Fit for a King (17 page)

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Diana
Palmer

Fit for a
King

133

that we can't have,
from time to time," she began
softly. "Like me, living a
fantasy. I'd give so much
to be like those women in the nighttime soap
operas
who have their fun and never have to suffer for it.
But I'm
too much of a coward to try it. I'd always
worry about
consequences and about hurting other
people." She closed her eyes,
breathing him in. "I
always felt so free with you. I could tease,
and you
never took me seriously. I could try my wings, I could
fly,
without any danger of falling."

"Until
one night you flew too close to the flame
and singed your
pretty wings," he murmured dryly.
"Were you
shocked?"

"Oh,
yes," she confessed. "I didn't expect it, you
see. And
I didn't realize how vulnerable I might be."

"I
did," he replied. His arms tightened. "We were
both
holding back for different reasons, bottling up
our passions.
Inevitably, it was going to get away from us one day. It just happened to be
with each
other. And I'm damned glad about that," he added
curtly. "Another man might have taken advantage of
it and
seduced you for real."

She
colored softly. "I can't imagine letting any
other man do those
things to me," she said honestly.

He
actually shuddered. "Don't say things like that.
I'm more vulnerable
than you realize."

"Because she's gone."

He paused
for an instant, and when his voice finally
came, it was cold and
measured. "Yes. Because she's

gone. I did warn you
that anything I did to you would
be out of desire for her. Didn't you hear me?"

"I was too busy kissing you." She laughed
gently.

He
laughed, too, despite himself. "Imp," he mut
tered, tightening
his arms and then loosening them to
step away from her and look down into
her quiet eyes.
"You seemed to like kissing me."

She tossed
back her head, living the dream all over again. "You have a nice mouth.
Very slow, very ex
perienced."

"Yours
isn't bad, either," he murmured, dropping
his eyes to it He
touched her cheek and traced her
lips with his thumbs. "I'm sorry we're
so close to the
house. We could strip and go swimming."

"My
father would let Ludwig eat you," she said
with a laugh.

He sighed.
"It was just a thought. I'd give a lot to
see you out of your
clothes, pretty thing."

That was
embarrassing and a little exciting, all at
once. "Well,
you haven't missed much," she said.

"Not
from the waist up, anyway," he agreed too
readily, and laughed
at her shocked little gasp. "God,
you're sweet to
tease. I'd forgotten that women could
be shocked. Women in my set tend to
be pretty blase
about sex."

"Probably
because there isn't a lot they don't know
about it." She
tried to step back, but he caught her
long hair and held her there in front
of him.

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Palmer

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"You're
nervous of me," he murmured. "Why
should you be? You could always scream for
help."

"Yes,
I know." She tugged at his hand. "I don't
want to stand in for
Bess, King."

"You
told me that in the beginning. I haven't for
gotten." He
hesitated for a minute before he reluctantly let her go. "You sound positive
enough about
it."

His voice
gave nothing away, but she thought he
sounded a bit irritated. She tossed her
hair and
laughed up at him. "How would you feel if I kissed
you and
pretended you were some sexy man I
wanted?"

His blood
surged. "I'd break your sweet neck," he
said without a second's hesitation.

She
laughed even louder. "You see? Tit for tat, big
man."

He made a
swipe at her behind, and she barely sidestepped in time.

"If
you hit me," she threatened, "I'll tell my
daddy."

"Go ahead," he challenged. "I dare
you."

"You
ought to be shaking in your shoes," she re
plied. "He's got
friends in high places."

He got
her meaning and grinned, all his bad temper
gone. "You know, I laugh more with
you than I've
ever laughed in my life,"
he remarked as they wandered back down the beach toward the brightly lit
cottage.

"I don't think you even
knew how to laugh at the
beginning,"
she recalled. "You were a little fright
ening. All business and cold as ice."

"Cold
on the outside," he said softly. "Never on the inside."

That was a blatant insinuation,
and she ignored it
"Are you and Dad
going fishing tomorrow?"

"Yes,
we are." He glanced her way. "Are you coming with us?"

"I'd like to, but I've got
to get in touch with Angel
Mahoney and tell
her I'm going to need another week
on
those new designs. Angel is vice-president of the
Seawear collection, and she bought my designs for
the chain of boutiques Seawear owns. I thought
they
were too strange for
anyone," she confessed, "but
Angel
thought they were deliciously outrageous and very salable. And she was right.
I'm making all kinds
of money these
days."

"It
doesn't show," he said abruptly with a speaking glance at what she was
wearing.

She lifted
a haughty eyebrow. "I wouldn't waste
my exquisite wardrobe
on a mere friend," she in
formed him.

His dark eyes narrowed. "Is that all I am?"

"It's
all I'm going to let you be," she said gently,
looking away from him.
"Would you like—"

"Why?"
He was behind her in the shadow of the house, his hands around her waist
pulling her back against his tautly muscled body.

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Palmer

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King

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"You
know why," she ground out. The warmth of
those hands was
driving her wild.

"I
can't have Bess,” he whispered in her ear,
drawing her even
closer, "but I can have you. You
can have me."

She
trembled and closed her eyes as the tempting
pictures rambled
shamelessly in her mind. She gritted
her teeth, because there was only one
possible answer
to the blatant seduction in his voice. "No."

"Tell me you aren't tempted, Elissa," he dared.

She pulled
away from him, taking a few seconds
to get her composure back. "How
about some cof
fee?"

He
hesitated at the back door, then sighed and gave
in. He didn't
understand himself lately. Elissa was
suddenly in his blood, and he wanted
her out. He
hoped he wouldn't one day lose control with her. The
thought frightened him a little. Yet he seemed to to
tally forget Bess
when he touched Elissa. That was
somehow frightening, too.

He
followed her inside, his face thoughtful, to find
her parents waiting
to join them around the coffeepot.
He smiled at them, relieved to find
something to keep his mind occupied. It was having a field day with memories of
Elissa, her dress disheveled and pushed
down to her waist.

The next
morning, King and Elissa's father set off
before daylight. By
the time Elissa and her mother

were up, the men were
long gone. Tina fixed a small
breakfast for them and then set about her
housework,
while Elissa went down to the beach for a swim. Afterward,
she set to work on her designs with a fierce
determination to work off her frustrations
on paper.

It worked,
too; she came up with some totally new looks, very innovative and sexy and
cool. She took a break for lunch and some lazy conversation with her
mother,
and then went back down to the beach, a
flowered patio skirt
over her one-piece black bathing
suit, and stretched out on her towel to
scribble some
more.

The sun
kept going in and out of the clouds. She
closed her eyes with
a sigh as it began to cool down,
and she was almost asleep when a shadow fell over
her.

She opened her eyes to King's
dark face, his eyes
narrow and speculative
where the skirt had fallen
away from
her long, tanned legs. Her bodice had
slipped
because of the shoulder straps, almost baring one breast.

"Sexy
as hell," he murmured, and there was irri
tation in his voice.
"You look like a beached mer
maid, and you'd better thank your
lucky stars your
parents are within earshot."

"Oh,
promises, promises," she laughed drowsily, only half taking him seriously.
She stretched, and his
jaw tightened.

He unbuttoned his shirt, watching her the whole

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Palmer

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King

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time, seeing how her
attention suddenly became riveted on the hair-covered muscles he was
revealing.
When he stripped it off, her eyes widened on his
torso, and he felt a surge of
desire so strong that it almost knocked him to his knees. She liked looking
at him. She was too inexperienced to hide her own
longing, and the sight of it made
him all to vulnerable
to his own hungers.

"I
thought I might go for a swim," he said huskily
as his hand went to
his belt.

Her lips
parted. "You...can't," she began, think
ing of her parents.

"I'm
wearing trunks," he said. He unhitched the
belt and slowly
moved the zipper down. She was breathing quickly by the time he finally peeled
the jeans down his long legs and discarded them, along with his sneakers.

"Why did you do
that?" she asked in a strange, high-pitched tone when he turned to her.

"I
like the way you look at me when I'm undress
ing," he said
quietly, meeting her hesitant gaze. There
was no mockery in his
eyes, no teasing. He moved
closer, looking down at her for a long
instant before
he caught one of her hands in his and put it against
his
chest. The hard muscles surged against it as he
breathed, feeling the
soft, silent searching of her cool
fingers against his heated skin.

"My...my
father?" she whispered, glancing down
the beach.

"He's
cleaning fish," he replied, searching her
eyes. "Your
mother is cooking."

"Oh."

He eased down alongside her, deftly
unbuttoning
her skirt. He pushed it aside,
baring the smooth, ex
quisite lines
of her body in the bathing suit. His hand
went to the shoulder strap that was already almost off.
He traced it down the fastening under her arm
and,
holding her shocked eyes, unhooked it.

"You
mustn't, King," she said shakily. She caught his wrist, but it didn't even
slow him down. He stared
at her bodice, peeling it aside with steady,
strong fingers, his thumb blatantly caressing her swelling breast and making
her jerk with a sudden spasm of pleasure.

"Go
ahead," he murmured curtly, bending his head. "Lie to me. Tell me you
don't want this."

"What
about...Bess?" she groaned, pushing at
him.

He said
something harsh and explicit that she only
half heard, and then
his head was against her body,
his mouth taking her breast inside the warm
darkness,
teasing
it with his tongue.

Her
whimpers excited him. She didn't know how
to hold back, and
that was delicious. He slid his hands
under her, smoothing her soft skin, lifting her closer to
his ardent mouth.

She was
trembling now, too far gone to protest any
thing he did to her.
He moved one hand up her side to explore the exquisite softness of her breast
while