Tender Deception (17 page)

“We’re here,” he said softly.

“This is it?” Vickie inquired, struggling from the lassitude of sleep and experiencing a moment of self-incrimination. Step right up, said the spider to the fly. And the fly was in the web of its own accord.

“This is it,” Brant replied, his voice edged with amusement.

“Well,” Vickie said briskly, sliding to let herself out of the car. “Let’s see this palace of Monte’s.”

“Ah, yes, Monte’s pleasure palace,” Brant mused behind her, deliberately sinister. “By all means, let’s view it quickly.”

Feeling none too confident with his breath at her back, Vickie threw off a careless shrug and hurried up the hedged tile path to the redwood building that awaited them. Even in the pale light of moon and stars she could see that the “cottage” was exquisite. It rose from sand and dunes in a split-level, eye-pleasing symmetry, like an oasis in the desert.

“Would you like the key?” Brant inquired politely as she paused blankly at the door.

“Thanks,” Vickie replied wryly, standing back for him to open it and turn on the lamps.

They both paused in the entryway. To the left, stairs wound majestically to a balcony that overlooked the fur-carpeted living room and offered a view of numerous doors—presumably the bedrooms. At the rear of the living room to the right, taking the entire back wall, were sliding doors of glass, giving a view of the Gulf that was breathtaking. The palms lining the beach were scarcely moving, nor did the water appear to be more than benevolent—sheer, shimmering glass like the doors that framed it.

“Monte does have taste!” Vickie murmured, teetering on the brink of a cold sweat of fear despite the humidity. Nonsense, she told herself, taking a breath to saunter up the inviting staircase. They were two adults; she had made no commitments as yet. Except in her own mind. Brant would force nothing from her.

Arguments raced on in her mind so loudly that she barely heard Brant’s answer. “Yes, the man has taste.”

“I’m going to pick out a room for myself,” Vickie called gaily, leaning over the balcony.

Brant tilted his chin to look up at her, his eyes narrow slits of mirthful blue fire. “You do that, Juliet,” he teased. “Or is it Rapunzel?” he asked as her raven hair floated over the carved bannister. Saluting her with a deviltry that assured her he was reading her mind, Brant backed toward the front door. “I’ll go get the luggage.”

Vickie meandered through the various bedrooms, averting her eyes from the beds. The beachhouse was furnished in the most elegant of contemporary styles. Chrome, glass, and shag carpeting were everywhere, as was wicker and thick, inviting cushions.

Vickie decided on the last room she entered, one facing the beach, and painted a light, sunshine yellow, complemented by earth tones in the decor. Moving to the high, draped window, she could see the water in the glow of the moon. Without realizing it, she curled her hands around the cloth of the rust-colored drapes.

“What is this,
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof?”
Brant inquired from the doorway.

Self-consciously, Vickie dropped the drapes. “Did you find something you like?” she asked coolly.

“Umm,” he replied with an assured grin that made her want to slap him. “Right next door.” He set her suitcase on the foot of the bed. “Have you got a bathing suit in this thing?”

“Of course.”

“Good, get it on.”

“Now? It must be at least three
A.M.
!”

“Actually,” Brant said, leaving her with the grinning arrogance that his order would be obeyed, “it’s closer to four.”

“You’re crazy!” Vickie called after him. “I’m not going swimming now!”

The bedroom door, which had been closing, reopened, and Brant’s blond head reappeared. “Sure you are!” he said nicely. His grin hardened a fraction. “With or without a suit. See you in a minute.”

Luckily the door shut before her mouth fell open. She had heard Brant speak with that sword-edged civility before. It meant he was determined to have his way, and to take any steps to achieve it.

Prudence overrode her instinct to tell him she simply wasn’t going swimming; he was welcome to be shark bait himself if he wished. The picture of Brant dressing her in her brief bikini was less than dignified. The imagining was so undignified that she was changed in less than the allotted minute and waited on the balcony with a white terry robe tied over her bathing suit.

Brant emerged from his door just seconds after she, clad only in cutoffs, a towel slung carelessly around his neck. He showed no sign of surprise at Vickie’s quick appearance, and as his eyes swept over her in a fraction of a second, she found herself returning the gesture and admitting to herself as her eyes took him in that he was a superb specimen of humanity. There wasn’t a spare inch of flesh on his body; his every movement was a play of perfectly toned muscle. He was a performer, she told herself. His body was his tool. Like any instrument, it had to be cared for.

“Shall we raid the refrigerator first?” Brant suggested.

Vickie quirked an eloquent brow. “Is there going to be something in it to raid?”

“Oh, I assume,” Brant murmured, fixing a hand on the small of her back to lead her down the stairs. “I’m willing to bet on a fruity, impeccably dry white wine and a fine assortment of cheeses. Perhaps some apples. A little forbidden fruit always comes in handy.”

The refrigerator contained much more than the items Brant had mentioned. It was stocked to serve an army.

“How did Monte manage all this?” Vickie mused, accepting the bottle of wine and crystal glasses Brant forced into her hands. Brant didn’t answer. He kept his head stuck in the refrigerator, searching for a Saran-wrapped tray.

“Monte didn’t manage all this!” Vickie charged with crisp harshness as suspicion became as clear as glass. “You did!”

The refrigerator clicked shut. “Guilty.” Brant stared at her with no trace of apology.

“And this house?” she asked icily.

He shrugged. “Mine.”

“This is a rather elaborate set-up.”

“Yes.”

“I think I will go swimming,” Vickie said coldly. “By myself, thank you.”

Clinking the wine and glasses down on the Formica counter with such vehemence that the crystal threatened to shatter, Vickie sailed out of the kitchen and stumbled to the back doors. So much for serious relationships! He had wanted her all right, and everything said and done from that point had all been part of a plot. She might have found the entire scenario amusing, and might have even ignored it and laughed it off, had the man been anyone but Brant.

He caught her just as she fumbled with the rather complicated lock on the sliding doors. As if a wind had swept by her, she found herself twirling around, feeling no pain, but turned with the force of a tornado.

“What the hell is this all about?” Brant demanded angrily. His back rested against the glass, his arms crossed over his chest. She could see the coarse curls on his chest rise and fall with the play of taut muscles as he breathed.

“I don’t appreciate being played for a fool,” Vickie grated, digging her nails into the palms of her hand to stand before him without flinching, her chin thrust to a regal elevation.

“What?” He shook his head in disbelief.

“All the plotting and planning—”

“So what?”

“So what?” Vickie repeated, shaking her head. Her mouth opened, but she couldn’t seem to form words for an explanation. “Just let me out, will you please, Brant. I’d like to be alone.”

“No. I’d like to hear what this latest problem of yours is.”

She knew damned well he wasn’t going to budge. His eyes had never been icier, the line of his full lips more grim or tight. But she didn’t want him near her, touching her, right now. It was too easy to accept his brand of lies.

“I told you when you came back to the theater to go after Terry,” she said, her voice containing a slight wince. If he touched Terry, she would go crazy, implode.

“Hell,” Brant muttered disgustedly, his bewildered anger making his words harsh and cold as a stone wall. “At least Terry occasionally makes sense.”

“I’m making sense, and you know it!”

“The hell I do!” he yelled. His fists clenched over his folded arms and Vickie was sure he controlled an urge to shake her.

Back down, she warned herself. Lowering her lashes, she murmured, “I can’t make any one-sentence explanations.” Trying to appear sheepish while still shaking at some inner core with hurt and an anger of her own, she added softly, “Get the wine and we’ll talk.”

If she had been thinking rationally, she would have realized an attempt to dupe Brant was the least intelligent thing she could do. Nor was she thinking that even if she succeeded in eluding him, she would be in trouble for hours to come. But she had lost all cool, rational thought. Her normal, controlled thinking processes had been absent since Brant returned.

Nor did she give a damn about the hours to come. All she wanted was to find a berth of safety away from him, a place where she wasn’t reduced to longing by the sight of him, tremors from the anger she had elicited. Withdrawal wasn’t defeat…

As soon as Brant grudgingly eyed her with a cynical warning and strode put of sight in the hallway, Vickie found the pin in the door’s lock and bolted it. She ran ridiculously down the beach with no place to go, the salt and sand and gentle surf a padding for her bare feet.

It was pathetic, the soft thud of her footsteps pounding in her ears. Where was Victoria, the woman who could handle anything with the blink of a commanding gray eye? The woman who thought and spoke, and never behaved on wild impulse?

She didn’t hear him coming. He was as fleet and silent as a rabbit on the sand. One second she was running, the next she was spinning. And then she was on the ground, the wind knocked cleanly from her lungs, the force of her fall shielded by Brant’s body. A superb tackle. Hindsight told her she should have expected no less.

He shifted and she was locked beneath him on the sand, staring into enigmatic pools of deep-set blue ice, fighting for breath to rail against him. She found some satisfaction in seeing that he was as winded as she; it had taken him a bit of effort to catch up.

She tried to speak, but instead of finding words, her lower lip trembled as her mouth parted. The pink tip of her tongue edged out to moisten the dryness that had parched her lips. Then everything she had been wanting to say left her mind as well as her tongue. The blue of his eyes began to mist before her as Brant lowered his head over hers and took her lips with a gentle, poignant yearning that belied any anger. He tasted of the wine; his scent was that of the surrounding sea. To resist him would be like trying to hold back the flooding tides of the ocean.

His tongue explored every succulent recess of her mouth. Then his kisses became butterflies that fluttered over her face, her cheeks, her eyelids, light as a breeze. But they wouldn’t end there. Despite the soft enticement of his sensuously teasing mouth, the arms that held her were vibrantly alive with heat and passion; his entire, sinewed being was taut.

With a shivered groan Brant encapsulated her head with his hands, raking his fingers through the raven hair that spewed across the sand like a silk covering, and brought his hovering chest to rest next to hers. His face was buried in her neck as he murmured, “Let me lie down beside you, babe…”

Vickie’s fingers moved to his head, sinking into his hair. It was the only gold she would ever covet. Her hands moved downward then, over his back, trembling as they ran down the strength of his spine. Her eyes were closed, clenched tight, but she could see him with her hands, trace the beloved pattern of his body. On the taut muscle of his left shoulder blade there was a tiny scar; above that was a smattering of faint freckles, made darker by the sun. And as her fingers played lower, over a bronzed expanse of ribs, they found a tiny mole just above his left hip.

His cheek moved against hers, slightly and deliciously rough with the dawning of an early morning beard. His tongue invaded her ear, drawing moist lazy circles that tensed her fingers immediately, and she clung to him, still at a loss of words, wondering vaguely if she cared to find any or not. The breeze that wafted over them was cooled by the water. She shivered. But she wasn’t cold. Brant’s heat was encasing her, infusing her, lapping her with a flame that entered the deepest center of her desire with a soaring blue flame. Vickie twisted to kiss the hollow of his neck, moving the tip of her tongue erotically, grazing him with small nibbles.

The result was an earthquake, an eruption of need, and a groan that threatened to split the ground asunder. She was immersed in his embrace, rolling with him along the sand, shedding her robe in the process. His hands steamed over her body like molten lava, sensitizing her flesh for the moist fire of the lips that followed in their path. He didn’t touch her skimpy suit at first, but aroused her to levels of insanity by making love through the sheer knit, making her feverishly toss and writhe beneath him as his fingers and then his mouth taunted her nipples to rigid peaks that strained against the fabric.

Only then did he release the ties of her bra top, to continue his torture with ever enlarging circles of his tongue that became figure-eights over her breasts. Both roseate peaks were then assaulted afresh with a fervent suckling that created a mindless whirlpool of pleasure, only to be deserted as his kisses followed his hands to strip her of the bikini bottom.

Vickie was fire herself, unable to keep still. His cutoffs did nothing to hide his desire, and they were a poor shield between them. The core of her being, demanding only satiation, went with her fingers as they moved to his snap. There was no hesitation to the hands that brought down his zipper with an ardent rasp. The cutoffs were gone. Brant was beautifully beside her, his masculinity throbbing its yearning to possess her. He was a golden god sent from the heavens. She found her voice.

“Oh, Brant…”

His thoughts weren’t much different as he gazed at her with the passion and awe of ageless centuries. She was all things to him, a Guinevere to be adored on a pedestal, a wild, passionate, raven-haired wood-nymph, a sweet, honeyed rose, a seductress, a temptress, an arrogant Morgan le Fay. His woman. All that woman should be…She was exquisite, her skin creamy against the sand, her waist his handspan, the intoxicating mounds of her breasts perfect for his devouring lips. Her hips fit to his with an unbelievable, harmonious rhythm. The enchanting gray eyes that returned his stare with no restraint were as deep as the earth, loving and trusting and incredibly sultry…