Flushed (10 page)

She waded up to the door, shaking off the encounter. There,
see? She could get over it. Besides, Kim Martin’s groupies had nothing to do
with her reason for being here. She opened the door. Oh, if ever a space needed
her services, it was the Wall Werx office. Dozens, maybe hundreds, of snapshot
prints were taped to the walls, many of which showed muscular people clinging
to walls of rock in breathtaking natural settings. Others were of people clinging
to walls here at the climbing gym. The clutter on the office walls met its
match in the clutter elsewhere, making the corridor she’d just left tidy by
comparison. The place was tiny, cramped and all but featureless with clutter.
The desk seemed to have collapsed with the weight of it.

Appalling as the space was, she had no trouble spotting Kim
in the maelstrom. He was squatting on the floor at the far end of the office.
His back was to her, and still she knew him. Maybe it was the pull of his
sleeveless navy-blue shirt across his shoulders that she recognized. Or the
back of the neck her fingers had enjoyed last night. Or his lean, muscular
arms. Or that tight, climber’s butt…

Was it warm in here?

And then a woman’s voice said, “Kim, I can’t find my bra. Do
you have it out there?”

Isabelle took an involuntary step backward. The stack of
magazines she stepped on slid. She fell against the doorframe and caught
herself on the edge of the desk—the desk that apparently hadn’t collapsed under
the weight of clutter, but rather something even lower on Isabelle’s list of
things she wanted to see.

Kim Martin and a woman who couldn’t find her bra, for
example. While a blonde would-be conquest hovered outside.

“Sorry, Jules,” Kim said. When Isabelle’s stumble caught his
attention and he pivoted toward the door. “Isabelle!” His hair was ruffled, his
color high on his cheeks. She wouldn’t picture how either had happened. She
wouldn’t. She w—

He was on his feet and reaching for her almost before she
could push the office door open to flee.

Almost.

Blood rushed to her head as she found her clumsy way toward
the main entrance, making it hard to see. What kind of man had sex on a messy
desk? Behind a glass door?

The same kind of man willing to have sex on a sofa in a messy
house behind a shattered one, apparently.

To think she’d been tempted. To find that, even now, she
flushed imagining the possibilities presented by a man who so freely followed
his passions.

She’d reached the parking lot before common sense caught up
with her.

Passions? He was a man ruled by his penis. She didn’t have
to imagine that. She’d been with a man like that—two, counting Daniel who’d
gifted her with chlamydia upon his return from France.

She paused, keys in her hand. Running away was beneath her.
Yes, Kim Martin was passionate, and ridiculously good-looking besides. So,
what? She needed a capable plumber, whatever sort of package it came in. She
could ask for a referral at least. What’s more, it wasn’t any of her business
what Kim had or hadn’t been doing on that desk before she walked in.

They certainly weren’t dating.

* * * * *

Kim finally caught up with her in the parking lot. He didn’t
know what her deal was, but he wasn’t going to let her go easily. His day had
had too little else in it that was good. Not that he could count her flinching
from his touch in the office good, or her storming through the vestibule to
make last night’s stomp up the sidewalk look like a casual stroll either. But
her being here was good. Being here to see him was very good.

“I had a question,” she said. “A plumbing question. I’m
thinking now I should call someone else.” Her chest was heaving beneath a pale
blue-green blouse that wasn’t like her usual glamorous, old-fashioned wardrobe
choices. In fact, she was wearing loose-fitting jeans and loafers as if she’d
been working around the house. But her skin was as flushed as it had been last
night on the sofa, when she was kissing him like sun on a rock face.

“What? Why?”

“I’m sorry to have brought you out here, Mr. Martin.
Clearly, you have other,” she waved a hand in the direction of the office,
“other interests to occupy you today.” A fake smile. Scathing formality. It
suddenly got easier to overlook her otherwise inviting curves.

Maybe he was projecting—thanks to Kerry, Kim had enough
leftover anger to supply them both for a week—or, he realized slowly, maybe she
was. Projecting, that is.

Jules. The bra. Isabelle’s certainty he had a woman in every
port.

“No!” He cursed, unable to contain himself or the dung heap
his day had become.

“I do apologize.” The keys she held snapped against her palm
and she turned away from him. She was leaving. He could only explain later if
there was a later. First he had to get her attention.

“I’ve got time for a plumbing question,” he said. “You’re
here. You may as well ask.”

She looked so stiff he could have used her spine to measure
pipe. At least she’d stopped walking away.

“Very well,” she said, though she didn’t turn to face him.
“My question is this, Mr. Martin. If an object is flushed down the toilet, is
it lost forever?”

She’d flushed something accidentally? Whatever it was must
be important enough to bring her running to him for help dressed only to the
fours, rather than her usual nines. He didn’t think she was wearing makeup,
either—a plus in his personal book, but a treat he hadn’t expected to see
outside bed, not that he had much hope left of that happening.

“Forever? Not always,” he said, desperate to reassure her.
“Given the state of your plumbing, it may be stuck in the works. I’d be happy
to come fishing.”

Her head fell forward as if she’d been defeated. She finally
turned toward him and she looked tired. Of course she wouldn’t have slept well,
her house had been broken into. And she’d flushed something down the only
toilet in the house? Kim wanted to put his arms around her.

“Thank you,” she said. “Maybe you could refer me to someone
to do the work.”

“I’ll just get my t—what? Someone to—what?” Why was he so
surprised? No, not surprised. He was hurt. Which was just as stupid.

“Or I can ask Stacey for another name if you prefer.”

“Prefer? Isabelle, I’d prefer to help you myself.”

“I don’t think that would be appropriate.”

She was talking about Jules again. The misunderstanding with
the bra. But it still wasn’t time to talk about that. She wouldn’t believe him,
not now. It pissed him off that she was so ready to judge him. She and Kerry.
Twice the haughty at half the price.

“I don’t see the problem,” he said. “It’s not as if we’re
dating.”

Her eyes narrowed at him. He guessed she didn’t like having
her words flung back at her. Too bad. And if he’d thought she was cold and
stiff before, she was now frosty enough to air-condition a September expedition
to Big Bend and act as the tent’s center pole to boot.

He had her attention. Now to use it. “Or is it that I’m so
irresistible you can’t trust yourself around me?”

* * * * *

Isabelle barely held her temper in check as Kim hauled his
gear into her bathroom for the second time this week. “It’s a ring,” she said.
“Big heart-shaped stone. Ugliest ring ever made.”

He put the big metal toolbox between the toilet and the tub.
She’d had to wait while he drove home to get his truck and his tools. Plenty of
time to fume about his attitude and the whole “irresistible” thing. He hadn’t
even tried to explain breaking furniture with the braless woman. It was
maddening.

It was also true. He was irresistible. Here in the confines
of her bathroom, Isabelle could smell him, a warm, healthy man showing plenty
of long limb and toned muscle.

“Heavy, then?” he asked.

She blinked at him. “I guess. For a ring. But the band isn’t
hugely wide. Not like a man’s ring.”

“And it just went down today?” he asked.

Isabelle tucked her hair behind her ear. “No. Yesterday.”

“Yesterday?” The word was an accusation. He was hardly in a
position to be accusing her of anything. Irresistible? Pig. His face was
beard-shadowed as if he hadn’t shaved today, his lips seemed pinker by
contrast, and damn if she could look away.

Crap.

She sniffed. “Can you get it or not?”

Kim rolled his shoulders and neck. “Let’s find out.” He
squatted on the floor by the toilet and looked up at her. “I’ll start simple.
Empty the water from the tank. Unbolt the toilet from the floor and have a look
underneath. We might get lucky. It could be stuck in the trap right at the
floor.” The down view made Kim appear to be all shoulder and leg. And eyes.
Those incredible eyes.

She could break furniture with this man. Definitely. She
could swing from the ceiling fan with him. And why shouldn’t she? Sure, he was
too good-looking to be trusted, but he’d been matter-of-fact enough about his
escapades with Jules, or whatever the gym babe’s name was. That meant he
wouldn’t lie to her about his other women the way Steven or Daniel had. That
was something.

“If that doesn’t get it, I’ll run a camera down the line and
see what we can see.”

He was still talking. She didn’t know why. She’d just
decided she would revel in the merely physical—go ahead and take the sex that
surely wouldn’t disappoint. “Camera?”

He stood up and she could swear she felt his heat, his
energy, brushing hers. She realized her heart was pounding.

“Don’t get your hopes up. It takes crappy pictures.”

The bathroom became quiet as Isabelle stared at Kim’s lips.
He was smiling. Her body throbbed in response. “Kim.”

“Isabelle?” His voice had lost its professional edge,
becoming fuzzy and less sure of itself. She’d always thought she wanted a
dominant man. Why was hearing this uncertainty in his voice as big a turn-on as
the way he charged to her rescue? This was no time for such thoughts. She
didn’t need a man touching her heart, not now, not him. On the other hand, if
he wanted to touch anything else—anything at all, she thought, pulse
pounding—she was good to go, especially if she went right now.

His breathing changed. The charge between them was building.

Then she realized what he’d said. Crappy pictures. She burst
out laughing. “That’s awful,” she said. She laughed some more, the stress of
the last couple of days making it hard to stop. Kim began laughing too, which
only made it worse. Soon she was gasping for breath, falling back against the
sink, stomach muscles beginning to ache, helpless. He took her elbow to steady
her. She found herself in his arms. Laughing became kissing, which was just as
breath-stealing and far more deliciously physical. She couldn’t seem to stop.
He didn’t seem to mind.

She pushed him down—thank goodness she kept the toilet lid
closed—and straddled his lap. It brought them close to the same height, making
it easier to kiss him. Warmth rose in the narrow space between their chests. It
was nothing compared with the warmth in her belly.

She pulled at the hem of his shirt. The heat of his skin
made her want to hurry. He pulled her farther up his lap. There might not be a
ceiling fan in the bathroom, but they were certainly on their way to the most
purely physical experience of her life.

And then Kim’s hands left her butt. Some shift in his weight
slid her back just far enough to let the temperature between them drop out of
the red zone.

“Isabelle.”

What was going on? She’d been far enough up his lap to be
sure he’d recovered from his tryst on the office desk. Fully recovered.

He eased her hands away from his shirt with calloused
fingertips. “Isabelle, Isabelle.” He kissed her, chaste, tender.

He was going to refuse her?

She tried to back off his lap and stand. He held her, one
hand at the small of her back, one on her leg. To insist, she’d have to flail,
since her feet didn’t touch the floor. This was humiliating enough without
flailing.

“Not like this,” he said, his eyes moving restlessly from
hers to her mouth, to her chin to her mouth. His breath seemed unsteady.
“Isabelle, I want to take you to bed.” His hand cupped her cheek. She shivered.

“Okay,” she said. She tried again to get up. He stilled her.

“I want to take my time. I want to wake up with you.”

It sounded pretty. It might be the nicest refusal a man ever
gave a woman. She wouldn’t know. She’d never been refused. “You’re saying no.”

That seemed to focus him. “I’m saying wait. Until I’ve found
your ring. Until I’ve cleaned up for you. Until I can give you everything you
deserve.”

He was saying no. He was saying it nicely, but he was saying
no. Maybe his code of honor only allowed him one woman a day or something and
she’d have to wait until midnight.

Bastard.

She backed off, slowly enough this time that he let her.
What kind of man refused sex? Well, two could play that game. “I see,” she
lied. “Feel free to clean up right here—the shower, whatever you like. As for
the rest, I imagine you’ll be plenty resistible later. Good luck with the
toilet.”

“Isabelle.”

She left him there.

When he came out of the bathroom, more than an hour later,
he wore his canvas coveralls and a respirator mask on an elastic cord around
his neck. “Gotta get the vacuum,” he said. “Be right back.” He went out the
front door into the gathering dusk to his heavy-duty pickup truck, parked at
the curb.

Vacuum?

He returned with a shop vac. Too intrigued to continue
nursing her anger the way she ought, Isabelle followed him to the bathroom. On
the way there, she was distracted by the sight of a toilet bowl lying upside
down on her bedroom floor atop a large number of shop towels.

Soon after, she saw the toilet’s tank in the bathtub. She’d
had no idea the fixture came apart in pieces like that. There was a rectangular
area on the floor where the toilet used to sit. A rag had been stuffed into the
large drainpipe in the floor, but a thin cable snaked up from it to a small
video monitor sitting atop Kim’s toolbox by the bathtub. The shop vac squatted
between the exposed drainpipe and the wall. Kim was watching her with those
amazing eyes.