T is for Temptation (5 page)

He chuckled and brushed their lips together.

“You do wonders for my ego, Tallulah Inglefield.”

Everything seemed to come together, and she blurted, “You’ve never called me by his name.”

“And you avoid saying his name if it’s at all possible.” His dark eyes ran a cautious scrutiny. “That plus our kiss last week had me hoping for this.”

The humming of an engine intensified, and Tee snaked her eyes around Jake’s muscular chest.

“A fishing boat’s coming into the bay.”

“We’d better get decent pronto, then.” He kissed her, a hard, fast contact. “This is by no means finished, simply on hold.”

He slid out of her, and a strange emptiness sucked their intimacy away. In an instant, she went from a comfortable coziness to a cold unease tempting doom. Anxious to avoid his prolonged perusal of her naked body, she slipped into the water and swam a furious pace, lunging onto the pier as soon as she made contact with the structure. He remained in the sea, treading water, as she dressed with hasty, jerky movements, aware of her every flaw.

“I wish I could keep you naked forever. You’re perfect.”

She’d never been naked in front of a man before, had been afraid he’d find flaws, scared he’d reject her. His words, the huskiness in his voice, the way his black eyes raked her, as if he’d devour every inch of flesh, flamed heat everywhere, and in that instant, she wanted to preen like a mare in heat.

He climbed the metal rungs, one unembarrassed nude vision of male perfection. Water clung to his bronzed flesh, and a steady river streamed from the tip of his engorged penis. Mute fascination focused her gaze, and she wondered what he tasted like. She touched the tip of her tongue to the corner of her mouth.

Jake swooped, gathered her close, and lapped the spot.

“You do that several times a day, and every time that pink tongue appears, I want to taste you.”

“Oh my,” she whispered and leaned to the side so his lips could maneuver more easily up her neck. “Jake, I hate to interrupt, but I think that boat is going to dock. Maybe we should go inside?”

They made it into the house just as the wooden fishing trawler docked at their jetty. Dressed, but damp, Jake surveyed the exiting passenger from the great room’s front wall of ceiling-to-floor windows.

“Do you know him?”

“Yes, that’s the caretaker. He lives here permanently in a cottage behind Eight Bells.”

“Eight Bells?” One of his dark eyebrows did an uphill run.

“We English have a most annoying tendency to name our residences. Eight Bells is the name of this house, and Greenbriar is the name of the guest cottage in town.”

He grinned. “What’s the name of the main town house, then?”

She ducked her chin, and an impish grin played with her mouth as she shot him a gleeful dart. “The Main House.”

They both chuckled, and the tension in the air settled into the cozy companionship of individuals at ease with each other.

“It looks like he’s headed in this direction.” Jake threw her a peculiar glance, all hooded and broody. “He’s very young to have a position like a caretaker on a lonely islet.”

“I never thought about it. I’ll have a quick word with him. Make yourself comfortable. There’s always beer and juice in there.” She pointed to the built-in industrial refrigerated wine cooler. “I’ll be back in a flash.”

Tee discovered the caretaker’s schedule included a visit to her parents’ house that afternoon, and she pressed him into delivering the damned crystal set to her mother. She jogged back into the house and explained her intentions to Jake while searching for the set.

“Here it is.” She pulled a long red Macy’s box out of a cabinet. “I have no idea why Tricia carted it down here and buried it in a storage cupboard.”

At his puzzled expression, she crinkled her nose and explained. “Cabinets, I keep forgetting. The English say cupboards and the Americans cabinets. Hard to believe sometimes we speak the same language. Hang on a minute. I’ll be right back.”

She waited until the caretaker’s fishing boat reached the middle of the bay and retraced her steps to the house, wondering what the correct protocol for after sex included.

“I found a bottle of red wine. Want a glass?”

The cork popped out of the bottle with a loud sucking sound, and she nodded, studying him while attempting an air of nonchalance.

“Does the caretaker have access to this house?”

His long, brown fingers twisted the stopper out of the metallic helix corkscrew.

“No,” she replied, following the hypnotic motion of that strong hand, the image of it cupping her breast imprinted on her pupils. She blinked and frowned. “Why do you ask?”

“There’s a tray of still-warm cupcakes on the table over there. I had a couple. Delicious. Fact is, though, since the house was empty when we got here, where the heck did they come from?”

Blood pooled in her cheeks and drained from her extremities. Cupcakes. Damn, she hadn’t conjured cupcakes in years. A strange sensation took control of her body, freezing every limb into a dazed slow motion, while her mind went into rocket-ship overdrive. Tottering on the edge of full-blown panic, Tee scrambled for a suitable explanation.

“Check it out yourself if you don’t believe me. Someone baked them and recently too. If he doesn’t have access to the house, who does?”

He poured red wine into two balloon glasses and jerked his head at the long table dominating the center of the large, rectangular room.

She didn’t have to look, but she did anyway and suppressed a groan. Her favorite treat as a little girl and her security blanket in times of emotional instability, cupcakes appeared whenever her control over her witchy powers slipped.

“Here,” he said and gave her one of the wine glasses. His dark eyes scanned her features, and he reached over and traced his finger along the curve of her cheek. “Are you okay, Tee? Sore?”

His words poured a watershed of embarrassment down her neck, and she didn’t know where to look. She gulped down some of the wine and followed the swirling of the ruby liquid as it bounced from rim to rim.

“Ah, heck,” Jake muttered.

He pried her hands away from the stem of the glass, set it on the counter, and drew her into his arms.

“You look like a rabbit about to bolt down its hole.”

He kissed the top of her head, stroked the length of her spine, and tipped her chin up with his finger.

Wary and more than a little bamboozled by his solid form, the heat of his body, the faint smell of the sea clinging to him, Tee melted, drowning in those sable eyes. Temptation ran rampant over logic, and she surrendered to the captivity of his gaze, the adolescent breathlessness of the delicious moment.

“You are the most intriguing mixture of assurance and hesitation. One minute, the bold sea siren standing gloriously nude under a blazing tropical sun, the next a fawn attempting to blend in. Why were you a virgin, Tee?”

Her mind spun with the sucker punch. Damn, damn. Think, think. “My marriage was a huge mistake, and I discovered that before, um, before anything happened.”

Tee concentrated on the pulse under his Adam’s apple, taking solace from its steady beat.

“You found out about Graziella and Tony.”

Her mouth dropped open. “You knew?”

“She came with him to Boca for the opening of our new headquarters.”

Something akin to rage tightened every neck muscle, and she balled her fists trying to contain her explosive temper.

“That’s why you recognized her at the club.”

The line of Jake’s sensuous mouth flattened, and he cocked his head to the right. “I met her before I’d even heard about you.”

“All this time you knew.” Bitterness twisted her insides. “You must’ve gotten a good laugh about how naive I was.”

“Never once found the situation anything but vile. You suspected nothing?”

She winced and stared at his chest, fascinated by the sprinkling of dark hair peeking through the shirt’s neckline. “I think I didn’t want to know. After I found out, it all seemed only too obvious.”

“The clarity of hindsight.”

“I found out about them after the wedding. I had no idea it had gone on for so long. Everyone must have had a field day when he proposed. Graziella was at the dinner. Even dead, he finds new ways to humiliate me.”

She squeezed her eyes shut, remembered the cupcakes, and inhaled, struggling to control her rage. No more unplanned conjuring.

“Let’s talk about this now, and then we can move on. Why did you marry him?”

She swallowed. “I’m not sure. It just sort of happened, and it seemed the right thing to do.”

His arms fell away, and one eyebrow lifted, skepticism dominating his expression.

Tee stepped back, cupped the wine glass, lifted it to her mouth, and sipped, playing for time. She moved forward and unlocked the sliding glass doors leading onto the patio. As she hipped one side open, a gust of wind sent a dangling fish-shaped copper chime into a musical frenzy.

“All my life, all I ever wanted was to win a gold medal in the Olympics. You know Tony won a couple a few years ago. Dad contracted him to train me for the tryouts for the British equestrian team.”

She perched on the edge of a white lounge chair and shot him a sideways glance. Although he faced her, those black eyes swept the bay in a careful assessment of the two lavish homes situated at opposite points of the bay’s horseshoe promontories. Deciding a clear mind proved in order, she set her glass on a low, round table.

“We trained for eight months, and I lost the final position by twenty seconds, a huge discrepancy. It was the worst thing that’s ever happened to me. A total, humiliating failure.”

His piercing coal gaze collided with hers. The constriction in her throat inflated to word-gobbling size.

“And Tony was there to pick up the pieces?”

He sat facing her and leaned forward, one elbow braced on his thigh, swirling the crystal container. Wine circled and eddied in the glass in a peculiar hypnotic rhythm.

She saw only concern in those sable eyes and plunged, surrendering to her impetuous nature. “Not exactly. My mother thought Tony was a perfect catch with his royal connections. I’m not sure if you knew, but he played polo with Prince Charles regularly. Tricia and I are not exactly close. She wanted a sweet, feminine replica of herself, and she got me, a tomboy obsessed with horses.”

Jake’s dark eyebrows met, and he snorted. “Tee, you’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever met, and your remarkable equestrian talents only add to that. The first time I saw you correct that stallion of yours after he threw you.” He shook his head and grazed a thumb over his chin. “Let’s just say, it was incredibly arousing.”

She blinked, once, twice and wet her lips, her Tony-bruised ego ratcheting up a nudge or two.

His mouth curved, and he slid one knee between hers. One hot, muscle-bound thigh gave her a slight graze. It took a few seconds before she realized he wanted her to continue.

“Tricia threw Tony and me together and kept telling me I was wasting my life, it was time to settle down. I think she’s hoping a granddaughter might turn out more in her image.”

Shadows crossed the patio, creeping up the wide ivory floor inch by inch, ensnaring a complete rectangle. The chimes hanging behind tinkled an intermittent jingle in correspondence with the half-hearted breeze, attempting to gentle the stalwart tropical afternoon heat.