Love Found Me (A City Love Novel, Book 1) (9 page)

She slid her hands through his silky chestnut hair, threading his feathery trim that sprung like a layered waterfall over his forehead. His scent oozed from the light stubble chiseling his chin. She could almost feel the Italian bergamot suckling her breastbone, as her hand glided down the back of his neck to his shoulders.

Her lips barely touched his when she said, "This could be the start of something special." Her gentle palms combed through his soft, dark hair like a sensual waterfall.

Barely a moment later, his neck rolled back and his eyes flitted toward the open rafters as he released a steady groan that had his heart pounding hard. "Ahhhhh..." He took a heavy breath and leaned to her forehead, as he lifted her hand to his chest, "You have the tender hands of a cherub," he said softly as he pressed a kiss to her slender hand.

She could feel his heart beating out of his chest, as she steadied her palms flat against his silky shirt. A groan whispered under his breath when her soft hair brushed over his lips. She roved her hands down the back of his neck to his shoulders, "You seem tense."

With her hands still on his shoulders, he said, "Not more than usual." Her hands roved to his belt, tugging at it when he bowed toward her. "I wanted everything just right...and special for you tonight." As he whispered the words to her lips, the moonlit Empire building stopped short of glittering a passionate silhouette of sapphire, ginger and orange.

Danielle smoothed her palms against his shirt saucing a little patch of sweat. The moment she'd thought--
This could be a night of romance
--the notion was cut short. She let go of him long enough for him to suddenly say, "I'm famished." Her eyebrows rose as he grabbed her hand, leading the way to the table.

Roman slid the chair for her and placed a dinner napkin in her lap.

"Oh...god," she moaned, as her toes threaded the soft ivory again.

"What a relief," she mumbled, as her naked flesh submersed a glorious meadow that rivaled pillow-top clouds and plush foamy cotton. 

"Let's just ignore the facts and have some fun tonight," he said, as his hands submersed her shoulders in a sensual massage. "These magic hands 'el do all the work in getting you properly loosened." His husky cadence rolled a sensual pulse all through her.

Luckily for her, she'd worn a silk tank blouse even in the heart of winter for those long nights of sweaty and intense pressure she was used to juggling at the office. The same pressure she'd been most often prepared to hack those unyielding unending stressful deadlines. 

"Roman, how is it you always seem to say the right things." Danielle said softly. "I don't feel worried at all in your arms."

"We're gonna release those cares and kindle something--" Her moan cut into his words. He dropped his gaze as she lidded her eyes in an aroused calm. She could feel his thumbs circling sensuously up the nape of her neck pulsing throes in her chest. She exhaled, as he stimulated the hollow flesh in her neck and shoulders.

He leaned in closer, "You look gorgeous," he said, as his feathery locks tickled her primal instinct to dive into his Italian bergamot musk that was practically fused to her rose and lavender.

"You're looking well ah..." her fingertips traced his chiseled stubble, "Not to bad yourself."

He swallowed, as his hands suddenly slipped from her body. Roman took a few seconds to roll down his cuffs as he centered himself to the main course, domed in porcelain. Barely a moment lapsed, when he said, "And now for the piece de resistance."

He lit a couple of candles and gestured toward the table, "Pumpkin tortelloni pasta in a butter and sage sauce, Canaroli rice with pumpkin, roasted beet salad and vinaigrette," as he synchronically lifted the cover from each dish.

"This looks great," she said kindly.

He held the stem of her glass, "Oh, and Amarone wine," he said as he continued pouring.

She could only vision just moments ago his light stubble riding the silk of her cheeky flesh.

"Perfect pairing," he bent to catch her eyes and smiled, as he gestured a flowing kiss from his lips.

Danielle did a hasty scan of the table and immediately blurted, "Who knew a man could cook...like this!" Danielle dove instantly into the pumpkin pasta, barely coming up for air, as she continued her musing, "I mean, besides a chef of course."

Groping his chair, he laughed as he sat down. "Glad you approve," he said, swirling his wine as it gushed near the rim of his glass. "Save some room for desert...gelato pistachio," the words rolled off his tongue in the sexiest Italian accent.

"You're a man of many talents."

His smile scintillated her from head to toe. But, all she'd kept playing to memory was his laugh over and over. It was lower than she'd expected -- huskier, sexier and even more --
Sensual
.

Roman rose from his seat, "You have a little--" he leaned toward her and rubbed a sensuous little circle against the corner of her lips. "There. All gone." His fingertips slowly traced the outline of her lips, as he levered over her pasta.

Her lips felt a tingle, the moment he'd touched her. Her heart was pulsing out of her chest, while every cell in her body had turned into a sultry pile of mush again.

Not only was her appetite quenched, but also she wondered would something else, something other than hunger satiate itself over dinner or perhaps later.
Maybe we should have part two to that massage
. She mused.

His eyes were dark and full of desire, as soft candlelight highlighted the bronze pursing through the loose button of her blouse. Then suddenly, he moved his palm away, as the smoldering gaze in his eyes quickly turned languid.

Roman slid to his seat, "Ah, I--" he swallowed, "I didn't mean t--"

Danielle blew a sharp breath, "You're fine. It's okay," she said with a long sigh.

Am I some kind of freaking idiot...it's not the garlic is it
. She said to herself.

Clearly, he wasn't interested in finishing what he'd mentioned at the office.

Hey, what happened about, "Part two to yesterday?"
She rolled her neck in a moment of deep thought. He simply raised his brow to her expression, ignoring her gesture for part two's massage. Apparently, he was still dwelling over his romantic faux pas.

Just shut up and eat Danielle. Enjoy this feast
. She muttered.

Chapter Seven

This was one of those moments when she should have come prepared -- and dressed for the occasion. Unfortunately for her, the pencil skirt was starting to suck some air out of her lungs.
Should've worn spandex to dinner
. She ruffled the waist of her peony tweed, and blew a sharp breath, when she tugged the side zipper. The vibration shook her hand and surfed the tiny bit of wine up to the edge of her glass.

"I've got to figure out what I'm gonna do about my parents. After this whole thing with Finch totally throwing a curve ball into my plans," she asserted, as she swirled her glass in frenzy.

Danielle's unnerving was starting to get the best of her, despite her innate plan--
Life wasn't perfect
: to discern her cup--half full--rather than half empty. She'd been a shrewd woman all her life, but no matter how insightful the motto was, feelings often ran her life instead of better judgment.

"I thought we were gonna cool it on that tonight." He paused, waiting until she lifted her eyes from the fork threading tortelloni suckling sage sauce. "Remember fun...relaxing...casting those cares--"

"I know. But it's just really starting to piss me off. You know I had plans, well sort of. Well, I hadn't really planned anything for my life, except making partner, fulfilling my dream of being the best darn forensic accountant. And now that I--" she hesitated. "I mean, when I was partner, I could more than afford to take care of them, the business, the farm...but now--"

Roman gingerly pushed aside his glass. He hesitated, with his hand suspended in midair over the dessert goblet saying, "The farm. Whoa wait a minute.
You
grew up on a farm," he giggled.  "Miss Fashionista over there," he added. "I never would've guessed. Hmm. You're someth--"

With his fingertips tracing the lip of the stemware, he glanced up and said, "I don't mean to laugh." She could see the mirth softening his guileless eyes. "That's just...That's amazing Danielle. There's a lot to learn about you."

"It's a lot of hard work. That's what it is." She drew a wistful sigh that flickered the candlelight.

"Naturally," Roman said. Compassion swept the look on his face, like he'd never seen a woman quite so shrewd and amazing--a woman that could rise from the depths of a vision to the top of her game.

"You have no idea, growing up in rural Pennsylvania...well, don't get me wrong. I loved the open spaces, I miss some things about it like my little
Muffin
and
Ed
."

"Muffin...Ed?"

"Yeah. My precious little terrier, I still miss him. And Ed's all grown up now... We bred him into a strong stallion. I still remember taking care of him ever since I was little," she sighed.

The earthy scent of bitter grapes infused her senses when she'd turned her head and tipped the glass to her nose, sipping the last bit of wine from its hollow.

Looking across the table at Roman, she'd just finished off her glass as she said, "It's nothing like life now. I'd gotten a scholarship to business school in my home state. Had I not, I don't know where'd I be, because my parents had enough burden running the farm. And when I left to go to school they'd had to make every dollar count like back in the day."

She went on, "Between my class lectures, coursework and a full-time internship at Finch, I'd barely had time in between semesters to breathe...let alone eat and sleep. I worked damn hard to get to this point. And now--" Danielle streaked a tear at her eyelid, "Now, it's all collapsed to a shallow memory -- nothing but grains of sand."

She twirled the spoon in her hand and weaved it in and out of her fingers. She waited for him to dispute her rationale, but all he did was listen.

"My parents wanted me to stay back home." She swirled a scant piece of lettuce in a puddle of vinaigrette. "Regardless of what my parents wanted..." She paused to take a deep breath before saying, "I love them, but I just had to live my life for me."

"Now that work is--" She squirmed in the seat. "I can't live with the regret of being a single woman all my life. I know, for the longest time I've put career first. But I'm ready for something more," she admitted.

"How 'bout some dessert, " he asked, as his eyes glistened like a dreamy romantic under the chandelier. "It'll make you feel better."

She paused and dropped her chin to her chest, except as her body reminded her he was right. This was a celebration. He'd gone through all the trouble in preparing a special dinner. And the least she could do was enjoy his gracious generosity.

Despite how she could have thought of the peril, there was something about the way his eyes met hers as he listened astutely to her every word. This lingering had her muscles quivering like jello.

And suddenly, her brain clicked into a jubilant overdrive. She flexed her arms in a blend of buoyant contentment. "Well, that's that," she said, tapping a finger against her glass. "No sense in crying over spilled milk now is there."

She folded her hands in her lap, "So what about you, any barnyard, campfire kind of stories...any mystery behind the man and his Lamborghini?"

"Nope. Nothing really," he said, as irritation edged his tone.

"What'd you mean nothing -- There must be something. C'mon Roman, tell me."

"Okay, I'm just what I appear. Daddy's rich son who's given anything he wants." Roman tossed back his cuffs in a petulant huff, "Okay. End of story." Suddenly, the flames jetted and blew on a diagonal, stirring smoke into a threading blur trickling oily wax by the minute.

Instantly, he threaded his fingers into each other and cracked his knuckles, waiting for the moment she'd start showering him in questions.

Danielle noticed Roman's preoccupation and followed his gaze. She grimaced as she saw him, not in anger but more in puzzlement.

Roman sighed a second later. "Sorry, I didn't mean to come down on you like that. I'm just a little stressed I guess. This whole thing with -- well you know." She watched him try to back peddle, but somehow the rising jubilance never quite settled with her.

"My dad's a great guy and my mom is--" he paused with slightly glassy eyes, "Well, I don't want to talk about it anymore. How 'bout we turn the conversation over to dessert."

Roman darted to the kitchen for the frozen concoction. He couldn't stand the thought of scrutiny -- the third degree so to speak. Somehow still, his private life wasn't something he felt comfortable talking about.

For a moment, the strange and brief interlude sparked a familiar and immense feeling of surreptitiousness in his eyes.

"It's pistachio, hope you enjoy it." She was surprised to see his chiseled expression surf into a wry smile. She looked straight at him, as if the chat hadn't gone in stormy territory. Despite how every bone in her body shuddered at the idea of him hiding something.

As Roman titillated her taste buds, aromatic in a melting feast of icy sea green, she momentarily lost the desire to arouse whatever he wanted to keep deep inside of him. She smiled despite his emotional distance.

"Looks scrumptious or should I say-- delicious," she told him.

They were already well into the dessert course when Danielle said, "You must've slaved over all this for hours," as she looked down at the crumbs trailing the plates of Bologna cuisine, "All this for me --" she added.

Danielle fought back the urge to spring across the table or better yet to pounce onto his lap and lick that bit of pistachio trailing from his lips. She knew not to do either one.

He answered with a soft smile saying, "Well I do love a little tortelloni myself," as he daubed the linen napkin against his mouth, his smile widening.

Suddenly, Roman laughed when he'd overheard her stomach growl a few seconds after. He laughed long enough as he watched her dark emerald eyes twinkle with mirth. There was something about her that spoke to him, a sense of loneliness that he knew all too well.

Roman fell back in his chair and smiled, as Danielle's booming laugh echoed throughout the room all the way up to the rafters--sounding as if she hadn't had much laughter in her life. He laughed along with her, and she was glad she'd amused him, although they each knew their time together was--eventual.

He ignored the desire to wrap his hand around hers despite how her smile creased a subtle dimple tantalizing his masculinity. A few seconds later, he swept up the dinner plates and laid out an evening cordial. His laughter still trailed from the kitchen as he cleared the last plate and rejoined her at the table.

"Would you like any?" Roman gestured to his special cordial, pouring himself a glass when she nodded. "No."

A few seconds later, he clanged his glass on the table, "Wanna samba?" Roman suddenly bolted out of his chair, and shimmied his hips after his voice-command piped up the music. She still thought of him as the ultimate party boy, which was why he was more than happily obliged to take on the role of lightening things up a bit.

"Can you turn it down?" she asked.

Roman's silence returned an invitation, as his smile widened and he bumped her hip gesturing her to dance. "I've got some
Woodstock
or--" He paused a beat. "Thought I'd liven it up a bit." But, in spite of his softening gaze radiating the entire apartment, all she did was twitch her bottom lip and stiffen as he rambled on.

His zestful eyes met hers scowling, "So, you don't like to dance? C'mon Danielle lighten up. Live a little. Let's have some fun." He shimmied across the dining area past the kitchen into the living room as glittering skyscrapers dwarfed six-feet of handsomely gorgeous into a speck on a chiseled metropolis.

"Isn't this stuff great. They made some slamming music back in the day." Roman couldn't have been more than thirty-five with his supple baby face eyes that had acquired a taste for established time-honored culture.

His toes threaded the lush silky fur as he whisked pass the coffee table and bookshelves. Roman's clapping and snapping echoed exposed rafters as she watched him master the samba--
swaying his body to the rhythms of the music
—the boogie-woogie and whatever else he'd thought to get kinky, loose and sensual. With all the leaping and sliding, she must've thought he'd been a master in acrobatics.

Watching from the dining room, her gaze barely kept up with him. As she sat in wonder she could only marvel at his flair for dancing, or at least speculate how was it that he'd kept surprising her with some skill far short of what she'd expected.

Danielle pulled her hair into a phantom ponytail, as it sprouted back down her back. After several intense moments sliding on the maple, by then she'd already folded her arms, wondering with every step finessing the textured rug, would he have had enough. She knew his laughter lightened up the evening, but for some reason, her mind kept zoning out and onto Finch Young--not within reason.

But, Danielle meant business. She'd wanted her way tonight. Her brain was on automatic--clicking to extremes. She waited a few minutes. When his eyes met hers, she hollered over the sound, "The music-- Turn it down!" this time, her expression serious. Maybe half of it had to do with the skirt riding her thighs like a veil of fury rising.

"Maybe you'd rather sing the blues," he hollered over the music. Roman stiffened and obliged, even though both of them knew the conversation was headed in another direction.

"I'm tired and my dogs are pooped." Her breath huffed slightly before she'd moaned and curled the tense muscles flexing the pressure points of her tingly soles. "I just want a little peace and quiet. Is that too much to ask?" she added.

Her flesh was a faded tan turning paler by the minute.

Roman stalled, as he leapt toward the dining room. Danielle was silent for a few seconds as she watched him grab a chair, sliding it close to her.

His breath was still heaving when she'd asked softly, "Oh... you never told me why you were at Finch earlier?"

"Huh?" Roman swept her crimson polished toes and fused them between his groin. The very next second Danielle felt his strong hands massage her naked flesh, awakening every satiated bone in her body again--sprouting her bronze back to life.

His hands were gentle on her small frame as she quivered slightly, just enough that his touch stiffened and aroused her.

"Roman," she said, as her lips released a low groan against his outstretched hand, "That feels so delicious."

His hands finessed her calves in primal rhythm, as he sprung them back toward her toes.
Oh god, I needed this
. Her words rang out like a sex kitten as he too submersed himself in a succulent ride. Her body was helplessly rippling and riding the cushion's depth like waves to ocean.

But, despite the temptation to crawl into primal position, his hands were weapons of distraction from her plan to expose him or whatever secret he was intent on hiding.

"Stop trying to divert my attention," Danielle groaned, unaware that she had stammered between quivers. "You heard what I said," she asserted.

Sounding instantly aware, just after she'd bolted her statement, Danielle looked straight at him waiting for his response.

Roman just looked at her as he continued massaging.