cherishing, this tenderness, this wooing, was almost more than she could bear.
“I’m wondering,” he murmured against her temple, “why I didn’t realize how beautiful you were when I first met you.”
“Because you were sober then?”
“I’m sober now. Which is why I have to be honest, and admit that at first I was fooled-by the bulky clothes and clumsy act and the glasses.”
“I
“You wear very silly glasses,” he said as he corrected her. “And you’re not wearing them now. When I’m around you, you seem to forget to wear them more and more. Which tells me-”
“That I only need them for close reading?”
“Nope. It tells me that you don’t feel you have to hide around me as much as you did before. And speaking of hiding, what kind of underwear are you wearing today?”
“I don’t think I should answer that question.”
“I think you should. I think it’s a very important question. All we’ve been talking about for days are questions that aren’t going to change the world. Questions that are disturbing and unsettling and ugly. Let’s try to start this whole thing from the beginning, you and me. Let’s just stick to the important questions. Like what kind of underwear you’re wearing at this very minute.”
“Yellow.”
“Yellow?”
“Daffodil-yellow. White lace edges. I can’t remember where or how it happened. But somehow en route, I got a little embarrassingly addicted to useless, pretty underwear.”
“Don’t even think about giving it up. This is probably the best addiction I’ve ever heard of. I think you should go with it. Forever.”
“Um…” All right, her good sense and common sense had completely deteriorated, and she’d answered the underwear question. But one of them had to get a grip. Their tummies weren’t just rubbing together. Their pelvises were locked tight. He was harder than petrified wood, and yeah, his erection was sealed against her, no one could see or know…but she knew. Fever shot through her bloodstream, making all that blood rush until she felt light- headed and dizzy.
“How come you don’t tell me about your work?” he asked, out of the complete blue, as if they’d actually been having a serious conversation.
“Because I’ve never had a chance?”
“See? That’s exactly the point I’ve been trying to make. All this crap with my brother has screwed up everything. We’re not getting the chance to talk about what matters. What you do. Why you do it. Your yellow underwear. Your addictions.”
“Cord?”
“What?”
“The music stopped playing. The bartender’s wiping glasses. There are only two other people in the place.”
“Hell, I don’t see why it matters if there’s music, when a person can’t dance anyway,” he remarked.
“Whew. I wasn’t sure if you realized.” Not that she wouldn’t dance with him again, Sophie mused. But the next time, she’d wear steel-toed shoes.
“You know what I
“That we’re going to get kicked out of this bar?”
“That you’ve never seen my place. It’s a house. Rented, which isn’t my choice, but I didn’t buy when I first moved here. I wasn’t sure how long I was going to stay. It’s in Arlington, toward Falls Church. A drive, but I had to have some country, some trees, some green. And that’s the thing. We can go there, to a place where we can both feel…clean. Away from the dirt around my brother’s life. A place that’s safe. A place where I can see that yellow underwear.”
“I’d like to see it, Cord. But…I can’t believe you’d feel…safe…leaving your brother’s place completely deserted for the night.”
“I wouldn’t. But I keep trying to tell myself it doesn’t matter. Someone breaks in, finds more answers, more stuff-why should this be any skin off
“That’s not your fault.”
“Maybe not my fault. But it sure as hell feels like my responsibility.”
“But that’s only because you’re stuck being one of those alpha guys, Cord. I totally understand that you can’t help it. The only one who’s really responsible for the mess is the mess maker. And that’s Jon.”
This hour, these last hours, he’d been so playful and crazy and fun. Seductive. Dangerous in the most seductive and luring of ways. But now he pressed his forehead into hers, said quietly, “Soph. I want you to leave town. Get away from this. You said you had two sisters. You could go visit one of them, at least for a couple weeks. Until this is…safe.”
He waited, but when she didn’t immediately answer, he jumped back in. “All right. You’re not saying yes-much less ‘yes, Cord, you’re so right, I’m going to call my sisters this very minute.’ So, at least promise me you’ll think about it.”
“I promise I’ll think about it,” she said, but the way she looked at him…he knew she didn’t mean it.
Eventually, he forked over a pile of bills at the bar, found her jacket and raced with her to the car. The night had turned sweet black, a frisky breeze shivering the leaves; traffic had thinned out this late.
He glanced at her. “We’re going…?”
“To my place. Not yours. And definitely not your brother’s.”
He nodded. “And as far as what you meant by that ‘we’…?”
Sophie leaned back against the neck rest, studying his profile. She said with a bluntness she didn’t remotely feel, “I don’t know where this is going, Cord. I don’t know what you want, what I want for sure, where either of us will end up after Jon’s business is over with. But what I
He liked that answer, she could see from his start of a grin, the easing of his shoulders, the spark of fire in his eyes.
He liked it even more when she climbed the stairs, unlocked her door and then just wagged her fingers in an unspoken order for him to hand over his jacket.
He liked it the best when she threw both jackets on the couch, kicked the door closed and reached for him. Off went the sweater. Then his shirt. Her hands, on his naked chest, climbed up, over, around-everywhere. She kicked off her shoes at the same time her mouth latched on his and locked.
Caviar leaped on the couch top and plaintively meowed. She heard him.
She knew he counted on a heap of love and attention whenever she came home, but right now…her other tomcat needed it more.
She wasn’t sure of anything with Cord…except that beneath the good looks, the brain, the alpha set of ethics, and yeah, the sexiness, was a sad man. A lonely man. He was around people all the time, but not people he could personally connect with.
That wasn’t something she knew. It was something she sensed, from the symptoms he kept showing her, the symptoms that kept wooing her heart. His surprise at being jumped. His groan of vulnerability when she whispered in his ear, when she stepped back, took his hand and led him down the dark hall.
He might not know the way, but she did. Being her bedroom, naturally the carpet was littered with everything from books to cat toys to abandoned socks. But she knew precisely where the fluffy comforter was. She sank down first, pulling him with her, but she’d twisted half on top of him before he knew what hit him.
Cord clearly wasn’t used to surprises-not surprises in life, not surprises from women. He wasn’t used to being wanted…well, like crazy. He clearly wasn’t expecting a woman who would yank and tug until she had him naked. A woman who would bite, then kiss with tenderness. A woman who could teach him to dance, nowhere near a dance
