Seduced by Stratton (The English Brothers Book 4) (23 page)

“Perfect,” said Val, giggling and nodding. “Definitely ask her out, Joe.”

They’d shaken hands and parted friends, and Val was relieved to be free of Joe, free to see what could happen with Stratton now that their hearts were unfettered to anyone else.

The downstairs door buzzed to let her know that Stratton was here.

“I guess that’s Joe,” said Barrett, glancing at the intercom by the apartment door.

“Actually—” started Val, rushing to press the button that released the downstairs door.

“He’s really nice, Val,” interrupted Emily. “Invite him in for a few minutes.”

She decided not to correct them, knowing full well they’d be shocked when they saw who was picking her up. Her lips tilted up, imagining their imminent surprise.

She took a deep breath, unlatched the chain, and opened the door.

“Hi,” she said, looking up at Stratton, who wore a long black overcoat open over jeans, a white T-shirt, and a dark blue cashmere sweater. Behind his glasses, his eyes consumed her face, drinking her in, finally resting on her lips. She tilted her head back and leaned forward just a little so that when he dipped his head, they met for a kiss hello.

But the tone of the kiss changed instantly. As soon as their lips touched, she felt his arms slip around her waist, pulling her against him. She wound her hands around his neck and pressed into him as his lips moved restlessly across hers and his tongue slipped into her mouth. Her fingers slid into his thick blond hair, and she moaned low in her throat, loving the feel of him, the taste, the urgency. Heart racing, chest heaving, she felt weak and wanting, but mostly, she felt like there was nowhere else on earth she’d rather be.

“
What the hell?
”

Stratton’s neck jerked up, his lips abruptly abandoning hers, and she stared straight ahead at his neck, blinking in surprise and trying to catch her breath.

“
Stratton?
” Barrett’s voice behind her was not just incredulous. It was shocked.

“Hey, Barrett,” answered Stratton, tightening his grip on Val. She could hear the amusement in his voice, and it made her smile as she laced her hands together against the back of his neck, resting her forehead on his chest. Her cheeks were hot and probably as maroon as her blouse, so she didn’t turn around, hiding in the safe haven of his arms instead.

“Um . . . what’s—I mean, what’s up, um, with you, Strat?”

“Just picking up my girl for dinner,” he answered casually, clearly having fun with the situation, and Val trembled with silent laughter as she imagined Barrett’s face.

“Your . . .
girl,
” said Barrett carefully then he turned to Emily, demanding, “Did you know about this?”

“N-No,” Emily answered in a stunned, breathy voice.

Val released Stratton’s neck and turned around in his arms to smile at her friends. “Joe didn’t work out.”

“But, apparently,” noted Emily with a surprised, but growing, grin, “Stratton did.”

“Mm-hmm,” she murmured, still beaming, still breathless from kissing him.

Val leaned back against his chest, tilting her neck to the side as he dropped his head to whisper near her ear, “You ready to go?”

“Yeah,” she answered, chuckling softly at Barrett and Emily’s still-shocked faces. “Um, I don’t think I’ll be back tonight.”

Stratton increased his grip around her and confirmed, “She definitely will not be back tonight. She may or may not be back by Thursday.”

Val couldn’t contain the short burst of laughter from his bold, playful comment, but her cheeks blazed with heat. She didn’t contradict him, just tried to breathe as he touched his lips to the side of her neck.

Emily’s eyes widened as they darted from Stratton to Val. “You
have
to fill me in at some point.”

“At some point,” agreed Val.

Stratton only let her go so she could grab her purse from the back of the couch. It contained her favorite book of love letters, and she’d thrown a toothbrush into it at the last minute. She’d thought about bringing a nightgown, but if she had her way, the chances of her wearing anything tonight would be next to none.

“Well, um, you two, just . . . be safe,” said Barrett, fumbling for words.

The low rumble of Stratton’s laughter as he held her parka for her made Val shake her head, laughing softly too. She stepped into it and zipped up before looking into his eyes, which looked at her like she was a miracle to him.

“I’ll keep her safe,” said Stratton, his smile tender as his eyes searched hers. “I promise.”

Trying to control the fierce pounding of her heart, she glanced back at Emily and Barrett to wave goodbye as Stratton pulled her out the door.

“It feels so good to be near you again. I missed you. I missed you so much, Val,” said Stratton as soon as they were both buckled into the car. They were close to his apartment, and he was relieved because it was starting to snow, coming down fast and thick. “Thanks for giving me another chance.”

“Thanks for asking for one,” she said softly, then added, “I missed you too.”

“Sorry about last night,” he said. “I think I took the wrong advice from well-meaning fans of overblown romantic gestures.”

“You redeemed yourself with the calla lilies.”

“Yeah,” he said, nodding. “They made you happy.”

“They did. They felt so much more like you.”

He put his right hand, palm side up, on the armrest between them, and was relieved when she laced her fingers through his.

“Where’d you come up with red roses and a suit?”

“My cousin, Kate,” he confessed. “She insisted. She said I needed to launch an attack on your heart. And Fitz, for that matter, who said to pull out the stops and go after you with everything I had. And frankly, your aunt . . . who indicated that showing up at your family dinner was the ticket to winning you back.”

“I’d like to meet Kate,” said Val, grinning. “But don’t take her advice anymore. Nor Fitz, nor my aunt. Just do things your own way. Your way is ten times better for me. I like you just the way you are.”

Stratton lifted their hands to his lips and kissed her knuckles gently.

“Did I tell you that you’re stunning?”

“No,” she answered.

“You are,” he said. “You’re always beautiful. But tonight you’re stunning.”

She took a nervous breath. “I’m not used to you being like this. I keep expecting you to blurt out ‘I’m not attracted to you’ or something.”

He winced. “I’m never going to live that down, am I?”

“I knew you were lying. I watched your eyes and your lips, the color in your cheeks, the way your voice changed . . . but you sure fought it tooth and nail, Stratton.”

“Every time I looked at you,” he confessed, “I had to force myself to look away.”

“Because of Amy,” said Val softly, then, “Will you tell me about her?”

They stopped at a red light, and he turned his neck to look at her. Honestly, he didn’t want to start their date talking about Amy. But he also understood that Val might have trouble trusting him until she understood why, and if he wanted them to have a chance, he needed her to trust him.

“What do you want to know?”

“Who was she to you? Did you ever date? Did you ever sleep together? Why did you feel like you needed to protect her? What if she breaks off her engagement? Are you going to go running back to her? Are you sure she’s not ‘in your heart’ anymore?”

“Okay. Easy questions first. No, I never dated her, and I definitely never slept with her. If she breaks off her engagement I will feel badly because she’s my friend, but I will never, ever be interested in her romantically again. And she is absolutely not in my heart anymore, because my heart belongs to you.” He squeezed her fingers gently to let her know he meant it, pressing down cautiously on the gas when the light turned green because the roads were getting slippery. “We both moved into my apartment building about two years ago, and the first night I met her I sort of fell for her. As you know, I tend to blurt out things on my mind, and it’s pretty alienating sometimes. We had this really awkward first conversation, but she was so cool about it. She gave me a second chance and I—I don’t know . . . I really liked that about her. But things really escalated in my head five minutes later when I realized she was dating Étienne Rousseau.”

“Wow,” said Val. “What a great name. Who’s that?”

“Not a great person. In addition to being a world-class misogynist and cheating on Amy constantly over the past four years, Étienne slept with my cousin Kate a long time ago. He then decided to brag about ‘Easy English’ at our school until Alex gave him a sound beating. He really hurt Kate because I think it meant something to her, and it obviously meant nothing to him. Speed up a decade and I meet this really cool girl as I’m moving into my apartment building, and then Étienne appears to pick her up for dinner. She seemed so great, and I knew the chances of him hurting her were high. It made me nuts.”

“So, what was your plan?”

“To seduce her away from him,” admitted Stratton, his cheeks flaring with heat. “But it didn’t work. I don’t know the first thing about how to seduce a woman. Not to mention, she only saw me as a friend.”

“Stupid girl,” murmured Val, bringing his hand to her lips and kissing it. “Lucky me.”

“Because of my history with Étienne, I wanted to fix the situation. I wanted to get Amy away from him so she’d be safe from harm, so he couldn’t hurt her like he hurt Kate. But you want to know the truth?”

“Always,” said Val as Stratton pulled into the garage under his building, releasing his hand so he could park.

He cut the engine and searched her eyes in the dim light. “What I only realized after being with you, was that we weren’t a match, me and Amy. We wouldn’t have made sense. I hate her taste in movies. She’s a nice person, but when you scratch the surface, her conversation isn’t very compelling to me. All she ever talked about was Étienne. She never asked me about my day or my family or my thoughts . . . about anything. There wasn’t anything really unique about Amy. Not to me, at least. But the thing that bothered me the most was that she didn’t have a lot of spirit. I couldn’t understand how she could stay with someone who mistreated her, who cheated on her, who made her so sad. It really bothered me.”

“She was blinded by him,” said Val. “It happens to the best of us.”

“Not to you.”

“Someone looking objectively at
this
situation might not agree.”

“You’re saying I mistreated you and made you sad?”

She shook her head. “No, I didn’t say that.”

“But part of you thinks that?” he asked, his heart dropping.

“Mistreated me? No. But I’m comfortable saying that a small part of me is cautious after what happened between us.”

“Then why are you here?” he asked, worried for her answer.

“Because the rest of me can’t stay away.” She smiled at him, and there was playfulness in her eyes, edging out the melancholy. “And because you like my taste in movies, and you find my conversation compelling. Because I ask you about your family and your work and care about your answers. Because I’m different from the girls you grew up with, which makes me unique to you and draws you to me. And maybe most of all, because you respected it when I walked away from you that morning. It made you realize what you had lost.”

“All true,” he murmured, mesmerized.

“Which means I don’t need to be jealous of her anymore.”

“Damn, it’s hot when you do that.”

Her smile broadened. “Do what?”

“Go all relationship-Ph.D. on us. It’s sexy as hell, Val.”

She beamed at him, cocking her head to the side and biting her lower lip before asking, “Go all relationship-Ph.D. on
whom
?”

“On
us
,” he whispered, reaching up to cradle her heart-shaped face in his palms and capturing her lips with his.

***

It was a little while before they made it into his apartment, but as they exited the elevator hand in hand, Val decided she was glad she’d asked the questions about Amy and shared her own worries about giving them a chance. She felt lighter and more confident, like she was exactly where she needed to be.

He unlocked the door and pulled her into his apartment, closing the door behind them. Reaching for her in the darkened front hallway, he pulled the zipper down her parka and slid it down her shoulders, dropping it on a bench behind him and quickly adding his to the pile. He placed his hands on her hips and drew her against him.

“I want to kiss you again,” he murmured in the darkness.

“You can kiss me whenever you want to,” she whispered back.

She pulled him down to her, closing her eyes and sighing into his mouth as his open lips landed on hers. Still holding her, he stepped forward until Val felt the vestibule wall against her back, and he slid his hands up her arms to her neck, cupping her jaw as his tongue swept into her mouth. His thumbs framed her lips, stroking gently.