What a Woman Needs (27 page)

C
UT!”

Bryan took a deep breath and tried not to glare at Carina. She was purposely sabotaging the scene.

PJ walked out from behind the camera. “Carina, you cannot straddle Bryan. It’s not in the script and Megan wouldn’t do that.”

“Megan’s a little too reserved.” Carina, not moving an inch from where she was plastered across his lap, pulled a lipstick from her back pocket and slathered it on her silicone-enhanced lips.

Bryan tried not to gag. He really hated the taste of lipstick. Women definitely wore it for themselves and not for men because no guy Bryan knew ever said anything about how great a woman’s lipstick tasted after kissing her.

PJ ripped off his baseball cap and ran his arm across his forehead. Only eight thirty and already tempers were hot. “Megan is
supposed
to be reserved. That’s part of why she and Mike don’t jump into bed together right away.”

“Well I think they should. It’d spice this picture up some.” She gave Bryan the once-over.

God no. Bryan tried not to squirm. The fewer love scenes he had to do with Carina, the better.

He coughed to hide his laugh. Here he was with one of the most beautiful women on the planet in a job more than half the male population would kill for, and he was trying to find ways to
avoid
kissing her.

“Then we wouldn’t have a movie.”

Carina rolled her eyes, then stared pointedly at his mouth before sliding her leg across his lap, slowly, the invitation still in her eyes. “I think we’d have a better one.”

“Well it’d be a different one, that’s for sure.” Bryan stood up and caught Carina’s glance at his crotch.
Sorry, babe, but he’s not reacting to you.
Probably the first time that’d ever happened to her.

PJ nodded at Bryan and blew out a big breath. “Okay, then. Let’s take it from where Mike surprises Megan in the garden.”

“What about Bryan doing that scene without a shirt?” Carina tugged the hem of his T-shirt. “That would really surprise Megan and maybe start her thinking about sex a little sooner. It takes a while to get to it in this storyline.”

“Carina, let’s do it the way it’s written, okay?” PJ settled his hat back on his head and tugged the brim down. “We’re building the sexual tension for the big payoff at the right moment. Anything sooner is going to dilute it.”

Carina grimaced. “PJ probably hasn’t gotten laid in years,” she muttered. “What’s he know about sexual tension?”

Bryan chose to ignore her. The thing was, he was feeling like
he
didn’t know what it was because he was so not into Carina that she could be a guy for all he cared. Okay, so maybe he was exaggerating, but trying to muster some attraction for her was stretching his acting muscles in a way he hadn’t anticipated. After all, who
wouldn’t
want to make out with a beautiful woman?

Him, apparently, if the woman wasn’t Beth.

Bryan kept his shirt on, literally and figuratively, worked through Carina’s diva-ness, and they got the scene in the can for the day. Two hours longer than it should have taken them, but at least that one was done. Why had he agreed to do this again? Oh, right. Because working with Carina Dempsey in one of her signature rom-coms was supposed to be good for his career.

He was beginning to question why. Sure, she was Hollywood’s hottest actress right now, but he wasn’t exactly a slouch in the in-demand department. One film with her. That’s all he was doing and then he’d live and die by his own merits. He just hoped he survived this movie because if this was what one scene could do to him, he wasn’t looking forward to the rest.

He should have stayed at Beth’s and finished out his four weeks. Or, hell, stayed at home and cleaned his own place to fulfill Mac’s bet instead of coming here early. What the hell had he been thinking?

You were running. From Beth and the kids and all the ties.

Yeah, he had been. So what? He wasn’t going to apologize for it or be made to feel guilty by his own freaking conscience, for God’s sake. He
didn’t
want that middle-class life and that was all Beth had to offer. It sucked, but it was what it was. At least he was honest with himself, and with her. Their lives were on different paths.

“Okay, let’s go over blocking for the kitchen scene.” PJ directed the camera crew to swing the cameras from a different angle. “Come on, Bryan, let’s see how good you are in a kitchen.”

He was damn good in a kitchen; just ask Beth.

Of course, he was also damn good in a gazebo and on a back porch, and he’d be absolutely perfect in a bedroom if he could ever get Beth there.

Carina’s fingertips walked up his abdomen. “I’m
so
looking forward to doing some cooking in the kitchen with you, Bryan,” she said in an almost purr.

He wasn’t saying a word.

“Let’s stick to the script for this one, ’kay, Carina? Then maybe we can wrap early.”

“You want to hang out after? Grab a bite?” She pointedly ignored PJ—and she wasn’t talking about food.

“Thanks, but I’ve got plans.” Like getting right back on a plane. He’d walked out on Beth and the kids for this? What had he been thinking?

He hadn’t. He’d been reacting. To Beth asking him to leave. To running from everything she represented, everything he didn’t want in his life.

Except he wanted Beth.

He wanted her kids.

Shit. He was so fucked. And not the way Carina obviously wanted him to be as she walked around him, dragging her hand across his abdomen.
Low
on his abdomen.

“What can you possibly have to do that’s more fun than hanging out with me?”

He wasn’t about to remind Carina that they were within an hour’s drive of San Francisco. Not exactly a hole-in-the-wall place. “Things.”

She sucked in her bottom lip. Yeah, getting shot down was definitely a new experience for her. She dropped her hand—right down the front of him, but that would only confirm that he had zero interest in starting anything.

“Okay, then. Guess I’ll find something else to do. And the rest of the time we’re filming together.”

“I think that’s probably best.” He just hoped she was professional enough not to let it cloud their working relationship. Even though she was riding the wave right now, one bomb could damage her marketability; she had to know that. He certainly had no intention of screwing up the film—nor screwing the film’s female lead.

He needed to talk to PJ. The director had rearranged the shooting schedule when he’d shown up early; now Bryan knew why. Anything to keep from having to work one-on-one with Carina. Well, it couldn’t be helped. Contractually, he wasn’t scheduled for another week and he had things he had to sort out back home.

He was going back.

L
ET
me get this straight.” Liam handed a slice of pizza to Bryan. “You came back here because of a woman yet you’re here playing cards with us?”

Bryan took a bite of his favorite pizza. No matter how many cities he’d been in—Rome included—nothing compared to Vinny’s Pizza around the corner from the house he’d grown up in. “Uh, yeah.”

“And why did you do this stupid-ass thing?” asked Sean, dealing out the first hand of the night. “I mean, I know we’re
bros-before-hos,
but if this chick was good enough to turn down Carina Dempsey for, then I say you ought to have your head examined for sitting here with us. I mean, we’re good-looking but we totally bat for the same team you do.”

“Not to mention, we’re related.”

“Yeah, there is that. That’s kinda wrong.”

“Kinda.”

Bryan chuckled. He could always count on his brothers to keep him in line. Nothing like family to bring you back to yourself and not let you get away with shit. Like dropping Carina’s name. There’d been a pair of raised eyebrows, but that was about it.

“So what
are
you doing sitting here?” Sean looked at his cards. “Ante up while you’re at it.”

“Sure.” Bryan checked his cards. Fours were wild and he had two. With the seven showing, he had three of a kind. Not a bad hand to start out with.

It got better on the next two, as two more sevens showed up. Five of a kind.

So symbolic it was scary. He won the hand with them—his last two cards being a king and queen of hearts and he didn’t need the universe to tell him twice.

He grabbed another piece of pizza, cashed in his chips, and called it an early night. He loved his brothers, but they were right. What
was
he doing here when the person he wanted to be with was a few miles away?

 • • • 

B
ETH
turned off the TV. Seriously, she should
not
be sitting here in the dark with a glass of wine she’d been nursing for the past four hours watching a Bryan Manley movie marathon. Just call her a glutton for punishment.

She glanced at the last text the kids had sent. They’d been happily riding the boardwalk rides, though Maggie said they weren’t as much fun without Bryan around.

A lot of things weren’t as much fun without Bryan around.

She sighed and pulled herself off the sofa, dragging her T-shirt down over her thighs. So much for sexy lingerie. It was a good thing Bryan wasn’t here for that reason alone.

And that was the only reason she could think of that she was glad he wasn’t there.

She picked up the wine glass and the half-eaten bowl of popcorn. Some exciting night this was turning out to be . . .

She let Sherman out. Even the dog wasn’t liking the quietness of the house. He’d taken to following her around like, well, a puppy—in a way he never had even when he’d
been
a puppy—and even Mrs. Beecham had deigned to curl up on the top of the sofa instead of in Maggie’s dollhouse, as if she wanted to make sure there was
someone
still in the house.

Was this what it was going to be like when the kids all grew up and left?

Knock it off, Hamilton. You’re still young enough to find someone. When the kids get a little older, they’ll be able to handle you dating.

Well she wasn’t going to find anyone tonight and it was time to call it.

She set the bowl and glass in the sink and let Sherman back in, then put him in his crate. Without Jason to curl up with, the terrier would roam the house looking for his buddy. She’d spent one too many sleepless nights in the past until she’d figured out to put one of Jason’s shirts in the crate and lock him in. Sherman slept like a baby then, and so could she.

“Night, Sherman. Pleasant dreams.” She was talking to the dog about dreams. Maybe she should do something special tomorrow. Spend the whole day at the spa. Drive downtown and see a show. Something instead of spending her time moping around the house, looking at the walls, and conversing with the pets.

She turned off the kitchen light and was walking through the darkened family room to the front stairs when the doorbell rang.

She glanced at her cell phone. Ten forty-seven. Who was ringing her doorbell at quarter of eleven on a Friday night?

Kara, wanting to drag her out for a hot night on the town.

Beth headed to the door. It’d serve Kara right for her to answer the door dressed like this.

Only . . . it wasn’t Kara.

B
RYAN.”

“Hi, Beth.”

It figured. She looked like hell and he looked . . . he looked as gorgeous as ever. Even travel weary in rumpled clothing, Bryan looked amazing.

“What are you doing here? I thought you were filming your movie?”

“I was. And now I’m back.”

He hadn’t moved off her front porch. Hadn’t moved a muscle actually. His hands were in his pants pockets and his head was cocked a little to the right and his feet were firmly planted an inch from the threshold.

She, on the other hand, couldn’t hold still. She was shifting her feet, wringing her hands then putting them on her hips, then behind her back, then crossing them in front of her . . . She couldn’t find a comfortable position. “But . . . why?”

He took a deep breath. “Can I come in?”

“Oh, um, yeah. Sure.” She stepped back, thankful that she’d turned off the lights. She didn’t want him seeing her in this stupid old threadbare T-shirt she’d pulled from the bottom of her closet.

“The kids are in bed?”

“Oh. They’re not here. My in-laws took them to the beach this weekend. They’re gone until Sunday night.”

“So you’re alone?”

Beth’s heart rate tripled. She was alone in a dark house, dressed in practically nothing, with Bryan Manley, the man she wanted more than anything, who, if what he’d said on her deck the other night was true, wanted her just as much. “Yes.”

Bryan pulled his hands from his pockets and raked one of them through his hair. “Jesus, Beth. Did you have to say that?”

“You asked.”

“I know. But that was because I didn’t think the answer was going to be yes.”

“I’m sorry, but I’m not following this discussion. Why are you here?”

“This. This is why I’m here.”

It took him two steps and he had her in his arms. Another second and he was kissing her. Half a second after that, she’d recovered her wits enough to lose them all over again when the kiss went from
hello
to
hot
in the next breath.

God, she wanted this. Needed it. Needed him.

“Beth, tell me to stop,” he groaned as he ran his hands over her back, down to her butt, then, ohthankyouJesus, under her T-shirt.

She shook her head, and sucked his bottom lip into her mouth. She wasn’t telling him to stop. Not now. He shouldn’t have come if he hadn’t wanted this.

He pulled her up against him. Oh yeah, he wanted this.

“I want you, Beth. I know I said I shouldn’t, but I do, and I can’t stop thinking about you.”

The words were incredible and so were his hands and his lips and the scent and taste of him and thank God he couldn’t stop because she didn’t know what she’d do if he did.

Beth wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pressed her aching breasts against him. God, she wanted him to touch her there. Needed him to. It’d been so incredibly long since she’d wanted someone’s hands on her. And lips and tongue . . .

“Bryan, touch me. Please.” She hadn’t wanted to beg, but that
please
sure sounded like begging and, funny, she didn’t care.

Bryan got it. He cupped the back of her head with both hands and brushed his nose against hers. “I will, Beth. I will. Among so many other things . . . if you’ll let me?”

His green eyes danced between hers, looking for an answer. Beth wasn’t quite sure of the question but she knew that whatever Bryan asked her to do tonight, she’d do. And tomorrow as well. Even Sunday, right up until the kids came home.

Now was
not
the time to think about the kids. It was time to think only about her and Bryan and what they could do for and to and with each other.

But Bryan stopped kissing her. “Beth. Sweetheart. I’m sorry. We shouldn’t. I shouldn’t have—”

“I don’t want to hear it. You came here for a reason. What was it, Bryan?” She wasn’t playing games. She, more than most, knew how quickly life could be gone. She wasn’t going to waste one more minute of hers on
should be
s. It was time for
could be
, and she wanted a
could be
with Bryan.

She wrapped her fingers in his hair and tugged. “Tell me, Bryan. What had you leaving your movie set and coming back here? Tonight? At eleven o’clock? To your home town that’s so far from the bright lights of Hollywood?”

He searched her eyes once more, then took a deep breath and it was as if some big momentous decision had been made.

“You, Beth. I needed you. To see you. Be with you.” His voice lowered. “Touch you.”

“And now that you’re here? Now that you have me in your arms?” She stroked the back of his neck and if she wasn’t mistaken, she felt shivers go through him.

He cupped her cheek and tilted her chin up with his thumb. “I want you. You know that.” He pressed his lower half against her. “Hell, it’s not like it’s a big secret. Lady, you’ve got me so twisted up inside, I can think of nothing and no one but you.”

“Not even Carina Dempsey?” Okay, she shouldn’t have tossed the actress’s name in there. Bryan wasn’t asking her to marry him. Hell, she wasn’t quite sure what he was asking her, but Carina or any other woman didn’t factor into this.

“Who?” Bryan gave her that cocky half smile he was known for and it did to her what it did to millions of other women.

But millions of other women aren’t in his arms, so why in the world are you jabbering on about some actress when the man just told you he wants you?

“Never mind.” She brushed his gorgeous hair back from his face and let her fingers trace gently over his ear.

“Beth . . .” His voice was low. Almost a growl.

“Yes?”

“If you keep doing that . . .”

“This?” She traced the outer shell of his ear so lightly it was almost as if she wasn’t touching him. But she was. She knew it.

And so did he. He shivered again and pressed his lower half against her even more.

His cock swelled against her thigh. “Do you see what that does to me?” he whispered almost in agony. “There’s no Carina, no other actress. No other woman. Only you. And me. Here. Now.”

And that’s all it’ll be
went unspoken, but Kara’s words also ran through her head.
Take this time for you
.
Enjoy what Bryan’s offering just for the simple pleasure of it.
There didn’t have to be long-term strings attached. No big, grandiose life plan. Just two people who wanted each other spending time exploring that desire.

“I want you, Bryan.” There. She’d said it. Ball was in his court.

He took it and ran with it. Or rather, he ran with
her
. He scooped her up in his arms like Jason had Maggie, but that’s where the similarities ended because the look in Bryan’s eyes said he most definitely didn’t see her as sister material.

“Your room okay?” he asked, striding to the front steps.

“Well, certainly not any of the kids’.”

He stopped at the base of the stairs and his smile faded as he searched her eyes yet again. “I just meant, since it was your and your husband’s room . . .”

If she didn’t already have feelings for him, that would have done it. She reached up to caress his cheek. “It’s okay, Bryan. Mike would be happy for me.”

“Then he’s a better man than I am, but I’m not going to be so noble as to turn you down.” He took the steps by twos and strode down the hallway, past each of the kids’ rooms, until at last, he reached her room.

Moonlight sifted through the French doors to the balcony and glittered across the bed. She’d chosen faceted door panels for just this reason; she loved the pattern the moonlight cast upon her bed, like something out of a fairytale.

Sort of like tonight.

Bryan set her on the bed, then sat beside her, the backs of his fingers stroking her cheek almost reverently. “You’re sure, Beth. I can’t make you many promises, but I
can
promise that I want you. That there’s no one else I’d rather be here with.”

“Shh, Bryan.” She ran her fingers over his lips, getting chills when he kissed them. “I’m not asking for the fairy tale. I’m just so glad you decided to come back. For however long you want to be here.”

His eyes roamed her face again and Beth was almost afraid to breathe, wondering if she’d scare him off. She wanted him so much, wanted
this
so much, it almost scared
her
off. She hadn’t planned on this. Hadn’t wanted it. Hadn’t even really been thinking about it. All she’d wanted to do was help her kids get beyond the aftermath of Mike’s accident and move on with their lives. She hadn’t really thought about getting that same chance herself.

Bryan slid his hand into her hair and tugged her closer for another kiss. No words, no preamble, just a God’s-honest-truth, raw hunger sort of kiss.

Beth was so with him.

She lay back as he pressed against her, wanting—no
needing
—to feel him on top of her, and somehow managed to work her T-shirt up to just below her breasts. Her aching breasts that were just begging for his touch and his kiss and,
ohdeargod
, his tongue and his lips.

She’d settle for his hands so that when he drew them down her sides, Beth arched into him, wanting that sensation all over the rest of her.

“God, Beth, you’re so responsive.”

“That’s what you do to me, Bryan.” She gasped when his fingertips danced across her belly, the sensation making a beeline straight to her core, and Beth couldn’t help the tingles that suffused her and the goose bumps that broke out across her skin, making her shiver.

“Are you cold?” Bryan asked, stilling his fingers.

“I will be if you stop doing that.” She wiggled from side to side to make her point and, smart man that he was, he started stroking her again while his lips sought hers.

She could so get used to kissing Bryan Manley.

 • • • 

H
E
was kissing Beth.

Beth Hamilton.

Widowed mother of five.

The one he’d sworn he’d stay away from.

The press would have a field day with this if they got wind of it.

Mac
would have a field day if she got wind of it.

She wasn’t going to.
No one
was going to. This was only about him and Beth and this incredible chemistry between them.

He inched her T-shirt up the smooth skin of her belly. Five kids and the woman didn’t look as if she’d carried one.

She gasped into his mouth when his thumb found her nipple and, holy hell, what that sound did to him. His cock went so hard so fast he was ready to be inside her now. This instant. Wanted to feel her around him, enveloping him, taking him into that most private part of her.

God, he wanted her.

Slow down, Manley. Enjoy it already. It’s gonna have to last you a lot of years because this shit ain’t happening on a daily—or weekly or even monthly—basis. You got plans, buddy. Big plans. And they don’t include six tag-alongs.

He shut the voice down. Way to kill the moment. He wasn’t asking Beth to spend the rest of her life with him—and she wasn’t asking him to ask her that—so why go down that path?

Because you do
want to spend the rest of your life with her, you’re just too pig-headed to admit it.

Not pig-headed,
smart
. Driven. Focused. He had a plan. After living in near-poverty during his childhood and adolescence, Bryan would
never
do that again, and this job was the means to securing his future and his peace of mind. A couple mil in the bank and he’d finally be able to rest easier.

Beth shifted under him and Bryan pulled his head out of the future and back into the here and now. He had Beth Hamilton writhing on the bed beneath him. Her legs felt so good against his, and every flutter of her abdomen when she gasped stroked his cock in a way nothing else could.

He’d
done this to her.
He’d
made her a gasping, panting, writhing woman who looked so utterly beautiful on the blue bedspread—he’d been right, blue was a good color on her.

He raised himself enough to take his lips from her and enjoy the sight of her opening her eyes to see why he’d stopped.

“What?”

He kissed the tip of her nose. “I wanted to look at you.”

She blushed. Amazing that after five kids and a healthy marriage, Beth still blushed. “Why?”

“Because you’re so beautiful, and I’ve fantasized about this so much that I can’t really believe I’m here. That this is going to happen.”

She reached up to cup his cheek again. God, he loved when she did that, her eyes all dark and intent—and intense—gazing into his. “Please don’t tell me you’re having second thoughts.” Her thighs clenched on his. “I don’t think I could survive it if you do.”

If she clenched his hips that hard when he was inside her,
he
wouldn’t survive. Already his cock was so hard it was painful, and his fingers were itching to close over her breast.

So he let them. And was rewarded with the sexiest back-arching twisting move he’d never seen before. And Beth moaning, too. Well, a long aching moan interspersed by several gasping breaths as he ran his thumb over her nipple. “Like that?”