Claude pounced the minute Maxie came to work.
“So, what did Beauregard the Bull want last night?”
“Beauregard the Bull?”
Maxie turned quickly to the chore of making coffee. She was stalling and Claude knew it, but she didn’t care. She preferred not to think about what had happened the previous night.
“You know who I’m talking about. He’s a clever devil. If it hadn’t been for my silk shirt, I’d never have left you alone with him. Never.” Claude set the cups inside the saucers. “What happened after I left?”
“Nothing much.”
It was nothing much if you were the kind who called a hurricane just a little wind. Maxie still felt flushed as well as confused.
“I can take a hint.” Claude huffed to the other side of the room with his coffee, leaving Maxie’s on the counter. “If you didn’t want to tell me, why didn’t you just say so in the first place.”
Maxie dumped her untouched coffee and put her arm around Claude’s shoulder.
“We didn’t dance, Claude.”
“What else didn’t you do?”
Maxie was saved by the bell. Literally. The chimes over her door tinkled, and in walked Mrs. Elmore Prescott, the most demanding woman in Tupelo. Claude was at her side instantly, turning on the charm while Maxie mentally geared herself for a long day.
“My house is a disaster. An absolute disaster. I’m so tired of yellow, I could scream.” Mrs. Prescott pressed her hand over her breast, her diamonds flashing in the morning sun.
Last year, yellow had been Mrs. Prescott’s favorite color. She’d wanted it in her bedroom, her bath, her sun room, and the kitchen. Maxie had tried to steer her in another direction, but she’d insisted.
Maxie led her to the sofa.
“Sit down, Mrs. Prescott. Can I get you a cup of coffee?”
“No sugar. I’m dieting.” She took a sip, then made a face and added three teaspoons of sugar. “I can’t stand my house another minute. You’ve got to do something, Maxie. Today.”
Reprieve, Maxie thought. She’d be so busy at Mrs. Prescott’s, she wouldn’t have a single minute to think about the previous night.
o0o
Joseph’s secretary stood in the doorway. Even after a ten-hour day she was still perfectly groomed, every hair in place, every thread on her body starched and pressed.
“Is that all for today, Joseph?”
“That’s all, Jenny.”
“What about this six o’clock appointment?” Jenny consulted her notes. “Maxie Corban?”
Joseph felt the heat rise under his collar. Could Jenny read his face? She’d been his secretary for sixteen years. Sometimes he thought she knew him better than his mother did. He resisted the urge to leap from his chair and stand with his back to her.
“I won’t need notes on that meeting. It’s personal.”
Jenny would never comment on his personal life unless he asked, but she couldn’t contain her look of surprise.
“She’s Joe’s other godparent,” he explained. “We’re planning the baby’s party.”
“A bachelor party?” Jenny quipped.
“Sort of. If baby Joe’s anything like my brother, he’ll be throwing his own by the time he’s two.”
Jenny closed her steno pad. “Have a good evening, Joseph.”
“You, too, Jenny.”
The hands on the clock said five forty-five. Fifteen minutes till Maxie showed up, fifteen minutes to wish he had suggested breakfast or lunch or even dinner. Something in a public place. Anything, anywhere except in the privacy of his office.
He must have been insane to ask her to come there after hours. Maybe if he stayed behind his desk, nothing would happen. Maybe if he kept one hand on a pen and the other on a notepad, he could stay out of trouble.
He glanced at his watch. Ten more minutes. An eternity to think about what had happened the night before and why. And exactly what he was going to do about it.
o0o
When Maxie faced a difficult task, she dressed fit to kill. For her visit to Joseph’s office she’d put on a black spandex miniskirt and red silk blouse, then picked her sexiest, most revealing undergarments, the ones she’d just purchased. Not that she planned on anybody seeing them. Feminine underwear made her feel powerful and self-confident. B. J. had once told Maxie that she spent enough money at Victoria’s Secret to add a wing to her small house on Maxwell Street.
Maxie had staunchly defended her purchases. “Red lace is my secret weapon,” she’d said.
Driving toward Joseph’s office, she regretted her secret weapon. When she was stressed, lace made her itch. Left too long against her skin, it caused hives.
She turned the air conditioner on high, hoping the blast of arctic air would cool her itch, but a block later, she knew it was hopeless. Sighing, she pulled into a service station on the corner.
Minutes later she was at Joseph’s office, itchless and devoid of motives, as well as a few essentials.
His nameplate was on the door, engraved in gold. Joseph Patrick Beauregard, Attorney at Law.
Maxie pressed her hand over her stomach. Butterflies. She hadn’t had them since she’d played the role of Daisy Mae in her high school production of Li’l Abner.
What role was she playing now? she wondered.
Maxie Corban, godmother? Maxie Corban, sister? Maxie Corban, sister-in-law? Maxie Corban, party planner extraordinaire? Maxie Corban, vamp?
That was certainly the role she’d played in her house the previous night. Shameless hussy. Wicked seductress.
It had all started as a game. She’d never meant to do anything except scare Joseph off, and maybe pay him back for standing in the doorway watching her have telephone sex.
That’s how it had started when she’d run her hands over his chest. Her motives had begun to get hazy when she’d trailed her fingertips across his groin. And when he’d kissed her, all reason had vanished.
And after that... She leaned against the door, remembering....
“This is not about dancing,” he said. “It’s about sex.”
They watched each other, breathless, suspended. She didn’t know who made the first move, but suddenly she was in his arms, in his lap, her arms and legs wrapped around him, lips melded on his, making soft kittenish sounds of pleasure as his hands roamed all over her.
Nothing in her past had prepared her for the passion she felt, the need to consume and be consumed. She’d kissed her share of men, certainly. But she’d always been in charge. She’d always been the one to draw the line.
In Joseph’s arms she didn’t know a line from a circle. What was more, she didn’t care. All she knew was that he held her spellbound. She forgot every vow she’d made to herself about not being the ruination of Joseph Patrick Beauregard.
He pulled her tank top out from the waistband of her shorts and slid his hands underneath, and she didn’t make a sound of protest, not even a whimper.
“That feels glorious. Ohhh, I want more.”
His eyes were dark and mysterious, glowing as if candles were lit deep inside them.
“More?” he whispered.
“Yes. I want...” Her body hummed. She hardly knew what she wanted, only that Joseph was the one who could provide it.
He raked her tank top off her shoulders and crumpled it around her waist. His breath was hot, his tongue delicious, his mouth heavenly. Clinging to him, she arched her back, giving him easy access. She was liquid fire, burning, melting.
“Oh yes,” she said.
“You like that, don’t you?”
“I love that... I want more.”
He lowered her to the sofa. The cushions were soft, Joseph, hard. And oh so right. So very right.
There was magic in his touch, the kind of magic that set off skyrockets and caused stars to fall. All reason vanished. Maxie encouraged him with eyes and lips and hands, with soft murmurings and whisper-light caresses and kisses as gentle as a melting snowflake.
She was melting, exploding. She reached for his zipper, he reached for hers. Suddenly his whole body went rigid.
“My God,” he whispered. “Susan.”
He pulled back, leaving her bereft and hungry. And furious.
“The name is Maxie.”
She shoved him off and reached for her clothes.
“Here, let me.” He tried to help, but she slapped his hands away and retreated to the opposite side of the room.
“Leave,” she said.
“Not yet. Not till I do what I came for.”
“I think you’ve already done enough.”
“I came to apologize.”
“You call that an apology?”
“I didn’t mean for that to happen.”
Neither had she, but she wasn’t about to tell him so. That would be admitting that she’d been totally out of control.
“Well, it did,” she said. “Fortunately, I stopped it before it had gone too far.”
He didn’t contradict her. If he had, she’d have bashed the lemonade tray over his head.
“I have a fiancee. Her name is Susan.”
He’d unbuttoned his shirt—or had she?—and he sat on the sofa with a great deal of naked chest showing, all of it gorgeous. She wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction of looking away. Let him think the sight of all that muscle and crisp dark hair didn’t tempt her.
“I don’t care if her name is Mergatroid. Just leave.”
“Not until I do what I came for.”
“Good grief. You are the most stubborn man I’ve ever known.”
“Probably.”
At last he fastened his shirt. She noted with some satisfaction that his hands shook. Not much, but enough to tell her that Joseph Patrick Beauregard wasn’t completely unmoved by that near-heavenly experience on her sofa.
Suddenly she realized she was hovering on the far side of the room in a cowardly fashion. As if she were the one to blame. Bent on revenge she stalked across the room.
Nothing is more dangerous than a woman spurned. She plopped down beside him. Close. So close her left leg smashed up against his right thigh.
A bead of sweat popped out along his upper lip. She took note with wicked glee.
“So, Joseph...” She ran her hands lightly along his thigh, and was rewarded with another bead of sweat, this one sliding down his cheek. “What kind of apology do you have in mind this time?” She leaned in close, deliberately brushing her breast against his upper arm. “Something kinky?”
He didn’t shift away. She would have to give him that. As a matter of fact, he reached for her hand. Since she’d been the one to so brazenly demand all this touching, there was no way she could pull out of his grasp.
“Nothing kinky. Though the idea does have merit.”
His smile was somewhat lopsided and totally disarming. Good grief, how many facets did this man have? And why did she find every one of them charming?
He held her hand lightly, as if it were a baby bird nesting in his palm.
“Maxie, I came here tonight to apologize for what happened nine months ago. I never meant to stand in the doorway watching you. It just happened. And I’m sorry. I invaded your privacy, and for that I apologize.”
She felt foolishly close to tears. “Apology accepted,” she said, clearing her throat.
“As for tonight...”
His thumb circled her palm, sending tingles along her spine. If he apologized for what happened on her sofa, she would cry. That’s all there was to it. She would burst into tears in her own living room, and once she got on a crying jag she was like her sister: She had a hard time stopping. It would be messier than floodwaters from the Nile.
“I can neither explain nor apologize. All I can do is assure you that it wasn’t planned... and it won’t happen again.”
It won’t happen again.
With his parting words echoing in her mind, Maxie traced the cool lettering on his nameplate.
“You’re right, Joseph Beauregard. It won’t happen again.”
Taking a deep breath, she pushed open the door and stepped inside his office.