Like Honey (5 page)

A
week later and another breakfast meeting was scheduled. The first several had been canceled because of the work that Gray needed to do immediately with the beekeepers, and their schedule was getting tight. He was also setting up a sales schedule so that he could introduce himself to the community and take some of those responsibilities from Jennifer.

Soon the first harvest would be in on the starflower crop, which they needed to stay on top of for efficiency's sake. Many steady clients had placed orders already. But he needed to reach out to their clients and find some new ones. So he was one busy man as he settled in to his new job.

Jennifer pulled the biscuits out of the oven and the room filled with the scent. Her grandmother's Southern biscuits. Any American man worth his salt would swoon. She'd ply him with food this morning, gain his trust and respect over time, and maybe he'd help her figure out just exactly what was going on around here—as if he didn't have enough on his plate.

Sausage crackled in one skillet and scrambled eggs in the other. She scooped the scrambled eggs into a serving bowl. Steam from the eggs met with the cool air. She hadn't had heat in a week. Which suited her fine. She just threw on another sweater or blanket and hunkered down. A few days ago, she built a fire and it had heated the library just fine. It was one of the few rooms she bothered with.

When he knocked at the kitchen door she was ready. The table was set with dishes filled with eggs, pancakes, sausage, biscuits, butter, and, of course, honey.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Good morning! What a feast!” He could not contain his excitement—or his hunger. He sat down at the table and began filling his plate. He was wearing a brown cable-knit sweater with a rough wool texture. Damn, she loved a man in a sweater.

“Coffee or tea?” she asked.

“Coffee, thank you,” he said, reaching for a biscuit. “Warm biscuits, hot coffee. All served by a pretty woman early in the morning. It couldn't get any better than this.”

“Pretty? Me?” she said, laughing. “It's been a while since you've been off the farm.”

Suddenly serious. “Oh, damn, I never should have said that. It just sort of slipped out of me. Sorry.”

Jennifer drank her coffee, smiling inwardly. It was always a good way to start the day to be called pretty.

“So how are things going with the bees and the guys?”

“Pretty good,” he said, cutting his sausage.

“Are we prepared for the first harvesting?”

He nodded. “Mmmm. Is there honey in this sausage?”

“Yes,” Jennifer said. “An old D'Amico recipe.”

D'Amico. The name stuck in her throat. She was surrounded by their things, their history, living in their home, and yet she knew almost nothing about them. All she had known was Ren. And sometimes she wondered how well she had known him.

“But the biscuit recipe comes straight from my family,” she said, trying to clear her mind of the D'Amicos, thinking of her family in Ohio and vowing to herself to call them later today.

“You know, there's a lot of rumors about the family,” Gray said, then wiped his mouth with a napkin.

“The D'Amico Curse,” she said with a mocking tone. “Come on.”

“There's the curse. And the way the family history is bound to this place and the people. Yet nobody ever thought to record it. For example, some say the place I'm living is the original homestead. But who knows?”

“Ren said it was.”

“And they also say the D'Amicos brought the first Italian bees to the area.”

She chortled. “Well, they certainly were the first Italian family here. Who knows about the bees? They were terrible record keepers. I mean the whole family. I still have yet to make sense of the books.”

“I'd not mind helping you with that. I like numbers.”

“That would be awesome,” she said. What a godsend this man was. She lathered butter and honey on her warm biscuit, then bit into it, luxuriating in the mix of sweetness and stickiness, closing her eyes. When she opened them, he was looking at her. Then quickly looking away.

“You really like that honey, huh?” he said, digging into the scrambled eggs.

“Yep,” she replied.

“I've some honey you might like to try,” he said, his voice smooth as silk.

Was he flirting with her? What did he mean? Did he mean what she thought he meant?

She was uncertain where she should look.

“I've a gourmet collection of honey from all over the world. I'd love to share it with you sometime,” he said.

Oh.

“Sounds good.”

“This breakfast is so good,” he said, licking his lips.

Oh, God. Those lips and that tongue were shooting little pinpricks through her, and she had been doing so well. Had he any idea what he was doing to her? And why was he affecting her like this?

“So,” he said. “You mentioned a lot of weird things going on around here. You said you'd fill me in.”

She ate the last bit of her honey biscuit. “We talked about this briefly earlier. But things just don't add up. The honey business has had its good years and its bad years. You expect that in farming. But I can't see that they ever made enough money to support this place and their lifestyle. And it stymies me.”

He sat back in his chair, perplexed. “Yet, they've lived here for years in this huge estate.”

“I've shut off both wings, as you no doubt noticed, as well as the upstairs. It's way too much for me. And in truth it was too much for them. After the boys were gone, why did they keep it?”

“Tradition, I suppose. I've enough Scottish blood in me to know that once you own land like this, you don't let it go.”

“You sound like Ren,” she said. “He used to say the same thing. I understood his attachment to the place. He grew up here. But if you haven't the money . . . what's the point in struggling with it?”

He seemed to consider what she said. “Maybe it's a matter of pride. Of not wanting to let it go. Something your ancestors worked so hard for?”

Jennifer sighed. “Maybe.”

“Okay,” he said, reaching for another biscuit. “There's the whole financial thing. Which we will find a solution for. But then there was a person watching you or us last week. And you said that it was one of many occurrences.”

She hesitated. “At first, I thought . . . it was Ren.”

His mouth dropped open. Her eyes filled with water. She looked away.

“I've never believed in ghosts, and I still don't. I'm sure there's a logical explanation for everything that's happened. That footprint proves it.”

“What things have been happening?” Gray said, his voice hushed as if he were afraid of what she might tell him.

“Things like prank phone calls. My windows being left open when I know I didn't do that. A dead bird left on my car seat. The electricity going off and on. Stuff like that.”

What kind of a spy was he? Not a very damn good one, evidently.

Gray hadn't noticed any of these things. But as he considered Jennifer, he had to wonder if some of that wasn't all in her head. She was stressed, had been grieving in a foreign land among people she didn't really know. Could her mind be playing tricks on her?

But there was that footprint.

“Whoa,” he said.
Intelligent response
. “How about Liam?” he said after a moment.

Her eyes narrowed. She sat straighter.

“I don't know what went on between you two, and I really don't want to know.”
Because I'd like to pummel the little bastard and shake the shit out of you for being so stupid.
“It's personal stuff. But I was there when he got kind of out of control with you, and I hear his brothers talking about him being lovesick.”

Her faced flamed. “Can I be honest with you?”

“Of course.”

“It was a complete and utter disaster of a date. Which I never should have said yes to. I mean, the guy is pretty. But the minute he opens his mouth. And the minute he got me alone—”

“Okay,” he said. “I get the picture. Are you telling me you went on one date? One?”

She nodded.

He whistled. “And he's that hot for you? I mean not that I don't understand but—”

“Gray, that's the second time you've alluded to the fact that you find me attractive,” she said sharply.

He paused. “Problem with that?”

“I am your boss. We were discussing Liam. The very same kind of probable situation. I shouldn't be dating the help. Obviously it could go very wrong.”

His mouth crooked off to the side. “Yes,” he said. “I see that. And yes I am very attracted to you. But I'm an adult and can manage.”

“So is Liam,” she said.

“But he can't manage,” he said. “So could he be messing with you?”

“This all began before the disaster of a date.”

“Tells me nothing,” he said. “He could have been crushing on you back when your husband was alive.”

She looked at him as if she'd just been shot. “I wouldn't have known,” she said after a moment. “I was so in love and so enamored with my new life, I didn't pay much attention to any of the workers. That was Ren's thing to manage. I was going to start a line of honey-based beauty products before all this happened.”

They sat together in the quiet for a few minutes. She was staring off into the distance and he finished his sausage.

“What do you know about the Gradys?” he finally asked.

“They've worked here forever. Their family has always maintained a cottage on the estate. Well, since anybody can remember. That's basically what I know. Three brothers, one sister, and a mother. The father died a few years back.”

“Accident?” Gray asked.

“Yes, come to think of it,” Jennifer said. “How did you know? It was a drowning.”

Gray shrugged. “Sounds like the curse to me.”

“Oh, you,” she said, and brushed him off.

God, that smile. There it was again. Wanton and sweet. It said almost everything there was to know about her.

When he left Jennifer that night, it was her smile that haunted him.

He had been counting on some long nights, but now he knew for sure he needed to make a call to Kasey, see what she had on the Gradys. And given what his grandmother had already told him, it looked like the Gradys might be the best way to start to crack this case. He wanted to do it as soon as possible.
Jennifer
. He was fighting so many impulses, especially the one he gave into most often—the one to flee.

After all, that is what brought down his relationship with Kasey. She'd gotten too close, too fast, and wanted too much. So the night he went out with his friends, he gave into a temptation, which was just another way of fleeing. Deep down, he knew she'd find out. Looking back, he saw clearly now that he had sabotaged that relationship.

Why was he thinking about this now, while he was alone in the cabin with Jennifer's smile etched in his mind? The drama? The eventual soul-searing heartache that came after?

But even before all of that went down, Kasey was not an easy person to love. But love her, he did. His stomach gripped tightly. No point in thinking about their love. It was better to think about the sex. At least it filled a purpose.

Tonight, he thought about the night she allowed him to tie her to the bed. The image of Kasey with her wild hair splayed around her face and shoulders, framing that gorgeous face of hers, with her arms tied by blue velvet ropes. The hollow of her arms, giving way to her large, firm, round breasts and her small waist there against his white crisp sheets.

“I'm not sure I like this,” she said.

“Then why are you so wet?” He held her foot in his hand and tied it to the bedpost. The last rope he had to tie.

She didn't answer.

He sat back and admired his handiwork, along with the curves and dips of his woman's body. He ran his hands alongside of her, starting with her feet, working his way up along the soft-skinned, but firm and muscled contours of her legs. Her flesh responded to his touch, as it always did. She could not fake ambivalence when it came to sex—like she did at times in other aspects of their relationship. In his hands, she was a hot, writhing sex diva.

He reached under the bed for his feather.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

He held up the feather.

Her eyebrows hitched. “You're not going to tickle me, are you?”

“Not really,” he said, running the feather along the inside of her leg, up her thigh. Her skin reacted with goose pimples. He then twirled the feather around on her firm stomach. She drew in a breath.

As did he. Sometimes he wanted to scoop her into his arms, all of her, and hold her, feel her body next to his, and never let her go.

His feather explored her breast next, circling around her nipple, then to it, and he could not help suckling a little and nipping at it. She tugged a bit on the ropes. Oh, she was hot and wanting him. She was not a woman who liked a lot of foreplay. But he liked to experiment and she conceded every now and then.

He dropped the feather on her stomach, then dipped his fingers into her pussy—so hot and slick. Then he brought his fingers to his mouth, took a taste of her.

His fingers slid on her hot nub, twirling around as she tried to respond with her movement, held down by the velvet ropes. She groaned in frustration.

He suckled on her nipple as he slid himself in between her fleshy folds. Ahh, yes, heaven. He could stay within her like this forever with her heat surrounding him. She moaned and tried to move against him. He pulled himself out, bringing his knees higher on her waist, gathered her breasts. He was just wet enough to slide himself between them.