Seduced: The Unexpected Virgin (6 page)

And more than any of that, he wanted to kiss her. To feel her lips, hot and wet beneath his. To kiss her until her irritation turned to surprise and then keep on kissing her until that turned to desire. Until she wanted him with the same deep pounding need that he wanted her.

But of course, the one thing he didn’t want to do was alienate her. Which kissing her would certainly do. Forget stripping her naked and lavishing her body with kisses.

Now, she was looking at him suspiciously. Little wonder since he was taking so long to respond. Instead of replying right away, he crossed into the kitchenette and pulled another tumbler from the cabinet.

He held it up in a gesture. “Do you drink tequila?”

She gave him a you’re-an-idiot look, followed by a brief nod. “I mean, I don’t do shots on a regular basis or anything. But
I’ve lived most of my life in Southern California. Pretty much everyone drinks tequila on occasion.”

“Good point.” He poured himself a finger and then one for her. He nudged hers across the counter.

She took a ladylike sip, a testament to her previous experience with Gran Patron. It was a sipping tequila.

He nodded in approval, then raised the glass in a silent toast and took a drink of his own, relishing the sharp burn down his throat. Then he set the tumbler down.

There was a part of him that wanted to tell her outright how much he wanted her. It was the same part of him that wanted to bend her over the table and plow into her right now. But he didn’t think either technique would fully satisfy him. Instead, he started talking. Doing what he did best. Seducing her with the sound of his voice and his ability to weave a story.

“When you’re a musician,” he began. “Everybody wants to buy you drinks. Club owners, fans, other musicians. Right or wrong, I’ve been drinking tequila since I was fifteen. A lot of it is pretty nasty stuff. It’s why you do shots, with salt and lime.” He picked up his tumbler again and held it up so the light from the pendant over the bar shone through the glass. The liquid was as clear as water. Only the astringent sting of it in his nose indicated its seductive power. “But Gran Patron, it’s the best sipping tequila in the world. You don’t drink it in shots. You linger over it. You savor it.”

In turn, she lifted her glass, took another sip and let it slide down her throat. He watched the delicate muscles in her neck shift beneath her skin as she swallowed. There was something innately erotic about watching her drink. Something about just being with her that soothed him.

Yes, she got in his face about Hannah’s Hope, but he never felt like she was desperate for a chunk of him, the way he sometimes felt with people. That only added to her appeal. Only reinforced the gut-wrenching desire he felt for her.

Since she didn’t say anything, he kept talking. “I’ve found women are a lot like tequila. When you’re a musician, there’s a lot of them around. Like cheap tequila, sometimes you indulge
without lingering over them. Something you do just because it’s there and it’s available.” He rolled the tumbler between his palms. “I loved my wife and I never once cheated on her, I was never even tempted. Why would I drink a shot of cheap tequila just because someone handed it to me when I had something worth savoring back at home.”

He looked at her then, his expression darkening. He took another drink of the Patron and then asked as if it was only just now occurring to him, “Does that analogy offend you?”

She thought about it for a second, tilting her head to the side as she considered. While she could see how it might offend some people, it didn’t bother her. “My father used to say that women are like Eskimos. You’ve heard the myth about Eskimos having forty words for snow? He said women were like that. We have hundreds of words for emotions. But men don’t. They describe women like possessions because they have no other way to convey how desperately they need them.”

Funny, she hadn’t thought about that in a long time. Growing up, her parents lectured her endlessly about staying out of trouble. They were so afraid of her messing up her life and her future by doing drugs or having sex and getting pregnant. Her mother’s lectures had been frequent, redundant and sometimes infuriating. But her father’s words had stuck with her.

Don’t sleep with a boy just because he says he loves you,
he’d told her.
That’s just a word boys will use to get you into bed. Wait for the boy who wants you enough that he’s willing to wait. Wait for the boy who can’t tell you how much he loves you. The boy who makes you believe it.

And she’d never met a guy like that. And so here she was, a virgin at twenty-seven. Honestly, she’d begun to doubt love like that really existed. Yes, her parents were daily proof that it did, but she knew their relationship was rare. Maybe even a throwback to a simpler time and place. Maybe her generation had lost the ability to love so completely. Maybe decades of rising divorce rates and instant gratification had bred it out of them.

But listening to Ward compare Cara to sipping tequila, for the first time she believed love like that was really possible.

This man standing before her had faced every temptation imaginable. He had to have had countless opportunities to be unfaithful, but he’d loved his wife too much. Even now, three years later, he loved her too much to live in the house they’d shared together. He couldn’t even discard her sunglasses.

How could that kind of devotion offend her, no matter what terms he couched it in?

She may not be able to understand the full depths of his grief. But she could respect it. And she certainly wasn’t going to judge him for it. She hardly knew him well enough to have an opinion on what was a healthy way for him to grieve for his wife.

Circling back to his earlier request, she said, “If you don’t want Chase to know you’re living in the carriage house, he’s certainly not going to hear it from me.”

He nodded slowly and smiled. “Thanks.”

But the smile looked sad. And a little rueful. Like he knew it was time to move on, but still wasn’t sure if he wanted to.

She buried a wistful sigh. Her reasons for coming now seemed so self-serving in the face of his obvious grief. “I’m sorry I invaded your privacy. I should have left you alone.” She set down the tumbler of tequila and headed for the door. He stopped her after only a step.

“Why did you come here?”

It sounded silly now. She had the unmistakable impression that the things he’d told her just now weren’t the sort of thing he shared with just everyone. So she’d probably been wrong. And if she hadn’t, so what? Why invade his privacy just to feed her insecurity? She’d worked with plenty of people she didn’t like in the past. She was professional enough to do it this time around.

Except, of course, that she
did
like Ward. Immensely. And that, of course, was part of the problem. She didn’t want there to be a likable person beneath the glamour of the megastar. But since there was, she’d have to figure out how to deal with him on her own.

Since Ward was still waiting for an answer, she smiled ruefully and said, “I thought you didn’t like me.”

However, when she looked up at Ward, she realized he’d gone completely still. He looked at her over the rim of his half raised tumbler with one eyebrow quirked. “What was that?” he asked, his voice pitched low.

That sultry tone sent a shiver down her spine, one she did her best to hide the effects of. She forced a nonchalant laugh. “It sounds silly now. But I thought maybe you’d been avoiding me.”

“Avoiding you?” he asked. There was note of humor in his words. Like she’d just unwittingly repeated some private joke.

“Yes,” she tried to keep her frustration out of her voice, but didn’t succeed. “Avoiding me. You took a different flight out to Charleston, even though there wasn’t really a board meeting. You haven’t been at CMF, even though Stacy assures me that you’re usually there every day that you’re in town.” His smile broadened, and her hands automatically went to her hips. “The other day at Hannah’s Hope, you totally got in my face about whether I had a problem working with you. So, what? I’m not allowed to do the same thing?”

Her irritation crept back into her voice. Dang it, what was it about him that got under her skin?

She blew out a sigh and gave her shoulders a little roll to relieve the kinks of tension before adding, “It’s not a big deal. I just thought I’d ask.”

He slowly lowered his tumbler and grinned. “Let me get this straight. You think I’m avoiding you? Because I don’t like you?”

She gritted her teeth for a second before answering. “Yes. And I don’t want it to affect my work at—”

But before she could finish her sentence, he rounded the island and crossed the room to where she stood. She nearly gasped in surprise as he pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

K
issing Ana was as close to heaven as a man like him could get. She smelled like snickerdoodles and tasted like his favorite tequila. Unless her skin was actually sprinkled with sugar, he just didn’t see how she could get any better.

Her mouth was hot and moist and after an instant of surprise, unbelievably pliant and responsive. The purse she’d been holding slid off her shoulder and hit the floor and then her hands crept up around his neck to weave through his hair. She deepened the kiss, opening her mouth beneath his and boldly stroking her tongue against his teeth. His hand automatically sought her bottom, lifting to press her against his growing erection.

She tilted her hips forward, rubbing herself against him in a way that sent fissures of pure pleasure shooting through his body.

He hadn’t meant for the kiss to get out of hand. Hell, he hadn’t meant to kiss her at all. If she’d shown even the slightest resistance, he would have instantly let her go. But she melted against him, and so he clutched her to him even tighter and felt her shudder in response. He shoved her jacket off her shoulders
and down her arms. Turning them around, he backed her up a step and then another, until her back was pressed to the wall beside the door. Her hips were anchored against his, but he wedged his hands between their bodies to flick open the buttons of her shirt, one by one. The shirt fell open to reveal a flesh-colored lacy bra.

He slipped his hand inside her shirt to the silky skin beneath. When he cupped her breast in his hand, she broke her mouth free, gasping in obvious pleasure. She threw back her head. With her mouth parted and damp, her eyes half-closed, and her breath coming in rapid bursts, she was the very picture of eroticism. Sex personified. Arousal in pure human form.

Her tongue darted out to lick her top lip and his erection leapt in response, straining against the zipper of his jeans.

If she was this turned on by such a little harmless groping, he couldn’t imagine how she’d respond to all the things he wanted to do to her. He could almost imagine that the passion between them surprised her.

Then again, maybe it had. Just a few moments ago, she’d thought he didn’t like her. She’d thought he was avoiding her.

Instantly, two parts of him were at war. One part that wanted to strip her pants from her body, pull her panties down around her knees and plunge his fingers deep inside of her. He wanted to find her clitoris and stroke it until she was mindless with passion. He wanted to suck it into his mouth and drive her mad.

But the other part of him—the last few shreds of his logical mind—knew that this wasn’t the time. For any of that.

Ana was no cheap shot of…no, he stopped himself mid-thought. It felt wrong, somehow, to think of Ana in the same way he’d thought of Cara. They were too distinct. The comparison served neither of them well.

Ana was her own woman. Completely different from Cara. If Cara had been fine tequila, crafted, elegant and expensive, then Ana was…maybe the perfect margarita. A little salty, a whole lot of sweet and plenty of tart to balance it out. None of it hiding the drink’s powerful punch. All of the ingredients working in harmony to produce a whole that was nearly irresistible.

But still the fact that he would even think of both women in the same thought made him distinctly nervous. Cara had held his heart, his career, hell, his entire life in her hands. And look how long it had taken him to get over that. No way was he ready for that again.

Nevertheless, Ana deserved more than a quick coupling against the wall. She certainly deserved the truth.

He stepped away slowly, waiting until her feet were firmly back on the ground, before turning away and plowing a hand through his hair. Christ, how had he lost control so fast?

Squeezing his eyes shut, he finally admitted the truth. “I wasn’t avoiding you because I didn’t like you, I avoided you because of this.”

He looked back over his shoulder and took in the sight of her. She still stood with her back against the wall. Her breasts were rising and falling with each labored breath she pulled into her lungs.

With her shirt hanging open to reveal her perfect breasts encased in skimpy lace, she looked like his wildest fantasies come to life.

Her gaze still looked dazed and unfocused, proof that she didn’t yet comprehend what he was saying.

“I was afraid of this,” he admitted. “I knew the chemistry between us was palpable. I didn’t want to come on too strong. To ruin our working relationship.”

“Oh.” She seemed to realize suddenly that her shirt was still unbuttoned. Her fingers went to work fumbling on the problem, but her breath still came in rough drags and her normally quick mind seemed to be working at half speed, which was still faster than his tequila-addled one.

He was lucky he’d been able to stop at all.

He crossed back to the kitchen, emptied his tumbler into the sink and then got himself a fresh glass of ice water. Since she looked about as befuddled as he felt, he got her one, too.

She followed him into the galley kitchen and accepted the glass, shaking her head as if to clear it. “So you’ve been avoiding me because you like me?” Then she held up her hand to ward
off some protest she imagined he was about to make. “Forget I said that. That presupposes that affection and lust are somehow tied together.”

“Ana—” he started to protest.

“No. It’s okay.” She smiled in a wobbly I’m-a-brave-little-trouper sort of way. Then she raised the water glass and drank it in quick, successive gulps. Like she needed to be doused with something icy. “So you want me, but you don’t want to want me. Do I have that right?”

“Let’s just say, yes, I want you. But sex complicates things. And I don’t want to hurt you.”

She set the glass down on the granite counter with a thud. “You’re assuming you could hurt me.”

Her naïveté was charming. “Yes, I am assuming that.” Maybe he should feign modesty, but in truth, he knew her emotions would have little to do with the man he really was. “I’ve been a celebrity a lot longer than you’ve been dealing with celebrities.”

“That’s not true,” she argued vehemently. “I dealt with all kinds of celebrities when I worked in Hollywood.”

“How many did you sleep with?”

Her cheeks turned a fiery red. “That’s none of your business!”

So the answer was either a lot, or none. He’d bet none. “My point is, celebrities are very easy to fall in love with, but very difficult to love.”

He wasn’t a particularly likable guy. He didn’t know if he ever had been, back before Cara got sick, but he certainly wasn’t now. It was a common malady among the famous. People fell in love with their fantasy rather than the person who was standing right in front of them, making their life miserable.

When she looked ready to protest again, he pressed his finger to her mouth to quiet her. “I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want you falling in love with me and then one day waking up and realizing that I’m not the man you really wanted me to be. That wouldn’t be fair to you.”

She frowned, her gaze a little too insightful. “It sounds to me like that wouldn’t be fair to either of us.”

“You’re a sweet kid, Ana. I don’t want to hurt you.”

Her gaze narrowed at his use of the word
kid.
He’d known it would. She wasn’t a woman who took well to diminutives. There was more than one way to drive a woman away.

She jerked away from his touch, her gaze blazing and went to swipe her jacket off the floor. “So where does that leave us?” she asked, her tone tinged with defiance.

He shrugged. “We still have to work together for Hannah’s Hope. Right now, while we’re starting up, the board’s involvement is pretty heavy. I don’t see any way around that. But once things are underway, it’ll slow down. In a year or so, I can step aside and you can find a new board member.”

But her expression slowly darkened as he spoke and by the time he finished, he knew she was going to make this harder than it needed to be.

She shoved her arms back into the sleeves of her jacket, and slowly stalked toward him. “I meant, where does that leave us. Personally. You’re convinced I’m some kind of delicate flower who can’t handle being involved with you. But you’re wrong. I can handle anything I want to handle.”

He couldn’t help smiling at her bravado. And her choice of words. He should probably walk calmly away from that innuendo, but, damn it, he just couldn’t. “Am I to assume you want to handle me?”

She arched an eyebrow, opened her mouth as if to speak, then seemed to think better of it. After giving him an assessing stare, she admitted, “I don’t know.”

That careful consideration made him nervous. A quick
yes,
he could have easily dismissed. That need to pull her into his arms and devour her still pounded through him, but the cadence of it had slowed a little. It was controllable now. Gazing deep into her inky eyes, he could read nothing in them except the lingering traces of her passion.

She pressed her fingertips to her temples and squeezed her eyes shut for a second. Like she was trying to block out the chatter of her internal debate.

A second later, she opened her eyes, her expression just as
confused. “I know I don’t want to walk away from this. I don’t want to walk away from you.”

“Hey,” he said trying to keep his tone playful. “It’s not every day a celebrity saunters into your life, right?”

The hard edge in his voice surprised him. He’d long ago gotten over any annoyance over the nail-a-celebrity scorecard some women seemed to keep. And he didn’t really think Ana was that kind of woman. But apparently, he still needed to hear that straight from her.

“It’s not that.” Annoyance flickered across her face. “Which you know.”

And to be fair, he did know. It wasn’t about that for her. Obviously. She’d worked in Hollywood. Met plenty of stars bigger than him in her life before Hannah’s Hope. He didn’t know how she’d managed to escape male attention in Hollywood. Thank God her figure was lush and curvaceous. Maybe in the land of skinny starlets the men there were all too stupid to appreciate Ana’s figure. Though it was the spark of passion that really spoke to him. Her devotion to Hannah’s Hope. He was less confident about what attracted her to him.

“Then what is it?” he pressed, surprised by his desperate need to hear her voice her attraction. He wasn’t generally the kind of guy who needed to have his ego stroked.

She shrugged. “I’m not sure. But would it be so bad if we let it run its course? If we waited to find out?”

He let out a low grumble of displeasure. Again, he shook his head. “I’m not going to risk your heart out of curiosity.”

“It’s not your heart to decide.”

He cupped her cheek in his palm. “Here’s the thing. Celebrities are very easy to fall in love with. But we’re almost impossible to love.”

Sadness flickered across her face. For an instant, he thought it was because she thought he was blowing her off. But then her lips curved in an almost smile and he realized he’d mistaken sympathy for sorrow.

“Yes. You said that already.” She bumped up her chin and met his gaze boldly. “But I’m not going to fall in love with you.”

Despite his grim mood, he found himself smiling. “You’re not?”

“No. Not even a little bit.”

“You promise?”

Her smile turned a little mischievous. “Cross my heart and lock it with a padlock.”

He still knew he should say no. He should push her out the door. Shut it behind her. Put her on a plane back to San Diego and never see her again.

This instinct he had to possess her, to keep her with him…it wasn’t good for her. And he was a selfish bastard for giving in to it.

But what could he say. He wanted her, plain and simple. And it had been too long since he’d wanted anything. He’d grown greedy during his emotional abstinence and if she didn’t have the good sense to leave, he didn’t have the strength to make her.

“Okay,” he agreed.

She smiled broadly, as if she’d won some kind of prize. Like she was the lucky one here, when in reality he was the one who would walk away the winner. He would inevitably disappoint her and she’d be lucky if she didn’t get crushed.

She rose up on her toes, her hand sneaking around his neck, but he carefully dodged her grasp.

“But we take it slowly,” he explained. “I may want to take you to bed and do all kinds of sinful things to your body. But we’re not going to do that now.”

“Oh.” Her eyes widened. And then a blush streamed up her cheeks.

Either he’d shocked her with his bluntness—which was entirely possible—or she genuinely hadn’t considered the possibility that if he started kissing her again, he might not be able to stop.

She went rapidly from confusion to surprise to embarrassed satisfaction. She didn’t quite meet his gaze as she nodded. “Okay. So where do we go from here?”

“We go to dinner.”

“Dinner?”

“Yeah.” He grabbed her hand and tugged her toward the
door. He snagged a set of keys from the console. “Neither of us has eaten. Public is much better. I don’t trust myself alone with you.”

Ward let her drive to dinner. Though he’d only had two shots, it had been on an empty stomach since he hadn’t yet dug into the take-out leftovers. And she’d only had a sip of her drink. His sensibility on the subject impressed her. A lot of men viewed asking someone else to drive as an affront to their masculinity. Not Ward.

He let her choose which car she drove, offering up one of his instead of her mild-mannered rental. Standing in the bay of the carriage house garage, she considered her options. A bright Tesla—a powerful, all-electric sports car. Another Lexus hybrid, identical to the one he drove in California. And a fully-restored Hudson Hornet, all patent leather and gleaming chrome. Its sleek lines both elegant and powerful, giving the impression that it was a wild beast, poised to pounce on some prey.

She’d probably never again have the opportunity to drive a machine like this. Only an idiot would choose her rented sedan under the circumstances.

In many ways, this thing with Ward was just like that. All her life, she’d put off getting involved romantically. She’d held herself aloof. Made the sensible decision. In short, she’d been driving a sedan her whole life.