Games People Play (11 page)

Her eyes shot to his face again, and she wondered what it had been like between them before the car wreck. Sydney pictured a smart, witty brunette, no doubt with a bod to die for, someone capable of keeping up with him. They would have been the golden couple, turning heads wherever they went. How did he live with her loss? The crinkles around his eyes weren’t all from smiling. Grief did the same damage. She couldn’t imagine him crying. If a man like him cried in front of her, she would cry harder. She couldn’t stand the thought of him grieving.

Suddenly Sydney felt like a Peeping Tom, peeking into his life as he slept unaware. Half-ashamed, she crept back to his room and this time slid beneath the sheets. They smelled so good, so clean and masculine. She buried her face in his pillow and inhaled the scent of his skin, then hugged the softness to her breasts and rested her cheek against it. She would doze a little longer, just a few minutes more.

When she woke again, late-morning daylight poured through the half-open curtains. The clock read ten thirty. Colm was sitting on the edge of the bed watching her.

She scrambled to a sitting position. “What are you doing?”

“Watching you sleep.” He was dressed in a pair of jeans and an unbuttoned, untucked shirt. His hair was damp from the shower and the scent of Irish Spring and shampoo tickled her senses.

Despite the knowledge that he’d been watching her, she didn’t feel violated. She wanted him to look at her. She wanted to strip off her clothing and let him see all of her, naked and shivering and wanting. Naturally she said, “You have no right to do that.”

“Yes, I do,” he replied. “You’re in my bed. I slept like hell on the sofa because of you.”

Her eyes dropped to his mouth, to the vague smile curling the corners.

He brushed the hair back from her cheek. “Keep looking at me like that and you’re going to get yourself kissed.”

She should have averted her eyes. Said something. Ended it right there. Instead she leaned forward to taste him.

He drew in a sharp breath at the first touch of her lips, and for a moment they both froze, mouths so close they nearly breathed for each other. Then she grasped the open edges of his shirt, pulled him to meet her, and tentatively brushed her lips against his again. Again. Again. She heard him swallow and she scooted closer, one leg sliding across his thighs and the other behind his backside, so they fit like puzzle pieces. She drew back enough to search his gaze and found his lashes lowered as he stared at her lips.

“Sydney,” he whispered. “Don’t do this unless you mean it.”

“I mean it.” She slid her fingers into his damp hair and opened her mouth over his, and this time he came to life and took her face in his hands, holding her as his tongue dipped between her lips and tangled with hers. Back and forth, thrust, retreat, while she felt herself go soft and wet, and thought she’d never been kissed like this in her life, that she’d never known such want. Beneath her leg he was hard, and she loved it, she wanted more, to feel that beautiful, perfect part of him in her hands, to caress and stroke until he lost all his confident control.

They explored each other’s mouths for what seemed like forever, tilting their heads this way and that, bumping noses and coming at each other a different way until he groaned and held her still and took control. He tasted like mint and warm, wet heat, his tongue silky as it stroked hers. He stopped only to kiss the corners of her lips, her cheek, her chin, then her mouth again, probing and hungry.

Only when his hands slid away from her jaw and moved down to cup her breasts through her sweater, only when piercing pleasure darted to the wanting place between her legs, did she put a palm to his chest and push him back.

Instantly he straightened, flushed and tousled from desire and her gripping fingers.

Oh God. What had she done? “I’m not thinking straight.”

“I like the way you’re thinking.”

But she shook her head and untangled herself from him. Grabbing her pants from the floor, she thrust one leg in, then hopped to get her foot through the material, humiliated and excited, refusing to look at him, because if she did, he would win. She would drop to her knees before him, slide her palms up his hard thighs, and take him, then beg him to put his hands on her everywhere, his mouth and tongue on her flesh, his fingers inside her.

If Colm knew what she was thinking, he didn’t show it. His mouth had thinned to a grim line. He grabbed up her paint-stained tennis shoes and tossed them to her one at a time. She was surprised he didn’t wing them at her head.

“And here,” he added, throwing her the bra she’d left draped over the night table, “you might need this in case someone’s watching your walk of shame and runs to call Max.”

“It’s not a walk of shame.”

He uttered a humorless laugh and leaned back on the bed. “All the girls say that.”

Face burning, she wadded the bra in her hand and headed to the living room. He didn’t follow. When she reached the door, she hesitated. Hollering a belated thanks for letting her stay, for taking care of her while she puked, for being so good as he always was . . . it would have seemed patronizing, so she said nothing. She slipped out and ran for the house, regret burning deep in her chest.

Chapter Twelve

A
fiasco. A failure like none he’d known since Azure’s invention of Colm Hennessy. So which side of him was falling for Sydney Warren, she who was no more than an unknowing customer and the victim of the greatest deception in which he’d ever taken part?

One hour after she’d left his cabin, Colm shoved a hand through his hair and stood barefoot on the guesthouse porch, watching for Sydney to make her way from the big house to her studio. No sign of her. She was probably already there working. There might be no further interaction between them today, no steps toward seduction after all; his lust had chased her off.

Nothing was sexier than a woman he could barely keep his hands off of reaching for him, taking him by surprise, laying her lips on his, digging her fingers into his shoulders and inviting him between her legs. All he’d had to do was ease her back on the pillows, kiss her when she tried to renege, sway her into her own much-needed compliance with hands and mouth.

Why hadn’t he? Why couldn’t he read her when she was ready for the next step? Instead, he and his lack of savvy had all but helped her out the door, watching the extra funds disappear with her.

He drained his mug, went back inside for his shoes, then headed for the studio. As he’d guessed he would, he found her there, her head bent over her palette as she mixed colors and prepared herself for an everyday session with him, as though they hadn’t stood on the precipice of sex only hours before.

By God, if she could fake it, he could, too. It was his job. He drew a breath, determined anew, and stepped quietly through the door, letting his gaze sweep over her slender frame and well-curved ass, letting his desire for her flow through him, no playacting, but the real thing, the true role of his lifetime. But he would follow Max’s path to damnation.

“Day six,” he said softly, a reminder to himself more than a greeting.

Sydney’s head jerked around and she uttered a breathless laugh. “Oh! The door didn’t squeak. You scared me to death.”

“Sorry.” He closed it behind him.

Today’s choice of music was Coldplay. The vague melancholia that seemed an inherent part of her persona made him smile. She was an artist through and through. And despite her current cheerfulness, she didn’t easily let go of things. Humiliation radiated from her across the studio, and he knew damn well she was thinking about what had happened on his bed that morning.

The room was chilly, the air scented with fresh paint. “How’s the ménage picture?” he asked, knowing better than to broach the subject of the latest kiss.

“It’s coming.”

When he sauntered down the ramp to take a look at it, she stepped in front of it, her cheeks flushing a faint pink. “I’m taking a break from the ménage right now. Working on something else.”

He spied a naked shoulder and knew it was his portrait, and that she felt like she’d been caught doing something taboo. A smile threatened to creep across his lips. “Need me to pose?”

“Yes.” She paused. “No. Oh, hell, I don’t know.”

Without another word, he headed to the stage, crossed his arms to grab the hem of his Henley shirt and drew it up and off, taking his T-shirt with it.

Sydney set the space heater close to the platform and returned to sit at her easel. They fell into a silent partnership as she resumed painting, she with her blue eyes darting between his form and the canvas, he standing in the simple pose she favored, drinking in her features.

“Tilt your head a little more to the left,” she said at one point.

He followed her direction. He was stiff from last night’s ménage pose, but he held perfectly still. “I’m curious about something.”

“What’s that?” Her attention dropped to his abdomen, then lower, and up again to meet his gaze.

“Posing for the ménage last night. It wasn’t what I’d thought it would be.”

She dabbed her brush in paint and applied it to the canvas. “What did you think it would be?”

“More of a threesome. But you kept me separate from Garrett and Cherise by several feet during most of the poses.”

“Not most of them. Just some.”

He didn’t reply. He was baiting her, and waited while she slowly swirled her brush in water.

“I was trying to tell a story,” she said finally, straightening. “One of a woman who’s with one man, but also of a second lover who would do anything to please her, if only the woman would reach for him.”

“Does she reach for him after your story ends?”

She glanced at him, then at the neglected ménage canvas leaning against the wall. “I think . . . she doesn’t know what to do.”

Colm climbed off the platform and wandered over to her workstation to study the painting she’d set aside. “She’s looking at me. The rejected lover.”

She turned to stare at it. “You’re—he’s—not rejected.”

“Then what is he?”

“Forbidden.”

He moved closer to her from behind until his lips were nearly against her ear, and she didn’t shy away. She sat with her back ramrod straight, but her breathing came fast and strident, the way it had that morning when she decided to kiss him.

“He’s forbidden because she feels trapped by her situation?” he asked, the words touching her silver hoop earring.

“Because . . . because she’s waiting, and I have no idea for what.”

A near-confession. The time was now. Colm’s fingers gently swept her hair behind her ear and he nuzzled her cheek, her earring, waiting for her to turn her head and meet his mouth.

“You’re going to kiss me,” she said in a low voice.

“You’re right,” he said. “Ask me to.”

“Ask
me
to, damn you.”

“Kiss me.”

She swiveled on her barstool to face him and nearly leaped to reach his lips, her knees bracketing his hips. He caught her around the waist and opened his mouth over hers, kissing her until she whimpered, until her palms wandered restlessly over his naked back, then his naked chest. He slid his hands under her thick hoodie and filled them with her breasts, and she didn’t stop him. She opened her knees wider, he pressed closer, pelvis to pelvis, and she touched her tongue to his, withdrew and thrust, teased and tangled with him until he slid his fingers into her hair to hold her head, to hold her still and devour her.

The sound of Mozart rang from the worktable, and the world shattered.

“Don’t,” he whispered, nipping her chin, her throat. “Damn it, Syd, don’t answer it.”

“I have to. You don’t understand what I—”

“You’re right.” He released her. “I don’t get it.”

Mozart played on like a sick joke.

She swung away from him and picked up the phone. “Max.”

Colm stalked to the cabinet, withdrew a bottle of water and guzzled it, then paced an agitated distance beyond the stage as he tried not to listen to the conversation and hated every word that reached his ears.

Sydney sounded falsely cheerful as she asked Max something about the new artist’s shows and how well the woman had been received. Then she said, “I’m working right now, but can I count on you to be home within a week?”

Her head lowered, a wave of blond hair shielding her profile as she cradled the phone close and listened. “Okay,” she said finally. “I’ll look for the photos tonight in my e-mail.”

After that, the conversation was polite, strained. Colm felt like he was eavesdropping on the end of a relationship. It promised double the money, but it didn’t help the ache in his chest or the hard-on in his jeans.

When she hung up, he returned to the platform, but she cleared her throat and climbed off the barstool. “I think we should stop.”

“Tired?” he asked grimly, snatching up both his shirts. “Because I sure as hell am.” The practiced gigolo in him had disappeared again, fickle bastard, and he was acting like a high schooler with blue balls.

She sighed and stuck her hands in the pockets of her hoodie. “Can we start over?”

That stopped him. He shoved his arms through his T-shirt sleeves and slowly pulled the hem down over his stomach. “What are you asking?”

“For your friendship.”

“For my . . . ?” He burst out laughing. Hell, he hadn’t seen that one coming. “Sure.” He drew on the second shirt, pushed the sleeves to his elbows, and met her in the middle of the room. “What do you really want, Sydney? Don’t lie to me. I know dishonesty when I see it.”

Her cheeks were flushed, her lips swollen from his kiss. All he had to do was slip an arm around her waist and pull her against him, and it would be over. He took a step closer and started to do just that, when she swallowed and said, “I want pizza.”

Colm stilled. “Are you serious?”

“Why? Did you have lunch yet?”

She was completely serious. And slamming doors faster than he could open them. His hands flexed at his sides.
Screw this.
“I’m not hungry.”

“You’re off until tomorrow,” she said flatly. “I’ve lost the desire to work today.”

“We’re wasting time,” he gritted out.

“I don’t care! It’s my call, and I say I’m not in the mood.”

Colm closed his eyes and tried to compose himself. “Fine. I’m going into the city.”

“Fine.”

They were both breathing fast. The mental echo of time ticking away burned a hole in him. Another afternoon off when she didn’t want him near. And God help him, he had to have her.

First, though, he had to get away from her before he ruined everything again, leaped at her and took her down like a lion with a wayward gazelle. He stalked to the door and without turning around said, “Enjoy your pizza.”

“I will,” she shot back.

He stepped out of the studio and closed the door too firmly behind him.

* * *

L
ong time no see.” The woman in the wheelchair studied Colm carefully as he found a seat on the patio and took one of her hands. “When are you coming home to stay?”

Colm reached to brush back the dark hair from her forehead and smiled into her eyes. “Soon. Isn’t it too cold out here for you?”

“I love the fresh air, even though I have to fight the nurses to get my way.”

“And you win.”

“Every time.”

In the dappled sunlight, Amelia looked so much like her old self—if not for the frail frame of her body, which could no longer support her. She’d been an athlete once, played soccer in high school, then became an avid bicyclist in her early twenties. She had lived with spirit and wild, reckless joy. And Colm’s mistake, his inability to see the world beyond his own emotions, had—in the blink of an eye—cost her all that and more.

Yet she’d never shown the slightest sign of blaming him. Right now he wished she would.

They talked for a while, casual conversation about nothing in particular, where Colm gave little away and Amelia sat there with no secrets. She’d never kept secrets, even as a kid. Colm was the dark one. When they lapsed into companionable silence, he took note of the freshly fallen leaves and branches on his lawn. His brick bungalow in Silver Spring needed attention.

No, Sydney needed attention. But right now it was his sister’s turn, and with her he could breathe again.

Birds tweeted and played tag overhead; the early afternoon sun offered bone-soothing warmth from a sky the shade of Sydney’s eyes. Everything seemed bucolic, if not for the wheelchair, and Amelia’s nurse lingering just inside the kitchen’s door.

“So what’s going on, Amie?” he asked, as though everything were normal, as though she wasn’t a quadriplegic and he a prostitute, both of them having left precious normalcy in the wreckage three years ago.

“I’ve been busy,” she said. “You know, running marathons and stuff.”

“Not funny.”

“Sorry.” She paused. “I talked to someone today. You’ll never believe who.”

An odd foreboding crept along his nerves. “The president of the United States?”

“That was yesterday.”

He smiled. “I don’t know. Who?”

“Roger.”

Instantly he stiffened. Roger Hatch. The wealthy, useless coward who’d put a ring on Amelia’s finger when she was a wild beauty, then broke every promise when Amelia broke every bone. Unable to deal with the changes in her, Hatch had left her six months after the accident, and Colm had thought it would kill her. Her grief—Christ. Even now, he wanted to wrap his hands around Hatch’s neck and squeeze.

“Did you tell him to go screw himself?” he demanded.

“He’s coming over for a visit tonight, James.”

Colm shot to his feet. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“I think he’s changed. He sounded so different on the phone. He—”

“Someone who abandons people doesn’t change, Amelia. I can’t believe you’d—”

“Shut up!” Her cheeks had gone pink, her thin shoulders tight. “Stop talking. I don’t want to hear it. I’m allowed to have a life, and my own friends.”

“And I’m allowed to say when I think your taste in ‘friends’ sucks!”

“No, you’re not, you asshole!”

Colm’s jaw dropped. “
I’m
the asshole? Hatch is the asshole.”

Before she could fire back, the French door opened and Jane, the nurse, stuck her head out. “You two okay?”

“We’re fine,” Amelia said without hesitation. “Just having a little sibling scrap.”

Jane harrumphed and shot Colm a warning glance. “Don’t scare the neighbors.”

“Shut the door, Jane,” he snapped.

She made another scolding sound, but did as he’d told her.

In the silence, Amie blew into the oral mechanism that controlled the chair and wheeled around to look at him. “I don’t want to fight with you.”

“Then tell that son of a bitch not to come sniffing around. He’s not welcome in my house.”

“James, just . . . please. Let’s not do this.” Tears shone in her eyes. “I don’t want us to be mad at each other.”

Ah, Christ. He couldn’t stand to see her cry. But he couldn’t help himself. “He’d better pray I don’t run into him.”

“Stop! Please stop. Let’s talk about something else. The Virginia project. Tell me about it.”

Her desperation pierced his anger. He drew a deep breath and reached to adjust the blanket the nurse had wrapped around her, mainly to give himself something to do short of punching the nearest brick wall. “It’ll end next Friday, and then I’ll be home.”