Millionaire: Needed for One Month: Thirty Day Affair

He slid one hand up to hold the back of her neck while his other hand continued to gently torture her with anticipation. His blue eyes caught hers and Keira wished she knew what he was thinking now. Now, when passion simmered in pale eyes gone dark with desire.

She wanted to give him what he was giving her, so she slid one hand down his body until she could encircle his length with her fingers again. He swallowed a great gulp of air before lowering his head to take her mouth with his. His tongue plunged into her mouth, claiming her fiercely, desperately, as if he couldn't wait another moment to taste her.

And Keira matched his need with her own. She shifted position, sliding her hands around his waist to splay them against his back. She felt his heart pounding and knew her own was in sync that wild rhythm.

His fingers dipped into her center, first one, then two, diving in and out of her heat, touching her deeply, but not deep enough. Not as deeply as she wanted him. Needed him.

When he tore his mouth from hers, he stared down at her and whispered, “We'll never make it back up to the bedroom.”

“Not a chance,” she agreed, already so hungry for him, her arms and legs were trembling.

“Here then,” he said and, moving quickly, he picked her up, carried her to the counter and plopped her down onto it.

“Yikes!” The cold granite bit into her heated skin and sent a chill slicing right through her.

He grinned wickedly. “Cold?”

She narrowed her eyes on him. “You enjoyed that. Payback for locking you outside?”

“Just a little,” he admitted, then leaned in and bit her bottom lip gently, swiping his tongue along the crease in her mouth. “But I'm willing to warm you up again, too.”

She reached for him, sliding her arms around his neck, pulling him in closer. “A generous man,” she said with a sigh as his mouth came down on hers.

As he kissed her, he parted her thighs, moved in close and entered her body on a rush of sensation that poured through the two of them, linking them in a way that neither had experienced or expected.

Keira arched into him, moving her hips on the hard granite in a desperate attempt to get closer, to take him more fully within. She closed her eyes and saw swirls of vibrant color as her body leaped into life. Her being soared, and something deep within her unexpectedly awoke. Her eyes opened again as that thought sang through her mind. She watched him and felt new feelings stir within. New emotions. New and incredibly fragile threads of connection.

Nathan's hands dropped to her hips and he held her still, trapped within his steely grip as he plunged in and out of her depths in a ferocious rhythm designed to drive them both quickly over the edge.

The world dropped away and it was just the two of them. Nothing beyond existed anymore. Passion swelled and trapped them in a silky web of desire. Keira held on to him, and lost herself in his strength, surrendering to the twist of anticipation curling inside her.

Her body tightened, her mouth mated with his and she hooked her legs around Nathan's waist, pulling him in harder, deeper. She felt his body's invasion of hers all the way to her soul and knew she would never get enough of him. Knew that this man was touching more than her body. He'd already laid claim to a piece of her heart.

Whether she wanted it or not, she cared for him. More than she wanted to think about. More than she dared to admit.

She pulled free of his kiss so she could watch his eyes as he claimed her. His beautiful blue gaze locked with hers, as though he understood her silent plea and felt the same way.

Her body quickened, anticipation exploded and a climax stronger than anything she'd ever known before shattered inside her, splintering itself into brilliant colors that tore through her heart and spilled into her bones.

Nathan kept his gaze fixed on hers and when she cried out his name, he gave himself up to the release clamoring inside him and followed her over the ragged edge of control, into oblivion.

By morning, Nathan was rethinking the whole situation.

The night before, he'd thought it a great idea having Keira stay with him. They'd come together often during the night and each time had been more incredible than the first. He felt as though each time he touched her, he felt something more, something different. And he'd reveled in their time together, knowing that in the morning, she would be going home.

At least, that's what he had thought.

He gritted his teeth and stared out the bank of windows in the kitchen. Outside the lodge, the world was a wash of white. Snow piled on the sides of the deck and blew in under the overhang to coat the wood planks with a layer of snow at least a foot deep. And that was under the porch roof. It was much deeper everywhere else, and it was still falling.

He'd never seen anything like it.

“It's mid-March and it looks like Siberia in December out there,” he muttered.

Keira came up behind him, threaded her arms around his waist and rested her cheek against his back. “Welcome to the high Sierras.”

“I tried the phone,” he said. “No dial tone.”

“Uh-oh.”

“What's that mean?” He turned his head to look at her.

“It means,” she said, “that with the phone lines down this early in the storm, it's a big one.”

Nathan glowered at her. “Which translates into …?”

She shrugged. “If the roads aren't completely blocked already, they soon will be.”

“Surely you have crews to take care of that.”

“Of course we do,” Keira said, smiling up at him. “But they can't roll till the heavy snows are over, and even when they do …”

He didn't like the look on her face. The look that said he's not going to like this.

“What?”

“They take care of the town first and then the main stretches of highway. Those are priorities for obvious reasons.”

“And …?”

“And,” she said with another shrug, “the roads up here probably won't be cleared for a few days.”

“A few days?”

“Maybe sooner,” she said, he suspected simply to placate him. “But the private roads and the roads leading to them are pretty much a lower priority. Unless there's an emergency or something. If the road crews get a call like that, they'll come right away.”

“The phones are out.” He paused, then said, “Wait. I've got my satellite phone.”

“But no one else around here has one.”

“Right.” Nathan shook his head.

She pulled her arms from around his waist, shoved her hands into the pockets of her robe and said, “Look, we do the best we can. And people generally privately contract to get their roads cleared, so that takes care of a lot of problems.”

“And does the lodge have a private contract?”

“I don't know.”

“Perfect.” Nathan blew out a breath. This month was turning into a real trial. “How long is this going to keep up?” He shook his head as he shifted his gaze across the lake, watching snow slide in sideways, riding a wind that was rattling the windows.

“Well,” she said, giving him a brilliant smile, “if it keeps up, at least it won't be coming down anymore.”

He glanced at her. “Oh, very humorous.”

She moved to stand in front of him, leaning both palms against an icy window to get as good a view as she could of the blustering storm outside. “I always laughed when my dad said it.” She glanced at him over her shoulder. “Of course, I was ten.”

Nathan wasn't amused. Nor was he charmed. He'd wanted her here last night—and he'd enjoyed every minute of his time with her. But that didn't mean he wanted her at the lodge for freaking ever. Scowling, he saw the wind spit snow at the windows and knew that she wouldn't be going anywhere. At least not today.

As if she was reading his mind, Keira turned around, leaned back against the floor-to-ceiling windows and tipped her head to one side, staring up at him. “So, what'll we do while we're stuck inside?”

He knew that gleam in her eye. Hell, he'd seen it most of the night. He was willing to bet they hadn't had more than a couple of hours’ sleep. Yet even thinking about being inside her, touching her, holding her, tasting her, made him hard and eager again.

Which was clearly unacceptable.

He wasn't a kid to be led around by his groin. And damned if he'd let himself get any more tangled up with Keira than he already was. Just because she was here, with him, didn't mean she had to be with him.

“Uh-oh,” she said, tugging the edges of her robe more firmly together over her chest. “It suddenly got very cold in here.”

He nodded. “I'll turn up the thermostat.”

“That's not what I meant.”

“What're you talking about?” he asked as he walked to the coffee pot on the kitchen counter.

God.

The counter.

How was he ever supposed to walk through this kitchen again without remembering her sitting naked on that counter? Without thinking about how she'd taken him so deep inside her he'd thought he might never find his way out again?

Crap.

Now he had a headache.

Rubbing his temple, he asked, “Coffee?”

“Sure. I'll have a cup of coffee, black, with answers.”

“Huh?” He half turned to look at her as she walked slowly across the kitchen. Did her hips always sway like that, he wondered, or was she doing it purposely now?

“I said I'd like some answers.”

“To what?” He was stalling. He knew it. He poured two cups of coffee, handed her one, then stalled again by taking a long sip of his own.

“To why your eyes suddenly looked even colder than this stormy day outside.”

“Keira,” he said tightly, “you're making too much of nothing.”

“So you're happy I'm here,” she coaxed, taking a drink of her coffee and moving in closer to him.

“Delirious,” he assured her.

“Liar.”

“Why do you do that? Accuse me of lying at every opportunity?”

“A better question is why am I always right?”

He set his coffee cup down, tugged at the belt of his robe and said, “You're not right. Women always say that to win an argument, but it's never true.”

“Of course it is,” Keira said, sipping her coffee. “Women are right because we see everything and we remember everything.”

“Sure.”

“Just like I can see that you're trying to start a fight so you won't have to answer my question.”

He sighed. This woman got to him like no one else ever had. And he was forced to admit that part of the reason why was because she never took any of his crap. She always called him on everything.

“Fine,” he said tightly and met her gaze with a hard look designed to put some distance between them. “I was thinking that it would be more comfortable if you could have gone home this morning. Happy?”

“Delirious,” she said, throwing his own word back at him. Then she turned around and pulled a chair out from under the kitchen table. Curling one leg under herself, she plopped down, propped her elbow on the table and took another sip of coffee before saying, “Was that so hard?”

Nathan just blinked at her. Any other woman would have been insulted, giving him all kinds of frosty attitude right now. Figured Keira would react differently. She had to everything else.

“You're not mad.”

“Nope, sorry to disappoint.” She took long drink of her coffee, then set the cup onto the table. “Nathan, I know you don't really want me here, and that's okay. I mean, I hadn't planned on staying forever, you know.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“But it's really storming out there, so I'm stuck here and you're stuck with me. We might as well make the best of it, don't you think?”

A constant surprise. Keira Sanders never failed to bewilder him with her reactions to things. He couldn't depend on what she'd do next, because she never responded to anything the way he expected her to. How was a man supposed to find his emotional footing if a woman kept changing on him?

“I suppose that's logical.”

“Excellent,” she said. “I've got a few ideas on what we could do today.” She hopped off her chair, stumbled over her own foot and slammed into his chest. She grabbed him in self-preservation and spilled his coffee down the front of his robe. Grinning up at him, she said, “Maybe we should do some laundry first.”

Cold fettuccine Alfredo for breakfast, a load of wash done and in the dryer, and the snow was still blowing outside.

Keira wandered through the lodge, peeking into closets and exploring rooms that were still standing empty waiting for the decorator. From every room, the view was outstanding and displayed the growing storm to its advantage.

She chewed at her bottom lip and wondered how the town was doing, then reminded herself that the people of Hunter's Landing dealt with snowstorms every year. The only difference with this storm was that she wasn't there. She couldn't see for herself that everyone was fine, hunkered down to wait out the snow.

She couldn't even call anyone to check on them. The phone lines were still down. Remembering the look on Nathan's face when he'd tried the phone again an hour ago made her smile.

Leaving one of the bedrooms, she wandered back into the upper hall, passed the master bedroom and paused for a moment, remembering everything she and Nathan had done together the night before. Her heart filled, her body ached with tired satisfaction and the small smile on her face faded slowly. She knew that today, he was regretting their time together.

He probably wasn't used to facing his nighttime bed partner the next day. Well, this was pretty new for Keira, too. But at least she was trying to make the best of it. Unlike Nathan, who'd buried himself in busywork on his laptop. The man had avoided talking to her for hours now and the quiet—except for his fingers hitting the keyboard—was starting to really bother her.

The wind howled around the corners of the house, sounding as though it was looking for a way in. Shivering, Keira headed for the stairs. She held onto the banister, and started down, her bare feet making no sound at all on the dark carpet runner that covered the wood planks.

Walking into the great room, she headed for the fire crackling in the hearth, turned her back to it and stared at Nathan, just a few feet away. He hadn't even looked up when she entered the room.

“Ignoring me doesn't make me invisible,” she said abruptly.

“Huh? What?” He raised his head, turned to look at her and asked, “What did you say?”

“I said, are you going to be sitting in front of that computer all day?”

“I have work to do.”

“That you can't send anywhere because the phone lines are down.”

“It's not e-mail, it's work,” he said.

“Fine.” She blew out a breath, walked toward him, then squatted beside him until they were eye to eye. “My point is, does everything have to be done today?”

“Keira …”

She hopped up, plopped onto the couch beside him and leaned in, staring at the computer screen. “Okay, okay. So you have to work. Tell me about it. Talk to me.”

He sighed in resignation, and Keira hid a smile. “I'm working up a new schedule for impromptu visits to my hotels.”

She looked at him, stupefied for a second, then burst out laughing.

“What's so funny?”

She waved one hand, shook her head and fought for breath. Laughter spilled from her throat, bubbled into the room and crashed down around them as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and gave him a fast hug. “Nathan, you're really something,” she said when she finally got control of her giggles.

“I'm so happy I can entertain you.”

“Don't you get it?” she asked, grinning. “You're making a schedule for impromptu visits. The whole point of impromptu is no schedule.”

Nathan scowled at her, then at the computer screen. He felt like an idiot. But in his own defense, he'd only been making busy work anyway. Anything to keep his mind off the fact that Keira was here and way too accessible.

He had no intention of getting in any deeper with her. And the best way to keep from doing that was to keep his hands to himself. Yet … everytime he heard her breathe, or caught a whiff of her scent, all he wanted to do was carry her back upstairs and bury himself inside her.

He wanted to experience again that incredible warmth that he'd only found with her. But it wouldn't be right. He wanted to enjoy her, enjoy their time together and still be able to walk away. Because he would be leaving. Nothing would stop him.

She reached out and closed the computer, then clambered onto his lap. Threading her arms around his neck, she looked into his eyes and asked, “What do you do when you're not working?”

He didn't have an answer. Strange, but he'd never really thought about it. “I'm always working.”

“Well, let's see what we can do about that.”

Nine

An hour later, Nathan rolled out of bed, his body replete, his mind racing. He glanced at Keira languidly stretching on the mattress and had to fight down an urge to lay back down and gather her up close. And because that thought was uppermost in his brain, he took a step or two away from the bed just for good measure.

“Now,” she said, sweeping her hair up to lay across the pillow like a red-gold banner, “wasn't that more fun than planning schedules?”

He grabbed his robe from the end of the bed, slipped it on, then stood up to look down at her. “If we spend the next few days like this,” he said with a smile he couldn't quite prevent curving his mouth, “by the time the storm ends, we'll be dead.”

“I can think of worse ways to go.”

So could he. That was one of his problems. Always before, Nathan's relationships with women had been uncomplicated and straightforward. Before he took a woman to bed, he made sure she felt as he did about affairs—that they should be undemanding, easily slipped in and out of, with no hard feelings, no promises made, so no promises broken.

Ordinarily, he never would have become involved with a woman like Keira. She had “complications” written all over her. And yet, at this moment, he couldn't really bring himself to regret what he'd found with her.

Regrets would come later. Once he was gone and safely wrapped up in his normal world. Once he was far enough away from her eyes that they didn't haunt him every damn minute.

“You're an unusual woman.”

She sat up, completely comfortable with her own nudity, and swung her hair back from her face. “Thanks.”

“You're welcome,” he said, his gaze dipping to the swell of her breasts, then back to her fathomless green eyes. She was tempting. More tempting than anyone he'd ever known before. He was walking through unfamiliar territory here and he felt as though he were trying to negotiate his way through quicksand.

What he needed was a little space. A little time to himself to gather his defenses and shore up the inner walls she seemed so determine to shatter.

Decision made, he said, “I'm going downstairs to get some work done.”

She looked at him for a long second or two, shook her head, then flopped back onto the bed, dragged the quilt up to cover herself and muttered, “Of course you are.”

A few hours later, Nathan was hunched determinedly over his computer, doing an excellent job of pretending Keira wasn't in the room.

Tossing the book she'd been trying to read for the last half hour onto the sofa cushion beside her, she frowned at the back of his head and said pointedly, “What're you doing?”

“Working.”

“Again, you mean. Well, I can see that, Mr. Chatty. Working on what? Still trying to find a way to schedule spontaneity?”

“No.” He shook his head, turned back to the computer and typed something else.

“Then what?”

“You're not going to give me any peace at all, are you?”

“Probably not,” she said.

“Fine.” He leaned back into the couch, winced and retrieved the book she'd dropped out from behind his back and set it on the coffee table. When he was settled again, he glanced at her and said, “I'm making some notes on how to confront the manager of the Gstaad Barrister.”

“Switzerland,” she said with a sigh. Then she asked, “Confront? About what?”

“I gave him specific instructions last time on how I wanted him to deal with the housekeeping staff, and they haven't been implemented.”

“Why not?”

He looked at her. “How the hell do I know?”

She curled her legs up under her, propped her elbow on the back of the sofa and leaned in. “What's wrong with the way he's handling things, then?”

Nathan sighed. “He's very … relaxed in his position. He allows the employees too much leeway in their work.”

“Does it all get done?”

“Yes, but—”

“So maybe,” Keira said, “he knows his people better than you do?”

“Maybe, but—”

She smiled. “So if you weren't stomping around bellowing orders like a bully, maybe you'd get more cooperation out of him?”

“I do not bellow,” Nathan said and sat up straight.

“But you do bully.”

He blew out a disgusted breath. “You don't understand. There's a right way and a wrong way to run a business, Keira.”

“Oh, I understand,” she said, reaching out to pat his shoulder, then letting her fingertips linger there just a moment or two. “Believe me, as mayor, I have to deal with people all the time. And it's just not logical to assume you can use the same strategy when dealing with different types of people.”

“It's always worked before,” he pointed out, scowling at her.

Keira scooted closer, leaned down and looked him dead in the eye. This she knew about. He might own all of the gorgeous hotels in the world, but Nathan Barrister was not a people person.

“But the thing is, Nathan, you don't know if it might work better doing things differently.”

“The company's policy has been in effect since my grandfather started the first hotel.”

“Jeez,” she said softly. “No wonder it's out-of-date.”

“I didn't say it was out-of-date.”

“Nope. I did.” Turning around, she sat back beside Nathan, tucked her hand through the crook of his arm and cuddled in. “Like, for instance, when Donna—she owns the pottery shop on the outskirts of town—wanted to increase her number of parking spaces in front of her shop, I went to bat for her with the town council. After all, her shop is out of the way, it wouldn't infringe on anyone else's parking. Why not?”

“Okay …”

“But, when the Clearwater wanted the same deal, I had to tell them no. Because they're in the middle of town, lakeside, and we just couldn't afford to lose tourist parking slots to make more room for their customers. Different situations, different rules.”

“Ah,” he said, smiling at her, “but the situations in my hotels are all the same. Each one is a Barrister. So the rules should apply evenly.”

She nudged his shoulder and laughed shortly. “The hotels are all in different places. Different traditions, different employees.”

“But—”

“Would you decorate your Barbados hotel the same way you decorated the one in say, D.C.?”

“No …”

“So, same thing applies.” Leaning her head against his shoulder, she added, “Cut your managers a little slack, Nathan. Trust them to know their people and their hotels. Lighten up a little and you might be surprised by the results you get.”

He frowned thoughtfully and shifted his gaze to the screen of his laptop, where his carefully written-up notes were marked with bullet points. “You couldn't have made your point an hour ago? Before I started working on this stupid list?”

Keira laughed and Nathan took a heartbeat of time to simply enjoy the sound as it swirled around him. She was cuddled in close and he liked the feel of her pressed against him. He liked knowing she was sitting beside him reading quietly—or that she was in the kitchen making grilled cheese sandwiches—or tripping over a rug on her way down the hall.