Seductively: Playing for Hearts Book 2 (Crimson Romance) (20 page)

“What are you doing here?” She stepped up on the porch.

Dominic moved back inside in the light. “I want to show you something. Come in.”

In one day, he’d changed from his slacks and a dress shirt from this morning into an old pair of jeans with a frayed rip on the thigh, faded spots on his knees, and a worn T-shirt. His mussed hair held up a pair of safety goggles. Her gaze went back down his body to the tool belt buckled low on his hips. She blinked at the hammer in his hand.

“Oh my freaking God. Are you crazy?” She stomped into the house. “You can’t break into this house. Someone bought it.”

“I know,” he said. “I’m only tearing something apart.”

She threw her hands up to her sides. “You are — ” She clamped her lips together and shook her head. “So freaking in trouble. Stop doing whatever you are doing and get out of here.”

She hated the way her voice broke and the way she showed how much seeing him here hurt. Sure, he was Dominic Chekovsky, famous hockey player, but he couldn’t do whatever he wanted. Cottage Grove police would throw him in jail for breaking and entering. Not to mention destroying a perfectly spectacular historical home.

“Follow me.” He motioned with his hand and walked into the kitchen.

She didn’t want to. She wanted to get out of here before someone caught them. But she couldn’t stop herself from absorbing everything about the entryway with the old chandelier glowing. The crown molding, a highlight of the original woodwork, only needed sanding and polishing.

In the living room, she scanned the long sectional wooden floor. She’d always assumed she’d need to have a new floor built, but the wood planks were gorgeous. She ran her hand across her cheek. God, she would’ve loved to varnish the floors to a shine. The history they told with their age would attract all the guests’ attention during their stay.

She stepped into the kitchen and her heart dropped. “Oh my God, what have you done?”

“I ripped out the old stove and cabinet. It’s in the backyard.” He moved over to the fireplace. “Did you know the chimney’s still intact and seems in good condition?”

Of course she did. She’d dug up every piece of information she could find on the house. She’d spent numerous hours being nosey, scouring the property, doing research in the library. She knew the cellar door on the outside remained broken, and the foundation on the east corner needed fixing, but the beams under the house were solid and in good condition. At one time, there was a winery in the backyard, but had since been torn down. Nothing he told her now would surprise her.

Except why he was standing in the house pretending he had permission to rip apart the kitchen.

“Dom … you’re killing me,” she whispered.

He approached her and took her hands in his. “We need to talk.”

“There’s nothing to say. I did my part for you. Someone else bought this house. I’m working at the hotel until I can make other plans.” She lifted her gaze. “And you have a hockey career you must take seriously. If you are caught vandalizing this house, you can kiss everything goodbye. We need to leave. Now.”

He shook his head. “I have a bigger problem.”

Despite telling herself he was none of her business, she asked, “What?”

“You failed to do what I hired you for.” He lifted her hands and kissed her knuckles.

She cringed. “The women are bothering you again?”

“No.” He chuckled. “They ignore me.”

She tugged on her hands, but he refused to let her go. “Well, I’m sorry that disappoints you. I’m sure you can do whatever you do and have them back.”

“I don’t want them,” he whispered. “I want you. You see, I realized that having you around all the time wasn’t what made them stay away from me. I didn’t need your protection.”

Kill me now.
She glared. “Fine. I guess you’re here to ask for your money back. You’re too late. I tore the check in half and mailed it to your house already. I don’t want your money, and seeing how you don’t think I did my job, we can both be happy.”

“I didn’t say I wasn’t happy.” His jaw twitched. “I said it wasn’t you who made all the women stop chasing me. I did that.”

“God. You are a conceited ass — ”

“They stopped throwing themselves at me because I fell in love with you.” He pressed her hands to his chest and held them there. “In my heart, I was taken the moment you came home with me. When you are around, all I can see is you. I went to bed thinking about you, and woke up anxious to be with you. Nothing else exists. The women, they know I’ll never see anything in them because you are my everything.”

Okay. That was perfect.

“I am?” she mouthed.

He leaned forward and put his lips to her ear. “You are, sweetcheeks,” he whispered.

“Oh my God.” She pulled her hands out of his grasp and dived into his arms. “I fell in love with you too. I wanted to tell you, but I thought you only hired me to do a job. Then I didn’t think I deserved you, because I whored myself out to you and you were not the player I thought you were.”

“It was never a job. The first time I saw you, I wanted you.” He tilted her face. “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she said.

He kissed her. There were no words to describe what they said with their lips. Her confession topped with finally having her mouth on him again was soul shattering and thorough. Deep and hypnotic. It was better than anything she’d ever dreamed.

His mouth was the perfect mold for her lips. His tongue tangled with hers. He held her still, wanting her to accept him, and she did without any question.

There was nothing but him and her. And the feelings they finally let out into the open.

Nothing compared to their kiss. Nothing. Not her independence or her broken dreams. Not his pushy ways or his career or even all the women he came into contact with on a daily basis. Not any of the hurdles she knew they’d need to jump would keep her from Dominic again.

When he lifted his head a fraction of an inch, he placed his forehead against hers. She breathed deep, feeling the tingles on her sensitized lips after the kiss and knew he felt it too.

Finally, he spoke. “Diana, will you — ”

A loud roar of cars grew close to the house, followed by slamming doors, pulling them apart. She gaped at Dom before jumping into action.

“Run!” She grabbed his sleeve and pulled.

He caught her around the waist. “Diana, it’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. This is Cottage Grove. Being a hockey player won’t get you out of being charged with trespassing and damaging someone else’s property.” She kicked out when he lifted her off the ground. “I don’t want to go to jail.”

The front door banged open. She stilled in Dominic’s arms as footsteps pounded over the wooden floor growing closer.

Shauna skidded to a stop in the kitchen. “I’m so sorry, Diana. Don’t be mad. It’s Grayson’s fault. He wouldn’t tell me what was going on, but I overheard him talking to Dominic at the tennis center and I couldn’t let — ”

Grayson appeared behind Shauna and covered her mouth with his hand. “Sorry, you two. She slipped away from me.”

Diana sagged in relief and smiled at Shauna. Everything about tonight made more sense now that Dominic had confessed his love to her. “It’s okay.”

Shauna squealed behind Grayson’s hand and gave her two thumbs up. Diana laughed, leaning into Dominic. God, she loved her friends. Their friends.

“We’ll be going now,” Grayson mumbled, picking Shauna up and packing her out of the house.

When the door closed, Diana turned to Dominic. “We really do need to leave. The house isn’t for sale anymore. Someone bought it before I could put an offer down.”

“Just a moment.” He took a deep breath. “I can’t spend another day without you. I know we have a lot to figure out, but the possibilities of spending the rest of my life with you and figuring all this out as we go makes me feel alive.” He paused, and sucked more air into his chest. “Diana, will you marry me?”

She covered her mouth. Moisture blurred her vision.

“Sweetcheeks … ?”

She nodded. Tears leaked through her eyelashes and spilled down her cheeks as she answered him.

Dominic laughed. “I have no idea what you said. You’ll have to move your hand off your mouth.”

She removed her hand and jumped into his arms. Against his neck, she chanted, “Yes, yes, yes, yes.”

He carried her as he kissed her all over her face. Her butt hit a flat surface and she pulled back, seeing he’d put her on the counter by the sink. She ran her hands over his gorgeous face, unable to believe he loved her as much as she loved him.

She grinned, shimmying on the old, dusty counter. “We’re getting married.”

“I’ve been busy the last several days, and haven’t had time to buy you a ring,” he said, taking off his tool belt.

She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. We have time.”

“That’s not good enough for my girl.” He dug in his back pocket. “So I thought maybe this would make it easier to wait until we can both go in together and pick out a ring.”

She tilted her head and took the piece of paper from him. “What is it?”

“Read it,” he said.

She unfolded the paper, rubbed her eyes, and bent her head forward. After reading the first line, she gasped.

“I couldn’t let your dream slip away,” he whispered. “You’ve worked too hard. The Ferriday house is yours. Free and clear. On one condition … ”

She pressed the paper to her chest. “What?”

“You give my jersey back to me that you stole.” He kissed her hard. “Then you wear it every night in my bed.”

She wrapped herself around him and planted her head in his neck. Life, at that moment, was perfect. She put her lips to his ear and whispered, “You’ve got deal, big guy. I love you.”

Top Selling Romance Author, Debra Kayn, lives with her family in the beautiful coastal mountains of Oregon on a hobby farm. She enjoys riding motorcycles, gardening, playing tennis, and fishing. A huge animal lover, she always has a dog under her desk when she writes and chickens standing at the front door looking for a treat. She’s famous in her family for teaching a 270 pound hog named Harley to jog with her every morning.

Her love of family ties and laughter makes her a natural to write heartwarming contemporary stories to the delight of her readers. Oh, let’s cut to the chase. She loves to write about
REAL MEN
and the
WOMEN
who love them.

When Debra was nineteen years old, a man kissed her without introducing himself. When they finally came up for air, the first words out of his mouth were … will you have my babies? Considering Debra’s weakness for a sexy, badass man who is strong enough to survive her attitude, she said yes. A quick wedding at the House of Amour and four babies later, she’s living her own romance book.

www.debrakayn.com

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Shauna Marino walked toward the front door of Schyler Tennis Center — or straight to hell — she wouldn’t know for sure until she stood before Grayson Schyler with her heart in her hand. With a toss of her hair and a fortifying breath, she forced herself to take the last remaining steps to face her past. If she’d planned the epic occasion better, she would’ve brought a bottle of tequila along to soften the outcome.

The wind caught the outer door and slammed it shut behind her with an ominous
whoosh
. She flinched, and then tried to hide her shaky reaction of being back in Grayson’s territory by wiping the palm of her hand on the front of her white tennis skirt. She hadn’t seen him in over six years, but the same anxiety-excitement-fear emotional cocktail threatened her resolve to pull this meeting off with class and calmness.

She inspected the front of her light pink, sleeveless polo shirt and flicked at an imaginary piece of lint. The odds were good that Grayson wouldn’t even recognize her. Not at first, anyway.

No longer the innocent teenager, gangly and wilder than the coastal winds, always diving headfirst into whatever feelings ruled the moment, she hoped to rekindle her friendship with Grayson. Before she could show him how much she’d changed though, she’d have to prove she’d left her old ways behind her.

“Hi. Can I help you?” To the right of the door, a young man behind the front desk stood up from his perch at the computer and approached the counter.

“I have a lesson with Grayson at eleven. My name’s Shauna.” She stared straight ahead, her heart beating wildly in her chest.

When she’d called and made the appointment, she’d left only her first name — spelled the wrong way to be on the safe side. The idea to keep Grayson in the dark about her return had seemed brilliant at the time. She didn’t want him reminded of how she’d made a complete fool of herself all through high school with her wild crush on him. She hoped the element of surprise would be enough to knock him speechless when they finally did come face to face.

Maybe then she would be able to utter the two words she should’ve said years ago.
I’m sorry.

She looked up at the oversized poster of Grayson holding the Wimbledon trophy. Warmth beat out the nervousness inside her stomach, and she leaned forward. She’d never missed one of Grayson’s matches on television, or an opportunity to be with him back when she’d still lived at home. It seemed like her whole life revolved around loving Grayson.

He’d started out as her idol when she was twelve years old and he was nineteen. Then, during the winters, when he came home in the off-season to teach at the tennis center, she’d used whatever creative act she could think up to spend time with him. Despite their age difference, they’d become friends. He’d fascinated her with his world travels, his responsibilities, and his goals. He was the young man who thought she was a funny kid, and she’d done whatever possible to make him laugh.

Shauna caught herself tapping the counter with her fingernail and stopped.

Looking back, she knew she’d gone overboard more often than naught, much to the disgrace of the town. But she could also point out that she and Grayson had supported each other while they’d dealt with their own individual hurts. They’d connected on a level that exceeded the normal friendships that came and went. She rubbed her arm. He’d meant everything to her. Smart, ambitious, and compassionate, he’d shown her that someone cared about her.