Between The Sheets (16 page)

“Yes.”

She breathed the word on the edge of a sigh and he caught the sound with his lips, deepening his kiss with a fierceness that held nothing back, a desperate need that touched the desperation inside her.

A growl rumbled low in his throat and April tried to capture the sound in her memory, the utterly possessive demand of his mouth on hers. She wanted him with a power that melted her insides and made her ache to feel him all around her, inside her, hot, hard and thrusting deep.

When he broke their kiss to nip her lower lip, she dragged her fingers through his hair to anchor him close, each tender bite making her gasp softly against his mouth.

“The pillow,” he said between tender bites.

She was so blasted with emotion and sensation that a moment passed before she could make sense of his request, to realize he wanted her to grab the Hidden Secrets Pillow for a condom.

Only when she said, “Oh,” did he let his hands slip from
her hair, a motion of such obvious reluctance she knew that she must feel as right to him as he did to her.

Pulling herself up on the edge of the mattress, April forced her gaze to focus, spotted the pillow all the way across the bed. She wasn't about to try and stand so she just tugged at the top sheet until the pillow slid toward her.

Rex must have noticed how her hands trembled when she tried to pull open the zipper, must have realized that this moment had become about more than sex, more than nerves, because he sat up and said, “Here, let me.”

His gentle tone caressed the raw edges inside her and she guessed he was trying to lighten the moment when he held up a red foil square and smiled. “Raspberry Romp? It's ribbed for extra pleasure.”

While the name was cute, the thought of
that
erection in
that
color…. “No.”

He struggled to get his hand inside the hidden compartment and finally held the pillow open to see what was inside. “This is a woman-size pillow. R and D needs to address this problem, too. We need to mention it to Wilhemina before she leaves.” Dropping the pillow onto the floor, he displayed a gold foil square. “I'm wearing this one—the Goldstar, the condom of champions.”

When she didn't reply, he arched that dark brow and looked mildly offended. “You don't agree?”

“Oh, no. Definitely the Goldstar.” She swallowed back a laugh. “Do you wear it with or without
that?
”

He glanced down at the leather apparatus making his erection point away from his body like he'd been speared on the end of a sword. “Without, thank you.”

Reaching for the snap, which lived up to its easy-release promotion by popping right open, he gave a grunt as his erection sprang free. After slipping the leather ring off, he
rested his head back against the mattress and let his eyes close. “Ah, man.”

The sound was such pure relief April almost felt guilty for asking him to wear the thing, especially when it hadn't done the trick. But she couldn't quite feel bad, not when he'd kissed her so possessively. Not when she gazed down at him, burnished hair ruffled over his forehead, sculpted lips parted ever so slightly around panting breaths, and knew a tenderness for this man that was unlike anything she'd ever known before.

The emotion was so rich it became a physical sensation that ballooned inside her chest, cutting off her air and forcing her to blink frantically against the sudden prickle of tears.

She lowered her head so her hair fell forward and covered her face, blinking hard as she reached for his top button. She wasn't sure when he opened his eyes, but when she pushed the shirt over his shoulders, she found him watching her, his expression as tender as this ache inside her, his need unabashedly open and honest.

Lifting his hand to caress her face, he slid his strong fingers around her cheek. “Love me, April.”

Such a simple request, but one that revealed the strength of his need with such quiet pride that the tightness in her chest expanded into her throat, cutting off any hope of a reply. The tears stung her eyes again.

And he held her gaze, searching her face, staring into her soul.

She nodded.

Suddenly his hands slipped beneath her skirt, molded the curve of her bottom, up, up, to peel the hose from her waist. She rolled away so he could pull them down her legs, desperately grateful for the chance to school her reaction, to try
and swallow back the knot in her throat that was choking her.

But Rex wouldn't let her hide. In barely a heartbeat, he was pulling her back into his arms and she faced that penetrating gaze that had never left her face, a gaze that saw everything.

Slipping his hand between them, he positioned the head of that steely erection against her moist skin, and April braced her hands on his shoulders, sank down on his heat, unfurling, stretching, filled with his hot length.

A series of fluttering breaths escaped her on that luscious downstroke, winning a smile from Rex, who ground up against her, just enough to make her gasp even louder….

His gaze melted as he watched her and his obvious pleasure sparked the fire deep inside her, so fierce she could only strain up to ride his hot length, to feed the needy flames before plunging back down again.

Only, this time his groan echoed in the quiet suite along with hers.

Her skirt had bunched around her waist, but he pulled the blouse free of the waistband, a frenzy of motions to drag her blouse and bra up and away. His impatience to free her satisfied some need inside that she hadn't even known needed satisfying and she could only laugh when he popped a button in his haste.

He drove into her hard in reply, the sleek strength of that stroke stealing the laughter right from her lips. Dragging the tangle of blouse and bra over her head, he freed her breasts, slipped his hands beneath them, caressing, lifting, even as he lowered his head toward her….

He pinched her nipples and there was something so erotic about his dark hands against her pale skin, about watching him pleasure her as she rode him, each squeeze stabbing
straight to her sex, urging her to ride him a little harder, a little faster, a little deeper.

With every stroke her hips lifted, revealing the triangle of hair at the base of his erection. His hips rocked beneath her, meeting her thrusts, creating friction exactly where she needed it to mount a rising pressure that promised such ecstasy….

And his fingers and tongue and mouth still teased and nibbled and played, fueling the urgency…and her urgency fueled his until suddenly his hands left her breasts, skimmed down her ribs, over her hips.

His fingers dug into her bottom to increase her pace, kneading, stroking, slipping between her cleft to explore. He found that sensitive core of nerve endings and touched her with complete freedom, but applying a steady gentle pressure that mounted her pleasure as if he'd opened the spillway to a dam.

April closed her eyes and arched her back as orgasm rushed upon her, a wave of sensation so fierce that she cried out, a desperate sound that was half sob, half gasp.

He ground into her with a rumbling growl of his own climax and she collapsed against him, completely boneless and utterly spent as her body continued to contract, spasm after greedy spasm, never wanting this moment to end.

Rex held her possessively, so close that their racing hearts beat in time, their ragged breaths burst together, and April clung to him, tried to reclaim her wits, tried to tell herself that such an explosion of the senses was normal. That nothing more than unbelievable sex and her newly awakened ability to have orgasms were affecting her this way.

Minutes lengthened. Their breathing slowed. Their heartbeats steadied. The silence grew between them, yet Rex made no move whatsoever. He just held her as though reluctant to let reality intrude on this moment.

But April needed reality, a strong, sharp dose to knock some sense into her and chase away this bittersweet tenderness inside, this overwhelming sense of completion that spurred her emotions too close to the surface. She couldn't trust herself not to blink back these stupid tears that prickled at her lids, to swallow back the sadness for all the things that couldn't be.

“Did you get what you needed for tomorrow's studies?” she finally asked, far too near the edge to bear the silence any longer.

He grunted and cracked open an eye. “And then some. Maybe we should recommend this position to R and D. What do you think? We'll call it the Over-the-Edge Tumble.”

Only Rex could make her feel right when she felt so wrong, could chase away sadness with laughter. She managed a weak smile. “I suppose, but once we hit the floor we were technically engaged in the Ladies' Tip-Top Thrill.”

He frowned and she knew he wanted her to play the game.

“Okay,” she said. “How about Hurl the Girl?”

“Hurl the Girl? More like Hurl the Guy.”

“No.
You
fell and dragged
me
over the edge.”

“No. You
knocked
me over the edge and I
fell
on the floor.”

April couldn't believe they were sprawled out on the floor, debating the cold hard details of April Accidentally's unfortunate talents. But she wasn't cringing. She wasn't even blushing. And Rex hadn't wound up in the emergency room, either.

They were both satisfied.

A few weeks ago this simply wouldn't have been possible.

“All right,” she conceded. “I confess. Your massage wasn't long enough tonight.
I
knocked
you
over.”

There was no missing the triumph on his handsome face. “We're back to Over-the-Edge Tumble. I'll suggest it to Wilhemina when I tell her about the thread-count problem.”

“What thread-count problem?”

“Those sheets are way too slippery. Didn't you notice how people slide right off and bust their butts?”

Only a true gentleman could turn that negative into a positive. “You're right.”

“I keep telling you that.” He pulled her back against him again, tucked her neatly into his hard curves and rested his chin on the top of her head in an upright version of the Shingle sleeping style. “And I've had another brainstorm. I'm heading home to Chicago for the weekend to celebrate Saint Patrick's Day with my family. I want you to come with me.”

She wanted to believe that Rex extended his invitation simply because he knew she hadn't made any plans for the weekend. Or maybe he wanted to share his family. Some people equated adoption with loneliness and Rex was kind enough to feel bad about leaving her alone.

But she would have been lying. April knew Rex wanted to take her home for the weekend for the same reason he wanted to run with her every morning. He wanted to be with her.

“Sure. I'd like that.”

Where Rex went, she went. That was the nature of the job.

“Good. We'll have fun. My family will like you.”

He sounded so certain that she was struck by the enormity of his concern for her. In her mind, April Accidentally had been in prime form tonight, had been lucky she hadn't caused an accident that had wound up with a call to 9-1-1.

But to Rex, winding up on the floor had been an opportunity to make love, to create their own Kama position, to pinpoint a potential problem with the sheets.

April had told him the Shingle was the “regal” position, indicating a strong ego and sense of entitlement. While that was true, this position was also the most “protective” of them all.

And as she lay there, April could no longer deny that there was other no place on earth she'd rather be than lying in Rex's strong arms, feeling protected.

“I'
M NOT CONVINCED
the results of that interview will be valid,” Rex said as he keyed in his password to access his computer.

“Acquiescence bias?”

Glancing up, he found April hovering above his right shoulder. “Yes. That particular respondent agreed with everything I said and I couldn't seem to turn her around. I'll have to take another look at the results.”

She only nodded and headed back toward her laptop.

Rex watched her go, a few short brisk steps that screamed edgy on the nervous meter. He suspected Wilhemina and Charles's arrival was to blame, because for a woman who'd just had a minimassage and been made love to thoroughly, she didn't appear to have carried away any afterglow from the experience.

He, on the other hand, was still feeling the effects of their stint with the Kama Sutra Sports Set big-time. He would much rather be wrapped around April than sitting in front of this desk facing two hundred and sixteen interviews.

His gaze trailed from the stack on the table back to April again, to the slim curves beneath her robe, the fine brown hairs that wisped around her shoulders. He could practically feel her curves beneath his hands, smell the delicate scent of her skin.

What was it about this woman that sidetracked him from work to think about everything he could be doing with her instead?

Rex didn't have an answer, but he intended to keep mulling the question until he found one. He hoped a weekend off duty with his family would give April a chance to relax. And give him a chance to figure out exactly what he wanted from her.

Sex? Definitely. More?

Wrapping up the Sensuous Collection project suddenly didn't look so good if it meant April heading back to California never to be seen or heard from again. It wasn't even looking so hot if he could see her whenever he visited L.A.

His sister Juliet, the oldest of his four siblings, had once told him that when he finally got
it,
he'd get it bad.

He had it bad for April.

The thought made him smile, and remember that today was the day Harold should have returned to his office. He was about to open his business e-mail program to see if he'd received a reply, but noticed the icon to the Luxurious Bedding Company network flashing. Double-clicking on the icon, he glanced at his in-box and knew by the sheer volume of the mail what had arrived.

 

To: Rex Holt (mailto:[email protected])

Date: 17 Mar 2003 04:38:22-0000

Subject: Personnel Training

 

Sexual role-playing sessions will train employees to work cooperatively in an innovative and stimulating environment!

 

Studies prove that sexual role-playing promotes team
work by teaching employees to focus towards a common goal. Managers can assess their staff's ability to perform under pressure. The confidentiality clause of the P & P manual will protect all parties from personal repercussions.

 

“Damn.” He highlighted all the posts and forwarded the lot to Wilhemina's e-mail address, chuckling at the image of her in an observation room playing a voyeur to assess her executive staff's ability to perform.

“What?” April asked.

“Another post from the stalker.”

“Really?” She left her laptop and took up her place over his shoulder again.

He tilted his monitor upright and watched the play of emotions across her face. “You don't find it funny?”

“I suppose.” A tiny frown had wedged itself between her brows. “It's just so strange. What kind of mind comes up with these types of ideas? What kind of person would terrorize a whole company with this stuff?”

He whistled. “That's the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. Leah's the human resources manager and it's my understanding she has a background in psychotherapy. I know Wilhemina has been consulting with her a lot and if there was an easy answer, I'm sure they would have nabbed the culprit already.”

“You're a people expert, Rex. What do you think?”

Though her expression never changed, she suddenly radiated an intensity Rex couldn't miss. His answer meant something, although for the life of him, he couldn't figure out what.

Leaning back in his chair, he folded his arms across his
chest. “A pervert might get a thrill from this sort of thing, sending the posts and watching the fallout.”

“Do you think that's what's happening here?”

“No.”

“You sound convinced.”

He shrugged. “I've gotten my fair share of these e-mails. Pulling something like this for any length of time involves a good bit of computer expertise and even more risk. At the very least our stalker will lose his, or her, job. Perhaps even face prosecution. I don't see anyone doing this for a thrill. Whoever's sending these posts has some other reason.”

She eyed him with a question in her eyes. “Really? Like what?”

“I don't have a clue. But when I think of all the files that forward from the various computers with each of these posts, cluttering up the network and peoples' in-boxes, I can't help but wonder if someone isn't trying to cover up something.” He shifted his gaze to the computer monitor, thinking about all the work stored on his system. He rented Web storage and obsessively backed up his files just in case his system crashed. His data couldn't be easily replaced.

“Have you looked at any of those posts, Rex? I glanced at a few and there was all kinds of stuff. Memos to research and development. Production schedules. Inventory logs. Even someone's request to accounting to be paid for a personal day because he needed a day off from the Sensuous Collection.”

“I looked at a few to begin with but now I just click Send. I don't have time.”

Nodding, April returned to her laptop and slid it across the bar to work. “Wilhemina said this has been going on for weeks, but it must be really hush-hush because we
hadn't heard a thing about it in my office. What do you think of the way she's handling the situation?”

That was a loaded question and Rex wasn't exactly sure what to say. On the one hand, he didn't mind sharing his opinion because he trusted April, but on the other, she did work for the company. Given her concerns about her job performance, he didn't want to raise doubts about the integrity of her upper management. He decided on honesty.

“I don't understand what the problem is. I'm no computer guru but it seems to me if someone is sending something over the network there should be a record somewhere. I realize it's impractical to monitor every transmission but impractical shouldn't mean impossible.”

He cleared his in-box then closed the e-mail program. “This company isn't some mom-and-pop business without resources and Wilhemina doesn't strike me as having a lot of patience for mysteries. She's a sharp businesswoman.”

April tapped out a quick series of keystrokes. “What do you think the problem is?”

“I get the impression that there's more to this situation than she's letting on. I could be wrong, but I just get that feeling.”

His answer seemed to content April and they fell back into silence again. Opening his business e-mail program, he scrolled through his in-box, prioritizing as he went. Bingo. There was a post from Harold. He opened it.

Good to hear from you, Rex. I'll be in the office late catching up from my trip. Give a call or log on to my private chat room and we'll talk about EHS.

He glanced over at April and decided a phone call was out of the question. Logging on to the Internet, he maneuvered to the research foundation's chat area, instead.

Harold was as good as his word. He responded instantly to Rex's greeting. His message popped up on the screen:

Have you gotten that Ph.D. in massage therapy yet?

Rex smiled, envisioning the debonair director, a man in his mid-sixties who walked between the worlds of research science and business with an understanding of both that Rex admired. Harold Snyder was most at home in his lab but he understood what it took to operate a large research foundation, to be at the whim of federal grants and private funding. He wore a business suit just as comfortably as a lab coat.

They exchanged pleasantries and then Rex got straight to the point.

I suspect my assistant is suffering from EHS. I've been researching online and not coming up with much information.

Glancing up at April to make sure she was occupied with her own work, he found her frowning down at her laptop screen, not paying attention to him at all. Good. He fixed his gaze on his monitor as Harold's reply appeared.

No surprise. There's not much information out there. This foundation is the leading source of research analysis on the topic and as you know, we're a private institution. Tell me more about her specific symptoms. Maybe I can help with a diagnosis.

Rex went on to describe the way sparks flew whenever April first touched bare skin, her unique working arrangement and her exhaustive energy level.

Harold replied by explaining the EHS basics.

Humans are dependent on the electrical and magnetic forces of nature. Electrostatic electricity is believed to be relatively harmless, but when it accumulates in a body, it
can cause a wide range of reactions, from irritability, clumsiness, fatigue or mania in people whose systems overreact to this electricity.

We deal with the effects of electricity constantly. Think about electronic-equipment processing plants. Operators on assembly lines wear antistatic wrist straps. Computer techs ground themselves before working on systems. When you understand this, you won't find it so strange for that balance to be occasionally off in a human body. We haven't yet determined which field—the electric, magnetic or electrostatic—is most severe in producing adverse biological effects, but our observations so far lead me to believe that all three can have subtle, yet profound effects on an individual's health. Think of EHS as an allergy.

An allergy perhaps, but one that could be treated in a world that relied on electricity?

What can offset the symptoms?

To Rex's profound good fortune, Harold proved more knowledgeable on the subject than he'd had the right to hope.

The solution could be as simple as moving the sufferer away from the source of electricity—or to a comfortable distance as Harold suspected April had done with her computer system.

There were also detection devices available like gauss meters and electric field detectors to test for electromagnetic radiation that triggered symptoms in EHS sufferers.

Demand switches were another type of device that proved helpful at controlling symptoms. This switch could be installed at the meter board in a sufferer's home to control the supply of electricity to the various rooms.

Aligning the body's magnetic fields was another area cur
rently being studied. Though this research was still in the early phases and Harold warned against crackpots out to make a buck by selling expensive mattresses and jewelry that may or may not have an effect, he believed there was merit in their findings so far.

We deal with a reputable firm that makes electrostatic devices for electrical circuitry manufacturers. I'll have my assistant forward the information to you. Get in touch with this guy and tell him I sent you. But the place to start is to ascertain your assistant's symptoms and how severely she's reacting. Bring her to the foundation the next time you're in Phoenix. We have the equipment to test her specific sensitivities. You'll be able to proceed from there.

Rex agreed and was already mentally calculating how he could rearrange their schedule to allow for a few extra days during their Phoenix run.

After thanking Harold and agreeing to take him up on his offer, Rex logged off the chat and sat back in his chair to absorb everything he'd just learned.

“April, what happens when you sit in front of your computer?” he asked.

She shot him an absent glance, jiggled the mouse impatiently. “I try not to.”

“But when you do.”

She shrugged. “I sort of melt into the chair. Within an hour my muscles ache and my head gets foggy and I can't think.”

“Getting up and moving around doesn't help?” He already suspected the answer.

“Not enough to offset the effects once they start. If I stand, I don't have any problems. I feel great. So I stand.”

Which confirmed Harold's suspicions about distance and
left Rex debating his best approach to convincing April to explore her unique symptoms.

And letting him be with her when she did.

 

To: J.P. Mooney (mailto:[email protected])

Date: 18 Mar 2003 23:34:01-0000

Subject: Mission Accomplished

 

Dear Brother-in-law,

I've listened to Paula complain about you working seven days a week for so long that I'm just popping online on the chance that you'll be in for a few hours in the morning while I'll be sleeping late to recover from the effects of too many rich meals. Don't bother asking Paula to call and interrogate me because I'm unplugging the phone.

I just returned from Florida and I do wish you could have seen April. You would have been amazed and so proud. She works behind the scenes while Rex conducts his focus groups, researching on her computer—that crazy setup traveled with her!—and running interference with the local marketing researchers. She's
flying,
John! I don't know what else to say. She is more self-assured than I've ever seen her and handles herself so beautifully that I'm convinced we did the best thing by nudging her out of the nest.

I admit I was wrong about one thing, though. I told you that Rex would have her eating out of his hand but it appears to be the other way around. ;-) The man is completely enchanted by her. Even my marketing director who made the trip with me noticed how amazing these two are together.

That's the good news. Now for the not-so-good news. My security chief is still going through the motions and
coming up with lots of possibilities and nothing concrete. I know you said an investigation of this size takes time, but I don't have much. April has given the board Rex's nighttime computer excursions and they've latched on to this like a dog with a bone.