Too Darn Hot (9 page)

He wanted to tell her to relax and dive into it, but there wasn’t time. Instead he held her hand and led her into the maneuver. It was awkward but effective. As one, they bulled their way through the churning water. A few more haphazard strokes had them safely riding the swells once again.

She clung to him, breathing hard, laughing giddily, as if she’d just come off the world’s biggest roller coaster. Their legs brushed underwater as he treaded for both of them.

How had it happened? How had the sky suddenly gotten bluer, the water warmer, and Lina lovelier than he’d ever seen her—lovely and silly, with her hair trying to go in three directions at once? He couldn’t remember feeling happier, freer, more at peace.

The look in her eyes said it all. For a blissful few moments she was open, unguarded. And so was he. All that existed was the energy arcing between them—raw and welcome and throbbing with sweet promise.

Too soon she seemed to become aware of her hands gripping his shoulders, of his hair-roughened thighs sliding rhythmically against her smooth legs as he worked to keep both their heads above water. She began to pull away.

The skin of her back felt like warm silk against his palm as he gently drew her close again. He was greedy. He was selfish.

And it felt damn good.

“Not yet,” he whispered.

Her eyes widened as he tilted his head to brush a kiss on her parted lips. She tasted of seawater and Fluffernutter. He smiled. “Close your eyes.”

She did. His arm curled around her back, pressing her to him, forcing her to wind her arms around his neck. She was a bit breathless. He hoped it was due to excitement and not fear of drowning. They moved as one, bobbing to the rhythm of the ocean and his bicycling legs. Her bikini-clad breasts grazed his chest in the same tantalizing cadence.

Lina returned his kiss with equal fervor. The feel of her soft, full mouth yielding to his made his blood pound. When his erection throbbed against her belly, she made a little mewling sound. Her leg circled his hips, locking them together.

Eric groaned deep in his chest. What he wouldn’t give at that moment to have something firmer under them than the deep blue ocean, to lay her back...to slowly pull off that scrap of a swimsuit....

His concentration faltered and he forgot to churn the water. In the next moment the two were sputtering and coughing and treading for all they were worth.

“You’re trying to drown me,” she laughed.

Drown you? No, something much more pleasant.

He looked toward the shore, where he could just make out his yellow beach towel. She must have read his mind, because she murmured, “Come on,” and started swimming. They rode a breaker to shore and emerged wobbly-legged in the foam and spray.

He didn’t know how they made it to the big towel, but somehow they did, falling together in a tangle of arms and legs and hungry mouths. The air felt ten times hotter after the frigid water, her skin cool and salty-wet, the heat of the sunbaked towel startling.

The sweet, silky tip of her tongue teased his lips, and he took a brief second to grin down into her flushed face. Her responsiveness thrilled him. Their tongues mated, plunging, tasting, promising. Their hands clung and stroked as they rolled on the towel, writhing like a couple of teenagers in heat.

It had been too long. He’d denied himself for too long.

He cupped her breast. Her stiff nipple teased his palm through the stretchy wet fabric, urging him to rub the peak in lazy circles. Lina’s breathing quickened. Her eyes drifted shut and her mouth opened on a little gasp of pleasure. She arched, offering herself. It was all the invitation he needed. His fingers slid behind her neck and found the tie strings of her bikini top. He pulled them free and bared her.

She was exquisite. He knew she would be. Her breasts weren’t large, one perfect handful, he thought, before lowering his head to a dusky puckered tip. He kissed it. She shuddered. He licked it, delicately at first, then with greater hunger, finally drawing the cool, salty-sweet flesh into his hot mouth.

She was breathless, squirming in his embrace. Finally his fingers replaced his mouth as he turned his attention to the other breast. Her gasps became soft cries of delight. She twisted under him, and he held her tighter.

Her hand came up, and she bit the back of her wrist to stifle her sounds. Eric pulled her hand away and held it. He wanted to hear her. He needed to know how he made her feel.

A noise just over the dune galvanized them. Voices.

Kids.

Lina whispered a succinct oath as she bolted upright. Eric was already lifting her bikini strings. He managed to tie them haphazardly in about two seconds, with shaking fingers. He felt like a derailed locomotive.

Damn!

He flopped onto his stomach just as three small children scrabbled to the top of the dune, peering down into the cove he’d thought of as his own private hideaway.

“Whatcha doin’ down there?” the littlest one, a girl of about three, asked. From a distance a woman could be heard calling for her brood. In a flash the spectators were gone.

He dropped his head to the towel and collapsed, his heart jackhammering. “Whatcha doin’ down there?” he mimicked in the guileless high voice of a toddler.

Lina was quaking with helpless laughter. Eric leaned up on his elbows and tried to scowl at her. “You find this amusing, do you? For your information, I’m in pain.” He shifted on the towel.

“Poor dear.” She flopped back onto the towel, smiling up into the sky. A telltale flush still adorned her face and chest.

He moved closer to shield her eyes from the sun with his shadow. She lifted a hand and ran soft fingers over his stubbled cheek, then lightly scraped her crimson nails over his whiskers.

“Did I hurt you?” he asked, thinking how raspy his face must have felt on the satiny skin of her breasts.

“I liked it.”

His eyebrows rose. She liked it.

“What can I say? I’m shameless.”

“Thank God for shameless women.” He leaned down and kissed her tenderly, almost chastely, and ran his fingers through her wet, unruly hair, straightening it. Her eyes never left his.

“I don’t know if you have any plans for tomorrow,” he said, “but we’ll be doing the basic Memorial Day barbecue deal at the Reid homestead. Real laid-back, nothing fancy. Hell, as long as you have enough beer and grilled flesh, what more do you need, right?”

He sensed her pulling back. “Thanks, but I—I can’t.”

Something told him she wanted to, though. Whatever plans she had could be broken. “Come on, Lina. You don’t want to miss this. The whole loony Reid clan’ll be there.”

“Loony?”

“Except for my uncle Ed. He’s rich, so he gets to be called eccentric. And there are a few that are just plain scary.” He sat up and leaned on a palm, still shielding her eyes. “Our family barbecues follow a prescribed ritual. My sister-in-law Jeri will get drunk and pick a fistfight with my cousin Ralph. Then her son Michael will eat till he pukes. I’m telling you, you can’t buy entertainment like that.”

“Sounds most diverting, but—”

“Arnie and his son will bring their guitars and serenade us with `Hey, Jude.’ All day. And of course, my aunt Harriet will have her camcorder going the whole time. That way, when Ralph sues Jeri for a broken nose, he’ll have the footage to back him up.”

He decided to bring out the heavy artillery. “This elegant affair will culminate in a frenzy of beer tossing, followed by a water fight, from which there is no escape.” He looked pointedly at her swimsuit. “Come as you are.” Lina was clearly impressed. Should he tell her about Cousin Fran’s strip poker tournament? “Well?”

Her eyes clouded over and she murmured, “I really can’t, Eric, but thanks.”

“Let me just ask one thing. Whoever you’re seeing tomorrow, it is serious?”

Confusion knitted her brow. “I’m not seeing anyone tomorrow.”

“I just assumed. I know you have an active social life,” he said, thinking about that weasel Bob.

“Are you thinking about that weasel Bob? That wasn’t a date. It was strictly business. Give me some credit.”

“What kind of business forces you to wine and dine sleazoids like that? You said you’re a writer....”

He left a fill-in-the-blanks opening. Most people love to talk about what they do. So why did Lina suddenly look like he’d asked her to do long division on her fingers? She stared off at the horizon, biting her lip. What could she possibly write that she’d be reluctant to admit to? Unless it was...

Naw, it couldn’t be. A refined lady like her? Writing porn?

Then again, there’d been nothing refined about her response to him behind The Cookhouse last week. She’d been on fire. And so had he. As for what happened between them today—well, for him it had been more than simple lust. For Lina, it had been...

Research?

“Lina?” He scowled at her shuttered expression, feeling his heart thump in rising confusion and anger, wondering if it was time to start feeling like a fool. His imagination left his rational mind in the dust as he thought about Bob Flanagan. And Mark Thayer. Research buddies? An outlandish notion perhaps, but one that, having taken up residence in his gray matter, proved impossible to shake.

It was strictly business.
What the hell did that mean?

“Tell me, Lina. What do you write?”

She pushed her wet hair behind her ear. “Restaurant reviews.”

He let out the breath he’d been holding. She wrote—

“What?”

“And before you ask...” She looked him in the eye.

“I’m Caroline Holland.”

Chapter Eight

Eric could only gape at Lina, speechless. He’d steeled himself to hear something along the lines of,
Well, you know those triple-X-rated movie scripts? I crank those out.

Nothing could have prepared him for her pronouncement. She didn’t have to elaborate. Every restaurateur in the country knew who Caroline Holland was. She was a legend in their business.

Yet it wasn’t possible. Lina didn’t look anything like Caroline Holland. In his mind he pictured the reviewer every time he opened up the latest issue of
Bon Vivant
to the “Dining Out in New York” column. Caroline Holland was a brash, zaftig, middle-aged woman who applied her makeup with a putty knife. He always knew he’d recognize her the instant she set foot in The Cookhouse.

Which could never happen, of course. There was no question Eric’s offbeat, out-of-the-way little establishment had a snowball’s chance in hell of being noticed by a reviewer of Holland’s stature.

All this crossed his mind in the long seconds he sat staring openmouthed at the woman next to him. “That’s not funny, Lina,” he managed to croak.

“It’s not supposed to be.”

A few moments ago, every iota of mental energy had been devoted to finding the means to carry their intimate encounter to its logical conclusion. Next thing he knew, he was sharing his beach towel with one of the most powerful forces in his business, a person capable of ensuring the success of the venture on which he’d devoted so much time, money, and heart.

Caroline Holland. The first woman since Ruth. The first woman to crack the shell of grief and betrayal that had kept him alone and celibate for a year and a half.

Eric rested his arm on a raised knee. He rubbed his bristly jaw and thought about the past few weeks. The mayhem of that first night. Her vocal condemnation. The way he came on to her afterward—came on to the New York restaurant critic for
Bon Vivant
magazine. Good God.

He glanced at Lina and couldn’t help running his gaze down her body, remembering. No. It simply wasn’t possible he’d been rolling around on a beach towel, panting and groping, with a legend.

She said, “I know this must be something of a surprise.”

He couldn’t repress a you-said-a-mouthful grunt as his stunned mind struggled to fit all the pieces together. With a sweep of his arm he indicated their close encounter. “And all this...?”

Her eyes widened, sparking with dangerous blue lights. “Seduction of the chef usually occurs after evaluation and before publication of the article. We’re right on schedule.”

“No, I mean...” He shook his head, trying to clear his muddled mind. It was just beginning to sink in. An incredulous smile split his face. “This is all just...a little hard to absorb.”

“I understand that. I couldn’t tell you who I really was while I was still evaluating The Cookhouse.”

He fought the urge to jump up and howl with triumph.

A Caroline Holland review!

He said, “Is that why you came here looking for me? To tell me?”

“Well, yes, and to return—”

“This is like winning the lottery, do you realize that?” He hadn’t felt this giddy since the birth of the twins. An ebullient sense of gratitude had replaced his initial shock. “You’ve paid for your last Cookhouse meal, Lina—although I suppose the magazine was picking up the tab so far.”

A strange wariness came into her eyes. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I want you to consider yourself my permanent guest. Your money’s no good at The Cookhouse. Hell, I should build a wing and name it after you.” He gestured at an imaginary sign. “The Lina Holland Annex.”

He chuckled, but for some reason, she looked less than amused.

He added, “The same goes for the cooking classes. Show up anytime. On the house. It’s the least I can offer in exchange for a review in
Bon Vivant
.”

She leapt to her feet and grabbed her cutoffs. Stunned, he watched her yank them on. Her fingers shook as she snapped the fly. She was breathing hard and looking anywhere but at him. She pulled her shirt on over her head, clearly oblivious to the tantalizing wet spots from her bikini.

“Lina?”

Her eyes darted around until she located her sneakers some distance from the towel. It was then he saw the cold outrage in her eyes, the rigid set of her features.

“Lina, what is it?”

She barely heard him calling to her as she snatched up her sneakers and strode swiftly the way she’d come. It was hard to look composed as she slogged through the sand. She elected to sacrifice dignity in the interest of speed, and picked up the pace.