Emma Holly (22 page)

"Do you doubt I want you?"

They'd turned to face each other during the kiss, their legs automatically rearranging to get closer. What her knee bumped now told her he was perfectly capable of taking her then and there. Normally she would have let him. Here was a perfect distraction from Eric. Plus, she wanted B.G. back enough to think it would be fun. Of course,
normally
she wouldn't have been kissing two guys on the same day, and definitely not when she had kind of a serious crush on the first.

No matter how dumb her feelings were, and never mind the rules of the game, Charity believed in serial fidelity.

Most confusing of all, she wasn't sure how B.G. wanted her to answer. She'd never met anyone as hard to read as him. While emotion gleamed in his bitter-chocolate eyes, she couldn't have said what the emotion was. Instinct was all she had to go by, and instinct told her his question was more of a test than a come-on.

B.G.'s left brow lifted as her silence grew.

"I don't know what you want me to say," she confessed. "If there's a right and wrong answer, I have to tell you I've never been good at tests. Yes, I'm attracted to you, and yes, I think I'd like making love, but you seem most interested in that when your partner is desperate."

"You're saying you're not desperate for me." Like his friend, B.G. had a way of not quite asking a question. Unlike his friend, he could ask a question like that without seeming hurt.

"Well, how could I be after spending the morning with Eric?" she asked reasonably. "That is what you want, isn't it? For me to be as desperate for you as I was for him?"

B.G. laughed, but it seemed to be at himself, some private irony she doubted he'd share with her. He rubbed his hand across his mouth as if to erase the loss of control. "The answer to that is
yes
and
no
.

Appropriately quantum, you could say."

His evasion should have annoyed her. Instead, her chest squeezed with sympathy. It didn't matter that he was eons smarter and more sophisticated than she was. In that moment, with that rueful smile, he seemed the lost boy genius he must have been years ago. Belatedly mad at Eric for having disliked him, she smoothed the single shock of hair from his brow.

"We could turn the game around," she suggested tentatively. "See if I can make you as desperate for me as you are for him."

She flushed as soon as she said it, surprising herself, and surprising him into coloring up in turn. Was it wrong of her to suggest that he was desperate for Eric—especially when she was pretty sure it was true?

"Lord." He laughed again breathlessly. "Forget what I said about you making people comfortable."

"I could work on it."

"Making me comfortable?"

She had to grin as she swung onto his lap. "No," she said. "I was thinking I'd work on making you desperate."

B.G.
didn't know how she'd turned the tables this handily, nor could he explain why he allowed it. He'd sincerely meant to keep her focused on Eric, to present himself as no more than the gatekeeper between her and him. In his experience, obstacles whetted interest. Could an hour they'd been given gratis mean as much as one for which they'd fought?

It troubled him that he wasn't sure of the answer anymore.

B.G. wanted her, and he was the rule maker. There were no obstacles to whet his interest. He wanted her simply because she was kind and warm and kissed from the heart. He knew she
could
play games.

He'd seen her do it. But she wasn't playing them with him. When she wrapped him in her arms and kissed him, he would have sworn she was only doing as she wished.

Then again, maybe he wanted her because, in his mind, she belonged to Eric.

Unable to make sense of his responses, he slid his hands down her back and cupped her bottom close.

The beat of excitement between her legs throbbed in counterpoint to his. Amazingly, at least amazingly to him, he was as hard as he'd been that morning before taking Eric. The only factor that prevented her from achieving her goal of making him desperate was that Eric had wrung him dry.

Was she magic, he wondered, to seduce him with no more than honest enthusiasm?

"Oh, you are a good kisser," she said, breaking free to nuzzle his throat, the tip of her tongue sending inexplicable skips through his pulse. "Every bit as good as Eric said."

He claimed her mouth again, afraid to go where her words were leading his mind. Clasping her tight, he rolled her off the stump onto the matted leaves and moss. He wanted to press her into the ground, to overpower her with physical strength alone—the simplest, and the oldest, game in the world. She was strong herself, her body sturdy beneath its curves. When she locked her shapely calves behind his thighs, their squeeze made sensation spike through his groin.

It felt better than it had any reason to.

Cursing, he pushed his hand under the waistband of her faded jeans, working it past her bottom to find her sex. She made a new kind of noise when his finger reached her slippery bud. She was swimming with arousal. Enchanted by the discovery, he drew an exploratory path around the small swelling, finishing at the tip of the shaft. Not knowing how sensitive she was, he didn't rub it, merely pressed it lightly with his finger's pad. Her breath rushed out against his cheek.

He wanted to feel that rush again when she came.

"Oh!" said a voice he didn't immediately realize wasn't hers. Charity beginning to squirm for escape gave him a clue.

Reluctantly, he broke their kiss and looked up. "Sylvia," he panted, too vexed at seeing her to pretend otherwise. "Why are you interrupting when you haven't been invited to?"

The masseuse turned almost as red as she had when Charity spanked her. "I… I was just taking a stroll." She wet her lips, her gaze going to the spot where his buried hand was touching Charity. Whether she wished she owned the hand or the pussy was debatable. "I could help."

"We're fine," he said as mildly as he could. "Go stroll elsewhere."

She nodded and backed away, appearing more stricken than his tone warranted, cowed in a way that triggered annoyance. He let her leave despite a twinge of guilt he knew he'd earned.

He'd recruited her himself from a spa in Victoria, dazzled by her hands of gold and her obvious submissive streak. She'd seemed to have plenty of spirit to offset it, and he'd thought her delicate beauty would inspire the rest of his staff.

Unfortunately, as soon as Sylvia's game began, she'd proved sullen and uncooperative with anyone but him and Eric, rebelling in ways that led to no one's pleasure—least of all her own. She seemed to think she was too good to play with underlings. Even more problematic, she had a fondness for pain beyond what he felt comfortable administering. In the end, they couldn't please her, and she couldn't please them.

She even bickered with Maurice, who could be relied upon to get along with almost anyone.

Because B.G. had felt bad about the failure of her experience, he'd given in to her request to stay on.

Now he wondered if that had been wise. He sympathized with her awkwardness, but unless he or Eric watched her like a hawk, she seemed determined to put her foot wrong.

Maybe
, he thought,
I ought to exclude her from our games. Maybe I ought to restrict her to the
duties of her official job
.

When he returned his attention to Charity, she was biting her lower lip. Although he found the gesture erotic, he could see the mood was lost. Sighing, he pulled his hand from her and let her up. Even if his body argued, he knew he shouldn't have let his lust race out of control. That could only complicate his matchmaking. Irritated with himself, but still aroused, he watched Charity brush what leaves she could reach from her hair and back.

"Sorry," he said, recovering his manners enough to help. "I should have been more considerate of your comfort."

She looked adorably flustered, her cheeks bright rose and her hair tousled. Her lips were swollen from kissing him so hard. Seeing them, his own mouth buzzed. When her head lifted from her cleanup efforts, her eyes gleamed like polished amethyst.

"It's all right," she said. "Rolling around like that was fun. I'm just concerned about Sylvia. Eric sent her away this morning. Between the two of you, I think she's feeling snubbed."

"Sylvia knows the terms of her employment. She's free to leave any time they grow onerous."

Charity snorted. "Somehow I doubt quitting would make her feel better."

B.G. suspected this was true, but didn't want Charity worrying. "As I said, she knows what to do if she's unhappy." The way Charity furrowed her brow at him made him uncomfortable. He seemed to have disappointed her. Maybe she was right. If Sylvia didn't fit in, it was his fault for choosing her. Reluctant to discuss it, he held out his hand. "Shall we walk back to the house?"

"Sure," she said, the answer riding out on a sigh. "I think I've had my dose of the great outdoors."

Offering his assistance was a mistake. Her hand was distractingly small and warm, remaining in his even after she rose. The simple clasp had him tightening inside and out. He couldn't help thinking of other places she might hold him, places that would feel far superior if neither of them wore clothes.

He couldn't help wondering what it would be like to make love to her with no games at all.

"I've been wondering," he said, clearing his throat as he strove to get his mind back on track, "if you'd be willing to engage in an experiment."

She wagged her brows. "That depends on what sort of experiment." Suddenly she halted in her tracks, a look of horror replacing her amusement. "Oh, God. I hope you don't mean more freaky-deaky stuff, because I'm really not up for that."

"No." He put his hand on her shoulder, oddly moved by how slender it was. Women were fascinating creatures, their nature as elusive as the tiny particles he studied. Men were easier to be with, at least for him, but women possessed an allure nothing else could match.

"No," he said again, his voice soft to his own ears. "No more time displacements. Those phenomena, interesting as they are, are not something I'm able to produce on demand."

She turned her face up to his. "You sound as if you wish you could produce them."

"If I could…" His gaze blurred on a distant line of moss-veiled trees. "If I could, it would mean I understood more than I have thus far. It would mean I was getting closer to controlling a state of affairs with the potential to be hazardous."

"Eric swore it wasn't."

B.G. shook himself. Why was he talking about this? This was precious close to discussing his most private work. "It's only
potentially
hazardous," he said out loud. "Not actually, so far as I know."

"Boy." Charity gave her little snorting laugh. "Way to be reassuring."

"Trust me, you're in no danger of being accidentally sucked to the Middle Ages. I will admit, however, that when the time displacement occurred in your presence, coupled with the fact that you happened to witness it, the idea to suggest what I'm about to occurred to me."

He took a breath to keep his enthusiasm for the topic under control. Calmer then, he went on. "It's my theory that certain minds are more open to, and quite possibly conducive of, anomalous quantum events.

Some unidentified quality in their brain waves prods the phenomena into happening."

"Oh, great."

He smiled at the way she rolled her eyes. "As I said, the condition isn't dangerous. It simply means that you may,
may
, do what every human being does more efficiently."

With her fingers shoved into her front pockets, Charity leaned one shoulder against a tree, looking—thankfully—more dubious than fearful. She might not know it, but she really was a born student. "What does every human being do?"

"Change their reality with their thoughts."

He said it gently, but that didn't help.

"Oh, jeez," she said.

"It all boils down to electromagnetism," he pressed on, knowing his next few sentences would be crucial.

"Electromagnetic energy is the basic force-stuff of the universe, the same basic force-stuff of our thoughts. Our brains, you could say, speak the language of quarks. Before you ask, I'm not the only one who thinks this. Since the late seventies, many physicists have believed that consciousness plays a role in forging physical reality, that attention—for lack of a better term—can manifest as matter or events through the action of a focused EM field. As William James said, the power to move the world is in our subconscious minds."

"Yeah, well, you science guys stick together."

"William James wasn't exactly a—Oh, never mind. The question is, should you discount a potentially life-changing theory without testing it for yourself?"

She sighed, and he hoped he hadn't been so fervent he'd put her off. He held his breath as she dragged her fingers back through her hair. He had a strong suspicion the success of his ambitions for her and Eric depended on this moment's choice.

"What would I have to do?" she asked cautiously.

He strove to keep his excitement out of his voice. "Merely practice thinking about yourself differently."