Bittersweet (2 page)

“Forgive you?”

She nodded. “Yes. My client. Mrs. Shapiro. I overstepped my bounds, I’m afraid.” She let out a mighty sigh that said the woman annoyed her but held something she wanted.

“Your bounds? What might they be?”

“I’m her interior designer. The bedroom she wanted.” Another frustrated sigh. “Well...”

He snagged a chocolate-covered pretzel from the shelf. Not just chocolate. A large sourdough pretzel dipped in very salty homemade peanut butter, then dipped in the smoothest milk chocolate Deacon had ever tasted. He broke it into pieces on the sample plate so that he didn’t look too eager. “Well what?”

“She entertains a lot, and part of having your own business is referrals. I’m sure you know this.”

He went still. “I’m learning it. I’ve only been running this ship for a few weeks.”

“Well, if you work alone, really alone...you need word of mouth. And this room. This room was just horrendous! It was this acid lime green, and she wanted zebra print! Zebra. Print. And cranberry red satin, too.” Her eyebrows went down in anger. Her mouth went all stubborn and pouty. Hands on hips. Stance wide. She was a pistol. No one told her what to do, Deacon thought. Well, almost no one. That was to be determined.

“Tons,” she admitted and laughed a nervous little laugh. For just a moment he caught her eyes skimming over his shoulders, across his chest. Ah, good. He had hope.

“So you want to get her back with some expensive, delicious bribery, and then you will give her a stunning alternative to that monstrosity?”

The anger disappeared and her mouth opened like a pretty pink flower for him. Deacon was so turned on he thought his blood might boil right out of his skin.

Chapter 3

“Oh...my...God. Who woulda thought that wasabi and chocolate would fucking rock out!” Maureen cried, mid-chocolate orgasm. Then her eyes went wide and turned glassy.

“Careful. They are potent. Little hot after a moment,” Rayka snorted.

Maureen downed the rest of her white wine and poured some more. “Holy crap! That was hot. But good. So, tell me, is he gorgeous? And are you sure he isn’t gay? He owns a candy store.” Maureen held up bag from The Good, the Bad, and the Yummy. Very large hot pink and black stripes accented by very, very thin white pin stripes. “I mean, look at the bag.”

Fueled by wine, Rayka let the giggles come. “No. Not gay. Trust me, Mo, he is so freaking far from gay it’s not even funny. But his uncle was. Gideon, the former owner. Deacon said he died from AIDS. Lived happily and healthily on meds for several decades, but a recent bout of pneumonia took him.”

“Hmmmm. Not gay. Okay. Well, then he must be a hottie judging how you got all glowy and wide-eyed when you talked about him.”

Rayka flipped through a swatch book. She fingered a nice turquoise cotton with a black polka dot pattern. Colorful, simple, chic, without being gaudy. Definitely not a neon lime chartreuse car wreck. “I did not glow. I do not glow. I am a serious business woman who is trying to fix a very big mistake. Never have a temper tantrum on a client. Instead, nod your head and then talk them out of their awful idea and talk them
into
your wonderful one.”

She liked the turquoise and black. Definitely. Those eyes of his flashed in her mind’s eye. She could almost hear his deep, demanding voice:
Open
and she had to shift in her seat and take a sip of wine. Her whole body wanted to tense up at the thought of him. Tense up and get tighter until that inevitable moment of...release.

“Oh, my God. You look orgasmic!” Mo hissed. “What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing.”

His fingertips on my lips. His eyes watching my mouth. The way he seemed to eat me alive with his gaze. The way I wanted to drop to my knees for him. Let him have me right there. Do anything and everything he said. Which is so...so...not me.

“Busted,” Rayka agreed and poured them some more wine. “Let’s call our order in before we both end up snookered.” She would focus on food and swatches and her best friend. Not on Deacon James or the nasty thoughts that came into her normally sane head when she thought about him.

“Who needs food?” Mo said, and pulled a chocolate-dipped pretzel from the bag. “I have dinner right here.”

“That is not dinner and that is mine. He gave
me
a bag of samples. I paid a fortune for Shapiro’s bag. That’s supposed to be my stash.”

“This is it! I swear,” Mo said solemnly and bit into the pretzel. It crunched and crumbled into a sinful pile of pretzel, peanut butter and chocolate pieces that Mo caught with her hand. Her long, lean fingers made sure to capture every piece. “Oh, Jesus. I think I love him, too,” she sighed around a mouthful of pretzel.

* * * *

After another cup of coffee and one more stolen piece of chocolate, Mo went home. Rayka cleaned up their delivery containers and stowed the rest of her shrimp lo mein in the fridge and put the wine bottle in recycling. The goodie bag tempted her, and she stuck her nose in the opening. Inhaling deeply, she let out a soft sound. God. The smell no longer just made her want a sweet treat, the smell now made her think of big muscular forearms, a crooked grin, fierce brown eyes, and a commanding voice. She could picture the faded denim that swathed his trim hips and the small scar on the first knuckle of his right hand.

Rayka withdrew a dark brown orb and pressed it to her lips. She took another deep breath, and the delicate smell of mandarin oranges filled her senses. She punctured the chocolate coating and pressed her tongue to the small wound where orange cream seeped from the candy. Her tongue came to life first and then brought to mind how his finger had slid past the barrier of her lips and touched her tongue when she had sampled the orange cream in the store. Just for a moment. So fast, she had almost doubted it had happened. Except for the intense warmth that unfurled like silken ribbons low in her belly. The pulse in her pussy assured her that he had, indeed, had his finger in her mouth.

Her breath had frozen for just an instant and he had caught her. That wide-eyed, stunned feeling of that second of her life. The overwhelming sensation that if he demanded she lower her designer skirt and shove aside her La Perla panties she would. Without a thought. Without an argument. Dear God. What was happening? Had she gone crazy?

But she hadn’t, and when he had said, “I’ll pick you up for dinner the night after tomorrow. I have a meeting with Gideon’s lawyers tonight and tomorrow night. To finalize the store. My first free night is Friday. I will pick you up at seven.”

She hadn’t questioned the fact that they were more orders than an invitation. Her body had hummed its response instantly. Yes. Yes, come and get me, feed me, take me. She had written down her phone number and address, accepted the pound of bribery for Ms. Shultz. She had blushingly taken his gift of a pound of candy for herself. His personal choices for her. Then she had hurried out, a pep in her step despite the fact that she was late to her next appointment.

Her only real concern had been how she would possibly make it until Friday. She would have that nervous sizzling feeling in the pit of her belly for almost two full days. Her concentration would be shot to hell and her hormones wouldn’t just be raging by then—they’d be on a rampage. Ready to pillage and plunder and do whatever he said. Never had she felt that way. Never would she have done anything a man asked of her even if she didn’t 100 percent want to. She was almost certain she would do that for this man. He did strange things to her. Not just her body, but her mind. Whatever he said, she obliged. It was very unlike her to open her mouth to a virtual stranger. Not even if the offering was an intoxicating morsel of chocolate.

When she closed her eyes, she could feel the slide of his hand over hers as he’d handed her the bags. For just a moment his fingers had lingered on the back of her hand, sending each nerve into a tizzy. Her nipples had hardened at the stimulation then and they did now.

Rayka shivered and bit the candy in half. The orange and chocolate concoction melted on her tongue and she wondered what his lips felt like. What he kissed like. What Deacon’s mouth would feel like closing over her nipple and kissing down her belly. How his hands would feel parting her thighs and how his fingers would feel sliding deep inside her ready moisture. When the phone rang she was breathing hard, a tiny dot of chocolate melting on her lower lip.

Chapter 4

He’d heard of bed head, but never bed voice. But she had it. The raspy gasp when she answered the phone brought to mind Bardot’s tousled, I’ve-just-been-fucked hair and rumpled bed sheets. Parted lips and a light sheen of sweat on bare breasts. Deacon ground his teeth together so hard he thought they might shatter. He relaxed his grip on the phone and steadied his voice before he spoke.

Normally when he made a date with a woman, he didn’t contact them until the time he had laid down. Not this woman. This woman had somehow wormed under his skin. She undid him in a way that was unsettling. He wasn’t sure he liked the hold she had over him, even if she didn’t know she had it.

“Rayka?” he said when he knew his voice was steady.

“Deacon?”

Jesus. Just the way she said his name brought intensely filthy images into his head. Deacon thought she’d taste like strawberries. Maybe that strawberry whip candy Gideon had been addicted to. Lighter than air with just enough of the sweet summery flavor to make your tongue giddy with the taste. He took another deep breath and closed his eyes.

“Yes, it’s me. What are you doing? Or what were you doing?” he said, letting just a bit of his dark humor tinge his words.

He heard her suck in a breath as if she’d been caught. He took a chance. After all, she could take offense, be horrified, and break their date. Or she might go along with him. Answer his rude questioning. He pushed.

“Were you touching yourself, Rayka?”

“No! Oh, no. I was...”

He could imagine the red stain of mortification on her pale cheeks. She had the lightest fawn-colored freckles on the apples of her cheeks. He wanted to run his tongue over each one to see if it had a taste or a feel. He bet different parts of her had different flavors. Or, at the very least, to him they would. Her earlobe would taste different than the nape of her neck. Her nipple would be sweeter than her pussy, and her pussy richer than the small of her back.

“You were. I see. What were you thinking about?” he asked. His voice was gruff. He could hear the dominant tone himself. She would answer or she wouldn’t.

“You.” It was said so softly he almost didn’t hear her over his own harsh breathing.

“What about me, Rayka? What were you thinking about me?”

“What it would be like to kiss you,” she admitted. Her voice remained soft, but the breathy, ethereal quality had increased. She was turned on. Deacon didn’t have to see her to know that.

“And what else?” he urged. “I know there’s more, Rayka. Don’t even bother to say there isn’t.”

Dead silence. He could picture her chewing gently on her bottom lip. Little nibbles as she thought. He’d seen her do it in the candy store and had fought the temptation to kiss her and bite that swollen bottom lip. Hard. And then soothe it with the gentlest of licks and kisses.

She breathed out that final word, and Deacon had to close his eyes and concentrate on not bursting apart in a thousand pieces. Finally, his heart settled a bit. “And in you, I bet,” he went on. “Pushing into that sweet pussy of yours?”