One-Click Buy: April Harlequin Blaze Read online

  Suddenly, she realized that maybe there was even some buried resentment about her human resources job: often, she watched the clock at her desk, just waiting to get home.

  Just another reason for change—if she would carry out the risk…

  “The cowboy wants to spend the night with me,” she finally said.

  The mere thought washed needful quivers down her limbs, leaving goose bumps in their wake.

  Carmen seemed to turn that over in her mind. “He’s the one registering for the room?”

  “Yes, and I’ll keep on my toes,” Lucy said. “But that’s part of the turn-on—the perceived danger.”

  “You know that if you gave me the room number, I could probably find out his name from the desk clerk. If I did it cleverly enough.”

  “You’ve got my back, I know that.” Lucy grinned in a preamble to changing the subject. Carmen was going out on a limb, too. “And what about with you? When’s Eddie letting you on the houseboat?”

  “Any time. That’s what the kids say anyway.”

  Lucy laughed. “The kids.”

  “They’re all nice. So lively and…open, I guess you’d say.” Carmen smiled wistfully. “Eddie doesn’t seem to fit in with them though, and I’m not sure why. He likes them well enough, but I can tell he’d rather be off on his own, taking pictures. And one of the kids said something…off…while we were eating ribs.”

  “What?”

  Carmen pursed her lips, then, “Richie said that Edward is renting the houseboat. That’s what they all call him, can you believe it? It sounds so formal. And when I casually started to ask if any of them were chipping in with money—because the way Richie worded it made it sound like the houseboat was Eddie’s treat—the others shot him a look. You know, like, ‘Shut up, man.’”

  “Hmmph. You’ll just ask Eddie about it though, right?”

  “He’s somehow managed to make me do all the talking so far, but sure. How much of a secret can it be?”

  They glanced at each other. The contents of this whole trip would be a secret when they got home, so Carmen’s question held a trace of irony.

  At that point, Lucy’s phone rang. She checked the ID screen to see a number from the woman covering for her at work.

  “You’re joking with me,” she muttered, letting the call go to voice mail. She would check it after she finished talking with Carmen, then she would catch up with her brother to also let him know where she was staying and in what room.

  She was horny, not completely dumb.

  Carmen patted her own purse. “I’ve been getting calls from Malcolm. Totally avoiding them, too.”

  “Vacation isn’t supposed to include ex-boyfriends.”

  “Agreed.” Carmen rubbed Lucy’s arm. “So you’ll be careful tonight, keep in touch, meet me tomorrow?”

  “You got it.”

  They hugged, then drew back. Carmen still held on to Lucy, peering at her, absolutely serious now.

  “Have fun with that fantasy,” she said.

  Lucy winked at her friend, wished her the same, then left.

  She headed to the car for some necessities, then the Shoreline Resort, where the cowboy said he would be meeting her in the lobby.

  7

  JOSHUA WATCHED the no-name brunette drop an overnight bag onto the carpeted floor and take a gander around their Mediterranean-style room. Sixty dollars hadn’t gone far, yet that was okay. Money was the last thing on his mind right now.

  It looked as if she had gone to her car and packed only what she might need for the night. Major baggage would’ve made things seem a little more settled, he guessed, and she didn’t come off as the type who longed for that.

  She turned this way and that, scanning the lake-inspired artwork, the carved teak trimmings, the entertainment center filled with a TV and drawers. With every move, her skirt rustled, reminding him of what she wasn’t wearing beneath it.

  Putting down the bag of snacks he’d picked up at the market, he rested a hand on his back pocket, where her panties waited. A memento.

  “Up to your satisfaction?” he asked, wondering if, off road, she was used to fancy hotel rooms or more modest offerings like the Timberline.

  “Perfect for an assignation.” She turned around, shooting him an impish grin.

  Right, he thought. He was here to bang her, and that was the extent of it. Why did he have to keep reminding himself?

  Because that’s what he was to her—a leave-behind lay. And why not? At least she thought he did something so well that she had come back for more. It gave him a sense of value in the most primal way, making him forget about the call he’d received about a half hour ago.

  One of his sisters, Melinda, had phoned to let Joshua know that they missed him, to assure him once again that they were going to get through this crisis in the end.

  He’d been short with her, not wanting to hear platitudes. He should’ve seen Trent’s lies coming from a mile away. He could’ve done so much more than losing his temper on Trent’s doorstep.

  Even though Melinda had meant well, the call had actually debased him, reminding him of his shortcomings.

  Yet it had brought to mind—to heart—the ranch where his parents had sat in the cabin’s family room, holding hands on the couch while watching TV.

  This, in turn, made him think of the first time he’d seen the brunette in her simple dress, and that made him want her all the more. So much that he couldn’t stop to think about the reason he was connecting her and his home so profoundly.

  He closed the curtains, only leaving a slit for sunshine, and pulled a chilled bottle of French-Loire sauvignon blanc from the bag, then a bottle opener and plastic glasses.

  “Thirsty?” he asked.

  The brunette—damn it, he had to think of something to call her besides that—smiled, then wandered over to take a gander at the bottle’s label. She smelled so tempting: as soft and soothing as the air near the creek that ran through the stolen land back home.

  When she was done, he uncorked the bottle.

  “Do you know your wines?” she asked. “I don’t, even though I kind of pretend to when I go into the store.”

  His ears perked up at the tidbit. “I took a course in wine production when I was getting educated in agribusiness at Texas A&M.”

  “Hold on, no credentials necessary with me,” she said, arranging their glasses on the table so he could pour. “Remember, the less we know about each other, the better.”

  Her cut-and-dried rule made him bristle. He didn’t like to admit it, but she made him wonder if he was beneath her with his down-home ways, and maybe she felt she was slumming with him. College wouldn’t exactly support the fantasy some women had about simple cowboy codes and riding the range, so maybe she wanted to keep his roughness intact.

  Then again, her refusal to hear anything personal also appealed. After all, why not be with a woman who already thought he was as low as he felt nowadays? She accepted that about him. No judgment or hard questions involved.

  But wasn’t he better than how she might perceive him?

  “You don’t have to remind me of our rules again,” he said, taking off his hat and tossing it onto a nearby chair. Then he produced a slab of Gouda as well as apples and strawberries from the bag. “You’re just here for the night, then it’s time to move on.”

  “Unless you catch up again.”

  He casually shrugged at being called on his determination to be with her. No skin off his back, because he was getting just what he wanted.

  “I’m glad you did catch up though,” she said, unwrapping the carton of strawberries.

  For once, he thought, his risks had paid off. When he’d chanced most of his savings, as well as his time and effort, back at the ranch, the outcome hadn’t been as successful.

  She went to the sink to wash the fruit, and he sliced the Gouda. Back when he’d taken business trips as a financial consultant for ag businesses around the state, he’d done the wine-cheese-fruit combinatio
n on women in upper-class hotels. But now with—damn it, what should he call her?—it wasn’t quite the same.

  He felt that, at any minute, she might stun him, just as she had last night, when she’d wiped her hands of him after they’d finished that mind-blowing screw.

  After the brunette came back and offered him the basket of strawberries, he took one, carefully sliding it past her full lips. She seemed taken by surprise at first, but then closed her eyes, languidly biting into the fruit and making a pleasured sound, just like the one in the truck when he’d built her up to an orgasm.

  He went hard at the thought, his groin pulsing.

  As she ate the strawberry, its juice lingered on her lips, making them even more vivid. He bent down, then sipped from her, licking up every last drop.

  When he pulled away midkiss, she laughed low in her throat, as if knowing that he was sexually baiting her.

  She pushed him back into the chair, straddling him. “Just so you know, my friend thinks you might be dangerous.”

  For Pete’s sake, did she want him to feed this little stranger fantasy of hers?

  All right.

  “Dangerous,” he repeated, relishing the word and realizing he really could be dangerous to someone like Timothy Trent.

  As if to chase away the darkness, he pushed up the brunette’s skirt so he could see her sex. The sight of it lit him up inside, causing his cock to stir against his fly.

  Downy hair covering the most intimate part of her. He could even see a hint of pink, pink flesh.

  She braced her hands on his shoulders, her breath coming faster.

  “Is my friend right?” she asked. “Should I be worried about being with you?”

  He only smiled, leaving her to fill in the blanks of her desires. Then, casually, he reached between her legs, stroking her, and she stifled a moan, as if not wanting him to hear. But she was getting damp, and that told him all he needed to know.

  “Why are you here if it causes such concern?” he asked.

  “Because…”

  Something cracked through her gaze, and he couldn’t properly read it. Indecision? Reality?

  Are you here because you’re not sure who you are anymore? he supplied for her. Or maybe you only need an anchor that you can let go of after you’ve gotten what you want out of me…

  Joshua’s world came to a standstill. He was talking about himself, not her. But he hadn’t been doing a very good job of letting go—of his bitterness, his anger or this new addiction.

  He stopped strumming her and rested his hand on her thigh instead while reaching over to grab his wine. Taking a deep swallow, he didn’t even taste it.

  The brunette—there, now the nickname sounded better, more distant—watched him, no doubt wondering why he’d abandoned their foreplay. But, hardly put off, she drank her wine, too, then picked up a piece of Gouda to feed him.

  The cheese was creamy, a decent distraction while she shifted on his lap, her sex brushing his.

  Sure enough, his jeans-bound cock reacted appropriately.

  “And…we’re off,” she said with a laugh so sultry that he thought maybe she was a little devil sent to keep him away from home for all time.

  He fought the hunger for her, but it was useless. He needed this woman, whoever she was, if only for the night. Then he would move on, finding another one to temporarily consume him, until either he got the results of the land survey or he was rational enough to go home.

  “Just who are you?” he asked as she pressed against him, wiggling her hips provocatively, teasing his groin, as she put her wine back on the table.

  “Only a girl on a holiday.”

  She leaned forward, her arms on either side of him while they rested on the top of the chair. Her dark hair curtained him as her forehead touched the top of his head, and all he could smell was soft, luscious perfume, powdery and erotic.

  She moved her hips again, torturing him, and his hands slipped down to her bare ass, cupping it.

  “Is this why you hit the road?” he asked. “For a string of sexual thrills?”

  “Not at first.” She ran her fingers over his shoulders, down his chest. “I was really going to Vegas. But then we got diverted and…you know the rest.”

  Yes, he did.

  And when she brushed down to his penis, the story continued from there.

  A story he truly didn’t want to end.

  AFTERWARD, LUCY LAY naked on top of the bedsheets, glistening with sweat that was going sticky on her skin. Lubrication from the condom they’d used lingered between her thighs, and she pressed her hand against herself to feel the slip and slide of it covering her nether lips.

  Oh…

  She thought of him while touching herself. He was in the bathroom, with the water running in the sink, and she imagined him in the mirror, his brown hair wet with sweat, his skin ruddy with the same fever that addled her.

  Part of her wanted to stay, just as she always found herself doing in the afterglow. Wasn’t there some womanly chemical that made a female want to cuddle?

  Well, Lucy didn’t need it. Never again.

  She heard the door open and stretched her arms above her head, elongating her body. Then he appeared, skin bare, the afternoon sun peeking through a slit in the curtains to shower gold over him.

  God, he was gorgeous: muscles cording him together, his belly flat, his penis thick and nested in darker curls.

  He caught her perusal. “You going to kick me out of the room now?”

  “Not a chance.”

  She rolled to her stomach and propped a pillow under her chest as he crawled onto the mattress, lying on his side. With him, she didn’t mind her nudity. She’d been a more modest creature before, but that was only because she hadn’t been sure of herself.

  Not a problem with him.

  He rested his palm on the back of her thigh, then leisurely traced up to her butt. She gathered a second pillow and rested her head on it.

  This was the part where they were supposed to talk in the intimate hush. Thing was, with all her fantasy-required rules, there wasn’t much to say—not if she didn’t want to know anything about him.

  The lack of discussion made her a tad anxious. It gave old Lucy too much time to think about what new Lucy was doing.

  “You travel much?” she asked, settling on a neutral topic. “I mean, besides around this area?”

  He kneaded her butt cheek, his fingertips inching between her thighs. Oh, he was killing her.

  “I’ve done my share of living out of a duffel bag,” he said. “Mainly in Texas. Business.”

  It always seemed as if he wanted to mention personal details. Boy, sex itself was so much easier than what came after.

  “And how about pleasure?” she asked, getting back to the basics. “Where do you travel for that?”

  A phone rang, and it took a second for her to realize that it was hers.

  Thank goodness—saved by the cell.

  “I’ll bet that’s Carmen,” she said, getting out of bed. The shape of his hand lingered in heated remembrance on her rear end.

  “Your friend, right?” he asked.

  A point for the cowboy, Lucy thought, nodding. He’d gotten his tidbit of information, and he looked rather pleased at that while he rolled to his back and slid his hands beneath his head.

  She fumbled her phone out of her purse, turned on by the sight of the hair under the pits of his arms. She thought that was sexy on a guy—earthy.

  “Carm?” she croaked, then cleared her throat.

  It didn’t help that he was scanning her naked body, smiling as if he was doing wicked things to her in his head.

  “I’m interrupting, right?” Carmen said. “Luce, I’m so sorry—”

  “Not to worry. How’re you doing?”

  “Okay. I mean, Eddie isn’t back yet, so I’ve been shopping with Sarah, the girl who you said looks like Lindsay Lohan. But this chick is together. She’s a marine biology major at UCSD. Smart cookie.”


  Disappointment for her friend took over. “Where’s Eddie?”

  “I guess he needed to take care of some kind of business that must not be named out loud. No one wants to talk about it though, so I’m wondering what’s up with the guy.”

  Eddie’s mysteries continued to grow. Funny, how Lucy had a stranger who wanted to share more than she would let him and Carmen’s seemingly open guy wasn’t so forthcoming after all.

  “Carm, I’ll be there in—”

  “Nope. No way. I’ll be on a houseboat cruise before you can get your clothes on, okay? I just wanted to check in.”

  Lucy had called Carmen with her room number before, so they were set on that point. “Are you sure? This is our trip, after all.”

  “I’m positive.” Someone in the background—Sarah?—yelled to Carmen. “Oop, see, we’re going to meet Eddie at the boat now. Call me if you need to.”

  “I will. Have fun. Don’t do anything—”

  “Don’t even say it, Luce.” A trace of concern still marred her friend’s tone.

  But when they signed off, Lucy was so focused on the cowboy crooking his finger at her in bed that common sense flew out the window.

  She put the phone back in its proper place as he spoke.

  “Your buddy’s off on her own adventure?”

  “Houseboating.”

  “Then you’re responsible for your own amusement, I take it.”

  “For the time being.”

  Lucy came back to bed to find him looking thoughtful. But when she brushed her knuckles against his penis, stirring it awake, he grinned, all else apparently forgotten.

  He scooped her against his long, hard body and her mind turned to mist, taken over.

  After they finished another bout of blood-churning sex, it took her a while to comprehend her surroundings, the room around her, the words he was saying as he kissed her neck.

  “Huh?” she whispered, on the edge of a moan as he nipped at her skin postorgasm.

  Then he locked gazes with her, his eyes a pale, fierce silver that cut through her fogginess. He was still hard inside of her, and he gave a thrust, working her right back up into an escalating glow.

  “Why not have an even bigger adventure—” another thrust “—with me.”