Exposing Alix (29 page)

Ryker looked down at the thick, black hair of his niece.
She patted his arms and gazed up with adoration. An invisible camera clicked
somewhere, and he felt the picture in his bones, the scene forever framed in
his mind.

Alix, in the water, smiling.

Felicity, looking up trustingly, her tiny body relaxed
against his.

The sun, casting silvery sparkles in the water around
them.

A wave of emotion hit him so hard his knees trembled. He
tried not to react, but the feeling was so strong he had to catch his breath.

“Are you all right?” Alix asked, concerned.

“I’m fine,” he managed to rasp. “I just realized how cold
the water is.”

“Here, let me take Fifi.” Alix walked over, arms extended,
and he handed her the child without argument. She took Felicity under the arms,
and when their fingers touched, he flinched.

“Jesus, I’m not going to bite you,” Alix muttered.
Felicity settled easily on her hip, and the two of them headed to the steps at
the shallow end of the pool.

He could only watch them go, a lump in his throat making
breathing difficult. He swallowed hard and looked down at his clothes, his
shirt plastered to his chest, cotton pants swirling in the water below. He
hauled himself out of the pool and unbuttoned his shirt while Alix toweled off
Felicity and herself. Helplessly, he watched the path of the towel across her
shoulders, around her waist, over her breasts, between her legs, and his body
reacted like it did every time he imagined touching her. Except now he was half
clothed and wet and didn’t have much room to hide.

Felicity dashed off through the patio door into the house.
Alix looped the towel around her waist in a loose sarong. “Fifi, wait for me!”

Ryker grabbed her arm as she brushed past him. “Alix, I
didn’t mean…” Whatever he had planned to say dried in his throat, because she
was gazing hungrily at his bare chest, and her lips lay in a loose, full line,
and all he could think of was pressing those breasts against him and claiming
that mouth in a deep, hot kiss.

“Alix,” he started again, but she was so close her towel
brushed against his legs, and the words dissolved in his mouth.

“Fifi,” she said. “I need to get Fifi.”

He looked at her smooth, wet hair and the perfect curve of
her nose. She was still staring, her gaze flicking between his chest and then
lower. When her tongue danced across her lips, he barely silenced a groan. His
hand traveled from her forearm to shoulder, and then brushed her collarbone,
trailing along the edge of her jaw. She sucked in a breath.

He’d been so good, fought his desire for so long, but
something broke down inside, and he cupped her chin in his hand and forced her
eyes to his. She blinked furiously and looked everywhere but into his face. He
could think of nothing to say, just memorized the shape of her lips and arch of
her brows.

“Don’t,” she said, her voice breaking.

He leaned forward, the rest of the world slipping away as
he focused on her lips.

“Ryker!” Rosalia’s voice rang out through the house.
“Felicity, what are you doing? You know Uncle Ryker doesn’t like it when you
pull the cushions off the sofa. Where is Uncle Ryker, anyway? Doesn’t he know
better than to leave a child alone in the house? Ryker?”

Nothing could have doused his ardor faster than the sound
of his eldest sister.

Why on earth had he given them all the security code to
his front gate?

Alix pulled away just as Rosalia emerged from the patio
door.

“Well, well, well!” Rosalia said. “What do we have here?”

Ryker glared at her and crossed his arms over his chest.
“Did it ever occur to you to knock?”

“Not when I’ve just driven across town in rush-hour
traffic to pick up my niece so my enormously important brother can get back to
work,” she said sweetly. “How are you, Daisy? So nice to see you again. I do
hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”

Alix, her face glowing with embarrassment, tightened the
towel at her waist and motioned toward a pile of clothes on a reclining chaise
longe. “Of course not. I just need to get dressed, and then I’m on my way,” she
said.

“Don’t go,” Ryker commanded.

Rosalia nodded. “Absolutely not. I’ll just get Felicity.”

“You didn’t need to come,” Ryker said. “We were doing
fine.” A sudden wash of anger sent his toes and fingers tingling. Just once,
he’d like to see Rosalia mind her own business and stay out of his life.

Just once.

“Maria told me you had meetings tonight,” Rosalia said.
“She felt terrible. I told her I would come by and get Felicity as soon as I
could.”

“Maria knows I’ll collect from her when the time comes.”
Ryker gritted his teeth. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Alix disappear
into the changing area at the back end of the pool, clothes clutched to her
waist.

He couldn’t let her leave. It suddenly seemed imperative
that he keep her there. “It wouldn’t make any sense for me to go back to the
studio now,” he said to Rosa, though he kept watching for Alix. “And remind me
why you need to get involved in everything that happens in this family?”

“I happen to care about this family.” Rosalia huffed. She
threw back her head and gestured toward the house. “Let’s not argue. I’m here
already. I might as well collect Felicity and go.”

“Fifi is fine with me,” Ryker said.

“She can’t stay here. Maria’s class isn’t over until eight,
and Felicity needs to be in bed,” Rosalia said.

“I have a playpen upstairs. She can sleep here,” he shot
back. “I’m not going to infect her, you know. She’s stayed here before and
survived.”

“Oh, for goodness sake, I know that. I’m just trying to
help.”

“Yes, you’re nothing if not helpful, Rosa.” It was an old
argument, her constant mothering like nails running down a chalkboard in his
mind. “Let’s drop it. Maria already planned to pick her up here.”

“But—”

“Drop it,” he warned.

“Fine.” Rosalia looked him up and down. “Fall into the
water did you?”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Without a look toward him or Rosalia, Alix emerged, fully
clothed, and ducked into the house. He watched her hips sway beneath her loose
jeans as she walked, her backside perfectly rounded when she bent over to talk
to Fifi, who was cheerfully ripping pages out of one of his magazines. A moment
later, the two of them were seated side by side on the couch. Alix pulled a
sippy cup and stack of books from an oversized diaper bag. Fifi bounced with
joy as Alix started to read.

Ryker sighed with relief. For now, at least, she wasn’t
planning to leave.

Rosalia pursed her lips. She studied Alix for a moment and
then turned back to Ryker. “She seems like a lovely woman,” Rosalia said. “And
Felicity certainly seems to like her. Any chance it’s serious this time?”

“I’m not in the market for serious,” he said. “Al…er,
Daisy knows that.”

“Just because Mama got hurt doesn’t mean everyone does.”

Ryker looked pointedly down at his pants. “Thanks. Now, I
really ought to get changed.”

Rosalia dropped her voice. “We’re going to the cemetery
tomorrow. Are you sure you don’t want to come with us?”

“No,” he snapped. “I don’t want to come with you. You’ve
been asking me to come for ten years, and for ten years, I’ve said no.”

“Mama would want you there.”

“Mama’s dead, Rosa. She doesn’t want me to be at her grave
with you. She doesn’t want anything from me.”

“You’re part of the family,” Rosa said stubbornly. “It
isn’t right not to have you there.”

“I’m half family, Rosa. And not even the right half. No
one cares if I’m not there.”

Rosalia sucked in a breath. For a moment, the façade of a
competent, slightly officious middle-aged woman dropped away, and she looked
like the twenty-four-year-old she was. “Damn you, Ryker,” she whispered. “I
care. I’ve always cared.”

She pushed past him, and he thought he saw tears in her
eyes. As she approached the couch, Felicity jumped up and grabbed her around
the knees. Rosalia picked her up and swung her around in a fierce hug.

“I’m sorry,
mi hija
, I have to go. You stay with
Uncle Ryker.” Her voice sounded husky and thick with tears.

Ryker fought the wave of guilt that followed. Words lodged
in his throat. He shouldn’t have to apologize, he told himself. Rosalia had
been perpetuating a fantasy for years that someday, everything would change,
and he’d want to be a part of their happy little Mexican family. But he wasn’t,
and he didn’t. And that was all there was to it.

He couldn’t change who he was or what he was.

Felicity gazed around hopefully. “Ry?”

Alix held out her arms. “Yes, sweetie. Uncle Ryker is
right there.” She pointed to the patio, where Ryker dripped onto the concrete.
“See? Your silly uncle is all wet. He can’t come in until he dries off.”

Fifi giggled and settled back into Alix’s lap.

“Have fun with the bastard,” Rosalia said to Alix. “Just
don’t turn your back to him.” Before Alix could respond, she brushed past and
ran out the door. A moment later, a car roared down the driveway.

Alix looked through the patio door at Ryker. “Everything
okay?”

“Of course. Just the usual.” He combed his fingers through
his hair, sending a cascade of water down his back and shoulders.

Felicity grabbed a hank of Alix’s hair and tugged.

“She’s direct, isn't she,” Alix said. “Maybe we should try
that on the set. Yank on Lena’s hair when she isn’t ready.”

“Good idea,” Ryker said, chuckling weakly. He slid off his
pants and stood in a pair of dripping boxer shorts as Alix resumed reading the
book. It was about a lost bunny who hopped around a forest glade searching for
his mother, but none of the other forest animals knew where she had gone, and
each sent the bunny in a different direction.

Ryker let the sun warm his shoulders as he stood,
listening to Alix’s husky voice and Felicity’s baby-speak until the thrumming
in his head drowned them out.

Tomorrow was the anniversary of his mother’s death.

Damn Rosalia for reminding him. Every year he tried to
forget, and every year she tried to drag him to the cemetery to remember. Once,
just once, he’d like to be on location on June twenty-fifth—somewhere in
a jungle or on a beach. Somewhere they didn’t have phones or Internet or
telegrams.

But he knew Rosalia would find him. It wouldn’t matter
where he went. She seemed to think it was her personal obligation to keep
Mama’s memory alive. They’d had a terrible fight about it the first year. He
told her she wasn’t like Mama, no matter how hard she tried, because Mama would
never have forced such a scene. She told him Mama was weeping in her grave over
his refusal to honor her along with the family.

It had been the same every year since, with varying degrees
of venom, as if they were rehearsing a scene in a movie and a sadistic director
somewhere was laughing and yelling, “Do it again!”

And damned if it didn’t hurt just as much, every time.

Alix schooled herself not to look
as Ryker walked past the couch on his way upstairs, a towel slung low around
his hips.

It was no use. He was simply too beautiful.

Like a sculpture by an artist who worshipped the male
form, he was all long, lean muscles and flat planes between, everything in
perfect proportion to lure the eye lower, low enough to see that the towel now
lay flat against his groin.

Apparently the visit from his sister had killed the ardor
aroused by the pool.

He had almost kissed her. After a week of healing the rift
they’d created at Gunther’s party, and striking a delicate friendship out of
what she’d thought had been an insurmountable distance, he’d leaned forward
with every intention of kissing her. And she’d said,
“Don’t”
when every
muscle in her body yelled,
Please, please d
o.

Fifi let loose a terrific screech that called to mind
crows fighting over a crust of bread and slapped the book impatiently.

Alix laughed. “Okay, Miss Demanding. I’ll finish the
book.”

She continued reading. The little bunny resorted to asking
the trees, stars, and west wind for help finding his mother. Each seemed to
send the bunny in a different direction, until he finally grew exhausted and
lay down by a gray, mossy rock to take a nap.

Ryker walked down the stairs, a pair of athletic pants
riding low on his waist, a matching T-shirt revealing his strong, brown arms.
He crossed the room and sat down across from them, opening one of the magazines
Fifi had destroyed with a resigned sigh.

Alix focused on the book, ignoring the rushing sound in
her ears and the way her body went on instant alert, just having him near.
Every inch of her skin seemed to prickle with awareness. The scent of him, damp
and male, filled her head and brought a tingle to her nose. Moist heat rushed
between her legs.

She couldn’t deny the single message each of her senses
gave her.

She needed him to make love to her. To finish what he’d
started. It wasn’t what she’d imagined when she made her vow all those years
ago. Ryker didn’t care about her, and she knew falling in love with him would
be a complete disaster. She could respect him, desire him, even like him. But
she must never, ever fall in love with him.

Yet since that painful night at Gunther’s, she couldn’t
stop dreaming about him. Fantasizing about his touch, his tongue, and his body
covering hers. Her conversation with Gunther had only made it worse. She
couldn’t stop thinking about the past and wondering why she’d turned into the
person she was. Why she panicked when Ryker began to make love to her.
Gunther’s words had resonated deep in her core. At some point, her commitment
to a childhood vow had become something much more dangerous.