A Tempting Engagement Part 12

"I've got your present, Em," Joshua crowed, unsnapping his seat belt and reaching for his car door the second they stopped. "Come on, I know where we go. I'll show you."

Slowing him from a gallop to something resembling a walk, and responding to his excited chatter, kept her mind and her nerves occupied all the way to Chantal's room except for that moment when she'd caught their reflection in the plate-gla.s.s entrance doors. Mitch looked so tall and broad and handsome; she looked not so bad in her off-white sweater and crimson skirt; Joshua strode, confident and happy, with his arms clutching the gift-wrapped parcel.

A family, she'd thought with a sudden shock of discovery. They actually looked like a family.

Then Joshua grabbed her hand and demanded an answer to some pressing problem, but she stored that image in the back of her mind for later ... later, when she would pore over all the carefully filed information and make her decision. But now she paused on the threshold and inhaled deeply now she had otherGoodwins to deal with.

"Come on, Emmy." Joshua tugged on her hand, pulling her into a large, airy room that could not have contained any more flowers or balloons or pink stuffed animals without extensive remodeling. It was also surprisingly light on people. NoGoodwins senior, just Chantal andQuade and Julia, the latter holding a tiny, swaddled pink bundle.

"I got another present 'ceptthis one's from Emmy." Joshuaplonked it down on the bed. "It's a bear for Charlie."

"Charlotte," at least two voices corrected.

"Told you so." Julia sounded very pleased with herself.

"All Charlottes do not get called Charlie," Chantal said tartly, and, as always whenGoodwins gathered, the room soon spun with teasing and laughter and it was so easy to relax and feel a part of it. Emily released her pent-up anxiety in a big smile and an even bigger hug for each of the new parents. When Joshua asked for a turn holding the baby, she instinctively hunkered down to help.

"Hold her so," she instructed softly, helping cradle the tiny bonneted head. She was so delicate and pink and sweet smelling and perfect. "Isn't she beautiful?"

"For a girl," Joshua decided with a heavy sigh. "Can the next baby be a boy?"

Julia patted him on the head and promised, "We'll do our best, sweetie," which drew a shudder from Chantal. "Do not even mention 'next baby' in my company." ButQuade squeezed her hand, and the look that pa.s.sed between them was so full of love it turned Emily to mush. She figured there would be more Quade babies, G.o.d willing.

"I have to scoot," Julia said. "Or my little princess will be spoiled beyond redemption by thegrands . You should see all the presents they bought inLondon."

TheP word captured Joshua's attention. "Is there any for me?"

"What do you think?"

His grin spread like spilled suns.h.i.+ne. "NanandDa always bring me presents."

Julia c.o.c.ked a brow at Mitch. "Okay if I take him around to visit with them?"

And in the ensuing organization of who-was-going-where-and-for-how-long, followed by the many kisses and hugs of departure, Emily ended up holding the baby. As she settledCharlotte's insubstantial weight in her arms, as she gazed into her sleeping face with its perfect cupid's-bow mouth and brow scrunched as if in concentrated thought, all the peripheral chatter faded away. Need, want, longing closed around her like a physical ent.i.ty a many-tentacled, living,breathing , writhing thing that threatened to squeeze everything else from her soul.

You can have this, Emily, your own tiny piece of G.o.d's perfection.

She looked up then, looked up to find Mitch watching her, seeing her most-secret craving written all over her face. Somewhere deep insideshe felt a tw.a.n.g of alarm. You're handing him everything he needs, it warned her, every tool he needs to shape your decision. But she could not do a thing about it. In that moment, she could not even bring herself to care.

"I'm sorry I missed your parents."

"No you're not." From the corner of his eye eyes he needed to keep fixed on the road and the evening traffic in midtownCliffton Mitch saw her turn to look at him, surprised by his response. "You were nervous as h.e.l.l about seeing them."

She didn't answer but she didn't have to. Her fidgety hands gave her away, first smoothing the skirt over her thighs, then tucking it beneath them. If she kept doing that, he wouldn't be able to help himself. He'd give in to the impulse tountuck , to unsmooth, to slide his hand under that prim good-girl skirt to touch the soft, warm flesh beneath.

"Are we going there now? To pick up Joshua?"

"No." One corner of his mouth kicked into a slow grin. "He won't be halfway through opening those presents."

"Oh."

Signaling his intent, he turned the SUV at the lights, onto the road leading home.

"Didn't you love the blanket they brought forCharlotte? It was so soft and pink-" She laughed self-consciously. "And I'm sure you didn't even notice."

"I noticed."

He'd noticed the tender skill of her hands as they held the soft, pink-blanketed bundle. He'd noticed the captivated stillness of her body, then the flood of rapture as she settled into the chair with Charlie in her arms. Cradled against her breast.

And he knew in those first ten seconds what it would take to change her mind about marrying him. Not the security of a permanent home or what had she called it that night in the car? A loaner family. Right. Even with a wedding band on her finger, that's how she would see them. Unless she had a family of her own.

She would marry him for that.

Disquiet stirred deep in his gut, a cautionary edge that he quickly kyboshed. So what if she didn't want to marryhim , if she was more interested in what he could give her? It wasn't as if he'd offered much of himself in this bargain. It wasn't as if he had much of himself to offer. But he did want to marry her, for all their sakes. For Joshua's need of a mother, for Emily's need of a family, for the guilty edges of his conscience.

This marriage was an arrangement where they all could have what they wanted, and he intended to make it so. Whatever it took.

"Have you made up your mind?" he asked, flicking on the headlights as they cleared the city limits and headed into the countryside.

"I'm ... no." Her exhalation sounded harried. "Please don't push me right now."

In the tricky twilight he couldn't see her eyes, but he pictured them dark and uneasy and pleading.

"Okay," he said.

"You won't push me for an answer?" she asked, suspicious.

"Not right now." He could wait another twenty minutes, until they were home, and then all bets were off.

He intended to push for as long as it took to get the answer he wanted.

"Should I be worried?" she asked with a nervous little laugh. "About later?"

Mitch smiled in the gathering darkness. "Very."

Chapter 11.

He took her hand as they walked from the garage to the house, and Emily didn't object. Too nice, the roughness of his man's skin and the warm strength of his grip as his fingers curled around hers. At some point possibly when they brushed shoulders walking up the verandah steps she was struck by a strange sense of first-date awkwardness. Probably because she had never held hands with a man before. Weird to feel nervous when she'd done so much more, when she was pretty certain they were about to do it all over again.

Still, when he opened the front door and led her inside, a nervous s.h.i.+ver coursed through her body. His grip tightened and he pulled her around to face him in the silent darkness of the entry hall. "Worried yet?" he asked, and her pulse jumped.

"Very."

He laughed low in his throat, a husky rumble that hummed through her senses. Then he lifted her hand and pressed a series of soft kisses into her palm, her wrist, the pad of her thumb, and the humming grew shrill, rhythmic. Exactly like the ringing of a phone. Intent on seducing her one nibbling kiss at a time, Mitch either didn't notice or didn't care.

"Aren't you going to get that?" sheasked, her voice hitching as the tip of his tongue traced a line across her palm. Probably her heart line.

"You want me to?"

Did she want to stop breathing? "No, but it might be your parents. Joshua."

The warm breath of his sigh sloughed her kiss-dampened skin, but he straightened at that magic word Joshua and turned toward the still-ringing phone. He did not let go of her hand, however, towing Emily in his wake as he strode to his office and circled his huge leather office chair to pick up the receiver. With his other hand.

Eyes on hers, he tugged her forward, slowly, inexorably, until she b.u.mped into his legs. The inside of his thighs, actually, since he had rested back against his desk, knees spread wide enough to accommodate her body. For a brief second she closed her eyes and indulged in his nearness the hard heat of his thighs, the scents of winter and leather and man, a few rumbled words into the phone.

The phone. Her eyes shot open to find herself looking right into his, so green and hot and steady that she forgot her place again. He took her hand the one clasped so firmly in his and put it on his thigh, holding it there with the same steady insistence she saw in his gaze.

I want your hand onme,was the message she read there.

"That's right," he murmured.

To the unknown caller or to her? She didn't have time to decide as the pressure of his hand increased, spreading her fingers over the hard muscle beneath. How would this feel without the denim, with only his hair-roughened skin under her palm? The breath she drew felt shallow, edgy, catching in the constricted heat of her throat as she imagined peeling those jeans down his legs and touching him in all the ways and places she had fantasized.

"That's fine with me." The husky note to his voice and the crooked edge to his grin caused her pulse to flutter madly. Could he read her mind? Possibly. Because his hand encouraged hers, moving higher on a pulse-hammering journey of discovery. When she discovered the distended fly of his jeans, a flush started deep in her belly and spread through her blood. One brow arched wickedly as he said, "I have things to do."

So it seemed. Under her fingers his arousal pulsed; his eyes blazed with a matching fervor, and his hands ... his hot, rough-skinned, sneaky hands were on her bare thighs. She snapped to attention.Both his hands were on her thighs, which meant she was cupping him all by her wanton self, and the telephone receiver lay discarded on the desk.

"Joshua's fine," he said in short explanation. "He's sleeping over."

She s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand away. "That was your mother?While I had my hand..." She couldn't finish the thought, let alone the question. She couldn't do anything but slump forward, hands clasping her flaming cheeks.

"It was Julia, actually. And as perceptive as my sister is, I doubt she knows where your hand-"

"Iknow," she fired back, inflamed by the soft laughter in his voice. "Andyou knew, yet you didn't do a thing to stop me."

"I didn't want to stop you." His eyes glinted, this time with more than teasing amus.e.m.e.nt. "I don't want you to stop."

"Well, I think the mood might be effectively snuffed," she said, her pulse and her voice leaping in gazelle-like unison as his hands stroked the back of her thighs.

"Are you sure?" His touchgentled, a sensual whisper of a caress. Then paused. "Did you wear this skirt on account of my parents?"

Emily tried to duck away. There seemed something inherently wrong with wearing a prim-and-proper skirt to meet a man's parents, then letting him put his hand up it. That hand now conspired with his thighs to prevent her escape, holding her firmly and securely in place. Talk about being trapped between a rock and a hard place.

"You look very nice, Emily. I'm sure my parents would have been impressed, although-" his hand glided smoothly over her bare skin "-no panty hose?"

"It's not what you think," she said quickly, flus.h.i.+ng from the inside out. "I only had one pair and they laddered when I put them on, and with the boots and the length of the skirt, I didn't think anyone would notice."

"I'm noticing. And just so you know, I hate the d.a.m.n things."

Emily swallowed. And struggled to understand what, exactly, he hated because his hands were cupping her bottom, then dipping under the waistband of her panties, then... She sucked in a startled breath. "What are you doing?"

"Taking your pants off," he said, so matter-of-factly that a surprised note of laughter burst from her lips.

"Do you hateall underwear?" she asked as hers s.h.i.+mmied down her legs. When they caught on her knee-high boots, what could she do but kick them off?

"At the moment-" and she felt the shockingly cool caress of night air as he bunched her skirt higher "-that would be a yes."

Their eyes met as he clasped her bared b.u.t.tocks, his hands a hot, solid contrast to the tremor that s.h.i.+vered through her body. And his eyes! They glittered with purpose, with knowledge, with power. Oh, yes, he knew what he was about, seducing her for his own means, to influence her decision. He knew, and Emily strived to formulate an objection as his hands slid down, parting her legs, dipping inward in a delicious probing caress.

"Are you trying to manipulate me?" she managed huskily.

"I think that's what I am doing."

In the literal sense of the word, yes. Those hands, those fingers. Weak-kneed, she shook her head.

"You want me to stop?" he asked, stopping.

Heaven help her, no, but she forced herself to focus. To grab a brief moment of sanity while she still could. "I want you to promise not to ask for a marriage answer while you're touching me. Anywhere. In any way."

"I won't ask, Emily."

He looked into her eyes and he gave his word and she believed him. She believed him, too, when he hauled her closer and nuzzled his face against her neck and muttered, "I want to taste you," against her flushed skin.

Emily smiled. "I don't have any problem with that."

But he ignored her proffered lips, standing and reversing their positions so quickly her head spun. When her perspective steadied, she found herself perched on the edge of his desk with her legs spread and her skirt shucked up around her waist, and Mitch looking down at her with hot, hungry eyes.

She tried to cover up; he didn't let her. "Lean back," he directed as his hands skimmed her inner thighs. "On your elbows."

Her lids fluttered shut and she jittered with a mix of nerves and need when his fingers parted her, when he touched her with tenderness and skill in that place so moist and wanting. His thumb rasped against her sensitive flesh, once, twice, and he murmured one word. "Beautiful."

The last of her self-consciousness evaporated and she let him spread her thighs wider, felt them tremble weakly as the silky coolness of his hair brushed their inner skin. Then his mouth was on her and the first velvet rasp of his tongue lifted her off the desk.

Approval hummed in his voice as he soothed her back down. "Easy, sweetheart, I'm only just starting."

"You're only-" The interplay of mouth and fingers drove the rest of that thought from her mind. Awash with heat, with building pleasure, with an unbearable intensity like a spring coiling tighter and tighter inside her womb, she grabbed for purchase. Her fingers tunneled into his hair and held on tight.

"Please, Mitch, you have to ... have to-"Stop, keep going no, stop . She craved his heat and fullness inside her but before she could tell him, show him, beg him, her release came in a blinding wave of sensation that left her limp and trembling. Even as she felt him move away, she could not move to save herself, to cover herself, to do any more than slump back with a long growl of wonder.

Mitch had never heard anything more erotic than that sound. It ricocheted through him, rebounding off every steel-hard facet until he had to grit his teeth and fist his hands to control the urgent, pulsing need to unzip his jeans and bury his most steel-hard facet in her soft body. He wouldn't last a minute, and that wasn't nearly long enough.

He aimed to give her incredible, amazing, earth-shattering. He wouldn't ask any questions, but he aimed to wring so many yeses from her soft lips that she forgot the meaning of no. He needed to last a lot longer than one hot, frantic, pulsing minute.

Looking didn't help his tenuous control any. Not in her current pose, spread out before him in her good-girl clothes and a pair of black boots that looked blood-thumping bad.

"All right?" he asked, trusting himself barely to brush his knuckles over her knee. Her thigh.

"I think so. That was..."

"Don't you dare say nice."