Angel in Armani (18 page)

“I will not fire you if you break up with me, Sara. And if you don’t want anyone else at the Saints to know, I’ll be the very soul of discretion. Angels are good at that. Trust me. I don’t want to screw up your life.”

“If you really meant that, then you’d walk away.”

“I really don’t want to do that,” he said.

“Why not?” she asked.

He reached across and curled his fingers around hers. Her pulse skittered as the warmth of his skin spread across hers. When she met his gaze, his eyes had gone dark and hot.

“Because of that,” he said. “And the thing is, Sara Charles, I don’t think you want to walk away from that, either.”

Chapter Twelve

When the whine of the rotors finally died, the silence in the helo was far too intimate for her liking. It wrapped around them, drawing them together like the candlelight had back in the restaurant. Making her think foolish, foolish thoughts. Making her wish she could be the girl that Lucas saw when he flirted with her.

But she wasn’t. And this was a helicopter that Lucas was paying for and she needed to climb out of it and remember what her life was really like. No matter how seductive Lucas’s argument had been back in the restaurant. Where she hadn’t said yes. And she hadn’t said no, either.

“Give me your home number,” Lucas said softly.

Five little words. Six whole syllables. How much trouble could four little words cause?

A lot, part of her knew. You just had to listen to his voice in the darkness to know he was a lot of trouble waiting to happen. To her.

Oh but such good trouble
, the rest of her retorted.
C’mon, you know you want to
.

Lucas leaned a little closer. Just a little. Just enough to make her want to lean in closer, too. She tried to remember why it was she hadn’t just said yes already. “I—”

“Just your number,” he said. “That’s all. After all, a guardian angel needs to be able to get in touch with his charge.”

She smiled then, against her will. “You already know my work cell. And I already told you, I don’t need an angel.”

“Maybe the angel needs you.”

His voice was so low and delicious in the dim light that she really wanted to believe this could be true.

Her good sense cracked, just a little. She wrote the number down on the notepad she kept stashed near her pilot’s seat and handed it to him.

“Just a number,” she said. “It’s not an invitation.”

He smiled as he took it. “Whatever you say.”

She was relieved when he climbed out of the helicopter and strolled off toward the car park.

Leaving without her.

He’d stop if she asked him to. He’d stay. He’d come home with her and demonstrate that expert anatomical knowledge again.

She went hot just thinking about it and shut down the thought as she finished shutting down the helicopter. The mechanics would have all gone home hours ago; they’d check it and prep it in the morning. Still, she lingered a little, walking a circle around the helo, running her hand over the metal skin, not quite ready to let go of the flight and the few stolen hours with Lucas.

Was it too much to hope that Lucas would have the good sense to leave quickly so she wouldn’t be tempted to follow him into the night?

She reached her car, stowed the flight bag in the back, rolled her shoulders once to ease the slight stiffness caused by the flight, and then climbed into the driver’s seat. The engine coughed to life as she turned the key and she headed out of the lot, trying not to feel like she was a complete idiot for letting Lucas leave.

She was halfway home when her phone rang. She hit the button for the speakerphone. “Hello?”

“It’s me.”

Lucas. Her stomach tightened, but she couldn’t stop the smile that immediately stole across her face.

“Did you forget something?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

He was doing that low and wicked thing with his voice again, and her mouth went dry. She had to take a breath before she could speak. “What?”

“I forgot to ask you to give me your address.”

Her hard-won breath left her in a rush. He wanted her address.

Oh
yes
.

Every particle in her body shrieked it.

“We agreed the phone number wasn’t an invitation,” she said, managing to ignore them.

“I know,” he said. “But you never said I couldn’t use it to ask for an invitation.”

“Lucas—”

“Sara,” he said, mimicking her tone. “I’m driving in the dark and I swear I’m going to run off the road because all I can think about is you. Tell me you’re not driving home in the dark thinking about me, too. Tell me that and I’ll leave you alone.”

“I…” She wanted to say it. The sensible part of her knew that she should say it. One little white lie and he’d leave her alone and she’d be safely back on solid ground. No Lucas Angelo disturbing and disrupting her.

Oh, but she wanted him to disrupt her. Wanted him to turn her world upside down and into something different. Wanted it enough that she knew it was a very bad idea to give in to that desire. “I—” she started again and then it happened. Instead of being sensible Sara Charles and telling him to keep driving, to leave her alone in the dark, she gave him her address in a rush of words that spilled out of her before she could think.

“I’ll see you there,” Lucas said and hung up before she could say anything else.

She realized that she’d stopped at a stop sign. She had no idea how long she’d been there. She peered through the darkness at the nearest street sign, suddenly unsure where she was exactly.

Hell, she was unsure who she was exactly. She’d just invited Lucas Angelo over to her apartment.

About the only thing she was sure of was that right now she wanted very badly to be home.

*   *   *

When she reached the drive of the little apartment block, her heart was pounding madly. But she couldn’t see any strange cars and the pounding was joined by a sudden rapid swoop of disappointment.

She parked and sat for a moment. Had he not arrived yet? She had no idea where he’d been when he’d called her, of course. Or had he changed his mind?

Maybe he’d had a sudden fit of sanity and driven away. That would make everything infinitely simpler. But leave her here with her racing pulse and tingling skin and the heat traveling her body that had been growing fiercer and fiercer with every mile closer to home.

He had to be here. If he was a guardian angel, he was here to make sure she got what she wanted, wasn’t he? And what she wanted right this minute was Lucas Angelo’s hands on her body.

She gathered her things and walked toward the entrance to the block. A small faux porch surrounded the door to the lobby, and as she reached the first step Lucas stepped out of the shadow beside the door. She dropped her bags and flew up the steps and then his arms were around her and his lips touched hers and she would have sworn the world just melted around her as her blood went volcanic and every inch of her shrieked
More
.

She opened her mouth to him and pulled him closer. They kissed frantically, like they needed each other for oxygen, and he backed her up against the door. His hands went to work, unzipping her jacket and pulling her shirt free of her trousers, and then his fingers were sliding over the skin of her waist, which made her moan and arch toward him like a cat seeking the sun.

He muttered something against her mouth that might have been her name or might have been
God
but then his hand dipped lower and pressed between her legs and she moaned louder, moving into him, thinking,
There, there, there
and
Oh God, yes
, as colors exploded behind her eyes and pleasure streaked through her body.

He reached for her zipper and slid it down and even though she knew she was standing at the front door and any minute any of her six neighbors might see them, she couldn’t care about anything but the feel of his fingers against her. She widened her legs and his fingers slid into her panties and curled into her precisely where she needed to feel him. She felt the world narrow to just that spot. Just the feel of him, and the taste of his mouth and the smell of him curling around her as she rocked against him, desperate for him and letting him do this completely crazy thing as the heat built and then surged and pulsed through her like the scream of a jet engine, and her mind went completely blank as she struggled not to cry out through the sheer perfection of it.

*   *   *

When she came back to herself, Lucas had eased away from her, his hands at her waist again, holding her steady while she tried to make her brain work. His fingers stroked her skin where they touched.

She lifted her head and smiled, drunk with pleasure.

“Hello,” she said.

“Hello,” he said, sounding only a little more together than she was. “Nice place you have here.”

The pleased rumble of his voice made her smile grow wider. “You haven’t seen it yet.”

“I don’t care,” he said. “I like it.” His head dipped and he kissed her and she felt everything start to go hot and blurry again. “Ask me in, Sara.”

“Do you want to come up and see my etchings?” she said, giggling.

“Do you have etchings?”

“I’m not sure I even know what etchings are.” She laughed again. “Want to come up and take my clothes off?”

“Hell, yes.” He straightened then, suddenly all business. “Where are your keys?”

It took her a moment to remember what keys were, let alone what she might have done with hers. “Keys. Bag. Stairs.” She gestured back down the stairs to where her things were sitting on the damp path—thank God it hadn’t been snowing or she might have just done dire things to her laptop. Lucas turned on his heel, descended the stairs with three quick steps, and then rejoined her. He handed her her purse and kept hold of her flight bag.

“Keys,” he said. “Now.”

She grinned. “Bossy, are we?”

“Yes,” he said. “Whatever it takes to get you naked.”

*   *   *

It didn’t take too much, as it turned out. They made it up the flight of stairs to her apartment and inside the door before the bags hit the floor again and then he was kissing her again with those fierce wild kisses that scrambled her brain. She tugged off his coat and he dispensed with her jacket and she toed off her shoes while he unbuttoned her shirt.

“Christ, that’s pretty,” he said, one hand tracing the edge of the lace of her bra before it moved down to cup her breast, long clever fingers dragging across her nipple.

“You’re prettier,” she managed to say before she lost her breath again. More clothes tumbled to the floor between kisses and hands discovering skin and then she was on the floor, the wool of her rug soft against her back and Lucas hard against the rest of her as she pulled him down and wrapped herself around him and almost sobbed as he moved into her with one sure and solid thrust that felt better than anything she could ever remember feeling.

Apparently the interlude on the porch hadn’t done much to satisfy her need for him, either. The feel of him on top of her, inside her, moving with her sent her crazy and she nipped at his mouth and locked her legs higher around his body. “Harder,” she said.

She didn’t have to ask twice. Lucas growled in her ear and then did something that changed the angle between them, tilting her hips up before he moved again. Moved hard.

“Like that?”

“Yes.” It was half a gasp as he did it again, the slide and shock of him making her skin even hotter even as she rose to meet him.

Lucas grinned above her, but neither of them managed to find any more words. Things went dark and hot in Sara’s head and she could only think of him and how good he felt as he drove into her, his body solid and warm and slick against hers. The only sound was the harsh breathing and the slide of skin upon skin.

Sex. God, she’d missed this. Though she knew it wasn’t just sex she’d missed, but sex with this particular man. This was what she had been trying to forget ever since Sag Harbor, and the pleasure spiking through her with his every move was evidence of exactly why she hadn’t been able to do that.

He kissed her as he took her—or was she taking him, it wasn’t exactly clear as they met each other like a clash of warriors. She found herself digging her nails into his back and biting at his shoulder as he moved on and on, the rhythm growing wilder and less controlled.

His hand moved to her clit and it was almost too much, the added sensation sparking through everything else. She dropped her head back and moaned.

“Come for me,” he said, his fingers moving to just the right spot.

She shivered and opened her mouth to say she wasn’t quite there when he changed the angle again and slid into her and she broke open, seeing stars as she dropped into the place where there was only the hot pulse of satisfaction as he called her name and came, too.

*   *   *

The sound of the curtains sliding open woke her. She bolted upright, trying to work out who the hell was in her apartment, but then as she caught sight of Lucas standing by the window, pulling on his trousers, she remembered. Remembered the whole very long night. They hadn’t gotten much more than snatches of sleep between lots and lots of sex.

“Going somewhere?” she said.

Lucas looked up. “I have to get to the hospital. They need me.”

“Oh,” she said. She should believe him, there was no reason not to believe him, but she couldn’t help the evil little sliver of doubt that suddenly stabbed her in the gut.

He must have heard something in her voice because he came back over to the bed, bent down, and kissed her. “Trust me, I wouldn’t be going anywhere this early if I didn’t have to.”

The kiss chased the doubt monkey away temporarily. But only a little. She tried to remember what day it was. Friday. Which meant that she was going to have her first day at Saints headquarters.

Only now she was going to have to do it without Lucas there. “Any chance you need me to fly you into Manhattan?”

He shook his head, bending to slide his foot into a shoe. “No, I’ll find my own way this time.” Then he paused, twisting back to look at her as he tied the laces. “Are you nervous about going to Deacon? Gardner will introduce you around. And I’ll come back, if I can.”