“Me, too. But unfortunately, that louse runs one of the most successful design houses in New York.”
“Hence your move to Seattle.”
“Exactly. There just wasn’t room enough in The Big Apple for both his ego and my career.” She smiled sadly.
The bastard she’d been married to had done his best to blackball her in the design community. Zephyr had returned the favor over the past two years and Très Bon no longer held its prestigious top position status. Arthur Bellingham’s word might send ripples out in the city, but Zephyr Nikos sent out waves big enough to drown in the international community.
The bastard who had done his best to ruin Piper’s life was on the slippery slope of business decline already. Art would only find himself in deep, murky waters when he got to the bottom, too.
Zephyr had never told Piper, of course. She hadn’t been exposed to his ruthless streak and he saw no reason to change that.
“Well, I am glad you came to Seattle,” he said.
“Again, me, too.” She tugged off her jacket, revealing the silky singlet she wore beneath it, and the fact she wasn’t wearing a bra. “I certainly made a better circle of friends.”
“Oh, I am round now?” he asked, practically choking on his lust as her hardened nipples created shoals in the slinky fabric of her top.
He forcibly snapped his attention back to Athens’s typically snarled traffic, lest he cause an accident or do a poor job avoiding one. He could hardly do what he was fantasizing to her body from a hospital bed.
Having her in peril of the same didn’t even bear thinking of.
“Don’t be smart.” She tapped his leg, having the opposite effect to the one he was sure she meant it to. “I have other friends.”
“Name one.”
“Brandi.”
“She is your assistant.”
“I have friends,” Piper insisted stubbornly. “There’s a reason I’m not available every night to keep you entertained.”
Which wasn’t something he actually liked, so he let the subject drop.
Usually, Piper noticed every tiny detail of her surroundings, always looking for ways to improve her own sense of design and aesthetics. However, she barely noticed the earth tones and ultramodern, simplistic design features of the luxury spa Zephyr had chosen for their stay as he led her through the oversized lobby to the bank of elevators on the far side.
She was too busy soaking in his every feature, her senses starved for the sight, taste and feel of him.
The past month and a half had been harder than any separation they’d had to date. For her anyway. Maybe for Zephyr, too, if the number of calls and texts she’d gotten from him was anything to go on. They’d had prolonged times apart before, but not since they started having sex regularly six months ago. Still, it wasn’t as if they were a couple. They were friends, who were also casual sex partners. At least that’s what she’d been telling herself since the first time they’d passed that intimate boundary nine months ago.
That first time, she’d thought it would be a one-off, something to get the sexual tension that had been growing between them out of the way of their friendship. She’d been wrong.
They hadn’t gotten physical again until three months later, but connected sexually several times a week since then. When he made it clear, again, that he did not see the sex as anything more than physical compatibility for stress release, she’d told herself she wasn’t ready for a committed relationship, either, so that was just fine with her. Art had done a real number on her ability to trust and she had a business to build. She didn’t have a place in her life for a full-time relationship.
The only problem was: she wasn’t sure she believed her own rhetoric any longer. Her natural optimism was doing its best to overcome her painfully learnt lesson on the ways of men. The fact she was having such a complicated internal monologue on the matter was telling in itself, she thought with an internal sigh.
She’d been careful not to ask for promises Zephyr might break, or make commitments she wasn’t ready for.
But she’d come to realize over the past six weeks—while subsisting on phone calls, texts, instant messaging and e-mail—that emotions didn’t abide by agreements, verbal or otherwise. That refusing to make a vow didn’t stop her heart from craving the security that promise implied. Nor did it stop her from living like she’d made her own promises.
She’d missed Zephyr more than she’d thought possible and wanted nothing more right now than to wrap herself up in him and soak in his essence.
He seemed to want the same thing. He hadn’t stopped touching her since they left the airport. He’d laid his hand over hers between gear changes in the car and he’d kept his arm around her waist all the way to the room.
He opened the door with a flourish. “Here we are.”
The suite reflected the minimalist décor from downstairs, but its spaciousness spoke of the ultimate in luxury. “This place is bigger than my apartment.”
“My closet is bigger than your flat,” he said, sounding unimpressed.
She grimaced at the truth of his words, but the curve of her lips morphed into a smile from the heat burning in his brown eyes.
From the feel of his arousal when he’d first hugged and kissed her hello, and the sexual need intensifying his features then and now, she expected to be taken against the door with a minimum of foreplay.
But that didn’t happen. He set her cases aside and then lifted her right into his arms, high against his chest, in a move that made her feel cherished rather than just wanted.
She quickly banished that thought even as her gasp of surprise escaped her. “Going he-man on me?”
“Spoiling you more like.”
“Oh, really? I could get used to this,” she teased.
He didn’t bother with a reply, but didn’t look too fazed at the prospect. So not good for the odd blips of emotion that had been pestering her lately. But that was one thing she could say about Zephyr Nikos, whether it be in his role as friend, boss or bed partner, the man did not stint on his generosity.
Despite his obvious desire, rather than showing mass amounts of impatience, he laid her gently on the big bed and seemed determined to reacquaint himself with every facet of her body. He drove her crazy with reticence while pumping her for information on her time away from him.
After he asked yet another question about her experience in the Midwest decorating the interior for a new office building, she laughed. “We spoke every day, Zephyr. I can’t think of anything I didn’t already tell you.”
The gorgeous tycoon actually looked like he might be blushing, his dark eyes reflecting chagrin. “I was just curious.”
“You know what I do on a job. I’ve done it for Stamos and Nikos Enterprises often enough.”
“Did you like the Midwest better than Seattle?” he asked with what she thought was entirely mistimed curiosity.
“Are you kidding?”
His expression said clearly he wasn’t.
“I love Seattle. The energy in the city is amazing.” And he was there.
“That’s good to know.”
Suddenly, all his questions started to make sense. “You heard.”
CHAPTER TWO
ZEPHYR tried to look innocent.