Against the Fire (9 page)

“I came with a friend,” she said. “She’ll worry if I leave without telling her.”

“What’s her name?”

“Tracy Spencer.”

“Stay here.” He left her at the top of the stairs, strode across the room to a tall, good-looking man with short blond hair.

In minutes he returned. “Sam knows Tracy. I told him we were leaving. He’ll tell her I took you home.”

“Maybe I should—”

His hot kiss cut off her words and had her tingling all over. As he tugged her out the front door, she stumbled and Gabe swept her up in his arms. “All right?”

She just nodded, feeling featherlight and utterly feminine. In seconds they had reached his truck and he had lifted her into the passenger seat. He rounded the pickup and climbed inside, hauled her over next to him on the bench seat and fastened the middle seat belt across her lap.

She must have been in some kind of trance because she didn’t resist when he drove away, heading off toward wherever he lived. It wasn’t very far because she was still silent, her heart still thumping madly, when he helped her down from the truck, led her into the elevator in the lobby, and pushed the button for the fourth floor.

“Cold feet yet?” he asked.

When she nodded, he bent down and gave her one of those wet, searing kisses that had gotten her into this in the first place. She felt hot and needy, felt as if her skin was stretched too tight. Inside her bra, her nipples were hard and aching. When the elevator door slid open with a ding, Gabe settled a hand at her waist and urged her across the hall. An instant later, she was standing in the middle of his living room.

“You want a drink?”

She needed a dozen straight shots, but there was something she needed more. She moistened her lips. “Would you…would you kiss me again?”

“I plan to kiss you all night, honey, in places you’ve never been kissed.”

A funny little sound seeped from her throat. She didn’t protest when he lifted her into his arms, carried her into his bedroom and began to strip off her clothes.

Soon she was naked and lying in the middle of his king-size bed. She watched as he pulled off his cowboy boots and dragged his yellow polo shirt over his head. As he unzipped and slid down his jeans, it occurred to her how exciting it could be to watch a man undress.

A man with a body like Gabe’s.

He was solid muscle, his chest wide and lightly sprinkled with curly dark brown hair, his stomach flat and ridged with muscle. His legs were long and muscular and the erection nested between them was immense.

The mattress dipped with his weight as he joined her on the bed, tipped her chin up and captured her lips. Deep, drugging kisses had her melting. Hot, wet kisses had her reaching for him, running her hands over all that hard male flesh.

“Gabe…please…”

“Take it easy, honey.” He nipped an earlobe, captured her mouth again. “There isn’t any hurry.”

She reached up and cupped his cheek, felt the roughness of his late-night beard. “There is for me,” she said, worried again that the haze of passion she was drowning in would fade and she would be left unsatisfied as she had always been before.

“Maybe this’ll help.”

She felt his hand skimming over her breasts, her belly, leaving a trail of fire wherever he touched. Parting her legs, he began to stroke her, lightly at first then more deeply, and hot sensation poured through her.

She groaned. She was so hot and wet. Gabe kissed her slowly, touched her exactly where she ached to be touched, and she arched into his hand. The tension built. She squirmed against him, begging for relief, and his fingers moved more deeply. For an instant, she hovered on the edge.

“Gabe!” she cried out and he caught her cries of passion in his mouth. Waves of pleasure washed over her, sensation so hot and fierce for a moment she couldn’t breathe. She was crying when he eased her into his arms.

Gabe smoothed a tear from her cheek. “It’s all right, honey, it’s probably just been too long.”

She shook her head, feeling ridiculous, unable to keep the words from spilling out. “I usually can’t…I mean, making love…it isn’t easy for me to reach…you know.”

“A climax?” He gave her a wicked grin. “Looked pretty easy to me. Why don’t we try it again and see?”

He kissed her before she could answer. Cupping her breasts, he bent his head to taste each one, leisurely suckled and laved, and there she was, hot and trembling and needy all over again.

“It’s okay,” he said softly as her fingers dug into the muscles across his shoulders. “We’ll get there. We’ve got all the time in the world.”

He proceeded to demonstrate that, taking his time, touching and caressing, heightening her arousal almost to the point of pain. When she couldn’t stand a moment more, Gabe eased himself inside her until he was completely seated. Keeping his weight on his elbows, he kissed her deeply, kissed her until she was begging him to take her.

Mattie bit back a moan of pure pleasure as Gabe began to move, the heavy thrust and drag of his shaft making her whole body tingle. It was like riding out a storm or being sucked into a whirlpool, like being consumed by flames.

Her stomach muscles contracted and then she was flying, her body clenching as release gripped her again. Mattie moaned his name and clung to him, her body tight around his hard length, but Gabe didn’t stop.

Not until she had reached another shattering climax did he allow his own release.

By the time she came back to herself, he lay beside her, one of his powerful arms nestling her close to his side.

“That’s what you’ve been needing all along,” he said, kissing the top of her head. “You’re a very passionate woman, Mattie. What you needed was a man.”

He meant a real man and yesterday she would have argued. Not tonight. Tonight she was a sexy femme fatale and she could handle a virile man like Gabe.

Her insides began to tighten.

Tomorrow she would again be practical Mattie Baker.

And she would have to find a way to deal with Gabriel Raines.

Gabe awoke late the next morning, more relaxed and content than he had felt in weeks. He had turned off his alarm last night, looking forward to sharing coffee and doughnuts with Mattie. He smiled as he reached for her, hard again though they had made love three times during the night. When his hand landed on cold, empty sheets, Gabe rolled onto his side in search of her, but Mattie was nowhere in sight.

Damn.

He had been sleeping so soundly he hadn’t felt her move off the mattress, hadn’t heard her leave. But the sexy silver dress he had draped over a chair last night was gone and so was Mattie.

Swinging his legs to the side of the bed, Gabe silently cursed. He should have known she would run. Her lusty response to his lovemaking had scared the hell out of her. He almost smiled. She would be even more scared if she knew that as soon as he realized how little experience she had, he had held himself back.

Still, she had run like a scalded cat out the door this morning and maybe even out of his life.

His shoulders tightened. He been lusting after Mattie Baker since the day he’d met her. He hadn’t thought it was more than that until now.

Maybe it was nothing, just that she was one of the most passionate women he’d ever met and they were incredibly good together in bed. Maybe it was just that he wasn’t ready to give up the great sex they’d shared.

As he padded naked toward the bathroom, he remembered how upset she had been when she thought he hadn’t used a condom. Funny thing was, once she realized he had, she seemed almost disappointed. The lady was definitely hard to read. And yet there was no question that the mind-blowing sex was beyond anything he’d ever experienced before.

Gabe turned on the shower. As he waited for the water to get hot, he spotted a note on the granite counter.

Gabe—

Last night was amazing. You showed me the woman I am inside and I will always be grateful. But my life is my career. Though we will probably run into each other on occasion, I hope you will behave like a gentleman and forget about last night, as I intend to do.

Mattie.

Forget about it? Having her again was all he could think about. And he was hardly a gentleman. A gentleman wouldn’t have undressed her in a storage room. A gentleman wouldn’t have pulled up her skirt and cupped that round little ass in the palms of his hands.

Gabe clenched his jaw at the memory. He turned the shower from warm to cold and climbed in, the cold spray ending his erection. Mattie wanted him out of her life. Fine, then he would leave her alone. He’d never had a problem with women. He didn’t need one who didn’t want him.

The icy water poured over him, calming him a little. So what if Mattie only wanted a one-night stand? It was the way things were these days. He should look on the positive side. He’d wanted her. Now he’d had her.

As he ducked his head beneath the cold spray and goose bumps rose on his skin, the thought didn’t make him feel any better.

Mattie worked hard all morning. Her job was never easy, but today she found it nearly impossible to concentrate on the endless tasks ahead of her.

Nearly impossible to keep her mind off Gabriel Raines.

She sighed as she studied the drawing she was modifying on the CAD program on her computer. One of the reasons she had been promoted to head designer was her ability to think outside the box, to come up with ideas that were both inventive and functional. Currently, she was working on a design for a contemporary art gallery over on Olive not far from the Dallas Museum of Art.

The structure sitting on the lot at present was going to be torn down. Mattie had come up with a concept that was architecturally exciting on the outside, which would help bring in business, and also on the inside, where the spaces were large and open, the ceilings dominated by lighting that would show the paintings off to their best advantage.

She couldn’t wait to present her preliminary drawings to the customer. She intended to stay late in an effort to finish them tonight.

If she could keep her mind on work and not on the night she had spent in bed with Gabriel Raines.

Mattie felt a tug of heat low in her belly. Last night had been incredible. All these years she had thought of herself as a failure at sex. But Gabe had unlocked the passion buried inside her. Whatever happened, she would always be grateful to him for that.

Unfortunately, her sexuality was a part of her nature she couldn’t afford to indulge. She had an important job, a career. If she allowed herself to get involved in a relationship, her future would suffer.

She blew out a breath, moving a loose strand of auburn hair away from her cheek. On the other hand, maybe she was overreacting. Maybe one night of lusty sex was all Gabe wanted. Maybe he had taken her to bed merely to satisfy his curiosity and prove his point.

The men she had dated were sexually wrong for her.

What she needed was a virile, masculine, flesh-and-blood male. The kind who made her feel like a woman.

She’d found that man in Gabe, but even if he wanted to see her again, she couldn’t let her sexual attraction to him go any further. After one brief night, she was finding it nearly impossible to keep her mind on work, to focus on spatial proportions instead of how it felt to have Gabe Raines on top of her, inside her, driving her to climax.

But there was something more. Something she had almost forgotten in her wild abandon last night. As much as she ached to have a baby, she had never wanted to be a single mother. She’d been careful with Mark, but she had still gotten pregnant. Then Mark had abandoned her and she had lost the child.

For nearly a year afterward she’d been submerged in grief. She couldn’t deal with that kind of pain again.

Gabe’s handsome image appeared in her mind and a memory arose of his mouth on her breast, his sinfully skillful hands doing things she had only imagined.

A rush of heat poured through her. Dammit, she had to stop thinking about him. The entire event had to be shoved to the back of her mind. With managing her career and her work at the center, her life was full enough.

A relieved sigh escaped when a light knock sounded at the door, interrupting her thoughts. Mattie looked up as Aaron rolled his wheelchair into the office.

“Thought I’d drop by and say hello. You’ve been holed up in here all day. Anything wrong?”

She felt the slow creep of heat into her cheeks. The only thing wrong was that after her wild night with Gabe, she felt way too good. “Nothing’s wrong. I just needed to concentrate, do some catching up.”

Aaron eyed her strangely. “You’re blushing. And there’s something about you that looks…well, different. Did you go to Club Rio last night?”

Aaron and Emily were the only two people in the office who knew about her secret life as Lena Sterling.

“Tracy and I went for a while.”

“That’s it, isn’t it? You met someone. You must have gotten laid.”

“Aaron!”

He shoved his glasses up on his nose. “Sorry. None of my business. It’s just…I’ve never seen you blush before.”

More color washed into her cheeks. “I’m not blushing.”

“If you say so.” He wheeled toward her. “You want to get some lunch?”

Mattie shook her head. “Too busy. I’ll be working late as it is.”

Aaron just nodded. “If you need to talk, you know I’m always willing to listen.”

“I know you are.” But talking about Gabe Raines was the last thing she wanted. Mattie ignored the quiet closing of her office door and went back to work.

Nine

Gabe slept fitfully that Friday night. He hadn’t dreamed of his days in the Marine Corps for years. He’d been one of the lucky ones, the guys who saw little in the way of action, but his training had been extensive and had given him the skills and confidence he’d needed to deal with the kind of rough-and-tumble guys who worked in the construction business.

The war in Afghanistan hadn’t started for a couple of years after he was out of the service, but he’d lost some good buddies there, and occasionally their faces popped up in his dreams. He awakened bathed in sweat, uncertain whether to be thankful he wasn’t with them, or to wish he had been.