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She closed her eyes for a split second, her shoulders seeming to droop. He had to check the urge to reach out and steady her.
“I was wrong when I said you were controlling,” she told him.
Progress? He felt hope rise.
“You’re not controlling. You are excruciatingly goal-oriented.”
She made it sound like a flaw.
“It only comes across as controlling,” she continued, “because you try to drag the rest of the world along with you.”
“Sometimes the world needs a little dragging.”
Take Devin. She could get an extra hour of sleep tonight, or she could agree with him on a nanny and get extra sleep from here on in. It was a no-brainer to Lucas.
“Sometimes you have to stop and smell the roses,” she told him.
“They don’t bloom until July,” he pointed out.
Devin cracked a small smile at that, even as she shook her head. Then she reached for her laptop case, and Lucas automatically reached out to lift it for her, brushing her shoulder with his forearm as he leaned around her.
The touch was electric, and he reflexively jerked away. The action brought the front of his thigh against the side of hers, and sexual energy jump-started his body.
What was the matter with him?
Sure, she was a gorgeous woman. But he’d been careful to keep that in perspective. He had no call, no business, no right to think of her as anything other than an obstruction. He wanted Amelia, and Devin was in his way. Wanting Devin was nowhere in the plan.
He sucked in a breath, lifting her laptop, drawing away. Wanting Devin? No way. Not going there. Not ever.
Devin followed on Lucas’s heels as he carried her laptop along the wide hallway on the main floor of the mansion. Her shoulder and thigh still buzzed from their contact. Was that really the first time he’d touched her? Ever?
She searched her brain, but she couldn’t remember another occasion. And apparently, the experience would have been seared into her spinal column.
“You can use this one as an office,” he was saying as they neared the front foyer. He opened a door off the hall, revealing a small library.
He hit the light switch, and a desk lamp came on, bathing the room in a soft glow.
The library’s walls were lined with ornate wooden shelves and what looked like an eclectic selection of books. There was a rosewood desk, a patterned area rug and two cream-colored wingback chairs with ottomans that complemented a compact leather chair positioned behind the desk. The room was surprisingly feminine, with touches of pattern china and figurines placed beside the books, and the occasional watercolor seascape recessed into the shelves.
“My mother used to like this room,” said Lucas.
“Are you sure you want me to use it?” She’d been complaining about her deadline to make a point, and to have an excuse to go to bed. She hadn’t intended for Lucas to try to solve her problem.
“Yes. Of course.” He set her laptop on the desk and turned to face her where she stood a few steps into the room. “You need somewhere quiet to concentrate.”
“Once Amelia is asleep—”
He leaned back against the desk, bracing his hands on either side. “You said you had a deadline.” “I do.”
“Then you’ll let the nanny monitor Amelia, and you will—”
“Are you trying to keep me away from Amelia?” His brows went up in obvious shock. “No,” he answered simply.
She was inclined to believe him, and she felt her guard go down a notch.
“Then, what are you doing?” she asked. Why did he care about her deadline?
“I’m offering you a place to work.”
She studied his expression, the tight mouth, cool slate eyes, dark imposing brow. “You’re being nice to me,” she accused.
“So?”
“So, it’s out of character. So, I’m trying to figure out what you’re up to.”
“I’m not a monster, Devin.”
The sound of her name made her chest go tight. “But you are rather cold-blooded.”
Silence followed her words.
Then he straightened away from the desk. He took a step toward her, then another, and another. A glow of awareness crept into his eyes. “Devin,” he whispered. “At the moment, I am not feeling even remotely cold-blooded.”
She tipped her chin to look at him. For the life of her, she couldn’t come up with a retort.
He smelled fresh as a sea breeze. His skin was shaved close, his hair neatly trimmed and his gray eyes flecked with silver. His softened lips captured her undivided attention.
“What are you doing?” she managed to rasp. She ordered her legs to move, to leave, to flee, but they didn’t obey.
“I wish I knew.”
His index finger touched the bottom of her chin. His breath puffed, soft and sweet, as his head tilted sideways. “We can’t,” she murmured.
There was absolutely no doubting his intentions. But she found herself subconsciously stretching up. Her skin flushed hot. Her eyes fluttered closed. Then his lips brushed hers.
His arm snaked around the small of her back, tugging her to him, pulling her flat against his chest.
He swooped down and kissed her deeply. Her body instantly responded. Her arms wound around his neck. Her head tipped sideways. Her lips parted, tongue tangling.
An eternity later, as the blood pounded through her brain and arousal peaked across every inch of her body, Lucas suddenly broke the kiss. His breathing was loud, and she could swear she heard his heartbeat matching her own.
“Turns out,” he gasped, clasping her upper arms firmly and putting some space between them, “we can.”
Embarrassment washed over her.
She bit down on the heat of her lower lip and finger-combed her short hair back into submission, mortified that she let him kiss her, that she’d kissed him back, enthusiastically.
It would have been bad enough if she hadn’t liked it. But oh, dear, she had really, really liked it. She struggled to bring her hormones back into submission.
Like she had while they were jogging, she was completely off her pace, out of control. Her world was spinning wildly around her, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
“That was bad,” she told him, shaking her head. “That was stupid. We are not going to let this happen again.”
They absolutely could not go around falling into each other’s arms, kissing each other, getting lost in passion when there were serious issues between them.
It was important they came to an agreement on that. He didn’t respond. “Lucas,” she prompted.
His eyes focused on her. “What? You want me to lie?”
Four (#ulink_b24b25d4-e378-592b-ba97-a48e613bebd3)
Devin had escaped the Demarco mansion first thing the next morning, taking Amelia in her car and heading to Lake Westmire, well away from any possibility of a chance encounter with Lucas. She decided she would check on her plants, pack a few more of Amelia’s clothes, listen to any messages on her answering machine and double-check the fridge for anything that might spoil during the few weeks she’d be away.
Lexi stopped by the house during Amelia’s afternoon nap. She convinced Devin to join her for a catamaran ride across the bay once the baby woke up. Devin was happy with the excuse to extend her visit. She decided that after the sail, she’d give Amelia her dinner, freshen her up in a bath and then let her fall asleep on the way back to the Demarco mansion.
Out on the lake, in her little swimsuit and a cotton cover-up, Amelia sat happily between Devin’s legs, bouncing on the catamaran’s trampoline deck. When the cool water splashed up through the springy, open-knit fabric, she grabbed at it with her hands, giggling when it disappeared from her little fingers.
“Define kiss,” said Lexi, adjusting the main sail with practiced maneuvers as she changed their direction and they skimmed out across the rippling water.
“A regular kiss,” said Devin.
“On the lips.”
“Yes.” Devin wasn’t sure anything else would have been noteworthy. Though she supposed Lucas kissing her on the cheek or forehead would have been pretty weird, too.
“Full frontal hugging?” asked Lexi.
“Yes,” Devin admitted. And, wow, that had been one great hug.
“Groping?”
“No,” she quickly denied.
“But the kiss was good?” Lexi persisted.
“The kiss was great,” Devin confirmed on a huge sigh of frustration. It would probably go down in the record books as one of her all-time favorite kisses. Whatever his ethics, whatever his conduct, Lucas Demarco knew how to kiss a woman.
She compulsively rolled one of the webbing straps on Amelia’s life jacket into a tight spiral, then she let it spring back open in her hand. “But I don’t get why he did it.” The question had plagued her all night long.
“Sometimes guys don’t have a reason,” Lexi offered, swooping some loose strands of hair back from her face as the wind grew stronger. “They take random action. And, when it comes to sex, they’re ruled by their primal brains.”
“Number one, it wasn’t sex. And number two, Lucas is not a random guy.” And Devin doubted his primal brain ruled any of his actions. “He’s logical, organized and compulsively goal-oriented. When he does something, it’s for a reason.”
“Do you really think you need to add paranoia to this situation?” Lexi pushed hard on the tiller.
The boat canted to one side, and Devin braced herself with a rope handle, holding tight to Amelia. “It doesn’t count as paranoia, when they truly are out to get you.”
Lexi rocked her head back and forth, obviously considering the merits of Devin’s point.
“I’ve been thinking,” Devin added, completely convinced that Lucas’s kiss was part of some well thought out, detailed plan to gain an advantage over her. “I’m not going to just sit back and wait for his next move.”
She anchored her white baseball cap on her head. “If all I do is react to his maneuvers, then I’m going to lose. That’s what happened in the temporary guardianship hearing. He had a plan. I didn’t. And it cost me.”
Lexi loosened the sail. “So, what are you going to do?”
“Make a plan,” Devin answered logically.
“No kidding, Sherlock. What kind of a plan?”
“I’m going to need your help with that.”
It needed to be devious, brilliant, but the simpler the better. It needed to paint Lucas into a corner, but he couldn’t see it coming.
“You could kiss him again,” Lexi offered. “That’s the best you can do?”
“You’d turn the tables on him. You’re a gorgeous woman, you know.”
Devin could see where Lexi was going with this. But is wasn’t something she’d be able to pull off. “I’m not exactly a vamp.”
Lexi’s voice was laced with laughter. “But you could be. You glam up good. I’ll lend you a dress. We’ll do your makeup, get you some sleep-with-me heels, mess around with your hair.”
Devin chuckled in return. “And then what? “
“And then he’s putty in your hands.”
“And…?”
“A little pillow talk. You learn his secrets.” Devin splashed some water at Lexi. “I’m not going to sleep with him.”
“Of course not. Just, you know, put on some sexy clothes, give him a couple of come-hither looks. If you can learn something useful about Konrad—or about Lucas for that matter—you can take it to court.”
Lexi leaned far back to balance the boat in a freshening wind. Devin tightened her hold on Amelia and shifted her weight to help out. The sail rippled loudly in the wind.
“It might work,” Devin called to Lexi. “I find concrete proof that Lucas and Konrad plotted Amelia’s birth for their own financial ends, and I’m home free.”
Lexi slowed the boat down as they neared her beach. “And if he’s already playing you on the sexual front?”
“Then I’ll lull him into a false sense of security.” Devin wasn’t scared. Okay, she was a little intimidated at the thought of playing sexual politics with Lucas. But it was for a good cause, and she’d simply have to make sure she kept her wits about her.
Lexi turned the boat for home. “You should also snoop through his house.”
“I’ve been thinking about talking to the staff,” said Devin. “Just idle chitchat. I’m not going to grill them or anything. And, hey, if there’s something interesting lying out there in plain sight…”
Lexi shot her a conspiratorial grin.
“I refuse to sit back and do nothing,” Devin defended.
“You have my complete support,” said Lexi. “Besides, he’s the one who forced you to stay there in the first place.”
