Searching for Sea Glass: BEST-SELLING AUTHOR (Sea Glass Secrets Book 1) (18 page)

Sunny shook her head. “It’s not for sale.”

The older woman cackled. “Sweetie, everything in this whole wide world is for sale, if the price is high enough. I’ll give you five thousand for it. That’s more than fair, especially seeing as how it doesn’t even have any real gemstones.”

“I can’t part with it. My best friend made the necklace for me before she died.”

“Awww…, that’s so sweet,” Leanne mocked. “But so atypical of your kind. I mean really, if you’ll screw for money, surely you’ll take cold, hard cash for a worthless bauble?”

“It’s not worthless to me. It’s priceless,” Sunny answered. She tried to push past the other woman.

Leanne stepped directly in front of the retreating girl. “Listen you two-bit tramp, I want that necklace.” Her voice became strident and piercing. Around the hall, heads turned.

Sunny had the highly uncomfortable sensation of being the center of unwanted attention. Her color heightened as people started whispering to each other. A few even had the bad manners to point.

“Is there a problem,” asked a cool, aristocratic woman’s voice.

Somehow, their hostess, Helene McIntyre stood before them. She was tall for a woman. Her shining hair was swept up into an immaculate French Twist. Her gown gave the impression of old money spent well, lots of it. Her face was a work of cosmetic and surgical art. One wing-shaped brow arched with a supercilious question. Sunny recognized that expression. When JD used it, he looked saturnine and masculine. On Helene, it was a gesture replete with icy hauteur.

“This hooker.” Some of Leanne’s wine sloshed over the lip of her glass as she used it to point to Sunny. “This filthy whore won’t sell me her jewelry.”

“You’ve had too much to drink, dear,” Helene said as she clamped a hand on Leanne’s arm to steady it. “I think you need to retire for a while, until you regain your ability to speak and think clearly. I’ll have dinner sent up to your suite.” She handed the tipsy woman off to a waiting maid. The woman in the crisp black uniform anchored Leanne to her side and led her from the room. The grande dame turned her attention to Sunny.

“I don’t believe we’re acquainted,” she said in a brisk no-nonsense voice. “This is a rather exclusive gathering. And I’m certain you’re not on the guest list. So I’ll be having you escorted from the premises immediately. I abhor party crashers, especially the ones with dubious backgrounds. Don’t try this again. The next time you show up here, I’ll have you arrested for trespassing.”

“She’s with me,” JD appeared at Sunny’s elbow.

She hadn’t seen him cross the hall. And she certainly hadn’t heard him stride up to them. But she was so very glad to see him now. Her heart flipped in her chest when he slid an arm around her and pulled her into his side.

Helene’s thin lips curled in disgust. “Really JD, how could you? How could you bring one of your filthy chippies to the house? Not to mention the fact that everyone will be asking for an introduction. How am I going to explain her away?”

“You’re not. She’s not going away. She’s my houseguest. I’ll introduce her to everyone, including you. Mother, this is Miss Elizabeth Sumner Murphy. She and her son will be staying with us for a few days, as my guests.”

The older woman rolled her eyes. “She and your bastard, you mean? Listen chickadee, I don’t know what sweet line he spun you, but we don’t pay off women.” The last comment was addressed to Sunny.

“Shut up,” JD snarled at his mother. His lethal eyes narrowed to dangerous slits.

Helene began sputtering in outrage. Never had either of her sons spoken to her in such a degrading manner. The fact that JD did so in front of a whole hall full of Dallas’s elite made the slight all the more cutting.

“Before you say another poisonous word, you’d better think twice. Sunny holds solitary custody of your only grandchild,” the man chided in a low whisper.

“You’ve truly got a bastard?” Helene hissed in horror.

“No, Willow had a son.”

“Had? Willow’s dead?” The words might have been heartbreaking, if there’d been any hint of warmth or grief in them. Instead, they just translated into irritation. “I wondered about that when the brat on the phone interrupted your wedding. He mentioned her name. I should have known the girl would end up being more trouble than she was worth. So now we’ve got a half-breed bastard on our hands?” Her straight shoulders slightly rose and fell as if finding out you had a long-lost grandson was a pesky, minor inconvenience. Helene shot her next words to Sunny. “Well, it seems I was wrong. We will gladly pay you anything you ask, Miss Murphy. If you’ll just disappear, with the brat and never come back.”

“No, we won’t,” JD said. He articulated each emotionless word. “Sunny and her son, Billy, are welcomed to stay here as long as they will. Billy is a McIntyre. And he’ll be treated as one. There will be no under-the-table payments and no disappearances.”

“But… but…,” sputtered the old lady.

JD ignored her. He spoke to the pale young woman under his arm, “It’s getting stuffy in here. Why don’t you let me take you out on the terrace for some fresh air?”

He didn’t wait for her assent. He just powered them through the fascinated crowd. Several times a stately matron or rotund gentleman tried to force the pair to stop and make conversation. JD wouldn’t allow it. He’d merely shake his head, smile like a hungry wolf, and continue easing Sunny through the milling throng. He pushed open a glass door. He led the girl out onto a wide dark balcony overlooking the pool and an extensive formal garden.

Sunny breathed deeply of the dry, sagebrush scented air. She looked up at the vast dark sky overhead. The stars seemed bigger here than they did at Sea Glass Point. And closer. So close she felt like she could reach up and pluck one down. As far as the eye could see, there was flat country marred only by a scant few low, rolling hills. It felt peaceful. Not in the same way that the empty midnight beach did. But this land held its own special beauty.

“You look incredible,” his voice rumbled down to her.

For a serene minute she’d let herself forget where she was. And with whom. She couldn’t afford to make that kind of mistake again.

“Incredible good or incredible bad?” she asked lightly.

His deep, slow laughter rolled over her senses like melted caramel. “Fishing for compliments?”

She shook her head. “Not from you.”

One of his hands began to thread through the long hair tumbling in waves down her back. He drew her closer to his taunt muscled body. She felt the rasp of his fingertips as they drew a lazy figure on the bare sensitive skin at the base of her spine. She tried to pull away from him. But his arm tightened to hold her fast. She felt the length of his solid arousal against her belly. She started to speak.

“Shhh…,” he whispered into her ear. “Just let me hold you.”

Her whole body shuddered as his lips traced a line around the pink shell of her ear. When his dangerous mouth began worshipping the delicate erotic spot right under her earlobe, she gasped. She would have pulled away.

But his seductive voice gentled her into staying. “Sunny, I want you. Can you feel how much?”

He opened her stance by dividing the skirt of her gown with a subtle movement. Their bodies were now intimately entwined. One of his hands settled in the small of her back. The fire of it branded into her naked flesh. Her whimper made him smile.

“You like this, don’t you?” he growled against the slender column of her throat. “You’re so damned responsive. I could give you pleasure this way. Out here in the open, with the chance that we might get caught. Is that what you want?”

Sunny’s lifted eyes pleaded with him. But she couldn’t form the words. She knew the bliss he could give her. She wanted it, craved it.

“I want to be buried so deep inside you, neither of us knows where the other begins or ends. I want to muffle those sexy little sounds you make with my mouth while you shatter in my arms. I want to taste your sweet wild honey on my tongue. I want to take you so many times, in so many ways, we’ll both be too exhausted to move the next morning.”

“JD, please,” she begged as he inched the thin strap of her gown off her shoulder. She felt the cool night air on her exposed skin. She couldn’t stop herself from arching up towards his searching mouth. She moaned in anticipation as he licked and suckled his way down to the straining tip.

“So sweet and delicate,” he murmured as he looked his fill. He drew the hard little pebble into his mouth. “I wonder if you’re as delicious down here?”

With a languid, controlled roll of his hips, he ground himself against her core. As he did, he blew a steady stream of almost electric air across the throbbing peak.

Sunny’s threw her head back. She choked off a tiny sob. Her body was pleading with her to surrender to him. The familiar earth-shattering experience only he could give her was building. She felt a powerful sensual anticipation flooding her- body, mind, and soul. Her legs refused to support her. She would have buckled to the ground, if he hadn’t pressed her more firmly to the railing of the balcony.

His hand moved to the remaining strap of her dress. With one slow seductive movement he pulled it off her shoulder. From her narrow waist up, she was completely bare. He watched her as his fingers leisurely dragged down the graceful slope of her breast and circled its up-tilted crown.

He felt a victor’s triumph when her hand slid behind his neck to draw his lips closer to hers. Her mouth opened for him like a flower eager for the morning sun. He stiffened his tongue and invaded her sweet depths with long, languorous penetrations. Teaching her body how he would give her the ultimate satisfaction, if she’d but let him. When the fingers of her other hand burrowed into the fabric of his shirt, he knew she was nearing her pinnacle. He caught her fierce little cry of passion with his mouth.

“Shatter for me, baby. Let me watch you break into a thousand crazy little pieces. It’s so damn sexy watching you,” his voice was a suggestive rasp.

Sunny felt him cup her mound through the black silk of the gown. Soon his hand was replaced by the steel imprint of his arousal. His hips set into an endless rhythm of deep, slow rocking motions. She gladly fully opened to receive the silk’s abrasions against the most intimate part of her. Soon he had her teetering on the keen knife’s edge of ecstasy.

Then he suddenly stopped. She heard the wheezing bellows of his breath against her forehead. She felt the tightly leashed strength in his hard body. And then she heard his cold grated words.

“I can push you over the edge. Or I can walk away. It’s your choice. But if you want this… me, there’s something I want in return.”

“Billy?” she pushed the name past her own panting.

He shook his head. He ground his teeth and sent a tense muscle jumping the length of his jaw. “You. I want you. In my bed. For one night.”

“But…”

“Yes or no?” he snarled. “I can leave you here hurting. Unsatisfied and aching like you are now. Or I can give us what we both want. For one night.” When she didn’t answer, he canted his hips slightly to remind her of what he was offering. Her sexy little whimper almost had him spilling his seed right there.

“I… I…” she responded weakly.

“Yes or no, Sunny?” He gritted out the words again.

When her passion-filled eyes finally opened and focused on his, JD was uncomfortable with the tenderness he saw in them. Why did women always confuse honest animal lust for something else? Something far more complicated and binding? But no matter what fairy tale she’d spun to lull her conscience tonight, he would have her. One night. That’s all it’d take. One night to get her out of his system. Then he could negotiate visitations with his nephew and send Sunny Murphy back to her sleepy one-horse town.

He leaned farther away from her. He felt the sudden chill of the night air between them. She must have felt it too, because the tiny little hitching sound she made was one of loss. She quickly drew her dress back up, covering herself. It would be the hardest thing he’d ever done, to leave her, shaking with unspent passion, if she rejected him. But he’d do it. Somehow, he’d find the strength to do walk away.

“Yes or no, Sunny?” He heard the desperate demand in his voice.

She lifted a jerky hand to her hair. She pushed it away from her hot face. She nodded. “Yes,” she said.

“You’re sure?”

He was giving her every opportunity to escape. And he was troubled by his new altruism. With any other woman he’d still be manipulating her. He’d still be drugging her with his potent sexuality. He’d be making promises. The kind a man could keep with a checkbook. But he realized he didn’t want to coerce or bribe this woman into sleeping with him.

She was already going to forever be plagued by regrets and self-recriminations. He knew her well enough to recognize that fact. Even knowing she would suffer, after they were thoroughly sated, didn’t stop him from craving her. The raging desire he felt for Sunny was like a living thing. A thing he couldn’t control. A thing he wouldn’t want to curb, even if he could. It needed to be explored and conquered. Like the way a man faced a prairie fire, with his eyes wide open and using every method at his disposal to extinguish the flames. For if a man continued to let them burn out of control, he would be consumed. And JD was sure he’d smile and welcome Sunny’s passionate, uninhibited fire until his very flesh charred, if he allowed himself that luxury.

“I’m sure,” she uttered the soft words.

But she couldn’t look at him, when she spoke them. No, for if she did, the lack of love she’d see might dampen her reeling emotions. His eyes might tell her he was just planning on using her up until there was nothing left that mattered. The stern line of his mouth might imply that she wasn’t at all special, even on this magical night. That she was just a warm, willing body to assuage his hunger. A forgettable woman whose name would escape him once she stumbled, broken and bereft, from his bed. Sunny didn’t want to see any of that. She wanted to deceive herself into believing, that if she could please him, he’d become as addicted to her as she’d always been to him. That JD McIntyre would be so charmed by the gift of her untried body, he’d fall to one knee and beg her to stay with him. To marry him. To live with him in a happily-ever-after she knew,
she knew
, was unrealistic. This wild and completely naïve fantasy was one of her own making. One that was as old as time. One that almost never played out like the woman hoped.

If she didn’t want a relationship solely based on sex, why was she going down this particularly rocky and dangerous road? Because you love him, a strong voice echoed through her brain. Because if this is all you can have, you’ll grab it with both fists and howl for more. Because you’ll only ever love one man. And that man is John Deacon McIntyre. Because being with him for one night, even when you know he’ll probably scrape you off his shoe in the morning. Is so much better than the wasteland your life would be if you’d never loved him, never given yourself to him at all.

“I’m sure,” she said once more.

She opened her eyes when she heard his gusty sigh of relief at her answer. She was glad when she saw none of the detachment in his face she’d so feared. Instead, she saw hunger. It glittered in his eyes and showed in the satisfied curve of his mouth. She started in surprise as he grabbed her hand. Before she could form a question, he had them both down the steps and across the dark fragrant garden.

“Where are we going?” she asked breathlessly.

“To my bedroom.”

“Now?” she was horrified. She wasn’t ready for that, not yet. “What about the dinner party?”

He turned and paused, looking down into her face. A shaft of pure silver moonlight lit her perfect features. He couldn’t stop himself from falling into the depths of her brilliant eyes. The night, the necklace, and the moon had transformed them into a deep warm turquoise. A color unlike any he’d ever seen before.

“Are you hungry?” he asked.

She shook her head. The tip of her tongue darted out to moisten the corner of her mouth. He groaned. She looked up at him quizzically. In her innocence, she had no idea he was suffering the tortures of the damned just by watching her. If he didn’t somehow gain some control, and quickly, he would end up ravaging her like some kind of Medieval barbarian. He took a deep breath. Then another. He rubbed a consoling thumb over the back of her cold hand where it lay with so much trust in his.

“I think my mother can manage the dinner party without us. If you get hungry later, I’ll have something sent to us from the kitchen. If that’s agreeable with you?” He was glad the words sounded so civilized. Because at the moment, he knew he was half-wild and feral. He was a rutting beast, clamoring to claim his mate.

Sunny nodded. She wasn’t hungry in the least. In fact, she was so anxious she felt a little queasy. She wondered if this was how a bride felt on her wedding night. But she was no bride. She was just a lovesick fool willing to exchange her old-fashioned morals for the chance to experience Heaven in the arms of the man she loved. She decided she’d better be honest with JD about her apprehensions.

“It’s just… it’s just,” she tried to make some sense of the myriad emotions racing through her brain. “I’ve never done this before.”

His lips twitched. But he refused to laugh at her fears. She was the bravest person he’d ever known. The way she’d shouldered the responsibility for Billy alone at eighteen, was evidence of her strong will. Now she stood, facing him in the moonlight, confessing her fears. How could he not admire her? How could he not want her?