One night when they’d been alone in that remote cabin, she’d cried, asking him what she should do about her stepfather. What would happen if they didn’t go back, if she didn’t finish school? Would he come to New York with her?
He’d realized then that Summer saw him as part of her future; saw her stepfather and Bonne Terre as something she was finished with forever.
Intending to comfort her, to reassure her that he wanted her in his future as well, he’d gone to the bed, taken her in his arms and held her close. Her hair had smelled of jasmine, so he’d nuzzled it. Then she’d kissed him, her soft mouth open, her body pressing against his eagerly. She probably hadn’t understood how she’d tempted him.
He’d stroked her hair, caressing her, and she’d moaned. Her tears had stopped, but she’d clung anyway. Then they’d come together as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Their union had been both sexual and spiritual. He’d believed they’d marry after she graduated, that they would be together forever.
Never again had he felt like that about a woman.
Forget it.
Zach forced his mind to the present. He couldn’t afford to reminisce. Time was more precious than money. His uncle’s death had taught him that.
Zach had his briefcase stuffed with foreclosure cases he’d intended to review as he sat in his attorney’s sumptuous conference room. Waiting for her. Plate-glass windows afforded him an excellent view of the bayou four stories below. Not that he was enjoying the scene of cypress and dogwood trees. No, he couldn’t stop thinking about her.
Why was she late? Was she remembering their last encounter and his promise to make her pay?
When he heard the desperate click of her high heels in the hall, he glanced up, tense with expectation. Even as he steeled himself to feel nothing, his heart began to race.
The door opened, framing her slim, elegant body before she entered. Her delicate, classical features and radiant complexion were too lovely for words.
He wanted her so much he couldn’t breathe.
They looked at each other and then away while the silent tension between them crackled. On some deep level, she drew him. Her incredible blond beauty alone made her unforgettable. Then there was her fame. Hell, how could he forget her when her face was plastered on the covers of gossip magazines and cheap, weekly newspapers?
She was everywhere.
Only a few days ago he hadn’t been able to resist reading the latest about her budding romance with Hugh Jones in one of those sensational newspapers he despised. He’d grabbed it off a wire shelf in a drugstore and jammed it into his briefcase. He’d carried it up to his office and pored over the story that went with the front-page photo of the famous couple sharing a kiss. Summer had claimed they were just friends, but Jones had expounded about how crazy they were about each other. Which one of them was lying?
Probably her.
Zach had wadded the newspaper and thrown it in the trash. In his penthouse suite, staring out at the city of Houston, which was littered with the skyscrapers he’d built and owned, he’d never felt more isolated.
She had a life—perhaps she even loved that famous, egotistical movie star—while he had only his fierce ambition and immense wealth. He’d gone through his contact list on his smart phone, called a beautiful blonde who resembled Summer and asked her out. But that night, after dinner, when she’d invited him up to her loft, he’d said he had to work. Driving home, feeling empty and more alone than ever, he’d burned for Summer.
So, he’d seized his opportunity. He’d used her brother to get her here.
“Coffee?” His attorney’s pretty secretary offered from the doorway.
“No,” Zach thundered without even bothering to ask Summer, for whom he felt irrational fury because she wouldn’t stop consuming his thoughts.
He wasn’t in the mood for niceties. When the secretary left and Summer’s long-lashed, legendary violet-blue eyes flicked in alarm, he felt as if she’d sucker punched him in the gut. Damn her, for having this much power over him.
His heart hardened against her knockout beauty even as other parts of his body hardened because of it. He wished he could forget the softness of her breast and the firmness of her butt and the sweet taste of her lips. He wished he didn’t ache to hold her and touch her again. He wanted to kiss her and force her to forget all about Jones.
How many others had there been in her bed since Zach? Legions, he imagined with a rush of bitterness. A Broadway star with a face and figure like hers, not to mention a budding movie career, could have anybody—directors, producers, actors, fans.
Hell, she had Hugh Jones, didn’t she? But was she as responsive when Jones touched her? Had Zach only imagined she’d been pushing against Jones, trying to free herself, when that picture had been taken?
None of it mattered. Zach wanted her in his bed with an all-consuming hunger. And he was determined to have her.
As if she read his thoughts, she flushed and glanced down, staring at her white, ice-pick heels rather than at him. Still, her sultry voice made him burn when she whispered, almost shyly, “Sorry I’m late. Traffic. I had to go by Gram’s first … to check on Tuck.”
“How’s he doing?” Zach asked, standing up and placing his hand on the back of the chair he intended to offer her.
He’d found Tuck drunk and unconscious on the living-room floor of Zach’s new house. The garage doors had been open, and Zach’s Lamborghini and second Mercedes had been missing.
Fortunately, Zach had come home unexpectedly and had caught two of Tuck’s friends, also drunk, ransacking his house, or he might have suffered worse losses. Since then, the automobiles had been found abandoned in New Orleans.
Zach blamed himself, in part, for not having hired an appropriate staff for the house.
“Tuck’s doing okay.” Summer answered his question as she stepped farther into the room, her legs as light and graceful as a dancer’s, her silky white dress flowing against her hips. He remembered how sexy she’d looked when she’d bent over in her short shorts on her grandmother’s porch.
And why shouldn’t she be graceful and sexy? She was a performer, a highly paid one. Everything she did was part of a deliberate, well-rehearsed act. Maybe the kiss they’d shared when she’d seemed to quiver so breathlessly had been a performance, as well.
She sat down in the chair he’d indicated and crossed her legs prettily. He stayed on his feet because staring down at her gave him the advantage.
Even though he knew what she was, and what she was capable of, the years slid away. Again he was sixteen, the bad new homeless kid in school with the sullen, bruised face. Everybody had been scared of him. Summer had been the popular, pampered high-school freshman, a princess who’d had every reason to feel superior to him.
People talked in a town the size of Bonne Terre. Everybody knew everybody. Nobody approved of Nick dragging such a rough kid home and foisting him upon the school. Thurman Wallace had even demanded Zach be thrown out.
Only Summer, who’d been a precocious thirteen and two years ahead of her age in school, hadn’t looked down on Zach. Not even when all the other kids and her step-daddy thought she should. No, even on that first day, when Roger Nelson, a football star, had demanded to know what Zach had done to make a guy hate him so much he’d beaten him nearly to death, she’d butted in and defended him.
“Maybe that’s not what happened,” she’d said. “Maybe Zach was in the right, defending himself, and the other guy was in the wrong. We don’t know.”
“So what happened, Torr?” Nelson had demanded.
“Why