Now they were alone, locked in the bookstore. He could think of worse things.
“Good one,” he said softly. “Me the guest speaker at a romance group.”
“I just knew they would find you exotic and intriguing and delightful.”
“You could have warned me.”
“I could have,” she agreed with an impish grin.
Lightning lit up the sky, and her face. Despite the grin, he could see something beneath it.
The hunger.
“Do you?” he asked her softly. “Find me exotic and intriguing and delightful?”
The world went dark again, but her voice came through the darkness.
“Yes,” she said, hoarsely, “yes, I do.”
And then he could not stop himself anymore. He reached through the pitch-blackness and his hand found the softness of her cheek. He heard her soft intake of breath, and he moved in closer to her.
His eyes adjusted to the darkness, and her face, illuminated by the odd flash of lightning, was possibly the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
“That look you’re giving me,” he said gruffly, “it seems distinctly come-hither.”
“Oh, it is,” she assured him.
He could not resist her anymore. Not if he used all his logic. Not if he used all his strength. With the thunder rolling as the perfect background music to what was happening to his heart, he dropped his head over hers.
Tenderly, he took her lips. Outside the rain began to fall with drumming intensity.
It might have started as conquest, but it quickly became something on the opposite end of the spectrum. He felt the surrender in himself. He felt the surrender in her. He knew what was going to happen next.
It was all so wrong. She was not that kind of girl. A bookstore was not the ideal place to make love for the first time.
And yet, as he scooped her up in his arms, and took her back to that cushion-filled nook, nothing had ever felt so right.
Ever.
Not in his entire life. He laid her down in the pillows, and the lightning flashed as she held open her arms to him. He fell into them.
It felt as if every moment since he had met her had been leading to this one: finally, finally, he had her in his field of lavender, her sweet curves crushed beneath him, her scent enveloping them both, her lips tender and welcoming under his.
If he had expected reticence he had been wrong.
She was a woman who knew what she wanted. And she wanted him. A side of her he had not expected came forward: bold, adventurous, willing to explore.
And her lips explored him. They explored his face and his earlobes, her teeth nipping lightly. They explored his lips and then moved on again, down his shirt, her fingers finding his buttons and undoing them. Her hands closed around the sides of his ribs, and her lips moved down the column of his throat to his chest, grazing over one nipple and then the other.
A groan of the pure pain of wanting her escaped him. She stopped kissing him. Her eyes dark on his face, she reached up and opened the top button of her blouse.
“Jessica,” he said hoarsely. “Are you—”
She nodded. “Sure. I’m sure.”
And then he took her fingers away, and tenderly he undid the rest of the buttons. He flicked her blouse open and gazed at the wonder of her. Then he lowered his head and began the same exploration she had done on him: lips, ears, column of her throat, anointing her with the fiery brand of his kisses.
Something banged. He lifted his head. She drew his attention back to her. “The storm,” she whispered.
But it was not the storm.
The bookstore door banged open with force, all the sounds of the storm—thunder and pounding rain—coming in with it.
Jamie pulled away from Jessica, blocking her body with his own. A flashlight beam caught him in the eye.
“Who the hell are you?” a man’s voice asked.
“I think the question is who the hell are you?” he shot back, shoving himself up.
Behind him, he sensed Jessica frantically doing up buttons, doing something to the mess of her hair.
“Dad,” she said, “this is Jamie Gilbert-Cooper.”
Her dad, understandably, looked less than impressed.
Jamie did not know he was capable of the feeling that overcame him. Guilt. A terrible sense of remorse.
What did he think he was doing? Well, no that wasn’t the question. He knew exactly what he was doing.
What he had forgotten was who he was doing it with.
A young woman from a small town. Beloved to all. Adored by her family. Protected by her father.
Jamie had known all along that she was wholesome and traditional.
How could he have done what he just did?
She wasn’t the kind of girl you had a tryst with. She wasn’t the kind of girl a man had an entertaining dalliance with.
“Are you from New York?” her father asked, as Jamie quickly did up the buttons on his shirt.
“Yes.”
“And are you the reason she’s been so unhappy since she got back?”
Startled, Jamie looked at Jessica.
He could tell he was the reason.
Why had he come here? Why had he chased her down? It wasn’t at all as he had said. Yes, Vivian Ascot had read the riot act to his boss, and yes, he had been sent to get Jessica’s model for her bookstore.
But really? Anyone could have come.
But he’d insisted, like a man who had sipped an elixir that he couldn’t get out of his head. That he couldn’t get enough of.
She made him powerless.
But that was only an excuse—and a pathetic one at that—for not controlling himself. Her father had arrived in the nick of time. Before Jamie had managed to fuel this thing between them until it burned them both down.
Not daring to
