Trouble (17 page)

And maybe if she kept assuring herself how smart she was, it would drown out the heady thump of her heartbeat at the thought of speaking to him again tonight.

She flopped onto her bed on her belly, feet in the air, and dialed his number.

“Hello?”

The TV was on in the background and his voice was mellow. Maybe even sad. Sleep-roughened enough to make her blood heat.

“Hi. Am I catching you at a bad time?” she asked.

“No!” There was a rustle, then the TV went silent. “Hey. Hi. I'm not doing anything. What's up?”

“It's Dara,” she babbled, undone by the easy intimacy of his voice in her ear.

“I know,” he said, sounding exasperated and amused.

Before she could tell him why she'd called, her mind—entirely without her consent—conjured up the image of her lying in bed, watching TV with him. He probably had a huge bed, with warm flannel sheets for the cold autumn nights. Not that they'd need the sheets to keep warm.

What did he sleep in? Pajamas?

More interesting was the thought of him wearing bottoms only, with the hard slabs of his chest and arms rippling.

Most tantalizing was the thought of him sleeping nude.

“I—I've been looking through the pictures,” she said quickly, trying to get a grip. “I think I found our mystery man.”

“Good work! I'll look at them first thing.”

Great. Time to hang up.

But she hesitated, reluctant to mention what'd happened between them earlier, or the incident with Sean, or to ask him anything too personal. Which pretty much just left the weather as a topic for discussion.

But, God, she didn't want to let him go yet.

“Um, Mike?”

“Um, yes?”

“Is everything okay? You sounded funny when you picked up.”

Long pause.

“Everything's great.”

“Wow. Did you actually mean to sound like a used car salesman just then?”

Harsh sigh. “It'll be fine. It's got nothing to do with … what happened today. Don't worry.”

What happened today
.

Nice euphemism.

Relieved, she sat up and pulled her knees to her chest. It seemed terribly important, suddenly, for Mike to confide in her. For him to know he could turn to her if he ever needed someone to listen.

“I'm worried. Spill.”

Another pause.

“My mother's had a recurrence of breast cancer—”

“Oh no!”

“And a mastectomy. The chemo's pretty rough.”

Dara didn't know what to say. She hadn't had the faintest idea anything so serious was going on. Mike was so strong that nothing ever seemed to faze him.

But of course he was only human.

“Sean hasn't said anything.”

“Sean doesn't know. Mama wants him to focus on school right now.”

To her surprise, she felt irritated with Mrs. Baldwin for burdening Mike with her illness and then making him take a vow of silence. Was Mike supposed to bear the weight of the world all alone?

“How is she?”

“She's hanging in there. She's tough.”

“And how are
you
?”

“
Me?
I'm fine.”

“Mike,” she said softly. “Don't you ever get tired of doing it all by yourself? Worrying about Jamal and your mother and your brother and your clients? Everything is not your responsibility, you know. It's okay to be a little scared. Who wouldn't be with their mother sick?”

No answer. Knowing Mike, she'd probably pissed him off. Time to backpedal.

“Sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn't mean to—”

“I do get … tired.”

“Whoa! Is the great Mike Baldwin admitting he's human?”

He laughed. “Don't tell anyone.”

“I think your mother is really lucky to have such a loving son to rely on,” she told him.

Mike's breath hissed with unmistakable surprise.

She was way out on a limb now. May as well go ahead and saw it all the way off. “And I think I'm lucky you think enough of me to confide in me.”

“Dara
.
”

“Hmm?”

“I … thank you.”

“Any time.”

Longest pause of the night. Her fingers tightened on the phone as though they knew it was time to say good night but couldn't bear to let him go.

She waited, listening to him breathe.

He cleared his throat. “About the awards dinner—”

She knew what he was thinking: that being there together was a bad idea. There was already so much sexual tension between them, the air seethed with it. Why light a match near an open powder keg? If she had any sense whatsoever, she'd let him off the hook, and that would be the end of the matter.

“What time should I meet you there?” she asked instead.

“Six thirty,” he said quickly.

“Here they are,” Dara crowed the next morning, waving the picture prints as she waltzed into Mike's office and plopped into a chair. She'd decided the best thing to do was to act normal, as if they hadn't had that wonderfully intimate conversation last night. Or the interlude in the closet. Or … anything. “The answer to all our problems. No need to thank me.”

Mike, in his shirtsleeves, eyebrows raised, leaned across his desk and snatched them from her. “You've been doing a lot of yakking about these pictures.”

“You'll see.”

He bent his head low as he flipped through them. “Hey. These are pretty interesting.” When he looked up, his smile—wide and boyish—disarmed her completely. “Good work, Dara.”

Dara's heart skidded to a stop. And as Mike held her gaze for one long moment, she understood, with absolute certainty, that she was crazy about this man.

And he felt the same.

It was far worse than she'd feared, much more than a powerful physical attraction. She liked so many things about him she could probably stand there for days listing them all: his sense of humor, intelligence, work ethic, and loyalty to family, employees and Jamal. His enormous heart. And if she weighed all that against his occasional flashes of arrogance? No contest.

Yeah, she thought, her mouth drying out.

She'd find herself in love with him soon if she wasn't careful.

Their smiles dimmed, leaving them to stare at each other with breathless heat.

Mike looked away first, rubbing his forehead with an unsteady hand before he resumed flipping through the stack of prints.

“Did you,” he said, his voice hoarse, “did you, ah, find any pictures with close-ups of his face?”

“Ah, yes. No, not that one. Wait.” She walked around his desk to stand alongside his chair. “Let me see.”

She leaned over his shoulder, accidentally brushing his face with her hair.

Mike tensed.

But he didn't roll his chair away from her.

Instead, he leaned forward until his face was mere inches from hers.

Well within kissing range.

“I
think this is the one,” Dara said, not daring to turn her head to look at his face. She glanced down instead to discover, with further embarrassment, her white silk blouse gaping open as she leaned over the desk. He could probably see the tops of her breasts and her lacy nude bra. Had he noticed? She didn't know, but he was utterly unmoving beside her, so quiet that even his breath seemed to have stopped.

She, meanwhile, had dissolved into a dangerous combination of oversensitized nerve endings and mindless lust. It would be so easy to reach out and touch his hard, chiseled cheek, or to slide into his lap, or to press her breasts to his face.

So easy.

Then she remembered the way he'd put the brakes on things yesterday, as well he should have done.

As she also should have done.

Determined not to make any foolish mistakes, no matter how much she wanted to, she leashed her passion for him and locked it back in its kennel, where it belonged.

Focus on work, Dara. Be a professional
.

“This is, ah, the one.” She handed him the picture and, as gracefully as she could, straightened, retreated to the other side of the desk and swore she wouldn't let herself get that deep into the red zone around him again. If only she kept her distance, physical and emotional, things would be okay.

Then she made the mistake of looking at him.

His gleaming gaze was unwavering and starkly hungry. His eyes slowly slid away from hers and down over her breasts, belly, hips and thighs. The force of his desire was so strong she could almost feel him peeling—ripping—away her clothes, piece by piece.

Her body, predictably, responded big, erupting with gooseflesh and shivering with delicious anticipation of things that could never happen. There was no possible way to control it.

Could he see the hard pebbles of her nipples through her thin silk blouse? Did he know about the sweet ache he caused between her thighs, or the jolt of pleasure she felt when she squeezed them together as she looked at him? Did he hear the subtle hitch in her breath?

His gaze jerked back to her face and he stared unblinkingly at her, a ravenous cheetah in the seconds before he chases down and devours his prey.

“Dara
.
”

He stood up and started around the desk for her. She felt his desire pulsing over her body like the insistent beat of a drum, and she welcomed it. Screw everything she'd just told herself. Fuck doing the right thing. She wanted to wrap herself around him, to taste him and pull every inch of his body inside herself.

Beep
.

The sound of his desk phone startled them both, a sonic boom echoing inside a library, and came back to her senses in a sickening rush.

What was she doing? She wondered, pressing a hand to her belly.

Oh, God, what was she doing?

From the dusty depths of her memory, an image of Antonio, the boy who'd hurt her so badly in college, shook itself off and waved hello. She'd wanted Antonio, too, and look where that'd gotten her. No, that wasn't true. What she'd felt for Antonio was a millionth of the way she felt about Mike.

Her passion for Mike, which was crossing over into need, was overwhelming. And terrifying.

And she'd be a fool to give in to it.

“You … your phone,” she said weakly.

A frown grooved between his brows as he focused on her and ignored the phone.

Beep
.

Beep
.

Silence.

“What are we going to do about this, Dara?” he asked quietly. “You and me. What're we going to do?”

Dara held his gaze, torn between what she wanted and what was good for her, which were two entirely different things. She wanted to wrap herself around him, to touch him everywhere she could reach, beg him to take her home and make love to her for the rest of the day and night. And for as long after that as he would have her.

Worse, she wanted to confess how deep her feelings for him went.

None of that was good for her because a man like Mike was all about casual sex, something she knew, from painful experience, that she couldn't handle.

“We're not going to do anything,” she said, turning away from the turmoil in his eyes that so perfectly mirrored what she was feeling inside.