The Tycoon (13 page)

She laughed, an easy good-natured laugh. “And did it?”

He still didn’t know. But it had brought marriage-minded women out of the woodwork. “I’m not sure it accomplished what it was supposed to. It had some unintended consequences.”

“Well that title got
my
attention.” Her eyes still sparkled with mirth. “I thought it was a real contest.”

Other than his little brother and sister, few people teased him. He liked her. He hadn’t figured her out yet, but he liked her. And what could be better than hot sex with a smokin’ hot woman he liked? “Ma’am, something tells me you’re yanking my chain.”

“Well…maybe a little. You seem so serious. But I really am impressed that you have one of those boxes at the football stadium. I’ve never met anyone who has one.”

Typically, he didn’t talk about what he had just told her. Nor did he discuss how he spent his money with a woman he had known only a couple of hours. But he couldn’t seem to steer the conversation off that path. She had a genuineness about her that loosened his tongue.

“It’s an investment. My company owns it. I and my associates use it to entertain customers and clients. My friends and family use it if they want to. But besides that, the Cowboys’ owner is a friend of mine. A mentor even. I naturally support him as well as the team.”

“Naturally. Birds of a feather, right?”

“Jerry Jones and I are hardly birds of a feather. He’s a whole lot smarter than I am.”

Just then, a blast of wind slapped sheets of rain against the windows. She caught a quick breath and stepped back, her palm flattened against her chest. Then she laughed. “Oh, wow, I’ve never been this high off the ground during a storm.”

A powerful urge to protect her passed through him. She was driving him crazy. He placed a reassuring hand at the base of her neck, found warm soft skin. “You okay? Afraid?”

“I don’t know if it’s fear. I feel like I’m suspended in space. In my mind, I have this struggle going on, like I need my feet to touch the ground. I get the same anxiety from flying. I’m not sure I could live up high like this.”

“You’d get used to it. On a clear day, you’d feel more anchored. Want to know one of the best parts of living here?”

“Besides luxury and privacy, what?”

“On wintery days, I get the sunshine on my breakfast table.”

“Oh,” she said, blinking. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

He gently squeezed her neck. “And I enjoy it even more if somebody shares it with me.”

She stiffened and sidled away from his hand. “Yes, well, if you recall, I came for supper, not breakfast. And you’re making me nervous.”

Disappointment softened his burgeoning erection. And embarrassment. He quickly dropped his hand and shoved it into his pocket. They stood in an uncomfortable silence, sipping coffee, staring out into the blackness for what seemed like forever. He had never felt so ill-at-ease.

She broke the awkwardness. “You know something? I knew your place would be at the top of the building. Even if it’s only on the twenty-eighth floor.”

“How would you know that?”

“The Discovery channel. I watch it all the time with my grandmother. I forget the name of the show. To live on the highest pinnacle is a survival instinct that goes back to primitive humans. In most modern-day people, it’s deeply buried. But in some people, it’s still strong and there’s no holding it back. It subconsciously affects everything someone does. Having a big ego is part of the same instinct.” She looked up at him again. “You know what I mean, I’m sure. It’s the confidence to believe you can do anything, no matter how hard it might be.”

Drake was a private man, kept most of his thoughts and emotions to himself. He had no friends with whom he shared secrets. No stranger had ever delved quite so deeply into him. She was no empty-headed twit he now realized, and she was making him as tense as she said he was making her. “And you think all of that applies to me?”

“I’m just saying. You live on a high pinnacle and you have a big ego.”

He chuckled, trying to relieve the tension. “God almighty, ma’am. I hope that doesn’t mean I’m coming across as a Neanderthal. I’m trying like hell not to.”

Her head tilted to the side and she gave him another one of those narrow-lidded looks. He had a dumb urge to squirm, which made him even more uptight. In a one-on-one, he wasn’t usually the one who squirmed.

“You can’t possibly care what I think of you. A man like you? I’m sure you have a long list of women in your life who have nothing but good opinions of you.”

“But none of them are as interesting as you’ve turned out to be. Being a straight, red-blooded male, I always care about the opinion of a woman who intrigues me.”

Her eyes told him nothing. All he knew was he had this insane notion that if he didn’t claim her as his he would be losing out on something important forever. He wasn’t ready to give up. She had come home with him for a reason. He just had to learn what it was.

“You can’t blame me for wanting you in my bed,” he said. “Any man would.”

Chapter 10

There it was. What he wanted, plainly stated.
But then, Shannon had known from the beginning what he wanted, hadn’t she? Sex was what most of the men she had known wanted from her. And she had to admit that in the past, too many times, she hadn’t been unwilling. For lack of a clever reply that wasn’t too revealing of her history—and didn’t make her sound like a hopeless cynic—she said nothing.

“You’ve got to know you’re beautiful,” he went on. “I’m sure you’ve heard it many times.”

But so what? Her appearance had never gotten her anywhere. Hard work. Sacrifice. Self-discipline. Those attributes were what had enabled her to own her own business and be halfway successful.

She shrugged. “Thanks, but beautiful is one of those words that can describe almost anything. It’s in the eye of the beholder I think they say. Dr. Frankenstein probably thought his monster was beautiful.”

He sighed. “Point taken. I’m not doing very well here, am I? How’s this? There’s more to you than just a pretty face. I think the outdated word is moxie.”

Moxie… Oh, hell
. She didn’t know the meaning of that word. She only hoped it was complimentary. She was so out of her depth in this conversation, but she forced a cool demeanor, as if hearing flattery from a man like him was commonplace. “My goodness, Mr. Lockhart, you can tell that by looking?”

“I can tell a lot by looking. I’m good at sizing up people. And quickly. Even from a distance.”

“Hm. It’s my guess that you’re good at most things.”

“And its’ my guess that you didn’t come home with me to steal the silver. So if spending the night in my bed isn’t on the agenda, what is?”

“You invited me to supper. Now I’m thinking accepting was a mistake. You didn’t say the words, but you made it clear from the beginning that you had more in mind than a meal.”

“Busted. But that doesn’t clear up what
you’ve
got in mind.”

“Food. I’m hungry.”

Just then, a buzzer sounded from behind them.

He smiled, in that little boy way she had noticed sometimes sneaked across his face. “Well, then. There’s supper.”

Saved by the bell.

As he walked away, Shannon closed her eyes and let herself deflate. Her muscles un-tensed and she let out a great breath. Drake’s words filtered through her mind:
…you didn’t come home with me to steal the silver....that doesn’t clear up what you’ve got in mind….

Sex…sex…sex…
That was what had been on her mind back in the hotel, what had lured her here. It was still on her mind. Just like the bad old days when she had been devil-may-care and found no reason to resist a romp with a sexy guy.

She was only human, she reasoned, making an excuse for herself. Drake was an enormously attractive man and she hadn’t had sex in more than two years. She hadn’t had
good
sex since long before that. And she had
never
had sex with the likes of Drake Lockhart.

But something had changed between the hotel and now. When he had first walked up behind her at the hotel’s foyer bar, if he had invited her to a room upstairs, she might have raced him to it, stripping off her clothes as she went. She had found him that appealing.

Now that she had spent some time with him, doubt and frustration swarmed inside her.

Doubt that she should do this; frustration because she
wanted
to. A truth she hadn’t counted on had surfaced. For her entire life she had wanted to belong to a man like him. He wasn’t just an idle playboy. He was smart. Well-educated and successful. He exuded confidence and strength. She instinctively knew that if a dragon roared out of the kitchen, he would slay it.

She wanted him not to see her as a slut, wanted him to think of her as more than just another notch on his bedpost, wanted his respect. Sleeping with him tonight could hurt her in myriad ways and most of them had little to do with a one-night-stand or sex or anything that simple. He was exactly the kind of man she could fall giddy, silly, head-over-heels in love with and he wouldn’t,
couldn’t
love her back. What he
could
do was break her heart, scar her soul and undo all the good she had done for herself.

That bone-deep realization affected her more acutely than guilt for doing something naughty that would disappoint her grandmother.

From the entertainment center, Willie Nelson sang about an angel flying too close to the ground. She stood rooted in front of the windows, listening to the music and waiting. How long would he be gone? He had just left her, a stranger, alone in his home. He evidently trusted her not to steal him blind in his absence.

You could just walk out,
her cranky alter ego said
. Just go. You don’t owe him an explanation.

True. But she couldn’t think how she could escape. She would have to go inside his closet for her coat, which she was loath to do. Doors with coded locks stood between her and the outside world. Her SUV was blocks away. She would have to either walk back to it or call for a cab. Fort Worth wasn’t a city where she could just walk out onto the street and find transportation. And last, she would, without a doubt, meet him in the hallway.

Dither, dither, dither.
Why couldn’t she make a decision? She made decisions every day.

Just then, he returned carrying a large aromatic bag with a REATA logo. When he had called in the order for food, she hadn’t known he had contacted one of Fort Worth’s best eateries. She didn’t know it made home deliveries. And maybe it didn’t for anyone but him.

He carried the sack into the kitchen and set it on the island. She followed him tentatively. He opened drawers and pulled out placemats and cloth napkins, picked silverware from a different drawer. He pushed them across the island toward her. “Want to take these to the dining table?”

She hesitated, then picked up the utensils. He opened the sack of food and lifted out two heavy crockery ramekins. When he uncovered them, a bouquet of vanilla and butter bloomed into the room.
Crème Brûlée
. She recognized it. She had ordered it every time she had eaten at Reata.

But she had made up her mind. She couldn’t let even food she loved distract her. She cleared her throat and plunged. “I hate to say this, but I really do need to get home. I don’t expect you to take me back to my car. I’ll call a cab and—”

His brows climbed up his forehead. “You want to leave
now
?”

Thank God he doesn’t have a gun.
She nodded.