This way.
Liam felt the impact of the gesture slam low in his groin. Simultaneously, hormones and endorphins lit up both his body and his brain. He gulped against the sheer force of the sensation. This French maid wanted to have some fun. Why shouldn’t he be the one to accommodate her?
He shook his head. What kind of spell had she cast over him? His tongue was cemented to the roof of his mouth. His eyes were transfixed by her lithe form. His nose twitched, suddenly sensitized to the scent of seduction in the air. His ears filled with a blinding white roaring noise.
She strutted off a second time.
Mesmerized, he watched her hips sway.
Liam went all Neanderthal then and lumbered after her. Must have woman.
By the time he reached where she’d been standing, she was already in the archway of another room. The place could have been completely empty. That’s how unaware he was of the crowd jostling around them.
The French maid paused again, but this time she did not look back. Apparently, she’d assumed he would follow.
She was correct.
Sending her auburn curls bouncing over her shoulders with a toss of her head, she turned to the right and started down a long corridor.
Liam made a beeline after her.
People were all around him, talking, laughing, joking, drinking, but he could have been stranded on a deserted island or trapped in a timeless vortex. He was that focused on Miss French Maid’s fanny as she slipped through the costumed throng.
She winnowed around a man the size of a boxcar dressed like Paul Bunyan and Liam couldn’t see her anymore. He quickened his pace, but at the next doorway, Paul Bunyan turned, blocking his path.
“Excuse me.” Liam stepped to his right.
Paul Bunyan moved in the same direction at the exact same moment.
Liam corrected, angling to the left.
So did Bunyan.
Was this on purpose? What was happening here? Liam frowned.
“Shall we dance?” Paul Bunyan chuckled, and Liam realized he’d been unnecessarily suspicious. By the time he got around the guy, he found himself faced with a long hallway filled with doors. His French maid had vanished.
“Dammit,” he muttered.
It’s all for the best. He was feeling much too vulnerable to be indulging in anonymous sex. That kind of solace, while great in the moment, wouldn’t fix anything. It wouldn’t make up for the aching for a real father that had dogged his bones since he was a kid.
He stood there in the corridor, staring at the doors, wondering if she was behind one, not wanting to leave in case she reappeared. A minute ticked past. And then another.
Face it. She’s gone.
He turned to retrace his steps when suddenly the door behind him opened and a hand reached out to grab him by the scruff of his collar.
Long, manicured fingernails tickled the back of his neck and the next thing Liam knew, he was being hauled into a pitch black closet.
The French maid wrapped her arms around him and covered his face in kisses. At least he hoped it was the French maid.
She murmured something in French. He didn’t understand the language, but he did get the gist of her suggestive message. He tried to take a step back to clear his head, but her fingers were frantically working the buttons of his puffy white pirate shirt.
“Slow down,” he said, or rather tried to say. His throat was twisted so tight with need the sounds came out as scarcely more than an excited groan.
Her mind-boggling aroma, which smelled like a cross between apricots and stargazer lilies, filled his nose and shot up his desire. He could see absolutely nothing in the darkness, but the rest of his senses were fully attuned and ready to be indulged.
“What…how…who…” He wrenched out the words, unable to form a coherent thought.
“Shh.” She placed an index finger over his lips. Her skin tasted forbidden.
He thought of truffles and Russian caviar and saffron, the most expensive spice in the world. His nerve endings blazed. In the back of his mind, far off in the distance, sounding as if it had been locked up in a dry, dusty trunk for centuries, his muffled conscience tried to get his attention.
Hey, sport, this seems awfully odd. Sexy babe coming on to you, no strings attached. You know there’s always strings attached. Something’s wrong. Pull your head out of the hormone soup. Think this through. Last thing you want is to be like your old man. Hey, hey…
His scruples got no further because his brain short-circuited, closing off everything except the exquisite glory of her hot little mouth on his.
3
KATIE COULDN’t believe she was really doing this. It felt so naughty, so wicked, so wrong.
And yet, it felt so damn good.
She should have known Richard would be a world-class kisser. He was one of the hottest bachelors in Boston and very popular with the ladies. Why had she waited this long to seduce him?
He seemed so receptive, so responsive. When she curled her fingers around his forearm, he actually shivered.
She was shivering, too.
His mouth was heated and moist and he tasted of peppermint. His arm went around her waist and he tilted her backward in the closet.
The sleeves of the coats on the rack swayed with their movements, the rough material of the garments brushing provocatively against her bare arms. Farther down on the rod, a couple of empty coat hangers rattled against the sway.
His breathing was as ragged and raspy as hers. The bold pirate was plunging his demanding tongue past her teeth, plundering her mouth with a brazen zeal, taking what he wanted, leaving her breathless and clinging tightly to him.
He pulled her closer, crushing her against his broad, muscular chest. The stiff short skirt of her outfit crinkled at the pressure, and her scalp tingled hotly.
Each strumming beat of her heart was a sexual question mark.
What now?
What was going to happen next?
Would he run his rough hand up her leg?
Would he give her the mind-blasting orgasm she hungered for?
“Woman.” The word was dragged from his damp lips in a husky inhalation of breath. He pulled his mouth from hers and tracked his tongue down her chin to her throat. “You are so, so sexy.”
She threw back her head, exposing her throat, giving him greater access to the pulse fluttering at the hollow of her neck.
Oh, he smelled good. Like candy canes and the joy of Christmas morning. She wondered what cologne he had on. Usually Richard wore a much cooler, more sophisticated fragrance.
Hmm, should she ask him?
And possibly spoil the moment? Was she nuts?
That sobering notion quickened her breathing, but it didn’t scare her. And that, in itself, was terrifying.
What was wrong with her? Why was she so willing to walk the edge, to tempt fate, to push the envelope beyond common sense?
Rhetorical question. She knew the answer. Ever since her mother had died she’d felt an overwhelming need to make her emotional pain disappear.
Without Daisy as an anchor, it was as if she no longer had anything to lose. Why not gamble everything for