Smooth talking stranger Read online

  She almost choked on her coffee, holding up a hand when he shot out of the chair, apparently to come to her rescue.

  “I’m sorry. You reminded me of a professor who’s just finished a lecture and wants to make sure his students understood all the important points.”

  He settled back, a corner of his mouth hitching up as though to carry amusement into his eyes. “We didn’t do a whole hell of a lot of talking.”

  “So I gathered.” And she wasn’t particularly in a mood to discuss anything now. She didn’t know how to handle this morning-after crap, especially when she could barely remember the night before. Although she feared her lack of memory might be more of a defense mechanism rather than any sort of true amnesia. To acknowledge the memories would be to admit what she’d done, and she wasn’t exactly proud of her actions last night or where she found herself this morning.

  She wasn’t in the habit of going home with strangers. Hell, she wasn’t in the habit of going home with men she knew! Last night had been an aberration, a fluke. One too many margaritas, one too many lonely nights. An incredibly sexy man who even now had her contemplating the advantages of staying in his bed a little longer.

  Not an option. She had responsibilities, commitments, obligations. None of which lent themselves well to waking up in a stranger’s bed.

  She glanced around the room. He must have only recently moved in. Nothing hung on the walls. No photos sat on the dresser. No plants or knickknacks offered a hint to his likes or dislikes. Her clothes were draped over the foot of the bed, a startling reminder that they weren’t on her. She inhaled a deep breath. “I need to get home.”

  He nodded slowly. “You’re welcome to use the shower. I set some clean towels—”

  “I’m not going to shower. I just want to throw on my clothes and get out of here as quickly as possible.”

  She thought she saw regret wash over his features, but the emotion was gone so quickly that she couldn’t be sure. She almost apologized for seeming ungrateful. Based on the way her body had felt when she’d awoken, she had a feeling she should be thanking him profusely.

  “Suit yourself. I’ll wait downstairs to drive you back to the bar so you can pick up your car.” He jerked a thumb toward the door. “Door locks.”

  He rose to his full height, and she wondered how—even with too many margaritas in her system—she could have imagined she was with Steve. Steve had been tall, but this man was taller, broader, gave the impression of power waiting to be unleashed.

  Carrying himself as though everything was a comfortable fit, he walked out of the room and closed the door.

  The firm click echoing between the barren walls snapped her out of her lethargy. She scrambled out of bed, hurried across the room, and threw the lock. Then she pressed herself against the door, seeking some sort of comfort while she trembled uncontrollably. Oh, God, how could she have slept with a stranger?

  Steve had died nearly six years ago. In all the time since they’d handed her a folded flag, she’d had not one date.

  She laughed mirthlessly. Last night she’d broken with tradition. Instead of curling up with a romance novel while soaking in a tub filled with luxuriant bubbles, surrounded by scented candles, she’d decided to go out on the town. She’d driven to Austin and walked along Sixth Street

  until she’d finally gathered enough courage to step into a bar. What an idiot.

  She’d felt so uncomfortable, so conspicuous, so out of place. She’d thought a margarita would calm her nerves. One drink had led to two, to three, to four. By the time the man had joined her, she’d apparently lost all her inhibitions. What a fool. She could have discovered when it was too late that she’d gone home with a serial murderer, a sexual deviant, a woman beater.

  Instead, she’d lucked out. She’d gone home with a man who’d carried her higher than she’d ever flown. The sex had been great—more than great. That was the one memory that she’d completely retained from the night before.

  Ironically, the terrific sex only added to her guilt. Because as good as Steve had been, he’d never been that good. It felt like a betrayal to his memory to find such joy in another man’s body. Part of her wondered if she’d hung onto Steve for so long because she feared discovering that what they’d had together had existed only in her mind.

  It had always been hard, so hard, to let another man in. And yet, last night, it had been so incredibly easy—not because of the margaritas she’d downed but because of the man who’d reached across the table and wrapped his hand around hers. The man who’d pressed a kiss to her palm and, with his eyes more than his words, had invited her to go home with him.

  Then he’d made her ever so glad that she had.

  And now she was assailed with guilt because she’d enjoyed herself. Because she was a mother and a daughter, and she had responsibilities that she’d ignored last night. She hadn’t tucked her son into bed. She hadn’t made certain that her father was coping with the recent loss of her mother.

  Last night she’d been selfish, thinking of only what she’d needed, and last night, she’d desperately needed a man. And by God, she’d certainly found one.

  Now she was in his bedroom when she really needed to be in hers. She didn’t want to take her cell phone out of her purse and see how many voicemail messages or missed calls were waiting for her. She’d warned her father that she planned to stay out late. She simply hadn’t expected at the time that she’d stay out until the early hours of the morning. She needed to get home.

  Wrapping her arms around herself, she crossed the hardwood floor to the bathroom. He was obviously a man of simple tastes. The bathroom was as un-adorned as the bedroom. It contained no evidence that it served any purpose other than its primary function—no potpourri, embroidered hand towels, or carved soaps in decorative dishes. She walked to the sink, gazed in the mirror, and wanted to die from mortification.

  “Oh, dear God!”

  Alice Cooper on his worst day stared back at her.

  Her mascara was smeared around her eyes, reaching down to her cheeks, her hair was little more than blond tangled tufts that looked as though it belonged on some creature in a Seuss book. No wonder he’d been unable to tear his gaze from her face.

  She looked as though she’d been resurrected from the dead. Whatever attentions he’d bestowed on her last night had to have been the result of a generous heart, because she was certainly lacking any sort of sexual appeal this morning—and for all she knew had been lacking it last night. She’d obviously deluded herself into thinking she’d looked terrific.

  Dropping back her head, she audibly sighed and wondered if crawling out the window and hitching a ride back to town was a viable option, because she certainly didn’t want to have to face this guy again. But she didn’t know where she was exactly or how far she was from town.

  Her only way of getting home was waiting for her downstairs. And after he returned her to her minivan, she’d never set eyes on him again. She found whatever small consolation she could in that fact.

  Taking a deep breath, she gathered up her courage. She had no choice except to face him again. She might as well do it on her terms.

  Hunter stood in his living room, his arm braced against the floor-to-ceiling plate glass window that looked out over the lake. The upstairs balcony that led off his bedroom offered a better view, but his bedroom was currently occupied. Besides, he’d convinced himself that the trees at eye level made this view more tranquil. And right now, he craved tranquility and absolution. Although he seriously doubted that either would be forthcoming.

  He repeatedly told himself that he hadn’t done anything wrong, anything he should be ashamed of. He’d spotted an attractive lady at the bar, sitting alone, downing margaritas as though they were lemonades on a hot summer afternoon. He’d sidled up to her, made small talk—for the life of him, he couldn’t remember what they’d talked about—invited her back to his place, and shown her a good time.

  Still, his actions nagged at
him. Probably because she’d looked so appalled when she’d come fully awake and realized she wasn’t where she expected to be. Her brown eyes, the most communicative pair he’d ever seen, were practically neon lights flashing every thought running through her pretty little head. She certainly didn’t step out on her husband much. If he were a betting man, he’d bet last night was the first time.

  For some unfathomable reason, that knowledge pleased him. He didn’t want to think of her as running all over creation, hopping into bed with any guy she happened across. He couldn’t recall ever feeling this possessive twinge. It was downright irritating.

  He glanced at his watch for the twentieth time in as many minutes. If it took her this long when she was just throwing on her clothes, he’d hate to have to wait around on her when she was doing more than that. On the other hand, he couldn’t help but believe that in spite of her infidelity, she was a woman worth waiting on.

  Hearing footsteps on the stairs, he glanced over his shoulder. She’d done a lot more than toss on her red flowing skirt and white lacy top. And he wished to hell she hadn’t, because she made him want to escort her right back up the stairs and offer her a repeat of last night.

  All her makeup was gone, although it appeared she’d dabbed something glossy onto her lips. Her short cropped hair was fluffier now, softer looking—like dandelions waiting for a soft breath to blow the petals away. And he was sorely tempted to skim his breath over her curls, along her throat, across her shoulder.

  She still looked as though she didn’t belong, and he wondered what it would take to make her appear as if she did belong here in his house—a notion that annoyed him for its audacity at passing through his mind.

  Lifting a delicate shoulder, she turned her head slightly as though embarrassed. “I decided to shower after all.”

  He couldn’t prevent his grin from forming. He’d figured once she’d caught sight of herself in the mirror that she’d at least want to scrub her face. “I thought you might.”

  She’d approached and was near enough now that he could see the blush creeping up her cheeks, could smell the scent of his spicy soap on her skin. And he hoped to hell that the fragrance of her perfume remained on his sheets.

  “I don’t usually wear that much makeup,” she said defensively, as though he’d insulted her because he’d seen her less than perfect face this morning. The odd thing was that he’d still been attracted to her—probably because the heat and sweat they’d worked up the night before had been responsible for the smearing.

  “Figured you didn’t.” It was one of the things that had clued him in that she probably wasn’t a regular at the bar. She’d reminded him of the way teenage girls looked when they first enter adolescence and started playing around with eyeliner and eye shadow and all the other powdery gunk women dabbed on their face to appeal to the opposite sex.

  Now that she was here, ready to go, he found himself loath to take her back to the bar, but he wasn’t sure how to entice her into staying. He wasn’t in the habit of wanting women to hang around. He had enough complications in his profession. He didn’t need the distractions in his personal life.

  Still, before he could think through the ramifications, he jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Did you want to eat breakfast before you go? I boil a mean egg.”

  Her lips twitched, her eyes sparkled, and he realized that teasing her was a bad idea. It was her smile that had prompted him to invite her out here to begin with.

  “No, thanks. I really do need to get home.”

  Yeah, her husband was probably fit to be tied right about now, because she’d been out all night. Or maybe he was out of town and would be arriving home at any moment. Whatever deviations in her life had allowed her to have the freedom to roam last night were probably drawing to a close. The clock had struck midnight, and he had a feeling she wasn’t going to leave a glass slipper behind so he could find her again.

  He escorted her out of his house and to his recently purchased black jeep. He opened the passenger door for her, conscious of the fact that they were both taking extra effort not to make eye contact, not to touch. It was a game he’d played countless times: a stranger before, a lover during, a stranger after—as though everything experienced during sex wasn’t strong enough or good enough to last into the afterward. Like an exploding star that burned brilliantly and then quickly diminished into blackness.

  The unvarnished history of his relationships with women: they always faded into nothing but a distant memory. It was a fact of his life that had never bothered him until this morning.

  He settled into the driver’s seat, started up the vehicle, and wished to hell that he could think of something appropriate to say to this woman sitting beside him.

  Any apology would come out as sounding insincere, because it would be. Knowing he should feel sorry didn’t necessarily make him sorry.

  Telling her that last night had been the best in his life probably wasn’t the way to go either. It had been more than the way their bodies had melded together. He’d felt a connection, a balance that he couldn’t explain. As though they’d choreographed their moves before, rehearsed with each other a thousand times, knew the rhythm, and understood the subtle nuances of each other’s motions. He’d experienced none of the initial awkwardness he usually did as he tried to determine a woman’s particular peculiarities.

  He couldn’t explain all that he’d felt last night. Sensations that went beyond the physical. He’d never flown so high, so quickly, so intensely, as though every aspect of his being had come into play, had participated.

  He told himself that it was only because he’d gone so long without a woman in his bed, but he knew instinctually that it was more than that. That there was something about her that he couldn’t explain. And as much as he wanted to pepper her with questions, get to know her better, he knew for his own sake—and hers—the less they knew about each other, the easier it would be to forget that last night had ever happened.

  So he drove in silence, finding it strange to contemplate that letting her go was going to be difficult—as though he had any sort of choice in the matter. She was a one-night stand. His life was littered with them.

  Yet he couldn’t seem to think of her in that inconsequential way, or place her in a comfortable niche that would render her insignificant. In spite of the fact that she’d betrayed her husband and her vows, he felt as though she deserved more respect, more consideration.

  With her arms crossed protectively over her chest, she stared out the window. He wondered if she was mulling over excuses to explain her absence. He considered tossing out a few scenarios for her. Quick thinking in dangerous situations was his forte.

  Only he hoped she wouldn’t find herself in danger, hoped her husband wasn’t a man with a destructive temper. Unfortunately Hunter also knew that if he were her husband and discovered she’d been with another man, hell, he’d kill the bastard. The irony in his thinking wasn’t totally lost on him—himself being the bastard in need of killing.

  He pulled into the parking lot she directed him to and stopped beside the only vehicle remaining. A minivan. He refrained from swearing out loud. She no doubt had kids. He was the last thing she needed in her life. A repeat performance was definitely out of the question.

  She darted a quick glance his way. “Uh, thanks for the lift.”

  She reached for the handle.

  “Look,” he began. She stopped and gazed back at him. He reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out the folded scrap of paper he’d written on while he’d waited for her downstairs. “If for any reason, you need to get in touch with me…”

  He extended the paper, aware that he was offering too little, too late. Still, it was more than he’d ever offered to anyone else. “My name and number.”

  She shook her head. He waved it in front of her. “Just in case. You never know…”

  Never knew if her husband might figure out she’d been unfaithful and take his wrath out on her and leave her
with no place to go. Never knew if she might find herself pregnant and unable to explain her condition or unsure who the father might be. Never knew if she might simply want to cross paths again—although he realized the latter was incredibly unlikely.

  He noticed the slight trembling in her fingers as she took his offering, and he couldn’t stop himself from uttering, “I’m sorry.”

  And damn if he didn’t discover that he did in fact mean the words.

  She lifted her gaze and gave him an almost impish grin. “I’m trying to be.”

  What in the hell did she mean by that?

  She opened the door.

  “Wait,” he ordered with the stern voice he’d used to command men.

  She stilled and once again looked back at him.

  “I know it’s none of my business, but what did your husband do that made you go to the bar alone last night, that prompted you to go home with me?”

  A deep sadness touched her eyes. “He died.”

  With the door slamming in her wake, she was out of his jeep and running for her minivan before he could utter an oath. He clambered out of the jeep, barely in time to watch her drive off.

  Then he cursed again.

  He didn’t even know her name.

  Chapter 3

  “Where in thunderation have you been?”

  “Mom! You’re home!”

  Honeybunch and Lucky yipped, sniffed at her feet, and ducked their noses beneath her skirt.

  Serena had barely closed the back door that led into the kitchen when her father, son, and the part-beagle-part-whatever-had-gotten-off-its-leash mutts noticed her arrival. Grimacing, she pressed her fingertips to both temples, her hovering headache threatening to return full force, the odor of scrambled eggs churning her stomach, causing it to threaten revolt. She forced a cheerfulness that she didn’t truly feel into her words. “Hello, sweetie. Good morning, Dad.”

  With her feet, she nudged the dogs aside and walked farther into the kitchen.

  “Don’t ‘good morning’ me,” her father said. “I’ve already called the police, the county sheriff, and every hospital in the area—”