Double trouble (13 page)

"Yes, you did tell me that. On the night we met, when you were pretending to be a lobbyist instead of a poHtical communications consultant or handler or whatever it is you call yourself." He didn't take his eyes from her, and the piercing intensity glittering there made him look very dangerous indeed.

Kayla gulped. Suddenly she wasn't quite as sure of herself. But she rallied her defenses. This was her time and her territory and she wasn't going to meekly let him intimidate her. "Look, save yourself the effort of insulting me, I'm already well aware of your low opinion of me. You believe I have all the ethics of Dracula."

Matt firmed his lips into a tight, straight line. "I didn't come here to insult you, Kayla."

'*I believe that as much as I believe that you actually came here seeking advice from me/' she countered caustically.

There was a light knock. **Kayla? Here's your coffee/' Arlene Gallagher called through the door.

Kayla went to get it. Fate was having a good laugh at her expense, she decided glumly. She'd never opened the door to anyone without first asking who was there, not until earlier tonight, when she hadn't had any doubt that it would be Arlene. And it had been Matt Minteer. Wasn't it Penny who said **Never trust a sure thing"? She was so right.

Kayla took the jar from her neighbor and closing the door, turned resignedly to Matt. "I was expecting Arlene in the first place," she said tartly. ''If I'd known it was you, I wouldn't have opened the door."

Matt heaved a sigh. ''Look, can we call a temporary cease-fire?"

"Why?" Kayla asked suspiciously.

"May I sit down?" Without waiting for an answer, he dropped down onto her blue-and-gray-striped love seat. "Kayla, I was thinking, you might be right about national pohtics diff^ing from local and state politics," he said slowly, as if he was carefully choosing every word. He was watching her, his deep blue eyes fixed on her.

He was making her nervous, Kayla conceded. Very nervous indeed. "Exactly what is it you're trying to say, Matt?" she blurted out.

"There is one thing that remains the same in all levels of politics, though," Matt continued, ignoring her impatient interruption. "And that is the moral behavior and standards of the elected official. They must be beyond reproach."

"Or at least appear that way," Kayla said snidely. "Isn't that what we nasty image-makers aie hired for? To cover up the sins of all those less-than-perfect politicians out there who want to dupe the unsuspecting public?"

Matt Stood up. '*You're not making this easy, Kayla," he gritted out.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," she replied with an exaggerated apologetic air. '*If you'll tell me exactly what this idiocy is all about I'll try to be more accommodating... that is, as much as my devious, dishonest nature will permit, of course."

Matt took a deep breath, then let it out. **I know you're pregnant, Kay la."

Kay la gaped at him, immobilized by shock and horror. His revelation was so unexpected, a bolt out of the blue. Her mind reeling, she placed her hand against the wall to steady herself. ''H-how—" she started to ask, then gasped the answer herself. '*Kristina! She's the only other person who knew."

''She told my brother Luke. Took him to lunch today, then told him the news over the pasta salad. He told me immediately afterward, of course. I drove down here as soon as I could."

Kayla felt the color drain from her face. ''You shouldn't have come."

He smiled crookedly. *'Give me a break, Kayla. I wasn't about to sit at home watching the ball game on TV after hearing that news."

"Kristina shouldn't have done it! She promised she wouldn't tell you. She swore she wouldn't."

"She didn't tell me, not directly anyway. She told my brother." Matt shook his head. "Luke likes to view himself as unshockable, but he was shocked by this, all right."

"It was my secret! I know Kristina must've thought she was helping, but she had no right meddling in my life againr'

"You mean you weren't going to tell me?" Matt's voice rose. "Not ever?"

"That's correct," Kayla said tautly.

"For Godsakes, why not? It's my—mine, too."

*'It's your what? Your problem? No, it isn't. I was careless and rU take full responsibility for myself and the consequences of my actions."

"It's my child/' Matt corrected sharply. "And you weren't the only one who was careless. Hell, neither of us was intentionally careless, Kayla. If anyone is to blame, it's those WINDS maniacs for spiking everything we ate and drank that night. As for letting you take full responsibility, forget it. I'm going to take care of you and the baby. I won't have it any other way. We're getting married, Kayla. Right away."

"Have you lost your mind?" Kayla stared at him in disbelief. "That's the craziest thing I've ever heard! We can't even pretend that we know or like each other! We spent one night together and neither of us were in full possession of our wits at the time!''

"We've been together more than that," insisted Matt.

"Oh, of course. There was our two-minute confrontation at Rillo's and the fifteen-minute one later that same night at Bootleggers. Those encounters certainly cemented our relationship, didn't they? And let's not forget those meaningful moments we shared when you appeared at Kristina's apartment uninvited, to tell me that you didn't ever want to see me again because my job didn't make me a woman of quality, that I wasn't worthy of your exalted presence."

A dark flush suffused Matt's neck and Kayla felt a momentary sense of triumph. She'd scored a direct hit with that one.

"I didn't mean to sound so pompous or so arrogant that night," he said quietly. "What I said, my reasons for being there..." He paused. "It occurred to me afterward that I wanted an excuse to see you so I invented one."

"You wanted to see me, so the reason you invented to see me was to tell me you didn't want to see me anymore?" Kayla laughed. "What you're doing is what we in the in-

dustry call 'putting a positive spin' on a previously negative incident. Too bad you disapprove of media consultants. You certainly have the raw talent to be one."

Matt's mouth tightened. *'What I'm trying to say is that I regret what I said that night and I—I'm sorry I hurt you, Kayla."

"You didn't," she said quickly. "For me to be hurt, I'd have to care what you think of me and I don't. It's presumptuous of you to believe that you could ever hurt me! You walked out of my hfe that night and haven't bothered to see me or contact me since and I don't care a bit. I'm glad you didn't. I didn't want to hear from you, I never think about you..." Her voice trailed off. The old saw about "protesting too much" was beginning to seem depressingly apt.

"I thought about you, Kayla," he said quietly. "Every day."

"Oh, spare me the hearts-and-flowers routine, if that's what you're working up to. You feel guilty about the baby and now you think you owe me some fairy tale about yearning for me hke a long-lost lover. Well, you don't, so please save your storytelling skills for the voters."

"You're really tough," he said.

Kayla thought she noted a grudging admiration in his tone. No, she decided, it was just her foolish imagination working overtime, spurred on by his ridiculous claim of secretly and silently wanting her all this time. She was horrified that she could be swayed, even momentarily, by such insidious strategy.

She glared at him. "Yes, I'm tough, and I don't need any lying sweet talk from you."

"You're right, you don't need lies from me. What you need from me is my support and my understanding and my loyalty. And a wedding ring, of course."

A wave of exhaustion swept through her. He was so tenacious! Why didn't he just give up and leave? "It's sin-

fully Stupid for you and me to even mention the word marriage, " she said wearily. ''We have nothing upon which to build a future together."

''We have a kid on the way, Kay la. That's a major cornerstone to build on, in my book."

"You're afraid it will tarnish your sterling reputation if word gets out that you're having a child out of wedlock!" Kayla accused. Hot angry tears stung her eyes. "What a hypocrite you are! You condemn so-called image-makers for what they do, but you're just as obsessed with keeping your own image untarnished, even to the point of offering to marry a woman you despise."

Before she realized what he intended, his big hands were cupping her shoulders. "This isn't about images, Kayla, not mine or yours or anybody else's. It's about a child. Our child. The one we made that night in the hotel. The one you're carrying inside you right now."

Tension and strength vibrating through him, he pulled her into his arms. Kayla felt the taut virile power of his arousal against her and gazed up at him with wide hazel eyes. He had barely touched her and yet...

"You shouldn't be surprised," he murmured huskily, reading her mind. "Just thinking about you makes me burn. And every time I'm near you I get so hard so fast that I—"

"No, stop it!" Kayla tried to draw back. His words, his tone were undermining her resolve to resist him. "Let me go! This isn't going to solve anything!"

"I disagree. It proves that we're compatible in at least one major way. What you neglected to mention when you were reminiscing about our previous encounters is that they invariably ended like this.''

His mouth opened over hers, drinking in any protest she might have made. His tongue thrust deeply and seductively into her mouth while his hands boldly shaped her body against his hard masculine frame.

Kayla stood passively in the circle of his arms for as long as her willpower held—which, to her shame, wasn^t very long at all. And then, with a whimper, she gave in to the hot ribbons of sensation streaking through her. Slowly, in sexy feminine submission, she sHd her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. Her mouth opened wider under his, and her tongue answered the hot demands of his.

Matt's breathing was becoming as rapid and shallow as hers. He moved against her, once again vividly demonstrating his swift, hard arousal. His hands moved boldly, possessively, over her, his fingers exploring the curves of her buttocks and hips, then the slender hollow of her waist before sliding upward to cup the soft weight of her breasts. He rubbed them through the yellow silk of her dress, fondling the softness with an expertise that made her moan. When his thumb unerringly found the ultrasensitive tip budding tautly, she cried aloud.

''Matt!" she whispered his name as she threaded her fingers through the dark springy thickness of his hair. His touch was burning her through the material of her dress and she knew a fierce, wanton longing to feel his fingers on her bare skin, to touch the hard naked warmth of him, to lie with him

''It's such a risk," she murmured feverishly. "Such a risk."

"You've already taken it," Matt soothed. "We both have. The baby is a reality now."

He thought she was talking about lovemaking, but she wasn't, Kayla realized. She'd meant that loving was a risk. Did she dare take it?

There was no more time to think. They kissed and kissed, until she stopped worrying about all the reasons why this shouldn't be happening and let her emotions carry her, just as they had that first night she and Matt had been together. It seemed so inevitable, as if fate and nature had both com-

bined forces to overcome all the barriers they had constructed to stay apart.

Matt muttered something dark and sexy under his breath and then lifted her in his arms. The sudden change in position made her head whirl. Kay la gulped for breath and instinctively clung to his shoulders.

Eight

In a few swift strides, he was in the bedroom. A pink light bulb glowed in the small bedside lamp, casting soft shadows over the room. Matt lowered Kayla onto the thick flowered comforter that covered the double bed and came down beside her, pulling her back into his arms and fastening his mouth on hers with a passionate urgency that matched her own.

The barrier of their clothing was an intolerable one that they tried to dispose of as quickly as possible. Matt tugged at the cloth-covered buttons of her dress, that stretched from the high collar to her waist. When they were finally opened, he pushed the material off her shoulders and swiftly dispensed with her yellow lace bra.

"You're beautiful, beautiful," he said hoarsely, and the rough desire in his voice made her feel sexy and voluptuous and utterly irresistible. It was the way Matt's immediate and hungry desire for her always made her feel, Kayla realized dizzily. He was the first and only man to make her feel that

way, as if she were truly the only woman in the world who could assuage him.

'*So pink and white and soft." His lips closed over her nipple, sensuously sucking it into his mouth. His tongue circled and laved the taut bud, and pleasure flowed through her like a wild, surging river.

A hot velvet blackness cloaked her, blocking out everything—common sense, the baby, their past antagonisms, everything that she'd used to keep away from him—and sent her spinning into a purely sensual realm where only the passion that burned between them was relevant.

She slipped her hands under his sweatshirt, reveling in the smooth flat warmth of his belly and the dark, curling hair on his chest. She loved to touch him, loved the feel of him, so male and hard and strong. Combing her fingers through the dark mat of hair, Kayla traced it downward where it disappeared into the waistband of his jeans. Through pas-sion-slitted eyes, she saw the burgeoning distension behind the metal buttons of his jeans. Daringly, she closed her fingers around him.

Matt drew in a sharp breath and trembled at her intimate touch. ''Easy, sweetheart," he said raspily. He reluctantly removed her hand and carried it to his mouth, pressing his Hps to the center of her palm. ''If you don't stop now, it'll be all over."

Kayla laughed shakily. "It's flattering of you to say so, but I'm hardly the type to induce an orgasm with merely a touch. Let's at least keep it honest between us."

"I am. And you definitely are the type. I'd let you prove it, but I don't want a quick—"

"My former fiance proposed to another woman while he was still engaged to me," Kayla blurted out. "An experience like that tends to ground you in reality when it comes to assessing your own appeal."