His for the Taking (12 page)

She pushed at him again, this time nearly hard enough to bruise him. ‘Let me go,’ she said, and her voice was strangled, rough and upset.

He loosed his hold on her and she stumbled backwards. Her normal ease in movement seemed to have deserted her; she teetered on her heels. Nick reached out to steady her, but she retreated even more.

‘Zoe—’

She breathed harsh and fast. So did he. She wiped the back of her hand against her mouth, as if she were trying to wipe away his kiss.

‘I don’t need your pity,’ she said, and ran past him out the door.

CHAPTER EIGHT

S
HE HATED TO
admit that Nick was right about anything. But he’d been right about New York. It was noisy.

Zoe sat on the edge of her bed to lace up her sneakers. Her eyes felt full of sand and her body ached and her throat was scratchy and she knew she was fooling herself.

The reason she hadn’t slept last night wasn’t because it was noisier here in her apartment in the Bronx than in her great-aunt’s apartment in Manhattan. She’d lived with the noise for years. The noise hadn’t kept her awake; Nick had.

For a couple of seconds she allowed herself to close her eyes and remember. She’d been in his arms. His hand had been in her hair. His body had been big and hot against her. And he’d kissed her, breathtaking and incredible, filling every single cell of her body with delight and longing.

She licked her lip, as if the taste of him could still be there seventeen hours later. It wasn’t, but she could taste him in her memory.

He’d been even better than she’d imagined.

Zoe opened her eyes and got to her feet, disgusted with herself.

No, he hadn’t been better than she’d imagined. Because in her imagination Nicholas Giroux would have kissed her because he wanted her, because he couldn’t resist her, and not because he thought he was some sort of knight in shining armour riding to her rescue. Not because he was a Boy Scout with special badges in lost causes and hopeless quests.

With the thought she pictured him as he’d been yesterday, standing alone, always alone, even in a crowd. Tall and alert, searching every face for his father.

Another wave of longing swept through her, even stronger because it wasn’t purely lust.

Right. It was a good thing that she had two back-to-back aerobics classes to teach this morning, because she could do with the endorphins. Plus maybe if she totally exhausted herself she’d be able to come back here and sleep for a couple of hours without being tormented by memories of the best kiss she’d ever had in her life.

Stupid girl. She didn’t need to be tormented by the thought of Nick—she had enough stuff to beat herself up about as it was. One thing Xenia’s funeral had shown her was how much her great-aunt had touched other people’s lives. There hadn’t been a single person in that church or at that reception who didn’t have fond memories of Xenia or a story about how she’d helped them out with money, time, or kindness.

Zoe was proud of her great-aunt. But she couldn’t help wondering whether anybody could say the same thing about her. How many lives she’d touched. If there were any.

And now she had Xenia’s fortune, and none of Xenia’s talent for spending it, or for helping people. All she had were her jobs, her apartment in the Bronx, and her independence.

Faced with that truth about herself, it was hardly surprising her choice of torture was to remember Nick’s kiss. Every melting, thrilling second of it.

As she walked from her bedroom to her living room, she pulled on a sweatshirt, noticing that her nipples were visible through her sports bra and her Lycra top. She could blame Nick for her imminent case of jogger’s nipple, as well as her lack of sleep.

Three things happened while her sweatshirt still covered her head. Somebody knocked on the door, she stepped on something that slipped sideways and made her ankle twist, and she yelled out in pain.

Except when she yelled nothing came out but a small-voiced squeak. She sounded like a mouse wearing a gag.

Zoe sat on the floor and pulled her sweatshirt down.

A quick glance at her foot showed her she’d stepped on one of her high-heeled shoes by mistake, and that her ankle was fine. The pain was already subsiding.

Someone was still knocking at the door.

Just a second,
she tried to say, but nothing came out again.

Dammit. She’d lost her voice. On a day when she had two classes to teach.

Zoe hauled herself to her feet. She’d have to cancel the classes, which sucked because she looked forward to them and she doubted the community centre would be able to find someone to fill in on such short notice. She tried coughing, but that didn’t seem to help. She’d had a tickly throat yesterday, and then she’d talked all day with people at the funeral, and then she hadn’t slept. Equalled no voice. It happened to her often when she caught a cold, as if her body was taking away her best defence when a virus took over.

She hoped Nick had caught her germs.

Someone was still knocking at the door. Zoe exhaled in annoyance and opened it.

It was Nick.

How did he get more gorgeous with every passing hour? His hair was wet and curling, he had dark stubble on his chin, and he smelled of rain. Zoe caught her breath, came to her senses, and tried to close the door.

He put his foot between the door and the jamb, and got his shoulder in there, too. ‘Zoe, please let me in,’ he said.

‘How did you find me?’ she whispered between gritted teeth. She hadn’t been able to face going back to Xenia’s apartment yesterday; instead she’d come straight back to the Bronx. She’d known Ralph would let Nick into the apartment after the reception. She’d figured with any luck he’d find his father, and then pack up himself and his pigeon and get the hell out of her life at last.

‘If I can track a deer through the woods, I can find you in the Bronx,’ he said. ‘Can I come in?’

She pushed at the door, but he was too solid. She rolled her eyes and let him in.

Xenia’s apartment was big. Zoe’s apartment was small. Nick seemed to fill it up with his broad shoulders and his strong body and his big hands, especially since he started talking right away.

‘Listen,’ he said, ‘I don’t pity you. I wouldn’t dare to pity you. And I didn’t mean to upset you, but I’m not sorry I kissed you, and I’m not sorry I defended you, either.’

Where’s your white charger, Sir Nicholas?
she tried to say, but nothing came out but the now-familiar squeak.

‘I was going to come after you right away, but I figured you needed some space to calm down so I went back to the apartment and waited for you. I sat on that damn couch all night waiting for you to turn up. And I know you’re a grown woman and I know you live in New York but I was worried about you and you’re lucky I didn’t turn up here at 3:00 a.m. to make sure you were all right. I was on my way at 3:00 a.m, as a matter of fact, but I figured you’d probably assault me.’

He stopped, and looked at her. ‘Why aren’t you interrupting me?’

She opened her mouth.
Squeak.

The corner of his mouth twitched. ‘Have you lost your voice?’

Zoe nodded, grudgingly.

‘Ha!’ Nick threw his head back and slapped his thigh. ‘Zoe Drake has lost her voice and can’t tell me to shut up!’ He sat on her couch, a look of huge enjoyment on his face. ‘I think this is my lucky day.’

Zoe glared at him, her hands on her hips. She stomped into the kitchen and got down the whiteboard and pen she used to write herself notes. She rubbed off a shopping list with her cuff as she went back to the living room, and then wrote on the board and held it up for Nick to see.

‘You are incredibly annoying.’

He laughed. ‘Does this mean you haven’t calmed down since yesterday?’

She rubbed and scribbled. ‘Forget 3:00 a.m., you’re in danger of being assaulted right now.’

He didn’t seem bothered by the threat. He looked around her living room, bare and functional as usual, tidy except for her shoes on the floor. ‘Where’s all your stuff?’

She furrowed her brow in an obvious question.

‘You know. All your clothes and handbags and fashion magazines and all that other stuff women always have all over their houses.’

Don’t be stupid,
her look said. He nodded, seemingly in approval.

‘Fine. Listen. I want you to know that I kissed you because I’m attracted to you. Plain and simple.’

For a minute, she almost believed it.

Plain and simple. He wanted her as she wanted him. She had lightning-fast visions of joining him on the couch, sinking her fingers into his damp, curling hair, and kissing him back as hard as she’d wanted to yesterday. Pulling his T-shirt over his head and seeing his bare chest, close up this time.

‘And you looked like you needed to be kissed,’ he added.

The visions vanished. She remembered being close in his arms, and him yawning. She remembered how he took off his clothes in her presence as if he hadn’t noticed she was a red-blooded female. She remembered the damn pigeon.

She’d needed to be kissed.

It was just another rescue mission.

‘In fact, I’d really like to do it again. But only if you’re interested.’

Do it again? If she was interested? The visions of kissing him and stripping him came stampeding back into her brain and she had to grit her teeth not to throw herself onto the couch and plaster herself all over him.

She needed to think of something, and fast, before she let herself become the charity case she’d sworn never to be.

And then she thought of something.

She rubbed off what she’d written on the board and wrote rapidly, concentrating on the words rather than him sitting there, big and male and gorgeous and inviting her to kiss him. She finished and turned the board to face him.

‘Okay, lover-boy, if you’re so hot to help me out, I’ve got something you can do for me.’

Nick, reading, raised his eyebrows.

‘I’d be happy to,’ he said, and his voice made her think of bedrooms, caresses, sweat.

‘Good,’ she wrote. ‘Let’s go. We don’t have much time, and you need a pair of sneakers.’

Nick watched as Zoe placed a brightly coloured plastic box in front of him on the polished gym floor.

‘What’s this?’ he asked.

A step, she mouthed. She demonstrated by climbing onto it with her sneaker-clad feet, and then stepping back off.

‘What am I supposed to do with it?’

She gestured at the sheet of instructions she’d written out for him on the subway to Manhattan and while he was changing into clothes he could exercise in.

The first class is step aerobics, and the second is a toning class. All you have to do is follow along, do the exercises with me, and when I nod at you, call out what I’ve written on this sheet so everyone knows what’s coming next.

‘You call this exercise? Stepping up and down on a plastic box?’

She just looked at him. There was a glint in her eye that he wasn’t sure was good for him. It was pretty incredible, how she could communicate without any words.

And she could let her body talk to him any time she wanted to, he thought. She was wearing Lycra shorts that showed off her perfect hips and backside, and her beautiful toned legs were completely bare. When they’d reached the midtown gym she’d taken off her big sweatshirt to reveal a tight sleeveless top. The whole outfit didn’t leave much to the imagination, although his imagination was working overtime anyway.

Nick was wearing a T-shirt and shorts and if he studied Zoe any more his arousal was going to be obvious to the entire class, who were starting to come into the room. He watched the plastic box instead as he moved it around with his foot.

‘I guess in New York you don’t have mountains to climb or trees to cut down,’ Nick said, trying to distract himself. ‘Plastic boxes are probably the best you can do.’

Zoe snorted and went back to sorting through CDs. The students were mostly women, Nick noticed, all of them fit-looking, though nothing compared to Zoe. All of them greeted Zoe as they came through, and gave Nick the once-over.

Nick didn’t mind being in rooms full of women. He liked women. Still, he was relieved to see a few men among the people setting up steps. He’d never been much of a gym person; even in the winter he preferred to exercise outdoors, cross-country skiing or snowshoeing. He didn’t think he’d ever been in a room like this, a dance studio with mirrored walls and full-length windows looking out at the Manhattan street below. The men made him feel a little bit less as if he were in an alien world. He smiled and nodded at them.

Zoe signalled the start of the class by putting on music, a high-energy dance track, and taking her place at the front of the room. Without a word from her or him the class fell into step together, jogging in place behind their steps.

Nick was situated at the front of the room, diagonally to Zoe so he could watch her, and so that the class could hear him. He started jogging in place, too. Although he doubted he’d get much of a workout, he might as well make the most of it since he was here; he’d been cooped up so long in the city that his muscles could use some action.

Plus, if he was lucky, it would tire him out enough so that he’d have a little bit less sexual energy. He seemed to like Zoe better and better in every outfit he saw her in, and he was spending a whole lot of time thinking about her in no outfit at all.

Zoe nodded at him and he read off the sheet he held in his hand. ‘Twenty basic, right foot,’ he said, and immediately the class began to step in time onto their boxes and off again.

What a weird way to exercise. There were hundreds of sky-scrapers; surely New Yorkers could climb up and down steps whenever they wanted to.

There was a plus to this kind of exercise, though. He watched Zoe step energetically up onto her box, and then back down again. The action tensed her thigh and calf muscles, and the movement made her breasts bounce under her snug top. Nick moved up and down to the rhythm of the music, unable to take his gaze away from the tantalising rhythm Zoe’s body was creating.