My Man Pendleton(62)
Author: Elizabeth Bevarly

Unfortunately, putting both hands behind her back that way left her arching her front toward Pendleton. Too late, she realized how intimately her br**sts skimmed against his chest. Too late, she noted how salaciously her torso pressed into those hard-as-rock abs of his. Too late, she saw how cordially her libido jumped up to greet his with a heartfelt howdy-do.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” she asked, trying not to notice the way her heart was jumping around in her chest.

“Oh, I’m sorry, didn’t I make that obvious?” he murmured. He twined his fingers easily with hers at the small of her back and, with a single, gentle nudge, pushed her closer still, so she felt his heart galloping erratically against her own.

“Um, no,” she lied. “I’m afraid you didn’t make it obvious at all.”

“Just goes to show you how long it’s been since I found myself in this position,” he said softly, dipping his head ever so slightly toward hers.

“Wh-what position?” she asked.

His lips curved into an oh-so-suggestive smile as he lifted one shoulder and let it drop. “Trying to show a woman how much I want to make love to her.”

“Eh-excuse me?” she stammered.

In response, he moved his head a little bit closer to hers, then began to sway their bodies in time to the leisure rhythm of the music. As he brought Kit along for the ride, she was helpless to do anything but follow him, so addled was she by the closeness of him, the scent of him, the heat of him. He backed himself slowly, slowly, oh-so-slowly toward the solitary lamp lit in the room, then released one of her hands to switch it off.

Before she had a chance to protest, he immediately settled his hand at her waist again. He raked his fingers down along her hip to her thigh before cupping her leg with much affection, then he skimmed his hand back up, to curve it gently over her fanny. As she opened her free hand lightly over his chest, whatever objection Kit thought she should utter got completely stuck in her throat.

The softly flickering fire in the hearth sent a pale glow dancing over them, as if the flames, too, were caught up in the subtle to-and-fro of the music. The changing yellow glimmer threw Pendleton’s face first into stark clarity and then into deep shade, a play of light and dark that kept her from ever knowing for sure what he was thinking. His eyes were fixed on her face, but for some reason, she suddenly didn’t mind so much his scrutiny. The darkness, she knew, hid the shortcomings of Mother Nature. Besides, she wanted to look at his face, too.

Gradually, she forgot about everything, except for the way his fingers tripped lightly over her fanny, her hip, her back. Except for the warm breath that caressed her forehead. Except for the stampeding of his heart against hers.

“You are so beautiful.”

His words erupted like a barrage of artillery between them, exploding in Kit’s belly with all the heat and force of a cannon shot. For one brief, lunatic second, she actually believed what he said. Then she came to her senses, and with a forced and difficult humor, she laughed off his comment.

“Spoken like a man dancing in the dark,” she said softly, uncertainly, striving for a levity she was nowhere close to feeling. “Light a candle, Pendleton. You’ll get over it.”

“I mean it, Kit. I don’t know why I’m just now noticing it, but you really are very beautiful.”

She swallowed hard. “Yeah, well, so is a big chunk of coal to a man who’s been freezing to death for a while,” she told him quietly.

He said nothing, only hooked his hands loosely at the small of her back and continued to gaze down at her face in the darkness. As he did, something inside Kit kindled and caught fire, the flames flickering and licking at her belly until she wasn’t sure she could stand the heat. God help her, as hard as she tried not to, she found herself wanting desperately to believe what he said.

“Don’t do this to me, Pendleton,” she petitioned softly.

He gazed at her in silence for a taut moment before asking very quietly, “Do what?”

She wanted to look away, but was helpless to do anything but meet his gaze. “I made a vow a long time ago that I’d never make love to a man again unless I was in love with him, and he was in love with me.”

“And your point would be?”

The fire in her belly leaped higher, burned hotter. Surely he wasn’t suggesting what he seemed to be suggesting. Surely he wasn’t saying that they were …that the two of them had…

“My point would be that I don’t love you and you don’t love me,” she stated emphatically. There. She’d said it out loud. And it hadn’t been nearly as painful as she thought it would be.

“You’re pretty quick to make that assumption,” Pendleton said. “Why can’t we be in love?”

She bit back a hopeful sigh. “Get serious.”

“I am serious. Why can’t we?”

“Okay, I agree that you may be a man in love,” she said, proud of the detachment in her tone that she faked very nicely. “A man in love with his ex-wife.”

He opened his mouth in what she was sure would be an objection, so she quickly cut him off. “Hey, I’ve seen the look on your face when you talk about her, Pendleton. I know you’re indulging in some fantasy about going up to New Jersey with every intention of stopping her wedding. You want to try to seduce me, fine. Try to seduce me. But don’t do it by lying to me. Have a little more respect for my intelligence than that, will you?”

In response, he only pulled her closer and began to move their bodies in slow time once again. As she felt her IQ plummeting, Kit nestled against him, wishing hard that he wasn’t such a liar, wishing harder still that she wasn’t such a coward.

For a long time, they remained so entwined, through song after song about mistrust and betrayal, until she wasn’t sure she could listen to any more. So she said impulsively, “How about a little Tito Puente instead? We never did get in that merengue down in Veranda Bay. I brought a few of his CDs with me. They’re up in the bedroom. I’ll just be a sec.”

She tried to extricate herself from Pendleton’s embrace as unobtrusively as she could, but for every attempt she made to free herself, he deftly pulled her close again. Before she had a chance to utter a single further objection, he began nuzzling her throat and nibbling the curve where her neck joined her shoulder.

“Oh,” she cried softly at the unexpected intimacy. “Oh, Pendleton.”