“I don’t like your being scared,” he said softly.
“Me, neither.” She tipped her head back to look up at him and he was relieved to see that her eyes were clear. No more tears, no more shadows. She looked, he thought, too damn good.
When she went up on her toes and tilted her head to one side, everything in him tightened. But as much as he wanted her, he had to say, “Charlie, you don’t owe me anything.”
“This isn’t about owing,” she told him, dropping her gaze to his mouth before looking into his eyes again. “This is about wanting.”
He skimmed his hands up her body until he was cupping her face between his palms. Smiling, he whispered, “Wanting is something completely different.”
“Show me.”
He did. His mouth came down on hers and his heart nearly slammed through his chest. The taste of her filled him, the need for her was raw heat pumping through his bloodstream and when she parted her lips for him, he took a deeper taste and lost himself in it.
It was her soft sigh that brought him up out of a kiss he wanted to linger over for days. But when he did his lingering, they’d be alone. In a bed. Not in the middle of a damn park.
Reluctantly, he broke off the kiss and lifted his head to look down at her. Her eyes were glassy and her mouth full and ripe. It took everything he had not to kiss her again.
“We’re going back to the office, Charlie, and you’re going to show me every email this guy’s sent you.”
“Okay.” Nodding, she pulled in a deep breath. “Then what?”
“Then,” he said with a fierce smile, “we fight back.”
Eight
“He kissed you,” Katie blurted out the moment Charlie walked into her friend’s office and sat down.
She probably shouldn’t have gone down to Accounting to see Katie, but Charlie hadn’t wanted to be alone at the moment, either. Practically the instant she and Vance had returned to Waverly’s, Ann Richardson had asked to see him.
He hadn’t been happy about it, but he’d had to leave before Charlie could show him the emails. Before they could decide what to do next. Still, he’d kissed her again, hard and fast, then promised they would straighten it all out when he returned. But she hadn’t been able to simply sit alone and stew, so she’d come to see her best friend. Who apparently was either psychic or had X-ray vision.
“Do you have radar or something?” she asked.
“Don’t need it,” Katie told her. “You’re all dazzle-eyed and your lips are puffy. That’s not even counting the fact that you’re practically glowing. So spill.” Katie grinned wickedly and rubbed her palms together in eager anticipation. “I want every detail. Spare nothing. He said hi, you said hi, he grabbed you up in his oh-so-manly arms and planted one on you and—”
“I kissed him,” Charlie said, cutting her friend off mid-sentence.
“Seriously?” Astonished, Katie stared at her openmouthed for a heartbeat or two. Then she slapped one hand to her chest and said in an overly dramatic voice, “I’m so proud. I think I’m having a moment here.”
“Very funny.”
“Well, come on,” Katie teased. “You haven’t been interested in anyone since …”
“I know.” Charlie winced. Katie knew the whole story of Jake’s father and how Charlie had been so completely conned by the first smooth-talking, good-looking guy she came across. Katie had been after Charlie for the past year to move on, find someone nice. Take a chance again. Now that Charlie finally had, Katie was ready to take a bow.
“Boy, when you step back into the dating pool, you go straight for the deep end, don’t you?”
“Seems that way. But, honestly, I don’t remember jumping in. One minute we were talking and the next—” Charlie could hardly believe it herself. Her body was still buzzing from the sensations aroused by that kiss. She could still feel Vance’s mouth on hers, the soft brush of his breath on her cheek, and the strength in his hands as he held her.
“I don’t even know what made me do it,” she confessed, then instantly said, “Oh, that’s not true. Of course I know. He’s been so nice. So un-alpha-top-dog the last couple of weeks.”
“I like alpha guys,” Katie argued.
“Oh, he’s still alpha,” Charlie assured her. The man just charged ahead, sure he could fix whatever was wrong. He didn’t take no for an answer and had supreme faith in his own abilities. Hard to argue with that kind of confidence.
She hadn’t told Katie about the blackmail threats or why she’d been so worried and distracted lately, so she didn’t bring up just how supportive Vance had been about that.
Katie sighed and cupped her chin in her hands. “And he kissed you back?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Then why is your happy-little-world glow slowly fading?” Straightening up, Katie folded her arms on her desk and frowned. “Honestly, Charlie, cut yourself a break, will you? You’re allowed to kiss a gorgeous guy and actually enjoy it.”
“Am I?” Charlie stood up and walked to the narrow window next to Katie’s desk. Not much of a view, but she could at least see the sky. “I’m a mom. It isn’t only me I have to worry about. If I make a mistake with a guy, it impacts Jake, too.”
Katie swiveled her desk chair around. “And Vance is a mistake?”
Her friend’s voice was quiet, but the question rang out loud and clear. The problem was, Charlie didn’t know the answer. If she went by how she was feeling, then, no, Vance was so not a mistake. But if she let reality into the hazy thoughts clouding her mind, then the answer was a big oh, yes. Walking into a relationship with Vance Waverly was just asking for future misery and pain.
He knew the truth about her now. Knew her background. Knew that she’d been foolish enough to be seduced by a man whose real name she didn’t even know. She’d confessed to being blackmailed and the auction house his family had founded was threatened.
They couldn’t be more different. Their worlds were so far apart they were in opposing galaxies.
“You’re going to talk yourself out of this, aren’t you?” Katie asked on a sigh.
Charlie looked over her shoulder at her friend. “Out of what? A kiss? Come on, Katie—me and Vance Waverly? That wouldn’t even make a good book. No one would believe it was possible, even as fiction.”
“You don’t read the right books,” Katie muttered, then stood up to join Charlie at the window. “You’re thinking too much. I get it. After Jake’s father, you were burned bad and I really understand why you’re being so cautious. But, Charlie, if you don’t open yourself to possibilities, you’ll never have anything in your life.”
“I’ve
