Notorious in Nice (3 page)

The strident tones of Chumbawamba’s “Tubthumping” splintered the tactile tranquil ambience of the Eden Roc restaurant. A violin strummed, the lyrics, “I get knocked down,” crashed into a sudden quiet.

“That’s me, I’m afraid,” Terrence grouched, and he glared at a metallic BlackBerry lying next to his white plate. “Excuse me.” He swapped the phone for his crumpled napkin, rose, and strode over to the balcony.

Taking his seat again a few minutes later, he shifted to face Su-Lin, one arm along the back of her chair. “I have to go, darlin’.” One forefinger slipped along the scooped back of her shirt, shooting sparks across her flesh. “Remember, tonight you’re mine. Say it for me.”

“Okay,” she whispered. It was time, and fate had chosen him as her first lover. A heady thrill had Su-Lin entranced. She followed the progress of the slow, satanic curling of one corner of his mouth, the way his slate eyes darkened at the edges, and she wet her lips, ravenous for another taste of him.

“Perfect.” He rose and threw his napkin to the left of his plate.

“James, Emma. I have to cut short this delightful lunch. I’ll see you later on this evening at the reunion cocktail party. It’s been a pleasure.”

Much to her disconcertment, he walked away without a backward glance.

From the second he set eyes on Jenny, Terrence O’Connor’s prick saluted. Before the battle even engaged between brain and cock, the little head that ruled any sexual male thickened in triumph, and from that point on, predatory prehistoric lust directed his every caveman-staking-a-claim action. He’d followed her out of the steam room, through the empty pool area, and into the women’s locker room.

A throng of gray- and blue-haired women had immediately surrounded him. And like vultures pecking away at carrion, they poked and prodded his chest, his biceps, his belly button. As gnarled hands captured prick and butt cheeks, Terry vaulted out of range and sprinted to the safety of the men’s room.

Superman never donned garments so fast. Her glistening pussy, those moist sable curls lovingly caressing dusky rose folds, was imprinted on burning pupils, and he wasted no time.

European security meant upscale hotels like the Eden Roc required photo IDs for all their guests. Since a fellow Royal Marine managed the hotel, Terry had her name within minutes: Jenny Su-Lin Taylor. The credit card against the account listed one James Lockheed and the address of a Hong Kong enclave he recognized from his aristocratic boyhood.

A surge of leprechaun luck heralded his pursuit when the concierge informed Terry the same James Lockheed had inquired about chartering the
Glory
. He could almost feel his prick ramming into her tight sheath.

“When did he inquire?”

“When he checked in yesterday.” The concierge cleared his throat. “He, um, said he’d read about you.”

His gut nose-dived. “Has there been a newspaper article about me recently?”

The other man’s complexion paled, and Terry’s jaw clenched. “When? Do you have a copy?”

“Sunday last, and yes, I kept it for you. Was going to give it to you before you left.”

Terry cricked his neck left, then right, while the man reached under the desk and retrieved a folded paper.

LE MEURTRIER LIBÈRENT TOUJOURS, the
Nice-Matin’s
headline read, the words centered above a grainy black-and-white shot of him four years earlier.

“I guess I should be grateful it’s only in the Local section,” Terry mused, his lip curling. “This the only copy you kept?” He doubled the newsprint, hiding the black letters, which spelled out “murderer” in French.

“On the boss’s orders.”

“Thanks. This Lockheed couldn’t have read it then, not if he arrived yesterday. Where’d he come in from?”

“He and his wife list a Hong Kong address as their home, their niece lists somewhere in Ohio.”

“Niece? About five-four, waist-length black hair?” Terry asked.

“That’s her. Amazing eyes.”

He flipped his wallet open and handed the man a couple of five-hundred euros.

“I noticed. Room number?”

“Penthouse, honeymoon suite.”

“How apropos,” he murmured, picturing her lying on the circular oversize bed, one leg bent, luscious curves and folds on display. “Thanks.”

A surge of desire overwhelmed him; he wanted to abduct the exotic beauty, take her someplace where the world wouldn’t intrude, and screw her brains out. Let those tight little curls between her legs know the minute his gaze flitted to that secret place, she should be hot, wet, creaming for him.

Nothing in life to date had prepared him for his reaction to this Jenny Taylor.

His Asian aphrodisiac.

Two, maybe three minutes in the steam room, and his world had changed, focused on a single goal, getting inside her, pounding his possession.

Leprechaun luck shone its merry green light again, and he’d managed to engineer the three-week cruise less than half an hour later.

Three weeks.

His cock broke into a heady jig, weeping precum onto his belly. Jaysus, he’d spent the night before servicing two women, gotten less than thirty minutes of sleep, and the mere thought of Jenny had him randier than a billy goat condemned to celibate purgatory. And to think he’d felt jaded, disgusted with his pointless, soul-depraved life minutes before she sashayed into the steam room.

That black cloud of hair, those startling Irish mountain emerald eyes, that diminutive Amazon-toned body. One glimpse and he’d flashed to a firestorm. And still blazed, whirling in the dust-devil turbulence she’d raised.

That kiss at the restaurant had been intended as a teaser. He wouldn’t have stopped if they hadn’t been interrupted. He’d have taken her in the john; he’d been so fired up, so fricking close to coming in his pants. Terry headed straight to the shower and jerked off.

A man like him had very specific appetites. From boyhood, if he craved steak but could only devour fish, even if he consumed an entire boatload of catch, Terry remained hungry, unsated. The only exception to this was women. Pretty much one hole resembled another, frequency more important than any particular female. But masturbation didn’t work this time, and he prowled his hotel suite burning with need.

Three hours to the cocktail event, he’d surrendered to the urge and gone down to the lobby cruising for a hook-up.

Nada.

Nothing, not one woman appealed. Even though he tried and had a woman in his room within half an hour, for the first time in his life his prick and his brain suffered a disconnect, one ready, the other picturing Jenny in the steam room, refusing to settle for less.

Jaysus.

Despite less than half an hour of slumber the night before, he couldn’t nap, couldn’t relax. Restless, uneasy, he went for a five-mile run along the beach.

For some reason, his thoughts strayed to Ireland, to Arran, to the father who’d disowned him more than a decade ago. Morose regrets dogged him, and he pushed his body to the limit, sprinting the last mile to the Cap.

Rolan Paxton’s marriage a few weeks earlier had started this internal strife. Watching Rolan and his new wife, Sarita, take their vows under the stars and the moon in Monaco’s Hotel de Paris’s Grill Room restaurant had made him malcontent. Seeing their mutual entrancement, their inability to take their eyes off each other, even for a minute, ignited an ache in Terry’s heart.

As a boy, even as a teenager, he’d been a romantic. His father and mother set the example, the perfect couple, in love to the end. He’d always expected to end up married and besotted, and then came the headache that ultimately killed his mother.

“Yo, Terry!” Harrison’s shout came from the side door to the Cap’s lobby.

He strode up the beach to his first mate and bent over gasping until he caught his breath. Winded, but able to speak, Terry lifted his T-shirt and mopped his face. “What’s up?”

“Got a text message from Geoff. He’s agreed to a charter for the
Glory
. We leave in three days.”

“Fricking rotten timing. I just agreed to a three-week Greek charter leaving Friday morning.”

“I thought we were taking a short break.” Harrison tipped his Stetson and met Terry’s gaze. “What’s up? Or should I say who’s up? You’re wearing that new-woman-in-sight expression.”

“Give me the details of Geoff’s charter.”

Harrison winced as shrill microphone feedback echoed around the hotel’s narrow beachfront. Drums and the discordant clash of an untuned guitar mingled with the high-pitched squealing.

Terry shook his head and pointed to a narrow path through bleached rocks.

Harrison grimaced but strode in the direction of the trail with Terry in tow. Neither man spoke until they passed through the well-trod tunnel, which cleaved the promontory in two. The tall boulders acted as sound insulation, muting the musical cacophony to a distant thrumming.

“I hate karaoke on the beach,” Terry muttered. “Should be fricking outlawed as noise pollution.”

“Whoa. Lookee there,” Harrison drawled and dug his elbow into Terry’s side.

“What?”

“By the kids’ swings,” he replied and pointed to a level area of the beach that sported one lone occupant.

“I see.” Terry shaded his eyes, and a certain familiarity about the female figure tugged at his brain.

“Some body on that sugar,” Harrison quipped. “I don’t know about you, but I’m for a closer peek at this sweetmeat.”

Curiosity stirred, Terry fell into place, matching his stride to Harrison’s. The steep upward slope of the fine white sand meant they couldn’t discern the female’s features until they stood about six feet to the left of the petite woman.

Jaysus.

Terry sucked in his breath and held it, staring at the vision before his unbelieving eyes. His Asian aphrodisiac was so absorbed in some sort of exercise routine, she hadn’t even noticed their arrival.

“Crap,” Harry muttered. “What the hell’s up with this? Is that sugar Asian with colored contact lenses? Son of a bitch, no one can have eyes that color and all that blue-black hair. I think I’m in love.”

“Sod it, boyo. That one’s mine. Scratch her off your bull’s-eye.”

“You don’t have to snap,” Harry grumbled. He whistled. “Will you look at that? Did she just do a split across those two bars?”

Heels touching only, Jenny Su-Lin hung suspended between the two gleaming silver bars in a perfect split, perpendicular to the powdery beach. She rotated slowly so her head paralleled the beach, stretched lithe fingers to ankles, then levitated off the bars and somersaulted to the ground, arms raised over her head, back arched, pretty bare feet perfectly aligned.

His heart settled back into place and fear gave way to fury. Terry jabbed one fist into his palm, letting the fierce sting dissolve the urge to strangle his little Asian. One wrong move and she could have broken her neck. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he noted the teal gymnast’s formfitting, high-cut leotard, which revealed surprisingly long legs, firm thighs, and a rounded, tight butt.

It had taken the last fifteen minutes of running at full pace to subdue his raging erection. One glance at her suspended in that split undid the last hour of punishing exercise as his cock reacted to the mental images imprinting his pupils. Lurid visions, which proved almost as blinding as the glaring afternoon sunlight, made him blink furiously against its brilliance.

Could she take him that way?

In a split?

Harrison cleared his throat.

Eyebrows raised to her hairline, she jumped and twisted to face them.

Their eyes meshed across the short distance, and she stiffened, gazed to the left for a brief moment, and swung her head back to meet his stare. She flashed him this saucy, impish grin and clamped small hands on lean hips. Her whole stance, chin tilted up, shoulders squared in a provocative come-get-me challenge, inflamed him.

Terry tipped her a two-fingered salute and knew she’d milk his aching cock tonight. Ready and willing, she’d so much as said the words.

“You know her?” When Terry didn’t respond, Harry elbowed his rib cage. “Earth to O’Connor. Who is she?”

“Her aunt and uncle want to the charter the
Glory
for three weeks. That’s the charter I agreed to this morning.”

“You and your leprechaun luck. What a sweet piece of meat. How old?”

“Almost jailbait for us, boyo. Twenty-one, small-town girl. From what the uncle said earlier, she’s been caring for a sick mother. Trip’s a graduation present from the aunt and uncle.”

As Terry watched, she toweled off, glanced at them, cheeks pinkening, and gave a little shake of her head. Dropping a cream towel on a steel bar, she jumped, hands clamping onto the high bar, her back to them. Swinging her legs faster and faster, she somersaulted the couple of feet between the parallel steel frames and went into a fast series of tumbles and tight turns.

“Jaysus,” Terry muttered.

“And then some,” Harrison said, shoving his hat off his head. “Kind of unnerving up close.”

“Too true, boyo, too true.”

“Shucks, Terry, you’re gonna break that sugar’s heart. And she has this air of fragility, kind of a sweet sadness about her.”

“Until I saw that little performance I’d have agreed with you. Trust me, Harry, you can’t be internally fragile and have the discipline and determination to become an accomplished gymnast. Yet, you’re right. She looks unsullied by the sins of the world.”

“She’s one freaking flexible woman. Did you see that?”

In exquisite slow motion, Jenny bent over at the waist, rested her palms on the sand, and lifted her pointed toes off terra firma, spread them perpendicular to the ground, and paused. She pirouetted, raised both legs above her head, torso a perfect, still straight line. Each movement sucked in Terry’s gut until air didn’t make it to his lungs.

“Three weeks ain’t gonna be enough, not with that sweetmeat. She’s blushing. When was the last time you saw a grown woman blush?”

“Don’t even think it, Harrison Ford.” Terry’s eyebrows slashed together as he levered a scowl at his first mate.

“That sugar’s marrying material, and I have a hunkering to settle down. She’s sweeter’n double-chunk peanut brittle, and there’s no way you get to be the only gunslinger in town.” Harry dusted off his hands.

“Sod the cowboy prattle, she’s not close enough to impress. Don’t cross me on this one, Harrison. I’m warning you.”

“Since when do you care who gets to pussy first?”

“This one’s mine. Touch her and you’re off the
Glory
, indefinitely.”

“Might be I’ll call you on that one. We’ll see.”

“Boyo, you’d better fricking not be planning what I think you are. Time you got back to the
Glory
and earned your keep. I’ll touch base tomorrow. Have a complete engine overhaul done. Miss a trick and it’s your hide.”

“
Sieg Heil
, Captain!” Harry said, snapped booted heels together, and gave a Hitler’s salute. “Tyranny so wins out over charm. But there’s a small matter of two charters at the same time. What’re you going to do?”

The few seconds of distraction proved fatal, and when he glanced up, Jenny Taylor had vanished.

“Terry? The two charters?”

“I’ll phone Geoff and see if I can fob the other one off for four weeks.”

“Your call. You’re the captain. Even if it’s blatantly obvious you’re thinking with your prick.”

“Sod it, Harry. I’ll meet you back at the
Glory
.”