Body Work (2 page)

Two

Revving the Engine

Heart pounding with sexual frustration and fear Lisa strode into the kitchen after her confrontation with Tyce and nearly knocked a tray out of the cook
’s hands as she barreled past.

“
Sorry,” she called back, as she started a full trot through the hall to the sweeping staircase. She slipped off her sandals so they wouldn’t slow her down, and then took the stairs two at a time to head off the dread in her chest. Dread that threatened to swell and consume her.

Tyce Branton.

She never expected he’d still have the power to make her quake. When she’d arranged for the work to be done on Harris’s collection, she knew there was no one else she would trust with the job. She had expected to be able to handle the feelings that seeing him again would dredge up. She was wrong.

Every time Harris had mention Tyce Branton
’s work, success, and skill, she’d come up with excuses not to call him in. She’d been afraid that on sight, she’d want the man.

She
’d been right.

Wanting was one thing, but a raging
, driving need was another. If she allowed Tyce into her bed, she’d be lost. Just like she nearly was all those years ago. Is that what she wanted? To be taken over by the man? To lose herself in his scent? His arms?

Damn straight it was. She wanted every inch of him, so deep inside she wouldn
’t be able to raise her hips for more. She wanted to shake for him, scream for him, and feel his teeth, his tongue on every quivering inch of her. Her breasts filled, her hands shook, her pussy melted in a stream of desire.

She reached the door of her room out of breath. Why was she running? She was not the girl she used to be. She was a woman. A powerful woman. A wealthy widow.

Wealthy powerful women did not tear through their kitchens and haul ass up their staircases as if they were being chased by a gang of bikers. At least, none of the wealthy women she knew would do anything as undignified.

Haul ass
? Even her thoughts had fallen back to the girl she used to be. A lady would never think
haul ass
. A teenage burger joint waitress from the La La Land Trailer Park would, though, she thought with a snicker.

“
You can take the girl out of the trailer park,” she whispered to herself, “and she does everything she can to stay out.”

She wasn
’t that girl anymore. She would not allow her heart to be taken over by Tyce Branton. She would not swoon, not give him more than he gave her. Which from what she’d seen downstairs was nothing more than a great ride in the sack. She had to remember that. Great sex did not equal a great love. Not in her world. Not in anyone’s.

More collected, she grinned and shook her head, opened her bedroom door. Once inside, she allowed the grin to include a chuckle at her own expense. Tyce Branton couldn
’t hurt her. Not now.

Not anymore.

She could fire him, but he was the finest mechanic and body man in the business. If you were selling a Branton vehicle you could expect more money, and money was what she needed.

If the cash was for
her she wouldn’t bother selling the collection. Harris’s greedy sons could have the cars. She wrapped her arms around her waist and held on, and wished she could move away immediately instead of seeing this through.

But she
’d promised Harris she’d get as much as she could for the cars and Lisa always kept her promises. She blew out a breath, gathered her composure, and reminded herself that her last vow to her dying husband was more important than her feelings for Tyce, the cars, or even protecting herself.

So come what may, for the next six weeks she needed Tyce Branton. And she was going to have him.

She walked to her window and peered through the sheer drapes at the French doors that opened onto her bedroom balcony, standing far enough back so Tyce couldn’t see her.

He bent over the hood of the car with his hands buried in the engine. From the twisting motion of his right arm he was probably using a wrench. From here she could see the muscles flex in the back of his arms. When he
’d forced that crank to move she’d seen huge bulges in his forearms, too. His hands had wrapped around the handle and squeezed. His neck had shown the strain, as had the muscles in his back.

How many times had she watched him in this exact pose? Too many times to count. How many times had she yearned for him to focus on her with that same intensity?

He was far more powerfully built today than he was at sixteen, eighteen and even twenty-two. He was full size everywhere, which she’d noted before he’d hidden behind the car.

The thought of
that
made her elbows sweat.

He had thirty cars to get ready. Everyone said her husband
’s collection was in good hands. Little did they know Tyce Branton’s hands were more talented with women than they’d ever been with cars. Heat climbed up her neck at the memory of what those hands could do to a woman.

Twice he
’d held up those hands so she could inspect them. Twice she’d seen them as they’d been twelve years before, sculpting and molding her breasts before he’d set to work on her with his tongue. Thank God she’d had the good sense to stop him there. Her memories were hot enough as they were.

She felt warmth low in her belly and smoothed a hand across herself. It had been years since she
’d felt anything close to this kind of heat. She pressed a finger hard against herself, felt the moistness through her skirt and panties.

Tyce Branton had always made her feel this way. Over the years since she
’d seen him, he’d become the mainstay of her fantasy life. Many times it had been Tyce who’d walked on stage for her when she needed to remember the feel of a man’s hand, or the hard length of a firm body.

Sadly, even that need had fizzled out in recent months. Stress and worry had taken their toll and Lisa had set aside her sexual self in order to be the wife her husband needed.

But Harris was gone now and the first sight of Tyce had brought the sexual Lisa roaring back to life with a force she wouldn’t be able to fight, didn’t want to fight, if truth be told. She was only thirty, too young to set aside that part of herself.

She settled on the bed, slid out of her panties and prepared to make the roar of sexual need dissipate. She tried to pull up the old Tyce, the version she
’d used countless times before, but he’d been swept away the moment she’d heard the Tyce downstairs say her name, Lisa Brady, each syllable a lash of anger.

Her hand worked, her nipples tightened, but still she couldn
’t find the gentle loving she’d come to expect from her fantasy Tyce. Nothing about Tyce Branton was gentle now. He was rough, ready, and he made her wetter than she’d ever been before.

Still, the roar rose without cresting.

Desperate, Lisa opened the drawer of her night stand. Inside, cushioned on a bed of lingerie, lay relief. She pulled out the massager Harris had given her two years ago. The gentle sadness in his gaze had officially marked the end of their physical relationship, although it had been dying for over a year.

But it wasn
’t her husband she thought of now, but the man in the courtyard, the man with strong hands, firm fingers, and a mouth that could kiss a woman senseless.

She set the tip of the personal device to her hottest button, crooning her urgency, and slipped her thumb across the on switch.

Nothing.

She tried again.

No buzz of relief. No hum of satisfaction.

No batteries.

~   ~

The next morning Lisa found Tyce much as she
’d left him, except this time it was the 1948 Jaguar he was working on.

He watched her approach with the same cool
, never-wanted-to-see-you-again expression he’d worn yesterday when she’d first said his name.

“
This garage could use a coffee maker,” he said.

She did an about face, walked back into the house and got the one off the kitchen counter for him.

“Never let it be said I force the hired help to work without caffeine,” she said when she set it on the workbench on the back wall. She’d slung a bag of supplies over her arm and set those on the counter, too. “I meant it when I said you should ask for anything you need.”

His dark brown ey
es had never been so hard. “I’ll take care of my own needs.”

“
Really? As long as your needs don’t hold things up, this arrangement will work out fine.”

The Jag he turned back to was a gun metal grey beauty. A convertible, it was meant to cruise and hold equally beautiful people.
“Harris had the upholstery redone just before we married four years ago,” she said.

He nodded but said nothing.

She set up the coffee maker and brewed a pot while he ignored her. He used his cell phone a couple of times to order parts and tools and hunt down still more. His nephew, who reminded her of Tyce as a kid, was busy with the Cadillac, buffing and polishing the chrome. There was lots of chrome.

She walked over to him and introduced herself. She asked about his mother,
Jenny. Tyce’s sister had Jason too young and Lisa remembered him as a rambunctious, beautiful seven-year-old.

“
You were the cutest little boy,” she said, realizing immediately that it was the last thing a young man wanted to hear.

But he smiled and allowed her the odd familiarity. His jaw and brow line were so much like Tyce
’s it took her aback but warmed her at the same time. When Tyce had been this young, there had never been a bitter word between them.

She went back into the house to get a cooler with ice and soda for Jason. By the time she returned the coffee had finished brewing. She poured Tyce a mug, determined to be of whatever help she could.

When he waved off her offer of sugar and cream, she held the mug out so he could take it. He wiped his hands clean before reaching for the mug. When their fingers brushed, the heat of him sent a thrill to her lower belly that stayed and glowed hot.

Oh my.
She dug through the ice-filled cooler, came up with a soda and rolled it across her forehead, down her neck, and across her collarbones to cool off. She caught Tyce watching her. A muscle in his jaw flexed and it dawned on her that he watched her just as much as she watched him.

That had not changed. She
’d known all those years ago that he’d stop what he was doing every time she walked past his place. His hands would still, his head would come up, and whatever tool he was working with would dangle in his hand.

She
’d stop at the Colorado spruce at the entrance to the park and use its thick branches to hide behind as she snugged down her T-shirt and hiked up her skirt. She would round the tree and put on a sway that would make a hooker proud, although she was too young to even know it. She thrilled down to her toes every time she made Tyce Branton stop what he was doing to stare at her.

There was nothing quite like walking past the Branton
s’ trailer, knowing she’d stopped his very breath. It all rushed back at once and she realized, now, what power she’d wielded then. Still wielded. Still wanted.

She looked back at Tyce, slid the icy can of soda down inside her blouse and across her nipples, making his eyes go narrow and intensely focused. Her nipples peaked with the frigid can against them.

Slowly she bent to the cooler again and removed a fresh can. Strolling by a still and glaring Tyce, she took the soda outside to his nephew.

“
Thanks,” Jason said with an awkward smile. He popped the top of the can and drained it in a couple of youthful swallows. When he tried to hold back a burp, she grinned. “Sorry, my Mom would kill me for that,” he said, flushing crimson.

Tyce came up behin
d her and spoke to his nephew. “You’ve got lunch in twenty minutes. You can take a break then.” He gave the boy a look that sent the kid scurrying to the far side of the car.

“
I thought you were in a hurry,” Tyce said, turning to her. “Don’t interfere.” But his eyes dropped to her blouse, his gaze hot and interested. She crossed her arms, and squeezed, creating cleavage. Her nipples remained beaded, even though the effect of the icy can was long gone.

“
Are you sure one helper’s enough? Six weeks isn’t very long.” She opened her stance and shifted her feet when she saw him glance down. She wriggled her toes in her sandals, and then stepped wider.

His gaze trailed up from her toes in a heat she remembered seeing only one time before. The coffee quivered in his mug.
“I don’t start anything I can’t finish. If you stay out of our way, the cars will be ready.”

“
And I’m betting you finish everything you start,” she said, with a smile designed to set his teeth on edge. Tyce Branton was hot and hard and better looking than ever. And he wanted her.