Blindsided (3 page)

Of course, of frigging course, Chelsea thought. He was a fucking rock star. King of all bad boys, outranking the bikers, the fighters, and all the other subgenres. Musicians were doubly dangerous. Besides the alluring danger of the tough guy image, they had the whole tortured artist thing going for them. Their art gave you a glimpse of a sensitive side that never quite materialized in real life. What woman could resist a hurt, broken man who probably just needed a little love? Musicians were like poets with sexy attitudes and colorful pasts, and Nate wasn’t just any musician. He was a famous one, a rock star. Chelsea had enough musicians in her past to know all about Nate and his type.

No wonder her libido was out of control. She mentally rolled her eyes and slapped her forehead. Why couldn’t her car have broken down in front of an investment banker’s house? Then she could have just called her brother and gone on her merry little way without her body heating up and thinking about doing things she had been abstaining from. The fact that her libido had developed into a little voice in her head made her wonder if the damn Australian Incident had long lasting consequences or if her abstinence had just been too long.

Chelsea couldn’t think of a thing to say. She was too busy trying desperately to squash both her desire to run and her desire to drag him into the woods and take off his pants and, well, enough said there, really. She started walking again, quickly, to try to get all this over with as soon as possible.

“I can see how that must be stressful. Touring, and interviews, I guess, and trashing hotel rooms. That’s probably quite, um, taxing,” she said finally.

She tried to keep her tone light to hide her fear. She was fairly certain that rock stars, like Rottweilers, could smell fear. Then they’d exploit it and seduce you right out of your underwear, your common sense and your heart.

“I don’t spend a lot of time in the States,” Chelsea said feeling that she had to explain why she didn’t recognize him, “I’m not that current when it comes to bands, or movies or anything else really. My friends say I’m a pop culture vacuum.”

Great, she was babbling.

“We’re popular all over Europe,” Nate said helpfully.

He was still grinning. What was it with this guy and his unstoppable grin? It made his eyes sparkle and her feel like a puddle of heat. It was all she could do not to fan herself.

“Oh, well, I tend to filter out the stuff that comes from America, you know? So I get an idea of local culture and ideas,” she said vehemently.

They had almost arrived at the end of the driveway and Chelsea was relieved to be one step closer to getting away from him and his smell, his smile, his eyes... Just everything, really.

“I’m a travel writer,” Chelsea explained, “I write for a few different magazines and contribute to a lot of travel guides. There’s no point in reporting back about MTV on German television or that you can still be assured of getting McDonald’s in every major city.”

“I’ve seen MTV in German,” Nate said with a laugh. “It’s kind of disorienting.”

Chelsea nodded in agreement. She knew firsthand just how disorienting. She wondered if his experience involved large mugs of beer and a man named Bittan.

“Well, I’m a little jealous that you actually see local culture when you travel. The older I get, the more I wish we had time for that. It doesn’t really feel like traveling the world when all you see is concert halls and hotel rooms.”

“Which you trash,” Chelsea said, smiling to let him know she was kidding. She was worried he was going to think she had no sense of humor.

“Of course. It’s actually the law in some countries. Though lately I’ve been hiring other people to do it for me. It’s a perk of getting famous,” Nate said with another dangerous grin.

That grin would be the death of her, she thought. That and his big, toned chest and long legs.

“What the hell is that thing?” Nate asked with a sudden grimace.

Chapter 2

Chelsea jumped, alarmed by the prospect of encountering something that would scare a man like Nate. Following the direction of his finger, all she saw was Bunny. Nate seemed to be trying to decide whether to laugh or scream in horror. That got her hackles up and for a moment she almost didn’t notice the way his eyes glittered with amusement. Almost.

“What do you mean what the hell is it? It’s a car. A VW Rabbit, to be precise. Her name is Bunny,” she added and then immediately wished she hadn’t. No one really needed to know she had named her car, and uncreatively at that.

“You drive a primer gray nineteen seventy-five Rabbit named Bunny?”

The look he gave her was equal parts amusement and incredulity. It filled her with equal parts rage and lust. He pissed her off and turned her on simultaneously. It wasn’t a nice feeling, but it was annoyingly addictive nonetheless.

“It’s a nineteen eighty,” Chelsea said hotly. “And I have to, um, get it painted.”

Her anger guttered out. Bunny was old and she hadn’t been good about keeping up on the maintenance. Looking at her through Nate’s eyes, she could see poor Bunny was in sad shape. Just the same, she loved that damn car and she’d take enough crap from Tony about it for the past 12 years. He’d always tried foisting his old cars off on her, but nothing would budge her loyalty to Bunny. If her brother couldn’t do it, then a stranger with way too many tattoos didn’t have a chance in hell. She and Bunny had been through a lot together.

“Well no shit!” Chelsea said more loudly than she had intended, “It’s broken, isn’t it? And don’t call me babe, or sweetheart, or any other little pet name you might come up with. You barely know me.”

And she needed to remind herself that she wasn’t his babe, his sweetheart. It was all too easy to fall into that trap. If you let them, guys like this would have you doing all sorts of things for them and you’d be thinking they cared about you. Then everything would fall apart and they’d make it clear that their priorities would always be themselves. Chelsea was too old and too experienced to fall for the grin and pet names. She just had to make sure her mind kept her body in check.

“Sorry, Ms. Spencer,” Nate said with a sneer. His smile fell off his face. “But this car is older than you are.”

“No it’s not. I’m two years older.”

And right about now she sounded like she was about two years old, period. She quickly removed her hands from her hips. The stance smacked of a child about to have a tantrum and she felt unbalanced enough by Nate as it was. Feeling like a child would only make matters worse.

“Oh, my apologies. The point is, it hasn’t been taken care of. These things can live forever, but this one’s trashed. It needs a lot of work. What have you done to this thing?
Babe
,” he finished.

Despite his obvious challenge, he was looking at her differently. His eyes were softer, his guard lowered, if only a little. She felt herself softening in response. Deciding to pick her battles, she let the pet name go. What was the harm in a little friendly conversation? He’d look at her car, eventually Tony would answer his phone and she’d leave. They would never see each other again, so why be so wary? This could be a pleasant afternoon of ogling and conversation, or one of heated arguments and pointless rage. The fact that her libido wanted to have a go at him didn’t give her the right to be rude.

“Sorry,” she said, with a resigned sigh “I’m a little touchy about it. And I never get around to getting all the maintenance done, since I’m not really around much. It’s in pretty bad shape. But my brother gives me shit about it all the time and I’m sick of hearing it.”

Nate had popped the hood and was getting ready to lift it when a truck came roaring around the corner, splashing a puddle up and over both Bunny and Nate. For a split second, Chelsea thought the truck was even closer than it had been. She was in the act of leaping forward to warn Nate when she realized the danger was gone, the truck zooming out of sight. Nate looked up at her and raised an eyebrow, water dripping from his hair and eyelashes and running down the planes of his face.

Chelsea tried desperately to crush images of herself gently kissing his eyelids, his face. Bad train of thought. Best to derail it right away, before it rushed into even more dangerous territory. She felt her face flush with heat as her body kept going down the track, full speed ahead. His tight shirt was soaking wet and clinging to the hard, muscular planes. She would run her fingers over his hard chest, get him out of the wet cotton. Letting her mouth trail over his chest, she’d feel warm moist skin under her lips. The truck had either done her a huge favor or gotten her into a lot of trouble. Probably both. Her vivid imagination had Nate naked and kissing her hard in less than thirty seconds.

“How about we get this into the driveway and then worry about what’s wrong with it?” he said.

He was looking at her with suspicion and amusement. With a sinking feeling, Chelsea realized he had seen the basic idea of her thoughts written all over her face. She blushed even more and grasped desperately on the last thing he had said.

and away from her fantasies. She had gotten herself worked up, and she was glad that she was a woman. At least her arousal, though obvious to her, couldn’t be seen.

Chelsea shrugged and got in. “This is never going to work,” she muttered to herself as she put the car into neutral. To her surprise, the car started moving with very little effort from Nate. She watched him through the rear view mirror and was surprised to see he wasn’t even breaking a sweat. He simply leaned nonchalantly against the back of Bunny, who rolled forward obligingly.

Of course, Bunny rolled over for him, Chelsea thought. She was a girl and he was by far the sexiest man either she or Bunny had seen in a long time. She used the time to study the way Nate’s muscles moved under his skin, the slight bunching and rolling of his biceps as he pushed the car. Luckily, she remembered to steer into the driveway. Nate disappeared from Chelsea’s appreciative gaze before materializing in the seat beside her.

“Just keep driving. It’ll be slow, but the driveway’s downhill all the way to the house,” he said as he tried to get comfortable in the passenger seat.

His legs were so long it was nearly impossible. He finally managed to give himself a little more room by lounging diagonally across the car. His head was only a few inches from hers and Chelsea felt her heartbeat kick up in response. He smelled musky, earthy and so very masculine. Either she was crazy, or heat was rolling off his skin.

For just a moment she let herself become lost in his spicy scent, letting her eyelids lower slightly in ecstasy. It had been so long since she had been this close to a man. Did they all smell like this and she had forgotten? Realizing she was drifting away from reality again, she forced herself to assert some self control and leaned away from him, from his heat. He was as bad as they came and she had no intention of falling for him, regardless of his intoxicating smell. With looks, fame and charm, he probably had women falling over themselves trying to get into his bed, but she would not be one of them. Nosirree. She had stopped being a glutton for that particular brand of punishment. Why was it becoming so hard to remember that?

Bunny lumbered along over the gravel, creating a slow-moving cocoon. Insulated from the rest of the world, their breathing mingled, the effect rhythmic and sensual. Chelsea shivered, suddenly very aware of her see-through sweater and damp skin.

Unable to help herself, she looked over at Nate. He was looking at her intently, as if trying to decide or decipher something. His blue eyes were dilated and shining with inner heat. Chelsea’s breath hitched in her throat as his eyes roved over her body. There was something vaguely possessive about his look. He wasn’t bothering to hide what was on his mind.

“What?” she asked.

###

She pushed a strand of the coppery hair back behind her ear and Nate swallowed hard. It was killing him not to reach over and do it for her, to slide his hand into her hair. To grab the back of her neck and pull her across this rat trap of a car and pull her lower lip into his mouth. And that was just the opening act.