Daring Dylan (The Billionaire Brotherhood Book 2) (15 page)

Gracie
pressed her ear against the door to Dylan’s room.

Silence. Absolute
silence swirled around on the other side. She tapped a brisk, business-like
tattoo on the hardwood.

More
silence.

She chewed
her lip, considering her choices. Should she barge in or not? She’d give
anything to avoid seeing him, but hanging the new window treatment in his room
was the last of the chores on Granddad’s list, and she wanted to be finished
this morning. In two hours, Gran needed her to come to the hospital to help
transport Granddad home. After that, she was scheduled to fill in for Gran,
taking care of the final ice cream production for the festival.

She hadn’t
seen Dylan since he’d limped into the house like the walking wounded last
night. He’d made it very clear outside McStone’s, and then again outside the
house, that he didn’t want her help. Even if he had deigned to let her drive
him home.

She knocked
again and took a deep breath. Now or never.

Opening the
door, she tiptoed inside. Rumpled sheets beckoned from the bed. Dylan’s clothes
littered the floor, but the man himself was absent. Thank heavens.

Her feet
paused beside his discarded jeans. A pair of boxer-briefs lay next to them. She
almost picked up both items, under the guise of tidying up, but stopped
herself.

She
pictured him asleep in the bed, naked. The pillow carried a hollowed-out
imprint. She imagined his sun-streaked hair mussed from his night’s sleep, a
muscular forearm blocking the sunlight from his eyes. His broad shoulders and
chest tapered to slim hips. The sheet covered his hips and groin. Barely. He’d
turn over, dislodging the fabric...

Edging
closer, she inhaled. The bedding carried his musky scent. Masculine… delicious.
She shook her head at her own foolishness. What in the world was she doing? She
had work to do, and it needed to be done. Now. While he was out.

It took
only a minute to move a chair away from the window then bring in her ladder and
tools. Perched on a middle rung, she dropped her screwdriver when a cell phone
beeped on an end table.

Debating
whether to answer it or not, she heard a splash from the bathroom. While she
hovered, paralyzed with surprise, the bathroom door swung open. Dylan appeared,
briskly dragging a towel across his wet body. He skidded to a stop when his
gaze riveted on her gaping curiosity, then wrapped the luckiest towel on earth around
his waist.

Close… so close to the whole enchilada
.

“What are
you doing here?” Dylan barked as he picked up the phone. Dark circles around
his eyes gave him an owlish look. Except that she’d never seen an owl in a
towel, of course.

“Hanging
drapes.” A sweep of her arm indicated the obvious. “But don’t worry, I’ll go.”

“Hello,” he
said into the receiver, motioning for Gracie to continue her task. “Yes, Uncle
Arthur. I did call yesterday. I could use your help with something.”

She should
leave. The chore wasn’t noisy, and it required her to face away from him, but
all that was beside the point. She knew he was there. She knew he was engaged
in a private conversation. And she knew he was the next thing to naked.

With just
the right angle, she could see his buff chest and sculpted shoulders reflected
in the window. The chiseled muscles sported an interesting array of cuts and
bruises. She decided to stay.

“You know
Jack Benning over at Latham, Benning and Brown, don’t you? I called him
yesterday about a deed they handled twenty-five years ago for some Cordial
Street property in East Langden.”

At the
mention of Clay’s old address, Gracie’s ears perked up. While she pretended not
to study him or listen in, she surreptitiously watched him inspect the worst of
his bruises as he talked. She had to put every one of her medical instincts on
hold to keep from taking the task into her own hands, but who was she kidding?

The thought
of touching those solid pecs, running her fingers through the mat of damp chest
hair, and stroking the ridges of his abdomen like a banjo had nothing to do
with healing and everything to do with sheer, unadulterated lust. The onslaught
of desire set her fingers trembling. A wall bracket slipped through her
fingers, hitting the floor with a clank.

Shooting
him an apologetic look, Gracie moved on to the center mount, determined to keep
her hands and mind off of his body and under control. She could do it. If she
could just keep her eyes off of him as well.

“They
claimed attorney-client privilege and wouldn’t give me any details, but all the
principles are dead. You think you’d have more success getting the
information?”

With the
final bracket removed, Gracie climbed off the ladder to retrieve the new ones.
Of its own accord, her gaze returned to Dylan’s body. Why couldn’t he be
scrawny and underdeveloped? A man with his looks and money shouldn’t be blessed
with physical perfection, too. And he should never, ever be allowed to lounge
on an unmade bed wearing nothing but a swatch of terry cloth.

With a
pillow propped behind his back and a leg bent at the knee, he had the look of a
Greek god waiting for a flock of handmaidens to feed him grapes, slather his
body in oil, and lick his toes. Or other, more interesting, parts of his body.

After
imagining herself in the role of most-favored handmaiden, Gracie realized the
one-sided conversation had ended. Dylan had put down the phone and was watching
her.

Watching
her
watch
him
.

Oops!
Busted. A blush spread from her cheeks down to the soles of her feet.

The corners
of his mouth quirked into a killer smile. One that revealed his perfect white
teeth, unmasked a dimple in his right cheek that was deep enough to lose a
finger in, and put a dancing light into eyes that were as inviting as sin,
despite being black and blue and puffy from the fight the night before.

Her small
reserve of resistance melted into a thick, viscous pool of desire. And she knew
with sick dread that it must have the same effect on every woman who witnessed
it. She vowed not to become his next conquest. He could go ahead and wow Tanya
with it if he wanted, but Gracie was made of sterner stuff.

“Want to
kiss anything and make it better?” he asked.

Yes!
Her eyes lingered over a bruise on his
washboard stomach.

“I’ve seen
road kill that looked more inviting.” She hoped she sounded disdainful and
uninterested instead of drunk on unrequited passion. “And I thought you didn’t
want my help.”

Dumb. Stupid,
really, to let him know how much that
comment had cut her last night. To let him know that she even remembered it was
foolish beyond permission.

“I didn’t
say I didn’t
want
your help last
night, Gracie. I said I didn’t
need
it.” He crossed his arms over his bare chest. His biceps and forearms bulged
into display. Firm, corded. Strong, capable, comforting.

A quick
hand to her mouth checked for drool. “Next time you get in a fight at
McStone’s, make sure Marvin Gardens is on your side before you start swinging.”

“Marvin
Gardens?” A more genuine version of the smile appeared. More endearing than
sexy, but sexy nevertheless. “Is that his real name?”

“The name
on his birth certificate is LeRoy. But during grade school, the name Marvin
kind of stuck.” Gracie gathered her control and turned back to her project.

“He
is
big enough to build a hotel on.”
Checking Dylan’s reflection in the window again, she watched him brush damp
hair off his forehead. The movement elicited a wince and rotation of his
shoulder in its socket. Muscles rippled like an earthquake down his chest and bruised
ribcage. He froze, mid-ripple. “He’s not
the
LeRoy Gardens, is he? The landscape painter that’s been getting all the rave
reviews in New York?”

“Yep.
That’s our Marvin. His work is fabulous, isn’t it?”

“Incredible.”
Dylan shook his head in wonder. “I went to one of his shows. One of my best
friends is married to art critic Kara Enderley. She called his work ‘raw’ and
‘elemental’. The starting price on a canvas was around fifty thousand.”

“Yeah,
we’re all really proud of him.” Gracie loved a good success story. “He was one
of my mom’s art students way back when, but he had his own unique style and
technique from the very beginning. Gran has a couple of his early paintings in
the dining room. You should check them out.”

“I’ll do
that.”

She risked
a glance over her shoulder, then turned quickly away. He was entirely too
comfortable with his state of undress to suit Gracie. “Were you soaking your
wounds in the tub? How do you feel? Do you think you should have some look at
you?”

“Someone’s
looking at me now.” He made a clicking sound with his tongue. “You just can’t
stand it, can you? You see someone who might be in pain and you have to play
doctor.”

“I don’t
play
doctor, I
am
a doctor, just not the kind you need. If you don’t want my
attention focused on you, get dressed. I’ll somehow manage to overcome the
disappointment.”

“You can
focus your attention on me anytime you want.” His voice deepened into a
flirtatious rumble.

Somehow,
while her back was turned, he’d come up behind her. His reflection appeared beside
hers in the window, and she felt the heat of his body just inches away. Almost
desperately she wanted to turn into him and share his warmth. She refused even
to look at him, rather than give in to the need.

“I’m sorry
about last night,” she said, warding off temptation. “I do tend to butt into
situations that aren’t my business. But you’re an outsider here, and it doesn’t
benefit you to alienate the people you intend to question.”

“Since
you’re on Clayton’s side, I’d think you’d be pleased by the lack of cooperation
I’ve received.”

She climbed
off the ladder and turned to face him. “Why? The more you learn, the better his
chances of being recognized as a Bradford.”

“There’s
that. But what if, by some miracle, I discover what you and he contend is true,
and I choose never to recognize him?”

“Why
wouldn’t you?”

He
scratched his chin. “What’s in it for me?”

“The
truth.”

“Some
truths are harder to swallow than others.” To his credit, he seemed troubled by
the possibility.

“But you
won’t be able to ignore it if it’s shoved down your throat, will you?”

His chest
expanded and contracted on a sigh. She wished he wouldn’t do that.

“No.” His
reluctance was almost palpable. “I’m committed to getting to the bottom of
this, however low that might be.”

“And you don’t
believe there’s any way that you and Clay have the same father?”

He
hesitated a second too long for certainty. “No, but I might not be the most
perceptive observer. I’ve been thinking about bringing in a private
investigator.”

“Another
outsider?” She hooked her elbows on the ladder behind her and leaned back. “How
would that help?”

“It
couldn’t hurt. He’d be more experienced and objective than I am. Wouldn’t have
a personal grudge against Clayton.”

“But the
people here would think you’re just spreading your money around, trying to buy
answers. They’d freeze a private investigator right out.”

The towel
slipped down a notch on his hips. She almost stopped breathing while he
adjusted it. “Do you have any other ideas?”

Plenty, but
she squashed the most obvious one. “About the investigation? Well, we could
join forces.”

He cocked
an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t we be working at cross purposes?”

“We may
want to find out for different reasons, and we may disagree about the probable
outcome, but we both want to uncover the truth. We can concentrate on that and
see what happens.” Gracie suspected she was babbling, but with Testosterone
Mountain acting like a brain-cell magnet, she couldn’t stop.

“You don’t
know anything more about investigating than I do.” His lips moved and sounds
emerged, but his reasonable words faded beneath his very distracting body
language. His physical presence challenged her to acknowledge him. His eyes
dared her to come closer. And the stroke of his finger slowly traveling up her
jaw toward her ear issued a clear invitation for her to touch him in return.

She reached
up one hand and traced the chain attached to a religious medal that nestled
against his chest. Crinkly chest hair tickled her fingers. She swallowed. “No,
but the people here will talk to me.”

“You may be
the only one who could talk the next person on my list into meeting with me.”
He caressed the sensitive spot beneath her ear with a fingertip, circling it,
teasing it.

Her fingers
drifted down the chain links to the medal itself. She pretended to study it.
“Why is that?”