The Bachelor's Bed (9 page)

Behind them both, shouting like a crazed banshee, came his aunt Lola, waving yet another squirt bottle. She had a handkerchief wrapped around her head. “Duck or you die,” his oldest and most dignified aunt yelled, grinning widely from ear to ear.

“What the—” he began, only to find himself the target of three wild-looking women. He registered the change in their eyes, saw the exact moment the target of their fun game switched from each other to him.

Him.

“Now wait just a minute,” he said, backing up as all three women advanced on him. “Just—”

It was all he got out before Lani—not looking even close to devastated—took the lead and sprayed him full in the face.

From the couch came a strange, muffled sound. It was Carmen, working hard at reading a magazine, holding her hand over her mouth as her shoulders shook with silent laughter.

Water dripped off Colin's nose, down his ears, into his collar. Both his aunts found this absolutely hysterical. Bessie was so overcome she had to sink to one of the couches. She rolled back and forth, laughing as tears ran down her face.

Lola took one look at her and snorted in a most un
ladylike fashion, which sent Bessie and Lani back into fresh fits of giggles.

Colin gawked at Lani. Tears of mirth streamed down her face, along with a good amount of water—one of his aunts had obviously gotten her good. Her hair was out of control, rioting around her face, her eyes were bright, her skin positively glowing.

Nope, no matter how hard he looked, he couldn't find an ounce of solemnity about her.

She squirted him again.

“What was that for?” he sputtered as he wiped cold, wet drops from his face.

“Well…” She grinned. “You looked hot.” Her smile mocked him and his all-day misery.

The urge to haul her to him and kiss away all frustration came on incredibly strong, but he couldn't be sure he wouldn't strangle her. He actually reached out to grab her, but at the last minute remembered his avidly watching, meddling aunts and slammed his hands into his pockets instead.

She'd sprayed him, right in the face! He couldn't believe it, couldn't believe how shock had turned into something else, something far more base. If he didn't kiss her right here and now, he would just explode.

The primal, savage urge startled him. He'd never, ever, felt this way over a woman. Over work, yes. But never another human, and it shook him to the core.

She wore jeans today, and while they were several sizes too large for her, hiding the figure he knew could alter his blood pressure, they had holes all over, including one high on her right thigh that revealed enough skin to have him swallowing hard.

Where was his distraught, depressed fiancée?

“What are you doing here?” she asked sweetly, as if she hadn't attacked him with a squirt bottle only a second before.

“What am
I
doing here?” He let out a sound of amazement. “I've been going crazy looking for you. What are
you
doing here?”

“It's not too difficult to figure out.” She smiled innocently, gesturing to her cleaning supplies, lying useless and unused on the floor. She seemed without a care in the world. As if she hadn't given him a second thought.

She probably hasn't.
The thought was curiously deflating.

“I'm working,” she said. “Very hard.”

“Oh, yeah, I can see that.”

Lani turned slightly to glance at his aunts, and when she did, Colin's eyes nearly bugged out of his head. The back of her jeans were even holier than the front. There was a slice through the denim so high on her left thigh he could see a flash of hot-pink panties.

Had he really once thought this woman not sexy? How had he been so blind?

With Lani giving them some silent but meaningful
looks, Bessie and Lola finally managed to control themselves and straightened.

“Better get to work,” Bessie said cheerfully, nudging her sister. They beckoned Carmen, who with a sniff of disdain, took her magazine, rudely stuck her tongue out at Colin, then disappeared down the hall.

Colin's aunts then grabbed a bucket full of cleaner and sponges.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

Lola and Bessie, both old enough to be grandmothers, both world travelers and grand sophisticates of the small educated, high-brow population of Sierra Summit, grinned wildly.

“Lani's short-handed today, poor thing,” Lola said. “She could never get everything done all by herself so we're staff today. I'm going to clean the bathrooms.”

“And I'm on vacuuming and dusting detail,” Bessie said proudly.

Colin couldn't believe it. “But neither of you have cleaned a toilet or worked a vacuum in your lives.”

“Always a first time, hon.” Bessie's smile turned wicked, and Colin knew enough about his aunt to know he wasn't going to like what she had to say next. “And speaking of first times,” she continued sweetly, “we're really short-handed here, and on a time budget since Lani pays by the hour. I think since she's your fiancée, you should help.”

“What?”

“Grab a sponge, darling,” Lola said, nodding her approval. “Let's see you prove your worth to this wonderful girl here. Give her a hand.”

Colin turned to stare at Lani. “Are they kidding?”

She looked at his aunts with laughter and affection in her gaze, but when she turned back to him, she said somberly, “Nope. I don't think they are.”

He thought about what he'd learned from her great-aunt Jennie, how hard she worked. How loyal and caring she was. How she'd lost her family so early.

How she feared storms.

He was beginning to realize the extent of Lani's depth and inner strength, and though he admired her very much for it, a much more basic emotion pushed to the surface.

Protectiveness.

“Unless of course, Colin, you can't spare the time for her,” Bessie said evenly.

Lola shifted the bucket in her arms like a pro. “Or maybe you think pushing a sponge isn't your kind of work.”

He couldn't believe it. These two women supposedly loved him as if he was their own child. Why were they giving him hell?

But they were right. He'd always put work ahead of everything else, and he'd always thought himself far above cleaning.

Guilt and shame were new to him, and he didn't
like either. “I'll help, dammit.” He grabbed a sponge, but then Lani was there with a hand to his chest, her eyes soft and apologetic.

“They're just teasing you.” She wiped a drop of water off his jaw. “I'm fine, I don't need you to stay.”

“I said I'd help.”

She looked into his eyes and apparently saw she couldn't convince him otherwise. “All right, then,” she said quietly. “Thank you.”

He unbuttoned his cuffs and shoved up his sleeves. “Where's my mother?”

“Florist shopping.” Lani chewed on her lip in the gesture he now knew was a nervous habit.

“For the wedding,” Lola added. “She's so excited. And the engagement party is completely under control. You two are going to love it.”

It was all too much, and he could see in Lani's eyes she felt it, too. “We really don't need an engagement party,” he said. “I wish you wouldn't go to the trouble.”

“Of course you need one.” Bessie rubbed her hands together in delight just thinking about it. “It'll be spectacular. Flowers, candles, music for dancing. So romantic.”

“An engagement party,” Lani whispered to herself, the sweet look of longing on her face tearing at Colin.

She wanted it to be real, with all her heart. Knowing that, he felt overwhelmed. What had he done to
her? Hell, to
him.
For a moment he couldn't even remember why he had chased her all over town and back. He should have left it alone.

Lani was staring at him. “What did you just say?”

“Nothing.”

“No, you most definitely said something.” She stepped closer, studying him intensely. “You said you can't remember why you were worried about me.”

Great,
had he really said that out loud?

“Why were you worried, Colin?”

“You're hearing things.”

“I don't think so.” She was right in front of him now, smelling like pine cleaner and shampoo and he wanted badly to haul her close and show her exactly what all this insanity did to him.

“You chased me all over town? Really?”

“So?”

At that statement of brilliance, Lani let out a little smile, as if she found his rare petulance very funny.

He didn't find anything even remotely humorous about it, and this time when she took another step toward him, he backed up.

This made her eyes warm, though he had no idea why, and now in addition to the humor he could see so plainly on her face, he also saw affection and more emotion than he knew what to do with. He was painfully aware of their audience when she asked him softly, kindly, “Did you need me for something?”

He stared at her. “Yeah.”

“Can you tell me what?”

“Not in mixed company.”

Bessie and Lola snickered in delight and left them in peace. Finally.

Silence reigned.

With both his aunts gone, Lani's bravado seemed to fade. She clasped her hands, studied her feet, then played with a spec of dust on the floor with her toe.

“Lani…” But nothing else came out. Now that he was here, with her right there within his reach, he hadn't a clue as to what to say or do.

She solved that for him. “I'm sorry your marriage didn't work out, Colin.” Her voice was quiet, full of sorrow. “I know you must have loved her very much if you haven't wanted to be in another relationship since. A
real
one anyway.”

L
ANI HADN'T MEANT
to just throw it out like that. She'd really intended to bring up Colin's marriage much more gently. She'd wanted him to understand that she was very sorry he'd gotten so hurt, that she understood how much he must have loved his wife.

And if irrational jealousy pounded through her, she would keep that part to herself.

But after her statement, Colin had carefully closed his mouth, grabbed a sponge and disappeared down the hallway of the medical building.

Lani had let him go. This was neither the time nor the place to hash it out, no matter how much she wanted to comfort him, wanted to encourage him to give love another shot with someone who would never hurt him, with someone who would cherish him until the end of her life.

And if she was thinking that that someone could be her, if she had conveniently forgotten she wanted no more of an emotional tangle than he did, she would live with that.

“You're an idiot,” she whispered to herself, shov
ing her hair out of her face. In one of the private patient rooms, she swept the floor with a vengeance.

“Who told you?”

She nearly dropped her broom.

“I want to know how you know,” Colin said, standing in the doorway, quietly furious.

“It doesn't matter.” Her heart ached because only a deep, unrelenting pain would cause him to be so upset. She knew first-hand how much damage that kind of anguish could cause. “I'm sorry you got hurt by it, Colin. I'm sorry your heart was broken.”

His jaw tightened. His eyes went hard. “I absolutely don't want to talk about it.”

“But—”

“Never, Lani.”

“It's not a crime to still love her.”

The laugh that escaped him was short and hard. “You've got it very wrong.”

“Then tell me.”

“Just leave it the hell alone.”

She leaned on the broom and studied him. “You could tell me about it, you know. I'd listen and maybe you'd feel better.”

“I've got a better idea. Let's talk about you. About why you never tell me anything about yourself.”

“You've never asked.”

“Tell me about your family.”

“All right. I have only my great-aunt Jennie. It's been just us for a long time.”

“Does the reason for that have anything to do with your nightmares?”

She paled, felt the blood drain right out of her face. “Yes.”

“It's also probably the reason you're alone now. Just like me, you're not interested in more hurt. Am I right?”

She crossed her arms, chilled. “I don't think I want to talk about it.”

“Well then, we're even, aren't we?”

Damn him for turning this around. It wasn't about her, it was about
him.
He'd never see that, not right now. “I have work.”

“Yes, well so do I.” And he vanished.

He'd go back to his work, she thought wearily, and bury both himself and his anguish in it, and it would be all the harder to reach him.

She figured he'd done exactly that, so when she heard the crash from the next patient room, she assumed it was Bessie, Lola or Carmen.

She went running, imagining all sorts of things, only to skid to a halt in the doorway.

On his butt, on a very wet floor, surrounded by a spilled bucket and a mop, sat Colin.

He wore a disgusted expression. Lani covered her mouth, but a laugh escaped anyway, making his frown all the more fierce.

“I suppose you think this is funny,” he growled.

“Are you all right?”

He shoved to his feet. “Physically? Fine.” He patted the seat of his drenched trousers. “Though my ego just took a hell of a beating.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Yeah? Then why are you grinning?”

Lani shook her head, but ruined it with another laugh that she quickly swallowed. “It's relief that you're okay. Honest.”

“Right.” He pulled at the material clinging to him.

“I thought you'd left.”

“I told you I would help, dammit, and I'm going to help. I just don't want to talk while I do it.”

“Then why did you come?”

“You disappeared, I was worried.”

“I was working,” she pointed out gently.

“I didn't know. I thought maybe you were upset or mad. Maybe you'd decided that—” Swearing, he broke off and looked away. “Never mind.”

Her stomach twisted. “That I would leave? I won't, Colin. I told you that.”

But she was going to have to prove it, she realized. Not only prove it, but give him the time to accept it as well. She could do that. For him, she could probably do anything.

“People don't always do what they say they're going to do,” he said.

“I do.” She smiled at his noncommittal grunt. “Oh, Colin. You don't have to follow me around and mop and—” she gestured with her hand to his very
wet backside “—do the slip and slide just to keep me.”

His eyes narrowed on her, and the laughter she'd been barely holding back escaped.

With a suddenly wicked gaze, he came slowly, purposely, toward her. “You're laughing at me, Lani. Again.”

“Now, Colin—” She backed up, right into the door, which shut behind her. She held her broom between her hands like a shield. “I wasn't laughing
at
you…just
with
you.”

“Uh-huh.” He kept coming, this big, sleek male animal. This big, sleek, wet,
annoyed
male animal.

“It's that you're so cute,” she said quickly. “Coming here, wanting to help me—”

He was there in a flash, moving far more quickly and gracefully than she'd expected, sandwiching her between the door and his body.

“I didn't realize how nice it would feel to have you care about me,” she managed. Oh, he felt good, so very good, against her. “You gave up your own important work today to come here and fall on your butt—”

He held her head in his big, gentle hands, his body imprisoning hers. “Stop it.”

“But it's such a great butt, Colin.” She burst out into renewed laughter at his expression.

“Lani? Be quiet.” Reaching around her, he flicked
the lock on the door, and with a loud, metallic sound, it slid home.

The amusement backed up in her throat, immediately replaced by a searing, heated excitement. “Colin…” Did he have any idea what that look on his face did to her insides? “Your aunts…”

“…will no doubt be listening so you'd better keep it quiet, hadn't you?” She was flattened to the door, between the hard wood and his even harder body. Gentle but inexorable fingers found the rip in the front of her jeans and played with the soft, giving skin on the inside of her thigh.

Her heart thundered in her chest. “I know you're upset because I probed into your personal life…”

Now his other hand slid around to the back of her, toying with the larger rip back there, stroking the flesh just beneath her panty line. “This has nothing to do with anyone else,” he informed her, his fingers shifting slightly, playing with the elastic on her hot-pink panties.

Lani forced herself to remain absolutely still, when what she really wanted was to arch into his hand. “Then you're embarrassed about that little pratfall you took.” She gasped as he slowly traced the line of the material. “But you don't have to be.”

“This isn't about the fall either,” he assured her roughly, slipping beneath the material now to cup her bare bottom in his hand. He kneaded it gently, sighing at the connection. “It's about before that. It's
about last night and this morning and the fact I can't get you out of my head.”

The words broke through her haze of passion, and they meant so much she could hardly speak. “Really? You think about me?”

“Yeah. Really.”

“You don't like it.”

“Not much,” he admitted. “But that doesn't seem to stop me.” Abruptly, he backed away from her. Shoving the bucket and mop aside with his foot, he grabbed her wrist and hauled her across the room, to the full-sized hospital bed that Dr. Morrow used to treat his patients. “Lani, I have to touch you.”

“You
were
touching me.”

“More then.”

She couldn't breathe. “Colin, I was thinking—”

“I was, too. You should be quiet now.”

She nodded. “Okay.”

With a none-too-gentle push, Colin pressed her down on the mattress. The bed groaned when he followed her. Seizing the broom she still held between them, he flung it across the room.

Then his mouth took hers, hot and demanding.

The connection sizzled. Dizzy with it, Lani could only cling to him. Her heart had already been aroused, from the very moment he'd stormed into the office looking for her, so it didn't take much more than a stroke of his tongue to bring her startlingly close to completion.

He tore his mouth away and stared at her. “You're driving me crazy.”

“The feeling is mutual.” She had gripped his shirt in fisted hands, holding him close. She couldn't bring herself to let him go. “You were going to touch me, Colin. Why aren't you?”

He settled himself between her legs, spreading them farther to accommodate his body. He rocked against her with a slow, building rhythm that had her moaning, gasping for more, a slave to the motion.

She couldn't keep a thought in her head as her body raced desperately. Colin gripped her hips in his hands, arching them up to better meet his, his erection nestling tightly to the aching flesh between her thighs, and the friction was so delicious she could hardly stand it. His mouth trailed over her jaw to her ear. The sound of his ragged, uneven breathing assured her he was every bit as wild as she. Still fully dressed, she was going to climax, with nothing more than his hips sliding against hers.

“I don't know what's happening,” he whispered, bewildered. She writhed against him and he moaned. “This was supposed to be fake, dammit.”

Only a few strokes away from blessed orgasm, Lani could do nothing but hang on for dear life. “Don't stop,” she begged.

“Fake,”
he repeated hoarsely, still rocking against her in perfect harmony.

Her body tightened, she couldn't see, could only feel, she was so close. He captured her mouth again, the kiss deep and urgent and so needy Lani's entire heart melted. And just to make sure she lost the rest of her head completely, he stroked his hands over her body, molding and pressing and coaxing, then slowing to kiss her again, until she was whimpering and begging and writhing beneath him.

“Lani, let me, let me—” Rearing up, he unbuttoned her cotton work shirt, letting out a groan when he found her bare beneath it. He dipped down, nuzzling first, then taking a tight, waiting nipple into his mouth. His hands went to the buttons of her jeans and while he fumbled there, she attacked his shirt, shoving her hands beneath it.

“This is crazy,” he muttered, slipping his warm, rough hands into the back of her jeans. Scooping her hips up, he thrust against her again, rubbing her with the hard ridge of his erection. He let out a dark, needy sound and dropped his forehead to hers. “I can't get enough of you, I need more….”

“More,” she agreed breathlessly, nearly crying in relief when she heard the rasp of his zipper. He shoved his jeans down, freeing himself. The back of his hand grazed the part of her that was hot and wet for him. Just that light brush of his knuckles was enough to send her once again skittering to the very edge. She tossed her head back as her limbs started to shake. Heat spiraled through her and she grabbed
his hand, needing just one more touch to send her over, just one more little touch….

The knock at the door had them both freezing. Hot, unseeing gazes locked on each other.

“Darling?” came Bessie's voice. “We're finished in the front room. Is Lani in there with you?”

Lani loved Bessie, really she did, but at that moment, she wanted to scream and stamp her feet. She wanted to throw a full-blooded tantrum at the fate of Bessie's bad timing.

It wasn't fair!
She'd been so close, so very close, that her entire body was damp and trembling and still rocking helplessly.

Above her, a solid mass of taut, quivering sexual animal, Colin growled. His shirt was shoved open, thanks to her desperate fingers. His zipper was down, his hair wild, his eyes were beyond description. His chest was hard and slick, his belly flat and rippled with strength. Below that…oh, my. He was magnificent.

And furiously aroused.

“Hello, Colin?” Bessie called. The doorknob rattled, making Lani thankful for the lock.

Colin hadn't moved, and Lani could understand. She could hardly think. She licked her lips and cleared her throat, but still her voice sounded weak and trembly. “We're both in here, Bessie,” she managed. “Fighting some nasty dirt, too.” She glanced at Colin. He hadn't moved or blinked. She could feel
him between her spread legs, hot and throbbing. “We'll…we need a moment,” she said weakly.

“No problem,” Bessie called cheerfully. “We'll wait.”

She let out a choked laugh. “They'll wait,” she whispered up to Colin, who shook his head and groaned.

“Great,” he said through clenched teeth. For a moment, he sagged over her, bracing himself on his forearms. His eyes were already shuttered, hiding himself, so it surprised her when he leaned close and brushed his lips over hers in one quick, hot, hard kiss.

“Oh, Colin,” she murmured against his mouth, holding him tight.

“I know.”

“I can't stand it.”

“I'm going to kill them,” he assured her.
“They'll wait,”
he repeated with disgust, pushing off her and yanking his shirt back up over his shoulders. “Damn, they've got timing.”

Lani didn't respond.

Colin turned back to her and groaned. She was still sprawled on the bed, clothes awry, hair everywhere, lips wet from his mouth, looking mouthwateringly beautiful.