Chick with a Charm (21 page)

In the time it had taken him to lock the door, she’d slipped out of her dress, and she stood there in her high-heeled sandals and red thong. As he’d suspected, she’d worn no bra.

But she’d chosen to put on that slender ankle bracelet. Some people called it a slave bracelet, but if either of them was a slave, it was him, not her.

She walked toward him, her gaze fixed on his. He tried manfully to keep his eyes on her face, but he’d never watched the movement of her bare breasts as she walked. She had firm, high breasts, and the gentle sway was subtle, which made it all the more riveting.

Did she hypnotize you?
Kevin’s question popped into his head, and he hated that. He wasn’t hypnotized by her almost naked body, but he sure as hell was fascinated and aroused by it.

“You said we only had an hour,” she murmured. “So I decided to get this party started.”

She seemed to be lit from within. Her fiery energy called to him, and he wanted her with such intensity that he was nearly speechless. But not completely speechless. “I love you,” he said.

He hadn’t expected to say that, but once the words were out of his mouth, he knew they were absolutely true. He loved her. That would explain everything.

She stopped and stared at him. Then, to his dismay, her dark eyes filled with tears. “You do?”

“Yes.” He stepped forward and cupped her face in both hands. “I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to realize it.”

Her voice was choked with tears. “Griffin, it hasn’t been very long, not . . . not really.” Tears dribbled down her cheeks.

“Don’t cry.” He brushed her tears away with his thumbs. “Loving someone is a good thing.”

“I know!” Her reply came out as a wail. “Oh, Griffin.”

“You don’t know if you love me back, do you?” He kissed her damp eyes, her damp cheeks, her trembling mouth, but softly, not urgently. For now, the urgency had been replaced with the tender knowledge that he loved her. “Don’t worry if you don’t love me yet. I can wait for that to happen. It will happen.”

She gazed up at him with brimming eyes. “You’re a good person, Griffin Taylor, and I don’t deserve you.”

“That’s ridiculous.” He captured her mouth with his, this time with more insistence. If she was having a crisis of confidence, he would have to show her how much he worshipped her, and maybe that would take the tears away.

She might be crying, but she still wanted him. He could tell by the way she unknotted his tie and tugged it free. Her hands were everywhere and he loved it. Her eagerness to undress him bolstered his hope that someday soon she’d admit to loving him, too.

He shrugged out of his clothes as she got them loose. They were so frantic to get naked and into the bed that it became funny. She laughed as he fumbled with his shoes, and he laughed with her. God, this was so great, to be here with her, each of them eager for what was about to happen.

In a frenzy they made their way to the big bed with its mound of pillows and rose-colored comforter. By that time he was down to his briefs and his socks. Her thong panties had been tossed to the far side of the room.

Gasping, she pulled her mouth away from his. “You take off your socks and I’ll take off my shoes.”

“Leave the shoes.”

Her eyebrows arched and she laughed again, breathlessly this time. “All righty, then.” She flung herself backward onto the rose-colored comforter.

The picture she made lying there, gazing up at him in welcome, would be burned into his memory forever. He decided that she loved him, whether she knew it or not.

She giggled again when he hopped on one foot so he could get rid of the blasted socks. She was so full of life. How could he not love her?

Shucking his briefs, he grabbed his slacks and fished in the pocket for the condom he’d put there earlier. He tore open the wrapper and started to roll on the condom.

“Wait.”

He glanced up to find her gazing at him with the kind of admiration that did wonders for his ego.

“We’ve never done this in the middle of the day,” she said. “I want to take just a moment to look at you. You’re . . . magnificent.”

He could live with that. In fact, few things in his life stacked up to having Lily Revere say that his package was magnificent.

Her smile trembled on her full mouth. “Thank you. I needed that. Now, if you have that little raincoat handy, we’re burning daylight.”

He was just burning, period. Climbing onto the bed, he slid his arms under her knees. Those do-me shoes of hers flashed red in his peripheral vision as he cupped her bottom and angled in for that first glorious thrust. He took it slow, enjoying the way her pupils dilated and her cheeks flushed as he eased into her.

Then he was locked in tight, and her sigh of pleasure made her nipples quiver. He liked this position, where he could watch her as he stroked lazily back and forth, but he also craved more body contact. Shifting while staying deep within her, he propped his forearms on either side of her shoulders.

There. Now he could lean down and nibble on her mouth, which he did, relishing the velvet feel of her lips and the tiny puffs of warm air as her climax drew near and she began to pant. He could lower himself just enough that his chest brushed her puckered nipples with every thrust. She wrapped her legs around his waist, and those crazy shoes rubbed against his butt as he moved within her.

There was nowhere else on earth he’d rather be than right here, making love to Lily. He kissed her again as the mounting tension urged him to go faster.

Then he lifted his mouth to gaze down at her. “I love you.”

She moaned and closed her eyes. “Don’t say that.”

“Then I’ll say this.” He pumped faster. “I love being naked with you. I love pushing deep inside you and making you come. I love the sounds you make and the way you clench around my cock when you’re ready to . . . like that . . . just like . . .
that
.” He came in a rush at the same moment that she cried out and arched upward, pulling him deeper, letting him feel the steady pulse of her climax.

He covered her body with his, wanting to absorb her tremors, wanting her to feel his. And while he tried to keep some of his weight on his arms as he braced them on either side of her, she wouldn’t let him. She hugged him to her, as if desperate for the contact, as if even one milliliter of space between them was unacceptable.

She might not want to talk about love, but her body was expressing every emotion she didn’t want to admit. He didn’t know what demons she was fighting that kept her from acknowledging her feelings toward him, but eventually he’d find out. Until then he’d just keep on loving her.

Lily knew that when the man of your dreams says he loves you, it should be cause for celebration. It should be, unless you’ve given that man a potion that has altered his perceptions and so his feelings for you aren’t real. Then it is cause for misery.

As miserable as she felt, she shouldn’t be able to enjoy sex this much, but she blamed the magic buzz she still had going on. Sex was a great pastime when you were feeling both high and agreeable. Besides, she hated for the finger food to go to waste.

Now that their immediate lust had been satisfied, they took the remaining time to play with what Griffin had ordered. He smeared cream cheese on her nipples and licked it off, which she found quite stimulating, so much so that she agreed to have him try the cream cheese lower down.

After she recovered from that successful experiment, she commandeered the whipped cream. “I’ll make this quick,” she said. “You have a meeting.”

He groaned as she smeared whipped cream on his firm penis. “Forget the damned meeting.”

“No.” She began to lick away the whipped cream. “You’ll make your meeting.”

“As if I care. Ah, Lily . . .”

She reapplied more whipped cream to the very tip.

Then she closed her mouth over that treat and sucked in deep. He gasped and clutched the sheets in his fists.

She released him for a second. “Now, concentrate, Griffin. We’re going to take it on home.”

“I don’t care if I’m late. I don’t . . . oh, dear God . . . that’s incredible. Sweet lord, but you know how to . . . ah . . .
ah
!” With a groan of surrender he came.

She loved knowing she’d given him pleasure. It was the least she could do under the circumstances. She coddled him a little as he came back to earth, and then she nudged him until he gave up and went in to take a quick shower.

She didn’t join him there. On top of her other sins, she wasn’t about to add career sabotage. Instead she stretched out on the bed and pulled the covers up to her chin. She hadn’t slept much the night before, and all this great sex had relaxed her.

Sure, she still felt guilty as Hades, but she had no immediate solution for her problem, and the sheets were soft and Griffin was whistling in the shower. For some reason it didn’t bother her so much this time.

He came out of the bathroom and dressed quickly. Then he crossed to the bed and leaned down to kiss her. “You make me very happy.”

“Thanks. Same here.” She wondered if making a man happy was such a crime. He hadn’t seemed particularly happy before she’d given him the elixir. Now he was enjoying great sex and thinking he was in love. Was that so bad?

With a sigh of regret he moved away from the bed. “Gotta go. But relax here for as long as you want.” He shrugged into his suit coat. “The room’s reserved for the rest of the night.” He paused. “Too bad you have to work, or we could hang out here.”

“Except I do have to work, and there’s the matter of Daisy.”

“Right. Didn’t mean to forget her. So I’ll see you at the Bubbling Cauldron, then.” He looked adorably uncertain. “And later? Is it okay if we—”

“Yes. That being-apart thing didn’t work out very well.”

“It sucked.” His smile was brilliant with joy. “Okay, then.” He touched two fingers to his forehead in a mini salute. “See you tonight.”

As he left, she thought the phrase
a spring in his step
described Griffin’s exit. And she had put that spring in his step. Sure, eventually she’d have to straighten this whole thing out and get right with Griffin. It wasn’t as if they could live their whole lives with a huge secret between them.

But for now, with the engagement party coming up and her parents in town, maybe a small deception could be forgiven. Maybe, even though he’d been given the elixir, he loved her a little bit on his own. It could happen.

With that thought cheering her, she snuggled under the covers and dozed, telling herself she wouldn’t take more than an hour’s nap. She had to go home, take care of Daisy, and change for work. But she had time . . .

Two hours later, she had almost no time. She’d slipped into a deep sleep and only a knock on the door, which turned out to be someone with the wrong room number, saved her from an even worse disaster. Ignoring the expense, she took a cab back to her apartment.

In record time she showered, changed, took Daisy for a quick trip outside and then fed her. She glanced at the crystal ball and candles in the middle of the living room floor as she ran out the door. Griffin might think it was a little strange, but she’d make something up. She’d tell him she was practicing a routine for Anica’s party on Sunday night.

She wouldn’t use her precious crystal ball at the party, though. Just her luck it would get broken. Instead she planned to do a couple of tricks with her wand. It would be real magic, which the magical people in attendance would know, but the nonmagical folks would assume she was very good at sleight of hand and let it go at that.

 

Griffin arrived back at the office, determined to talk Kevin out of his idea of investigating Lily’s apartment. But he was in meetings until nearly four, when they’d agreed to go over to Lily’s.

Kevin breezed into Griffin’s office with Miles right behind him. “Ready to go?”

“No. It’s a bad idea. We can’t do this.”

Kevin turned to Miles. “Told you he’d try to back out.”

Miles stepped forward. “We gotta go over there, Griff. I was talking to Biddle today. He wants to know what’s up with you. You were the golden boy until this week, but now . . . he asked if you had some psychiatric problem he should know about.”

“Jesus.” Griffin shook his head. “So I missed an appointment. One lousy appointment and he’s convinced I’m a nutcase. If he’s that touchy maybe I should just quit.”

Kevin and Miles exchanged a glance.

“You missed more than the appointment, buddy,” Kevin said. “You were supposed to have lunch with Biddle at his club today. He was looking all over the office for you, but you were AWOL. I don’t have to think very hard to imagine where you were or what you were doing.”

“That lunch was today?” Griffin looked at the calendar on his desk and groaned. “I completely spaced on that. Man, I need to apologize. Is he still here?”

“Nope,” Miles said. “He’s gone home for the weekend. Said he’s taking his yacht out on the lake tomorrow for the first time, and you know what a big deal that is.”

“Yeah, I do,” Griffin said. “He loves that boat.”

“Yeah, well, apparently he was going to ask you to join him,” Miles continued, “but when you didn’t show up for lunch, he bagged that plan. He asked me to go, but I get seasick.”

“He didn’t ask me,” Kevin grumbled. “But then the short guy always gets passed over for you tall sonsabitches.”

“The point is,” Miles said, “you aren’t your normal self, Griff. A week ago you would never have forgotten that lunch date. Biddle’s treated you like a long-lost son, but that isn’t going to last if you keep up this bullshit.”

“Look, it’s my fault, okay? Lily didn’t hypnotize me or anything. I’m in love with her. Simple as that.”

Miles and Kevin stared at him, their mouths open.

“Don’t look at me like that. Lily’s a wonderful woman. Why wouldn’t I be in love with her? I know this is a little sudden, but sometimes love is like that. It strikes when you least expect it to.”