopped at the prow, and nudged her ahead of him. “Not exactly the
Titanic,
but the view is good.”
From behind, he gripped her by the waist and drew her flush to his chest. The heat of his body against her back, the gusts of his breath across her temple, his erection pressed against her buttocks, made her head swim. If she'd ever felt this powerful a sexual attraction, she couldn't remember it, or it had been exorcised by Dane McCoy's laying-on-of-hands. Hands he slid now to around her middle, splayed wide over her stomach. Her breath stalled in her throat.
“Like it?” he whispered into her hair.
In sensory overload, achingly aware of him, her mind was a fog, dense and blank. She couldn't for the life of her figure out what he was talking about. Nothing registered except his light, almost careless, touch, his hands sliding around her belly; first up to under her breasts, drifting down—but not down far enough to touch her in the place she yearned to be touched.
“The view, Esme. How do you like the view?” He pulled her hair back, kissed her nape, nestled his mouth close to her ear.
Seven days . . . definitely too long. Five at the max.
She turned in his arms, looked into his face, every angle of it silvered by moonlight. “I like this one better.” Esme ran her hands across the muscles of his chest. They tightened under her palms, like strong ropes pulled taut, to be ready . . . able. She traced the muscles down to the belt, circling his lean waist, ran a finger along the leather, just inside the band. She looked up to see him briefly close his eyes, then open them, slam his gaze into hers, daring and dangerous. He clasped her hand, held it to his chest.
“Enough,” he said gruffly. “Given that ‘waiting' you're so intent on.”
She didn't intend to study his mouth, but she did, drawn as if under a spell. She didn't intend the rush of moisture at the apex of her thighs, but it came, and she didn't intend to say, “Kiss me, Dane,” but she did.
His mouth came down on hers hard and hungry. He spread his legs, tugged her into them and slipped his hands down to grasp her rear, hold her against the steel jut of his penis.
The kiss slowed, turned deep and voluptuous, and she gave herself to it, taking his tongue, probing his mouth with hers, until her lungs were as empty as her mind. His hot hands grew urgent on her body, and his fingers dug deep into the soft flesh of her buttocks, each an anchor to hold them fast.
“Jesus, your mouth is heaven.” His expression hardened. “I don't want to wait.”
Esme, breathing hard, her underwear dampened with need, her head as useless as a half-filled balloon, took a step back, out of Dane's arms, away from the heat of him.
The cold claimed her instantly, and she massaged her upper arms. “I do want to wait.” She didn't, but she had to, because this instant lust, this sudden . . . blaze between them was bewildering. Too fast. Too primal. She'd always counseled her clients to relax about sex, worked to free them from inhibitions that kept them from enjoying their bodies and those of their lovers—as she did herself—but that hadn't meant leaving the brain out of the equation.
Dane didn't try to hide his frustration. “Why, for God's sake? I want you. You want me. And we're both over voting age. What could be simpler?”
“There is nothing simple about this.” She looked up at him, squared her gaze with his. “Maybe you'll understand this. I have a rule and I've never broken it. I don't fuck on the first date.”
For a second he stared at her, as if he couldn't assimilate what she'd said, then a smile, slow and easy, tilted his lips. “I haven't had to work this hard for a woman in a long time.”
“Hard? You call having to wait a few days hard?”
He lifted her chin, brushed his mouth over hers—stopped when their breaths fused and need tore up the air between them. “When it comes to waiting for you? Beyond hard and into impossible.” He rubbed her mouth with his thumb. “You have any idea what it's going to be like for me tonight? Knowing you're a bedroom away?”
She nodded. “Yes, I do. Because, believe it or not, I'll be sleeping on the identical bed of hot coals.”
Maybe four days would be enough . . .
 
The next morning, Peggy knocked on her door. It was past eight. “Ms. Shane,” Peggy said, rapping again. “I've brought you coffee.”
Esme, sitting at the desk under the window, had been up since six, working on the book layout. And, yes, delaying seeing Dane, which wouldn't have been a problem if she hadn't spent the entire night acting opposite him in a triple-X movie that put
Sex And The City
on a par with Barney. Heat crawled up her throat, and her body thundered even now remembering it.
Afraid every scene she'd played with him would show on her face, she'd decided to wait, connect with real life and get her wits about her before going downstairs. If she didn't she'd attack him over the breakfast table. She smiled. Not really the worst idea she'd ever had. Although the man was going to have to be damn good in bed to top the movie version.
Still smiling, she headed to the door, clad in the cotton robe she'd put on after her shower. She opened the door to the aroma of fresh baked . . . something and sniffed appreciatively.
“Something smells so good it has to be sinful.” She stepped aside to let in a tray-laden Peggy.
Peggy carried the tray to the table near the window seat, and set out a service for one. “Mr. McCoy said you liked my beignets so I brought a couple. And some fruit.” She poured a big cup of steaming coffee.
Esme picked up a beignet and sighed. “Peggy, you should be bronzed. No, make that gilded—in pure gold. Thank you.”
She smiled, walked to—and started making—Esme's bed. “When would you like your lunch?” she asked, smoothing the duvet.
“Whenever Mr. McCoy wants it is fine with me.”
“Oh, he's not here. Mr. Janzen called on some business matter early this morning and he flew off. Didn't say exactly when he'd be back, said maybe a day or two.”
So much for seduction . . .
Esme was ridiculously disappointed. “Then, twelve or twelve-thirty for lunch will be fine. Thanks.”
When Peggy was gone, Esme went to the window and gave herself ten minutes to sort through her feelings. Dear God, she was actually hurt. How stupid was that! Dane was committed to his work—was crazed by it, if Marilee was to be believed—which made it insane for her to think he'd put his business on hold for her. When it came to a choice of money or sex, for men like McCoy, the decision was a no-brainer. His abrupt departure was a good lesson for her, though, a reminder to stay on her toes and keep her emotional distance.
Which left only one thing to do: get that
grip
everyone was always yammering about and do something.
She dressed and was on the beach in minutes. The Gulf water, glorious and bright under the morning sun, lifted her spirits somewhat and she settled in to work, Dane—and last night's movie—never far from her mind. But she refused to fret like an adolescent over a man she'd met only two days before. She absolutely would not. He had his life, she had hers.
It wasn't as if they were heading for hearts, flowers, and minivans. More like a king-size bed, where, if she got really lucky—and Dane McCoy knew what he was doing—she'd enjoy some seriously fine sex. An activity, she reluctantly admitted, that had, somewhere along the way, grown stale and uninviting and been pushed to the bottom of her priority list. And wouldn't some of her old clients laugh at that, after all her lecturing about the necessity of a healthy sex life. Yes, sexual. . . release with Dane would be good for her. Healthy.
Which was all she wanted.
Wasn't it?
Her hand slipped and the charcoal pencil she'd been holding scarred the drawing on her lap.
Damn it!
She erased her mess, told herself to focus, gritted her teeth, and started again.
 
The day was long and productive; another few like it and Esme figured she'd have most of the drawings she needed for the book—and one other—one she'd begun sketching late in the day. The drawing, started on a whim, had engrossed her so completely her entire body ached from the rigid posture imposed by the intense concentration.

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