a good thing,” he said.
She shook her head and pulled away from him. “No, it’s not. There are things about me that you don’t know.”
“Tell me about them,” he said.
“Not here. Come to my house tomorrow morning.”
“I can’t wait until tomorrow,” he said.
She smiled up at him as he leaned in close. The hardness of his body was a remembered thrill. “We already did lust. Remember?”
“Yes,” he said. “I know you remember, too. It’s there in your eyes when I hold you. You still want me.”
She did still want him, but she liked to think she was older and wiser. Please, God, let her be wiser. She couldn’t fall for him again. Wouldn’t let herself be that weak where he was concerned. Cam Stern wasn’t the kind of guy she could have a one-night stand with and walk away from.
But that was what she wanted. She wanted to pretend they were strangers with no baggage or no commitments. That they could have one night of passion with no consequences. But it was too late for that. She was emotionally entangled with him, even though he wasn’t with her.
She went up on her tiptoes and rubbed her lips over his and then slowly opened her mouth and kissed him.
She held on to his shoulders and felt his mouth move against hers. He parted her lips with his own, and his tongue snaked over her teeth into her mouth.
His thrusts were light and teasing, making her crave so much more of him. She opened her mouth wider, held on to his shoulders and let everything drop away. She didn’t think about the past or her secrets. She didn’t think about the glittering people at this charity ball. She didn’t think of anything except Cam Stern and his mouth.
That oh-so-talented mouth that was moving over hers and making her forget everything except the way he tasted and the way he felt.
His lips were firm but also tender against hers. His hands smoothed their way down her spine. One sprawled in the middle of her back and the other dipped lower to her hips, drawing her closer to him.
“Let’s get out of here,” Cam said. “We need to go someplace private.”
Confused for the first time in a very long time, Becca really didn’t know what to do. So she followed Cam out of the ballroom and onto the street as he hailed a cab.
Cam wasn’t ready to let the night end. Seeing Becca again wasn’t at all what he had thought it would be.
The April sky was clear, the night air a little cool but not cold when they left the club. Cam had said his goodbyes to Russell earlier and Russell had offered the car, but Cam had turned him down. He liked to do things his own way. He wanted to be in control.
Cam hailed a cab for them and asked to be taken to his hotel, the Affinia Manhattan, which was a suite-only hotel. Though he’d only been in town for a few days, Cam liked to have room to be comfortable. At six-five, he was a big man, and he didn’t like to be in a room crammed with a bed and a dresser.
“I thought you said you only wanted someplace private,” Becca said, arching one eyebrow. “Why do we need to go to your hotel? “
“I don’t know any other quiet place we can talk.” He wanted her to himself. That was one thing he’d done right during their affair. They had spent all of their time together in her hotel room. Having sex and lying in each other’s arms. Despite the fact that they were both working hard during the day, the nights had been filled with only each other.
She tipped her head to the side. She studied him, and he wondered what she was searching for. When he looked at her, he saw the same beautiful, sexy woman he’d known two years ago. But she had changed. There was something mysterious about the woman sitting next to him now.
“Okay, we can go to your hotel, but we are getting a drink in the lobby bar.”
“Fair enough. I want to take my time and really apologize for the way things ended.”
“Apology accepted,” she said.
She was a graceful and charming woman, and as she sat next to him during the cab ride, he surreptitiously studied her. Her heart-shaped face was framed by her hair, and her eyes were dark and mysterious in this light.
He wouldn’t have thought to look into his romantic past to find a woman to move forward with, but it made sense to him now that Becca was here.
He stretched his arm out behind her and toyed with the soft tendrils of hair at the base of her neck. “Thank you. But I know you like me so I have that in my favor.”
“How do you know this?” she asked.
“The way you smile at me,” he admitted. “And the way you kissed me.”
“That wasn’t about you,” she said.
“It wasn’t?”
“No. It was a gift to myself. A chance for me to taste the forbidden fruit of the past and then move on.”
“Why are you in this car with me now?”
“I wanted to hear what you had to say,” she said. “I really don’t know much about you.”
“Or I about you,” he said.
“I think men like it that way,” she said.
“Men? I hope I’m a little different than every other man out there,” he said. “I think I want to know everything about you.”
She shook her head. “I doubt that. As long as I have secrets then I will be mysterious and just a little more attractive to you.”
“You couldn’t be anything less than you are right now, Becca. I want you.”
She shook her head again. “I know you do, but we aren’t going down that path.”
“I can’t think of anything except you in my arms,” he said, watching her blush.
“Why are you here? You said Justin is helping his fiancée move.”
He laughed. “Fine. I will stop talking about your sexy little body for a few a minutes, but I can’t stop thinking about you naked in my arms.”
“Cam.”
“Okay.” He knew he was pushing her, but he only had this night before he had to return to Miami. And apologizing for the way things had ended between them wasn’t enough to repair the damage he’d done. He wanted her back. He hadn’t realized how much until he’d danced with her. Kissed her.
“I’m here visiting Justin and to attend this charity ball tonight. The African Children’s Fund was one of my mother’s pet charities,” Cam said as the car started moving.
“Well, that’s nice.” She would have liked to think that she’d made a clean break with everything Cam Stern, but she still read about him in magazines, and late at night when she was feeling
