Some Like It Hot (12 page)

“That’s the ticket,” he said. “Homemade fried chicken would solve all my problems.”

Melanie canted her head. “What are your problems, Robert? You seem pretty balanced to me. Other than being scarred for life by an excess of TV dinners.”

Even though she knew she was being dramatic, she could just see him sitting in the dark, an eight-year-old kid, eating a TV dinner of soggy enchiladas and cherry pie with no cherries in it, while watching reruns of The Waltons, wishing he had a family like that. She’d had such a family—loving, loyal, closeknit—and she’d so underappreciated them.

“You.” He stepped closer.

The kitten jumped out of her arms and trotted off on a mission of her own.

“Me? What about me?”

“You’re my biggest problem,” he said.

“How’s that? I undermine your authority on the job?”

“There is that.” He moved nearer. She didn’t back up. “But that wasn’t what I was thinking about.”

“What were you thinking about?”

“You push me out of my comfort zone.”

“That’s a good thing. Right?”

“Except maybe I like my comfort zone.”

“Maybe you don’t and you don’t even know that you don’t,” she suggested.

One step, two, three and then he was right in front of her nose.

“Does this feel comfortable?”

No way was she going to admit that he was in her space, pushing her out of
her
comfort zone.

“Um, sure.”

“Liar.”

“One person’s comfort is another person’s misery.”

“Potato, patato.”

“Does anyone really say patato? Personally,” she said, “I’ve always been partial to ‘tater’ myself. Or if I’m feeling spunky, there’s always ‘spud.’”

“So what you’re saying is that there’s an infinite number of ways for us to miscommunicate.”

“Exactly.”

“It’s a wonder we manage to understand each other at all.” His breath tickled her cheek.

“A miracle, really.” Now she was eyeing his lips. They were incredibly close. If she moved forward a half inch, their mouths would touch.

“I read where eighty percent of communication is nonverbal,” he said.

“Really? That much. Explains why the potato-patato issue isn’t more of a barrier.”

“Yeah. You don’t have to say a thing. Cut ’em up, fry ’em in oil and everyone knows what a French fry is. It’s the universal language of love.”

“Are you saying I’m a French fry?” she asked.

“I’m saying that you’re much tastier than a French fry.”

Neither of them said anything, and it was all nonverbal communication from then on out.

Robert splayed his palm against the back of her head and pulled her close for a kiss so savage Melanie couldn’t think beyond
More, more, gotta have more.

And then she couldn’t even think at all.

Robert’s mouth branded her hotly, completely, and she relished it to her core. There was something positive to be said, after all, for bossy, take-charge men.

He tasted like rum and Coca-Cola and smelled like a cross between spray starch and designer cologne. He snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her up tighter against him.

It was late and they’d both had rum and cola and there was soft music playing and he’d outbid Wilmer Haddock for the pleasure of her company. All heady stuff.

Plus, the man was one hell of a kisser.

Who could fight that?

He pulled his mouth from hers and then very gently set her aside. “I better go.”

“You could stay the night. It’s still raining and you’ve been drinking. Sure, you could call a cab, but then your car would still be here.”

“I don’t think staying overnight would be such a hot idea.” He edged closer toward the door.

“Why not?”

“I don’t think either one of us is ready for this step in our relationship.”

“Who said anything about a relationship?” she said, more to protect her ego than anything else. “I just asked you to spend the night. I never said a word about spending it in my bed. The couch folds out.”

“Oh.” He had the good grace to look embarrassed. “My misunderstanding.”

She felt weird about this whole thing. Should she grab him by the collar and drag him to bed like a cave woman? Or back off and give him the space he needed to digest what was going down between them?

She cast a sideways glance at him and was surprised to find him looking at her with a strange sense of wonder.

It felt as if there were a thin, but incredibly strong thread—
something like a spider’s web—stretching from his solar plexus straight into hers. They were standing between the lit kitchen and the dark living room, their faces half in light, half in shadows.

In that pause between heartbeats, she could see all the way into him, or at least fancied that she could, and that he could see into her. Unexpectedly, trust rose in that short span of space, in that whisper of silence.

But if she blinked, would the moment be over? Was their silence the only thing keeping this instant in perfect harmony? They kept staring at each other in a confusing mixture of admiration, consternation and sexual arousal.

She held her breath, waiting for what was going to happen next.

He moved close to her again, spanning the distance in one long step. But then he stopped short, his eyes never leaving her face.

Oh, boy. She realized they both knew that they were going to cause each other equal parts pleasure and misery.

“Lucky for you,” he said, his voice thick and sultry as he raised his palms up to her, “I’ve got big hands.”

Her heart hopped backward to bump against her spine.

At last,
she thought,
a man who can handle me, but who knows how to do it gently.

“Got sheets?”

“What?” She blinked, pulled from her dazed thoughts.

“For the fold-out couch.” He gestured toward her sofa with one of those big hands.

He was so near she could feel the warmth of his skin, and she wanted him to kiss her again but was too afraid to ask. She wasn’t afraid of what he would do, but of herself. Terri
fied she would strip those jeans off his body and have her way with him on the living room rug.

“Uh-huh,” she said, but, spellbound by him, did not make a move.

“If you tell me where they are, I’ll get them.”

“No, um, I’ll do it.”

Forcing herself to stop looking at him, she scurried to the hallway closet where she kept the bed linens, and pulled out sheets, blankets and a pillow and brought them back to him.

“Thanks.” His smile was golden. “Just to let you know, I’m an early riser—5:30 a.m.”

“You won’t get much sleep.” She looked at the clock. “It’s almost midnight.”

“I like strong coffee first thing. You got any on hand?”

“Me, too. I’m not human before my second cup.”

“Who gets the bathroom first? Me or you?”

“I take longer. You go first.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Their eyes met.

His chest heaved.

Hers did, too.

He hardened his jaw.

She clenched her fists.

Both of them were struggling to hang on to some small measure of control, and failing spectacularly.

“We’re not going to make it through the night,” Robert murmured.

“No,” she agreed.

He stepped toward her.

A thousand tiny needle pricks hot-wired a message to her brain. He reached out, wrapped his hands around her wrists
and purposefully drew her toward him. He yanked her up flush against his chest, his gaze never leaving hers.

“You smell so good.” His voice rumbled as deep as the thunder outside her door.

She was a goner, all her plans vaporized by a sexual chemistry so startling it left her breathless. She wanted him and she didn’t care about anything else.

His knuckles grazed her breast as he slid his hand to the right side of her waist, and then lower to cup her buttocks in his big palm.

She gasped at his touch. His chest rubbed provocatively against hers, making Melanie even more aware of his incredibly hard muscles.

He kissed her, and she felt alive and tingling in all the right places. And then his other hand went to the left side of her waist, his fingers pressing against the scarred flesh beneath her shirt.

Robert pulled back, breaking their kiss, and his eyes widened.

Self-consciousness derailed her desires, and Melanie hitched in a breath.

He moved to lift her shirt.

She grabbed his wrist. “Don’t. Please don’t do that.”

“Why not? I want to see you. All of you.”

“I…” she moistened her lips. “I’m afraid you won’t find me attractive anymore.”

“Shh, don’t be afraid. I won’t judge you.” He said that now, but he hadn’t yet seen the scar.

“I’m ashamed,” she whispered.

“There’s nothing about your body to be ashamed of. Why are you?”

She shrugged. How to explain to him that she felt respon
sible for what had happened to her because she’d made a poor choice in marrying David? Her knees trembled.

“Let me see.”

She shook her head.

“Melanie,” Robert crooned, cupping his fingers under her chin and raising her face. “Look at me.”

She looked him in the eyes.

“I know,” he said.

“Know what?”

“What it’s like to hurt that way. Trust me.”

“You’re asking a lot from me. Trusting the wrong person was how I ended up this way.”

“I won’t hurt you.”

“I barely know you.”

“You can’t deny there’s something between us. And I think we both know it’s more than just sex. Trust me.”

The need to trust him was so strong she could barely fight it. But she’d never been able to rely on her impulses. They always seemed to lead her in the wrong direction.

“You’re the first,” she blurted, losing her battle with caution.

“The first?” He arched an eyebrow.

“The first man I’ve been with since the divorce.”

“How long ago was that?”

She gulped. Emotions crowded in on her. Guilt, nervousness, expectation. The need to talk and the fear that if she did talk she would chase him off.

“Four years.”

“You haven’t had sex in four years?”

She shook her head.

“Because of this?” His palm was flush against her waist.

She nodded.

“What happened?”

“I…I don’t like to talk about it.”

He made a noise of empathy, not pity. He went to raise her shirt again and this time she did not stop him. She watched his face, searching for any sign of disgust or revulsion, but saw only tenderness in his eyes. He dropped to his knees and pressed his lips sweetly against her scar, accepting her for who she was—flaws, imperfections and all.

Raising his head, he looked up at her, the scar at his temple glistening whitely in the lamplight.

“You tell me about your scar,” he coaxed, reaching up to finger his temple, “and I’ll tell you about mine.”

T
HIS WAS MORE DIFFICULT
than he thought. Robert had never opened up about his past the way he’d promised to open up to Melanie. Only his Aunt Pamela knew the true story of his scar.

He gritted his teeth. Talking about his past didn’t come easy. Yes, it was difficult, but Melanie was worth it. He wanted her desperately, and until tonight he hadn’t realized exactly how much.

He led her to the couch and sat her down beside him. She tucked her long legs underneath her, studying his face curiously in the light.

“This is hard for you,” she said, seeming to understand all the emotions teeming inside him.

“Yeah,” he admitted.

“You don’t have to do it.”

His hand went to her waist. “Yes, I do.”

“I’ll go first,” she said. Funny, how she was rushing in to protect him from himself.

He might be a lot of things, but he wasn’t a coward. “It’s all right. I can do it.”

“No, I’d rather go first. In case…” She trailed off.

“In case what?”

“In case you’re disappointed in me.”

“Melanie, what is this guilt you’re carrying around with you? Why are you punishing yourself this way?”

She inhaled sharply. “I suppose it’s because deep down inside I feel like I’ve done something wrong.”

“In what way?”

“By being so impulsive. By marrying David too soon. Before I really knew him.”

Robert looked into her eyes as far as he could see. “Tell me.”

“David had a drug problem that I knew nothing about.”

Robert’s stomach tensed. He could relate so well to what she’d gone through. Caring about people so much that you didn’t know what to do when they turned up with a problem too big for either of you to handle.

“We were working a lot of hours,” she said, restlessly toying with a strand of hair that had fallen from the elegant chignon. No wonder she reminded him of Holly Golightly. “Trying to get our own restaurant off the ground. You know how hard that is. Especially in a city as competitive as Boston.”

Robert nodded. He did indeed understand the pressure she’d been under.

“David seemed to be able to just go and go and go. I didn’t understand why until I caught him in the bathroom with my compact mirror and a straw.”

That old dark feeling stole over Robert. Melanie had been through the exact same thing he’d been through. He felt his connection to her deepen, felt the tentative bond between them solidify.

“He told me it was the first time. Promised it was the only time, and I was foolish enough to believe him.”

“Drugs,” Robert said. “The great deceiver.”

She gave him a strange look he did not understand, and he felt the bond grow shaky again. What had he said to upset her?

“David kept using, of course. He grew short-tempered, seemed to be angry all the time. He started berating me on the job. Finally it got to the point where I couldn’t stand working with him any longer. I told him for the sake of the marriage that I wanted out of the restaurant.”

She paused and swallowed hard. Robert sensed that she had yet to reveal the most difficult part of her story.

“He shoved me. It was the first time he’d been physically abusive. I fell against the stove. The gas burner was turned on.”

“Melanie.” Robert heard his own pain in his voice as he breathed her name.

“I’ll always bear his brand.” She touched her left side.

Adrenaline surged through Robert. If her ex-husband had been in the room with them, he would have beaten the guy senseless for hurting her.

“My friend Coby took me to the hospital. They treated me for the burn, but since it was so late they kept me overnight for observation. The next morning I went home, packed my things and moved out. I filed for divorce that same afternoon.”

“Good for you.” She’d been smarter than him. Once things had turned violent, she’d gotten out. She was braver than him, too.

Melanie shrugged. “Turns out leaving David was the best thing I could have done for him, too. He got into rehab and turned his life around.” She laughed mirthlessly. “I heard he’s married again, has a baby and from all accounts is totally drug free. I’m happy for him, really I am, but I’m jealous, too. Why couldn’t he have gotten clean and sober for me?”

“You just weren’t meant to be with him.”

“Maybe I’m not meant to be with anyone.”

Robert took her hand, lifted it to his lips and softly kissed her knuckles. “Stop blaming yourself. It’s not your fault. None of it was your fault. He was the addict. It was his problem, not yours.”

“I jumped into marriage without looking. Everyone told me not to do it, but I was stubborn, determined to do things my own way. I married him anyway and I paid the price.”

“You made a mistake. That’s how we learn. Next time you’ll know better.”

She gave him an odd look. “I’m not sure there’s going to be a next time.”

“What are you saying? That you never want to get married again?”

“I don’t know. I’m scared.”

“We’re all scared, Melanie, and scarred in some way. You and I just happen to have the physical scars to prove it.”

Robert had one arm slung over the back of the couch, and she leaned closer, resting her head on his forearm and gazing up at him expectantly. His heart missed a beat or two. Those indigo eyes of hers could melt a glacier, and he’d been cold for far too long. Just being here with her lit him from the inside out. Warmed his tired soul.

She raised her hand, traced her fingers along his temple. “A knife?”

“Razor blade.”

She winced. “How?”

He swallowed, unable to go on. “I’m sorry. I thought I could do this, but I just can’t.”

“It was that bad?”

“Worse than you can imagine.” He saw her trying to guess what had happened, but knew there was no way she could.

“It’s okay. It’s all right. You don’t have to tell me. Clearly, it’s too painful for you to share.” He heard the compassion in her voice, saw tears glistening in her eyes.

But he wanted to tell her. He really did. He just didn’t know how to begin. How to form the words and force them from his mouth.
I, too, was betrayed by someone I loved. I understand what you went through.

“What a pair we are.” She laughed shakily. “Both battle scarred and wary, but ready to take it on the chin and try again.”

The sound of her hopeful laughter struck a deep yearning within him.

“I’m glad you stayed,” she said. “It feels good not to be alone.”

Something tightened Robert’s chest. He was trying to decide if he should go through with this or run straight out her door before he got caught any deeper in the quicksand of her eyes.

Too late.

She zapped him with another one of her meaningful stares and he felt as if a cop had taken a stun gun to his heart.

Take that and that and that,
her eyes proclaimed.

“I should go,” he said. “The way we’re feeling, I’m afraid we’re going to do something we’ll both regret.”

“But maybe that’s exactly what we should do to chase away our ghosts.” Audibly, Melanie sucked in a breath. “I want you, Robert. I’ve wanted you for months, and ever since we tussled over the turkey and ended up on the floor together, I’ve known exactly how much I want you.”

“Melanie…I—”

She interrupted him, reaching up to touch his scar again. “I’m going out on a limb here—”

“I don’t want you to have unrealistic expectations. I’m not sure I can—”

“I haven’t felt this way about anybody in a very long—”

“—promise you anything more than good sex.”

Oh, God.

All of his feelings for her—the craving, the guilt, the sadness, the desire, and the fear that he’d screw things up with her—whirled together inside him in a thick black cyclone of emotions.

“Good sex is enough,” she whispered. “It doesn’t have to mean anything more than that.”

Robert kissed her. He had no choice. He was swept up in the brightness of her blue eyes, the fullness of her lush lips and the aching need in him that had gone unfulfilled for so long. This might be the stupidest thing he’d ever done, but his body was hell-bent on doing it.

If he kissed her, he didn’t have to talk about the past, didn’t have to relive the sorrow and the betrayal. Didn’t have to dwell in the darkness that had dogged him most of his life. She was sweet salve to his lonely soul.

Melanie clung to him, needing him as much as he needed her. She matched the fury of his kisses, the fierceness of his welcome. They were starving for contact, hungry for connection and mad with passion for each other.

He’d been fighting his desire for her for so long. He simply couldn’t fight anymore.

Both hands snug around her waist, he pulled her into his lap so that she was straddling him on the couch.

Dear Lord, he had wanted her since the first moment he’d
seen her waltz into Chez Remy with her ponytail swishing and a bewitching smile on her lips. He’d had no idea she harbored a secret pain to rival his own.

He thought about what she’d been through with her ex-husband, and immediately felt like a snake in the grass. This was a bad idea. He knew it was, but he no longer possessed the power to stop himself. He had to have this. Had to have her.

She seemed to need him just as much.

Melanie was touching him all over, thrusting her fingers through his hair while her eager mouth explored his face as if she couldn’t get enough of the taste of him.

She wriggled in his lap, captured his lips with hers and inhaled him. She was so hot.

“This is a very dumb thing to do,” he muttered against her lips, needing to say the words even though it was too late for either of them to stop. This moment had been a long time building. They’d crossed an invisible threshold, and retreat was next to impossible.

“Sometimes being dumb is the smartest thing you can do,” she said.

That made no sense at all, but at this point, he pretended her words were pearls of rare wisdom. They could worry about the consequences later, when their judgment wasn’t glazed with the bright sheen of lust.

Robert felt remorseful, but he made a choice to live with the guilt and just let himself go. He tipped right over the edge of stupidity and allowed it to take him under. Drowning his common sense, drowning his fear and his restraint.

Very quickly he stopped feeling guilty and just let the sensations come.

The next thing he knew they were in her bedroom, kicking
aside her dumbbells, throwing clothes off the bedspread. They were both naked and he wasn’t sure how they’d gotten that way or how he was going to survive what he knew would happen next.

“Hey,” he said. “You put up the dream catcher.”

“But of course. It was a gift.”

He kissed her again. Long and hard.

“You sure you want to do this?” The last thing he wanted was for her to have regrets when this was over.

“Lighten up, Robert, it’s just sex. It’s not like you’re asking me to marry you or anything.”

Maybe to her it was just sex, but not to him.

Get out of here. Stop this before you get hurt.

But how could he do that when his body burned so badly for her? He couldn’t even think straight. He stared at her, awed by the sight of her lean coltish body. She was long of leg and narrow of waist, and the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Her eyes flared at his frank appraisal, darkening to deep navy-blue, almost black.

The pulse of blood in his groin was hot, and when she reached up to cradle his face in her palms and kiss his lips lightly, sweetly, he groaned at the pleasure-pain of it.

She nibbled her way around his chin. He needed a shave and he heard his beard rasp against her skin, but she didn’t seem to mind.

“Wait,” he said. “We can’t do this.”

“We’ve already been over that, Robert. Just be in the moment, stop thinking and let yourself go.”

“Can’t,” he gasped, so aroused he was barely able to speak. “No protection.”

“Don’t worry.” She pulled open the drawer to her
bedside table and pulled out a three-pack of condoms. “Got us covered.”

“Thank God,” he croaked. “But I thought you haven’t had sex in four years. Do you think the condoms are still good?”

“I have a confession,” she whispered.

“Yeah?”

“I bought them the day after you came to work at Chez Remy.”

“With me in mind?”

She grinned at him.

“Melanie.”

“Robert,” she breathed huskily.

That voice of hers got his blood pumping, and when she rubbed her breasts against him, he was sure he couldn’t hold back much longer.

“It’s been so long,” he said. “I can’t promise I’ll be any good.”

“That’s why I’m going to take care of you first,” she said. “And then when you get a second wind, it’ll be my turn.”

Slowly, trailing her hands down either side of his body, she sank to her knees.

“Melanie…” Robert groaned when he felt her warm breath against his throbbing skin.

She was a goddess.

He should tell her to get up, tell her not to do this, tell her that he wanted to be inside her, but he was just a man. And when the tip of her tongue flicked out to moisten the head of him, he was a goner one hundred percent.

She splayed her hands across his buttocks, and her mouth was sweet, velvet heat, her tongue an instrument of delicious torture.

She’d pushed him to the limits of his endurance. He tried to hold back, tried to resist, but he could not. She was just too damn wonderful.

His release was powerful, explosive. A ball of fire rolled along his nerve endings to lodge dead center in his aching shaft.

And then he left the earth, shot straight to the stars, and it was all her doing.

He collapsed backward onto the bed, pulling her with him. Panting, he closed his eyes, spent but still wanting more of her.

Laughing sneakily, she curled against his chest.

“Your turn now,” he said, once he’d recovered somewhat. “And then we’ll see who’ll be snickering.”

“What?”

He rolled her over onto her back, pinned her to the covers and stared down at her. She lay there looking up at him with those wide, trusting eyes, nibbling her bottom lip, nervous but excited.