Girl Gear 1: All Tied Up (9 page)

“I’m on my own. Got it. And consider the reverse to be true, as well. If I cook for myself, I’ll cook for you.”

“Okay.” She held up one warning finger. “But don’t touch my laundry.”

“Don’t do your laundry or don’t touch your laundry?” he asked, this time going for the grapefruit, giving her a second to ponder his question as he chewed. “Because last time I was here you had different rules about touching your laundry. I just want to get things straight.”

“Grr.” She tossed the cleaver and the cutting board into the sink, grabbed a bag of potato chips and a package of Oreos and stomped from the room.

Grinning to himself, Leo served up a bowl of fruit salad, pulled a rib-eye from the freezer and set the microwave to thaw. He found fresh garlic and butter and an indoor grill.

Maybe intimate and domestic wasn’t so terrible. Maybe he’d worried over nothing. So, she was perceptive. So, she was too damned attractive for his peace of mind.

So far Macy’s house rules suited him just fine.

A
NTON
N
EVILLE LEANED
against the railing that ran along the second floor landing of the home he’d made in an abandoned warehouse. To the average observer, the place gave no hint to the aesthetics hidden in the framework, the oddly slanted roof sections, the placement of windows.

Anton’s gift was being able to see with more than the naked eye. The way Beethoven looked at a piano’s ivories, the way Michelangelo looked at a block of marble. This was how Anton’s mind worked. He looked at buildings long since left to decline and visualized the possibilities.

Which was why, now, looking down at Lauren, who sat working at the computer station he’d added to their home office, a sense of dissatisfaction chewed at the contentment he’d lived with since she’d moved in.

She had amazing potential, a potential that guaranteed more career possibilities than he knew she’d imagined. gIRL-gEAR was a fantastic launch to her multimedia career, but she was still thinking inside a smaller graphic design box than her position gave her boundaries to explore.

Lauren insisted the artwork she created for the company’s Web site fit the image Sydney and the others agreed best conveyed gIRL-gEAR’s upbeat and energetic attitude.

But Anton couldn’t help thinking that Lauren was stifling her creativity, stunting her artistic growth in a way she wouldn’t be if she were to expand her graphic portfolio.

“Are you going to stand up there and stare at me for the rest of your life? Not that I’m complaining, mind you.”

“I don’t know. Sounded like a complaint to me.” Anton made his way to the central staircase, descended leisurely. He kept his hand on the polished aluminum railing, his eyes on Lauren.

“Then I guess I need to make my meaning a bit clearer, don’t I?” She swiveled in her chair and crooked a finger his direction.

Anton gave in to the smile that tugged at the edge of his mouth. Since the day he’d stepped from his car and found Lauren waiting to tour the loft in which she and Macy had lived, he’d fought what felt like an unhealthy obsession.

He had her under his roof now. The obsession should have eased. The fact that it hadn’t said a lot about the way he’d let her get under his skin. He had plans for the long term and he wanted to include Lauren.

What he didn’t want to do was forget about his future because he’d gone and fallen in love.

Once he reached her chair, he braced both hands on the padded arms, leaning down to nuzzle her hairline from temple to ear. Lauren moaned and Anton pulled back, but only far enough to snuggle his nose to hers. “Still complaining?”

She nodded, and this time he moved to look into her eyes. “What’s wrong now?”

She slipped the noose of her arms around his neck. With her lips brushing his in light butterfly kisses, she
whispered, “You’re not naked and I’m wearing too many clothes.”

“A single-minded wench, aren’t you?”

“Now who’s complaining?”

Giving in would be so easy. Too easy. He finished the kiss she’d begun, then ducked away from her hold. “That would be me. But only because I’m meeting Leo in twenty minutes. Not enough time for a wench of your nature.”

“Oh, now suddenly you’re the expert on my nature.”

“I do know your nature, Lauren.” His voice was soft and coaxing, convincing. This was one thing he didn’t think she understood. “Better than I think you know yourself.”

“I’m some sort of mindless bimbo. Is that it?” She’d tucked her heels up on her chair, pulled her knees to her chest. A childlike defense. Fetal. Protecting herself from his prying eyes. As if he needed to see her to know her.

He’d taken too long to answer, and she’d started to fidget, rolling her thumb over the trackball of her mouse, sending the cursor in a jerky flight across the screen. He knew her well enough to lay odds on her imminent flight.

Five, four, three, two, one. She was out of her chair.

“I can always move back in with Macy. I’m sure she’s climbing the walls by now, being on her own.”

“You think I wouldn’t be climbing the walls if you left?” He’d taken hold of her shoulders to prevent further flight. Now he drew his palms in a caress down her arms to her wrists. “I want you here, Lauren. With me.”

Her chin went up a notch. Her eyes glistened.

He refused to be swayed by her tears. “You’re beautiful, creative, intelligent. But that’s only the tip of the
iceberg. I want to learn everything there is to learn about you. I want you to know me in the same way.”

She looked away, found her composure, then met his waiting gaze. “Isn’t that why I’m here? Because we wanted time together? Time we didn’t have living apart?”

Anton closed his eyes briefly. He wanted to say things to Lauren he knew she wouldn’t want to hear. It had always been his way to push. Both himself and those around him. His put-up-or-shut-up method produced results.

But this was Lauren, he reminded himself. And toned down the words he wanted to say. “I want you here. But you have to want to be here and to believe in us for this to work. You have to be as honest with yourself as you are with me.”

“Why would you think I’m not honest with myself?”

“I don’t know that you’re not. I hope you are.” He paused, took a breath. “What I don’t want, Lauren, is for you to…settle. For me. For anything. Not if you can do better.”

Lauren waited through several long seconds, then pulled free of his hold. She gave a disgusted shake of her head. “This is about gIRL-gEAR, isn’t it? You still think I’m wasting my time there.”

“I never said you were wasting your time. Or your talent,” he added, before she cut him off.

“Maybe not in so many words.” Lauren began to pace. Her sandals slapped lightly over the espresso-colored Italian marble of the room’s flooring. “Why would I want to leave gIRL-gEAR?”

“I didn’t say you should leave gIRL-gEAR.”

“I love what I do. I’m good at what I do. I love the people I work with. It’s a dream job. I’m making tons
of money.” She stopped, pressed fingertips to both temples. “I can’t even believe this has come up. Again.”

He leaned back against her desk and crossed his arms. “I don’t want you to leave gIRL-gEAR. I only want you to recognize that you can do anything you want.”

“I
am
doing what I want. I know you’re not crazy about me working in an industry dependent on fads and styles. But you know what? You’re doing the exact same thing. Turning your talents to supply the demand for the—” she rolled her eyes, made air quotations with her fingers “—oh-so-fashionable lofts and warehouses. So don’t give me crap about not knowing myself.”

She returned to her desk then, closed out the file she’d been working on.

“Macy’s new logo?” he asked after the screen went blank.

“Yes, as a matter of fact. And I’m very happy with the design, thank you.”

Anton had to admit it was time to back off. All he wanted was for Lauren to live up to her potential. But he’d yet to figure out how to make his point without ruffling her feathers. Her defensiveness had a source he still hadn’t discovered.

And that was why she was here, wasn’t it?

“Look,” she said, finally. “If we’re going to do this housewarming, I’ve got to get busy. And I could use some help.”

“I’m all yours,” he said. His truest statement of the day.

“I
HAVE AN IDEA
.” Cradling her first coffee of the morning, Macy barely gave Leo time to set foot in the kitchen before she pounced. “Coffee’s hot. Get a cup and I’ll tell you all about it.”

He lifted one brow in answer. A small fan of laugh lines spread toward his temple, but nothing resembling a wrinkle or a droopy, under-eye bag marred a face well-suited for an eight-by-ten glossy. The man could at least have the decency to look half-asleep first thing in the morning. But no. He’d been here three days now and he still had no decency whatsoever, looking as if he’d stepped from the pages of a sleepwear fashion shoot.

He wore black, pin-striped pajama bottoms and a matching calf-length robe. The bottoms served to emphasize the length of his legs, the robe the breadth of his shoulders. His only faux pas was the pajama top he’d skipped, wearing, instead, a form-fitting white T-shirt. Macy approved of the gaffe.

Each of his movements—reaching up into the cupboard for a coffee mug, lifting the brimming carafe to pour, bringing the white stoneware to his mouth to blow across the steaming surface and sip—teased her with glimpses of his lean waist, his muscled chest, the bulge of a shoulder rising just above his collarbone.

Discreet glimpses, of course. Modest glimpses. Totally innocent, acceptable glimpses. No bare skin or—

“Macy?”

“Hmm?”

“You have an idea?”

“Idea? Oh, yeah.” She shook off her lust and set her mug on the countertop, scouring the pantry shelves for the box of Cocoa Krispies she’d hidden from Lauren. “Let’s play a game.”

He lifted his stoneware mug. “It’s seven o’clock in the morning, I haven’t even finished my first cup of coffee and you want to play a game. Not to mention that I need a shower. Or that I haven’t had breakfast.”

She wiggled both brows, shaking the box of Cocoa Krispies.

Rolling his eyes, Leo started to leave the kitchen. “I have to be in court at ten. Chocolate isn’t going to cut it.”

Macy reached out and, grabbing the belt of his robe, gave a quick yank. “I’ll make you a deal. An omelette. Cheese. Ham. All the protein your brain can handle.”

He slowed, since she wasn’t giving him a choice, and, sipping from his mug, considered her offer. “What’s the game?”

Macy grinned. Men were so easy. “Twenty questions. Sort of.”

Leo breathed deeply. “Your
sort of’s
worry me.”

“C’mon,” she pleaded, telling herself she really wanted that sailing vacation. “For the scavenger hunt. How hard can it be?”

“Can’t.” He drained his coffee and made to leave the kitchen. “I’ve got to get in the shower or I’ll be late.”

He hardly needed three hours to get to court. She knew that. After the past few days of his off-and-on company, she’d learned things about him she never thought she’d know.

He wasn’t as uptight as she’d accused him of being. He had a sense of humor, a real sense of humor, not just the sarcastic wit he wielded so well. No doubt he hid other redeeming qualities. The one thing he didn’t hide was his impatience with her playful nature, or with her tendency to open mouth, insert foot.

She winced and tried again. “C’mon, Leo. How long can it take?”

“Considering the way your tricky little mind works? Fifteen minutes, give or take a week.” He set his empty mug on the counter and headed for the back of the loft.

Grr.
She took it back. Men weren’t so easy, after all. “Hey. What do you mean, my tricky little mind?”

She followed, enjoying the light slap of his bare feet on the hardwood floor. Hmm. What was Mr. Designer Pajamas doing with bare feet, anyway? What happened to his coordinating designer house shoes? “Leo. Answer me.”

“I’m taking a shower, Macy.”

She stopped when he stopped in the hallway, waiting while he grabbed a towel and a washcloth from the loft’s single linen closet. “I can’t believe you’re saying no to an omelette.”

“I’m not saying no to an omelette.” He closed the closet door and looked down into her face. “I’m saying no to a game of twenty questions that will end up being twenty-two thousand after you get through.”

“Ha.”

He continued toward the bath and she continued to stalk, er, to follow. He turned into Lauren’s rooms, looked over his shoulder only when he reached the bathroom door. “Macy. I’m going to take a shower.”

She crossed her arms and stood her ground. “No one here is stopping you.”

He took her up on the dare with only one arch look before he walked into the room tiled in red and black. Macy didn’t let him get too far ahead. It was her gauntlet he was walking away with, after all.

She moved into the doorway and swore she caught a hint of a smile on the mouth of the beast. That did it. He couldn’t pay her to leave. She’d stand here until night fell if she had to. She would not be the first to back down.

Apparently Leo was of the same mind-set. He’d draped his towel on the rack, his washcloth on the
shower head. His glasses he set on the shelf above the pedestal sink. And then he turned and shrugged off his robe.

His eyes never left Macy’s as he reached behind the door for the clothes hook, and she wasn’t about to be the first to look away. His T-shirt came first, off and over his head. The devil on her shoulder went pitchfork crazy, but Macy refused to move her gaze from Leo’s face.

Temptation had never been so hard to resist. With her eyes only marginally popping out of her head, she took total advantage of her peripheral vision and sucked in the picture of Leo’s hard body.

His pecs were well defined, his abs sported a six-pack. The body of a man who worked out for stress relief instead of competition. His chest was free of all but a feathering of dark hair, soft hair, hair she wanted to feel against her bare skin.

She wanted to melt into a girl puddle at his feet, but managed to do nothing more than wet her lips, clear her throat and say, “I could easily stand out here and ask my questions while you shower.”

“You could just as easily fix that omelette instead.” He hooked both thumbs in the elastic waistband of his pajamas.

“No questions, no omelette.”

“No omelette, no pajamas.”

He wouldn’t. No way. She snorted her disbelief. “Oh, this I gotta see.”

“If you insist.” And he showed her. Though she didn’t see a thing because at the first sign of male belly and the stripe of hair spreading out over Leo’s lower abs and lower other things, Macy shut her eyes tight.

She ignored both his laugh and the prurient urge to
peek, listening for the snap of the shower stall’s door latch catching, finally. Listening, too, for the first blast of water from the shower head.

When the spray at last hit the tiled stall wall and the drain took its first gurgling drink, she peeled open one eyelid, still expecting to come face to crotch—er, face to face—with a naked Leo Redding. But she found herself alone.