Strong And Sexy

Chapter 14

Slipping down onto the couch, Dani found herself stuck in place like a deer caught in headlights.

“Dani?”

“She’s not here.” Sinking farther into herself, she closed her eyes. “She…left the building.”

“Uh-huh.” Shayne shut the door. She heard the lock click into place.

“Go away.”

“Not until I leave a message. Tell Dani that Shayne came by.”

“Shayne? The pilot? The, what did the business card read, president of operations?”

He sighed. “Saw that, did you?”

“Hard to miss. It was embossed in gold.”

“Maddie’s doing.”

“President of operations, Shayne. Not just a pilot. Not by a long shot.”

“There’s other things to talk about,” he said. “Like why the hell is your door unlocked?”

Scrunched down as far as possible, the ice cream and spoon still in her hand, she was rooted to the spot by several facts.

One, she was wearing huge pity-party sweats.

Two, she’d gone through nearly half the ice cream already and the sugar high was quickly turning to wooziness, a direct cause of number three.

Which was why at just the sound of his irritated voice, her entire body had gone on high red-alert status, including nipples hardening, belly quivering, and a whole host of other things too.

Good God, she was worse than Pavlov’s dog. “You’re supposed to knock.”

“I did.”

“And wait for a response!” Craning her neck, she took a peek. She couldn’t help herself.

Yep.

There he was, in the flesh. Wearing his pilot gear, which consisted of blue trousers, a white button-down shoved up at the elbows with Sky High’s logo on a hard pec, and aviator sunglasses, which at the sight of her he pulled off. That meant that those piercing light brown eyes landed directly on her without any barrier.

Great. So much better.

Except not. With a groan, she sank farther down in the couch and tried to vanish.

Shayne frowned at the couch. What the hell was she doing? Besides avoiding his calls.

Then the couch spoke. “Why are you here?”

“Good question.”

“If you don’t know-”

“Oh, I know why I’m here. Why the hell didn’t you return my calls?”

“Well-”

“And why the hell is your door unlocked?”

“You already asked that.”

“Still waiting for an answer that makes sense.”

“Fine. I got a little distracted.”

Tired of talking to the couch, he came around the front of the couch to face her. She wore green monster face paint on her face. Her hair had gone wild on top of her head, though he could see another yellow number-two pencil in there trying to hold it all together. Her entire lower body had been swallowed whole by a pair of sweats that looked like they might belong on a four-hundred-pound rapper. And then there was the ice cream, and not just a bowl either, but an entire gallon.

That was some serious ice cream consumption. “Bad time?” he asked.

“Yes, actually.” She bristled a bit, which looked comical in green. “I’m…” She shoved the wooden spoon and ice cream behind her back, as if he hadn’t already seen them. “Busy.”

“Ah.”

At that, she lifted her chin, playing the I-don’t-care-that-I-look-like-shit game. Good tactic, one he might have taken himself, though he doubted he’d have looked even half as adorable as she while playing it.

“Very busy,” she added.

A drop of the green mask fell from her nose and plopped to her camisole top.

“Very, very busy,” she added, her voice a bit smaller now as she tried to surreptitiously rub the green into her sweats.

So damned adorable. “I can see that.” He said this with an utterly straight face, but she rolled her eyes, set down the ice cream and the spoon, and got to her feet.

“I wasn’t expecting company,” she said pointedly, looking at the door.

“You didn’t return my phone calls.”

“No, I didn’t.” She took in his expression and shook her head. “That’s never happened to you before, has it?”

He rubbed his jaw while trying to decide the right answer to that.

She laughed again, then put her hands to her face. “This is drying. Don’t make me laugh, I’ll crack.”

In his pocket, his cell phone vibrated, but he ignored it. He didn’t have a flight, and everything else could wait. “You smell like avocados.”

“Why are you here again?”

“Are you kidding me? Last night you thought you saw a murder.”

“I’m sure that happens.”

“No, actually. It doesn’t happen. Then you had someone in this very apartment.”

“I might have been mistaken about that part.”

“And you were shot at. You weren’t mistaken about that.”

She went on the defensive, in her big sweats and green face mask. “How do you know they weren’t shooting at you, Shayne? You ever think of that?”

He gave her a long look, and with a sigh, she plopped back to the couch. “Okay, fine. What’s your point?”

“My point is…” Actually, he had no idea. She turned him upside down and sideways, with seemingly little effort. He shouldn’t have come, and yet not coming hadn’t been an option.

Hunkering down at her side, he looked into her face. Her green face. “A call back might have eased my mind.”

“Okay, well, I’m sorry about that.”

“Something might have happened to you.”

“It didn’t.”

“I was worried.”

She blinked, as if that hadn’t occurred to her. “Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.”

She looked down into the ice cream on the coffee table, and then at him, and this time, her eyes had warmed. “I’m sorry.”

“It never occurred to you I might be concerned?”

“That’s not what I thought you were calling for.”

“What did you think I was calling for?”

Her telephone rang, shattering the sudden silence. Looking relieved to be saved by the bell, she got up, flashing him a very brief view of the top of a pale blue thong before she yanked up the slipping sweats and stalked toward the telephone.

He sank to the couch and tried to concentrate past that pale blue. He’d come to make sure she was okay. Now that he could see that she was, he could leave.

Should leave.

Damn it. He didn’t want to.

Dani frowned at the phone, then hung it up.

“Wrong number?” Shayne asked, sitting on her couch like he belonged.

“No one was there.” She felt him watching her. “A hang-up.”

“Do you have caller ID?”

“No.”

“You need caller ID, Dani.”

With a sigh, she plopped at his side on the couch, tilted her head back and stared up at the ceiling. “I know. But for now, I’d like to keep pretending that it was just a wrong number.”

He put a hand on her leg. Her entire body went back on high alert.

“Back to my earlier question,” he murmured. “What did you think I came here for?”

It wasn’t easy to think past the hand he had on her knee. In fact, it was impossible.

“Dani?”

She sighed. “A booty call.”

“A booty call.”

She lifted his gaze to his, and for the longest beat he just looked at her, clearly surprised.

Okay, now she didn’t know which was worse. That she’d said it out loud, or that she’d been wrong.

“A booty call,” he repeated. “Jesus.”

She tried to get up, but he pressed a hand to her leg, holding her still. She closed her eyes. “My being mistaken makes me an even bigger loser than sitting here with a mask on, halfway through a gallon of ice cream all by myself.”

“Now, see, you didn’t have to admit that part.” She felt him lean forward, look into the carton. “Wow. You weren’t kidding.”

“Please. Just go out the door and pretend you weren’t ever here.”

“Dani.”

She didn’t answer.

“Dani.”

With a sigh, she opened her eyes and looked at him.

“I just want to get this straight. First you were upset because you thought I was calling for a-as you so eloquently put it-booty call. And now you’re upset because I wasn’t?”

“That’s right. I’m just doing my best to live up to my crazy reputation.” She walked to the door and opened it in invitation for him to leave. It was hard to maintain her dignity with the mask cracking all over her face, her hair falling out of its tenuous hold and into her face, and also into her face mask, ew, but she did her best.

“You really want me to leave?” he asked in shocked disbelief. Clearly, this was another first for him. “Why?”

Not expecting the question, she could only stare at him as he rose to his feet and slowly walked toward her. When their toes were touching, he reached around her and shut the door.

Locked it.

Okay, this was where she said something. Anything. “Um.” Oh, um. Yeah, that was brilliant. Really.

He ran a finger over her temple, pushing a strand of hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear, then taking that finger on a slow, seductive tour down her throat.

“S-Shayne-”

“Why, Dani?”

“Because.” She cleared her throat. “Because I’m not interested.”

“Bullshit.”

“Okay, because you don’t repeat.”

Finger still on her, he went still, gaze lifting to hers.

Yep. That should do it. Any second now he’d walk out. It made her heart hurt to think of it, because despite her horror at being caught in the middle of a pity party, she didn’t want to be alone.

More than that. No matter what she’d told him, she wanted his company. His. “Right?” she pressed. “You don’t repeat, and I tend to do exactly that, so really, this thing is done.”

“Dani.”

Holding her breath, she locked her gaze on his. “Do you repeat, Shayne? Yes or no.”

“No, but-”

“No buts necessary.”

“But,” he said again, softly. “I have a feeling this is different. You’re different.”

She stared at him. “Is that good or bad?”

“I haven’t gotten that far yet.” He glanced back at the ice cream. “So this whole ice cream and movie thing. Is it a party for one?”

“A pity party, you mean. And yeah. It’s for one.”

Holding her gaze with his for a beat, his mouth quirked, a dimple flashed. Then he broke the eye contact and leaned in so that his mouth brushed her ear. “How about one plus one?”

Oh, yes, her body said. Great idea. “I don’t have enough facial mask for you.”

He laughed low in his throat, a sound that was just as damn sexy as the rest of him. Setting his hands on her hips, he backed her into the living room, back to the couch, and as she walked, his big, bad body nudged into hers on purpose, letting her feel that she was not alone in this uncontrollable surge of need and desire.

“I’m not sharing my ice cream.”

“Are you sure? Because…” Again he put his mouth to her ear, taking a second to nibble. “I’ve got a much better use for it than you could possibly have had…”

Oh, God. She’d just let in the big, bad wolf. “Well.” She swallowed hard. “That’s a very intriguing thought.” She felt the couch at the back of her thighs, and just as he smiled again, she found herself falling back onto the cushions.

He followed her down, stretching his long body over hers, and there, towering above hers, with his wonderfully warm, hard length pressed to her, he still didn’t kiss her.

And that’s when she remembered. “The mask.”

“I’m sure it tastes very yummy, but maybe it’s best if you…”

“Yes. God.” Shoving free, she leapt up and ran down the hallway to her bedroom and into her bathroom, where she stared, breathless, at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were bright, but it was hard to tell about the rest of her face beneath the cracked green mask. The one that made her look like a seasick smurf.

He’d looked at her looking like this. Nearly kissed her like this.

She scrubbed clean. Vanity had her adding some lip gloss. Great. Now her lips looked fabulous, but the rest of her? Not exactly at her best. She ran into her room and into her closet, ripping off all her clothes. Naked, she scrambled for something to replace the sweats with, but she hadn’t done her laundry. “Damn it.”

“Everything okay?” Shayne asked from the other side of her bedroom door.

God! She shoved the closet door closed and stood inside it, naked. “Don’t come in here!”

“Why, because you might be wearing sweats and a mask?”

“You’re a funny guy, Shayne.” Crap. He’d come into her bedroom. In the dark closet, she fumbled through the pile of clothes on the closet floor for a new pair of panties. What was it with her and losing her panties lately? She didn’t find any, but did locate the brush she’d lost weeks ago.

“Dani? You okay?”

She tossed the brush aside. “Peachy.”

He nudged the door and she held it shut. “Don’t you dare come in here.”

“That’s not what you said the last time you got into a closet.”

“I mean it!”

“You sound out of breath. What are you doing in there?”

She found a hoodie zip-up sweater. Because she couldn’t find a bra, she zipped it up to her chin. “I’m out of breath because-Never mind!” She groped for a pair of jeans and came up with a gauzy skirt she’d worn to a Renaissance Fair last summer. It was loose, with a drawstring waist, and she’d just managed to pull it up and tie it when the door was nudged again.

“Damn it, Shayne Mahoney.” Why was she always commando around him? “You don’t listen very well.”

Completely unaware of her dilemma, he spoke with a grin in his voice. “That’s what my mother always says. ‘Shayne Mahoney, you don’t listen.’”

She gripped the door, holding him out while she desperately straightened her clothes and tried to regain her breath. “So what did she do about your listening skills?”

“I was the last of six boys. As a litigation attorney, she was far too tired by the time she came home from work to deal with me.”

Still in the dark, Dani lifted her head. That didn’t fit into the mold in which she’d placed him, the one of a pampered, spoiled kid, the absolute apple of his mother’s eye. “So your brothers raised you?”

“More like beat the shit out of me, regularly.”

“No way. You’re too big for that.”

“I was a puny kid, trust me.”

She pictured that, him a helpless little kid, no one to really protect him, and without her permission, her heart squeezed and engaged. “Your mom allowed that?”

“Like I said, she was tired. Of us. Literally.”

“What about your father? Surely he-”

“A very busy brain surgeon. Not around much either, but when he was, he usually only encouraged my brothers to toughen me up.”

“What? Why?”

“Because I was a classic underachiever.”

She turned to face the door of the closet, even putting her hand to the wood as if she could touch him. “But you’re a pilot. You run a private airport. You fly all kinds of planes and people, all over the world.”

“I’m an expensive taxi driver.”

“Shayne-”

“Don’t get me wrong. I love what I do. I was born to do what I do. Being in the air, it…it feeds my soul. I’m just telling you what they think.”

And she knew despite not wanting to, he cared what they thought. How well she knew the agony of that. It had her opening the door.

He was casual as could be, arms lightly crossed, his feet the same, propping up the wall. Yep, easygoing as they came.

Except there was more to him than that lazy confidence, so much more.

“There you are.” He took in her zippered hoodie and the long gauzy skirt, the combination of which covered her from chin to toe. “With your armor intact.”

She managed a smile and tried not to look directly at him, because he was damned distracting. “Thought I might need it.” Her eyes wandered to her bed. Bad eyes. “So…did you always want to be a pilot?”

He smiled. The distraction wasn’t fooling him. “From the moment I first saw a plane. What are you looking at?”

“I always wanted to work with animals,” she said quickly. Not looking at the bed. “From the time I was little, animals were it for me.” As usual, her mouth was running off without permission because she was nervous. And excited. Nervous and excited were a bad combination for her. “When I got my job at the zoo, my mother stopped by on my first day. I was giving an enema to a clogged giraffe.”

“Let me guess. That’s what she thinks you do all day. Evacuate shit.”

In spite of herself, she laughed. How he did that, made her laugh when she hadn’t planned on being amused, was beyond her. “Sort of like taxiing people, huh?”

He grinned too. They grinned at each other, unexpectedly unified in this. “You’re happy in your job,” she murmured.

“Very.”

“Me too.”

“I’m happy in my life,” he said.

In his single life. Right. Got to remember that. She glanced at the bed again. He was happy single.

“But here’s the stickler,” he said quietly. “I’m happier now that I’ve met you.”

Before she could begin to figure out how to process that, his gaze dropped to her mouth. “Much happier.” Cupping her freshly washed face, he leaned in, and this time didn’t stop until their lips were touching. This kiss was different from the wild kiss they’d shared in the last closet they’d stood in, and different from the kisses they’d shared at his house.

This kiss was slow and sweet, and so heartfelt she felt her throat burn, and when he pulled back a fraction, just enough to look into her eyes, hands still on her face, he murmured, “And as to your earlier question…I was worried about you, but I also wanted to see you again. I wanted to repeat. If you meant what you said, yesterday that you don’t, then tell me now. Look me in the eyes and tell me you feel nothing for me, that you don’t want to see where this goes.”

Oh, God, don’t do this. Don’t be so gorgeous and have the heart too. Don’t be the whole package. “You…you want to repeat.”

He offered her a sweet, sort of baffled smile. “Go figure, right?”

This wasn’t good. He stood there looking young and sexy, but also shockingly vulnerable, and the combination was almost too much to take.

She could fall for him.

Hard.

Fast.

And here she was without her handy-dandy, trusty safety net. Not good. Not good at all. Backing out of his arms, she moved back down the hall.

He wanted to repeat. How did she resist that? Answer-she couldn’t, she really couldn’t.

“Where are you going?”

“To the ice cream. I need ice cream for this.”

“For what?”

She plopped down on the couch and resumed her earlier position, holding the spoon and the carton, thinking there might not be enough ice cream on the planet for this.

The couch sank as he hit the spot beside her, his thighs brushing hers. “You got another spoon?”

Turning her head, she looked into his eyes. And just like the ice cream in her hands, she melted a little. “I suppose I can share.”