The Erotic Secrets of a French Maid (16 page)

Emma raised an eyebrow, wondering if Kevin was serious about his ideas of what wives were for. It apparently hadn't occurred to him that Russ might marry a woman who worked outside the home. It also wasn't helping her opinion of Kevin that he was all but badmouthing his boss and friend.

"But you like him, overall?" she asked.

Kevin shrugged. "You can't not like him. I mean, the guy's a straight shooter and as determined as a Sherman tank. And he's not going to let his personal feelings get in the way of doing what he thinks is right. And he's loyal."

"He sounds like a fine, upstanding citizen. Not very exciting, though," she said, baiting him to say more.

"Not much of a risk taker."

"No, James was the one who was daring, who was willing to take a gamble. That was his brother—do you know about that?"

"Yes."

"James was the visionary, but his ideas probably wouldn't have come to much without Russ there to do the grunt work. And when their first business,

usedbooks.com, started to go under, it was Russ who saw that some of their proprietary software was worth salvaging. Enough about him, though. Tell me more about this design contest."

Emma did, keeping it as brief and impersonal as possible. She didn't want to tell Kevin about her creative struggles. He didn't give her the same sense of being an emotionally safe sounding board that Russ did.

Their salad rolls arrived while she was talking, and by the time those were finished and their enormous bowls of
pho
—noodle soup—had arrived she was trying to turn the conversation back to him. "So, how's your car treating you?"

"All right. But I'm beginning to think it was a mistake. It looks too middle-aged. I'd be better off with something like that beefed-up Honda of yours."

Til trade ya."

He laughed. "What type of car do you think I should get?"

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"For attracting women?"

He nodded.

"It doesn't really work that way. Not if you're looking for a serious relationship. Are you?"

"I'd like to get married." He looked at her soulfully.

"Well if that's what you want, forget about impressing women with your car. Buy one that you honestly love and are excited about. If you didn't give a rat's ass about what anyone thought of you, what would you buy? What's the first thing that comes to mind?"

"Hmm..."

"No, tell me. Now! Don't think about it."

"A Mini."

Emma blinked. "One of those new Mini Coopers?" It was a chick car, even cuter than the new VW

Bugs.

He nodded, looking hopeful.

"Then that's what you should get. The right woman will appreciate your choice and be impressed that you had the courage to choose what suited you, rather than the biggest, fastest penis car you could afford."

His face colored. "Penis car?"

She slurped up a mouthful of noodles. "You think women can't see through a guy's car choices?" she said when she'd swallowed. "We assume that penis cars are driven by insecure, arrogant assholes. With a
Mini,
though, a woman would think, 'There's a man who'd make a kind, attentive, and good-humored dad.'"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"So what does your new boyfriend drive?"

She blinked. "Er, some sort of hybrid, I think. I haven't been in it yet, though."

"Russ has one of those."

"Mmm?" she murmured, quickly stuffing her mouth with noodles.

"He donates to a lot of environmental causes. Sierra Club, all that. So is that the type of guy you like, one who drives a hybrid?"

She shrugged, stuffing more noodles into her mouth. He waited for her to swallow. She took her time.

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"All I want to know," she said at last, "is that it's paid for and it runs."

"So what does your car say about you?"

She laughed. "That I take what I can get." She explained about her brother and his cautious wife.

"What would
you
buy if money were no object and you didn't care what anyone would think?"

"I don't know."

"Yes, you do. Tell me," he insisted, echoing her earlier command to him. A classic convertible roadster from the 1920s zipped through her imagination, roaring along a country road in England. It zipped and was gone, the impracticality of it erasing it from her mind. "A Volvo station wagon."

His eyes widened. "Really?"

"They're safe and you can haul a lot of stuff."

He didn't say anything.

Emma took a moment to think about her choice, then covered her face with her hands. "Oh God. That's pathetic."

"No, it's, er ... practical. A very reasonable car. It sounds as if you're looking forward to being a wife and mother."

Emma groaned and pulled her hands down her face, stretching it into Edvard Munch's
The Scream.

"No! There will be time for that in my thirties. Why did I say a Volvo station wagon? Why? Why?"

"Maybe it's a secret longing."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh for God's sake. Not every woman is looking for a husband!"

"But if you find him before you think you're ready, maybe that means that you're more ready than you thought."

Emma dropped her hands. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Maybe you've already found your Mr. Right." He stared at her with an infuriating expression of kindly patience, as if awaiting her inevitable acceptance of him as savior.

Emma pulled out her cell phone and checked the time.

"Jeez, it's getting late. I've got to get home. My
boyfriend
is coming over soon. Lunch has been great, though."

"You don't want dessert?" he asked, sitting up straight, the expression of calm wiped off his face.

"I'm stuffed—couldn't eat another bite. Thanks, though, I'll have to remember this place. Good food!"

She dug in her purse, pulling out some cash.

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"No, no, I invited you."

"That's kind of you." She looked him in the eye. "Thank you. Can I leave the tip?"

He shook his head and signaled for the check.

She accepted his offer of a ride back to her neighborhood and had him drop her a block and a half away from her building. He'd chattered about his favorite TV shows throughout the short drive, leaving her blissfully free to lose herself in her own thoughts. As she said good-bye and watched him drive off, the same thought plagued her that had plagued her throughout the drive.

A Volvo? What the hell was the matter with her?

Talk about thinking inside the box.

Cripes.

Are you ready for your bed bath, Mr. Carrick?" . "Yes, nurse," Russ said, wondering why he hadn't put a stop to these skits, yet grateful that he hadn't. Emma was all in white: a white short-short zip-front dress, garter belt, stockings that came halfway up her thighs, spike heels, and a tiny white paper cap on her head with a red cross in the center.

He hoped she left the stocking-and-heels ensemble on through it all. Whether planted in the male psyche by adolescent perusals of
Playboy
or not, a woman in garter belt and spike heels did something electric to a man's lust. His gaze flicked between the cleavage of the tight dress and the hemline that barely covered her sex and butt cheeks.

Oh God. He was going to enjoy this too much.

"Roll onto your stomach, Mr. Carrick, if you would."

He did as bid under the sheet of her bed, and turned his head so that he could watch her set a bowl of steaming water and a sea sponge down on her nightstand. There was also massage oil there, a plastic water carafe and cup, bottles of pills that looked like candy, a thermometer, a cheap pink stethoscope, and a pair of latex gloves. Props to add to the hospital effect, apparently, just like she'd found a hospital gown for him to wear. No man felt virile in a hospital gown, but he was willing to play the part in exchange for seeing her in that nurse's getup, and he had high hopes for the massage oil.

She pulled down the sheet and leaned over to untie the fastenings of his hospital gown. He reached out and stroked his fingertips along her thigh, tracing the place where stocking changed to flesh.

"Teh tch,

Mr. Carrick. You know better than to flirt with your nurse."

He slid his hand up to the hem of her dress, reaching under it to lightly brush against the tropical warmth of her sex. She wasn't wearing underpants.

"Very naughty, Mr. Carrick," she said softly, pressing herself against his hand, allowing him to caress her. He heard her suck in a breath of pleasure, and a moment later she moved away, out of reach.

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He closed his eyes, feeling absurdly happy. Good food, good wine, and a beautiful woman about to give him a bath and sex. Greg was right. He
was
a lucky bastard.

He heard her wring out the sponge, the droplets of water the only sound in the apartment beyond their own breathing. The quiet created a strangely intimate intensity, each of Emma's sounds and movements capturing his attention. He could hear the brush of her arm against the fabric of her dress, the faint rub of one stocking-clad thigh against the other.

She started on his shoulders, rubbing gently with the steaming sponge. The water was hot enough to shock his skin, soon replaced with a chill as his damp skin was exposed to the air. The contrasts were weirdly pleasing, and the more so because he didn't know where to expect the sponge to hit next. Emma worked in a semirandom pattern but gradually made her way down his back, over his rump, and to his feet.

"Please turn over," she said softly.

He did so, freeing the erection that had been pressing with almost painful fullness against the mattress.

He saw her eyes widen, and he bobbed it in greeting.

"Mr. Carrick, I don't know what you've been thinking, but I'm only here to wash you and massage any sore muscles."

A smile pulled at his mouth, but he refused to take the verbal bait.

"You don't have any areas that need special attention, do you?" she asked. "Any place at all?"

"I'll let you find it on your own."

She wrung out the sponge again and went to work on his thigh, bringing it tauntingly close to his groin.

"This is modern medicine, Mr. Carrick. Patients are supposed to work
with
their health care professionals in order to receive the best treatment possible."

"I think you're doing pretty well on your own."

She climbed onto the bed, straddling his legs as she worked the sponge up his belly. "You think so?"

He pulled the pillow under his head so he had a better view. Her breasts were nearly spilling out of the neckline, and the hem of her dress had ridden up her hips, revealing her sex, the glorious warmth of it hovering mere inches above his body. She moved up his body several inches, her mound brushing against his erection.

He slid his hands up the outsides of her thighs, then around back to cup her buttocks. She leaned forward, her hands on his chest.

"You really shouldn't be doing that, Mr. Carrick."

He reached farther and found the silky warmth of her folds, skimming his fingertips along them. He watched her face, her eyes closing, her lips parting.

"Open your dress," he said softly.

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She met his gaze, her eyes dark with arousal, then lifted one hand off his chest to tug down her zipper.

"There," he said when the zipper was at midtorso. He reached up and slid it off her shoulders, trapping her arms at her sides, her breasts coming free. He lowered his hands to her hips and urged her farther up his body.

A frown pinched her brows. "What are you doing, Mr. Carrick?"

"Assisting." He continued to walk her upward on her knees until she was forced to step over his shoulders, at which point the light dawned.

"Oh, no, Russ. No, you can't mean to—"

"Shh. The other patients will hear you."

She grabbed the headboard for balance, her arms still partway pinned by her dress. She looked down at him, her face framed by the mounds of her breasts, and started again to protest. He gripped her hips and laid his tongue to her folds. He wouldn't let her get through this night without an orgasm.

Emma's words shimmered into nothingness as the sensation of Russ's tongue on her sex rushed through her. Still, she felt self-conscious as she straddled his face and hung onto the headboard, her thighs straining to keep in position above him. He could see so
much
of her from down there; his view upward must be of her tummy. She felt exposed and alone, but when she looked down, she found him watching her, only his eyes and forehead visible. She was embarrassed that he was watching her while he licked her.

She felt his tongue find the right spot and swirl, and she had to look away from the intensity of his eyes.

She turned her head to the side and closed her eyes, trying to forget that he was there.

His tongue became something else in her mind: a nameless tool used to give her pleasure as she straddled it; as she was forced to accept its touch whether she wanted to or not. It was easy to imagine herself elsewhere this way, with her eyes closed and no contact with him beyond that warm mouth on her sex and the firm grip of his hands on her hips.

His wet, warm tongue stroked up and down her folds, parting them, then skimming their edges. He flattened his tongue and laved the length of her, almost too hard, trapping her between pleasure and discomfort. The tip of his tongue played at her opening, rubbing gently until she parted to admit a bare breath of tongue. He moved up again and sucked at her nub, his tongue teasing it with gentle flicks inside the tight, sucking confines of his lips. She gripped the rail of the headboard and tightened the muscles of her thighs, straining toward the pleasure. The flicking of his tongue was light enough to make her press her hips toward him, asking for more even as she knew that harder would not feel as good as this taunting, teasing touch.