Secret Seduction

The door slammed closed behind them.

Her mouth was on his and her arms were around his neck and they were sort of dancing around the room. They fell onto the bed. Tanner was on his back. Vanessa straddled him.

She tugged his shirt from his pants and plowed her hands underneath the hem to plane her palms over his belly. Then she lowered her head and planted hot kisses around his navel.

His body burst into flames. His blood burned and his cock throbbed. He hadn’t been with a woman in four years. Not since Maria. He told himself that’s why he was so hard, so blindsided by lust. He couldn’t even think straight. He knew he shouldn’t be doing this. He was her secret bodyguard and he was about to screw the woman he’d been hired to protect.

He was breaking the number one rule of the bodyguard’s code: Don’t get sexually involved with your protectee.

But the sweet, intoxicating smell of her warm body and the taste of her hot lips and the feel of her soft flesh made him forget his job. At the moment he was all male, awash in testosterone and desperate to have this woman.

She traced her thumbs over his nipples and Tanner groaned aloud. He grabbed her hips and pressed her flush against his pelvis, letting her see exactly what she was doing to him.

The bedsprings creaked beneath their weight. He didn’t care how noisy it got. He had to have her or go mad.

He flipped her over, pinning her to the pillow-top mattress, and speared his fingers through her mass of lush black hair, holding her in place while he ravaged her mouth with kisses.

She wrapped her legs around his waist, simultaneously opening her mouth and letting in his tongue. She tasted incredible. Rich and robust and sexy.

“I want you, Tanner. I want to feel you, all of you,” she murmured against his mouth.

“We’ve got all night. Let’s take our time,” he said, as much to convince himself as well as her. What he wanted was to hike up the hem of her skirt, strip off her panties and plunge right into her.

Not since Maria had a woman made him so hard. Who was he kidding? Until Vanessa, he hadn’t even thought of another woman. This felt strange but good. Healthy to be able to feel something again.

It’s neither good nor healthy. You’ve been hired to protect her. You’ve got to stop this.

It was a rational thought, but the ability for any rational action was lost when she angled her head up to take his earlobe between her teeth and nibbled.

Outside the storm raged. Rain pelted hard against the thirdstory window. The scarlet-neon hotel sign threw a red glow into the room. Vanessa’s smile was wickedly naughty as she dropped her head back to the mattress and looked up at him, her lips glistening.

She splayed a palm against the flat of his chest and pushed him away.

“What is it?” he rasped huskily. “Have you changed your mind?”

“Sit,” Vanessa commanded, getting to her feet and patting the mattress with her hand.

Tanner obeyed.

She stepped away from him and in that soft red glowing light slanting through the window, she slowly begin to disrobe, sliding down the zipper of her dress, easing the capped sleeves over her shoulders, exposing inch after tantalizing inch of light caramel skin.

He gulped. What a show.

Finally, the silky dress floated down her body to pool at her feet. She stepped out of the garment, but Tanner didn’t notice. He was too busy staring at the hot vision of her in a black lace bra molded to her high, sumptuous breasts.

His hands tingled with the need to touch her, to fill his palms with the weight of her bosom. He wanted to run his tongue over her skin, taste her rich womanly flavor. He wanted her in the most elemental way. At least for tonight, for this moment. She was the antidote to his malaise.

Tanner’s attention fully captured, his gaze tracked from her chest to the smooth curve of her belly to her black satin thong panties, clinging so provocatively to her sweet, luscious ass.

Then slowly she raised one leg and cocked her stilettoed foot on his thigh, the thin heel digging lightly into him. “Undo me.”

His fingers felt big as sausages as he fumbled with the delicate buckle at her slender ankle.

Her breathing was shallow and quick.

The buckle was stubborn.

Not looking so smooth, slick.

In irritation, Tanner slipped the strap under her heel and just peeled the shoe off her foot, leaving the buckle still fastened. He tossed the shoe over his shoulder. It landed with a plop on the other side of the room.

“Give me,” he said, indicating her other foot.

She complied, putting her bare foot on the floor and extending her other leg across his outstretched palm. Touching the sensuous curve of her calf proved more than Tanner could handle—he had to have her now. He dispensed with the second shoe, then wrapped his hand around that delicious calf and lay back against the headboard, pulling her with him.

Vanessa made a soft noise of half surprise, half pleasure. She was atop him again and his arms went around her waist. Her breasts were pressed against his chest and her head was cocked back.

She was ogling him as if he was something interesting she’d found in a novelty store. Her look was both unsettling and provocative.

His fingers went for the clasp of her bra.

She reached back and closed a hand over his fingers. “Not so fast, Tex. It’s your turn to remove an article of clothing.”

He didn’t need any more encouragement than that.

Tanner pulled his shirt over his head without bothering to unbutton it, and toed off his shoes. Her fingers were plucking at the waistband of his pants, working the snap and zipper almost simultaneously.

She shucked the pants down his legs, Tanner lifting his hips to help. His slacks quickly joined her dress on the floor. He and Vanessa were left in their underwear staring into each other’s eyes.

Sharp appreciation increased Vanessa’s awareness as she drank in Tanner’s muscular body. The man was a work of art.

A flash of lightning flooded the room in split-second illumination, emphasizing the intensity of what was happening between them. A myriad of sensations pelted her. The sound of his ragged breathing. The heat of his flesh. The scrape of his beard stubble as he claimed her mouth in another kiss.

Passion surged high within her, increasing the sexual drive that had been building since their dance at Emilio’s.

He tasted robust and piquant, like the roasted coffee they had shared at dinner. She was thirsty for more.

Their tongues played, gliding in and around and over each other. The tender slide of his palms underneath her breasts as he made her bra disappear became a hungry hunt to increase her pleasure.

The burning urge to stroke him, to travel the tempting terrain of his body compelled her.

She ran her fingertips over his belly, exalting in the way his taut stomach muscles quivered at her touch. His low groan lit her up inside. She tracked her hand lower, finding her way through the coarse curls to glide her palm up the long, hard length of him.

Excitement stirred her blood. A murmured whisper of delight slipped past her lips at the sexy feel of him pulsating in her hand.

Her body clenched, anxious to have him inside her, filling her up, making her whole, but she didn’t want to rush things. She wanted to savor this moment, savor him. It took every ounce of will she possessed, but Vanessa forced herself to hold back. She knew he was worth the wait.

He eased her hand from his shaft and pulled his mouth from hers. “You keep doing that and I won’t last two minutes.”

Tanner kissed his way down her neck to her swollen and achy breasts. His mouth settled over one straining nipple, sending a coil of heat firing like an inferno into her blood.

Her body grew heavier, more languorous until it seemed to liquefy into his. He forsook her nipples and returned to making idle circles around her breasts, until once more he was back, pulling and plucking the straining peaks.

She writhed against him.

He circled back.

This time she moaned through clenched teeth when he reached her nipples at last and rolled them between his rough fingers.

Her breath came out in low gasps and her entire body felt aroused. Nibbling her ear, he lifted her up onto his thigh.

His lips tugged on her earlobe. She delighted in the sensation as he began to suckle on her flesh and the ruby stud nestled there. She shuddered at the wetness of his tongue, the heat of his mouth.

He spread his legs and, in the process, pried hers apart with his knee. His hand slid down her breast and across her inner thigh. His other hand gently massaged her buttocks.

Her breathing quickened and her heart thumped.

Flashes of pleasure bombarding her, Vanessa let out a muted purr of confirmation, telling him he was on the right path as he blazed a trail down her torso with his wicked tongue. She felt his hand at the waistband of her panties, his fingertips taunting her by slipping underneath the silky elastic.

“I’m going to love you with my mouth,” he promised, not asking her permission, simply telling her what he was going to do.

His comment shot her arousal to a fevered pitch. His heated breath against her bare belly was driving her insane. His fingertips shifted through her moist curls, headed for the area she most wanted him to touch.

In response, she arched her back.

Come on, come on.

If she didn’t feel the warmth of his hot, wet tongue against her soon, she was going to lose her mind.

Tanner slipped her panties over her hips, slid them down her thighs, past her knees. She kicked them off.

“You smell so sweet.” He inhaled and then placed a smattering of kisses down the area below her navel.

She felt every quiver of her body, every ragged breath.

With excruciating slowness, Tanner moved his hand to cover the triangle of hair between her legs.

Vanessa moaned her pleasure as his hand cupped her gently.

She allowed her legs to drop open, giving him full access to her body. He lay on his belly between her knees and lightly brushed his lips over her feminine folds.

He hissed in air. “You are so wet.”

Her heart skipped a beat at the sound of wonder in his voice. Desire for him seared her nerve endings as she surrendered to him completely.

It wasn’t easy for her. Vanessa wasn’t used to exposing herself like this, neither out of bed nor in it. Ever since she’d escaped Carlo Vega, she’d been in control of her own life. But now passion was forcing her to relinquish the reins to Tanner’s tender tongue. She wasn’t sure she liked it.

The air was thick, weighted with tension. The sheets smelled slightly scorched, as if they’d spent too many minutes in a commercial drier. Her breath crawled sluggishly through her lungs, filling her with lazy heat. Her limbs were made of marble, heavy and smooth.

Then everything vanished from her mind except the erotic moisture of his lips against her throbbing sex. And when his mouth formed a gentle suction over her clit, she came completely unraveled.

Gently he inserted one thick finger inside her tender folds. She lost all sense of herself, all sense of time. The world tumbled, creating an easy glide into ecstasy.

The pressure mounting inside her womb was sublime torment. At that point, nothing else mattered to her except Tanner making love to her with his mouth and his fingers.

He teased her clit, nipping lightly with his teeth.

All the air left her body and she felt reborn. Her pulse pounded like drums in her ears, rushing blood through her veins, pushing her toward an inevitable conclusion.

Tanner was desperately fighting off completion, but it was almost impossible. She knew the soft sounds of her sexy cries, and the way she threaded her fingers through his hair were getting to him.

She wanted him to be inside her. He had to get inside her now. “Please,” she whispered. “Please take me.”

“Not yet.”

Cruel, sweet torment. He kept at her. Licking and teasing until she was shaking from head to toe and oh, so wet.

He paused long enough to retrieve a condom from his wallet and slip it on and with the intermission she felt oddly bereft. He spent a few moments working her up again and then finally, finally he slowly entered her.

Vanessa whimpered gratefully.

Her body enveloped him. She provided him with her heavenly, moist cocoon. She met each of his thrusts with corresponding movement of her hips, arching her back up to meet him. Urging him to quicken his pace.

Instinct took over. She could no longer think, could only feel. Her focus was attuned to one thing and one thing only—the merging of their bodies. His energy swirled up through her until her whole universe spun dizzily. His stark reaction was such a powerful thing to behold. Vanessa felt both awed and blown away by his responsiveness.

His hands trembled as he held her. He thrust into her again and again. Her entire being seemed to pull him deeper and deeper into her until she simply could not differentiate where his body stopped and hers began.

He cried out one last time and shoved himself as deep as he would go into her warmth. The walls of her sucked at him, gripping, kneading, pulling him into the very core of her.

Then Tanner’s body shuddered as he poured into her.

They clung to each other, helpless, as wave after wave of the orgasm rippled through them. Binding them together in one blazing, crazy light before expelling them into the infinite beyond.

Gasping, Tanner rolled over, sinking onto his back and taking her with him.

He held her close as her chest heaved. He held her and they listened to the rain and Vanessa thought, What in the hell have I done?

Chapter 3

AS DAWN CREPT IN through the window, Vanessa crept out of bed.

She pulled her dress down over her head and poked her arms through the sleeves, then realized she’d forgotten her bra.

Where was her bra?

Frantically her gaze fell on the bed where the blond Viking she’d picked up at Emilio’s lay on his belly, a pillow thrown over his head. What had seemed like a splendid idea in the heat of last night’s passion was looking more and more like a very big mistake by the cold gray light of morning. Not that she hadn’t enjoyed herself. They’d spent hours exploring each other’s bodies, giving and receiving pleasure after pleasure.

Her cheeks warmed just thinking about it.

It had been great actually. Maybe even the best sex she’d ever had. And he’d stirred something deep inside her. Something she couldn’t identify because it wasn’t like anything she’d ever felt before.

That was most unnerving of all.

Please let me get out of here without him waking up, she pleaded to the heavens. Dropping to the floor, she raised the bed skirt and searched underneath.

No bra.

It was probably in the bed with him.

She did find her panties on the floor and wriggled into them as quietly as she could. A quick trip to the other side of the room retrieved her high heels. She wondered how she had come to be the kind of woman who picked up men in bars for one-night stands. Wondered how she was supposed to handle this casual new way of being. She didn’t know if it was freedom or rock bottom.

Forget the bra. Get out of here. And go jiggling out of the hotel, dressed in last night’s now very rumpled dress? It would be a true walk of shame.

Embarrassing as that might be, she simply had to get away from the smell of their lovemaking and that weird sensation knotting her stomach.

She plunked down in the chair parked at the desk long enough to slip on her stilettos. Bra be damned, she was almost out of here. Once her shoes were on, she stood up, only to be confronted by the sight of the gorgeous Viking sitting up in bed stark naked.

His hair was sexily tousled and his eyes were half-closed, but he was awake and eyeing her as if she was his favorite dish of ice cream. She could almost feel his gaze reach across the room and stroke her.

Gulp.

“Running out on me?”

Inwardly she groaned and dipped her head, unable to look at him. She reached for her purse that had somehow ended up slung across the back of the desk chair. “Hmm, no, not at all,” she lied. “I’ve got a really busy day planned.”

A grin curled the corner of his mouth upward. “Uh-huh, sure you do.”

“I do. I have to get the oil changed in my car, swing by the ATM and take some movies back to Blockbuster.” That was the truth.

“Yeah, your day sounds jam-packed.”

“It is.” She could hear the defensiveness in her own voice. “Well, see ya.” She headed for the door.

“Wait.”

She stifled a sigh and turned around. “Yes?”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“Huh?”

He held up her bra, the thin strap of black material dangling from the tip of his big finger.

Vanessa went for it.

He pulled his hand back, holding the bra out of her reach.

She lunged and lost her balance on the stilettos and ended up tumbling headlong onto the bed.

Vanessa glanced up.

Tanner was looking down.

What she saw in his eyes stunned her. It was a mixture of longing, regret and sadness so deep she could feel it straight to her soul.

But in an instant, the look disappeared, replaced by stark sexual hunger and she almost believed she’d imagined it.

Almost.

The physician part of her brain told her that this man had been using her to salve some secret pain of his own, just as she’d been using him to forget about Carlo Vega. No need reading something more into this than there was.

But the urge to grab him and go at it again was so overwhelming she knew she had to get out of here. Stat.

Anxious to escape, Vanessa scrambled to her feet. But she wasn’t quick enough.

Tanner reached out a hand, encircling her wrist with his strong fingers. “I’d like to see you again.”

She shook her head. “I’m afraid that’s impossible.”

“Impossible?” His touch burned her skin, sent heat flaring up her arm.

Vanessa sucked in her breath. She might be a lot of things but she was no coward. She’d been cornered. She’d tell him the truth.

“Look, Tanner…” she began and tried to tug away from him, but he wasn’t letting go. The man was like a snapping turtle and she found herself wishing for thunder.

“I’m listening.”

“Last night was great. A lot of fun. We met each other’s needs, and I thank you for being there. It’s just that—”

“I’m not good enough to be seen with you in the light of day.”

“No, no.” She shook her head. “That’s not how it is.”

“How is it?”

He had a way of looking at her that made her feel both guilty and empowered. It was an odd sensation.

She cleared her throat. “Look, I don’t normally do things like this. Picking up strangers in a bar.”

“And you think I do?” He wasn’t letting go.

“You don’t?”

He shook his head. “First time.”

His gaze never left her face. He looked so earnest, she believed him. “Okay, here’s the deal. I don’t have room in my life for a relationship.”

“You could make room.”

“Not much.”

“We could take off one afternoon and go kayaking. Or you could call me on those nights when you’re watching movies all alone. I could bring the popcorn.”

It was so tempting. Too damned tempting. Panic fluttered, turning in her chest. “I don’t like popcorn.”

“Sure you do. Everyone likes popcorn. We can even rent Dark Victory.”

“Look, I’d just rather not, okay?”

Abruptly, he let go of her wrist. Vanessa, who’d been pulling against his grip, stumbled backward at the sudden release. She breathed a sigh of relief, even though her skin still tingled from his touch. “Thank you for letting go.”

“Have a nice life,” he said.

“You’re mad.”

“No,” he said. “I’m disappointed.”

“Disappointed?”

“I thought—” He paused. “Never mind what I thought.”

He’d thought they had a special connection? It would have been laughable except for the small knot in her stomach that whispered, I thought we had a special connection, too.

Vanessa had to get out of here before she crawled right back up into bed beside him.

“Take care of yourself, Tanner,” she said, grabbed up her purse and ran out the door.

And you claim not to be a coward.

“SO WHERE WERE YOU last night?”

It was an innocent enough question. Vanessa was supposed to have called Elle last night to make plans for Julie’s birthday, but she’d forgotten. To Vanessa’s ears, Elle’s question sounded like an accusation. She shrugged, not wanting to lie, but not wanting to admit where she’d been. “I got caught up in something.”

“A man’s arms perhaps?” Julie Demarco asked with a teasing gleam in her lively blue eyes.

“You’re such a die-hard romantic,” Vanessa said, effectively dodging her comment.

All three friends worked at Confidential Rejuvenations. The cloistered hospital had been built fifteen years earlier on the banks of the Colorado River. It was owned by a group of private physicians with high social standing and powerful connections in Hollywood, the Austin music industry and Texas politics. It was the place where anyone who was anyone came to receive the very best in specialized medicine and cutting-edge health care.

While their jobs held a degree of glamorous cachet, they were also stressful. To deal with the demands of their professions and the secrets the job forced them to keep, Vanessa, Julie and Elle had formed an after-hours club where they could get together and vent. Sharing their hopes, dreams and fantasies with one another. Today, they were meeting for lunch at a cozy tearoom that also served as an antique store in a genteel area of Austin. Vanessa appreciated her two best friends, but sometimes—like now—she wished that they weren’t so perceptive.

“How are things in the E.R.?” Vanessa asked, hoping to throw Elle off the scent. “Has it calmed down any after what happened with Mark?”

A few months earlier, Elle’s ex-husband Mark Lawson, who had also been one of the co-owners of Confidential Rejuvenations, had been murdered by the gangster he’d been doing business with, selling designer party drugs on the black market. Elle and Dante, an undercover FBI agent who’d been investigating Mark, had barely escaped with their lives.

Elle scowled at the memory. “Things were improving. We’d stopped seeing kids come into the E.R. with overdoses, and we thought all the petty vandalism was over, but last night someone sliced all the tires on the cars in the employee parking lot.”

“Oh, gosh,” Julie said. “The hospital saboteur strikes again?”

Elle blew out her breath. “Apparently.”

Besides the issues with Mark, over the past few months several odd incidents had occurred at the hospital. From anonymous leaks to the press about celebrity patients to an arson fire in the laundry room to items stolen from the kitchen and central supply. Taken one by one, the occurrences were nothing more than criminal mischief, but put together they seemed suspicious, especially with all the security cameras in the hospital. It seemed odd that the perpetrator hadn’t been caught on the monitor.

“Dante told me the hospital board hired a new head of security,” Elle said. “Let’s hope this puts an end to this mess. Confidential Rejuvenations had taken a big financial hit from the fallout over what Mark did. The last thing the hospital needs is more scandal.”

Vanessa nodded. She knew all too well how scandal could ruin lives.

“Anyway,” Julie said. “Back to Nessa’s boyfriend.”

“There is no boyfriend,” Vanessa corrected.