need to worry; it was so private here. What would he look like...nude? Beautiful, she decided. He was so tall, broad-shouldered, lean where he should be, bronzed and so nicely, tightly sinewed. 'Hello.'
Alexi gasped and whirled around. Instantly fire-red coloring flushed her cheeks.
It was Rex. Of course it was Rex--it was his beach. But she hadn't expected him here. She hadn't seen him since he'd dropped her suitcase on his hallway floor. That was almost two days ago. She still hadn't been back into her house; she'd been in his, and he in hers. Impatience had brought her to the beach. Impatience and frustration. The cleaners had stayed so late on Monday that she hadn't gone back, and on Tuesday he had told Emily that the fumes were still too strong for Alexi to be able to do anything worthwhile.
Alexi had been determined to go back anyway. Emily had convinced her to stay, telling her that she would do much better for herself in the next few days if she allowed her foot to heal properly. And, Emily had told her with a wink, Rex was working--he was too immersed to notice the fumes.
'I said 'Hello,' not 'Take your clothes off, please.' Do you have to look so horrified to see me?'
'I'm not,' she said quickly. She was. She looked down to the sand, not sure how to explain that he had interrupted her when she was imagining him without his clothes.
Not that he was wearing much. He was in a pair of cutoffs--and what she could see was very near what she had imagined. His flesh was very bronze, very sleek. His shoulders and chest were hard and sinewed; his legs were long and his thighs powerful. Dark hair grew on his chest in a swirl that tapered into a soft line down to the waistband of his shorts. He wore a gold St. Christopher medal and a black-banded sports watch.
He sank down beside her. She felt his gaze move over her, and it touched her with greater warmth than the sun. Actually, she wasn't exactly cocooned in clothing herself.
Her bathing suit was one-piece, but it had no back, and the cut was very high on the thighs. To her horror, she felt her heartbeat quicken. Surely he could see the throb of her pulse in a dozen different places.
'Must you?' she demanded huskily.
'Must I what?'
'Come out with all those things.'
'What things?'
“About clothing. Or lack of them. Or sleeping with the Helen of Troy Lady.'
He was silent for a moment, looking out to sea. He shrugged, then stared at her again. It took a lot of effort, but she finally lifted her eyes to his--and watched him as coolly as she could.
He smiled slowly, the curl of his lip very deliberate and sensual. 'You were blushing before I opened my mouth.' 'The sun--' 'Hah!'
Alexi threw her hands up. 'Mr. Morrow, meet Ms. Jordan. How do you do? How do you do? Pleasant weather, isn't it? Lovely weather, really lovely. That, Mr. Morrow, is the type of conversation that people who have just met exchange!'
He laughed, leaning back on an elbow. 'You're forgetting the way that we met.'
'You mauled me.'
'And I loved every minute of it.'
'Would you stop?'
'If you want me to stop,' he said evenly, 'why are you out here on my beach in that bathing suit?'
'It is a beach! People wear bathing suits on beaches.'
'Mmm. But not people who look like you, in bathing suits like that.'
'I'll wear my long Johns next time.'
He laughed softly, then suddenly reached out for her shoulder and toppled her down beside him. She gasped, ready to protest, but then the smile left his face and he stared down at her so intently that all words fled from her mind. There was something about him. His eyes were so sharp they were almost pained; his features were taut and haggard.
He drew a finger down her cheek very slowly, barely touching her. Then he breezed that same finger over her lower lip, very slowly, never losing the sharp, hungry tension of his gaze upon her.
For the life of her, she couldn't move. She could only imagine him as she had before: with a nameless woman on the beach--naked.
He was Rex Morrow, the famous, talented recluse, who used women--and the world couldn't possibly know that she was incredibly naive and pathetically vulnerable. Well, she had some pride, and she couldn't be used! 'Rex--'
'It's going to happen, you know.' 'What?'
'Us. You and me. We're going to make love. Maybe right here, right where we are now.' 'You're incredibly arrogant.' 'I'm honest. Which you aren't at the moment.' 'Someone should really slap you--hard,' she told him disdainfully, though with some difficulty. He was still halfway over her. She could feel his body, so warm from the sun beating down upon it. So close. And both of them so...barren of substantial clothing. Her pulse was beating furiously again. And she wanted to touch him. She had never before known such temptation--a desire that defied good sense and pride and reason.
'Is that someone going to be you?' he said slyly.
'If you don't watch it,' she warned.
'Can't you feel it?' he asked her lazily. 'The sun-baked sand, the whisper of the waves, rising, ebbing...rising. Can't you feel the heat from the sun, from the earth, becoming a part of us?''
He touched the rampant pulse at the base of her throat.
'Can't you feel the rhythm...throbbing?'
'You're an arrogant SOB--that's what I can feel,' she said coolly.
He laughed. The tension was gone; the hardened hunger of his gaze. He pushed himself up and landed on his feet with the grace of a great cat. He offered a hand to her. 'Come on. I've got a present for you.'
She stared warily at his hand, causing him to chuckle again.
'Nervous, Alexi? Think I'm going to toss you to the sand and maul you?'' Impatiently he grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet.
And then against his body. He arched a brow wickedly. 'Don't worry. When we get to it, you'll be breathlessly eager.'
Alexi coolly took a step backward, raising her chin, smiling as sweetly as she could.
'I hardly think so, Mr. Morrow.'
He laughed, slipped an arm around her waist and started back toward the house. When they were nearly there, he lowered his head and murmured near her ear, 'Liar.'
'Ohh...' she groaned. Really. What incredible insolence, she thought. She stepped ahead of him again and turned around to face him challengingly. 'You really like the suit, huh?'
'I like what's in it.'
Alexi groaned. 'Eat your heart out, then!' she teased.
Rex laughed. But when he caught up with her again and whispered what he did intend to do, it was so insinuative that the sensations that ripped through her, jagged and molten, felt dangerously as if he had followed through.
Chapter 6
At the path to the house, Rex suddenly stood still, crossing his arms over his chest. He nodded toward the front door.
'You first, Ms. Jordan.'
She arched a brow, then shrugged, heading down the path. At the door she paused. 'I don't have a key with me.'
'It isn't locked.'
She raised her brow more. 'I'm having problems with people and footsteps, and you left the door open?''
'Samson is inside. I assure you--no one is in there with him.'
'Oh.' Alexi pushed open the door. Rex had been telling the truth; Samson was sitting in the hallway, just like a sentinel. He barked and thumped his tail against the floor. He was standing behind a large wicker basket with a red-white-and-blue checked cotton cloth extended beneath the handle.
'Good boy, Samson, but what is this?' Alexi said, then turned to look at Rex again.
