Guarding Miranda (20 page)

Ben helped her clear away the rest of the table.  “You’d think so, by the looks he was giving her all night.  Looks like he was undressing her with his mind...”

“Yes, he was rather obvious about it.  Miranda, now she doesn’t seem too impressed by the likes of him, though.” Mabel sighed. “So I doubt he’s her boyfriend.”

“Are you kidding me?” Ben laughed. “With that dreamy look she was giving him when he wasn’t looking? She’s
clearly
smitten, whether she realizes it or not.”

“You don’t think he’s a con man or something, do you?” Mabel supposed aloud. She lowered her voice to a whisper, even though they were alone in the house.
“I mean, she is very wealthy.”

“Well, I aim to call Russ Gundy right away and find out who he is.  Best to make sure there’s no trouble afoot.”

“You’re just nosey,” said Mabel, pulling him aside to plant a kiss on his lips.

“I’m the Mayor of Waterhen!” He declared in mock boastfulness. “It’s my God given right to be nosey.”

Chapter Nine:

Meanwhile, down the gravel road in the confines of the burgundy rental car Miranda was teeming with barely checked anger.

“You are so quiet tonight, love,” Brian commented, as he turned unto the driveway that would take them to the cabin. “Mad, are we?”

“Yes, I’m mad.” She turned toward him in her seat. “Really, Brian, what did you hope to gain by telling my closest neighbors that I’m a stripper?”

He grinned at her side profile. “You started it, by calling me the dark, dirty lil secret of the family.”

“For a grown man, you can be incredibly immature.” She retorted, as the small car’s headlights flashed across the front of the cabin.

“Sorry, love.  I thought you could take a joke.  Apparently, I was wrong.”

He parked the car and she got out before him and went to the cabin door, key in hand.  She slipped the key in and turned it to the right but nothing happened. 

The door was still locked. 

She tried the key again. 

Nothing. 

She felt Brian’s presence looming behind her, felt the warmth of his breath tingling her shoulder and was made uncomfortably excited by the effect that his breathing had on her.

Her breath caught in her chest as his hand covered her own and as she felt the lock give way, she was turning around, about to tell him that his help wasn’t necessary, that she could do it herself.  

She ended up staring up into captivating eyes of slate grey, eyes that made her pause at the intense longing she found in their dark and stormy depths.

As he lowered his head, she breathed in his breath and found it to be a very intimate and erotic thing. 

His lips gently covered hers and despite her protests early in the day, she did not retaliate in violence... but she did reply in kind, whimpering softly as she granted him access to her mouth, to her tongue, to her secrets, her pleasure.

His kiss ignited the desire that she had tried to deny for far too long but in the heat of his mouth, that denial was burned into ashes of oblivion. 

Oblivion, sweet oblivion was what she found in his kiss.

Her mind seemed cloudy, impaired of judgment as he stole the breath from her.  What was she doing? She loathed this man – loathed him! – didn’t she? 

But even as part of her mind screamed at her to stop, her body refused to obey, responding to his gentle, insistent hands the way kindling responds to fire: by bursting into flame.

Miranda was as aware of his tongue plundering the sweet recesses of her mouth as she was of his large, capable hands roaming over her shoulders, her back, her buttocks. 

As though entranced by him, hypnotized, she moved against him as he touched her, groaning as his hands cupped her denim clad cheeks and pulled her to them, so that they were again pelvis to pelvis, his arousal made blatantly obvious.

Her hands went up to find his short, dark hair of their own accord, reaching up past his shoulders, past his neck, to bury her fingers deep in the feather-softness she found there. 

She groaned again as his own fingers threaded in the hair of her temples, his hands cupping her face, that he might kiss her with greater direction, greater freedom, greater ardor... 

She was dizzy from her lack of breath but did not care that she might fall.  Sensing her weakness, Brian lowered one thick, powerful arm to her waist and held her steady against him.  With the other hand, he dared to tenderly massage one of her full breasts and then the other, teasing the nipples beneath the olive colored tank top into hard peaks.

His tongue flitted into her mouth again, drawing her attention away from his hands and back to his mouth.  She touched his face gingerly and kissed him with unchecked, unashamed passion.  He was making her weak with her want, weak with her desire. 

Her legs had given up on holding her steady long moments before.

And what of the pool of heat that had begun to build in her abdomen and her most intimate recesses, now bursting into flame at the assault of his tender attentions? 

Never, in her whole life, could she remember having been this aroused, this scorched by her own need for sexual release.  That Brian was as aroused as she, it fed her fire.

She kissed him with fervor, matching his unspoken need, when suddenly, the heat of his mouth was replaced by cool air. 

There was something he wanted to say.

“Miranda,” he crooned. “My sweet, succulent Miranda. What are we going to do about this intense attraction between us?”

She stiffened in his arms and he could see that he should never have spoken. 

Speaking had broken the spell, dispelled the magic. 

There was cool upset in her eyes now, instead of warm ardor.

Like mercury, her response to him had shifted, changed.

“Nothing,” she said, pulling away from him. “Absolutely nothing.”

“Nothing?”

He was disoriented by the sudden change in her.

Where there had been a warm, willing woman in his arms just heartbeats before, there was now just cold, indifferent air.

Shouldn’t have spoken, you stupid, stupid numbskull,
he scolded himself.

She opened the unlocked door, removed the key from the lock and clambered up the stairs. “I’m going to bed.”

“Want company?” He jested, knowing that it would rile her.

“In your dreams,” came her only reply.

Smiling to himself, Brian locked the cabin door behind him. 

The Ice Queen had responded to and melted beneath, his touch once again, leaving herself confused by her mercurial emotions. 

Brian was not so confused.

He knew that the intimacy he longed for only paled in comparison to her own desire for him. 

Never had he held in his arms a woman who could respond so quickly and feverishly to his kiss, his caress... 

She provoked in him a sexual hunger that threatened to burn him out in its heated intensity. 

Intensity. 

It was the word he could easily use to describe the look in her eyes as he had pulled away from their kiss, before he opened his big stupid mouth to speak instead of rain kisses down upon her.

How she had responded, for the second time! 

He knew that the third time would be better yet. 

He held close to him the secret of the intimacies that lie in the future for him and his pale faced, onyx haired temptress.  With a little tender loving care, administered in the right places, at the right times, without any more stupid comments from him, she would submit to him, he knew.

There was nothing he looked forward to more...

While Brian was in the foyer, smirking to himself, Miranda was in the master bedroom, stripping down to nudity.  As though a phantom were upon her, she could still feel his hands, touching her back, her bottom, her breasts, her face...

He had left her nipples sensitive and hard to the touch.  Her swollen lips, moistened center and softened breasts were a startling reminder of what had just occurred between them.

And what if she had not come to her senses? 

She gazed at the neatly made king sized bed and imagined for a moment what it would look like if Brian had come up here with her, still locked in the throes of their shared desire. 

Shared desire...

Her body thrilled at the memory of his hands and her mind balked at it.  Her arousal had proven traitorous, yet again, victor over her sensibilities.

She contemplated this latest kiss or kisses, rather. How they had enraged part of her at first, as surely as they had enthralled her at the same time.  She remembered how his lips had been so hungry, so insatiable, as he towered over her, invoking a hunger in her that she had never thought herself capable of.

He could be so sexy and attractive at times and yet – how pig headed he was, even for a man! 

All brawn and no brains. 

He was big and dense and chauvinistic, using his size to his advantage. 

To think she had succumbed to him, yet again! 

It was the second time in the same day that he had kissed her so brazenly, so boldly. 

And what was worse? 

She had kissed him back, on both occasions.

And what was worse than that?

Brian was a pawn of her uncle Russ, sent to keep her safely under the protection of Russ’ thumb. 

Swearing under her breath at the both of them, she donned her robe of green silk and prepared herself for bed.

She decided, as she brushed her long dark hair, that she loathed everything about Brian, from his huge body, to the confusion he brought out in her, to his cheesy Australian accent.

“Miranda,” she said softly, mimicking him. “
My sweet, succulent Miranda.
”

She realized as she crawled into bed that she had forgotten to brush her teeth and she did so want to get rid of the taste of him that lingered on her tongue. 

She could hear the TV going – he had not yet come up for bed. 

But then again, it was only ten o’clock.

Angry at him, at herself, at the whole situation, she marched down the steps in the skimpy robe and went to the bathroom to brush her teeth.  Brian sat in one of the two overstuffed armchairs, watching her intently.

As she brushed her teeth, she stared at herself in the mirror. 

Her cheeks were as flushed with color as were her lips and her eyes were bright with anger.

Although, was it anger or arousal
?

Both?
 

Anger
, she decided,
is a shade becoming of me –I’ll have to wear it more often, which should be easy, with Brian around
. 

She didn’t dare attribute the color in her cheeks to the passionate exchange that had occurred on the cabin’s porch.  She left the bathroom and hoped that he would not speak to her. 

She was not going to be that lucky...

“Got any potato chips?” He asked.

“No.”

“Any popcorn?”

“No.”

“Back to monosyllables, are we?” He continued, as she stomped up the first few stairs.

“
Yes.”

“Going to bed?”

“
Yes.
”

“There’s a good movie on, Mortal Weapon Five – care to watch it with me?”

“No.” She slammed shut her bedroom door.

“Didn’t think so,” he called up the stairs.

How typically male
, thought Miranda angrily.

Got any chips, any popcorn?  How annoying he was.  What was she, his grocer? 

She slipped between the sheets and shut of the lamp, darkening the room with shadows.  She was asleep before she realized that she had forgotten to call her Uncle Russ... and her dreams were not to be pleasant ones.

*          *          *

 “Miranda!”  She felt a weight upon her chest and she struggled to open her eyes. “Are you all right?”

“Of course I’m all right!” she snapped, though remnants of the dream were still with her.

“You had a nightmare. You called out for me in your sleep.”

Miranda stared at his naked chest for a long minute, chewing the lip that quivered between her teeth. He had turned on the lamp and as a result, was being bathed in a very flattering forty-Watt light.  He smelled so good to her, so male and reassuring. 

“By name?” She asked, disoriented.

“By name.”

“It was horrible.” She admitted softly, the fragments of dreamscapes clearing from her mind.

His smile was wary, full of concern. “You’re sure you’re okay?”