скачать книгу бесплатно
Ariana hated that drink. She’d seen more than her share of inexperienced drinkers get sloshed thanks to the innocent-sounding name. Too bad there wasn’t a drop of tea in the thing. Just vodka, gin, tequila, rum, Collins mix and an ounce of cola for color. “Great, just…”
“No, iced tea. Unsweetened. With lemon.”
As the truth of his claim registered, she stepped up on the lower shelf behind the bar again to look directly into his eyes. His pupils were huge—and passion had nothing to do with it. He was sweating more than he should have been. His jaw was slightly lax.
“You’re sure? You’ve had nothing to drink but iced tea, half a beer and a few sips of my Flaming Eros?”
For a moment she thought she’d given him way too much to think about, but he managed to nod. “I feel kind of weird,” he admitted. “I think I should…”
He pushed off his stool slowly, his hands firmly gripping the bar. If she hadn’t been watching so closely, she might not even have seen him waver when his feet were firmly on the floor.
“You’re not going anywhere.”
Ariana scurried around the bar and caught him before he’d taken a single step toward the door.
“I can walk home,” he reminded her, though he didn’t pull away from the supportive brace of her shoulder beneath his arm.
“Oh, really? You make it to the door without my help and maybe, just maybe, I’ll let you go.” She had absolutely no intention of allowing him to go anywhere by himself, though her idea of seducing him was a great big bust. “You’re not drunk, Max. Someone…someone in my establishment,” she added with increasing anger, “slipped you a Mickey.”
“A Mickey?”
She ignored his question, knowing that after a brief time delay, he’d understand. Someone had drugged him and it certainly hadn’t been her. However, since the event had happened in her place, she could only imagine the trouble that could come just as she was about to break into the international restaurant scene. She’d heard about people using such deception at college parties. She’d read about the practice at raves and in dance clubs. But in a family-style restaurant? A neighborhood bar?
“Why?” he finally asked.
She shifted beneath his weight and guided him toward the door. “I have no idea.” She called to the kitchen, which she suddenly noticed was quiet. She shouted twice more, than leaned Max against the hostess stand and ordered him not to move.
“Uncle Stefano? Paulie?”
The kitchen was empty. The floors were damp and the dishwashers steamed, but no one was around and the back door was bolted tight. She checked the office. Empty. Uncle Stefano and her chef, Paulie, never left without saying goodbye and making sure she had a ride home. It was nearly one o’clock and the last cable car left the turnaround at 12:59.
As she grabbed her backpack from behind her desk, removing the architectural plans and placing them atop the file cabinet, she wondered if Uncle Stefano had seen Max lingering in the bar and assumed she had plans for the night. She didn’t know why he’d make such a ridiculous assumption except that, this time, he might have been right. And he had been hounding her about dating again, even agreeing with Charlie that Max made a good potential suitor. Perhaps Stefano thought she’d finally taken him up on his advice.
“Looks like it’s up to me to take you home.” She closed the office light and grabbed the keys.
Max shook his head, staggered then steadied himself to catch his balance. “Just call me a cab.”
Ariana glanced at the phone, frowning. Yeah, a cab could get him home—he supposedly lived only a few blocks away. But what would happen in the morning when Maxwell Forrester, San Francisco real estate and power broker, woke up with a severe headache, possible memory loss and other unpleasant side effects? What would happen when he realized that she could be held culpable for his condition, even if no one who worked for her was involved? She didn’t know how mad he’d be, but she imagined herself in his place and didn’t like the picture that came into focus.
Negative word of mouth would be the least of her worries. He could call the press, file a lawsuit. If she lost her liquor license, even for the briefest time during an investigation, her business would be dead in the water. She’d invested in the reopening every asset she and her uncle held. She couldn’t risk what had happened to Max—though through no fault of her own—jeopardizing her future.
She’d planned to take Max home tonight. No sense in changing the blueprint of her original plan this late in the construction.
“If we hurry, we can make the last cable car. Your place is…”
She moved to slip her arms beneath his again, but this time he caught her off guard. With one hand balanced on the hostess stand, he used the other to brush a strand of hair from her cheek. The friction of his fingernail against her skin was not unlike the lighting of the match. Heat flared where he’d touched her, so gently, so softly and yet with a pyrotechnic flash of instantaneous desire.
“Ariana,” was all he said, four syllables on a deep-throated breath scented with anise, teasing her skin, fanning the flame she’d not so effectively tamped down just moments before. “I don’t think I’ve ever said your name before,” he said, curling the strand behind her ear, skimming her suddenly sensitive flesh as he thread his fingers into her hair.
She blinked, wondering if the mystery drug was the reason for his sudden interest, and if it was, wondering if she cared.
“I like the way you say it,” she admitted, liking also the feel of his hand bracing her neck, his chest pressing closer and closer to hers so that the edge of his tie skimmed across her nipples. Her breasts tingled. Her breath caught. His arousal pressed through his slacks, taunting her. In the morning, he might not remember ever wanting her.
And again, she wondered if she cared.
“You’re incredibly beautiful, Ariana. I’ve wanted to tell you that for a long time.”
“Why didn’t you?” she asked instantly, wincing when she realized that she might not want to know the answer.
His smile was crooked, tilted slightly higher on the left side. Still, the grin lacked the sardonic effect such an uneven slant might have on anyone else. Her insides clenched in a futile attempt to rein in her response—a cross between a magnetic pull and a bone-deep hunger for a man who was, in reality, a stranger.
Only he didn’t feel like a stranger anymore, and he hadn’t for a long while.
“Union Street,” he answered.
“What?”
He hadn’t answered her question, wasn’t making sense.
He pushed away from her slightly. “You asked where I lived. On Union.”
She nodded. Right. Get him home and to bed—though not at all in the way she’d originally intended.
“THIS IS INCREDIBLE!”
Max heard his voice echo beneath the clanging grind of the cable car, not certain he’d intended to share such an exuberant sentiment aloud. Yet when Ariana glanced over her shoulder and rewarded him with a smile that crinkled the corners of her eyes and flashed the whiteness of her teeth, he was glad he had.
“Haven’t you ever ridden a cable car before?”
Max couldn’t remember. He must have, but never like this. Against Ariana’s wishes, he stood on the side step, one hand gripping the polished brass pole, the other aching to wrap around her slim waist and tug her close, back against him. So she could feel his hard-on. And know he wanted her.
And God, he wanted her.
So what was stopping him? He was sure there had been some reason at some time, but he couldn’t remember and he certainly didn’t care. The crisp San Francisco night air, clouded with a late-night fog, trailed through her nearly waist-length hair and fluttered the glossy strands toward him. The tendrils teased him with a scent part exotic floral, part crisp ocean—and all woman.
Without thought, he did as he desired, slipping his hand around her waist and stepping against her full and flush.
She stiffened slightly and nearly pulled away.
“I want to hold you,” he said, beginning to accept that simple thoughts and simple explanations were all he could manage while intoxicated by whatever she’d said someone had put in his drink. He doubted her claim anyway. She had drugged him all right, but no pharmaceutical agent was involved.
She didn’t protest when he curled his right arm completely around her waist, careful to remember that he had to hang on to the cable car with his left. His brain was fuddled, but his heightened senses compensated for his total lack of control.
He fanned his fingers across her midsection. The texture of her ribbed shirt felt like trembling flesh. When he brushed his fingertips beneath the swell of her breasts, her back firmed, then relaxed, then pressed closer against him.
He dipped his head to whisper in her ear, “I want to touch you.”
The cable car rocked and shimmied to a brief halt. A clanging bell blocked her reply, if she’d made one, but when the car moved again, she turned around and traded her handhold on the brass pole for a firm grip around his waist.
“Where?” she asked.
She’d pulled her cap low and tight, so the dark brim pushed her bangs down to frame her large eyes. She bent her neck back to see his face, exposing an inviting curve of skin from the tip of her chin to the sensual arc of her throat.
His mouth felt cottony, but the desire in her eyes spurred a moisture that made him swallow deep. He ran his slick tongue over his lips and when she mirrored the move herself, his blood surged.
“Where will you touch me?” she asked again.
He blinked, a thousand thoughts racing through a brain too thick to harness them. The mantra “location, location, location” played silently in his mind then drifted away. Every single place he wanted to touch her—her lips, her throat, her shoulders, her breasts, her belly and beyond—seemed too intimate, too private to speak aloud.
He’d just have to show her.
He shook his head, grinning when his dizziness sent him swaying. She gripped him even tighter, giving him an excuse to dip his hold lower, over the swell of her backside, another place he most desperately wanted to touch with his hands and lips and tongue.
Max decided then and there that he had to accept his current limitations. As he had his entire life, he had to work with his immediate circumstances and the most basic skills at his disposal. His ability to speak was severely hampered. Forming a complex thought was out of the question. But he still had his instincts—natural, unguarded responses to basic, inherent needs. Hers and his.
“I’m going to touch you wherever you want me to.”
Her smile was tentative, a little surprised and entirely fascinating—as if he’d said something that shocked her.
“What if that doesn’t mean what you think it does?”
He shook his head. Processing that puzzle of a comment was impossible in his condition. He didn’t even consider trying.
“Whatever that means, I’m game. I’m in no condition to be in charge tonight. You’re going to have to tell me what to do.”
She chuckled. The sound was warm and deep and soothing like the liqueurs she’d poured in his drink, like the passions he’d kept in check for way too long.
“You may regret that,” she quipped.
Somehow, he doubted he’d regret anything about tonight, especially when the cable car slowed at Union Street and she jumped off the car and crooked her finger into his waistband to tug him to follow. So what if someone had supposedly doctored his drink, making his mind so fuzzy he had a hell of a time remembering his address? So what if some crucial reason, currently out of reach, existed why he shouldn’t let this incredibly sensuous woman take him home?
But no thought, no logic, no amount of reason could override the surge of power he felt even as she fairly dragged him up the sidewalk. He was going to make love to this mysterious woman with the sassy black hat.
Just as soon as he remembered where the hell he lived.
3
ARIANA SLID HER HAT off her head. Her backpack came down off her shoulder with it, but she held tight to the strap so it didn’t touch the polished marble floor. She wasn’t exactly a rube from some hick town, but standing in Maxwell Forrester’s living room certainly made her feel like one. She’d expected wealth, not sheer opulence.
Everything was white. Pure white. The carpet, the furniture, the walls. Do-not-step-on-or-touch-me white. Glass cases of crystal sculpture reflected sparkling rainbow prisms, but the color was icy, precise. Only Max, a mass of gray and brown and flesh tone who shuffled in front of her before he flopped on the couch, shedding shoes and jacket and tie along the way, warmed the room with subtle invitation.
“Could you dim the lights? I had no idea I’d installed three-hundred-watt bulbs in my living room.”
Ariana grinned. Filthy-stinking-rich or not, Max was in bad shape and needed her help. They’d walked nearly three blocks to his house and, with each step, the playfulness he’d enticed her with on the cable car had begrudgingly faded away. Right now he was in no condition to tell her where the light switch was, never mind detailing how and where he was going to seduce her. Maybe things were working out for the best. She would dim the lights, make sure he was comfortable and get the heck out of Dodge before she made a huge mistake.
But first she had to find the light switch. She searched fruitlessly, soon realizing that when they’d first come in, Max hadn’t flipped any switches. He’d opened the door, they’d walked in and, snap, the lights had flared to life.
Oh, great. A house that was smarter than she was.
She backed up in the foyer and reluctantly laid her ratty leather backpack in the corner closest to the door and propped her hat on top, running her fingers through her windblown hair while she scanned the wall for a control panel that simply had to exist.
“Ariana? Are you still here?”
His voice was a mere whisper, but the sound still stopped her, warmed her—frightened the hell out of her. There was no mistaking the sound of hope mingling with the possibility of utter disappointment if she didn’t answer, if she’d abandoned him in his glittering marble palace.
She found the switches behind a thick drape and slid the controls until the recessed lights shone like subtle moonlight rather than like the outfield at Candlestick Park.
“I’m here. Is that better?”
He’d removed his arm from across his eyes, then slid his elbows along his sides and propped himself up. “Now I can’t see you.”
She remained in the foyer, her boots firmly planted.
“What’s to see?”
The only thing coming in clear to her was the fact that she couldn’t seduce Max Forrester. Not tonight. Maybe not ever. And she couldn’t let him seduce her. Could she? She must have lost her ever-lovin’ mind. She obviously didn’t belong here—with him—even temporarily. She was just a middle-class Greek chick trying to make a name for herself in the big city. He lived in a world she didn’t understand and, therefore, couldn’t control.
This was all a very big mistake.
“I said I’d get you home safe and sound. I should—”
“Don’t leave.”
For a man muddled by an unknown substance, he could issue a command with all the authority of a mogul, yet all the vulnerability of a man lost in a foreign land. She couldn’t leave him—not, at least, until she was certain he’d be okay.
Somewhere between leaving the restaurant and sprinting to catch the last cable car, the desire that had deserted her when she thought he was merely drunk had crept back under her skin. The mystery substance made him dizzy, yes, but it also loosened his tongue and his inhibitions. The way he teased her on the ride, touched her, innocently and yet with utter skill, fired her senses and fed her fantasies.
If she forgot about the million-dollar town house, the imported sculptures, the computer-controlled light switches and focused only on the man, the possibility of making love to him didn’t seem so impossible. Just…simple. Elemental. A fact of life in the wild, sexy city they called home.
Still, she held back, even while her mind said, This is it. Her chance of all chances to step onto the snowy carpet, shed her own jacket and make her fantasies come true. Heck, Max was already in a semireclined position. He’d already detailed several delightful means to “get to know each other better”. How hard could a seduction be at this point?
But even if he wasn’t drunk, he was, technically, “under the influence.” If and when she and Max explored their mutual attraction, she wanted no regrets—from either of them.
“You don’t know me, Max.”
His grin lit his face, contrasting against the shadows all around him. “I’d like to remedy that.”
His smile wavered at the same time as his balance. He slid his arms down, plopping back onto the cushions of the long couch and letting out a deep-throated groan. “Just my luck. I have the most beautiful woman in San Francisco standing in my doorway and I’m too dizzy to seduce her.”
She laughed at the wry turn in his voice—until his words actually sunk in. Those drugs sure were powerful. The most beautiful woman in San Francisco?
She crossed her arms over her chest. Doubt and hope clashed in a war that resulted in her usual sarcasm. “You don’t get out much, do you?”
He turned his head on the leather cushion. “Ariana, come closer. I’m in no condition to attack you, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”
“I’m not afraid,” she insisted, straightening her backbone, crossing her arms tighter and nearly stamping her foot on the tile. She wasn’t afraid of anything, or anyone. Except, perhaps, of herself…with Max.
He shook his head and chuckled. The sound, like warm molasses, sweetened her indignation into humor, despite her preference to remain offended and aloof. Safe.
