Asking for Trouble Read online

But he wasn’t that man anymore. An inner voice of anger and regret, which might have been his conscience or just his intelligent side, was always present now, reminding him of Charleston. It made him acknowledge just how badly giving in to his liking for women had turned out then. A bar pickup with a stranger had seemed dangerous only in the sexual sense—he’d never, in his wildest dreams, imagined how that night would end up. Bloody.

  And deadly.

  Any man would steer clear of beautiful, strange females after one he’d picked up in a bar had turned out to be armed and violent. The blonde in Charleston—and her accomplice, who had followed them to Simon’s hotel room that night—hadn’t just robbed him of his money. They had stolen his faith in the basic decency of strangers. So he should have been much more wary of the brunette who’d landed in his arms tonight.

  But for some reason, he wasn’t. Something had awakened within him. His long dormant sensual side, he supposed. Whatever it was, he had liked having this stranger curl against him as if they were longtime lovers. She’d liked it, too—he could tell by the little sighs in her throat, the soft surrender of her body against his and her warm, womanly smell.

  But something had changed. Because the creamy-skinned, dark-haired woman was now backing away from him with horror in her eyes. Stepping closer to the edge of the porch.

  A roaring began to build in Simon’s head and his whole body grew tense as another image replaced this one. Another woman, another patio. A scream. A plunge.

  “Please, stop,” he said, forcing the words out of his thick, tight throat as he thrust off the memories and focused on the here and now.

  She slid back a little more, until the high heels of her boots moved perilously close to the edge. Though they were only a few feet off the ground—not eleven stories, like he’d been in June when he’d watched a woman fall away—he simply couldn’t let it happen. Not this time. So, without warning, he lunged out and grabbed her arm, clamping his hand around her wrist in an iron grip.

  She fought, flailing her arms, trying to twist away. “Let go of me.”

  Her struggle put her on the precipice of the step and he wrapped an arm around her waist to pull her away from it. “You’re about to fall.” Dropping a hand to the small of her back, he held her with gentle firmness, waiting for her to calm down. He thrust off the pleasure he felt at having her in his arms again, and fought the wicked impulse to drop his hand and cup her ass to keep her from wiggling. Or to keep her exactly where she was. He honestly wasn’t sure which.

  “Would you relax and tell me who you are and what it is you want?”

  She finally stopped squirming, which was a good thing. Because her curvaceous form—though wet and tense—still felt much too good when pressed against his.

  Once he was sure she’d relaxed, Simon released her and stepped back, holding his hands up, palms out, in a non-threatening way. The rain still pounded, and a vicious bolt of lightning exploded across the sky, brightening everything around them for a few seconds before plunging them back into near darkness. But that quick glimpse—along with the view he’d had inside, when she’d been in his arms—convinced him of one thing.

  The woman was glorious.

  All that thick, dark hair hanging like a wet drape around her face only emphasized the creaminess of her skin, the exotic way her dark eyes tilted up slightly at the corners. She had full lips that were trembling either from nervousness or from the cold. High cheekbones, a slim jaw. And a graceful, delicate throat. Beautiful.

  But frightened.

  Now, however, she seemed to calm down a little. She’d stared at him just as intently during the lightning strike, and whatever she’d seen had made her stop fidgeting.

  “Yeah,” she whispered. “I think I’ve regained my sanity.”

  “What were you afraid of?” he asked, trying to keep his voice low and soothing. “Is someone chasing you?”

  She shook her head.

  “The storm?”

  Another shake. Then, finally, she whispered, “I’m sorry, I was afraid of you for a second.”

  Stiffening, he realized he should have figured as much. Wasn’t the whole damn town afraid of him? At least, afraid of the man they whispered about—the one who didn’t bear much resemblance to the real Simon. The gossipers had everything wrong.

  Well, practically everything. The rumors that he’d killed someone were more accurate than he’d like to admit.

  “I didn’t get a good look at you until just now when the lightning flashed,” she added.

  That made two of them. Although, she’d seemed perfectly willing to feel her way around getting to know him. Not that he blamed her, since he’d had exactly the same reaction to her surprise stumble into his arms.

  “You’re not…oh, wow, this is going to sound so stupid but for a second, I thought you were…someone else. The dark hair and eyes were all I saw and I overreacted.” She laughed softly and even from a couple of feet away, he reacted to that husky sound. “Of course, you don’t have that awful handlebar mustache.”

  He barked a laugh. “Uh, no, definitely not.”

  “And you’re much scruffier, a lot tougher looking.”

  He didn’t know whether to be offended or not. But he supposed she was right. He was scruffy. He hadn’t shaved in a few days and had run his hands through his hair to comb it this morning after his shower. He’d also lost weight during his recovery so his clothes hung on him.

  His friends and colleagues in Baton Rouge wouldn’t recognize him. Definitely the media wouldn’t. With a presence in newspapers across the country and a couple of bestselling books, he wouldn’t exactly call himself a celebrity…but people knew his name. The papers back home, at least, had gotten used to labeling him as a smooth, traveling playboy with a woman in every town he visited.

  They’d probably gotten a lot of mileage out of Charleston. He’d bet the Fatal Attraction comments had been flying. Since he had avoided any hometown newspapers for the past few months, he could only surmise they’d had a field day with the fact that the reckless playboy had finally tangled with the wrong woman.

  Oh, so very wrong.

  “Thanks,” he finally said, forcing the memories away by sheer force of will. “I think.”

  She laughed again. “Well, I mean, it is a good thing. You don’t look like him, and you sure felt hard.”

  He did a quick mental check of his body’s reactions and realized she wasn’t far off the mark. Their close encounter had affected him more than he’d realized.

  Clearing her throat nervously, she added, “I mean, you didn’t feel like a vapor or a cloud or anything. Stupid, I know, but I thought you were a ghost.”

  A ghost. Hmm. Three months ago, yes, that would have sounded incredibly stupid to him. It didn’t so much now, though. Not after the things he’d seen and felt since moving here. Ghosts seemed as likely an explanation as anything else for the crazy things that had happened since he’d relocated to this tiny corner of Pennsylvania in an effort to escape his past.

  Whenever he’d come to visit his uncle Roger at Seaton House before the man’s tragic, untimely death last June, he’d always loved the mysterious aura of the old hotel. His uncle used to talk about Seaton House’s dark, secretive past, and had promised to someday tell him about how it had come into the family a few generations before, through Simon’s great-grandfather.

  He’d never dreamed that someday would never happen. That his uncle would be taken away so shockingly a few short weeks before Simon’s own world had gone to hell.

  He sometimes wondered now, though, if he’d feel differently about this place if he knew whatever it was Roger had hinted about. Despite what guests would sometimes say, and the comments his uncle occasionally made about the place’s history, he’d always scoffed at the idea that anything supernatural was going on. Even having a home near New Orleans hadn’t made him a believer in the occult. But living here for three months…well, he wished he and his uncle could have had that conversation.


  The brunette was watching, appearing almost tentative after her only half-joking admission that she thought he was a ghost. And he wasn’t about to add fuel to the fire of her imagination. He would never open his mouth about something as foolish as his occasional curiosity about whether his was the only spirit residing in Seaton House.

  “Well, I’m not a ghost,” he said, beginning to stiffen and emotionally pull away in self-defense, as he had for the past several months. Now that she’d calmed down, and removed herself from the edge of the porch—and from him—he frowned and got back to the more pressing issue. “So, tell me, what are you doing here?”

  Another splash of lightning made him realize she’d moved closer to the door and was, in fact, reaching for the knob. “I don’t recall inviting you in.” That didn’t appear to faze her. She pushed the door open and walked back into his house as if she belonged there.

  She didn’t. He was meant to be alone. The last thing he needed was to do something stupid like letting his interest in a beautiful woman influence his actions. Wasn’t he still recovering from the wounds from the last time he’d let that happen?

  Real annoyance began to crawl through him, his shoulders growing tight with tension. “Have you ever heard of respecting private property?” he asked as he followed her inside the dimly lit foyer.

  “Isn’t there any light in this place?”

  “The power’s out.”

  Grabbing her bag from the floor where she’d dropped it, she walked toward the study. Her heels made a funny squishing sound as they tapped against the hard tile. “So where’s that light coming from?”

  “Well, yes, of course, make yourself at home,” he muttered, not attempting to hide his sarcasm.

  Unable to believe he was trailing after a complete stranger—a drenched, gorgeous one—in his own home, Simon strode past her. He stepped into his office, turning in the doorway to block her way. “I have a few battery-powered lanterns. Now, would you mind answering my questions? Who are you and what do you think you’re doing barging into my home?”

  “Your home?” One of her fine, dark eyebrows lifted in surprise. Here, closer to the lantern, he had a better view of her face, the redness in her cheeks and the tremble of her lips that told him she was cold.

  “Yes, my home,” he muttered as he grudgingly swung out of her way and gestured her in.

  “This is Seaton House, isn’t it?”

  He nodded. The woman opened her mouth to continue, but before she could do so, she let out a few little sneezes. Unable to keep the gruffness from his voice, he pointed toward the fireplace. “Go over there. You look like you’re about to shatter from cold.”

  She didn’t hesitate, rushing toward the crackling fire in the massive fireplace that dominated one wall of his office. She held her hands out—pale, slender hands—and Simon saw they were shaking.

  Wonderful. A freezing, wet waif had landed on his doorstep, intruding on his solitude when he could least afford the interruption. He was finally getting back to work—returning to his writing after a long hiatus during his recovery. In fact, before the strange image had appeared on his computer screen tonight—or, the image he thought had appeared—he’d actually managed to churn out eight pages of the travel guide he was contracted to write.

  He needed to get the book done. It was the first step in reclaiming his life. Returning to his place in the world, changed though it may be.

  To do that, he needed to be alone. With no distractions. No reminders of how stupid he’d been to let physical desire take the place of common sense.

  He’d nearly paid for it with his life. And in his darkest moments, he suspected he had paid for it with his soul.

  But he wasn’t completely lost to the social niceties. Shoving her back toward her car—which had been his first instinct—didn’t seem very gentlemanly.

  Not that he’d been accused of being a gentleman. At least not lately. “Foul-tempered beast” was, he believed, the epithet one of his unwanted guests from town had flung over her shoulder after he’d ordered her off his property a week or so ago.

  Still, he just couldn’t see forcing the stranger to get out on the road again during what sounded like the most violent height of the storm. She’d leave the moment it was over. The very second.

  Shivering in front of the fire, the woman wriggled out of her coat, dropped it to the hearth, then stood there and soaked up the heat.

  Hmm…maybe not the very second.

  Because damn, the brunette was built like a centerfold. It was bad enough that she had those big, dark eyes and that beautiful face. Did she have to have such mouthwatering curves, too? Even from several feet away he reacted, a warm flow of familiar desire washing over him and pulsing in his groin.

  If she were a few feet closer, she definitely would not mistake him for anything but rock-hard man.

  No, not again. You’re a different man.

  And she was a different woman. She wasn’t an easy blonde in a skin-tight short skirt giving him a sultry glance across a crowded bar on a hot June night. She was nothing like that woman.

  Spying his half-empty drink on the coffee table beside his laptop, he went over to it, picked it up and slowly drained the neat Scotch. The alcohol only ratcheted up the heat—it did nothing to calm him.

  He couldn’t help staring at her. Her black jeans were plastered to a generous pair of hips and an incredibly long pair of legs. They disappeared into her high black boots.

  Her V-necked red sweater, also soaked, outlined her slim waist and positively clung to her generous breasts.

  Correction. More. Than. Generous.

  The woman was very well built. His hands clenched reflexively at the thought of cupping her, scraping his fingers across her puckered nipples, so sexy and inviting against the sweater.

  She turned around, so her curvy butt faced the flames. Smiling, almost purring in delight, she closed her eyes. Obviously wanting more, she shifted her feet a little apart, silently admitting she wanted the waves of heat to slide between her wet thighs.

  He stiffened. But didn’t take his eyes off her.

  Pure physical contentment made her whole body stretch and sway. It was as if each muscle in her body were crying out to be kneaded and caressed by the heat, every inch of her skin kissed by the glow of the fire.

  She soaked it up. Indulged in it. Smiled and sighed at the pleasure of sensation.

  As he stood there and watched, lazy desire suddenly turned into raging want. It was sudden. Shocking. Overpowering.

  This wasn’t about looking at a woman and acknowledging she was lovely. It was about seeing the secret, sensual side of a mysterious female and knowing that she wanted to be touched—was thinking of being touched—by a lot more than warm air.

  And he did know. He’d suspected it when she hadn’t pulled away from him after falling into his arms. Now, seeing her take pleasure from the warmth enfolding her body, he had no doubt this stranger was one sensual woman.

  Watching long, individual tendrils of her dark hair slowly beginning to dry, he swallowed hard as a few strands thickened in soft curls around her face. He would dearly love to see the woman strip off her wet clothing, piece by piece, and stand there, covered only by the golden glow of the flames and her own thick, brown hair.

  Lowering his glass, he stepped closer. There was more he’d like to see. A lot more. Like the way her bottom lip would catch between her teeth as a small moan escaped her mouth when she was being caressed. The way those tiny remaining goose bumps on her neck would disappear under the warmth of his touch.

  The way her dark eyes would widen and her body arch as he slid inside her.

  No.

  He’d let his guard down around a sultry stranger once. He’d never do it again.

  Clearing his throat, he asked, “Feeling better?”

  She finally opened her eyes and nodded lazily. “Definitely. My brain cells are functioning again.”

  The rest of her looked in tip-top sh
ape, too.

  “I think some of the cold rain slid into my head somehow and made me act like a twit when you opened the door.”

  “Yes, that would explain it,” he replied softly, hiding a smile when he saw her eyebrows shoot up in indignation.

  She must have seen some hint of humor sparkling in his eyes. “Smart-ass. I was trying to apologize for being such an idiot.”

  “An idiot?” He wasn’t sure whether she meant the way she’d curled into his arms, or the way she’d suddenly flung herself out of them. A part of him—the sexual, womanizing part he’d thought had been lost along with a lot of his blood and part of his chest back in Charleston—preferred to think it was the latter.

  “Thinking you were a ghost or something. You don’t really look like…him.”

  “Him?” Simon stepped closer, then sat on the arm of an overstuffed leather chair beside the fireplace. “Please tell me you’re not referring to Casper,” he murmured. “If I’m a ghost, I’d at least like to think I’m a frightening one.”

  She chuckled softly, and Simon relaxed a little at the sound. He wasn’t used to making small talk with strangers. To light conversation and lighter flirtation. To letting down his guard and laughing. But he was remembering why he’d once liked it so very much.

  God, what had happened to the man he’d once been?

  The stranger’s pale cheeks were now flushed, though he didn’t know if it was because of the fire or embarrassment. “No, of course not. It was silly. It’s been a long day of driving.” Wriggling, she twisted again to face him—and to warm her left side. She tugged at her clothes, but the wet fabric thwacked right back against her skin, the jeans still clinging tightly to her. And the sweater…heaven help him, the soft, red fabric was almost glued to those high, full breasts and the taut, puckered nipples beneath.

  He needed another drink.

  “For the past hour I was thinking of nothing but how scary this place was going to be, and wondering how I’d let myself get talked into coming here.” She laughed softly, a low, whiskey laugh. “But the worse the weather got, and the heavier my eyelids, the more I just desperately wanted to get here so I could get into bed.”