Wicked Pleasures (3 page)

“H
EY
! W
ATCH IT
!”

Regina grabbed napkins from the table holder to mop up the water she’d just accidentally spilled on a guest. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know where my head is today.”

A lie, to be sure. She knew exactly where her head was. And where it had been all morning.

She was an hour into the lunch rush and this was the second time she’d spilled something. Unfortunately, the first time had been coffee. Fortunately, it hadn’t been on the customer.

Seeing as she worked mostly for tips, she figured she could rule out getting anything from the upset businessman who snatched the napkins from her and then waved her away.

Sigh.

She hadn’t been scheduled to work until later that afternoon, but the owner, Trudy Grant, had asked her to come in when one of the other waitresses called in sick. No matter how much she would have liked to decline, she could use the extra money. And anyway, she’d hoped keeping busy would take her mind off other, um, uncomfortable thoughts.

When she’d finally come out of the bathroom earlier that morning, she’d found Linc gone and Viv dressed. She and her friend sat down in the kitchen to drink the coffee he’d brought them (if that’s what you could call her choking down a small portion of it), but she’d quickly found out Viv wasn’t any more enlightened on the previous evening’s events than she was.

“God, I hope nothing happened,” Viv had said.

Regina had nodded in full agreement, relieved she shared her hope.

“Although not for the same reason as you, I suspect.” She’d sipped her coffee loudly. “If something like that goes down, I want to remember every last sweet moment of it.”

Regina had found an excuse to usher her friend and her outlandish ideas out of the apartment as quickly as possible. Then she’d spent the next two hours frenetically cleaning the place from top to bottom, although it hadn’t needed it. The physical activity had made her feel marginally better. But when she’d gone in to catch a shower, she’d discovered her mind going straight back to Linc and the night before.

She distinctly remembered him backing her into her bedroom…kissing…lots of kissing…and then she’d gotten down on her knees…and…

Oh, hell…

She spilled water from the pitcher again, this time on her way back to the kitchen. Brian, the busboy, shook his head and grabbed a mop to clean it up before someone slipped on the wet tile.

“Are you all right?” Trudy asked.

Regina finally put the water pitcher down and wiped her damp palms on the front of her white apron. “Late, um, night.”

“You? Well, then, you must tell me all about it.”

L
INC SPOTTED
R
EGINA
the instant he walked into the diner.

It was just after seven and the dinner crowd was mostly gone. Regina sat at the end of the counter. One of her shoes was off and she slowly rubbed her bare foot against the shin of her other leg, engrossed in something she was reading in front of her. She was half turned away from the door, so he could see little more than her profile. But even in her plain gray uniform and white apron, her hair pulled up haphazardly, she was still the prettiest girl in the room, regardless of what room or how empty or full it was.

Damn. He’d hoped seeing her again would provide the evidence he needed to prove she was nothing special; allow him to forget how incredible it felt to have her full mouth on him. Instead, he couldn’t help noticing what made her unique, and the desire to sample that mouth seemed to have doubled.

Regina lifted her head as if hearing something. Then she turned and met his gaze as if knowing he was there looking at her.

He couldn’t help smiling.

And his groin tightened when she easily smiled back.

“Can I help you?” a girl who was probably no older than sixteen asked.

“I’ve got it, Tiffany,” Regina said, coming up behind her.

“I thought you clocked out?”

“Well, I just clocked back in.”

“Whatever.” The girl walked off.

Linc chuckled and Regina smiled.

“Need I ask if this is a coincidence?” she said, motioning for him to take a seat at one of the front booths. He slid in and she did the same opposite him.

“Is what a coincidence?”

“This. Your stopping by the same diner where I work.”

His grin widened. “You suggested I stop by. Remember?”

She looked down at her hands in her lap.

“You don’t…”

Of course she didn’t, he knew. She hadn’t said one word about where she worked. But he guessed she recalled very little about last night, which left him a lot of room in which to wiggle. And he planned on doing a lot of moving. Whatever it took to nab her ex.

His objective tonight was to find out if she’d heard from Billy. And if she had, to get an idea of where he might be.

“Did I suggest anything specific?” she asked. “You know, did I invite you here or…?”

He squinted at her, trying to follow her line of thinking. Then he shook his head. “No. I’m just here for a meal. And some good company.”

She pulled one of the menus in a stand free and slid it in front of him. She looked ill at ease. Much like this morning. Only with clothes.

He found his gaze dropping to where the material of her uniform stretched against her chest. Not overly generous, but he’d seen enough the night before to leave him with a lasting impression. Along with a lingering desire to sample each.

“Look,” she said, clearly uncomfortable. “Before you order, I need to ask you something…”

He waited, not about to let her off the hook she strained against, but not enjoying watching her struggle nonetheless.

The truth remained that he could have easily taken advantage of her last night. And while he got the distinct impression she’d been acting out of character and wasn’t the type to indulge in one-night stands with perfect strangers, well, what could he say he knew about her?

And what if it had been someone else her friend had pulled up to dance?

“Okay, I don’t know how to say this except just to say it,” she said finally. She lifted her eyes to stare into his. “Did we…sleep together last night?”

He liked her directness. As well as the earnest expression on her face. As if prepared to face the consequences, whatever they may be.

“You don’t remember anything?” He was a little disappointed she didn’t remember putting her mouth on him. Especially considering the impact it’d had on him.

Her lashes created shadows on her cheeks as she looked down, a pink blush covering her skin. But if he wasn’t mistaken, there was a little, naughty quirk to her lips as she said, “Well, I remember one thing…”

Linc shifted in the booth. So she did recall their encounter. That pleased him.

“Nothing happened,” he said.

She blinked to look at him. “Pardon me?”

His gaze locked with hers and for a moment, everything seemed to stop.

He wasn’t sure what it was about this one woman, but she seemed capable of seeing him in a way he hadn’t been seen in a good long time. And it both calmed and agitated him.

“Well,” he said quietly, sure his own lips were doing a bit of quirking. “Outside the one, um, thing…”

She laughed.

The sound was a welcome and sexy surprise. It told him she wasn’t sorry about what had passed between them, while leaving the door open for perhaps something more. Still, it spoke of her relief that her memory wasn’t faulty.

“Nothing?” she asked, a decidedly suggestive glint emerging in her green eyes.

His pants grew tighter. “Yet.”

“So are you going to sit here with him or wait on him?”

Linc hadn’t heard the irritating teen waitress approach until she popped her gum and intruded on the moment with her question.

He watched Regina’s smile widen as she reached down to take off her apron and fold it on the table in front of her. “I’m hungry. How about you?” she asked him.

Suddenly he was ravenous. And not for anything on the menu, either…

T
HE NIGHT WAS PLEASANT
enough compared to the recent heat wave they’d been experiencing lately, and the air was filled with the scent of flowers. So much unlike summers in Maine when evenings like these might require a sweater.

Regina couldn’t remember a time when she’d so thoroughly enjoyed a man’s company doing something as simple as taking a walk after a meal.

“Haven’t you been on your feet all day?” Linc asked.

They both looked down at her sensible, thick-soled shoes, reminding her she still wore her uniform. Funny, she half expected to be clad in something comfortably appealing, based on how she felt.

“Yes.”

“Would you prefer to go someplace where we can sit?”

She shook her head. “No. I’m actually enjoying a walk longer than the length of the diner. Besides, this is nice.”

Silence fell between them, something it seemed to do often. Linc didn’t appear to be a man much for talk. And she liked that about him. Liked that there could be quiet without either of them feeling the need to fill it.

And for the first time in what seemed like forever, she felt…safe somehow. As if she didn’t have to keep looking over her shoulder, waiting for the shadow dogging her heels to rise up and suffocate her.

“So, are you from Colorado Springs?” she asked.

“No. New York.”

“City or State?”

“Technically, both.”

“I can’t say as I’ve ever met anyone actually from New York City.”

“Well, you can now.”

He had a great smile. One that seemed to surprise him as much as it did her whenever he used it.

“Which part?” she asked.

He hesitated for a heartbeat. Something that might go unnoticed in mixed company, but that she made a mental note of. “The Bronx.”

“I’m from Maine,” she offered without being asked, surprising herself. The story she’d concocted to protect herself had her from Boise. Why had she just told him the truth?

“I thought you said you were from Idaho?”

“Did I?” She must have shared more than she realized last night. What else had she said? She hoped not too much. She’d been so good over the past year and a half. So why was she revealing so much about herself now? And why to him?

“Yes.”

She tried for a casual laugh. “I must have been really drunk.”

“And you told me you were from Idaho because you were afraid I’d look you up?”

“Something like that.” She moved closer to him as another couple approached from the opposite direction. Her arm brushed his, sending shivers across her skin. “So, you know I work at a diner…”

“And are studying, if the books I saw you poring over earlier are any indication.”

She’d stowed the textbooks in her car before they went for their walk. “Yes, I’m studying to become a registered nurse. I volunteer ten hours a week at Beth El.”

He didn’t look surprised.

“So what do you do?”

“Me?”

“Mmm.”

“What do you think I do?”

“If I had to guess…” She looked over his close-fitting T-shirt and jeans with an appreciative eye. “Personal trainer?”

His chuckle filled the night. “A personal trainer?”

“Yes. Why is that amusing?”

“So, I look dense?”

“What, are you saying personal trainers are stupid?”

He didn’t respond, merely shook his head and continued walking.

“So what
do
you do then?”

“I’m in security.”

She was a little more careful with her response this time. “Like a night watchman?”

His chuckle tickled her ear. “Slightly more advanced.”

“Oh?”

His answer was another smile.

“Okay. A mystery.”

“Hopefully one you don’t feel compelled to solve.”

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to do an internet search on you.” His expression sharpened. “I’m not that kind of girl.”

A heartbeat of silence and then he offered, “Maybe you should be.”

His words struck her as odd, and her footsteps slowed until she’d stopped altogether.

O
KAY
,
ON
the moron-o-meter, that comment ranked somewhere between asinine and flat-out stupid.

“I’m just saying that in this day and age, well, checking someone out may not be a bad idea. The technology’s there—it’s dumb not to take advantage of it.”

“Is that what you do? Do you perform background checks?”

“No.”

She’d resumed walking and he slowed his steps to allow her to catch up.

“I’m a partner in a private security firm. We handle various aspects of a company’s needs.”

“And before that?”

“I was a Marine.”

He kept his eyes trained forward but felt her gaze on his profile for a long moment.

“I can see that,” she said quietly.

He looked at her.

“My father was a Marine,” she said.

He hadn’t known that. Of course, her background material merely noted the basics: father deceased when she was six.

“Once a Marine, always a Marine,” he said.

The light briefly left her eyes. “Yes, well, then my dad is a Marine with wings. He was killed in combat when I was young.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Thanks.” She looked down at her feet and then at him. “What about your dad?”

He shrugged.

“Would you rather not talk about it?”

“There’s really nothing to talk about. I don’t know my father outside the name on my birth certificate.”

A long silence and then she asked, “Have you thought of looking for him?”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. Closure, I suppose.”

“I’m not even sure he knows he has a son.”

“Don’t you think he deserves to know?”

“What?” He stared at her.

“I guess I worded that wrong—wouldn’t you want to know if you had a son out there?”

He’d never quite looked at it that way before.

The truth was, his mother had never really mentioned his father outside of saying he wouldn’t want to have anything to do with him. He had been a one-night stand. And both his parents had been no more than sixteen at the time. Linc had been raised by his aunt.

He hadn’t realized he’d spoken the words out loud until Regina asked, “What happened to your mom?”

Lord. Had he ever told anyone this before? He must have at some point. But damned if he could remember. Which made it doubly interesting that he was sharing the information so easily with Regina.

“She moved to L.A. when I was an infant. I barely saw her while I was growing up. I talk to her every now and again, but for all intents and purposes, my aunt has always been my maternal figure.”

Her arm brushed against his and then she was entwining her fingers with his. He was glad for the touch and squeezed her hand. The desire to squeeze much, much more was growing with every step they took.

“My mom and I were always close,” she said quietly. “I miss her now we’re so far apart.”

“She still in Maine?”

She nodded and then looked in the opposite direction as if to keep him from seeing her expression. “I keep trying to talk her into moving out here with me, but…well, she says that’s where she was born, that’s where they’ll bury her.”

She looked sad somehow. Alone.

And Linc was surprised by the desire to protect her that surged within him.

Before he knew that’s what he had in mind, he was tugging her close and tilting her chin up so he could look directly into her face. Her mouth hung open slightly, both in surprise and, he guessed, anticipation.

He kissed her.

R
EGINA’S EVERY MUSCLE
melted like a marshmallow over a fire. Funny, Linc seemed to taste exactly like that. Somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she understood that it was because he’d had a piece of Trudy’s chocolate-marshmallow pie. But right then, she couldn’t seem to concentrate on anything beyond the way her heart pounded an uneven rhythm in her chest, and how her mouth watered with the desire for Linc to deepen the kiss.

Then he did…

His tongue stroked hers in a slow, deliberate way that robbed her of breath and made her tighten her hands where they rested on the hard muscles of his upper arms. He leaned into her and she discovered, with a silent moan, that his arms weren’t the only hard thing she was able to feel.

The memory of having taken his long, thick length into her mouth the night before might have made her blush…but not now. Right now, all that was on her mind was the desire to enjoy tasting him without the blurriness of drink.

“Damn,” he said quietly as he broke off the kiss but made no move to resume walking.

“What?” she whispered.

He looked into her eyes and the impact was just as powerful as his kiss had been.

“I never thought I’d hear myself say these words. Your place or mine?”

Her throat was so thick she nearly couldn’t speak. “Which is closest?” she managed to whisper.

“Yours.”

“Then mine it is…”

L
INC HAD BEEN THINKING
about this moment ever since forcing himself to push Regina away the night before. And it was proving sweeter than he could have imagined.

Twenty minutes after their kiss on the sidewalk, they stood in her bedroom, a small lamp from the living room casting a soft, red glow against her skin where she stood naked in front of him. The moment they closed the front door, they’d come together like a couple of thirsty travelers, kissing and tearing at each other’s clothes as they stumbled their way to the bedroom.

And now here they both stood, about to fulfill what had begun the instant their gazes met at the club last night.

Regina’s fingers skimmed around the girth of his erection and then firmly grasped him. The air hissed from his mouth at her confident touch. She moved her hand, causing his hips to buck involuntarily.

He wanted to be inside her. Now…

He drew her closer, kissing her deeply, reveling in the feel of her taut nipples against his chest, her hand trapped between them. He skimmed his fingers down her back and over her firm bottom, then sought out her shallow channel from behind. He groaned without sound. So wet…so ready…

“Protection,” she rasped.

He continued kissing her. “What?”

“Condom. Do you have one?”

God, she tasted like ripe fruit. “No. Don’t you?”

She made a low sound and then stepped back, leaving him practically panting in front of her.

“Oh, hell. You’ve got to be kidding me.” He ran his hands over the top of his close-cropped hair several times in barely concealed agitation.

This wasn’t happening. Not twice in as many nights. If he were a superstitious man, he might think the Fates were trying to tell him something. But he wasn’t and even if they were, he had no intention of listening.

“There doesn’t happen to be a drugstore that delivers, would there?”

Her laugh released a bit of his pent-up need. “Nope. Although that’s a good idea. Think of the business they’d get.”

Damn. Damn, damn, damn, damn.

He reached for his jeans that were near the bedroom door. Leaving her standing there, looking so ready to be made love to, had to be the most difficult thing he’d done in a good long while.

“Where’s the closest place?”

“About a mile up the road.”

“Of course. It couldn’t be up the block, could it?”

She reached for her clothes.

He caught her hand. “Don’t.”

She blinked at him.

He scooped her up and deposited her on top of her bed. God, but she looked so incredibly sexy, her honey-brown hair tousled around her face, her mouth swollen from his kisses, her breasts full and accessible. It was all he could do not to beg her to go without protection just this once.

“Don’t move a muscle,” he said.

Her laugh was almost gigglelike, touching something inside him.

He couldn’t have moved any faster for the door had he broken into a run.

R
EGINA LAY BACK
against her bed, listening as the door slammed closed behind Linc. She smiled and snuggled deeper into the bedding, squeezing her thighs tightly together, delighting in the tiny shivers that swept over her skin.

She felt giddy and high and feverish, and none of it had a thing to do with alcohol. She skimmed her hands over her hypersensitive breasts, catching her breath at her immediate response to her own touch. Her nipples were so hard and achy. She swallowed, edging her right hand down her trembling abdomen. She spread her thighs slightly and slid her fingers into the damp tangle of curls there. She stretched her neck, realizing she could come so easily…

She slowly drew her index finger the length of her shallow crevice, unable to remember the last time she’d been so wet and needy. Correction, unwilling to. All she wanted to think about was the here and now. And Linc…

She recalled their interaction last night in bits and pieces, but nothing had prepared her for holding his length in her palm tonight. So long, so big…

She groaned as the tip of her finger dipped into the pool of heat between her legs. Her heartbeat quickened and just like that she achieved orgasm…