Really Something (16 page)

Allie cast a sharp glance in Duncan's direction. Of course he would stick up for Lisa, out of all the women in Tempest. “That's no excuse for the way she talked about that woman.”

“True. But sometimes, Lisa doesn't think before she opens her mouth. She's had it rough, and sometimes that roughness comes out in the way she treats people.” He cocked his head, studied Allie. “That was really nice of you, to offer her a role.”

“Nice?” Allie opened her mouth, closed it. She hadn't expected Duncan to think she'd taken the high road with Lisa. “Oh, yeah, that's me. Just being nice.”

Right. Wait till he sees what “role” Lisa gets.

One side of his mouth curved upward and his study of her intensified. “What are you hiding, Allie Dean?”

“Me? Nothing.”
Everything.
As he continued his perusal, her heart began to race again, thundering in her ears. Lisa forgotten, the entire diner forgotten, her attention so easily again riveted on him.

The grin swung across his entire face. “Good. Then you wouldn't mind a little Truth or Dare?”

She arched a brow. “Truth or dare?”

“I'm sure they played that, even in California.”

“Of course.”

“Then play. With me. Now.”

“Now? Here?”

The grin widened into a tease. “Unless you're too chicken?”

“Not at all.” Her chin jutted up, ready to meet any challenge he laid out.

“So, what'll it be? Truth? Or dare?”

Definitely not truth. “Dare.”

He thought a minute. “I dare you to touch me. Under the table.”

She moved her foot, bumping against his. “Done.”

“Not there,” Duncan said, his voice low and dark.

Everything within Allie melted, going from warm to white-hot in an instant. All she knew, all she saw, all she heard was Duncan Henry.

And those two very tiny, very sexy words.

The short vinyl tablecloth hung about twelve inches off the side of the table. Around them, the blur of activity still filled Margie's, the perfect cover. Servers rushed between tables, filling glasses, taking orders, dispensing salads that were more lettuce than substance. Few spared more than a glance in the direction of Duncan and Allie.

Duncan watched her, his eyes dark. Allie met his gaze, the pool of desire spreading through her. She kicked off one Prada heel and tiptoed her foot up his trouser leg, inch after inch, until she met the hard resistance of his zipper—and the erection beneath it. She rubbed her toes over it, watching as his eyes grew rounder, darker, then dropped her foot back into her shoe.

“Maybe we should…ah…” Duncan said, “find another game to play.”

“Not until I get my turn to ask you. Which will it be?” she asked, her voice husky, her pulse thundering in her ears. “Truth? Or dare?”

“Depends. Do you want to ask me a question? Or do you want me to touch you?” He arched a brow.

Oh, she wanted him to touch her. Very, very much. But she also wanted to know the man. The only way to defeat an enemy, she'd once read in a history class, was to know him intimately.

And that was one lesson Allie was more than willing to learn with Duncan. But not yet. A little truth, she decided, would be a better choice. It might help quell the riot of heat in her gut, take her hormones from the red zone back into something safer.

“Have you ever been in love?” she asked.

Something flickered in his eyes, like a shade being pulled back, allowing a peek inside, nothing more. “Once. A long time ago. And I never even told her.”

“Why not? What happened?”

“You only get one question, remember?” His smile, though, had dimmed a bit. Curiosity burned in Allie. Who was she? An ex-wife? Ex-lover? Allie rifled through her high school memories, but couldn't come up with any one woman that Duncan had dated long enough to fall in love.

Of course, she'd been gone for seven years. He could have met someone in college, or when he returned to Indiana. He could have fallen in and out of love while she'd been in California, changing her body, her life, and trying to put him out of her mind.

She shouldn't care. And yet she did.

“My turn to ask you again,” Duncan said. “Truth or dare?”

“Dare.”

“Are you avoiding truth?”

“I would think a guy like you would appreciate a girl who prefers dares.”

“A guy like me, huh? And what kind of guy is that?”

“The kind that doesn't want strings, regardless of what you said the other day in the garden.”

“A real love 'em and leave 'em type?”

“More the ‘let the woman love me and then leave her' kind.” She heard the bitterness that tinted her words and drew back. He'd surprised her with his earlier answer about being in love once before, and some of that surprise had bled into her words. It had upset her carefully constructed emotional apple cart, and she needed to get it righted. Fast. Before she again let too much slip. “Of course, I don't have any firsthand knowledge—”
liar, liar
“—but that's what I've heard people say around here.”

He grinned. “So you've been asking people about me?”

“Trust me, every two-X chromosome human in Tempest is talking about you. No need to ask.”

“Even this one?”

She raised her chin. “I'm immune to you.”

“Is that why you kissed me?”

“I can kiss you without falling in love.”

“So that's your plan? Love me and leave me, is that it?”

She grinned, as though that was a big huge joke, to keep him from realizing how close he'd come to the truth. How cold it sounded, coming out of his mouth. How…awful. “Exactly.”

“Well then, Allie Dean, that's my dare.”

“What is?”

“Make love to me.” He'd lowered his voice, and the words seemed to skate across the table, heavy, full of promise. “Now. Tonight.”

“Here?” The word came out with a squeak.

He laughed. “No, not here. But somewhere.”

“Don't tell me.” She tapped a finger on her chin, feigning deep thought. “Lovers' Hill.”

He arched a brow. “How do you know about that?”

Another slipup that pointed to her as an innie, not one of Earl's dreaded outies. “I've been looking for teens to play extras. And you know teenagers. They like to talk.”

He seemed to buy that because he nodded and went on, still teasing her, still sexy as all heck. “I was thinking of something a little more comfortable than the front seat of my Miata. Or the back seat of your Taurus.”

She laughed. Anticipation rushed through her at breakneck speed. How long had she dreamed of making love to Duncan Henry? All her life.

And an extra ten thousand times since that moment in the farmhouse.

He may be all wrong for her in a hundred different ways and she may not have any intentions of anything beyond right now, but that didn't mean she couldn't have one night, did it?

This night. This moment.

Then tomorrow, she could forget it all. Move on.

Right?

Allie accepted the check from the waitress and went to lay a bill on it, but Duncan beat her to it and grabbed up the slim paper.

“I have a hotel room.” And as she said the words she knew there'd never really been any doubt that eventually it would have come to this. Even as the sensible part of her whispered that while this might fit in so well with her plan—and what could it hurt to spend just one night with him?—her heart might be a casualty in the end. “And it's not too far from here, but far enough that—”

“No one in Tempest will see my car or yours and put two and two together.”

“Exactly.”

He grinned. “Probably not a good idea to rent a room at Hildie's B&B then?”

She laughed again. “No. Besides, by this time, the maid has already turned down my covers.”

“A real time-saver.” He threw a twenty on the table, way overpaying for the inexpensive meal, and put out his hand. “Let's go.”

“So who won?” she asked as they left Margie's.

He leaned down, nuzzling his mouth against her neck. His breath, his voice, were warm on her ear. At this rate, they might not make it to the hotel. “Right now, I'd say it's a draw. Let's have the tiebreaker—in bed.”

She took one look at Duncan and doubted there'd be any need for Joe Swanson's special milk-of-magnesia shake tonight.

The car engine clicked, cooling in its parking space, but Duncan and Allie had already started a heated race up to the room. As the miles between Tempest and Indianapolis had passed, the tension between them had ratcheted up, as if the distance from Duncan's reality gave him license to enjoy the very real fantasy sitting beside him.

Not to mention the little tease provided by her foot back in the diner. It had taken three mental recitations of “The Star-Spangled Banner” before he'd been able to walk out of Margie's.

He may have told her he wanted a one-night stand, but he'd left out the truth part. There was more between them than one night. Duncan felt it. And he intended to prove to Allie Dean that she wouldn't be able to walk away after one night.

Or, at least, he thought that was his plan. Because right now, with her against him and his libido in charge, he wasn't thinking much beyond small words like Allie, bed, and sex.

“I can't find the key,” Allie said, her voice breathless, lost somewhere in her throat.

“We'll just break in then,” Duncan murmured along her lips, ready to throw one of the stone-encrusted ashtrays through the glass door if need be.

“You might consider pausing”—at that she did a pause of her own and returned the kiss, with one as fiery as his—“so that I can dig in my purse.”

“I would, if you'd quit”—and he did the same, right back at her, tangoing his tongue with hers, dancing along the delicate ridges of her mouth, tasting the after-dinner coffee she'd managed only a few sips of before they'd decided to skip dessert and head for the hotel—“teasing me.”

“Jackpot,” Allie said, producing a key, fumbling it between them to slip it into the door, doing so blindly while her mouth stayed busy with his, their hands crossing paths when the buzzer sounded, and they shoved on the handle, nearly falling inside the hotel, stumbling onto the carpet in a laughing tangle of arms and legs and caresses.

“Don't tell me you're on the top floor,” he said.

Her eyes shone with anticipation and she trailed a hand down his chest, her touch lingering on his swollen erection. “Think how much fun we can have in the elevator.”

But that wasn't to be. An elderly couple shared the ride with them, frowning disapproval at their disheveled clothes, swollen lips, teasing glances. “Some people,” the woman whispered under her breath.

“Get a room,” the old man said when Duncan tasted Allie's neck between the second and third floors.

The elevator dinged at the top floor. “We did,” Duncan said, then gave the couple a wave and tugged Allie off with him.

This time, Allie had her card ready. Within seconds they were in the room, Allie against the wall, Duncan's hands ranging over her body, shifting her skirt upward, the silky fabric riding over her body like water over a cliff.

He reached over her head for the light switch, but she stopped him. “I like the dark.”

“I want to see you,” he said, his voice nearly a growl, the desire beating hard and fast in his veins. It had been a long, long time and this woman, this stranger, really, had awakened feelings in him that he'd thought were dead.

She let go and light flooded the room. “Better?”

“Perfect,” Duncan said. He captured her jaw in his hands and drew her face to his, placing a kiss against her lips. He took a moment to savor the kiss, to savor her, this moment, because he knew in ten seconds, everything would turn to fire.

And before it did, he wanted to preserve one sweet moment in his memory. “Thank you,” he whispered.

She smiled. “For what?”

There weren't words to express what he wanted to thank Allie for. For giving him back his life. For making him believe, if only for tonight, that he had a future waiting for him down the road, a day when the responsibilities would lessen and he could live a normal life. “Just thank you.”

Her smile widened, then she dipped her head, raising his shirt to allow her access to kiss his chest, slipping it off an inch at a time as she did. He had to resist the urge to tear off his clothes—and hers—to hold back from racing to the finish line. To hell with savoring, his body said, just get to the point.

But no, this was oh so good,
she
was good. So he stood there, letting Allie touch him, kiss him, waiting for a few minutes while she took over the driver's seat.

Allie stepped back and pulled off her own shirt, revealing a white lacy bra. He felt his groin stiffen even more—he hadn't thought he could get any harder than he was, but he did, and then again even more when he couldn't wait any longer and joined the party, his hands cupping her breasts. He ran his thumbs over her nipples, nearly dying when she let out a gasp of ecstasy.

His mouth joined hers again, no more sweet kisses this time, instead a hard, hot kiss that told her exactly where he wanted to go next.

“Patience, Duncan,” Allie whispered, pulling back and out of his grasp. She bent down to remove his pants. Then his boxers. She trailed her kisses down his torso, and Duncan inhaled sharply with anticipation.

“I think”—But then Allie went down on him and Duncan decided thinking during sex was highly overrated.

 

Duncan Henry didn't just make love to Allie Dean. He played a waltz on her body. By the time they made it to the bed, he had given back even better than she had and stoked the fires of her desire with every available body part. His tongue, his mouth, his fingers.

Yet with every step closer to the bed, her brain was yelling at her, telling her this was a crazy idea. That there was a very real danger of falling for Duncan Henry again.

And in the end, being the one who loved and then ended up being left. Again.

But when the last piece of clothing between them was gone, and they fell into the bed, twining and untwining their bodies, still kissing and touching, she forgot exactly why making love to Duncan was a bad idea. Allie slid against him on the bed, warm skin to warm skin, fitting into the valleys of his body with the perfection of just the right puzzle piece. Wanting only to feel him inside her before she died with want. “Did you…come prepared?”

She could swear his face reddened. “It's, ah, been a long time. I don't think I have anything with me.”

For some reason, that thought thrilled her. Duncan wasn't running around town with woman after woman on his arm or in his bed. He didn't have a whole box of Trojans waiting in his back pocket. In fact, he didn't even have
one
.

“I stopped at the store.” She had indeed done that, after the day at the farmhouse, considering the purchase part of her whole love-him-and-leave-him plan. For a second, she wondered where that plan had gone.

Because right now, leaving didn't sound like such a great idea.

Especially given the way her heart had tangled with her desire, sending all her best intentions by the wayside. Allie shook off the thoughts. Afterward, she'd deal with her emotions. For now, there was Duncan—a very naked Duncan—and a few needs of her own to fulfill. Allie leaned over, her breasts brushing against his chest, the sensation against her nipples nearly enough to send her over the edge, pulled open the nightstand drawer, and withdrew a condom, then took her time sliding it on him, enjoying his groan of anticipation.

She watched him, his blue eyes intent on hers, her heart beating so loud and fast, and every muscle in her body so taut, she was sure she'd break if she didn't find release.

“I think you've waited long enough,” Duncan said, as if he'd read her mind, sliding his arm around her waist, flipping her as easily as a pancake, then slipping his body between her legs. She inhaled a sharp, deep breath when he entered her, arching her back, accepting his length, the way he filled her so easily, so completely. Oh God, yes, it was everything and much, much more than what she could have imagined.

“Allie,” he murmured into her hair, his strokes long and slow at first, the tempo easy and sweet, then, the heat between them building again and her nails dug into his back. One of them—maybe both at once—began to stroke harder, her hands gripping at his ass, wanting it faster, harder. Just wanting him, more of him. Wanting him now.

“Oh, Allie,” he moaned in her ear, pumping harder, a little rough, but not so that he hurt her, his speed arcing her orgasm up with electrical bursts.

She called out his name, then bucked with him, stars exploding somewhere in her head, as the world disappeared for one long, slow, hot second in Duncan Henry's arms.

Everything she could have imagined—and more. And try as she might to have kept her heart above the fray, she knew it had gotten swept up, too.

“I think,” Allie said when she could breathe again, when her pulse had settled, “that we're going to have to do that a second time. It's been a while for me, too. And I think I need a refresher course.”

He grinned and pressed a kiss to the tender valley where her shoulder met her throat. Something melted in Allie then, something that told her she wasn't going to be able to walk away from him so easily.

Her plan had a major hole in it, and she could feel it, in the lingering tenderness of his kiss.

“Good thing you have a ready and willing tutor.” Duncan peeked past her into the still-open drawer, then returned his gaze to her face, his grin half tease, half tenderness. “And a lot of supplies.”