Taming Tess (The St. John Sibling Series) (16 page)

"I said I was sorry," he growled,
turning and advancing on her, too late remembering the state of undress she'd been in when he'd burst into the room. At least she'd put on a robe, the short, slinky one that barely covered her and that scrap of yellow panty.

He forced himself to think about the business at hand, his shorts
…or rather the lack of them and demanded, "Where are my shorts?"

"You said you would not wear pink shorts.
I got rid of them."

"I also asked you to buy me new shorts today."

"You didn't ask, you ordered."

"Ordered.
Asked. Whatever. Just tell me you bought me new underwear."

"I bought you
new underwear, St. John."

"Where are they?"

"Right here," she purred, lifting an ominously small bag from the clutter of female products on top of the dresser.

He read the black lettering on the green paper bag.
"You bought me underwear from the Men's Emporium?"

He snatched the bag from her fingers.
"There are cheaper places to shop."

"But Franklin and Son Men's Emporium has the finest quality."

Roman frowned at the bag that barely filled his palm. "What'd you do, buy me just one pair of shorts?"

"Of course not.
I bought you six."

He dug in the bag, his frown deepening as he pulled out one of the thongs.
"What the hell is this?"

"A thong," she chimed.
"It's the latest thing in undergarments for men as well as for women." She pulled another thong from the bag and stretched out the narrow cord that comprised the back of the garment. "See. It leaves no panty line."

"Do I look like a man
concerned with panty lines?"

She glanced down at the towel barely covering his modesty.
He resisted the urge to fold his hands over the place where the family jewels twitched in protest. His heart and mind may be willing to abstain, but that conscienceless part of his anatomy didn't like being out of commission.

"Okay.
You've had your fun," he muttered. "Now where are the real shorts?"

"These are as real as you're going to get."

"You can't be serious."

"You commanded me to buy you shorts.
I bought you shorts."

He dangled the thong in her face.
"These do not qualify as jockey shorts."

"The
man at Franklin's considered them shorts."

"Junior
no doubt. He's into alternatives. Just ask his significant other, Vincent. I'm not."

"Variety is the spice of life."

"I'll spice up my life in my own way, thank you very much."

"Ah yes.
Ski jumper and world class ski instructor. Had yourself quite a run in your oat sowing days, didn’t you? Got it all out of your system?"

"All out of my system.
You got it."

"Put
all your little boy toys away, huh?"

"It's the sort of thing grown
-ups do."

"And what is your grown up idea of spicing up life?
Taking out the garbage on Tuesday instead of Friday? Or maybe it's the day you rotate your mattress?"

Mattress.
Bed. That's where he wanted to be. In his bed. Him and Tess Abbot between the sheets. How was that for grown up thoughts?

More like his thoughts had just taken a bad turn into Never-Never-Land.

"Look," he prodded more gently, "I don't suppose I could talk you into washing out the few white shorts I have."

"How about you wash your own shorts?" she
simpered back at him.

"It's late.
I need to get some sleep. I have to be on the site tomorrow by five a.m. What if I throw them in the washer and you toss them into the dryer when they're done?"

She yawned.
"I'd like to help you out, St. John. But somebody woke me up this morning at the crack of dawn. I just can't seem to keep my eyes open."

"Just tell me where the pink shorts are."

"In the garbage."

"Fine."
He turned for the steps.

"Not your garbage."

He regarded her narrowly. "What do you mean,
not my garbage
?"

"Given your hyper-sensitivity to the color pink, I thought it prudent that I d
idn't put them in your garbage. Wouldn't want anyone getting the wrong idea about you, now would we?"

"Where are they?"

"I put them in my garbage."

"At The Castle?"

"That's where my garbage is and I do have a lot of garbage these days, thanks to you."

Roman groaned.
"What the hell am I supposed to wear for underwear tomorrow?"

Tess dangled the thong in front of his face.

"That is not going to fit me."

She slid her hand into the front pocket of the thong, flexing her fingers until she stretched the silky sack to capacity.
"Feels like the perfect fit to me."

And she would know.
She'd
handled
him to a fever pitch only a few nights ago on the very spot where he now stood. He tensed just thinking about the silky exploration of her fingers around his…

He snatched the thong from her fingers and wheeled for the steps.

"Sweet dreams," she called after him.

T
he bag full of thongs crushed in his fist.

He walked away without comment.
That was the sort of thing Roman had contended with all day. Though none of the guys had guessed the real reason he walked funny was because he wore thong underwear that felt like more like a rope between his butt cheeks. But they all knew about Tess staying at his house, thanks to Brody telling Raymond.

Roman climbed into his truck.
It would be a cold day in hell before he trusted Brody with any more of his secrets.

He started the truck and turned it in the direction of The Bargain Mart.
He'd buy his own damn underwear, Tess Abbot and her thongs be damned.

Though, by afternoon, he had begun to get used to the coarse scrape of denim against his backside and the slick slip and slide of the thong pocket cradling his most personal assets.
At the oddest moments, he'd recall the way his houseguest had nestled her fingers into the sack of the thong, fingers she'd once closed around his arousal.

The memory made him jerk within the slick pouch--made him recall how she'd stood over him naked, wet, and ready
. He wanted to chase the harpy away and make Tess Abbot abandon herself to that passionate woman who'd been intent on taking him on the floor of his guestroom. What would she do if he walked into the house, caught her up in his arms, and kissed her?

She’d p
robably smack him into next week.

He
grimaced. He didn't need any more blows to his ego. She'd battered that enough in the weeks since they met to last him a lifetime.

The lit sign for The Bargain Mart loomed to his right. He slammed on his brakes and careened into the parking lot.
Hell, even thinking about the woman made him forget what he was doing. Tess Abbot was definitely hands off.

#

She'd bought the thong underwear to spite Roman, only to find herself caught up by their arousing properties.

Troublesome
man or not, she'd spent a restless night dreaming of her irksome contractor. Even a long day calling around for estimates on services and materials, couldn't keep her mind from wandering to Roman. No two ways about it, she wanted him enough to jeopardize her independence. Then again, if the attraction was purely sexual…

That last was what she was banking on when
Roman's truck rumbled into the driveway. Tess turned from what she was doing at the stove with its steaming pots and toward the front door. Her father had often said, "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach."

Not that she was interested in Roman's heart as anything more than a mean to a much lower part of his anatomy
.

Outside, a truck door slammed.
Tess smoothed her hands down the back of The Bargain Mart shorts. Just in case her father was as wrong about men's stomachs as he was about her, she'd dressed to appeal to that targeted male piece of anatomy. The pink short shorts and crop-top set from the Bargain Mart.

Roman walked
in, plaid shirt slung over one shoulder, thermos caught between one big hand and a lean hip, and Bargain Mart bag dangling from his fingers. He stutter-stepped to a halt, his gaze fix on her bare midriff. Bingo. Why had she bothered with kettles and hot water?

Then his gaze lifted to the stove behind her and he grimaced.
"You're cooking?"

"Relax, St. John," she
said. "It's spaghetti."

He raised an eyebrow at her.

"I can boil pasta."

He hung his shirt on the peg by the door, circled the table away from her, dropped his thermos by the sink, and stopped in front of the stove.

"The sauce smells…good," Roman said, his voice edged with astonishment.

"It should," she returned acidly.
"It's yours."

Roman looked at her, that quizzical eyebrow
raised once more.

"I found it in your freezer."

"In that case," he said, sounding far too relieved, "supper should be edible."

"Just go wash up," she muttered.

The minute he'd spied Tess in that belly button baring, leg revealing outfit, he'd wanted to throw her down across the kitchen table and nibble his way from one end of her to the other.
Or maybe he'd have started with that ring piercing her belly button.

Yeah.
He'd have started with that gleaming gold ring, then move to her creamy white skin. Aah, but in which direction to move? Upward to the underside of her sweet mounded breasts teasing him from the loose bottom of the cropped top or…downward? That path would be barred by the elastic waistband of the shorts…which he would chew through with the speed of a skill saw.

He tightened, filling the silk pouch, the caress of that slick fabric reminding him of her fingers around him.
He should have hung those gray shorts back on The Bargain Mart rack with the pink set that had reminded him of cotton candy and nibbling the sweet confection from--

Roman groaned and shoved his hands into the steaming stream of water.
Maybe a little blistered skin would keep his mind off Tess's skin…her very supple, very exposed skin. Smooth skin stretched across her flat stomach. Taut skin climbing from her polished red toenails to--

Roman groaned again.
It wasn't his hands that needed blistering. But he hadn't the stomach for self-mutilation, especially not to the extent required to evict Tess Abbot from where she'd burrowed under his skin. For a woman who'd decreed sex between the two of them a bad idea, she sure wasn't making it easy for him to ignore her succulent body.

Or, maybe she didn't want to discourage him
any longer. Maybe Tess Abbot was dishing up something besides a spaghetti dinner tonight. Maybe she was dishing up another dose of vengeance.

His arousal pressed against the zipper of his jeans.
The discomfort of metal teeth reminded him of the pain she could cause his ego. He'd just have to muzzle his lust through supper.

He snorted.
What he really wanted to muzzle was Tess' mouth.

Her delicious mouth with its ripe lip
s.

Roman groaned a third time and muttered at his reflection in the mirror above the sink, "Just get through supper without touching her.
You can hold out that long."

And the rest of the evening
?

He'd take a
very cold shower then lock himself in his office.

#

Tess wanted to dump the kettle of boiling spaghetti over Roman's head instead of into the colander in the kitchen sink. She wanted to turn to him where he sat at the head of the table and conk him on the head with the heavy pot.

She wanted to pour his precious spaghetti sauce into his lap.

Then lick up every last drop.

Tess struggled to stifle a moan.
He'd insulted her cooking abilities and all but ignored her scant attire after that first reaction, and still she wanted him. She wanted him so badly she'd nearly bitten off her tongue to keep from saying what she really thought of his
supper should be edible
comment. Barbed comebacks were not conducive to seduction.

She ladled a healthy portion of sauce onto the spaghetti and placed the bowl of pasta on the table next to the tossed salad she'd prepared earlier.
Roman was frowning at the salad.

"Something wrong?" she asked.

"I didn't know I had any croutons in the house."

"You didn't," she said sitting down opposite him.
"I seasoned and toasted them from your old bread."

"You seasoned them?"

"I'm not totally inept in the kitchen."

He raised a skeptical eyebrow at her.

"I happen to mix a pretty mean salad."

"But the croutons
…" He eyed the salad on the table between them, his brow puckered above his eyes. "
What
did you season them with?"

Rat poison
. That's what almost rolled off her tongue.

But she swallowed the comment.
Seduction was tops on the menu for tonight, she reminded herself. Think sweet and non-confrontational. Think sexy, she silently prompted and smiled sweetly as she answered, "Garlic salt, sweet basil, and a little grated Parmesan."

He peered closely at the salad, his frown deepening.
"Furry little things, aren't they?"

"For God's sake,
Roman, they aren't poisoned." She snatched a crouton from the salad and popped it into her mouth, chewed, and swallowed. "Satisfied?"

He gave her a curious look.

Some seduction.
At this rate, she'd still be chasing him around when they were using walkers. Maybe this was her subconscious' way of telling her to give up.

"Just eat your spaghetti before it gets cold," she grumbled.

His frown shifted to the bowl of sauce drenched pasta.

"Do I need to taste test the spaghetti to prove
it’s not poisoned either?" she asked.

"Hey, I'm not the one who brought up poison," he shot back.

"The hell you didn't. That look you gave the salad all but spelled out you thought it toxic."

"I was curious about the croutons."

"You were suspicious of the croutons. And now you're suspicious of the spaghetti. Let me show you how ridiculous you're being." She reached for the bowl.

He grabbed it off the table.
"I'll eat it."

"I wouldn't dream of letting you take such a risk," she huffed back at him, standing and gripping the near rim of the bowl with both hands.
"Not until I've taste-tested the blasted dish for you."

"I don't need you taste-
testing anything for me." He tugged at the bowl. She tugged back. "Dammit woman, I ate your hamburgers without complaint."

"I knew you couldn't stay quiet about them forever," she
howled, letting go of the bowl just as he jerked on it.

She'd
never dreamed spaghetti could flip out of a bowl that easily, that spectacularly. But there they were, thin strands of pasta dripping with sauce flying through the air and landing in Roman's lap, the very lap she'd earlier fantasized dumping sauce into…and licking it up. How Freudian was this?

Roman, meanwhile, just sat there staring in disbelief at the mess in his lap.
Then, with an ominous silence, he scooped up the tangle of noodles and deposited them back in their bowl.

"I'm sorry," she
said, biting the insides of her cheeks not to laugh as she rounded the table toward him. "Let me help you clean up."

She began rubbing at his sauce stained lap with her napkin. He caught her by the wrist and stood.
His chest rose and fell with each breath and, she swore, his nostrils even flared.

"I'll clean myself up," he said through tight lips, then released her and strode stiffly into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind him.

Tess flinched. That wasn't quite the result she'd been going for. That wasn't even close to what she'd planned. Now what could she do?

In the bathroom
, the water in the shower splashed on. The metallic scrape of the curtain hooks along the rod signaled when he'd stepped into the shower. He'd be naked in that shower…now. Wouldn't he be surprised if she walked in on him?

Surprised or aroused?

Or
angry
.

Only one way to find out.

Tess strode down the hall, opened the bathroom door with purpose, and tore back the shower curtain.

"Look here,
Roman. You want it and I want it. We're both frustrated."

He gaped at her, steamy water spattering off the side of his head and sluicing down over his shoulder, his chest,
his abdomen, his…

He
dropped the washcloth he held between her gaze and his dangling assets. Oh yeah, they both wanted
it
.

She brought her gaze back up to his face and looked into his astonished eyes.
"The only way we are going to end this frustration is to have sex. When you're ready, you know where to find me."

She released the shower curtain and
walked out of the bathroom.

The closing door sent a current of cool air through the room, into the shower stall, and over Roman's wet body.
It was like a slap to his ego. Or a wake-up call.

She had said they were both frustrated?
Hell, Tess Abbot didn't know jack about frustration.

Frustration was looking into a woman's eyes and falling in love only to get your ears
pinned back. Frustration was sleeping one flight below a temptress who slept in your t-shirt or less. Frustration was having your dick poised on the brink of hot, wet penetration only to be denied for lack of protection. He'd show her frustration.

He caught up to her half way to the kitchen, grabbed her by the upper arm and swung her against the wall.
Before she could protest, he covered her mouth with his own, swallowing her surprised "Oh" and slipping his tongue between her parted teeth. Her body melted against his and her eyes drifted shut.

"Is this what you had in mind," he muttered against her lips, pinning her back against the wall with his wet body.

"It's a start," she purred, her fingers against the nape of his neck like tiny lightning strikes seeking ground on his water-beaded skin.

For a moment, he lost himself to the play of her small, taut tongue across his teeth.
He lost himself in the lush curves she arched against his naked body--to the contact of her bare thigh to his naked sex. How easy it would be to strip away her skimpy shorts and whatever silk scrap of panty she wore beneath.

But he had something else in mind for Tess Abbot
. He was going to teach her the meaning of frustration.

He clamped his hands over her hips and held her against the wall.
He stroked her bare stomach with his thumbs--nudged the cool ring piercing her warm belly button. He stroked the ring again, circling it with one thumb. Circled it again and again. He wanted to know what that ring would feel like against the tip of his tongue--to taste it and find out if it tasted like her.

He wanted to taste her.

A low, warning growl rumbled in his throat. This wasn't supposed to be about pleasure. Not his. Not hers. This was supposed to be about teaching the woman who'd brought him to the boiling point only to deny him what that kind of frustration felt like.

He needed to tease her.

He stroked the bottom tines of her ribs. He stroked higher, beneath the loose lower edge of the crop-top.

She squirmed beneath his touch.

He nudged the undersides of her breasts. Her moan buzzed against his lips, vibrated through his mouth, and reverberated straight into his primal core. He twitched against her thigh, realizing he'd sagged into her.

No
t good. Not if he was going to make Tess Abbot suffer as he had.

Not when he needed to tame her.

He pulled back and removed his mouth from hers. He feathered kisses along the line of her jaw and nipped at the curve of her neck. She wriggled within the staying grip of his hands on her waist, straining against his restraint--struggling to lift her body against his.

She was close.
Very close. Almost to the point where he'd been when she'd stopped them. But not quite close enough.

He moved one hand from her waist, moved it down her hip, across her thigh, and into the heat between her legs.
Her body arched, tearing her mouth from his and pushing her body against his hand. As responsive as she was, he doubted he'd need do little more to bring her over the edge.

But, his intent wasn't to send her into the abyss of sexual release.
If it were, he'd want to be with her, skin to skin. He'd want to be gripped by her contractions and drenched by her release.

He'd want to be inside her.

Heavy with his blood and his need, his sex throbbed between his legs.

He wanted to be inside her
.

But, to give in to his need and join in her release was to lose.

Yet, to resist, to exact his vengeance by denying her, would be to deny himself. Something else niggled at him from deep in his soul. If he did conquer his own needs and extract his revenge, would he be able to look himself in the mirror tomorrow morning?

Roman went still and Tess met his conflicted gaze.
There was a war waging inside him. She saw it in his eyes and in the pucker of his brow. She heard it in his ragged breaths--felt it in the tension of his muscles.

Continue or stop
? That's the dilemma his body battled.