Since I Saw You (16 page)

“Klinf started his company on his own?” Kam interrupted her at one point.

“Yes,” she said pausing. “It’s a boutique business, a much smaller company than either Gersbach or Stunde, the company we’ll be meeting with next Thursday. You and Jason have some things in common, actually,” she said diplomatically.

He turned his head on the pillow, meeting her stare. “Such as?” he asked, looking slightly suspicious.

She kept her expression calm. He seemed to catch her sleight of hand with miraculous accuracy. In truth, she was more anxious about the meeting with Klinf than anyone. She was worried Kam’s raw honesty and Jason’s smooth sophistication would not be a good combination. “Well, Jason is French like you, for one. He’s also brilliant. Plus, you two are close in age. Jason is probably only three or four years older than you.”

“You just told me that he’s a darling of the fashion industry, a connoisseur of opera, wine, rare antiquities and women. Except for both being heterosexual, I don’t see that we have a bit in common.”

She gave him a repressive glance and continued. “Jason designs all his timepieces himself.”

“You mean he’s invented some novel technology? I’ve never heard—”

“No,” Lin interrupted him. “I mean that he designs the exterior, creating stunning watches that women across the globe would kill for. Each watch is handmade and exquisitely detailed. His watches are probably the most sought-after—and expensive—timepieces in the market.”

“You wear one.”

Lin blinked when she absorbed the tone of his voice. It’d sounded like an accusation. She met his sleety stare and found herself blushing. She wouldn’t have guessed that Kam had noticed the diamond Klinf watch she wore last night, although she suspected the Gersbachs would. She knew from experience, however, that Brigit herself owned a Klinf, so she hadn’t felt uncomfortable wearing it for the meeting. Jason’s fashionable luxury watches were almost like a different product from the Swiss-made timepieces, like comparing an exquisite bracelet to a Rolex.

“I do own one, yes,” she conceded.

“So you’re one of the few women on the planet who not only would ‘kill’ for a Klinf watch, you actually have the money to buy one?”

“I didn’t buy it,” she said before she could stop herself.

He sat up and turned onto his side, his elbow on the pillow, his head braced in his hand, his steady stare pinning her. Lin suddenly felt like the star witness who had just faltered. Kam was like the prosecutor going in for the kill.

“Jason Klinf gave you one of his priceless watches?” Kam asked evenly.

“Yes,” she said, giving him a sharp glare for making her feel like she’d just admitted to a crime.

“Did you date him?” he probed.

Lin gave a frustrated sigh. “I did, yes—a few times—but that has nothing to do with him giving me a watch. He did it as a courtesy following a technology exchange deal he did with Noble enterprises a couple of years back. What?” she demanded when she saw the hint of disdain cross Kam’s bold features.

“Nothing. It just figures he’d have to buy his technology from Ian. So who broke it off? Klinf or you?”

“Neither of us, really. It just sort of . . . faded away. It wasn’t like a blazing-comet romance or something. I wasn’t that interested, and Jason isn’t the type to settle down or anything. It was just two single people passing some time together pleasantly while he was here in town.”

“Did you sleep with him?”

“
No
. Not that it’s any of your business.”

“According to you, it’s precisely my business,” he said calmly.

“I never—”

“You said I should be as prepared as I possibly can be for these meetings,” he interrupted. “Don’t you think any former relationship between two of the players, sexual or otherwise, is relevant to the situation?”

Her mouth fell open but her words stuck in her throat.

“Just tell me this,” Kam continued, taking advantage of her speechless state. “Is Jason Klinf one of the guys that Ian mentioned who you were unfortunate to have dated? One of the guys who didn’t appreciate your refinements and sensitivities or sensibilities, or however the hell he put it.”

“What?” she sputtered. “No, of course . . . Ian
said
that?”

“Yeah. He seems to think that you’re like a piece of fine porcelain that we men trample all over in our blind, savage stupidity.”

At first she just stared at him incredulously before the ridiculousness of what he was saying struck her. She burst into laughter. The familiar thundercloud expression darkened Kam’s face.

“What are you laughing about?” he demanded.

She tried to stop giggling, but only snorted. His scowl was priceless. She brushed her hand over his jaw, heartened to see her caress lighten his expression ever so slightly.

“It’s just hilarious. Why would Ian say something so strange to you?” she asked, repressing her mirth with effort.

Kam scooted closer to her. One second, they’d been apart, and the next his solid male body was close, skimming and brushing against tingling patches of her skin. His movement erased her erupting amusement like nothing else could.

“You think it’s strange, do you?” he murmured, a warning glint in his eyes, his face just inches from hers. His big hand opened at her lower back and lowered to her ass. He pushed her closer yet with a precise flex of his arm. She zipped across the sheets and thudded against his solid length. He paused, squeezing her buttock. Desire rippled through her when she felt his obvious response to their pressing naked bodies.

“Yes. Don’t you?” she asked, her chin tilting up to bring his mouth into striking distance of her own.

He held her stare and shook his head slowly. “I think Ian’s got a point. You certainly turn me into an animal.”

A smile flickered across her lips. “I don’t think that’s what Ian meant.”

“He meant I should be careful with you,” Kam said distractedly. Even though the light was dim, she sensed his gaze drop to where her breasts pressed against his chest. “But it’s just so
fucking
hard when all I want to do is . . . fuck you hard,” he muttered before he kissed her—hot and toe curling—and Lin gave up entirely on making sense of their conversation. He lifted his head slightly a moment later. “I want you again,” he stated the obvious, which throbbed against her thigh. “I know you’re probably sore. I’m sorry. I’ll try to be civilized.”

She closed her eyes and moaned softly as he shaped one of her breasts to his palm.

“I don’t want you civilized,” she whispered before she pressed her lips to his and lost herself in Kam’s wild, fierce heat.

•   •   •

Kam awoke in the early morning hours. Rather than being disoriented like he had been almost every day when he woke up in his claustrophobic hotel room, he knew precisely where he was. The scent from Lin’s hair combined with the unmistakable fragrance of sex lingering in the air had pleasantly warned him even before he’d opened his eyes.

He’d left the bedroom door open when he rushed Lin in here earlier, laid her on the bed and ravaged her. A light was on in the hallway, the distant glow sufficient for him to see Lin’s face on the pillow next to him. For a few seconds, he just studied her sublime beauty cast in shadow and pale gold. He recalled in vivid detail their last joining. She’d been on top, her face tight with pleasure, her breasts heaving, her round hips gyrating in a graceful, precise rhythm that had left him sweating. He’d finally taken control, driving her down on him until her cries had grown frantic and she’d shuddered around him, her bliss driving him straight over the edge with her.

So much for going easy on her. He knew very well she was tender from his forceful lovemaking, but he couldn’t seem to stop this frenzy of need.

He waited for the urge to leave her bed to settle on him, studying her peaceful expression the whole time. It finally dawned him that the impulse wasn’t coming. Instead, he wanted to pull her against him and join her in the warm, secure cocoon of deep sleep.

He stiffened at the realization. The only woman he’d ever regularly spent the night with had been Diana. Even with Diana, however, he’d sometimes awakened in the middle of the night feeling claustrophobic. Suffocated. He’d controlled the impulse to flee, however, knowing it wasn’t appropriate with the woman he loved.

The Kam Reardon who had first arrived in London for college at seventeen, the awkward, brutish young man, had vanished, replaced by a well-groomed and cosmopolitan, if occasionally taciturn, cardiology resident with a brilliant future. The nearly ten years he’d spent in London had altered him beyond recognition. Many of the quirky mannerisms he’d acquired at Aurore Manor had to be willfully abandoned, strangled out of existence, or at best controlled. His brooding, harsh moods morphed into reserved, aloof ones. He’d believed in the rightness of his self-discipline of his more idiosyncratic, loner mannerisms until the day Diana had found out about his parentage and bizarre, inglorious upbringing. He’d believed until the day she’d fabricated a lie for him to give as a cover story to their affluent “friends.” Until he’d stubbornly shoved his ragged, shameful past into her and her friends’ faces, publically humiliating her—or so Diana had claimed.

Until she’d left him. Or he’d sacrificed Diana to his pride and left her. Kam had never really figured out which.

After that catastrophe, he hadn’t even bothered to rein in his instinct for isolation. He’d been entranced by Diana’s elegance and sophistication, her beautiful body and a face that could make a man like him crazed, it was so beyond his experience. He’d been hypnotized into sacrificing his freedom.

It suddenly struck him that the more refined Kam had recently made a reappearance since coming to Chicago. Yes, his cosmopolitan impression was less consistent than it had once been, and probably a hell of a lot less convincing. But he’d definitely been donning the once-familiar role again.

He’d been doing it because of Lin, and for no other reason.

“Kam?” Lin murmured a minute later as he pulled on his pants, her sleep-roughened voice in the darkness causing goose bumps to rise on his neck and arms.

“Yeah. Sorry. Didn’t mean to wake you. I thought I should go. I’m moving over to the apartment in the morning.”

“I’ll send a driver to the hotel who can help you transport all your things,” Lin said in a hushed voice.

“It’s okay,” he assured, whipping on his shirt and buttoning it rapidly. “I can carry it all, no problem. I’ll take a cab.” He hesitated next to the bed, now fully dressed. Her low, melodious voice, graceful arms and soft-looking form beneath body-warmed covers pulled at his consciousness.

“I’ll see you at two o’clock?” he said, reaching for his discarded jacket.

“What?”

“At the new apartment,” he reminded her, determinedly looking away from the appealing vision of her. “You said you’d be my test subject.”

“Oh. Right. Okay,” she said sleepily.

“Ian told me that you have a workout facility for the managers at Noble. Do you use it?”

“Yes,” Lin said, sounding a little puzzled.

“Can you use it sometime before you come to the apartment tomorrow? I’ll send over a sensor and some instructions. I’ll need to get your resting and exercise heart rate and your blood pressure. This part of the protocol is pretty straightforward. Just use the instructions and then bring the sensor with you when you come. I’ll extract the information from it. I’ll send over a quick questionnaire about your general medical history, too.”

“Sure. I’ll just do my workout before work.”

“Good. I’ll see you this afternoon then.” He started for the door.

“Kam?”

He paused. “Yeah.”

“Thank you for a nice night.”

For some reason, discomfort swamped him. He didn’t know what to say. He almost walked out the door without a word, but instead found himself taking two long strides back to the bedside. He leaned down and kissed her, at first hard, and then lingering.

Which made it all that much harder to walk away a moment later.

•   •   •

“Did you hear anything back from the courier service we hired to pick up Angus from the airport?” Lin asked Maria the next day after she’d finished her workout. She carried the surprisingly small sensor that Kam had delivered to her in order to gather data. He’d been right; using it had been straightforward and easy.

“Yes. The ‘goods’ are supposed to arrive at O’Hare at two forty-five this afternoon. Given the check-in time and evening traffic, Angus should be downtown by four thirty or so,” the administrative assistant told her, smiling. “I actually wish I could be there to see Mr. Reardon’s surprise. I got the impression from Phoebe Cane, the woman who was watching Angus, that they have quite a relationship.”

“Kam and his dog?” Lin murmured, distracted.

“Well, now that I think of it . . . them, too.”

Lin blinked, her gaze sharpening on Maria where she sat at her desk. The small hairs on her nape seemed to stand on end. She walked toward the other woman.

“What do you mean?”

Maria chuckled and shook her head, as if to say,
It’s nothing of consequence.
It suddenly felt as if she’d swallowed lead. Lin smiled congenially, even though her lips felt stiff.

“Are you suggesting that Kam and this Phoebe woman are an . . . item?”

“She certainly asked a lot of personal questions about Mr. Reardon for your typical dog watcher,” Maria responded with a significant glance.

“Well it’s not too surprising, I suppose.” Lin attempted to make light of the matter. “Kam’s a very good-looking man. He’s bound to get a lot of attention from the women in that village.”

“Right,” Maria said, turning to her computer.

Lin wavered in her heels. Something in Maria’s tone told her there was more to the story. “What sort of things did this Phoebe woman say?” Lin asked, despising herself for not being able to just walk away and dismiss the whole thing.

“Oh, the usual things like, whether or not Kam seemed to be enjoying his stay in the States, when he was returning, and if he missed Angus and Aurore Manor.”

“Anything not so typical?”