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Kelly frowned. “Where are you going?”
“It’s been a pleasure, sweetness,” Tate responded, tossing an amused look at Ryan.
Kelly’s frowned deepened. “You’re leaving?”
Tate glanced at Ryan. “I’d ask him.”
Ryan and Kelly both watched as Tate moved off toward the door, then Kelly swung to face Ryan.
“You chased him off,” she accused.
“No chasing was involved.”
“Thanks a lot,” she muttered. “It’s none of your business.”
She took another swallow of her drink, then looked surprised when she came up short.
Ryan watched as she signaled the bartender.
“Don’t you think you should go easy?” he asked.
“I’m not talking to you.”
He sighed and settled down on the bar stool beside her, opposite the one where Tate had been sitting. Clearly, she wasn’t going to make this simple.
“If you’re looking for some action, why don’t you go after the guy you really want?” he challenged.
She surveyed him. “I don’t want you.”
He arched a brow. “That wasn’t the case when you were moaning in my arms.”
Her lips pursed. “Go away.”
“Can’t. That option isn’t available to you.”
They sat without talking for close to an hour. She made vain attempts to flirt with other men, but Ryan knew his presence—like a dragon at the gate—would keep them away.
He’d have to put a stop to this at some point soon. She was obviously a drinking lightweight and, despite the sex-on-heels outfit, she seemed unaccustomed to the bar scene.
Finally he watched as she finished her drink and tossed a look his way. He looked back at her.
“You’re cute, you know?” she said, her voice a little slurred.
He arched an eyebrow. “Some have said so.”
Now this was an interesting turn in the conversation.
She tilted her head and touched his hair. “You’ve got wonderfully thick, dark hair.”
He stiffened at her touch, and want shot through him.
“Such deep, dark eyes.” She sighed, then pronounced, “Mysterious.”
She looked back at his hair and said sadly, “You’d have beautiful hair if you kept it longer than almost military length.”
An unbidden smile tugged at his lips. Nobody used a soft, frilly word like beautiful for him. And though he knew it was the alcohol talking, he felt his body grow taut in response.
She leaned toward him but, when it seemed as if she was about to lose her balance, his hand shot out to steady her, clamping down on her thigh—and staying there.
They both looked down, then she looked up and met his gaze.
“Nice hands, too,” she said huskily.
He could see the lovely rays of golden-brown in her hazel eyes and his hand tightened on her leg.
Then he caught himself. He wasn’t here so she could hit on him. He was here so he knew she got home okay.
“Let’s go,” he said.
She sat back. “Go?” she echoed. “Well, that’s direct.”
“You’re slurring your words.” He called over the bartender, then covered their tab plus a hefty tip.
She hopped off the bench, showing off mile-long legs and he sent up a prayer for resistance he didn’t have.
Then, because she teetered on her heels, he took her arm. And when that didn’t seem to do the trick, he bent in one quick motion and swung her into his arms.
She gasped and he could feel every luscious curve of her pressed into him.
He moved toward the front door, and one of the other patrons opened it for him.
He glanced down at her as he walked over the gravel drive to his car. “You know,” he said wryly, “I think I like you better drunk.”
“You know, I think I like you better when I’m drunk.” She frowned, concentrating. “Wait. Did I say that right?”
He smiled. “It came out okay.”
She looked at his car. “A black Mercedes. I wasn’t surprised you drive a Mercedes. You’ve always had money.”
He ignored the comment about money. Dangerous territory, he decided, right before he set her down—against the car, just in case.
He got the front passenger door open. “In you go.”
She looked around, perplexed. “Where’s my car?”
“Doesn’t matter. You’re in no shape to drive.”
“Hmm … I guess I agree?”
Then, because she chose to just stand there and he was getting impatient, he picked her up and put her in the front seat.
He reached across her for the seat belt and strapped her in, all the while brushing against her, picking up her scent and testing his endurance even more.
“What’s the perfume you’re wearing?” he asked roughly.
She smiled. “Sin.”
“Of course.”
He closed the passenger door and went around the front of the car.
On the drive over to the lodge, she was chatty. She yawned a few times, too, tiredness winning out over the alcohol.
“You’re not as bad as you seem,” she observed after an interlude.
Her words came out sleepy, and he glanced at her, taking his eyes off the road for a moment. She was striving to keep her eyes open.
“You’re doing a good deed by staying at the lodge. Hunter Palmer was your friend and you’ll be helping sick people.”
“It’s my good deed for the decade,” he disavowed. “I’m as low and slimy as you think.”
If she was calling even him nice, she must really be tired or wasted or both.
Six
When they got to the lodge, Ryan pulled into the garage and got Kelly upstairs to the guest suite next to the master bedroom.
Once there, she sat on the bed and looked around. “This room is so pretty. I hope I can do as good a job with the rooms I’m decorating.”
“I’m sure you will,” he reassured her.
“Do you think so?” she asked hopefully.
He nodded.
There was not much else he could say. The room they were in looked fine to him. Maybe it was because he came from money and took it all for granted, but he’d never been too interested in the aesthetics of his surroundings.
He regarded Kelly. “Are you okay getting undressed and into bed by yourself?”
She flopped back onto the bed so that she was lying in it. “Of course.”
He sighed, then reached out and grasped her hands to pull her back to a sitting position. “Okay, sweetness, let’s really get you ready for bed.”
With her cooperation, he got her shoes off, tugged off her skirt and breathed a sigh of relief when it turned out she was wearing a strapless bra beneath her halter top.
Undressing her was pure torture. He was just glad she was too tired and inebriated to turn up the heat on him even more.
“I’m just like my mother,” she said as he tossed her clothes onto a nearby chair.
He stopped because her comment came out of nowhere. “What?”
She looked forlorn. “I’m being undressed by a man I met in a bar.”
He wanted to point out that they’d known each other before tonight and that he had no intention of taking her to bed—he just wanted to put her in one.
“No matter how hard I try,” she said sorrowfully, “I can never escape my mother’s past.”
Now that he could relate to. Hell, he’d been trying to escape his legacy for more years than he could count.
Aloud, he said, trying to offer some solace, “You’re not the only one.”
He pulled back the bedcovers and she slid her legs underneath them. Without delay, he tugged the covers up, hiding her tantalizing body from view.
She sank back against the pillows and closed her eyes, and he expelled a breath.
In a moment, however, her eyes opened again. “You forgot to take off my bra.”
He clenched his jaw. “I didn’t forget.” He mentally ran through explanations. “There are no pajamas here for you to wear, so you’ll have to sleep in your bra.”
The logic wasn’t great, but he hoped in her current foggy state, she’d let it pass.
“Hmm,” she said, and in the next second, sat up and reached behind her.
Her luscious breasts sprang free.
He couldn’t help himself. He took it all in hungrily.
Her breasts were round and firm and capped with tight, dusky pink nipples.
Kelly dropped the bra to the side and lay back down, pulling up the covers as she did so.
“I’ve never had a man look at them like that before,” she murmured, her eyes drifting closed. “But then, I’ve never been to bed with a man before, either.” After a moment, she added more faintly, “Well, one guy. Once or twice. But he didn’t stay the night.”
His mind churned with questions, but her peaceful expression told him she’d fallen asleep.
She had dropped quite a few bombshells on him tonight, but damned if she hadn’t left the biggest for last.
Kelly woke with a headache.
She moaned and pressed her head into the pillow.
Some of the events of the night before came back and she reflected that she’d drunk more at the White Fir than she’d ever put back at one go in her life.
Making a note to herself that those apple martinis were potent stuff, she finally opened her eyes and looked around.
It took a moment to register she was in the already-furnished guest suite at the lodge.
Her heart seized and she bolted to a sitting position … then moaned again and cupped her forehead.
