True Bliss (21 page)

She inclined her head and met his gaze. "You are so sure of yourself. Whatever Sebastian wants, Sebastian gets. Isn't that what you believe?"

His jaw flexed. "Might be nice. I know what I want right now. Could we just make nice with a few more people?"

"And then? Then, what, Sebastian?"

"Then I'm going to take you away from here and finish what we started the other night."

She lowered her eyes and remembered how foolish she'd felt over the ring in his wallet, foolish and incredibly emotional. And she was a fool. He hadn't carried that ring around for fifteen years.

"Larry Wilman," Sebastian said, in a hearty, I'm-in-plastics tone. "How the hell are you?"

"Fine, fine." Balding, smoothly pampered-looking Wilman slapped Sebastian's back. "Hell of a party you had in Chicago last month."

"Glad you enjoyed yourself. This isn't shabby, Larry."

Larry raised his triple chins and cast a satisfied eye over the

proceedings. "Did you get the stuff I sent over on my Nordstrom proposal?"

"Sure," Sebastian told him. "Yours and every other agency in the country. What makes you think they aren't satisfied with what they've already got?"

"Nothing. Never hurts to show an alternative that's better, though."

"Agreed. I'll take a look at it for you some time this week."

"Do that," Wilman said, sounding distracted. He followed the progress of a red-haired woman. Her long, green chiffon halter gown stretched tight over large breasts. The divided bodice was open all the way to a gold belt at her small waist. She wore heavily tinted glasses, and enough very red lipstick to make her white skin appear luminous.

"Stand there a minute," Sebastian said. "I've got to speak to someone."

Sipping champagne, Bliss watched him stride rapidly toward the woman in green. He slipped a hand through her arm and ushered her from the conservatory back into the house. How many women had he made love to? How many women was he involved with now?

More and more guests drifted out among the exotic plants. A deep blue parrot screeched on its perch.

Bliss felt the level of conversation drop, and the uncomfortable certainty that she was under inspection. The first pair of eyes she met were Larry Wilman's. He smiled and raised his glass. She nodded.

Every man and woman in the room had probably read about Prue's darn committee—and seen Bliss's name linked to Sebastian's. They must be exchanging theories on the nature of their relationship.

She wandered to the outer glass wall of the conservatory and walked between the palms and banks of potted orchids. The instant Sebastian returned she'd insist upon leaving.

The appearance of the woman in green had—angered him? Bliss crouched to examine a frilly yellow bloom. Sebastian

hadn't been neutral, or surprised, or thrilled to see the woman; he'd been furious.

The lights went out.

An initial moment of silence died beneath a blast of excited exclamations.

"Stand still everybody!" Larry Wilman's voice boomed above the rest. "Circuit must have blown. This won't take a moment."

Bliss steadied herself with a hand on the orchid pot and pushed herself upright.

Her scarf tightened around her neck.

She cried out and tried to turn around. Her glass slipped from her fingers, but made no sound wherever it landed.

"Nothing to worry about," Larry Wilman shouted. "Relax, people."

The scarf drew tighter.

Bliss tottered backward in her high heels. A body stopped her from falling.

Blood pounded in her ears. Her lungs burned, and her throat with each breath. "Let me go," she gasped—into the hand that closed over her mouth. The hand smelled of rubber. Rubber gloves. A smooth sleeve scraped her cheek.

"Shut up," a male voice whispered against her ear. "Just listen. Scream and I'll finish this now. Believe me. No one will ever know how it happened. Can you be quiet?"

She nodded.

"That's a good girl." The odor of aniseed coated his breath, and she smelled laundry starch. "You shouldn't have come here tonight. Now it's damage control time."

A tug on the scarf silenced Bliss. Her legs trembled. Why didn't the lights come on? Why didn't Sebastian come back?

The man took his hand from her mouth and slid his arm around her waist, pulling her against him.

She panted with horror. He was hard and he jutted his hips rhythmically against her bottom.

"Not a word," he said. His tongue entered her ear, then he bit her earlobe and his breathing grew heavy. "Stay away from Plato."

She moaned.

He chuckled softly. "You like this, huh? I like it, too." The hand at her waist slid up to cup a breast. He squeezed. "Oh, yeah, I do like it. We're going to do a lot more of this."

Bliss's control broke. She struggled and drove her elbows backward.

His hand returned to her mouth. He shook her. "Okay. End of first lesson. More to come—much more. Get rid of Plato. Tell him to stay away. I'll be watching. Got it?"

She wriggled.

"Nice," he said, and rolled his erection against her again. "You excite me, baby. Violence excites me. Too bad we can't finish this tonight, but I'm patient."

People talked loudly all around them. Why didn't the lights come on?

Bliss felt her scarf slide from her neck.

"Yeah, baby," the man whispered. "Get ready for me. I'm going to fuck your brains out."

She retched.

"Do as I tell you with Plato and I'll make sure nothing bad happens to you. Cross me, and I'll fuck you to death, baby— slowly. I'll eat you alive."

He released her so suddenly she staggered and almost fell.

She rubbed her neck. Her heart throbbed and her muscles felt formless.

Darkness within darkness. A sound as of roaring wind hammered at her brain. Panic. Bliss pulled off her glasses and pressed her eyes. She must not pass out.

"Let there be light!" Larry Wilman yelled, his laughter booming. "Will you look at this? Nothing wrong with the lights. Some goddamn fool leaned on the dimmer panel is all. Sorry, people. Carry on."

Bliss searched around. Mouths stretched in grins. Voices bab-

bled. Backs were slapped, and bejeweled fingers waved. Fresh drinks circulated. It was as if a clockwork scene had been rewound and the movement picked up where it had stopped. No sign of a man anywhere near her.

Her life had been threatened. She ought to tell someone.

First there'd been the "ghost" at the lodge who told her to stay away from Sebastian.- Now a maniac had pawed and menaced her disgustingly, and given the same warning—only this time there'd been the threat that she'd suffer regardless, hadn't there?

What would she say? A man grabbed me and threatened to rape and kill me but now he s disappeared and I can't even tell you what he looked like. She could visualize the skeptical—and pitying—response that would get. They'd think she'd panicked in the dark and imagined the whole thing.

Fern Wilman swooped down upon Bliss and said, "What on earth's the matter, love?" She frowned and snapped her fingers for a waiter. "Brandy. Get a brandy and be quick about it."

"I don't like brandy," Bliss murmured.

"I think you need it," Fern said. "Darling, you look positively deathly. All we've had here is a little light failure, for goodness' sake. It isn't going to kill you."

Thirteen

It isn 't going to kill you?

He isn't going to kill you? Bliss couldn't be certain of that. "Excuse me," she said to Fern Wilman and stepped resolutely past the woman.

"But they're bringing you some brandy."

"Thank you, but no," Bliss said without looking back. "Thanks for a lovely party. I've got another appointment." An appointment to get out of here and back to peace and safety—if there was anywhere left where she could be anything but scared.

People crowded the wide vestibule. Many more party-goers had arrived and the noise level blasted Bliss.

Sebastian materialized out of the crush and took her arm. "Sorry, Chilly, had to take care of some business."

"Don't give it another thought. I'm out of here."

"Okay." He held her still. "What's the problem?"

"You already know the problem." He didn't know half of it anymore. She needed to think things through. Alone. "I'm going to ask the doorman to call me a cab."

"No, you're not."

The trembling hadn't entirely subsided. Now it increased again. "Please let me go."

"No way."

"I don't want to make a scene. That would embarrass both of us."

"You're irrational."

Bliss turned on him. "I think that's enough, Sebastian. I don't have to take insults from you."

His black brows drew sharply together. The speculative narrowing of his eyes turned them a hard, glittering green. "What happened after I left you in there?"

"Nothing." He knew her too well.

He shook his head. "I don't think you're telling me the truth."

What shreds of control left to her began to crumble. "I don't belong here. I don't want to. You have business to attend to. Do it."

"Yeah," Sebastian said through his teeth. "I have business to attend to. The most important piece of business in my entire life." He pulled away from the throng, looking around as he did so.

With her left arm in the grip of his left hand and his right hand settled firmly on the back of her neck, he steered her behind the foot of the staircase where a huge floral arrangement filled the space.

"I want out," she told him, desperate now.

He opened a door, peered inside and propelled her into the confined area beyond. Sebastian closed them into a musty space and turned a key in the lock.

"I want—"

"Stop telling me what you want. Just for a moment, will you?" He held her in one arm and fumbled until he found what he was looking for. A single, naked bulb produced low-wattage, yellow light. Hanging from the high ceiling, the pathetic glow slithered over the contents of a storage closet.

"This is too much," Bliss said, reaching for the key in the lock. "I've had a hell of a night already and now you lock me in a cupboard."

"In a cupboard with me," he said. "Actually I thought it might be a bathroom, but this is better."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Less likely to be interrupted."

Bliss's heart turned. "Interrupted?"

"I've got a feeling that if I let you get out of this house without some serious talking, I may be chasing you all over town before I can get you on your own again. You looked spooked out there."

Spooked? "How did your business meeting with the redhead go?"

His jaw flexed. "Fine."

"She's quite something."

"Is she? I didn't notice."

Bliss snorted. "Do I look that stupid?"

"I want to talk about you. You and me."

"Is there anything to talk about?"

He stepped toward her.

Bliss backed up, until her back met cardboard boxes stacked almost to the ceiling. If she spread her arms, she'd touch china-laden shelves. On the floor, an open laundry bag spilled wadded linens.

"We've got something to talk about," Sebastian said softly. "Us. The future. I want you, and I think you want me."

"You don't know what I want anymore. You did once, but those days are gone."

Sebastian braced himself with a hand on either side of her head. The boxes were cool at her back. He looked into her upturned face. With the yellow light behind him, his features slanted dramatically.

Bliss drew herself up. "You're not being fair."

"Aren't I?"

"No. This is bizarre. You don't trap people in closets in strange houses."

"You aren't trapped."

"You locked us in."

"I locked other people out. Say the word and you can go."

Bliss opened her mouth.

He watched her lips and his own parted. "Don't go, Bliss."

Questions, so many questions, yet she couldn't make herself look for the first one.

"Say something."

She closed her eyes and rested her forehead on his chest. If loving him was dangerous, she was in mortal peril. She drove her teeth into her bottom lip. She did love him. Crazy as it must be, she did love Sebastian Plato.

"Kiss me," he said.

She sighed and shook her head. "This is nuts."

"So, it's nuts. Let's be nuts. I want you." He rubbed the back of her neck with his knuckles. "I'm not giving up this time, Bliss. This time it's going to work for us."

"The lights went out."

He grew still. "Yeah."

She felt the heat of his body. "It scared me."

"I didn't think you were afraid of the dark."

"I never used to be." Tell him, tell him exactly what happened in the conservatory.

Sebastian raised her chin. "You're safe with me."

Was she? Or was she in more danger than she'd ever been in her life?

"I won't let anything happen to you, Bliss. I want to spend the rest of my life making sure you're happy."

But he'd been able to take a fifteen-year hiatus from feeling that way.

Very gently, he took her glasses off, folded the armatures and slipped them into a jacket pocket. "You don't need them to see me, do you?"

"No."

"All you need to see is me, sweetheart." He brought his mouth to hers, caressed, skin to skin, softly back and forth. "Open up for me."

Bliss let him part her lips. His tongue slid inside and her eyes drifted shut. She felt him shift, spread his legs apart to bracket hers. His weight clamped her against the boxes. He filled the small space.

She kissed him back.

The small, hidden places inside her ached, throbbed. Sensa-

tion slipped away, all sensation but that which drew her to him, surrounded her with him. Sebastian reached into the cold, silent spaces within her body and painted them whispering hot.

Holding her face in both hands, he kissed her again and again, and she pressed closer, helpless to stop her hips from straining to meet his.

From her face to her neck, to her shoulders, his long fingers caressed, rubbed, felt their way, inch by fevered inch.

Bliss fought for breath.

She heard voices in the hall outside and vaguely registered the marvelous madness of making love in a closet while people made small talk on the other side of the door.

Sebastian kept on kissing her, but struggled out of his jacket while he did so. Bliss caught at his tie and he helped her loosen and drag it off. She undid his shirt buttons and pulled the tails free of his pants. Beneath her hands, the hair on his chest was rough, the skin heated.

His breathing was almost as fast as her own. "We were going to talk," he murmured, kissing her again, nuzzling her jaw up, breathing into her neck, following his breath with his lips.

Bliss felt dazed. She said, "Talk?"

"Wedding rings and condoms."

She blushed. "I made a mistake"—the scent of him filled her nostrils—"I was overexcited."

He chuckled, pressing his attention to the hollow above a collarbone, below the bone. "Guess who's overexcited now?"

"We both are." She felt the evidence of his words, and the evidence of her own. He was hard. She was wet, and aching. "What—"

He covered her open mouth with his own, her breasts with his hands. Bliss moaned and wrapped her arms around his neck.

"This little dress is something," he told her. "Instant turn on. Not that your purple pedal pushers don't turn me on just as much." He laughed.

Bliss didn't laugh.

She couldn't reach enough of him, touch enough of him. His

body was hot—her body burned. He pulled her arms from his neck and tugged the flimsy straps of her dress over her shoulders.

"We can't do this here, Sebastian." But she panted, and helped him free her from the bodice. It slipped easily to her waist. "Sebastian."

"We should have had that talk," he muttered, fondling her naked breasts, groaning faintly, maddeningly.

Bliss unbuckled his belt, unzipped his pants. "About what?"

"Wedding rings—"

"And condoms," she finished for him. "Why? I made a mistake—"

"I want you now, Bliss. I've got to have you."

"We can't. Not here." His waist was smooth, his buttocks unyielding. Bliss savored the texture of him, the power. His thighs were rock where they met her hips. She tested a flat nipple with the tip of her tongue, and smiled when he sucked in a breath.

"Bliss, I don't have anything."

She pushed his pants down. "We should stop."

"But you don't want to, either." He caught up the hem of her dress and gripped her thighs beneath. He smoothed the sensitive skin all the way to her bottom and drew her to her toes. "Do you? Do you want me to stop?"

She shook her head. His disheveled hair fell forward. His body pulsed against her. Sebastian stripped away one stocking. Bliss steadied herself on his taut biceps while she tore off the other silver-shot wisp of nothing. He cupped her mound and pressed his fingers into the dampness she was helpless to disguise.

"Oh, Bliss, I think we're just going to have to be human."

She held his penis in both hands and rubbed the tip against her, pressed it between her legs and gritted her teeth—at the searing of her own flesh, and at his tortured gasp.

Her panties joined her hose and Sebastian dipped just enough to push his fingers inside her. She played him over the hair at the apex of her legs.

"My God," he hissed. "You're killing me."

"You're killing me," she told him, her voice barely audible.

"Nice death," Sebastian said. He sucked a nipple into his mouth and she heard the laugh, deep in his throat, when she sobbed. "Better not make too much noise or we'll both be embarrassed," he warned. "If they break down the door we'll be caught bare-assed—among other things."

"Sebastian," Bliss cried into his shoulder.

He moved his mouth to her other breast.

She filled her fingers with his hair and held on.

"You want me, Bliss?" he asked between kisses. "Say you want me."

"I want you." And she couldn't think anymore.

Gripping her thighs, Sebastian lifted her. "Wrap your legs around my waist."

She did as he asked. She would have done anything he asked.

His big hands spanned the fronts of her legs and his thumbs met where the fierce excitement pooled. His thumbs massaged, and he rocked his penis upward, inside her.

He was big, huge—her delicate skin protested and tiny muscles contracted. Then, rather than push him out, those muscles clenched, drew him in.

"You are so tight," he said into her hair. He held her against the boxes, held her there and grasped her thighs, repeatedly passed the pads of his thumbs over the slick, swollen focus of all feeling.