“We’re holding up the elevator,” he said irritably. “This is a one-night stand, we’re not talking marriage for life. So what does it matter?”
A one-night stand. How cheap that sounded. “I’m not going anywhere with you,” she flared. “I really did want to sketch you—it wasn’t a come-on.”
“Look, I’ve apologized.” He tugged her out of the elevator. “What more do you want?”
Anger had hardened his jawline; his energy, fierce and unyielding, called up a matching response in her from a place she refused to deny. “I don’t like being called a liar.”
“I’m taking your words at face value—that you’re not interested in my money. Isn’t that enough for you?”
“I guess it’ll have to be,” she retorted, her cheeks hot with temper.
With sudden impatience Bryce put his arms around her, pulled her to the length of his body and kissed her. His hunger, ruthless and imperious, wiped out her anger as if it had never been, replacing it with a surge of primitive passion that was utterly new to her. Drowning in it, she clung to him with all her strength. His hold tightened. Then she felt the first thrust of his tongue like the lick of fire. Instinctively molding her body to his, she opened to him; and in a rush of mingled amazement and pleasure realized that what he was demanding she was more than willing to give.
Abruptly Bryce released her, saying roughly, “The car’s just outside. Let’s go.”
Jenessa stumbled after him, knowing that in one brief kiss she’d learned more about the power of one man’s body over her own than she could have imagined. Enthralled. Swept off her feet. Bewitched. In a way that even ten minutes ago she couldn’t have anticipated.
Bryce ushered her into the passenger seat of a silver Mercedes, and without a word drove out of the lot. Soon he was navigating the noisy streets, weaving in and out of the traffic. As though there’d been no hiatus in their conversation, he said, “There’s something you should know about me. I fly to the west coast tomorrow and leave for Singapore the next day. I don’t do commitment and I always use protection.”
Something in his tone angered Jenessa profoundly. “Are you being purposely unromantic?”
“I’m telling you the way it is. If you don’t like it, it’s not too late to back out…I’ll buy you a drink and no hard feelings.”
Inadvertently he’d given her an excuse to escape from a situation that was way beyond her depth. She should take it, take it and run. It was perfectly clear to her that she’d never even have gotten into his car had he not been Travis’s friend, and thus known to her by hearsay.
But then she remembered the incredible power of that single kiss; mysteriously, hadn’t it transformed her into a woman truly aware of her own femininity? Was she going to run away from that?
With a barely discernible quiver in her voice, Jenessa said mendaciously, “My first rule is protection.”
“Fine. And your second?”
This time she was telling the hard truth. “That no one, but no one, controls my life but me.”
“Then we’re on the same wavelength,” Bryce said.
Jenessa sat back, trying to still the trembling of her limbs. Right now she was going on the assumption she’d have at least some control over whatever happened in Bryce’s hotel room.
But what if she was wrong? What then?
CHAPTER TWO
AS A CABDRIVER blared his horn, Jenessa gave a nervous start. She depended deeply on her intuition in the studio; it was now screaming that the next few hours could unalterably change her life in ways far more significant than any lost virginity.
She was under no illusions: she was about to go to bed with her brother’s best friend. It was a crazy plan. Plain crazy. But never before had her blood fueled her body with such an undeniable and imperative ache of desire.
She’d allow herself to be seduced by Bryce; and then she’d leave. If he ever found out who she was, she was sure he’d never tell Travis.
In that, at least, she was quite safe. And how much better to lose her virginity with an experienced man who was, however obliquely, known to her, than to any of the fumbling undergraduates who had only filled her distaste. She said coolly, “I’ll take a cab home afterward.”
Not taking his eyes off the constant traffic, Bryce asked, “How old are you, Jan?”
Her lashes flickered. “Twenty-one.”
“Do you graduate next spring?”
“No…I was late applying.”
He said in exasperation, “I can’t read you—you elude me. Usually women are an open book to me. But not you.”
“Perhaps open books aren’t worth reading.” She gave a sudden chuckle. “Which sounds like a Japanese koan, doesn’t it?”
“Mysterious? Paradoxical? You’re both.” He grimaced. “I’ll be back in New York in a couple of months. Will you give me your phone number?”
“No.”
Her answer, like everything else she’d done in the last hour, had been instinctive. Bryce said flatly, “You really are into control.”
Suddenly exhilarated as much by their verbal fencing as by his physical presence, Jenessa said provocatively, “Is there any reason why I shouldn’t be?”
Deliberately he took his hand from the wheel and slid it up her stockinged thigh, bared by her miniskirt. “I hope neither of us regrets this.”
“There’s no reason why either of us should,” she said, as much to herself as to him; and made no attempt to hide her shiver of response.
Leaving his hand heavy and warm on her thigh, he said, “Two more blocks.”
Ten minutes later, Bryce was ushering her through the double doors of the penthouse suite in one of the city’s most prestigious hotels. She gained a quick impression of gleaming parquet and opulent Chinese carpets before Bryce said with the underlying impatience she was already realizing was characteristic of him, “Do you want anything to eat? Or drink?”
The courage that had preserved her time and again in her childhood came to the fore. She slipped her feet out of her shoes and stood on tiptoe to kiss him. “You and you,” she whispered.
With a strength that intoxicated her, he lifted her in his arms and carried her the width of a richly furnished living room, its tall windows jeweled with the lights of the city. His corded muscles were hard against her body; she could hear the heavy pounding of his heart, an intimacy that made her faint with longing. He pushed the bedroom door open, strode across a thick carpet to the bed and lowered her onto it. Then he straightened and yanked at the knot of his tie.
Mesmerized, Jenessa watched as he hauled off his jacket, tie and shirt. He kicked his shoes to one side. Socks and trousers followed. His watch, whose price
