Hot as Hell (2 page)

T
wo hours later Lexy walked past the aerobics studio and started toward the main administration building. Exercise class started in thirty minutes, but jumping up and down on a little step was the last thing on her mind. No, she had other problems.

Two men. Two potential disasters. Two reasons to have a headache all the medications in the world could not fight.

She did not enjoy anything about the spa, the situation, or Noah’s presence in the same state. Oh, she knew he would run after her. Decreasing his security clearance and blocking his access to work files guaranteed that. If she could have come up with a better way to ensure the confidentiality of her company’s private information, even temporarily, she would have done that, too.

It was not as if she had a bunch of great options sitting out in front of her begging for attention. Noah and her brother ran the business. Noah was in a position of power. She took care of the public relations and marketing end, but a huge chunk of the day-to-day operations fell to Noah.

Noah enjoyed a great deal more trust and fewer restrictions than anyone else in the office. Seeing him appear in the middle of the desert brought it all back—the frustration, the humiliation. He lied to her from the beginning. And she bought every word.

Now she would get her revenge and reveal him to be the crook he was.

She had studied the comings and goings at the spa for the last few days. She knew the resort’s security chief, Charlie Henderson, left his office at the same time every day, grabbed coffee or whatever else he carried around in that white cup, and headed to the weight room for a mid-afternoon workout session

Today was not any different. As she rounded the corner of the terra-cotta-colored building, she saw Henderson jog down the building stairs.

Bingo
.

The man would be gone for at least an hour. While he worked on his pecs, she’d figure out a way into his office to conduct her search. The details of how she was going to do all that were a bit murky.

Her previous visits taught her about the location of Henderson’s office and the hours he kept. She knew the people who worked at the spa were not sit-at-a-desk types. Most spent little time in their offices. She was counting on that being the case today. With Noah at the resort, she no longer had the time to wait.

She ducked behind the building until Henderson took off. She waited another few seconds and then headed for the door of the administrative building. She barely got up the ten steps to the porch before she felt a presence behind her.

She turned around expecting to see Noah. She saw Henderson.

Even from the step below her, his six-foot-huge frame had him looming over her. Blondish gray hair gave him an older look than the forty-four years her private file on him indicated. Either way, up close the harsh angled lines of the guy’s face gave him a scary look.

“Looking for something?” Henderson smiled, but there was no amusement in his voice.

Yeah, a good excuse for being exactly where she was not supposed to be
. “I got turned around. I have an aerobics class in a few minutes and seem to be in the wrong place.”

“You’re nowhere near the studio.”

Unease zapped through her at his sharp tone. “My mistake.”

She tried to breeze past him. Stay calm, keep her head down, and get down the stairs before he could get a good look at her.

He was having none of it. “There’s no need for you to rush off.”

Something about his deep voice caused her head to snap up. This time she saw emotion swirl in his dark eyes. Something dark and knowing.

“I have a class,” she said as her mind raced, trying to come up with a Plan B.

“Uh-huh.”

There it was. The male grunt that meant something but failed to say anything. “If you’ll just—”

He stepped in her path. “You were looking for me.”

“What? No.” She tried to step back, but her heel slammed smack against the stair.

“You were following me.”

She snorted and hoped her voice sounded genuine. “Of course not. Why would I do that?”

“That’s what I want to know.”

Something about his demeanor and hovering sent a tiny tremor of alarm skipping through her. “I took a wrong turn. No big deal.”

He leaned in until she could smell the peppermint gum on his breath. “I’ve seen you around this building for two days now. You’ve been in the hall and asking questions.”

So much for her investigative skills.
Time to concentrate on her lying skills. Being with Noah taught her something about that subject. The man lied about everything, which was why she was stuck on the steps talking to Henderson.

She swallowed the nervous energy that threatened to drown her. “I’ve been thinking about using the resort for an office retreat and—”

“Questions about me.”

“No, no. There’s some confusion here.” She tried again, figuring the more she talked, the more likely it was that someone would walk by and she could sneak away without a scene. “I really was just walking around the resort.”

“You were conducting surveillance.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Okay, she did, but he did not need to know that.

Henderson rested his hands on his hips. The move emphasized just how big the guy was. Somehow his frame managed to block the sun.

“I know who you are,” he said.

That’s exactly what she was afraid of. “Of course you do. I’m staying at the resort.”

“I know about your company. Your brother and your fiancé.”

“Ex-fiancé.” The correction slipped out.

“What?”

“Never mind.”

“You followed me back from San Diego. I want to know why.”

This guy had an ego big enough to match his truck-sized forearms. She thought about pointing it out, but he could snap her in half with one hand, so she let the comment go.

“You were in San Diego? Lovely, isn’t it?”

“This is your last chance, lady.” Those arms crossed in front of him this time. “Tell me what you want.”

“Just some rest and exercise. See, I’m on vacation.” She figured if she kept saying it, maybe someone would start believing it.

“Uh-huh.”

The third time with this guy was not one ounce more charming than the first two. “Are you always this direct and difficult with patrons?”

“Just the nosy ones.” He dropped his arms and took two steps until he stood above her. “You need directions back to the aerobics studio?”

“No.”

“Good.”

Noah leaned against the corner of the building and watched Lexy talk with a guy who looked like he should have bolts in his neck. Noah strained to hear, but was too far away. Whatever they were talking about made Lexy frown. By the end of the conversation, she was squirming hard enough to pop right out of her skin.

Rather than guess about the topic of conversation, Noah decided to ask. The guy walked off, leaving her alone on the steps. She owed him an explanation. Owed him more than that by his count, but he’d settle for very little at this point. Anything.

“New boyfriend?” he asked from the bottom of the staircase.

Lexy held her hand up to her eyes and squinted against the glaring sun. “I’m getting a little tired of men sneaking up on me.”

“What does that mean?”

She stopped in front of him. “Why are you still here?”

“At the resort?”

“In Utah.”

“Ah. As to that, I’m just looking around.”

She shook her head. “Go home, Noah.”

She tried to walk past him. He let her get about two feet before saying anything else. “I asked you a question. Who’s the guy?”

She glanced over her shoulder. Whatever expression she saw on his face, whatever she perceived or imagined, made her stop running and face him. “No one.”

“The talk looked pretty serious to me.”

“You’re wrong, and it’s not the first time you’ve jumped to conclusions about me and other men, either.”

She made him sound like the raving jealous type. Wrong. He was a practical guy. Having Lexy break off their engagement is what made him lose his control. He kept searching for reasonable answers to her unreasonable behavior. Four weeks later and he was not one inch closer to understanding what the hell happened.

“I assume you’re talking about that limp wrist you’ve been going out with for the last two weeks.”

She somehow sighed and glared at the same time. “That is not appropriate, and William is not gay.”

“He’s not manly. He owns a pink polo shirt, for Christ’s sake.” Noah gritted his teeth together at the thought of Lexy with any man. Any man. “He wore it with red pants to have lunch with Gray. Red pants, Lexy.”

“How did you know about their lunch?”

Noah shrugged, pretending William’s newfound coziness with the Stuart family did not matter, even though it did. “I hear things at the office.”

“My life isn’t your business—”

“Wrong.”

“—and shouldn’t be the subject of office gossip.”

“Yell at your brother, not me.”

“Oh, I intend to.”

“All I’m saying is just because a guy has a cock, that doesn’t make him a rooster, if you know what I mean.”

She blinked a few times. “Actually, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I rarely do.”

“That is one of the problems in our relationship. A failure to communicate.” The conclusion settled into his skin and felt right there.

“The bigger issue had to do with your lying.”

The woman needed to find a new complaint. He had heard this one over and over. “Never said a thing that wasn’t true.”

“You rarely say anything that makes sense.”

“Yet you heard me just fine when I proposed.”

“We are not talking about that.”

“Why?”

“Even though you seem to think I’m dating every man I know or meet or pass on the street, I’m not. I’m trying to enjoy my vacation.”

“Fair enough.” With that out of the way…“So, who’s the guy?”

“Didn’t we just cover this?”

“I can find out, you know. It would just be easier if you told me.”

“Don’t you have work to do?”

Now there was a subject as raw as an open wound. “About that. Any idea where my work files disappeared to?”

“Ask someone at the office.”

Yeah, he’d tried that already. All roads led back to Lexy. “I’m talking to you about it.”

“I’d love to work this all out with you, but I have an aerobics class.” She pushed past him and called over her shoulder. “Enjoy your flight back to San Diego.”

He did not know what was going on, but he did know he was not going anywhere without her. As much as he wanted to take Lexy back home and put that ring back on her finger, he had to wait.

If his fiancée—and that is exactly how he thought of her and would until she became his wife—wanted to spend some time in the desert, he would get used to the heat. Hell, he was used to cold showers, anyway.

L
exy suspected Noah would be waiting when she came out of her aerobics class all hot, sweaty, and desperate for a shower. She waited until almost everyone else, including the instructor, filed out just to see if he’d hang around. With all the other disappointments he had given her over the last few weeks, this was not one of them.

“Have fun?” He asked the question while lounging against the side of the building, just outside the front door.

“Up until about two seconds ago, yes.” She threw her bag over her shoulder. She thought about storming off, but two women from her class hung around and listened in without making any attempt to hide, so she refrained from causing a scene.

“Tell me about your relationship to Charlie Henderson.”

She tried not to flinch. “I thought you didn’t know him.”

“I don’t.”

“But yet you know his name?”

“Is his name a secret?”

“You tell me.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She scoffed. “Please. Give me a break. As if you just happened to guess his name.”

He tapped on his temple. “Security expert, remember?”

“Since you’re so brilliant, why not figure out who the guy is yourself? You shouldn’t need me.”

“I’d rather hear from you. I’ll stand here and melt into a puddle while you explain it to me.”

She tried to imagine how much time it would take to dissolve all 190 pounds off his six-foot-one frame. The result would be a water hole the size of Cleveland.

“When you put it that way, I’m thinking a vow of silence might be in order,” she said.

“Doubt you could stay quiet for five minutes.” He smiled. “But go ahead. This should be entertaining.”

As the seconds ticked by, Noah said hello to their nosy audience. He engaged in a random bit of idle chitchat with a third woman who joined the group. All the while, sweat collected behind Lexy’s knees and dripped off her neck.

Since he was wearing the same charcoal-gray dress pants and blue cotton shirt from earlier, she figured Noah had to be near the toasting point. The thought made her smile.

It disappeared when he smiled and that familiar tingle started down deep in her belly. It had been this way from the beginning. He walked into her family’s business two years ago to interview for a job and knocked her over. Literally. He ran her right down in the hall with the force of a train. Came around the corner with his head down and slammed her into the wall.

Bruised and counting the butterflies winging around her head, she looked up, saw him, and never saw another man the same way again. She remembered every minute. Every detail. Black suit with a crisp white shirt and bold red tie. Dark brown hair clipped short and sexy. Melting chocolate-brown eyes. Lean, buff, muscled.

Any woman, concussion or not, would have fallen for him even if he were not the best damn kisser ever, which he was. She had not felt the same way about another man before or since. Even though she just turned thirty and had a lot of kissing in front of her, she doubted she ever would feel the same way about any other guy ever again.

Seeing Noah now should have been a huge shock. It wasn’t. Despite all the anger and hurt, the pull between them tugged just as strong.

Noah laughed at something one of the women said before they stepped back. Neither lady left or wandered very far. No, they hovered around the weights and mats just inside the door, about fifteen feet away. Lexy decided to ignore them both and deal with Noah.

“Hot yet?” she asked hoping his internal temperature had spiked to crisis levels.

Noah made a scene of glancing down at his watch. “Three minutes.”

“What?”

“That’s about as long as I thought you could go without talking.”

“Really? I’m wondering how well you could breathe with a hand weight stuffed up your nose.”

“I’ve dealt with worse.”

“Is that another secret from your past you’ve decided not to share?”

“I’m here now. Ready to talk. Shoot.”

She considered doing just that. “I don’t have anything new to say. You know why I gave the ring back.”

“Actually, I don’t.”

Since they had an audience, she decided to play to it. “Let’s start with the global issues, shall we?”

“I like international things. Go ahead.”

From the way he stood up straighter and his gaze darkened, she knew his mind and body were on high alert. As usual.

“You were not honest with me.” Quite an understatement, but she figured the comment would get the ball rolling in the right direction.

“And?”

“
And
?” Her squeal of outrage made the eavesdropping ladies give up their pretense and openly stare.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Dishonesty is a huge deal.”

He frowned. “Is that really the only complaint you have about me?”

She seriously considered practicing some of those fancy kickboxing moves she had just learned on him. “It’s more than enough for most people.”

“Not sane people.”

“You lied.”

“To you?” he asked.

“To the guy who drives the airport shuttle.” She threw up her hands. “Yes, of course to me. All the time and about almost everything.”

His frown deepened at her assessment of his honesty skills, or lack of them. “Give me an example.”

“I can give you fifty.”

“Since it’s not getting any cooler out here, let’s start with one.”

She homed in on the most obvious problem. “You failed to disclose important information about your past.”

He scoffed. Actually, he made one of those male sounds that stood for “my woman is a nut job,” then just stopped talking.

“You hid the facts from me.” She held up a hand. “And if you make that noise again, I am going to test your theory about being able to breathe through a hand weight.”

“Not sharing every irrelevant detail of my life is different from lying.”

“It is not.”

“See, I knew it. This is just a difference of opinion. We can work thought this. No problem.” His head dipped to the side and he shot her one of his let’s-go-to-bed stares.

No freaking way
. No matter how he affected her, how fast her heartbeat galloped whenever she saw him, sex was not going to happen.

“About some subjects, I was the only one who didn’t know…” The words caught in her throat. “Do you have any idea how it feels to practically live with a guy and not know anything about him?”

She had waited for months for him to tell her about his past. Months of ignoring the fury building inside her as his silence chipped away at her trust. Then she got the call from one of the company’s business clients about a break-in that pointed to Noah. The evidence was shaky. The company had more of a suspicion than anything else, but Lexy knew the truth. Lying, stolen money…it all added up to getting scammed by an expert. One Noah Paxton.

The realization had nearly destroyed her. Loving someone so much only to have him screw her and her family made her throw up for days. Then she gave the ring back, locked down the business information she could, and followed every lead. That had taken her to Charlie Henderson and southern Utah, which was why she was sweating off pounds by the minute.

She had to find the evidence to prove Noah had participated in ripping off their client. Without that, he would sweet-talk his way out of it just as he did everything else.

“Your past never mattered so long as you were honest about it. You could have answered a question now and then, but no.” She waved her hands in the air for effect. “Everything was a great big secret.
Everything
.”

He rolled up his sleeves. “What do you want to know? And make it quick, because my skin is turning to liquid.”

He opened the door for the first time since she’d known him. She sensed a trap and refused to step in it. “Why the big change in attitude?”

“Okay, I’ll start.” He leaned in and lowered his voice out of eavesdropping range. “Are you upset about Mexico?”

“Mexico?”

His dark eyes searched her face for a second before his expression wiped clean again. “Never mind.”

What the hell was he talking about?
“As in the country?”

“Is there a Mexico in Kansas?”

“Being a smartass is not a good move when we are this close to the edge of a big desert where no one would find your body for months, possibly years, after I finished with it.” She was just furious enough to do it.

“Good point.”

“So,” she blew out the anger clogging the back of her throat as she struggled to catch up with his side of the conversation. “Tell me about Mexico.”

“Why?”

She scoffed just to see how he liked it. “How should I know? You’re the one who brought it up.”

“Only because I thought that was the reason you broke off the engagement. It wasn’t, so it’s not relevant.”

Typical
. She kept stacking the information he hid from her on a mental pile. The thing was within inches of toppling over and crushing them both.

“If it’s not Mexico, then I’m thinking you must have found out about my time in jail and got pissed.” He nodded. “I can see where that might be an issue for you.”

“You were in prison?”

“Jail.” He held up a finger. “And I can explain.”

“I somehow doubt you will.”

“Parts of the experience are fuzzy. A little alcohol and a parrot and things got crazy, but—”

“Parrot?”

“No big deal. The charges were dropped before trial.” He reached out and traced a thumb along her chin.

“Unless you want to lose a finger, now is not the time to touch me.” She brushed his hand away. “So, this parrot issue is in addition to the time in prison?”

“Jail.”

“What’s the difference?”

“A trial and a conviction, and I didn’t have either. And, by the way, no harm came to the bird.”

“You didn’t tell me any of this, Noah. You still haven’t, really. We were engaged for two months. You never said a word.”

“That’s what I don’t get. If you didn’t know about this stuff, then how could it matter?”

“Being purposely obtuse is not helping your case.”

She wanted to scream, but the women had edged closer and no longer pretended not to listen in. No need to give them more of a show or make it easier to eavesdrop.

“None of what happened to me before we met means anything to us,” he said as if he actually believed it.

Even if that was true, there was still the problem of the theft of a client’s money and trade secrets. “What about the part where you forgot to tell me you were married?”

The older woman of the two gasped. For some reason the idea of Noah being in prison did not warrant a sound, but news of a wife did.

If Noah heard the noise, he ignored it. “Yeah, you yelled a lot when you found out about Karen.”

“Your wife.”

“Ex.” He smiled at the women he had charmed earlier. “She conveniently forgot to mention the divorce.”

One of the woman treated him to a tsk-tsk sound, then started whispering to her companion.

“The existence of an ex-wife is not one of those things that just slips your mind,” Lexy said.

“You shouldn’t assume that. Karen is a pretty forgettable lady.”

“Not to me.”

“Because you never met her. If you had, you’d see a certain similarity between Karen and jail time.”

“This isn’t funny.” It managed to be the exact opposite of funny as far as Lexy was concerned. Hearing him talk about another woman as his wife—the role Lexy at one time thought she would fill—made her wonder why she traveled to Utah instead of just turning him over to the police and letting them figure out his crimes.

But she knew the answer to why she stayed involved. Despite everything that happened, Lexy wanted to believe in him. To hear a simple and understandable explanation that would amount to something other than a string of nonsense and lies. Seeing him appear in Utah caused hope to flicker to life inside her.

But his words…well, nothing changed that she could see.

“Lexy, listen to me.” Those dark eyes softened in a way guaranteed to crush her defenses against him.

“Don’t call me that.”

He rested his head back against the wall and made a strangled sound. “It’s your name.”

“My name is Alexa.”

“Alexa Annabeth Stuart. We slept together for eighteen months, honey. I took the time to learn your full name.”

“Then use it.”

“Also figured out in the first hour the name didn’t fit you.”

“Meaning?”

“Alexa Annabeth is a stuck-up rich woman’s name.”

“Annabeth happens to be my mother’s name.”

He lifted his eyebrow. “Your point?”

“Sure, it’s not as pretty as your
wife’s
name.” Lexy sneered over the word. “Karen. How lovely.”

“Ex. We’ve been divorced for more than a decade.”

“So you say.”

“Back to your mother.”

“What’s wrong with her?” The dangerous question came out before Lexy could stop it.

“What kind of woman saddles her kids with names like Alexa Annabeth and Grayson Jameson but then calls her dogs George and Martha?”

“Mom wanted the corgis to be patriotic.”

Noah’s jaw dropped. “You know that’s crazy, right?”

Lexy did. Over-the-edge nuts. That described her parents. They were successful to a shocking degree and smart, but that was all to the outside world. In the eyes of those who really knew them well, which was almost no one, they were utterly dysfunctional.

And the whole damn family adored Noah. Her brother Gray turned out to be Noah’s biggest supporter. Gray whined almost daily about her decision to break off the engagement. Tried to talk her out of it about a hundred times. Her dad grumbled about Noah being a man who could handle her. Her mom, well, Noah charmed the woman right out of her expensive designer shoes.

Noah worked hard with Gray and refused to quit even after she dumped him. Since the entire family sided with him, Lexy got stuck with a reputation as an unreasonable outcast. Little did they know she was trying to save their collective butts.

“You know, if you had asked me about any of this before you stormed out, I would have told you. There was no reason to go to limp dick—”