CHAPTER FIFTEEN

By the time John rapped hard on Bliss’s door he was angrier than he had ever been in his life.

The pictures of him and Brooke prominently displayed in the window, the stares and whispers of the women standing around him, didn’t help. Seeing Brooke behind the counter, cool and calmly sipping bottled water, laughing with Lorraine while she had single-handedly screwed up his life sent him over the edge.

A red haze filled his vision. The glass rattled under his knuckles.

Brooke glanced up. The frown beginning to form on her beautiful face was replaced by shock. She slowly lowered the bottle of Evian from her red lips.

That’s right, sweetheart. Time to pay.

Lorraine followed the direction of Brooke’s gaze, said something to her he couldn’t understand, then started for the door. Brooke’s hand on Lorraine’s arm stopped her and she came around the counter instead.

If he hadn’t been so angry he might have given her points for facing him. At the moment all he wanted to do was get his hands on her neck.

“Hi, John. Come to congratulate us on the success of our marketing campaign?” she said sweetly as she opened the door.

“You—”

Ignoring him, she spoke to the women gathered outside the door, “Ladies, as you’ve probably already guessed, this is the man in the picture.” She gave him a thorough once over and John clenched his teeth tighter. “What do you think? Was it the Bliss products or him that put that smile on my face?”

Amid the laughter and suggestive comments that made the tips of his ears burn, John took Brooke’s arm and pulled her inside. “You—”

“We still have an audience,” she said through clenched teeth, her smile never wavering. “We can talk in the back.”

John slanted a look at the women with their noses practically pressed against the glass, and at Lorraine who was warily watching him, and he started toward the back of the store.

“Brooke—”

“Don’t worry, Lorraine, I have a black belt in karate,” she said when she passed as she allowed John to pull her along.

The swinging door closed behind them. John glanced down at her, felt the softness of her skin and scoffed at the idea. Brooke barely came to the middle of his chest. “You have a lot of explaining to do. You told me the photo was going on a Web site.”

“If you think I’m going to discuss anything with you while you’re manhandling me, you’re mistaken.”

John released her arm. He’d forgotten he held it. “Talk.”

Brooke straightened the turned-up collar of her yellow sleeveless blouse while John tried to refrain from shaking her. “The contract you signed gave Bliss use of the photos in any way we saw fit to promote the products. It was in the contract.”

“You know darn well I didn’t read it,” he shot back.

Her eyebrow lifted regally. “As a businessman, you know better than to sign anything you haven’t read first.”

“You conned me.” The fact that she was right only added fuel to his anger. “People at my church are talking about that picture. My parents have even been down here.”

Uncertainty flashed in Brooks eyes. “They have a concern about the pictures?”

“Wouldn’t your parents?”

She glanced away before he could read any emotion in her face. He was about to press another point when he heard a sound that was suspiciously like stifled laughter. He couldn’t believe it. “You think this is funny?”

She stopped laughing, but her mouth twitched. “My father and uncles would probably take you out on my uncle’s fishing boat and use you for bait, but I’ll explain that it’s just business. I’ll be happy to talk to your parents and tell them the same.”

“I don’t want you anywhere near my parents or my children.”

Brooke took an abrupt step back from him, the hurt in her face unmistakable.

Impulsively John reached out for her to apologize and seconds later found himself flat on his back. When the stars cleared he saw her standing over him, her hands braced on her hips. “You’re the nastiest man I’ve ever met and I feel sorry for your parents, and for Mark and Amy that they have to put up with anyone like you.” She stuck her nose in the air. “No man puts his hands on me unless I want them there. Remember that.”

She whirled to leave and he came off the floor in one controlled rush. She might know karate, but he’d been wrestling since he was Mark’s age and he hadn’t always fought fair. An instant after he grabbed Brooke around the waist, the pointed heel of her sandal speared the top of his foot.

She didn’t fight fair either.

It took all of his strength to control her without injuring her or letting her injure him. He finally managed to pin her to the wall with her arms over her head. After she tried to make a eunuch out of him, he stepped between her legs to protect himself. It was the wrong move to make.

He knew it.

From her sudden intake of breath, she knew it.

He stared down at her. Her warm breath fluttered across his mouth with each breath, and each time her lush breasts stroked his chest. There was nothing he could do to prevent his arousal or her from feeling it. He might have been able to extricate himself if her gaze hadn’t gone to his mouth. He lost it.

His mouth crashed over hers. She met him with the same fierce desire. She was fire and passion in his arms, burning him up and he was gladly consumed. His tongue mated with hers in the boldly erotic way he wanted his body to mate with hers. He greedily searched her mouth’s sweetness as his hands boldly roamed over the soft curves of her body.

He’d die if he didn’t touch her skin. His hand slipped under her blouse. He moaned when his hand closed over her lush breast. It lovingly filled his hand and emptied his mind. He had to taste. His head bent.

“Brooke?”

Claire’s hesitant voice was like a bucket of cold water. Still, it took long seconds for him to control the wild hunger racing through him. He stared down at Brooke. Her eyes were closed and he didn’t know if it was from embarrassment or if she was still fighting the need clawing through her.

“She’ll be out in a minute.”

“John, I—”

“Please. Claire.”

He heard the louvered door swing shut, then took a deep, shuddering breath and straightened. He groaned on seeing Brooke’s blouse hitched up over her tempting breast in a flimsy piece of cloth imitating a bra. Swallowing, he reached out and slowly covered up the temptation with hands that refused to stop trembling.

Why should they? She had almost blown the top of his head off. If he ever got inside her … He stepped back from the lure of her body.

John knew he should just leave, but somehow he couldn’t. She looked vulnerable with her eyes closed, her hands clenched at her sides. He didn’t manhandle women.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for this to happen.” He rubbed his hand over his head. “I’m not sure how it happened.”

Slowly her eyes opened. Passion still shimmered in their depths. “I think it best if we don’t see each other again.”

She had drawn first blood again.

“Fine by me.”

Picking up his baseball cap from the floor, John plopped it on his head and strode out. Claire and Lorraine stood just outside the door. He didn’t know quite how to excuse his bad behavior. “I didn’t mean for that to happen. I’m sorry.” He left, knowing he was going to be a lot sorrier if he ever saw Brooke again.

She was nothing like the women he was used to, and he had never wanted any of them the way he wanted her.

Bad. Very bad.

The moment John left, Claire and Lorraine hurried into the back. Brooke was on the floor, her arms wrapped around her updrawn knees. The two women knelt in front of her.

“Are you all right?” Lorraine asked gently.

“I wouldn’t have come in, but Lorraine said he was angry and we heard the noise,” Claire said. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”

Brooke finally lifted her head and leaned it against the wall. “I’m a disgrace to the partnership.”

“Nonsense,” Lorraine said. “You’re two attractive, single people.”

“All you did was kiss him,” Claire soothed.

“And proved without a shadow of doubt that our products might be good, but they can’t make my body burn the way John just did. And I could just kill him for that.”

*   *   *

The Livingston distribution plant in Columbia was a little over an hour and a half drive from Charleston. Gray had planned the inspection for next week, but Claire had changed his mind. His fingers tapped on the steering wheel as the Porsche ate up the road.

Claire had changed his mind about a lot of things. Her innocence, her vulnerability, her sense of fair play drew him to her. He enjoyed being with her. Seeing her made him forget to be cautious. He liked seeing those tell-tale blushes on her beautiful face.

She was beautiful, not pretty as he’d always thought. That beauty came from within as much as it did without. And he’d bet his portfolio that she had never been intimate with a man.

So where did that leave them? He could control his zipper, but he had healthy desires.

Flicking on the turn signal he pulled onto Gordon Livingston Drive, named after his grandfather. Buying up the ten-acre tract for the second distribution center and making sure he had room for expansion allowed him certain privileges.

His grandfather had blustered about the name, but Gray had seen the shine of tears in his eyes. On the other hand, his grandmother had wanted to know why her street, Corrine Boulevard, was in the back since she was the one who actually sold the products when he’d been stationed in Korea. Gray had explained to her that her street would wind through the entire complex and link everything one day, just as she was the link that held the family together. She’d asked for his handkerchief to blot her own teary eyes.

The guard on duty stepped out of the white gatehouse even before Gray rolled to a stop in front of the double white steel bars. No one was going to crash through his gate.

“Good evening, Mr. Livingston. Good to see you again.”

“Good evening, Cecil.” Accepting the clipboard, he signed himself in. He never made exception for himself or his family. He handed the clipboard back. “Everything all right with security?”

“Yes, sir, and the loads are moving in and out on schedule. No vandalism.”

“Good. Please call ahead and have Peters meet me at the loading dock. Tell him to be prepared for a full inspection.”

“Yes, sir.”

The gates swung open and he cruised through. For the time being, he’d have to put thoughts of Claire on hold. All fifteen of the loading dock spaces had an eighteen-wheeler parked in front. He bounded up the steel steps leading inside the first of two warehouses.

“Thinking about getting on the road again, Gray?”

“Hello, Carl,” he said as the brawny figure of his old friend approached. Carl Sanders was six feet of solid muscles and had hands the size of dinner plates.

“I’m leaving in thirty, heading down to Jacksonville. Remember those good times we had?”

“Good and wild,” Gray said with a wry twist of his mouth. Carl could outdrink, outcurse, and outfight any man who had the misfortune to cross him. “I thought grandmother was going to have granddad fire you and scrub my mouth when I came back from that trip to Texas, chewing tobacco, when I was sixteen.”

“Made a man out of you.” Carl moved a wad of tobacco from one cheek to the other.

Gray stuck out his hand to greet the best driver Livingston employed. His safety and delivery record attested to that. Gray, Sanders’s wife and his adult children had long since given up trying to get him to kick the chewing habit. His comeback was that he had to die of something. “Good to see you.”

Carl nodded toward Gray’s knit shirt, softly washed jeans and loafers. “Gotta say you look better out of those fancy suits you’ve been wearing since they made a big shot out of you.”

Gray slid four fingers into the front pocket of the jeans he’d had to scrounge in his closet to find. “I plan to do a full inspection of the plant.”

Carl eyed his boss. “You could walk though a pile of manure and come out squeaky clean and smelling like a rose, just like your grandmother. Pull the other leg.”

“I do believe you’re insinuating your boss is not telling the truth.”

Carl shook his dark head and smiled. “You don’t have to lie. You’re good enough at twisting the truth and leaving out to make lying unnecessary and not as much fun.”

Gray folded his arms across his broad chest. “I think you’ve just insulted me.”

“And I think you were hiding something, and I want to know what her name is?”

Gray’s expression didn’t change. Out of the corner of his eye Gray saw the plant supervisor hurrying toward them. “You better hide yourself. Peters is bearing down on us and if I’m not mistaken, no type of tobacco is to be consumed on the premises. I signed the memo myself.”

“Damn. Later.”

“Later,” Gray said with a smile. What good were rules if you couldn’t bend them once in a while for a friend? he thought as he greeted the plant supervisor. The thing that bothered him was, how had Carl known there was a woman involved?

*   *   *

Hamilton had known this would happen.

“Hamilton, sweetheart, I won’t be home until around ten tonight. I can’t wait to tell you how fabulously the day went.”

His finger jabbed the delete button on the answering machine. Lorraine knew how he hated coming home to an empty house. Before she had the crazy idea of opening a shop, she had kept those times to a minimum. Now, that had changed.

He glanced at his diamond encrusted Rolex. Six-thirteen. Setting his attaché case on the granite counter he went in search of the food Lorraine always left on those rare occasions she would be gone when he arrived. The refrigerator was well stocked, but there was nothing with a note attached with heating instructions. Closing the door, he stalked to the phone and jabbed in her cell number.

“Hello, Hamilton. Can you hold on a minute?”

She’d sounded breathless. Why was she breathless? His hand gripped the phone tighter. Lorraine was too honest to even think about having an affair. But he’d also thought she was thoroughly happy and satisfied in their marriage.

“Sorry, it’s been hectic here.”

“Where are you? Why aren’t you home?”

“I’m at the store,” she told him. “We decided to put the Web site address in the window since there’s been so much attention for the window display. We’re already getting hits. Claire is setting up a chat for Friday night to discuss the products. Isn’t this wonderful?”

“I want you to come home immediately.” There was a long silence. “Lorraine, did you hear me?”

“Hamilton, the other night … I thought you understood.”

“It’s you who doesn’t understand,” he told her, refusing to be swayed by the memory of her beneath him, loving him so sweetly, so completely. “Your place is here at home with me.”

“The products—”

“I do not want to hear about some idiotic marketing plan that claims to be better than sex or some soap that lathers better than the rest. All I want to know is when you’re coming home.”

There was an unnerving moment of silence, then, “With that attitude I may not come home at all.”

A frisson of fear raced through him. He forced himself to relax. “Lorraine, don’t be silly. Just come home.”

“To think I was considering bringing home Peach Meringue tonight.”

He thought he heard her voice hitch, but couldn’t be sure. At least she hadn’t forgotten about his dinner. “Thanks for thinking of bringing home dessert, but there’s nothing else. Stop somewhere for takeout.”

“Hamilton.”

He was sure she was going to ask for forgiveness. Lorraine had always been sensible, if a bit stubborn. He was prepared to be magnanimous in his victory. “Yes?”

“Don’t hold your breath.” The phone disconnected.

Hamilton leaned heavily against the cabinet, the receiver still in his hand. As soon as the bookstore opened tomorrow he was going to pick up a couple of books on menopause. He wife was definitely going through a change.

*   *   *

“I guess I won’t need this after all.” Lorraine removed the jar of Peach Meringue whipped body cream from her oversized bag and placed it back on the shelf.

“Is there anything we can do?” Claire asked, turning from the computer screen in the back room.

“You name it and it’s done,” Brooke said, concerned as well.

Lorraine shook her head. “I feel so stupid after all the talking I did today. Our night meant nothing to him.”

“It’s a sad fact, but men think with their gonads and women with their hearts,” Brooke said philosophically. She glanced at Claire. “Perhaps you should have canceled your date with Gray. You’re already worried that he didn’t ask you out again.”

“I think I’d rather live life than be afraid of it,” Claire told her. “If he doesn’t ask, I’m considering asking him.”

Brooke bumped her shoulder against Claire’s. “Lorraine, I think we’ve created a monster.”

“I agree with Claire. Hamilton may be acting like a total ass, but I love him and refuse to regret that love although I’m very angry with him at the moment.” Lorraine folded her arms. “When I mentioned the Peach Meringue he thought I was talking about dessert and asked me to bring takeout.”

“Typical,” Brooke made a face.

“What are you going to do?” Claire asked.

Lorraine unfolded her arms. “Teach Hamilton a lesson. I won’t be treated like an imbecile, and he can’t run my life.” She picked up the jar she had just placed on the shelf. “I’m taking the Peach Meringue home after all and I plan to rub it all over my body in full view of my husband, then go to sleep. Alone.”

Brooke nodded with approval. “Dirty, but effective.”

“You’re sure you want to do that?” Claire asked, a thoughtful expression on her face.

“Yes, and I’m not going to let you talk me out of it.”

Claire leaned back in her chair. “On the contrary, I was going to suggest you take the bath and body gel and the soap as well. When Hamilton goes in the bathroom in the morning faint traces of the fragrance will linger through the night. He’ll remember and regret.”

Brooke whooped. “You might be a later bloomer, but you learn fast.”

Claire smiled. “I’m trying.”