No strings attached (8 page)

But it was already too late. She could tell by the change in his taste and the way his balls had drawn up into his body. She concentrated on the rhythm of her stroke and, as he shuddered, as he groaned, she drew him into completion, easing him through the ecstasy and taking him into the calm.

When she finally let him go, he handed her the damp paper towel she’d dried his chest with earlier. Then he reached for her shoulders and pulled her to her feet.

She didn’t know what to say. For the first time in
Eric’s company, she didn’t know what to say! Not a single comment from her extensive after-sex repertoire came to mind. She was…shy. This was not a good thing. This was, in fact, very bad.

He wore an expression of sleepy amazement, his lids blinking slowly as he smiled. “Come upstairs with me and shower.”

She shook her head. She had to get away. “Go ahead. I’ll wait till I get home.”

“You sure?” Uncertainty was evident in his tentative frown.

Her nod was quick and to the point. “I need clean clothes, makeup, stuff like that. I’ll wait.”

That explanation appeased him. Men rarely understood or wanted to know what went on in a woman’s toilette.

Holding the terry wrap in a strategic position, he backed out of the kitchen toward the rear stairway he’d descended earlier, hesitating with his foot on the first step as if he knew she planned to disappear the minute he turned his back.

She kept a smile on her face, kept her shoulders relaxed, her stance casual, certain he’d call her bluff.
Please, hurry and get the hell out of here already!

“Gimme five minutes.” He glanced at the mess on his torso, then back to her face. “Better make it ten.”

“Take your time.” She shooed him away, returned the food to the fridge. She refused to look his way again until she knew he was gone.

And, once he was, she ran toward the hallway and grabbed her knapsack from the telephone table on her way out the door. Eric’s house sat only blocks from one of the city’s Metro bus routes, but Chloe knew she didn’t have much of a head start.

Her car was parked at Haydon’s. Eric could conceivably shower, dress, fire up those horses and beat her back to the bar. Maybe she’d luck out and not have to wait for a bus.

And maybe she’d luck out even further if Eric woke up to the fact that she’d left for a reason, and let her go without giving chase.

Her luck wouldn’t hold beyond tomorrow, unfortunately, because she’d see him at the gIRL-gEAR open house. She would owe him an explanation, one assuring him he’d done nothing wrong, that their kitchen encounter had been her pleasure.

And, oh, had it ever. Her body still tingled and ached. And the fact that he’d asked her into his shower brought a rush of moisture to burn her eyes.

Chloe made it to the closest bus stop seconds before the bus arrived. She climbed the steps, slid her dollar into the meter and settled into the closest blue vinyl seat. She blinked to clear her vision, but regrets were blinding her already.

Not because she’d performed such an intimate act on a man who was no more than a friend, but because she’d thought only of pleasing him, not of any pleasure he owed to her.

She’d been more aroused by this one man’s reaction than by direct stimulation from countless other men. And now, because of her, their easy friendship was a thing of the past.

But that wasn’t what had her running scared. It was the realization that at some point, while her defenses were lowered, Eric had become more than a friend.

So very much more than a friend.

T
HOUGH THE NEXT DAY’S
open house wasn’t scheduled to begin until four, noon found Chloe in her office working to clean out her in box.

An in-depth marketing proposal for additions to the gRAFFITI gIRL line of medicated skin-care products was going to take more time to study than she had to spare today. And she couldn’t do anything about the lab reports on the perfume trials until tomorrow at the earliest. The rest of the memos were easily handled via instructions jotted to her assistant.

Next she turned to her office e-mail, marking her calendar for the rescheduled partners’ meeting now set for next week at Lauren’s loft, and wondering, while she did so, if Revlon’s or L’Oréal’s founders had ever conducted business in gIRL-gEAR’s unconventional ways.

Even if gIRL-gEAR was to one day enjoy a fraction of Revlon’s or L’Oréal’s worldwide success, Chloe doubted she’d be around to share the wealth or the fame. Not if she didn’t start using her head instead of using her mouth. Her language was one thing.

But what she’d done in Eric’s kitchen? To Eric? The very man who’d agreed to help her salvage her reputation?

This three-events-for-three-wishes business was obviously a big waste of time. One down, five to go, and
she’d already proved that she had absolutely no desire to change her bad-girl ways. No doubt Eric had shared the joke with her skeletons, and the lot of them were laughing themselves silly at her expense. She could hear the bones rattling in the closet of her mind.

Oh, wait, no. That was a knock on her door. She looked up while saying, “Come in.”

A man entered. Tall and broad shouldered and beautiful, with hair several shades darker than her own. Just as it had always been—well, except for the shoe-black dye job he’d given himself the year he’d gone Goth. The one and only time Chloe could remember their father laying down the belt of Zuniga law across Aidan’s back end.

She was out of her chair and around her desk and in her brother’s arms before he could take another step into the room. She held him tight. He held her tighter. She didn’t know whose heartbeat it was she felt in her chest.

And then she looked up, met his mischief-filled gaze, and the four years since she’d seen him dissolve like mist. The dazzle of his smile rivaled the sweet feel of her own. Oh, how she’d missed him!

“What are you doing here?” She practically squealed the question as he swung her around. “How in the world did you know where to find me?”

Aidan finally lowered her back to the deep purple carpet. He cast a frowning glance around the room, which was decorated in bright candy colors. “You do business in here? And your stomach doesn’t heave?”

Chloe punched his arm. “Stop making fun of my office and tell me why you’re here. This is so out of the blue.”

And it was so wonderful to see him. Ten years older
than Chloe, Aidan had always been her champion, her ally even while he’d been their father’s favorite son.

“Blue would’ve been a better choice, Chloe. You’re over the top with the pink.” Aidan shook his head, but he didn’t stop her from taking his hand and dragging him to one of the visitor’s chairs.

Once they were both settled, Chloe having kicked off her shoes and tucked her feet beneath her, Aidan pulled a folded newspaper from the pocket of the tweed sport coat he wore with cowboy boots and worn denim jeans.

A write-up on gIRL-gEAR in the
Houston Chronicle
’s business section. She wondered if anyone else in her family had seen it. She wondered why she cared.

“It would’ve been nice to hear firsthand that my baby sister is a local celebrity.” Aidan’s brows arched over his deep leonine eyes.

Chloe shrugged off the charge. “Oh, please. I’m hardly a celebrity.”

“You’re doing something right to get your name here—” he tapped a long finger against the paper “—instead of in the tabloids.”

He had no idea how close she was to becoming a tabloid headline: gIRL-gEAR Partner Blows Her Own Career.

“I’m doing all right. But I want to hear about you.” She reached for his hand and squeezed. “What’s going on in the world of quarter horses? You can’t be doing too badly—those custom-made boots on your feet cost a bundle of hay.”

Aidan studied her face for several long moments. His scrutiny unnerved her, because he’d been the only one able to see through her perfect daughter facade,
the only one who’d known how miserable she’d been behind her perpetual smile.

She wasn’t even sure her smile was fooling him now.

“The boots were a gift,” Aidan admitted with a bit of a smirk. “A cowgirl who couldn’t get enough of me.”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “I see you haven’t changed a bit. First it was cheerleaders. Now it’s cowgirls. Is there a female alive able to resist your drawl or your charm?”

“Only my sister,” he said, holding tight to her hand when she tried to pull free. “What’s the deal, Chloe? You wave at me across the lawn at graduation and that’s it?”

He was right. She had cut herself off from her family—all of her family—once she’d had her diploma in hand. She’d thought it the easiest way to be on her own. But now, seeing Aidan, she knew she’d been hasty when filing her emotional divorce. Still, all she could do was shrug. “I did what I thought I had to do.”

“Well, you thought wrong. I’m your brother, Chloe. I’m not our father. Neither is Colin, Richard or Jay. Dad was never easy on any of us. But, yes,” Aidan added, when her hackles began to rise, “he was especially hard on you.”

He was hard on me because he wanted me to be her.
Bitterness began to seep into this moment where it wasn’t wanted. “Thank you for noticing.”

“I noticed. You know I did.” He reached up to cup her cheek. “And even after I left home, I kept up with what was going on. The boys told me. So I knew.”

Chloe turned her head away from his touch. “You
knew what they told you. You didn’t know what it was like. How hard I worked to please him. How I never got it right.”

Aidan shifted in his chair to sit forward, bracing his elbows on his knees and turning so he could hold both of Chloe’s hands. He studied her fingers, her short practical nails painted in Porcelain Prankster.

She wanted to ruffle her hands through his hair the way he’d always ruffled hers. But to do that she’d have to let go. She didn’t want to have to let go.

And then Aidan looked up. “Here’s the thing, Chloe. I do know what it was like. Colin, Richard and Jay…they were too young to remember. But I saw how Dad was with Mom. I saw it over and over for the ten years I had her.”

His grip tightened almost painfully. “And I’ve lived with the guilt for years.”

Watching his throat work scared the hell out of Chloe. She jerked her hand away and stood, her bare toes curling into the plush carpet. “What’re you talking about?”

He continued to sit forward, he continued to study her face. “I’m talking about leaving home the first chance I got and letting Dad treat you like he did Mom. I’m talking about reputation versus fact. Fantasy versus reality. Our mother was never the flawless ideal Dad led you to believe. That’s what he wanted her to be, yeah. But what he wanted would’ve been impossible even for a saint. Though God knows she tried.”

Chloe shook her head in a dazed denial she wasn’t even aware of making. The world as she knew it had turned into a carnival house of mirrors.

“It’s true, Chloe.”

She waved him off, then cupped her hands over her
ears so she wouldn’t have to hear any more. “This doesn’t make any sense. He worshipped her. All I heard for seventeen years was how perfect she was.”

“And she was,” Aidan agreed in a reverent tone, his gaze warmed by memories. “As far as I was concerned, she was. But to Dad…” His focus sharpened. “She never had a chance of pleasing him. She was human. Just like you are.”

Chloe started to pace, her bitterness welling to spill free in a flow of words. “When I argued with him about volleyball, he threw it in my face that my mother never questioned his decisions.

“When I wanted to major in phys ed, he told me she would never have pursued anything unladylike even if she
had
considered working outside the home…which she hadn’t because her only interests were home and family. She never smoked or raised her voice, and she certainly didn’t drink. He let me know all of that when he caught me smoking and drinking and cussing up a storm.”

Aidan reached out a hand and snagged her wrist when she next passed by. “When she swore, he took away her car keys. When he caught her in his whiskey, he cut up her credit cards. When she told him that she’d enrolled in business classes at the community college, he told her she’d never pass. Why humiliate herself and him?”

Chloe had lost all feeling in the hand Aidan gripped, as well as in the rest of her limbs. Her heart, suddenly bruised and aching, had stolen all sensation. “You saw this?”

“I saw. I heard. But I didn’t realize it qualified as verbal abuse until I was out of that dysfunctional
house.” Aidan shrugged and let her go. “It’s a lousy excuse, but the only one I’ve got.”

Chloe sank back into the chair beside her brother. “Well, fuck me.”

After a minute, Aidan chuckled. “Nice, little sister. Very nice.”

The words were barely out of his mouth before Chloe whipped her head around. “Why the hell did she stay with him?”

“I can think of five reasons, all under the age of ten.”

Five children, and tied to a man who set impossible standards. No wonder her mother had adored Cary Grant. She had to have been miserably unhappy, forced to surrender her identity, her individuality. Having no control over a life that should have been her own first, shared with her partner second.

Chloe sighed and closed her stinging eyes, struck by the irony that, in the end, she’d done exactly what her father had wanted her to do. She’d become her mother, giving up who she was to earn her father’s love.

She’d broken free, yes, but to become what? A wisecracking ball-buster her father would despise.

A woman Chloe wasn’t too crazy about herself.

“I can’t deal with this right now. I don’t have time to deal with this right now.” She shook off her tears and sat up straight. She had to get through the open house before she could even begin to deal with all of what Aidan had said.

“Are you staying at the Doubletree?” It was where she’d always known him to stay, he’d never stayed at their father’s home when he’d come to town from his place near San Antonio.

Aidan got to his feet, gave her his room number. “Seven o’clock?”

“Perfect. And have your bags packed. You’re coming to stay the night with me.”

T
IRED OF WAITING
for Chloe in the gIRL-gEAR lobby and having already mingled for fifteen minutes with the rest of the open house attendees, Eric finally went in search of his nondate date.

He found her in her office, her back to her desk, her arms wrapped around her middle, one finger pressed to the tip of her nose as she stood staring out her first floor window onto Kirby Drive.

He leaned a shoulder against the door jamb, shoved his hands into the pockets of his khaki Dockers. The tails of his navy sport jacket flared around his wrists. He couldn’t help but take a deep, steadying breath.

He’d never expected her to make him feel anything but the flirtatious affection so natural to their friendship. But he was feeling more now. More that he didn’t want to acknowledge, because it would make him a sap. A whipped sap. And no man with any self-respect allowed himself to be whipped by a single blow job.

The thought of her mouth made him weak. But he’d long since learned that he wanted more from sex than the obvious fun. He wanted a connection, a woman to touch him in more than the physical way. He just wasn’t sure Chloe was that woman. Not if she only had it in her to see man as the enemy.

If they didn’t have anything going for them as a couple beyond the banter, the innuendo and the sex, then she was right that this time spent together was nothing more than a favor between friends. Eric had
hoped it might be more. He’d wanted for a long time to discover the source of their sparks.

The gIRL-gEAR offices fronted on an east-west cross street rather than onto Kirby Drive, so he knew she wasn’t watching out the window for him to pull into the front parking lot. He wondered what she was thinking because, though she faced away, at an angle, he could sense her pensive demeanor from the stiff set of her shoulders and hips.

She wore a flowing dress, pink, of course, a floral print that draped loosely over her lower body, hugging her waist and her bustline, yet teasing more than revealing most of her amazing curves. The hem, a flouncy type of ruffle thing matching the ruffled collar, hit just above her knees. Her legs were bare.

And that played perfectly into Eric’s plans to pay her back for yesterday’s kitchen encounter.

When he’d come downstairs from his second shower, fully dressed and ready to deal with the conversation they needed to have about what was going on between them, he’d wavered between disappointment and relief when he’d found Chloe gone.

It really didn’t surprise him that she’d hoofed it. She’d been in a strangely prickly mood since they’d left the park. He’d wanted, on the drive back, to ask what was on her mind. He knew she’d enjoyed the volleyball tourney. No denial she could possibly make would change his opinion on that.

But she hadn’t said anything at all. She’d just stared out the car window, a funny sort of thoughtful crook to her mouth, as if trying to remember why she’d held such a grudge against sports in the first place. Or replaying the reason and finding it no longer held much water.

Sooner or later he’d get to the bottom of yesterday’s disappearance. He’d also figure out why she’d been so adamant that they keep their exchange of favors nonsexual, then had stripped him naked in his kitchen the first time they found themselves alone.

Today, however, he had his first part of their three-part bargain to uphold.

And a self-made promise to keep.

“Tell me something, Chloe.”