“Riiigght,” Johnny slurred under his breath. “Thanks, Tito.”
“One more thing, Johnny,” Tito added, rubbing his nose with an oily hand and smudging more lubricant on his face. “My lady asked if you will come over and eat with us. She will make your favorite chalupa.”
“Name the date and time and I’ll be there,” Johnny replied, a smile coming to his face at just the thought.
Tito’s wife and four kids had taken him in like one of their own. Johnny’s mother and father were killed in an auto accident when he was twelve years old. Their car brakes had faltered. He ran away from the abusive Michigan foster home he was put in, and hitchhiked to Los Angeles where Mr. Farrell found him and guided him back to constructive living. Maybe Johnny’s parents’ car tragedy was the reason that keeping automobiles in perfect order was so important to him.
It was closing time, but three cars in need of repair pulled into Johnny’s shop, anyway. He could never refuse a customer who needed service. His shop was suddenly spinning with malfunctioning Volvos and M.G.’s. He barely had time to think about Rachel Smith and her sex interview.
That is, until later that evening. Johnny spent one night a week in his own apartment while house-sitting for Mr. Farrell. As Johnny watered the miniature vegetable garden he’d planted on the small plot beside his rent-controlled Santa Monica apartment, his mind wandered to Professor Rachel Smith.
Maybe it was the silver moon in the black velvet sky. Maybe he was tired and his body was beginning to relax. But as he sprayed his tomato plants, Johnny fantasized that Rachel was standing in front of him right that moment. He wanted to bask in the warmth of her feminine presence and delight in her defiant, stubborn and exciting nature.
He pictured Rachel’s swelling ivory breasts spilling over her spaghetti-strapped rose-colored dress as he’d gripped her waist in Mr. Farrell’s gym.
When her taut nipples strained against the cotton fabric, he’d realized her ample breasts were bra-free. How close his hungry mouth had been to suckling one pert nipple.
The sprinkling garden hose suddenly veered off course into his landlord’s cactus plant. He quickly turned off the water faucet. In a few minutes, he hit the bed, still smelling the sweet gardenia scent of her skin.
He fisted his pillow several times to get comfortable, but he was plagued with Rachel Smith thoughts. He kept picturing her soft body cuddled up to his in a tender embrace.
Restless, he got up and peered out the window at the shining star-glazed night. A half smile formed on his lips. Rachel had practically stripped her car gears to get away from him.
Yes, he’d definitely ticked her off. He’d gotten to her academic insides and stirred her up a bit. She was highly emotional, he could tell. Women who got that stormy, that quickly, usually had a healthy passionate nature and a tender sensitivity. He couldn’t deny it. He was irresistibly drawn to Rachel, more than to any woman he’d ever known.
A cloud suddenly hid the moon, and a dark shadow brushed over Johnny’s heart. Forget your emotional pull to Rachel, he silently told himself. You’re invisible to her. She sees Zane Farrell, not you.
He’d permitted his own powerful attraction to her to seep through and go beyond the boundary he had to have with Professor Smith. He wouldn’t let that happen again. No sir. He wasn’t going to disappoint Mr. Farrell.
He had to make Mr. Farrell’s volunteer study a successful one. Not that Johnny could figure out why a man like Mr. Farrell would ever participate in a sex research project.
Johnny hopped back into bed and punched his pillow into a snug position. Professor Rachel Smith, get ready. Mr. Farrell’s sex study was definitely not over yet. Johnny would play his role with more of a Zane Farrell cultured flare and not allow the uncouth, uneducated Johnny Wells to interfere again.
The next morning, Rachel pressed the fifteenth-floor elevator button in the steel-and-glass building in downtown Los Angeles for her second case-study interview, Harvey Glitt, a certified public accountant to the wealthiest business people in Los Angeles.
In the accounting office, Rachel tried to concentrate on quiet, shy Harvey Glitt with his bow tie, tall bony frame and pale complexion. Harvey yearned for a relationship with a woman, almost begged for one. The poor man had negative sex appeal. Maybe he was the type of male she needed. No arousal threat. Only platonic friends.
Rachel knew if she ever let loose her sexuality again with Zane Farrell, she’d lose her sensibilities, her logic, and would end up in a disastrous situation like the one she’d been in with Kent. And she never wanted to hurt Zane that way.
She made an unending vow to herself. The next time she was with Zane, she would demolish every emotionally close and sensually tempting thought that rose to her consciousness. Zane would remain a purely academic study to her. That was all.
The moment she returned to her office at the university, she quickly recovered Zane Farrell’s home phone number from the trash can where she’d angrily hurled it after their last encounter.
She nervously fingered the wrinkled sheet of paper. Excuses for never seeing him again lightning-flashed through her mind. But she refused to retreat. She’d keep it friendly but emotionally distant.
Just as she picked up the phone, there was a knock at her closed office door. She barely uttered a “come in” when the door powerfully swung open Zane Farrell-style. A bouquet of gleaming white gardenias were in Zane’s hands.
“Rachel, before you throw a lamp at me,” he began in his deeply resonating voice, “can we make a truce?” He handed her the sweetly scented flowers and added, “The aroma is definitely you.”
Rachel was so surprised, she couldn’t utter a word. She hugged the precious gardenias to her and inhaled a long, deep intake of flower-scented air with her eyes never leaving his.
Zane leaned against the wall of her office watching her, as if he belonged, like he was part of her life. And for that second, she wished that he really was.
Stop it, Rachel Smith. Control yourself. You promised.
She set the flowers down on her desk. “I assume this is a confirmation that you’re still a candidate for the university study?” she managed to say in her best businesslike voice.
“Only if you’ll have dinner with me tonight at The Wave Restaurant.”
His enticing eyes twinkled at her, and she suspected that his invitation was filled with much more than thoughts of the case study.
Thump, thump, thump, went her heart. A romantic dinner. Tenderly holding hands at the table. Eyes entwined. An invitation back to his mansion. Then a peak at his bedroom. Then his bed.
Be the professor, not the woman, she cautioned herself.
“Will the restaurant be conducive for our interview?” she asked carefully.
“Absolutely. One hundred percent,” he said confidently. “Eight o’clock?”
“Seven,” she firmly countered.
He chuckled as though pleased she was still wearing her battle gear. “Seven it is, Professor Smith. Shall I pick you up here or at your apartment?”
“I’ll meet you at the restaurant.” Keep it impersonal. Distant. All business.
“I look forward to it.” Then he was gone.
She plopped down on her desk chair. Why did he have to touch her heart by bringing those beautiful flowers? And why did he have to be so sexy? Could he see her trembling in his presence?
She quickly phoned Kim for support. “Kim, I can’t go to dinner with him,” she said, nervously stretching the phone cord.
“Just concentrate on the study,” Kim advised.
“How