Burning Up Read online

  This was it? They were going to play a stupid board game? No amateur psychology? No attempts to comfort him?

  “You want me to explain the rules again?” she asked, seeming to notice his stare for the first time.

  “Nope. Got ’em,” he said, at last dropping his gaze to his own tiles.

  “Ooh, nice,” she said suddenly, and he watched as she spelled out BOOBS on the board.

  “You played this game with your parents?” he asked skeptically.

  “Yep. And Mom always won, the dirty bitch. I guess being older she’d been around more than me and Carrie,” Sophie said, extracting replacement tiles from the box. “Although I don’t know what Dad’s excuse was. Lack of imagination, I guess. Your turn.”

  He really didn’t want to play, but she’d gone to a lot of trouble. The least he could do was stick a few words down before he bailed on her.

  She nodded with approval when she saw his word: SHAG.

  “Nice, and you got a triple word score there. Hmm.” She rested her cheek on her hand as she contemplated her tiles. “Oh yeah, now I see it.”

  She spelled out BALLBAG, using his G as an end point. He nearly snorted whiskey out his nose in surprise. Maybe it was the alcohol kicking in, but he was starting to warm to this game.

  Sophie frowned when she saw his next word: HAIRYOLA.

  “What the hell is that?” she asked.

  “A hairy areola. Hairyola for short,” he said, poker-faced.

  “That’s a made-up word,” she said.

  “And boobs isn’t? Just because it’s not in the dictionary doesn’t mean they don’t exist.”

  She pulled a face. “Ew. More whiskey, please.”

  He topped her up, managing to get a decent look down the loose neckline of her T-shirt when she leaned forward.

  “No hairs down there, I think you’ll find,” she said archly as she took a sip of her drink.

  “I know. But perhaps I should take a look, just in case,” he suggested.

  “Maybe we should make this a little more interesting and make it strip Scrabble,” she countered.

  As it wound up, he let her get one more word down before pulling her into his lap. Letter tiles flew everywhere as he stripped her naked.

  “I was ahead on points. Just so we both know that,” she said as he sucked one of her nipples into his mouth.

  “I unreservedly conceded defeat,” he said.

  Afterward, she led him back to bed and curled against him. As he drifted back to sleep, he marveled at how she’d made him laugh and forget for a moment.

  Every time she surprised him. Every damn time.

  THE NEXT MORNING, Sophie woke before Lucas again and eased quietly out of bed. Collecting her clothes, she dressed outside the bedroom so as not to disturb him.

  Last night when he woke shuddering and trembling beside her, her every instinct had screamed at her to take him in her arms and hold him. But she’d known without even trying that he wouldn’t accept her comfort.

  And why should he? They’d known each other for less than a week. They knew very little about each other’s lives, apart from the very obvious stuff. Hell, she didn’t even know his parents’ names, where he grew up…none of the stuff she’d known about Brandon without ever having to ask. She and Lucas were two people who found mutual fulfillment in each other’s arms, end of story.

  Still, she hadn’t been able to let him walk off into the night on his own. She’d remained in bed for a few minutes after he’d left, tossing up the options, wondering what sort of ghosts haunted him that his whole body had been so rigid. She’d gone after him and distracted him as best she could.

  And just before she’d fallen asleep again, she’d had an idea. She wanted to do something for him. Something in lieu of comforting him.

  Now, she had a quick shower, then went and did reconnaissance in the fridge. As she’d suspected, she had all the ingredients she needed there. Then she sat down with his diet chart and went to work.

  By the time he joined her in the kitchen a couple of hours later, she’d roughed out a new program and was slicing herbs for his revamped breakfast.

  “Hey. You’re up early.” He was a little subdued, she noted. Probably thinking about his nightmare, wishing she hadn’t been there to witness it.

  “I had something I wanted to take care of,” she said. “I’ll bring in your breakfast in a few minutes.”

  “I can hardly wait,” he said drily. “Let me guess—today’s special is cottage cheese.”

  She merely quirked an eyebrow at him, not wanting to give away her surprise.

  Five minutes later she slid a savory-scented egg-white frittata filled with lean bacon, crunchy vegetables and fresh herbs, accompanied by chunky salsa, in front of him.

  “You’re kidding me. This is on my diet?” he asked.

  “On your new diet chart,” she said. Drawing her jottings from her back pocket, she spread them out in front of him. “I broke down the old plan into calorie counts and fat counts. Then I came up with a new menu that will keep you within the same boundaries, but allow you to actually enjoy your food, too.”

  He studied her workings for a moment. “No more cottage cheese?”

  “No more cottage cheese.”

  He surveyed his plate as if he almost couldn’t believe it was true. “This smells really good.”

  “Of course it does,” she said with a complete absence of modesty. “It’s real food. Whoever put that other diet together for you hates food.”

  She perched on the edge of the table, legs dangling, waiting for him to take his first mouthful.

  He carved off a generous portion with his fork and carried it to his mouth. He closed his eyes, relishing the moment.

  “What’s the smoky flavor?” he asked once he’d swallowed.

  “Smoked paprika. It’s my favorite spice,” she said. “You like it?”

  “I love it,” he said, attacking his plate with gusto.

  She’d never gotten so much satisfaction out of watching someone eat. She felt mildly guilty, in fact, that she was enjoying herself so much when she’d supposedly done it for him.

  “This is like culinary porn,” she confessed as he pushed his plate away. “Cooking a meal then watching someone really get off on it. The ultimate payoff.”

  “Really?”

  “Of course. Most of the time in a restaurant, you’re so far away from the customers you have no idea if they like the meal or not. Sometimes they send their compliments, but mostly you figure that if they come back again and the dining room stays busy, you’re doing okay.”

  He stood then, and she was about to slide off the table to start cleaning up when he stopped her with a hard, hot kiss.

  “Thanks,” he said. “I appreciate you going to the extra effort.”

  For some reason, his sincere gratitude made her feel very self-conscious and she could feel a blush stealing into her cheeks.

  “It hurt me almost as much to prepare those meals as it hurt you to eat them,” she said lightly.

  “Mmm. I think we’ll have to disagree on that one,” he said drily.

  Again she tried to slide off the table, and again he stopped her.

  “Also,” he said, “I wanted to say thanks for last night.”

  This time, he was the one who had trouble holding her eye.

  “I didn’t do anything,” she said.

  “You did, and you didn’t. Thanks on both counts,” he said.

  Then he kissed her again, grabbed his crutches and was gone.

  Sophie sat on the table for a moment longer, wondering. But it was none of her business. Big-time none of her business.

  LUCAS HAD ANOTHER nightmare that night.

  Sophie hadn’t intended to stay in his bed again—their deal was sex, after all, not intimacy—but she’d dozed off after they’d come together for the second time. She woke to find his rigid body trembling beside her, his fists crushing the sheets as he fought an invisible demon.

&nb
sp; As she had last night, she reached across and soothed his shoulders, trying to rouse him from the dream.

  “Lucas. You’re dreaming,” she said gently but firmly. He awoke with a start, and she could feel his heart pounding hard where her palm was flat against his shoulder blade.

  “Shit.”

  As he had last night, he rolled to the side of the bed and sat there, his elbows propped on his knees, his head in his hands. Wordless, she knelt behind him and tried to rub some of the tension out of his shoulders and neck. At first he remained stiff, resistant, but after a few minutes she felt him begin to let go.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” she asked quietly.

  He sighed, and she felt his shoulders tense again beneath her hands.

  “It’s just an old dream, nothing important.”

  “You know, sometimes just naming it helps. Puts a bit of perspective on it,” she said.

  He shifted restlessly, and she thought she’d pushed too hard. Fair enough. They didn’t owe each other anything.

  But then he started to talk, his voice low, almost inaudible.

  “I’m just a kid. I have no idea how old. It’s night, and I’m on a bike, riding past an ordinary suburban house. It’s not familiar to me, but I feel like it’s mine, like it’s home,” he said.

  She didn’t say a word, simply stilled her hands on his shoulders and let him feel her touching him.

  “All the windows and doors of the house are open, and the curtains are streaming out, as though there’s a breeze inside pushing them out. The door is open, and I throw my bike down on the front lawn and race up the steps. Inside, the rooms are empty—no furniture, nothing except for pale marks on the wall where photographs and pictures should be. Everything is gone.

  “I start running around the house, opening and shutting all the doors until I find the master bedroom. I throw the door open and rush inside, but there’s only an empty bed….”

  He trailed off. She blinked back tears for him. Like most dreams, the details of his nightmare sounded completely innocuous when spoken out loud, but she’d seen the effect it had on him.

  “You were all alone,” she said slowly. “Your family left you all alone.”

  He didn’t say anything, but tension still vibrated through his body.

  “I read a book on dream interpretation once,” she said, trying to offer him something. “Houses in dreams are supposed to represent security, belonging, family. I think I’m getting this right. If it’s a childhood home in your dream, one that you don’t live in anymore, I think it’s supposed to represent your desire for a family of your own. But I don’t know what the open doors and windows mean. Or the empty rooms.”

  She wanted to help him so very badly. She’d wrestled with her own demons only very recently—was still wrestling with them, on some level, every time she let herself drive his car, or lie naked before him, or offer him the gift of a rude board game when he needed distraction.

  He shifted again, huffed out a little laugh. “You know, it’s probably because I moved around so much when I was a kid. I always wanted to stay in one place, but it never happened. Stupid.”

  There was a finality to his tone. The subject was closed. She got the message loud and clear. She moved back to her own side of the bed. After a beat, he laid down and pulled the sheet over himself.

  Lying in the dark, facing away from him on her side, she fought the urge to turn around, curl against him and offer more comfort. But he didn’t want anything more from her.

  Remember the rules of engagement, Sophie. More importantly, remember those stupid women who believed in something that was never going to happen.

  Too bad her vision of Lucas had shifted irrevocably over the past few days. He would never again be a shallow womanizer in her eyes, just a convenient body for her to get off on for a few hot weeks. He was a real and whole person—a vulnerable person, she was beginning to realize, despite all his apparent success and fame.

  Behind her, the mattress dipped and she felt the warmth of his body as he moved closer to her. His arm snaked around her waist and he pulled her tight against him, his hips cradling her butt, his chest to her back.

  Then she felt the press of his lips against the nape of her neck.

  “Go to sleep, Sophie,” he told her softly.

  If the ridiculous warmth that washed through her weren’t warning enough, the tears that burned at the back of her eyes were.

  She was falling in serious like with Lucas Grant. Dangerous, indeed.

  10

  TWO WEEKS LATER, Lucas lounged beside the pool, the late-afternoon sun tamed by the umbrella shading his corner of the world. He hadn’t had a single nightmare since he’d told Sophie his sad little tale, and neither of them had brought it up again. It was a nonissue, as far as he was concerned. He suspected Sophie felt otherwise, but she never raised it with him.

  He glanced to where she was splashing around in the pool. She was doing a doggy paddle, her head held high. He couldn’t help but smile.

  A month ago, if anyone had told him that he’d be content to spend the bulk of every day with one person—someone he’d met recently, at that—he’d have laughed in their face. But Sophie was so easy, so warm, so genuine that each day was over before he knew it.

  The sex helped a lot, of course. It seemed to get better and better. Now that they knew each other’s hot spots, they could get one another crazy in a handful of seconds—or draw it out for hours on end. And in between the best sex of his life, they had fun.

  Rude Scrabble had become a nightly challenge. He could only imagine what his party buddies in L.A. would think of the fact that he actually looked forward to settling on the couch at night with only Sophie, a few inches of whiskey and all those stupid little tiles. At first he’d simply been humoring her, but pretty soon it had become a matter of pride to beat her. She had a dirty mind, and an even dirtier vocabulary, he’d quickly discovered. Commercial kitchens, she’d explained to him, were full of foul-mouthed, foul-tempered people under stress. Slowly he’d clawed ground back, however, and last night he’d won his first game.

  They’d become friends, he realized. Physically intimate friends who liked each other’s bodies one hell of a lot.

  In the water, Sophie rolled onto her back and floated, the sweet peaks of her naked breasts breaking the surface of the water. He’d stolen her bikini top when he was in the water with her earlier, retaliation for an earlier bombing incident that had caught him full in the face. As he watched her appreciatively, a memory nudged at him—Candy-Cindy in a similar pose in his hot tub just a few weeks ago.

  Two women could not be more different. Candy-Cindy had been all about artifice, seduction, ambition. Sophie was just Sophie. She had no agenda. It was amazing to him how refreshing that was.

  God, he liked her. She was funny, smart, cheeky, challenging. Damned sexy. He was going to miss her when their four weeks were up.

  Although just because they left the estate didn’t necessarily mean he and Sophie had to stop seeing each other.

  He frowned as the thought slipped into his mind. Where the hell had that come from? Then he decided to stop fooling himself—it had been hovering there for a while now, and he knew it. He just hadn’t been prepared to own up to it yet.

  He wasn’t ready to let her go. And he wasn’t quite sure how to deal with that. The odds were good that once he was back to his old life, his old routines, Sophie would quickly become a thing of the past, a pleasant memory of hot summer days and nights.

  For some reason, even though the thought ought to have been comforting, it only made him feel uneasy.

  Sitting up, he shaded his eyes so he could see her properly.

  “Tired yet?” he called.

  She stopped floating and stood in the shallow end of the pool, water sluicing off her curves as she pushed her hair out of her eyes.

  “Sorry, what?” she asked.

  “Are you ready to come out yet?” he asked, smiling faintly. She
had no idea how hot she was, which was one of the things about her that drove him crazy. She was effortlessly sexy and sensual. And always, always responsive. His very own little auburn-haired fire cracker.

  She lifted a shoulder in a casual shrug. “Sure. Why not?”

  It was only when she exited the pool that he saw she’d shed her bikini bottom, as well. Poker-faced, she sauntered to the lounger where she’d left her towel.

  “Mmm, the towel’s all hot from the sun,” she murmured as she blotted her face and hair dry. She eyed him from beneath her eyelashes as she rubbed the towel over her breasts, then lower, over her belly.

  Predictably, he was hard in an instant, his erection tenting the damp fabric of his board shorts.

  “Come here,” he said.

  She lifted a leg onto the lounger’s arm and pretended to dry her thighs.

  “Why?” she asked innocently.

  “Sophie…” he growled, and she smirked and sauntered over, hips swinging.

  “Yes, Mr. Grant?” she asked, stopping just outside his reach and pressing her upper arms to either side of her breasts so they sat up high, begging for his attention.

  “Sophie, if I have to come after you, it’s not going to be pretty,” he warned her.

  She pretended to give it some thought. “In that case…” And she strolled toward the house, giving him a mouthwatering view of her round, wiggling butt.

  “Vixen,” he said between his teeth, then he was on his feet and after her. She was almost at the house when she looked over her shoulder and saw he was advancing fast, and she picked up her pace. Not too much, since she wanted to be caught as much as he wanted to catch her. He ate up the ground with his crutches, gaining on her with every step. She was laughing when he finally tackled her on the stairs.

  She rolled onto her back, her velvety eyes dark with passion. Then she looked into his face and she was suddenly very, very serious.

  “Hurry,” she said, sucking on her forefinger. He watched, mesmerized, as she traced the coral pink edge of a nipple with her damp finger. It pebbled hungrily under his avid gaze, and he stripped his board shorts off in record time.