Taste for Trouble (12 page)

She
spit a strand of hair out of her mouth and glared over her shoulder at him. “I
didn’t
intend
to drop it, you know.”

He
smiled at her, amusement crinkling the corners of those oddly changeable eyes
of his, and she was suddenly aware that he hadn’t let her go. Water flowed over
their joined hands under the tap while his body nestled comfortably up against
her backside. A warmth snaked into her belly that had nothing to do with the
recent misapplication of hot tea to her person, so she concentrated on the painfully
cold water running over her burns instead.

“Tossed
it on a whim, then, did you?” He studied her gravely. “Wouldn’t have pegged you
for the impulsive type.”

She
glared at him. “I’m not. And if you’d had the manners to announce your presence
instead of sneaking up behind me, I wouldn’t have burned myself. Nor would I
have had cause to smash the single mug you seem to own.”

“Oh.
Well, that’s too bad about the mug.” He pursed up that perfect mouth of his and
considered this. Then he peeked over her shoulder and down the front of her
robe. “But there are benefits to doing it my way, too.”

Bel
glanced down, then seized her gaping lapels together with her free hand. She
was wearing a t-shirt under the robe, but it was old and baggy, and from that
angle, he’d probably gotten a decent look straight down it. And since Will likely
had a point about the—what had he had called them? Star fuckers?—James had
probably seen down a whole lot of women’s shirts. Which meant he was used to ogling
a female landscape quite different from the flat, prairie-like expanse of
blinding white skin she’d just treated him to. But that was no excuse for
mocking her. Benefits, indeed.

“I
beg your pardon,” she said stiffly. “I realize my dress is inappropriate. I
didn’t anticipate company.” She stepped to the side, putting a few badly needed
feet of space between her and the easy strength of his body.

“Now,
now. No need to poker up. I was just having some fun with you.” He gave her
that
shucks, ma’am
grin she was starting to dislike heartily, flipped
off the water and passed her a dishtowel. He nodded toward her hand. “That
going to be all right?”

She
patted her hand dry, gave it a quick glance and shrugged. “Of course. I bake
for a living. I get worse than this twice a week.”

He
reached for the hand in question, and though her impulse was to snatch it back
and run screaming for the safety of her bedroom, she figured that might be
overreacting. And revealing. James clearly had some sort of investment in
keeping her off balance, and if she kept stuttering and blushing every time he
touched her it would only encourage him to keep it up.

So
she gritted her teeth and let him take her hand. It looked small and white
against the tanned expanse of his big and blocky palm. Brick layer’s hands, she
thought for no reason she could imagine. But his fingers were gentle as they
brushed over each scar and nick, learning them as if by Braille.

“You
work hard,” he said.

“I
do,” she said, and admired her tone. Brisk, appropriate, completely unrattled. Which
was great, because her belly was flipping around inside her like a trout. God,
when
was he going to let go of her hand?

“What’s
this one?” He brushed his thumb along a white scar on the inside of her wrist
and sent her heart trundling into her throat.

“I,
uh, cozied up to a 500 degree oven without an oven mitt.”

“And
this?” He trailed a finger along a thin line crossing the knuckle of her index
finger.

“That
would be my Wusthof.” One dark brow arched into the sunny spill of hair over
his forehead and she said, “My first really nice chef’s knife. It cost the
world, or so I thought at the time. I julienned everything for weeks.”

“Including
yourself?”

“Sadly,
yes. But I still have that knife.”

He
smiled at her, delighted. “You’re a tool girl.”

That
smile, she thought, a little dazed. So easy and sunny and thought-stealing. The
way he
focused
it on her. She was starting to understand how women
looked at this man and decided, in spite of all the red flags, to take a flier.

“Not
normally, no,” she said, gripping her focus with both hands. “But this is a
Wusthof
.
A ten incher. It’s a beauty.”

He
just kept smiling at her and Bel wondered if she’d missed something, some
subtext of the conversation that made it her turn to keep talking. It wouldn’t
surprise her. She knew she wasn’t exactly a sophisticate. Getting where she was
had required the kind of 24/7 focus that hadn’t left any time for learning the
art of light flirtation.

Not
that what James did could be called light. The guy laid on the charm the way
the
Kate Every Day
makeup artists troweled on the foundation. If she was
going to survive this job and get her career back—get her
life
back—she
was going to have to learn to either shrug it off or convince him to stop
laying it on her in the first place.

Which
reminded her. She ought to at least try to get her hand back.

She gave
it an experimental tug but he held fast, still grinning that sunny grin at her.
The urge to smile back was overpowering.

Cripes,
Bel, she thought. Snap
out
of it.

“What?”
she asked. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

He
blinked, then shook his head. “Sorry. You were saying?” His grin went a little
sheepish around the edges. “I kind of lost focus right after you said
ten
incher
.”

“Oh,
for pity’s sake.” She yanked her hand back.

“What?
I’m a guy.”

“Maybe
you haven’t noticed,” she said. “But that
I’m a guy
thing? Eventually,
it wears pretty thin. People get tired of it, usually by the time you hit
thirty or so. Then they expect you to get over being a
guy
so you can be
a man instead.”

“A
man, huh?” His eyes lit with interest and something else Bel couldn’t identify.
But it made her want to step back when he stepped forward.

“Yes,”
she said, though it came out a little breathless. Space. She needed space. She’d
never liked people crowding her, particularly not men. She edged backward only
to discover the cool press of the countertop against the small of her back. “That’s
why I’m here,” she said, a little desperately. “To help you.”

“Help
me what?”

She
couldn’t see him moving forward but every time she looked away then looked back
he was closer. He was stalking her, she realized. The realization sent a hot
thrill arcing into her stomach, a thrill she couldn’t identify, exactly. Panic?
Fear? Anger?

Anticipation?

“Transition,”
she said, firming her voice up with a heroic effort. “From guy to man. And from
what I’ve seen, we have a ways to go.”

“Ah,
Bel. You don’t give yourself enough credit.” He closed the distance between
them with a single bold move, propped his hands on the counter on either side
of her hips and leaned in. “Since you turned up, I’ve been feeling more manly
every minute.”

She
sucked in a breath but the air had gone hot and dense between them. Every
molecule separating their bodies vibrated with something Bel refused to name. “See?”
she said, and if there was a panicked squeak in her voice she ignored it. “That’s
exactly the kind of thing that was probably cute five years ago. But now?”

Not
so much
, she’d planned to say.
It’s
not so cute anymore
. But then he leaned in and nuzzled at the hair she’d
tucked behind one ear.

“Now?”
he asked, his voice low and pleasantly rough, like a cat’s tongue.

“Now
it’s just—” she began but trailed off. It was hard to form a complete thought with
her entire being focused on the inch of space between that gorgeous, perfect
mouth of his and her earlobe. She must have wanted to say something, but for
the life of her she couldn’t think what it might have been. Couldn’t imagine
why she’d been chit-chatting while he was gearing up to do whatever this was to
her nervous system anyway.

“Just
what?” He buried his nose in her hair and breathed her in as if she were oxygen
itself. A thrill of pure pleasure shot straight through her. “Because I have to
tell you, I don’t
feel
cute.”

“How
do you feel then?” The sound of her own voice shocked her. When had her brain
given her mouth permission to speak? And who had authorized a question like
that? And in that voice? All throaty and
kiss me now
?

Still,
when he drew back to gaze at her with those silver-green eyes alight with lust
and amusement, she stared back and waited for her answer.

“Do
me a favor?” he said.

“What?”

“Shut
up a minute.”

“Why?”

“Because
I’m about to show you.”

CHAPTER TEN

“Oh.”
She paused while her sluggish brain connected the dots and arrived at the
startling conclusion that he was about to kiss her. “Oh! No! You should
definitely
not
do that. I’d prefer it if you just, you know,
told
me. Or not.” She gave her watch a desperate glance. “Wow, is that the time? I
really ought to get back to—” She broke off, unable to say the word
bed
with his beautiful mouth two inches from hers and intent emblazoned all over
his pirate’s face.

He
sighed. “Bel.”

“What?”

“Shush.”

She
frowned at him. “I’m sorry, did you just
shush
me?”

“Lord,
you’re making this difficult.”

She
stared at him. “I’m a difficult woman.”

“Tell
me about it.”

“I
just did.”

He
sighed again but closer this time, close enough that she felt his breath on her
cheek. Her stomach jittered itself right up into her throat.

He
slid one hand into the hair at the nape of her neck and she froze. Her brain
said calmly
you
you shouldn’t be
letting him do that
at the same time her entire nervous system said
Yes,
please
.

“Um,”
she said, her internal gears grinding.

“Shush,”
he said again.

A
spike of outrage shot through her at being shushed two times in a row but it
melted immediately into a confused little puddle. Because then he was kissing
her.

It
occurred to her, vaguely, that she might be in some sort of fugue state. It was
supposed to be kind of like sleepwalking, right? Where you could walk and talk
and interact, but weren’t actually conscious and therefore not responsible for
your actions? Fugue states weren’t at all uncommon, she told herself. She’d
read about them.

Besides,
she couldn’t think of any other possible reason why she was simply standing
there, in a threadbare robe and a fifteen-year-old t-shirt, letting the man
responsible for the demise of both her job and her wedding
kiss
her.

But,
lord, what a kiss. If his mouth looked like perfection, she didn’t even have
words for what it felt like. All she knew was that he smelled like mint
toothpaste and warm man, and that he took possession of her entire body with a
fluid ease that had every scrap of her DNA thinking reproduction.

His
body fitted itself against hers as if they’d been custom-designed to dovetail
just like this. He moved with the smooth assurance of a man whose mastery of
his own body was absolute, but without the air of entitlement that usually went
with it. This kiss didn’t demand so much as ask.

No,
not really ask, she thought through the fog of his hands in her hair, the magic
of his mouth on hers, the potent invitation of his body against hers. It was
more coax than ask.
Come on
, that kiss seemed to say.
Where’s the
harm? Just a taste, see?

He
lingered over her lips, as if he had all the time in the world. As if there
were nothing more important than learning the shape and taste of her. As if
there might be a quiz later and he, by God, was going to ace it.

How
long, Bel wondered with a start, had it been since somebody had kissed her and actually
paid attention? Made
her
pay attention?

Then
his mouth opened over hers. Just slightly, an invitation to a deeper dance. A
hot thrill shot straight from her head into the pit of her stomach and she froze.

An
invitation required a reply.

A
dance took two people.

He’d
asked, and now she had to answer.

She
knew what she
wanted
. She wanted to open her mouth under his. She wanted
to savor the hard press of his thighs against hers. She wanted that sparkly
wave of heat to keep streaking straight from her belly to the ends of her hair where
it turned the air around them dangerously electric. She wanted this kiss to go
on and on so she could bask forever in the unprecedented luxury of being...God,
it was stupid to even think it but the word that kept popping into her head was
cherished
. How else could she describe being at the perfect center of
another person’s mental, emotional and physical attention?