Hard To Tame

Once Celeste was ensconced in the back seat, she looked up at Sara. “I’d like to repay you for your kindness. Would you care to accompany me home for tea?”

The invitation took Sara aback. “I…I’d better not. I have to get back to work soon.”

Celeste waved a hand and the driver went around to the other side of the car, opening the passenger door. “I’ll have Benjamin drive you when you have to go. Please don’t waste time arguing, dear. I make it a point to get my own way. It’s one of the few pleasures left to me.”

Studying the woman, Sara noted the flush in her cheeks, which couldn’t be blamed on the heat. They’d merely exchanged one air-conditioned environment for another. No doubt Celeste had a full staff and a family at home to see to her health. But Sara still felt compelled to accept, if only to see her home safely. There was little risk. Surely this sweet, frail woman wouldn’t lead her to danger.

So she engaged in uncharacteristic small talk with the woman as the car made its way across town. After several minutes it turned off the street through an open gate and up a long winding driveway.

Sara fell silent in something approaching awe. The sprawling, ancient mansion was white, with small dormers marching along the roofline proclaiming its French architecture. She could almost imagine the centuries falling away to reveal hoopskirted ladies and gentlemen in cutaway coats sipping mint juleps on the wide veranda.

“Impressive, is it not?” Celeste said as the car drew to a stop before the house. “It was built by my ancestor Claude in 1722 for his wife, Pauline Fontenot.” Simple pride rang in the woman’s voice as she was helped from the car by the driver. Sara rounded the vehicle, and Celeste set her hand lightly on her arm as they climbed the steps. “Claude brought his young bride to New Orleans, after it was settled for King Louis XV. This house was damaged by the fire in 1794, but my great-great-grandfather, Jean-Paul, presided over the restoration himself, and made sure the structure was duplicated exactly, rather than allowing the Spanish style of architecture to influence the rebuilding. My grandson is the ninth generation to live here, although—” she made a moue of disappointment “—he doesn’t spend nearly enough time here.”

The long lineage the woman cited was difficult for Sara to comprehend. She hadn’t known her own grandparents. Family hadn’t meant a whole lot to her mother. Janie Parker had been most concerned with good times and handsome, fast-talking men. She’d made it her business to fill her life with both.

When they reached the huge, double front doors, Celeste showed Sara inside to a graceful tiled hall with vaulted ceilings supported by carved beams. After ordering iced tea from the servant who met them at the door, the older woman led Sara into an old-fashioned parlor, complete with furniture that looked as though it had traveled from France with Claude himself.

Celeste waved her to a chair facing the tall narrow windows gracing one wall. “This is my favorite room, partly because of its view of the gardens. If I were feeling more stable today I’d take you on a tour of them. It’s this awful blood pressure medication I’m on, of course. It sometimes causes the worst dizzy spells.”

“The gardens look lovely.” There was a note of wistfulness in Sara’s tone.

“They can be very peaceful.”

“Sometimes peace can be hard to find.”

“You are quite young, I think, to be so wise.”

“I’m twenty-one.” The lie came to her lips automatically as she shaved two years off her age. Amber Jennings was twenty-one. And Sara Parker’s age no longer mattered, since she’d ceased to exist six years ago.

“Ah, to be twenty-one again.” Celeste smiled at her, a dazzling display of charm that transcended her years. “I would be tempted to envy such youth had I many regrets.”

“But you have no regrets, have you?” The words came from behind them, the voice amused. Sara stilled, finding something about it ominously familiar. “Shall we credit that to clean living or a convenient conscience?”

“Nicky!” Delight sounded in Celeste’s tone, sparkled in her eyes. As the older woman offered a cheek for the tall, dark-haired newcomer to kiss, Sara stared, her feeling of foreboding changing to disbelief. Life, she’d often found, contained the cruelest of ironies. That had never been so apparent as right now.

Because the man straightening to greet her was none other than Nick Doucet.

“Amber, I’m thrilled that you will get to meet my grandson. Nicky, this is—”

“Amber Jennings,” Nick murmured, an arrested look on his face. Sara’s pulse tripped, and it didn’t escape her that he used the last name she was currently going by. She had little time to reflect on that fact, however. With his dark gaze fixed on her, he crossed to her chair, took her hand in his. Raising it, he brushed his lips across her knuckles. “What a delightful surprise.” The old-fashioned courtliness of his gesture was at odds with the pure wickedness in his eyes. “Welcome to my home.”

Heat flashed through her, owing nothing to the temperature and everything to the simmering, latent sexuality he exuded. His voice was as smooth as velvet, meant for dark steamy rooms and rumpled satin sheets. The image that description conjured up was just a little too real, and had tension spiking through Sara’s muscles.

“You know each other?” Puzzlement was evident in Celeste’s voice as she watched their byplay.

“No.”

“Yes.”

Their simultaneous but contradictory responses had the older woman’s brows climbing.

Sara felt compelled to explain, “Your grandson has come to the café where I work on a few occasions. That’s all.”

“For some reason Amber seems anxious to avoid me,” Nick added, taking a seat next to his grandmother. “What a delightful surprise to find her here this afternoon, especially after she turned down my earlier invitation.”

She gazed at him with genuine dislike. “If I’d had any idea that you were related to Celeste, you can be sure I wouldn’t have come.” In the next moment she flushed, realizing how that sounded, and sent an apologetic glance to the older woman. She needn’t have bothered. Nick’s grandmother gave all appearances of finding their conversation highly entertaining.

“So Amber rejected an invitation from you? How…fascinating.”

“She appears to have a strange, and totally unnecessary, compulsion to avoid me.” He broke off as a servant entered with a tray of iced tea.

Celeste accepted a glass and drank deeply from the cool beverage with obvious enjoyment. “Amber, please forgive my grandson. He has been outrageously spoiled by women, myself included. It does him good to be thwarted by one now and again.”

Sara took a drink of her tea. “I have a feeling he’s more in need of it than most.”

The woman’s eyes crinkled. “Again you are correct.”

“I’m sitting right here,” Nick pointed out. Lazily, he reached out to pick up his glass. As he drank, he took the opportunity to survey his grandmother critically for signs of fatigue. She looked frailer every time he came home, so he’d made his visits more frequent. Watching the indomitable matriarch of his family fade with each passing year was perhaps the only thing capable of touching his heart. “Why don’t you tell me how the two of you happened to meet up?”

“Oh, I just met Amber at the library and we hit it off,” his grandmother said airily. She was an accomplished liar, but not accomplished enough to fool him. Her color was high, and there was a slight tremor in her hand as she set down her glass. He thought he could guess something close to the truth, even if it wasn’t forthcoming from his fiercely independent grandmother.

“I’ve enjoyed seeing your home.” His attention shifted to Amber, who was studiously avoiding looking at him as she spoke to his grandmother. “But I really have to get going or I’ll be late for work.”

His brows skimmed upward when Celeste took Amber’s hand in hers and gave it an affectionate squeeze. “It was such a pleasure, my dear. Thank you so much for everything.” With the mantle of age, his grandmother had abandoned some of the niceties of polite society. She didn’t waste time, or civility, on anyone she didn’t hold in some esteem.

“I enjoyed meeting you.” Amber’s smile was the first genuine one Nick had seen from her, and his hand faltered for an instant in the act of raising his glass. As if she felt his gaze on her, her smile quickly faded, to be replaced with her more familiar wary mask.

“Perhaps we’ll meet again. I think I would enjoy getting to know the woman who can hold her own with my grandson.” Eyes twinkling, Celeste rose. “I’ll tell Benjamin that you’re ready to leave.” With careful steps she left the parlor.

Nick took the opportunity to refill Amber’s glass, noting the way she stilled as he drew closer. He could almost see the effort it took for her not to move away, and felt an element of admiration, tinged with amusement. She was determined not to show him even that small weakness. He understood that kind of control, possessed it himself. He wondered what kind of experiences had forged hers.

“Are you going to meet with Douglas tonight?” she asked.

She’d managed to surprise him. Taking his time setting the pitcher down and settling into his chair once more, he studied her. “Why?”

Her fingers worried the earring at her lobe. The nervous gesture was at odds with the defiance in her eyes. “It wasn’t fair of you to make the meeting conditional upon my accompanying him.”

“I don’t play fair, Amber.” A thought occurred to him then, and wouldn’t be quieted. “What’s your relationship with Fairmont?” He was adept at eliciting the information he wanted with far more finesse, but her answer mattered more than it should have.

“Are you asking if I serve him more than breakfast?”

“Do you?”

Silence stretched, while their gazes did battle. “No.”

The elastic tension inside him that had stretched taut while he waited for her answer slowly relaxed. He hadn’t thought so, but her defense of the man had had him reconsidering. “Good.”

“Why do you care?”

“Because…” he paused to sip his iced tea “…I have no intention of entering into a business arrangement with a man I would later have to destroy.”

Shock flickered across Sara’s expression. Her hand clutching her glass, she rubbed her thumb over the condensation collected on it. “And I have no intention of accompanying him here tonight. Will you still help him?”

“I may. It depends on the figures he shows me.”

“So…you’re into investments?”

Smiles didn’t come easily to him, but he felt one on his lips now. “I make all sorts of investments. Some more lucrative than others.”

From her expression it was obvious that his cryptic response failed to satisfy. But she didn’t press him for details as other women might have done. Instead she said in a very matter-of-fact voice, “I won’t sleep with you, you know.”

The tea had difficulty passing the sudden knot in his throat. He hadn’t expected such forthrightness from her, but then, he really didn’t know Amber Jennings. Not at all. “I reserve the right to try and change your mind about that.” He noted with interest the way her fingers flexed on her glass, and wondered if the action reflected anxiety or annoyance.

“You don’t look like a man who enjoys wasting his time.”

“I’m not.”

Her glass made a small clink on the marble tabletop as she set it down, then rose. “I’d like to leave now.”

“I’m sure Benjamin has the car ready.”

She hesitated, then gave a nod. Turning to go, she halted a moment later, and said, “Please tell your grandmother again how much I enjoyed meeting her. She’s a wonderful lady.”

He made no effort to disguise the affection in his voice. “She is, yes.” Strolling along beside her, he opened the front door for her when they’d crossed the hallway. The car was pulled up front, waiting. She started toward it without another word, and Nick followed her out onto the porch, watched her descend the steps. “Amber?”

She halted in the act of sliding into the car, and looked at him.

Raising his glass to her, he said, “I’ll see you soon.”

She made no comment, and he’d expected none. The car door slammed, and the vehicle pulled away. He was contemplating the winking taillights when he heard his grandmother’s voice behind him.

“I like that girl, Nicky.” She tucked her arm into his and he covered her fingers absently with his own. “You will leave her out of those games you play, n’est-ce pas?”

Broodingly, he watched the car as it turned out of the drive. “I’m not playing, Grand-mère. Not this time.”

Chapter 2

Sleep could be unkind to those with blood on their hands. Nick tossed on the sweat-dampened sheets while faces loomed in his unconscious, each receding, to be replaced by yet another. And when an all too familiar shot ricocheted through his dreams, shattering his slumber, he woke with a start, his heart jackhammering in his chest.

He hauled in a deep breath, then another. He was used to the nightmares, but lately they’d become more frequent. More relentless. After wiping his perspiring face with the sheet, he tossed it aside, got out of bed.

Despite the darkness, his steps were sure as he crossed the room that had been his since childhood. Unmindful of his nudity, he opened the terrace doors and stepped out onto the little balcony that overlooked his grandmother’s beloved gardens. There was a hint of a breeze, but it did little to cool his heated skin. The air was heavy with moisture. It would rain by tomorrow.

His muscles still quivered with the aftershocks of the nightmare. From long practice he kept his breathing deep and steady, fighting off the sensation of suffocating. At one time that feeling had been a constant in his life. But those days were over, reenacted only in his dreams.

The scent of gardenias drifted toward him and his fingers clenched on the railing as he filled his lungs. But it wasn’t the gardens he thought of this time, but the woman who hovered at the edge of his unconscious.

Amber. With her wide, catlike eyes and long sleek body, she reminded him of a feline, begging to be stroked. But that one wouldn’t welcome petting, and most definitely not from him. She did everything in her power to avoid being touched by him at all.

Nick worked his shoulders, impatient with himself. He’d never been one to obsess over a woman, and if he wasn’t careful, that’s what Amber would become. An obsession. One that filled the mind and absorbed the senses. One that caused a man to forget all about obligation and focus solely on her.

She was a puzzle, with her badly cut hair and quick, nervous movements. Her anxious mannerisms, when she toyed with her earring or her necklace, were at odds with the cool, measuring look in her eye. It was intriguing to wonder which was the real woman—the nervous waif or the wary combatant. Whichever she was, she’d made no secret of her distrust of him.

If he were a better man, a kinder one, he’d forget all about Amber Jennings and leave her alone to live her life as she chose. But because he was neither, he knew he’d do nothing of the sort.

The promised rain hung low in the clouds, doing little more than releasing the occasional fat drop and keeping a miserable mugginess in the air. Sara waved to Candy as they parted ways for a few hours. She wasn’t expected back until the dinner shift today, and the freedom of the next few hours beckoned. She’d been on edge all morning, and it was tempting to blame that fact on the weather. But in truth, Nick Doucet was at the root of the feeling.

Without meaning to, she’d watched for him all morning, his words from yesterday ringing in her mind.

I’ll see you soon. Her memory all too accurately recalled the promise in his voice, the predatory, masculine intent in his eyes.

Her experience with men in recent years had been kept to a minimum, by her choice. There had been the waiter in Seattle, the one who had reminded her, in some slight way, of Sean. The resemblance had only been physical, and their encounter brief. She’d left town shortly after their relationship had started, and there had been no one since.

Dispassionately, she’d wondered from time to time if she was capable of feeling the type of desire that books rhapsodized over and movies glorified. Wondered if something vital in her had been broken years ago and could never work correctly again. She’d never regarded her lack with much regret. From what she’d witnessed, passion was an excuse, a weakness…and in the hands of some, a weapon.

But that didn’t account for the razor sharp awareness that flared to life every time Doucet came close. And her own unfamiliar reaction was just one more reason for her to steer clear of him.

Ignoring the sullen threat in the clouds, she walked several more blocks until she came to a small market on the corner. Going inside, she selected some necessities and paused over the produce. She could take all her meals at the café on the days she worked, but she liked to have fresh fruit in her room for an occasional snack.

Thunder rumbled ominously, and with one eye on the sky, she paid for her purchases and hurried from the store.

“You took a chance coming out on a day like today without an umbrella.”

Her spine stiffened as she recognized the voice. Without turning, she hurried even faster, to no avail. Nick merely fell into step beside her.

“Can I carry something?”

“No.” A few drops of rain hit the pavement before her. It was too much to ask that, given no encouragement, he’d disappear. He was much too tenacious for that.

With his hands tucked into the pockets of his custom-fit linen trousers, he strolled along, seeming unconcerned as the drops fell with increasing urgency. “Perhaps it’s difficult for you to believe, but I was raised as a Southern gentleman.” He reached over to pry one of the bags from her fingers. “It’s my duty to at least give the appearance of being helpful.”

It was her reluctance to touch him, not his perseverance, that caused her to relinquish her grip on the bag. The nerves were back, flickering just below the surface of her skin, and she damned them almost as fiercely as she damned the man beside her. “Do Southern gentlemen normally stalk women who have made their disinterest clear?”

“Stalk?” He seemed to give the word consideration. “That seems a harsh conclusion, given the fact that the market you were shopping at is directly across the street from my family’s offices.” She looked at the nondescript brick building he indicated. “We could dodge in over there, and wait out the rain.”

“Go ahead,” she invited, walking faster. The precipitation was growing heavier. She’d be soaked by the time she reached her apartment. But there was no way she was going anywhere with him.

“Now what kind of gentleman would I be, Amber, if I didn’t see a lady to her door?”

At the teasing words she whirled on him, wiping the rain from her face with a hunched shoulder. “It appears you would be a dense one, Doucet. Or maybe you’re the type who can’t stand the fact a woman isn’t interested. Is that it, huh? Is it the challenge you enjoy?”

He’d stopped when she did, met her gaze with his enigmatic one. “I enjoy you.”

Lightning sizzled, and Sara was unable to discern whether it was from the darkening sky or the chemistry sparking between them. She couldn’t look away from him. She was inexperienced, but not stupid. It would be impossible to misidentify the predatory gleam of male intent in his eyes, or the corresponding frisson of pleasure shooting down her spine.

The sky opened up then, and the ensuing downpour succeeded in dispelling their silent communication. “C’mon.” Nick cupped her elbow in his hand. The feel of his fingers on her chilled skin sent tendrils of warmth curling through her system, and although she tried to dislodge him, he held her firmly. Guiding her to a deep doorway up ahead, he allowed her to step beneath the protection it provided, then crowded in after her.

He was too close. Sara shrank back as far as she could, but if anything, he seemed to loom nearer. He didn’t seem to notice her discomfiture at his proximity. He shook the moisture from his dark hair, finger combed it carelessly.

Her throat clogged. The white shirt he wore was plastered against his body, and she could see through it to his chest, with its covering of dark hair. His soaked trousers clung to his hard thighs, leaving no doubt about the muscular strength of his body. She moistened her lips, which had gone inexplicably dry. Thunder boomed, and she glanced out at the street. All the other pedestrians had taken cover, and even as she registered the logic of the action, there was a part of her that was tempted to bolt, to take her chances with the elements in an effort to escape this man. These feelings.

“Amber.”

She didn’t want to respond to that low raspy tone, didn’t want to see the desire that would be stamped on his face. But her gaze raised of its own volition. And immediately the storm around them paled in comparison to the tempest between them.

Despite his earlier efforts, a lock of black hair had fallen across his forehead. His eyes were heavy-lidded, intent, and there was no mistaking the stamp of arousal on his face. It was there in the flare of his nostrils, in the skin stretched taut over his cheekbones. Her pulse leaped once before settling into a hard staccato beat.

His head lowered. There was no room to pull away. And even if she’d had the will to make a run for the street, it was doubtful that her legs would have obeyed the command to move. A strange lethargy had invaded her limbs, turning them weak and boneless.

She felt his breath warm her throat before his lips brushed against the pulse that was pounding there. Then that same barely perceptible caress whispered across her jaw, her eyelids, the corner of her mouth. He didn’t touch her anywhere else, and that fact somehow made the light contact more sensual. Restrained, but full of promise. She shivered against him, but not from the dampness. Heat flashed between them, enough that she imagined the air around them should fill with steam.

The world narrowed, to include only this moment. This man. She thought he could surely hear her heart slamming against her chest. Imagined she could hear his. Her lips parted as his mouth hovered above hers.

The tip of his tongue traced the seam of her lips, with a light deft stroke that had her shuddering. He rubbed his mouth against hers savoringly, as if he wanted to absorb her flavor and brand her with his own.

And because he was close, all too close, to succeeding, she found the strength to turn her head.

“I have to go.” She could barely form the words.

“Amber.”

She used her elbows to wedge herself past him, not daring to look in the direction of that dulcet voice.

“I want to see you tonight.”

The words sounded as though they’d been dragged from somewhere deep inside him. The blood pumped through her veins, and she struggled for composure. She’d never been in greater need of it. “I have to work.”

“Then I’ll come by for dinner.”

Without responding, she walked away as swiftly as she could without running. Running would have been useless, at any rate. There was no way to outpace the emotions that even now were churning and crashing inside her like white water. No way to escape the certainty that she’d made a very grave mistake indeed by allowing Nick Doucet to touch her. To taste her.

She walked faster to outpace the memories. His flavor still lingered in her senses, and she felt oddly disoriented. Her thoughts were a jumble, and it wasn’t until she heard the blare of a horn that she realized she’d nearly stepped off a curb in front of an oncoming car. Jumping back, she ignored the driver’s rude suggestion and tried to control a shudder at her recent narrow escape. Both of them.

The rain was steady now, falling gently. Her grocery bags were plastic, so she didn’t have to worry about them ripping, but everything she’d bought would have to be dried off before she put it away in her apartment. She looked forward to the task. Any distraction would be a welcome respite from her tumultuous thoughts.