First and Ten Read online

  Again, she shook her head, unable to trust her voice. She managed to lift her eyes to his face, and inhaled shakily as he slowly smiled. Shaking herself back to reality, she cleared her throat and said, “Um…no. Never met anyone I wanted to be with.”

  “Never?”

  Her face grew hot, and she frowned up at him. It felt so damned great to be able to look up at a man! “Not after graduation. Too busy with school and business.” How the hell could she tell him that he had been the only man she’d ever remotely wanted in her life?

  He reached for her jacket without taking his eyes off her, and she shrugged into it nervously. “Not after graduation…” he repeated thoughtfully.

  “Look, Jack…what you just did for me was amazing.” She blushed hotly, but she refused to act embarrassed over something she’d dreamt of for 12 years. “Thanks for that. It puts things into perspective.”

  Jack gently fastened the two buttons on the suit jacket, and then ran his hands up over her breasts to the sides of her face, almost making her faint dead away at the delicious sensations he created. “Are you trying to tell me ‘thanks…now get lost’?” His eyes searched her expression.

  Dear Lord! He was enough to drive her insane, and she wanted more than anything to take him up on that offer to come home with him, but she had promised Karen that she would stay at the house. She chewed her lower lip, and then said, “Yes?”

  He drew a deep breath that caused his muscular chest to brush enticingly against her still aching nipples. He nodded as if digesting the fact that she didn’t want to spend the night at his place. When he spoke, his tone was calmly conversational. “Okay. Let’s get you over to the big house. Your stuff should already be there.”

  Chapter Five

  As he drove, Jack tried not to keep looking over at her in the black leather bucket seat. The strained silence between them seethed with unasked questions…with unspoken wants and desires. He now knew that she had wanted him as badly as he had ever wanted her. But many years had passed. The fact that she had never married was encouraging…but then, she hadn’t really come right out and told him that it was because she was pining for him. The way she had responded to him still had him as hard as hell. But then, she was completely different than she’d been in school. More confident. More worldly.

  He had teased her all those years back, hoping for the kind of response he’d just gotten, but back then, she had seemed uptight and afraid. That had been part of the attraction. She was so unlike the women who had chased him constantly—the women he preferred not to be around. And less than fifteen minutes ago, she had teasingly invited him to give her a second sample of what he so desperately wanted to do to her. And he had taken the bait. Hell, he’d snapped it up like a starving trout. And he’d wanted to take it even further.

  She wasn’t on the pill, so that meant that she either didn’t have sex often enough to feel the need for it, or all her partners used condoms.

  No. He didn’t want to go there. He preferred the prior reason. God, what a hypocrite he was! She was what…thirty-two? Maybe thirty-three? Did he truly hope that she had saved herself for him? Or at least for the man she married? Hell, was he kidding? That old-fashioned notion had gone out with graduation from junior high school!

  The woman was just too damn hot to have made it this far without having made love to at least one man. Or many men. He growled softly deep in his throat, and realized that she was staring at him. He kept his eyes on the road until she looked away again, and then he said softly, “Looks like the van is over at the Spot. Almost there.” He glanced at the big old frat house as they drove past it toward the street where Karen’s big Victorian stood, surrounded by a manicured lawn that still boasted a rose trellis with a bench, and a lover’s maze that Karen had spent some cash on rebuilding a few years ago. He had given a couple thousand to help out, since it had seemed so important to her. Karen was the only person he knew who seemed to take Jack Gerrard at face value, and didn’t seem to expect something from her friendship with him. And if nothing else, Jack was loyal to his true friends.

  The big house was lit up, almost every window aglow as he pulled into the driveway. He turned off the engine, and sat for a long moment, trying to plan how this was going to work. But she took the initiative by saying quietly, “Are you going to be at the cocktail party tomorrow night at the Ambassador? Because if you are, I would love to buy you a drink.”

  He glanced across the console and let his gaze slip hungrily over her, noting the hectic color that flooded her cheeks at his hot perusal. She plucked at the seatbelt that she had just released.

  “I had planned on it.” He reached across and slid his palm around the back of her neck, drawing her toward him, unfastening his own seatbelt as he did so. He saw the wide chocolate gaze fixed on his mouth, and he breathed softly, “You’ve got yourself a date, Ms. Jamison…” and his mouth took her full soft lips before she could reply. He heard her little whimper of pleasure, and if the damn console hadn’t been there to block him from full contact with those lush curves...

  But before he could deepen the heated kiss, the porch light came on, and Karen came bounding down the stairs, with two other women on her heels, concern written on her pretty face. He sighed and drew back, and Fran just sat there, her eyes closed as if in a dream, until her door was jerked open and Karen’s voice cried, “God, Fran! Are you hurt?”

  He slid out from behind the wheel and came around to help Fran, but she was already on the pebbled drive, hugging and sobbing as her old pals gathered around her. He rubbed the back of his neck as he watched her greet old friends, and then feeling a bit like a third wheel on a bike, he nodded to Karen, handed her Fran’s bag, and headed back around the Mercedes to drive back to the Spot and switch vehicles. He would see her tomorrow night…

  * * * *

  “Bill told us what happened at the airport…your bags are up in your room.” Karen’s voice was filled with worry. Chloe hugged her and made a point of checking her forehead for bruises before saying, “Bill said Jack Gerrard hit you in the face!”

  “No, he didn’t!” Karen shook her head. “He said they bonked heads!”

  “You okay, honey? You look a bit flushed! Need an ice bag for your head?” Chloe’s cool fingers touched her feverish face.

  If they only knew what had caused her hot cheeks, she would have been bombarded with shocked questions. She smiled tightly and said “I’d love an ice bag, Chloe.” But when Karen slipped her arm around her and started to haul her up the steps to the wide porch, Fran hung back and glanced around. “Did Jack leave?”

  Karen lifted the laptop bag. “Yeah…what exactly did happen tonight, Fran? We expected you here an hour ago.”

  She couldn’t prevent her blush, but she shoved her hair back from her face and said “Jack and I talked for a while before driving over.”

  “You and Jack talked awhile…” Karen pursed her lips, then chuckled. “Sure you talked…since when did Jack Gerrard ever know anything about stocks, bonds, and securities trading?”

  Fran chewed her bottom lip, and then decided to let Karen think what she wanted to think. None of her old friends would ever believe what had happened, anyway. And she wasn’t about to share.

  Having her old room back was great. She unloaded her things onto the narrow four-poster bed, and sighed. She hadn’t realized how much she’d actually missed this old house until the sounds of more arrivals floated up the curved staircase, and the sound of voices that she hadn’t heard in nearly a decade filtered into her bedroom. She heard Chloe shouting up the stairs, telling Bliss not to take all night.

  She smiled as she heard Bliss yell back that she would be down as soon as she got unpacked. Everything was quiet for a moment, and then a tinkle of tinny music floated through the transom over her door, and she shook her head. That song…O.M.G! THAT song?

  Fran slipped out her door and padded quietly to the room where Bliss had always stayed, and she drew a deep breath, using her old �
�secret knock”. Bliss called out, “Come on in, Fran.”

  Her throat tightened as she turned the knob and stepped inside the familiar old room. Like hers, very little had changed in this room in the last ten years. It was like stepping back though time. She tossed a crooked grin at her high-school closest friend, and sighed “When are you going to design me something that makes my butt look good?” She waved her hand at the black, toga-style sheath caught at Bliss’ shoulder with a matching tie. God, Bliss looked great. It was as if she hadn’t added another ten years. She still looked to Fran like she belonged in high school. Bliss looked up with a small grin and laughed.

  “I’ll make a deal with you. You take enough time off from the think tank to come to New York and get measured, and I’ll make you a dress that will win your butt an award.”

  Bliss had made the offer time and again, but Fran had simply figured it was an offer made as a polite gesture. Bliss’ creations were one of a kind, and they were expensive. Bliss had said she would do it for free, but Fran was not a pauper, and she had no intention of letting her friend give her a fabulous dress for free. Besides…she had already bought one of Bliss’ creations last week.

  Bliss shook her head and sighed, turning back to stare at the musical greetings card she held in her hands. The tune it played was the sound Fran had heard a moment ago. Bliss seemed to be mesmerized by the card.

  Fran lifted one brow. “What the hell is the name of that song you keep playing?”

  “I don’t remember,” Bliss shrugged. Fran knew where she’d heard that song. It was the song they’d been playing the night of the frat house raid. She almost rolled her eyes. Was Bliss still thinking about that night? She drew a deep breath and exhaled slowly to keep from saying something that might hurt her friend.

  “Have you remembered a damn thing about that night?” she asked, mentally urging the woman to fess up. Had Bliss actually forgotten?

  “Not much after Elliot broke up with me. I think there was dancing and green Jello involved,” Bliss shrugged, “after that, nothing.”

  “So are you here looking for Nick Santucci as a possible Mr. Right? ‘Cause, honey, Mr. Right could be fat, bald or married—and very possibly, all three.” She recalled Nick’s dad at graduation and suppressed a shudder.

  Possibly? More like, probably. But Bliss was the always the dreamer.

  Bliss blinked. “It’s scary how much we think alike. And the answer is not just no, but hell no. I think. So, are you not looking for Mr. Right, either?”

  “There’s no such animal.” Fran turned away to hide her own extremely incriminating thoughts. “But I wouldn’t mind a few rounds with Mr. Wrong.”

  Unfortunately for her, Mr. Wrong was driving home right now in his catering van, probably having completely forgotten about the incident in the parking ramp at the airport.

  He hadn’t even waited to say goodbye. Just handed Karen her laptop bag, and skedaddled. That fact left her wondering if he had regretted their lapse of sanity as they’d both succumbed to an itch that had waited twelve years to be scratched.

  * * * *

  After leaving Bliss to moon over her musical card, she made the rounds, greeting and chatting with old friends for what seemed like hours before finally climbing the familiar curved stairs and falling into bed. But it was a wasted effort. No matter how dead tired she was, she lay there listening to laughter and squeals of delight as those still exchanging stories shared their lives with friends. She rolled over and pulled the pillow over her head, and then spent another hour tossing and turning, her thoughts filled with Jack Gerrard and the way his warm skin had smelled. The way his body had fit against hers. The way his eyes had zoomed in on her mouth, making her heart beats accelerate and her pulse explode.

  Had they really made out so heedlessly right there in a public place? Her cheeks grew hot at the memory. She finally drifted off to sleep, only to have the most delicious, amazing dream that brought her awake before dawn, her heart pounding and her pussy throbbing with another amazing, mind-blowing orgasm. As she lay there panting, reconstructing the marvelous dream, she wondered if Jack Gerrard was as good in bed in the real world as he just had been in her dream.

  Good thing she had every intention of finding out…

  Chapter Six

  Jack dragged on his dress shirt and glared at his reflection as he buttoned it and tucked it into the waistband of his tuxedo pants before zipping up and threading his belt through the loops. Had she been disappointed? Had he gone too far too fast? Had he been the jerk she had thought him that day in the school parking lot when he had made that weak attempt to apologize and ask her to go out with him? He growled at himself and reached for his black tie.

  She hadn’t even bothered to thank him for bringing her to Karen’s last night. She’d simply walked off as if he was some cab driver instead of the man she’d just been kissing. His eyes slipped over his face and body critically. She used to blush every time he was near, and she would chew that lush lower lip just like she had last night…making him wonder what it would taste like…how soft it would feel as he nibbled her mouth and teased it open for his kiss.

  He knew what it tasted like now…what it felt like, and it was damned addictive! But had she gotten the same kind of electrical charge out their kisses that he had? Was he kidding himself that she’d felt what he had while they had practically devoured each other in the parking garage?

  He inserted his gold cufflinks shaped like footballs with tiny diamonds marking the stitching, and he adjusted his collar, checking the tie. He had always been lousy with ties. He seriously doubted that Fran would even notice that his damn tie was crooked. At least, he hoped she wouldn’t. He hoped to hell her eyes would be on his mouth as they had been last night… seeming to anticipate how they would feel on her body.

  His cock was hard and tight, stretching his zipper to the breaking point. He reached into his wooden dresser top case and pulled out his coveted 1969 Super Bowl ring, a gift from the family of another injured KC Chief, sliding it onto his hand. .And then he tugged open the top drawer and pulled out the brand new freshly purchased box of lambskin condoms, pulling three out, and tucking them into his pants pocket. He wasn’t going to go unprepared again. He wouldn’t see disappointment in those lush brown eyes tonight.

  Shrugging his Tux jacket on, he drew a deep breath. He ran both hands through his hair to smooth it back. To hell with trying to get it to lay flat and smooth. It had a mind of its own, and he knew he looked just a touch wicked with it tousled and finger combed. He figured he needed all the help he could get, because Fran Jamison wasn’t going back to Karen’s after the party. Tonight was going to be a full-out seduction. If he had to toss her over his shoulder and carry her off like a damn sack of potatoes…so be it.

  He inhaled deeply and blew his breath out to calm his nervous gut. He was tied in bigger knots tonight than he’d ever been before a big game. Tonight was more important than any football game he’d ever played. Tonight he was going to win a far more important prize than a championship ring. No matter what the prize thought about it.

  * * * *

  Karen looked up as Fran leaned around her door and said, “Need an opinion here…”

  “On what?”

  Fran made a wry face and stepped into the room, and almost fled at the amazed look on her friend’s face. Karen managed to pull her mouth shut before she said, “Oh, wow!”

  “Is it too much?” Fran was almost afraid she’d overdone the seduction routine here. She chewed her lower lip and twirled for Karen to get a look.

  “Oh. My. God! Who’s the poor guy you are out to slap your saddle on, Franny? He hasn’t got a chance!”

  Warm color flooded her cheeks, and she plucked at the delicious Bliss Harper confection she’d bought on a whim last week. “She sure does a fabulous dress, doesn’t she?”

  “Honey, it ain’t the dress that does the job…it’s the woman inside it.” Karen’s eyes were shining with admiration, and Fran h
ugged her.

  Her throat tight with emotion, she drew a deep breath and said softly, “You and I need to have a long talk, Karen…about this old house. If you are really planning to sell, please talk with me before you do?”

  Karen’s eyes widened and she clapped both hands over her mouth. Fran lifted a hand and shook her head. “Not tonight…I have a major seduction working here. But before you make any real plans to sell it…okay? I want to see you keep this wonderful house forever.”

  Karen blinked back tears, nodding jerkily behind her hands. And then she lowered her fingers and hiccupped, “Who’s the poor lost soul who’s going down in flames tonight?”

  “I’m not ready to divulge any details. He may see me coming and make a flying leap out the window to escape.” Her lips twisted as Karen laughed and flapped her hands in front of her face to dry the tears.

  “Honey, once he gets a good look at you in that, he’s not going anywhere…that I can practically guarantee!”

  “Well, wish me luck…” She sighed. “I have three more hours to refine my strategy. And this is not something I have much hands-on experience with.”

  * * * *

  Jack stood by the bar, not really paying much attention to Bill and Wes as they told stories about the good old days and the women they’d enjoyed while they had been the school’s hot jocks. He’d heard the same old stories four or five times since arriving an hour ago, and he knew that most of it was just bullshit. He shook his head and once again scanned the crowded ballroom with its multitude of hastily set up portable tables that were practically groaning under the food and drinks, leaving barely a twenty-foot square for dancing. The small dance floor was a squeeze. He hadn’t seen so many familiar faces in one place since graduation.

  “Yo, Jack Gerrard! Great to see you again, man!” An unfamiliar face grinned up at him, and when he blinked questioningly down at the man, the guy blushed and tried to remind him of how they knew one another, obviously trying to impress the woman who was clinging to his meaty arm. He took pity on the man after a few tense moments, and smiled.