Her Man Friday (44 page)

That was okay, though, Schuyler thought, for now. Because standing as she was, he could drink his fill of her visually, and visually, she was a magnum of Perrier-Jouet just waiting to be savored.

Her hair was once again swept up behind her, but not in the severe, pinching fashion she normally wore. No, in fact, several breezy little tendrils cascaded around her face, nearly to her shoulders, and the rest looked as if someone had just carelessly piled it atop her head. It was almost as if the removal of one little pin would send the whole arrangement tumbling down.

Oh, yes. Schuyler
much
preferred this style to the other.

She had bypassed her usual bland wardrobe colors and had opted for a sapphire blue gown that hugged her lush form in a manner that would have made him jealous, had her dress not been an inanimate object. Oh, hell, yes it did make him jealous, and he itched to remove it so that he might be the one hugging her form instead.

Later, he promised himself. But not
much
later.

"You look absolutely edible… uh, incredible," he said by way of a greeting. "Well, you know what I mean."

She smiled at him, and those few little bits of uncertainty that were still settled in his belly dissolved. Just like that. "You don't look so bad yourself," she said, nodding toward his tuxedo.

"Well, that goes without saying," he agreed.

She took a step forward, almost reluctantly, then another, and another. Schuyler crooked an elbow when she was still a foot away, and the gesture was evidently enough to encourage her to take that final step. Looping her arm through his, Caroline paused for a moment beside him, and it was all Schuyler could do not to scoop her into his arms and carry her upstairs and make dinner out of
her
.

"I was afraid that you wouldn't come," he said, not sure when he'd decided to reveal such a thing.

"Were you?" she asked.

He nodded. "And then I was afraid that you would."

She parted her lips slightly, as if she couldn't quite get enough air. "And now?" she asked. "How do you feel now?"

He gave that some thought before answering, and was surprised by what he discovered. "Now," he said, "I think everything—
everything
—is going to work out exactly as it should."

She smiled again, but this time the gesture was one of understanding. She said nothing to comment on his remark, but then, no comment was really necessary. So Schuyler covered her hand with his and tugged her forward, and together they entered the dining room.

He was still focused entirely on her face when he slowed his pace, urging them both to a standstill at the center of the room. "Everyone," he said in a voice of urgent announcement. "I'd like for you to meet Caroline. Caroline," he added, still looking into her eyes, "I'd like for you to meet everyone." And then, just to make sure everyone—including Caroline—knew what was what, he forced his gaze away from hers and to the audience that had gathered. And then he added, in a surprisingly carefree voice, "Everybody be nice to her. She doesn't realize it quite yet, but she's going to be my wife. Oh, and let's not hold dinner for darling Lily and Leo," he hastened on before she could correct his assumption—not that she would correct it, because it was in no way erroneous. "Something tells me they're not going to make it. Not for dinner, at any rate."

In the library, Lily rose to follow Schuyler as he fairly raced out the door—honestly, what
was
his hurry?—but Leo's soft voice halted her from making a clean escape.

"What's your hurry?" he asked.

She narrowed her eyes at him, suspicious of his ability to read her mind. It was more than a little unnerving. Nevertheless, she supposed there was still far too much left unsettled between them to let it go just yet.

In spite of that, "I'm hungry," she told him.

He smiled, a
very
predatory smile, but there was a lingering uncertainty darkening his eyes. Good, she thought. He should feel uncertain. The sneaky little fink. Call her a liar, would he? He was the one who had manufactured a completely false persona from the start. Call her thief, would he? He was the one who'd stolen something. Her heart. Damn him. Call her greedy, would he? He was the one who consumed something whole. Her love. Good thing for him she had such a charitable nature. She was willing to forgive him. Eventually. But not until she had him exactly where she wanted him.

On his knees.
Begging
for forgiveness. Among other things.

"Hungry huh?" he asked. "What a coincidence. I'm hungry, too."

Yes, but were they hungry for the same thing? she wondered. Experimentally, she suggested, "Then it would probably be a good idea to join the others in the dining room, don't you think?"

"Oh, you're hungry for
food
, are you? That's too bad. I had something else in mind myself."

Ah-hah, she thought. So they
were
hungry for the same thing. That was going to make the rest of the evening infinitely easier to plan. After she finished with that business of bringing him to his knees, of course. But all she said in response to his assertion was, "Oh?"

He nodded. "Yeah, I'm in the mood for a veritable feast, myself. A real smorgasbord, as a matter of fact. All-you-can-eat."

"I see."

He rose from his seat, too, unbuttoning his tuxedo jacket with much nonchalance. "Not as much as you're going to."

Lily's heart began to hammer, and her very skin began to hum. "Why, Mr. Friday. I do believe you may be making a sexual overture toward me."

He nodded. "You got that right, boss lady."

Ooo. She did like the sound of that.

"And if you think the overture is good," he added, "just wait until you see the first act."

"Mmm," she murmured noncommittally. "I hope there will be lots of gratuitous sex."

"Oh, you can count on that."

"Then I think I'll like the first act very much indeed. And the second. And the third. Of course, that's assuming that
you
are the one playing opposite me in that act, something that, right now, is very much in question."

His smile fell. "Oh."

"You see," she began mildly, "I don't normally make it a practice to have sex with a man who's accused me of lying, and stealing, and being greedy."

He winced, flinching visibly at her charges.

"Did I do that?" he asked.

Lily feigned consideration. "Mm, yes, I believe you did. I distinctly recall you resorting to name calling at one point. A thief, you called me. A liar. Kind of interesting, seeing as how
you
were the one who lied about his identity—"

"That wasn't lying," he interjected with an almost convincing look of surprise. "That was practice. I was planning on being a bookkeeper named Leonard Freiberger for Halloween, and I was just trying out my costume on you. Pretty convincing, huh?"

Lily eyed him with much skepticism, then continued, "You lied and then violated the privacy of my bedroom—"

"Oh, now see, there you go, making assumptions again," he interrupted once more. "I just went up to your bedroom to fondle your underwear, that's all. Your computer was making a funny noise, so I decided to see if I could fix it, then suddenly… boom… all this information just sort of appeared, and I made the perfectly innocent mistake of thinking you were, you know, stealing money from your employer. It could have happened to anybody."

"Mm."

He inhaled a deep breath and released it slowly. For a long moment, he said nothing, clearly struggling to find something to excuse, or at least explain, his actions. Then, evidently deciding there were no words to accomplish such a thing, he simply told her, "I don't know that I will ever be able to apologize enough for thinking the worst of you the way I did."

Okay, that was a good start, Lily thought. But not quite enough to appease her. What else was he willing to do?

"And I'm not sure I can even explain why I was so ready to think the worst of you the way I did. Unless it was just because I was—"

"What?" she demanded.

He hesitated again, then confessed, very softly, "Because I was terrified of you."

Oh, well, that certainly got her attention. "Terrified?" she echoed incredulously. "Of me? Why?"

He took a step forward, then seemed to think better of the action, and halted. "Because it scared me, how quickly I fell in love with you."

Ooo,
now
they were getting somewhere. But instead of making it easy on him, Lily said, "Go on."

He sighed again, with a little less anxiety this time. "I've never felt about a woman the way I've found myself feeling about you. You just… you're inside me, Lily. And I know you'll be there forever."

Yes, that was good. "Go on."

"And maybe, as a last-ditch reflex of self-preservation," he continued, "I jumped to conclusions about you in an effort to put the brakes on those feelings. Funny thing, though," he added, his voice softening more. "Even when I was trying to tell myself you were a liar and a thief, I never really believed myself. I knew, deep down, that you just weren't capable of something like that."

She nodded, but said nothing, just waited for him to go on. Because she knew he wasn't finished yet.

"I'm sorry I lied to you," he said.

There, that was what she'd been waiting for.

"I could try to excuse myself by saying that I was only doing my job," he went on, "but that's a pretty lame excuse. Still, Lily… I was only doing my job. And I am sorry for misleading you."

This time Lily was the one to sigh, in acceptance, in resolution. "I guess we both rather misrepresented ourselves, didn't we? Neither of us was entirely honest. Which means that we can't afford to make that mistake in the future. For the rest of our lives, Leo, let's promise to always be truthful, okay?"

He paused a telling moment before asking, "So then, we do have a future?" He was obviously still not quite sure where he stood with her.

"Oh, yes," she promised him. "We definitely have a future. A really long and full one."

He smiled at that, looking extremely sexy and suave and sexy and sophisticated and sexy and handsome and sexy and hot and… did she mention sexy? He must have only used water to slick back his hair, because it was dry now, a single, unruly lock falling down onto his forehead. His eyes were lit with a raucous gleam, and the black tuxedo enhanced every elegant line of his body, every ripple of hard muscle he possessed. She couldn't wait to get it off of him. Something told her then that they would very likely be spending the rest of the evening in the library, in front of the fireplace, performing all kinds of maneuvers that were wanton and lascivious and hedonistic and—

"You really are one smart lady," he said, scattering her thoughts.

"What was that?" she asked absently, hoping her lascivious intentions didn't show. "I'm sorry, I was calculating the weight of the sun."

He chuckled as he shook his head. "You just… you're not like any woman I've ever met. And I…" He shrugged. "I love you, Lily. I don't want to lose you."

The warmth in her belly curled and dawdled through her midsection to points beyond. "I love you, too. And you never will lose me. Now then," she proposed, taking a step toward him. "About that hunger we both seem to be experiencing…"

He glanced toward the library door, then lifted a finger in that direction. "Does, um, does that door have a lock?"

She nodded. "A really big one. Schuyler's safe is in here."

"That's all I need to know."

Quickly and deftly, he crossed to take care of that particular matter, while Lily strode to the Palladian window and tugged the heavy draperies closed.

She reached for the top button of her jacket as she spun back around, and by the time she'd returned to the sofa, she'd freed all but one of the buttons. Beneath, she wore a brief camisole of silver silk, and the soft fabric danced and glittered in the firelight. Leo, too, had made short work of his jacket, which he'd tossed onto the sofa beside Lily's. Now, as she watched, he pushed the suspenders of his trousers over his shoulders and went after each of the buttons.

"Hurry," she said, reaching for the zipper at the back of her skirt, pushing that to the floor and kicking it aside. Beneath, she wore tap pants to match the camisole and smoky thigh high stockings. She started to toe off her high heels, then, feeling devilish, decided to leave them on for now. Because judging by the way Leo was looking at her…

He halted his movements at the sight of her, the fire in his eyes leaping higher, burning hotter, than those in the fireplace beside him. "Oh, Lily," he said softly, his voice a mere caress. "You are so…"

"What?" she asked, suddenly overcome by uncertainty.

He grinned
very
salaciously—something that went a long way toward dispelling that uncertainty—but shook his head slowly, teasingly. "I just don't ever think I'll get enough of looking at you."

She grinned back. "Oh, please, Leo. You'll have decades to look at me." She took a step forward. Then another. And another. "Right now," she purred, "I want you to touch me. All over."

He extended one finger toward her, tracing it over the slender line of her collar bone, then down her breastbone, to the lace of her camisole. "Hey, you're the boss," he told her, his voice low and husky.

Oh, yes. She most definitely liked the sound of that. "In that case, Mr. Friday," she said, her own voice none too loud or smooth, "you'd better do exactly as I say."

He lifted his head to meet her gaze, but his eyes were full of playfulness and teasing. "Yes, ma'am."

"Then again," she said softly, eyeing his half-open shirt, "there's a lot to be said for doing things for oneself."

Quickly, easily, Lily unfastened the rest of his buttons and tugged his shirt free of his black trousers. Beneath, he wore an old-fashioned undershirt without sleeves, his dark hair springing from the neckline, the salient biceps revealed by the style gilded with gold in the firelight. One side of his face lay in shadow, but she could see that his eyes were now dark with desire. She cupped one hand over his rough jaw, and his eyes fluttered closed. Then she raked her thumb gently over his lower lip—so incongruously full and soft compared to the hard planes and angles of his other features—and he uttered a quiet sound of pleasure.