The Mistress Deal Read online

  The beer bottle arched spray through the air. Purple-sarong gave her a blissful smile, Reece looked murderous, and Lauren swallowed the urge to dissolve into hysterical giggles. Then her friend Daly, a painter of some renown, grabbed her by the waist, perhaps taking pity on her. “I knew you wanted to dance with me,” he said, and whirled her onto the dance floor.

  “There isn’t any music,” she muttered.

  “We make up our own,” Daly said. “Who’s the irate gentleman in the Wall Street suit?”

  “I couldn’t possibly begin to explain,” Lauren said. “Daly, have you ever been in love?”

  “Dozens of times. Trouble is, I bed ’em and I move on.”

  “You men are all alike.”

  “Some of us are worse than others. Sandor was a creep, Lauren. One hundred percent sleaze. Kindly don’t put me in the same category as him.”

  She’d always liked Daly. Wondering with one part of her brain whatever had possessed her to give this party, Lauren said, “You’ve been in lust. Not in love. That’s what you’re saying.”

  “Yep. I don’t know who the guy in the suit is, but he looks about as different from Sandor as you could get. Glad you said yes to him, Lauren—yes to what, by the way?”

  “None of your business,” she said fractiously. “Do you think if I produced a big pot of very strong coffee my guests would take the hint?”

  Daly laughed. “You can try. Want a hand with the grub?”

  She gave him something like a genuine smile. “Thanks—you’re a real pal.”

  “Time you came out of that icebox you’ve been living in,” Daly said lightly. “Let’s see if I can steer you in the direction of the kitchen.”

  For the next hour Lauren kept herself extremely busy serving curried meat balls, broiled shrimp and cheese straws, as well as tactfully suggesting coffee to as many of her guests as she could. Reece, to her infinite gratitude, was keeping his distance; although every now and then she’d find him watching her with an intensity that made a shiver race along her spine.

  The party started to break up around two in the morning, and by three the last of the stragglers—among them the man in the purple sarong—had gone through the door. Lauren closed it behind him, shoved the bolt across and put the chain in its slot. Was she locking purple-sarong out or herself in? she wondered crazily, and said in a voice that sounded almost normal, “What a mess this place is. But people had a good time, didn’t they?”

  “Except for you and me,” Reece said wryly.

  He’d turned the music off. The studio echoed with silence and emptiness. Feeling horribly at sea, she said, “Half the time I was praying for them to leave and the rest of the time I wanted them to stay all night.”

  “Let’s go to bed, Lauren.”

  “Shouldn’t we clean—”

  “I’ll help you in the morning.”

  “It is the morning.”

  His features a hard mask, Reece rasped, “You’re really dreading this, aren’t you?”

  “Do you want to back out?” she said with a flash of hope.

  “No, I don’t want to. I’m not going to ask you the same question because I’m pretty sure you’d say yes…let’s go upstairs.”

  Her bedroom and bathroom were in a loft over the studio. “What if Sandor’s right?” she said in sudden anguish. “What then?”

  “Trust me, Lauren,” Reece said forcibly. “That’s all you’ve got to do—trust me.”

  “That’s one heck of a lot,” she said with something of her normal spirit.

  He laughed. “It sure is. You go first.”

  The stairway was steep, and her skirt rather tight. Conscious in every nerve of her body of Reece on her heels, Lauren slipped off her shoes and climbed the stairs. Turning at the top, she said, “I need a shower, I won’t be—”

  “Let’s have one together.”

  “No! No, I won’t be long,” she said frantically, scuttled to the bathroom and locked the door.

  Sanctuary, she thought, gazing at her face in the mirror. She looked scared to death. Petrified. Terrified. Cornered.

  Trust me, Reece had said. Trust me and trust yourself.

  Which was precisely what she wasn’t doing. She wasn’t giving herself a chance. Taking a deep breath, Lauren lifted her chin and gazed deep into her own eyes. To the best of her ability, she was going to trust Reece. Trust that he had her best interests at heart.

  Because, of course, she had no idea why he was really here. To make amends? Intuitively she knew there was more going on than that. To get in touch with his own emotions, buried with his dead sister? Perhaps that was closer to the truth. Perhaps Reece had his own healing to do. And perhaps she could help him in that.

  Somewhat heartened, she stripped off her clothes and showered. Her nightgown was hanging on the hook on the door. It was full-length, made of delicately embossed cotton; she hauled it over her head, dragged a brush through her hair and opened the door.

  Reece was sitting on her bed, taking off his socks. His shirt was already slung over the back of her Windsor chair; it shone very white against the taupe walls. He smiled at her. “I’ll have a shower, too. Any clean towels?”

  “In the cupboard,” she said, and watched the muscles ripple across his chest as he stood up. The door closed behind him; her newfound courage seemed to have deserted her. She sat down hard on the other side of the bed, her fingers clasped in her lap, and wondered what Wallace would think were he to see her now. If it hadn’t been for his duplicity, she wouldn’t be here, waiting for a man who felt like a stranger to make love to her.

  All too soon, Reece came back into the bedroom, a towel wrapped around his waist. In a strangled voice, Lauren said, “Put out the light…please?”

  As he flicked the switch, the dim glow of the city filtered through the skylight over the bed. Then Reece sat down beside her, taking her hands and chafing them gently between his own. The warmth of his shoulder seeped through the thin cotton of her gown.

  She had to go through with it. She had to.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  LAUREN’S fingers were ice-cold. And it was up to him to warm them, Reece thought. Warm her fingers and warm her heart. Undo the damage that bastard Sandor had caused her, and free the woman of passion he was convinced lay behind her panic-stricken eyes.

  Free her, and what then?

  One thing at a time, Reece, he told himself, and brought her hand up to his lips, dropping small kisses along her thumb and the back of her hand, then turning it to bury his face in her palm. Her wrists were as stiff as boards; her rapid, shallow breathing smote him to the heart. Raising his head, he cupped her face and, with infinite gentleness, kissed her on the lips.

  Her jaw was rigid, her mouth unresponding, so much so that he wondered if his confidence had been misplaced. Had the damage gone too deep? Or was he quite simply the wrong man for her? Both thoughts filled him with a hollow ache of emptiness he didn’t want to analyze.

  With exquisite control, he moved his mouth over hers; and felt the first tentative softening of her lips. He said softly, “Lauren, my beautiful Lauren…I’m so happy to be here with you,” and with a small shock of surprise knew his words to be the truth. He wanted her body, no question of that. But more than that, he wanted her presence.

  He took her lower lip between his teeth, nibbling its soft curve, letting his tongue brush her mouth with tantalizing brevity. As she made a tiny sound deep in her throat, he put his arms around her, stroking the taut line of her shoulders with repetitive smoothness. His own body was in no doubt of what it wanted. Slow down, Reece. This is for Lauren. Not for you.

  Then her hands slid up his torso and linked themselves behind his neck. Her breath wafted his cheek in a small sigh. “Reece, I…”

  “Tell me what you want, sweetheart. I’ll do anything I can for you.”

  Briefly she burrowed her face into his bare shoulder, her sweetly scented hair falling to his chest; then she looked right at him. “I don’t know
what I want…show me what I want, Reece. Please?”

  His heart pounding like a triphammer, he bent to kiss her again, this time unleashing some of his desire; after a fractional hesitation, he felt her match him kiss for kiss, her lips parting to the dart of his tongue, her own tongue playing with his. Wondering if his heart could burst in his chest, Reece fought for control. He mustn’t rush her. He’d done that once. Never again.

  He kissed her lips, the hollow of her cheekbone, the sweep of her forehead; then let his mouth drift down her throat to the pulse where the beat of her blood told its own story. He fumbled for the buttons on her gown, saying with a thread of laughter, “These things weren’t invented with me in mind.”

  She said shyly, “I could take it off.”

  Shaken to the core, he said, “You’re so full of courage.”

  “I want you to make love to me,” she whispered.

  His hands unsteady, he helped her lift the soft folds of cotton over her head. Her creamy skin gleamed in the soft light; her full breasts, her curve of waist and hip, struck him dumb. He felt as though he’d never made love to a woman before. He felt as though he’d been given an immeasurable gift that he in no way deserved.

  Teasing her nipples to hardness, he watched her eyes darken, heard her breathing quicken in her throat. Suddenly she took his face between her hands, kissing him with an unbridled fierceness that took his breath away. He drew her down beside him on the bed, feeling the towel slip from his waist; and again had to draw on all his willpower to subdue his body’s tumultuous response.

  Wanting only to give her pleasure, he caressed her breasts until she whimpered with need, her body arching so that the softness of her skin rubbed against his body hair. Her eyes were dazed with wonderment; very slowly, he drew one hand down her belly, seeking out the soft, damp crevice between her thighs. She gave a single, sharp cry, moving her hips against his with an unpracticed seductiveness that told Reece more than he needed to know about Sandor’s selfishness and her essential innocence. He dropped his face to her belly, rejoicing in the smoothness of her skin, then moved downward, parting her thighs, his tongue plummeting to give her the pleasure she’d been denied; yet stopping before she could topple over the edge.

  In a broken voice he’d never heard before, she gasped, “Reece, oh, Reece…I’ve never felt like this in my life. So overcome, so frantic.”

  He touched her where she was most sensitive, watching her features convulse. As she cried out his name, he hurriedly reached for the little package by the bed; then he slid into her, moving as slowly as he could, until he thought he’d die from the pain of holding back. Not until she was begging him for more did he plunge into her. Thrusting in and out, he waited until she was shuddering with the inexorable rhythms of surrender before allowing himself to meet her in that place where he was most alive and most intimately joined to her.

  A new place, Reece thought dazedly. Depths he’d never plumbed. A union unlike any other.

  Very slowly, he lowered his body to hers, feeling against his ribs the frantic racing of her heart, her dazzled face only inches from his. “Lauren,” he muttered, “are you all right?”

  She opened her eyes. Brilliantly turquoise, they smiled up at him. “All right? I’m overwhelmed, I’ve come home, I—I just never knew…” Then suddenly she clutched him to her and began to weep, her face buried against his throat.

  He held her hard, rolling over on his side so his weight wouldn’t crush her, feeling her sobs shaking her frame. “Was I too fast for you? I didn’t—”

  She looked right at him, her breath still heaving in her chest. “You were perfect—I wanted you so badly. But I must have been clumsy, I’m sorry if—”

  He began to laugh, hugging her to him and inhaling the lilac scent of her hair; and knowing he’d never felt as close to a woman as he did to Lauren now. “No more apologies. I think we both did just fine, how about that?”

  Her cheeks pink, she said, “We did, didn’t we?”

  “Next time,” he said deliberately, “we’ll do even better.”

  “How long do I have to wait?” she asked saucily.

  “Not as long as you might think.”

  As she blushed entrancingly, he drew one hand down the length of her body. He was exactly where he’d wanted to be ever since she’d walked into his Vancouver office that day in her severe gray suit: in Lauren’s bed. Learning about her. Discovering her vulnerabilities and her incredible courage, her laughter and her newly released passion. Passion whose subtleties they’d only just begun to explore. He thrust his hands into the soft weight of her hair, drawing her face to his and kissing her as though they’d never made love, as though she were utterly new to him and all the more needing to be wooed.

  “You’re my heart’s desire,” he said roughly, and heard the words echo in his mind. He wasn’t in love with her. Of course not. He wanted her, that was all. Wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anyone or anything in his life.

  With all his powers of imagination and empathy, Reece set about showing Lauren just how much he wanted her; he was rewarded, as the first light of dawn streaked the sky, by a mutual release that overpowered him in its intensity. He lay on top of her, sweat filming his forehead, his heartbeat like a drumroll in his chest, and wondered how he was ever going to say goodbye to her.

  He had to go to London the day after tomorrow. No choice.

  Two more days, he thought, letting his cheek rest on her hair, feeling through every nerve ending the sweet clasp of her arms around his ribs. That’ll be enough. We’re both adults, with full lives, and this is a temporary madness. We’ll be fine. Of course we will be.

  The shrilling of the telephone woke Lauren from a deep sleep. With a jolt she realized a man’s body was curled around her, one arm heavy over her hips, one thigh pinioning her to the mattress. Reece. With whom she’d made love twice through the night, discovering within herself a woman she hadn’t known existed.

  She rolled over, grabbed the receiver and mumbled, “Hello,” only to be greeted by the dial tone and the continued peal of a telephone bell.

  Reece sat up beside her. “It’s my cell phone,” he muttered. “Where did I put my jacket?”

  He scrambled out of bed, lunged for his jacket and took the phone from the pocket. “Hello,” he barked. Then he said nothing for several minutes.

  His body, so lean and strongly muscled, was utterly beautiful, Lauren thought. She wouldn’t sculpt him, though. Not yet. Not until he was so much a part of her that she wouldn’t even need to see him for her hands to trace his outlines.

  She wanted him again. Wanted him fiercely and now. Half appalled, half amused by her own reactions, so delicious and so surprising, she realized Reece was now talking. Abruptly her heart grew cold, as she heard him say, “Gary, I can’t believe this has happened. So much for thinking we were on top of it. Okay, I’ll leave as soon as I can. But I can’t possibly arrive before midafternoon—at least the jet’s at Kennedy, so there won’t be a holdup there. You’ll meet me at Heathrow? Fine, I’ll get the pilot to radio ahead. ’Bye.”

  Without even looking at Lauren, he quickly entered some numbers. “Randolph? I’ll need the limo in fifteen minutes.” Giving Lauren’s address, he went on, “Kennedy Airport, yeah. You’ll call Tom and alert the crew we’ll need to head for London as soon as possible? Thanks.” Then he jammed the phone back in his pocket and turned to face Lauren.

  “You must have heard that. I’ve got to go to London, pronto. A major deal could fall apart unless I get over there and do some damage control—it’s something we’ve been working on the last four months. And I’m the only one to handle it.”

  Her smile had congealed; aware that she was cold, she grabbed at the sheet, pulling it up to hide her nakedness. In a stony voice, she said, “Go ahead.”

  “I’d never have anticipated this,” he exploded, “I thought Gary and I had covered all the angles—but I was wrong. I’m not going to London because I want to—I’m g
oing because I have to. I want to be here with you, surely you know that?”

  “Of course,” she said politely.

  He pulled her to her feet, his hands clasping her shoulders. The sheet slipped down her body; she clutched at it, feeling exposed and vulnerable. He said urgently, “Lauren, last night was—I can’t begin to tell you how wonderful it was. Listen to me, will you? This business shouldn’t take more than a week maximum, then I’ll come right back here. Before I go to Cairo.”

  “You’d better get dressed,” she said. “Your driver will be here in a few minutes.”

  “You’re not listening to me! I know the timing’s lousy. But it’s not the end of the world…I’ll be back, do you hear me?”

  “If I want you back,” Lauren said.

  “Oh, you want me,” he said furiously, pulling her toward him and kissing her with such passionate hunger that her body ached with desire even as her soul was filled with a fierce resentment that he should leave so precipitously. Although why should she be surprised? He’d never married, he must be an expert at extricating himself from women’s beds.

  She pulled her head free. “Don’t, Reece! You don’t have to pretend. Or lie. I’m sure I’m an amateur compared to your other lovers, so why would you want to stay?”

  His breath hissed between his teeth. “Are you accusing me of setting this up? As a way—an extraordinarily graceless way—of dumping you?”

  “Why wouldn’t I? I’m no sexual gymnast, no sophisticated jet-setter who’s read all the manuals. I behaved like a virgin. Not your type.”

  “Why don’t you let me decide who’s my type—as you so cold-bloodedly put it? Are you also saying if I come back here in a week, you won’t let me in?”

  “It’s all happened too fast,” she cried, pressing her palms to her cheeks in unconscious drama. “Last night I—I was transported. And now you’re leaving. Going four thousand miles away. How am I supposed to behave? Wave my handkerchief at the window and shed a few decorative tears?”