Embraced by Love (2 page)

And her body . . . long, slender legs led up to slim hips and a narrow waist. Her breasts were full and round. She had a figure most women would kill for, yet she kept it carefully hidden.

Hidden from everyone but Cooper.

He stood up slowly, his eyes lingering on the deep blue-green of her lingerie and the contrasting paleness of her smooth skin. When he met her gaze, all traces of embarrassment were gone from her face. He saw only a reflection of the fire he knew was in his eyes, a fire only she could ignite.

“Happy anniversary,” she whispered as she melted into his arms.

Cooper lay awake long after Josie had fallen asleep. He held her in the darkness of their bedroom, listening to her slow, steady breathing, feeling the beating of her heart next to his.

He remembered the first time he saw her as clearly as if it were yesterday. He’d just finished a presentation and was standing in the hall outside of the client’s office, trying to break away from the post-meeting chit-chat. Josie had come storming out of a neighboring office, slamming the door behind her so hard, he was a little surprised that the glass in the panel next to it hadn’t shattered. She was extremely p.o.’d, her shoulders tense and her fists clenched. Sparks were flying from her stormy brown eyes.

As Cooper watched, she marched across the wide, carpeted hallway. Placing the palms of her hands against the wall, she braced herself against it, almost as if she were about to be frisked. Curious, he moved a few feet closer, and realized that she was counting under her breath.

A man came out of the same office door, and stood several feet away from her, waiting politely until she had counted all the way up to ten. The man was clearly an underling, probably her assistant or her secretary, and she turned to face him.

“Tell that son-of-a-bitch if he thinks we need his business so badly that we’re going to let him rip us off from here to kingdom come,” she said, “he’s gonna find himself sitting out on the street on his big, fat ass before
he
can count to ten.”

The assistant grinned. “Shall I quote you or paraphrase?”

Josie smiled, then snorted and laughed. “Paraphrase please, David,” she said, pushing her brown curls back from her face.

She had a low, husky voice with a twangy southern accent. It wasn’t a sugary, deep South, Georgia-style accent, but more of a Kentucky drawl, Cooper thought. He’d been close. She was from Tennessee.

She glanced up, as if feeling Cooper’s eyes on her, and said, “Damn, we need a bigger office. At least something with two rooms so I can have a place to go when I’m losing it.”

“Keep up these negotiations,” David said, “and we just might be able to afford another room.”

She glanced at her watch. “I want this over with by lunch time. I’m gonna take my sorry little peanut butter and jelly sandwich into the park and sit in the sunshine while I eat it,” she said. “Nirvana on whole wheat. I may not come back.”

Her assistant laughed, and turned to go back inside, but when she didn’t follow, he looked back at her questioningly. “Aren’t you coming, Josie?”

Josie. Her name was Josie. Cooper smiled. He liked it. It fit her perfectly.

“Not yet,” she said, crossing her arms and leaning back against the wall. “I want that creep to squirm.”

The door closed behind her assistant and she reached up to rub her neck, closing her eyes briefly and twisting her head to the side, as if trying to get a knot out. When she opened her eyes, she was looking directly at Cooper. Their gazes locked for several long seconds, and then she looked away, as if embarrassed or even shy.

Cooper knew that dressed as he was in his dark suit and designer power tie, with his hair pulled back into a ponytail, and with his sunglasses on, he cut something of an imposing figure. Standing six feet six inches in his bare feet, he was not a little man. And the muscles he’d gotten from playing college basketball had been maintained, if not added to, over the past six years by his daily workouts at the Y.

Still, she glanced back at him and smiled. “Wish me luck,” she said, and disappeared behind the office door.

Cooper excused himself from the group of businessmen and stood for several moments, looking at that door. Taylor-Made Software, it said. He smiled, and hurried home to change his clothes.

He brought his skateboard to the park, knowing that the wheels would make it easier to find her when she showed up for her lunch. It also gave him a reason to be there, something to do.

After only a few minutes out in the hot sun, he peeled off his T-shirt. He found himself wishing that he’d kept his hair tied back in a ponytail instead of loose around his shoulders. It seemed as if they’d gone from winter directly into summer this year, completely passing over spring—

He spotted her, walking down the street.

He had been a little bit afraid that he wouldn’t recognize her. He’d only seen her for a few short minutes, after all. But he
did
recognize her. Hell, he would have been able to pick her out of a crowd.

As she moved closer, he braced himself. She couldn’t possibly be as pretty as he remembered. No woman could possibly look that good. He had been swept up by her charisma and her energy, and no doubt his imagination was supplying him with this memory of near perfection.

She sat down on an empty park bench, and opened up her lunch box.

Cooper swept past her, the wheels of his skateboard making a swishing sound on the concrete.

Hot damn! She was even prettier than ever out here in the sunshine.

He turned his head to watch her and nearly ran smack into a lady walking a pack of five dogs. He had to use some acrobatic moves to keep from running over an excited terrier and landing on his face. As he skidded to a stop, he realized Josie was watching him. He grinned and winked at her, and to his surprise, she smiled back.

That was when he knew that he was going to marry her. It was that smile that clinched it for him.

He courted her slowly, taking his time even though he wanted her so badly there were times he could barely remember his own name. And he knew she wanted him, too.

Cooper remembered the first time she let him see that he turned her on, the first time he looked into her eyes and saw the fire burning inside of her.

They were dancing at a block party. The moon was full, and its silvery light outshone the lanterns that had been strung across the street. There was magic and romance and the wildness of the full moon in the air. When he gazed into her eyes and saw that flame, he stopped dancing and kissed her, a deep, soul-shaking kiss. She pressed herself against him and he pulled her even closer, his tongue fiercely sweeping into her mouth, possessing her, claiming her. If they had been alone, he couldn’t have stopped himself from making love to her.

But they were in the middle of the street, surrounded by hundreds of celebrating, happy people. Somehow, some way they kept dancing and the moment passed.

Summer stretched on, the weeks flew by, and the nights became hotter. One stormy August night, they raced from a movie theater to Josie’s apartment through the pouring rain. As they stood dripping wet in the entryway, out of breath from laughter and exertion, Josie turned to Cooper and said, “Stay tonight.”

He had stayed. That night, and every night since then.

Five years had passed. Half a decade had gone by, and he still loved Josie deeply. God knows she wasn’t perfect, but neither was he. She had the power to drive him crazy with the zealous attention she gave her computer software company. But she had started her business on a shoestring out of one tiny office, and now it was a multi-million-dollar corporation, with over a hundred employees occupying two entire floors of a midtown office building.

Zealous attention? Hell, face it, she was a workaholic. But her drive for success wasn’t based on greed or need for power, but rather a very healthy fear of being poor. She’d grown up in a depressed part of Tennessee, escaping from the endless cycle of poverty by winning a full scholarship to Columbia University. She’d graduated at the head of her class. Her skills at designing and writing computer software, together with the business courses she had taken and her no-bullshit attitude were a winning combination.

But she worked day and night. He’d quickly set up a rule—no work after eight. From eight to midnight every night, she belonged only to him. Half of Saturday and all of Sunday, Josie couldn’t so much as discuss business. Most of the time she complied.

But then there were times like last spring . . .

Josie had wrangled a contract with Duncan Industries. They were twice as big as any company she had ever worked for before.
And
they wanted their software in half the usual time.

For three hair-raising months, Josie had been in her office from six-thirty in the morning to eleven-thirty at night. She had worked both Saturdays and Sundays. She had worked until she dropped and then she’d slept. When she had awakened, she’d gone straight back to work.

It had not been fun for Cooper, but Taylor-Made Software had met their deadline and received a hefty bonus from Duncan. Josie took two weeks off, and they had gone to their house in Connecticut and recovered. That
had
been fun.

He smiled, remembering how, after three months of near celibacy, they had made love like newlyweds. Often during those two weeks they’d dressed to go out to dinner but had never made it out the door.

Cooper kissed Josie lightly on the lips, and she stirred, sleepily opening her eyes and looking up at him.

“Don’t tell me it’s morning already,” she murmured.

“It’s not,” he said, kissing her again, longer this time. His hands swept down her body, touching, exploring. “Besides, you’re not going into the office until next Monday, remember?”

She smiled, stretching languorously like a cat, pressing herself up against his fingers. “So you woke me up just to tell me that I don’t have to wake up?”

“I just kissed you,” he protested. “How did
I
know you were going to do some kind of sleeping beauty thing?” He kissed her again and smiled. “But as long as you’re awake . . .”

She put her arms around his neck, pulling him on top of her. “Cooper McBride,” she said, gasping as he pushed himself deeply inside of her, “you should wake me up more often.”

He kept her awake until dawn.

TWO

C
OOPER ONLY
glanced at his watch because his stomach growled. Eight-fifteen p.m. How the heck could it be eight-fifteen? True, he was hard pressed to finish up these drawings before his Wednesday deadline, considering that he hadn’t even thought about them since his wedding anniversary nearly a week ago. But the last time he’d looked at his watch, it had been twenty after six. He’d been hungry then, but he’d figured instead of cooking dinner, he’d work until Josie got home, and then they’d go out to eat or bring home Chinese.

But she was over an hour late.

He reached for the phone and hit the automatic dial.

Josie picked up her private line on the first ring.

“Taylor,” she said curtly.

“Oh come on, babe,” Cooper said teasingly. “You knew it had to be me. Who else would be calling at nearly eight-thirty at night? If you’re going to stay late, the least you could do is answer the phone with a cheerful, ‘hi, honey.’ ”

“I’m in the middle of a meeting,” Josie said. “Honey. Can I call you back?”

“The
middle
of a meeting?”

“The middle of a meeting that’s about to end,” Josie said. “I’ll call you back in about twenty minutes.”

“Twenty minutes?” Cooper said. “I won’t be here.”

“Cooper—”

“I’ll be at your office, ready to take you someplace exotic for dinner,” he said. “Hey, did you get a package from me today?”

“I most certainly did,” she said, “and I most certainly cannot discuss it right now.”

“Was it a big box from Victoria’s Secret?”

“Good-bye, Cooper.”

“Aren’t you even going to thank me for the present?”

“Since it’s more of a present for
you,
no,” she said.

“Aha,” he said. “So you
did
open it.”

She sighed. “Yes, and fortunately I was alone in my office at the time. Unlike now, where I’m in the middle of a meeting, with five of my staff sitting here watching me talk on the phone to you.”

“Don’t you want them to know what you wear underneath those scary clothes of yours?” Cooper said.

“
Definitely
not.”

He laughed, a low, sexy rumble of sound. “You put some of it on, didn’t you? Which color?”

He’d sent her a dozen sets of fancy lingerie in all different colors and styles.

“I’ve created a monster, haven’t I?” she said. “Good-bye, Cooper. I’m going to hang up now.”

“You realize that when I get over there, I’m going to lock myself in your office with you until we clear up this mystery,” he said.

“Purple,” she said.

“Oh, God,” Cooper said. “I’ll be right over.”

At a few minutes to nine, the meeting was officially over. While the other members of Josie’s senior staff let themselves out her office door, David Chase lingered.

David had been her administrative assistant since day one, and he now served as her executive vice president. Whatever his title, he was still her right hand.

“This is going to be one hell of a big job,” he said, sitting down directly across from her desk after closing the door tightly.

Josie met his steady gaze. “I know,” she said.

“You sure you want to do this?”

“I want to do it,” she said. “But I do need to talk to Cooper before I make a final decision.”

David wore his dark hair conservatively short, and as he ran his fingers through it, it fell neatly back into place as if it dared not remain mussed. “He’s not going to contribute any positive energy to the project,” he said. “He’s only going to add to your stress, raising it to an unbearable level.”

“What are you suggesting?” Josie said tartly. “That I don’t tell him about this contract?”

David smiled, his lean face relaxing. He reached up and loosened his tie. It was nine o’clock at night, Josie thought. He’d been in the office for nearly fourteen hours today, working straight through lunch, and only now, at nine o’clock at night, was he loosening his tie.

“No, obviously you’ve got to tell him,” he said. “But it’s too bad you can’t just send him off to camp for the next thirteen months.”

Josie laughed. “Camp?” she said. “David, he’s not a child.”

“No?” David said. He leaned forward, and she realized that he was not entirely joking. “He’s irresponsible, unreliable, and never takes anything seriously.”

Josie thought about the huge box of sexy underwear that was sitting in her closet. “Wanna make a bet?” she said, smiling.

“He can’t control his impulses—have you noticed that whenever he comes into the office, you’re constantly apologizing for him?”

“I’m constantly
explaining
him,” Josie corrected gently. “That’s hardly the same thing.”

“You shouldn’t need to explain him all the time,” David said. “If he didn’t behave so outrageously—”

“Then he wouldn’t be Cooper.”

David gave up, sitting back with an exasperated laugh. “You know, I really thought you’d get tired of him.”

Josie looked down at the stacks of papers on her desk. “If you want to know the truth,” she said, “I thought he’d get tired of me.”

A loud rap on the door made her look up expectantly, a smile on her face. “Who is it?” she called, standing up and moving toward the door, knowing full well who was on the other side.

“It is I,” boomed a deep, Dudley Do-Right voice. “Pizza Man.”

“My hero,” Josie said, opening the door and batting her eyelashes at Cooper. He kissed her hello.

“Dave, baby, how’s it hanging?” Cooper asked, spotting Chase still sitting across from Josie’s desk.

Cooper was holding an insulated pizza box. He wore a baseball cap backwards on his head, and his long hair was loose around his shoulders. His sweat pants had a psychedelic paisley print, and he was wearing his black leather biker jacket over a Star Trek T-shirt.

David shook his head slightly while he looked at Josie pointedly, as if to say “See what I mean?”

“I thought you were going to take me someplace exotic for dinner,” Josie said, as Cooper put the pizza box down on her conference table.

“I was,” he said, sitting down and shrugging out of his jacket, “but I couldn’t seem to walk past the pizza place. It smelled so good, and I was so hungry. Besides, this office has a pretty high exotic rating. I designed it that way, you know.”

“Want a slice?” Josie said to David.

He shook his head, pushing himself out of his chair and moving toward the door. “No, I’ll leave the two of you alone to talk,” he said. “It’s time I got home to feed the cat.”

“Say hi to Fluffy for me, Dave,” Cooper said.

David smiled tightly as he left.

The door had barely closed before Cooper grabbed Josie, pulling her down onto his lap. She smiled and closed her eyes as he kissed her and held her close.

“I missed you,” she murmured, breathing in his familiar scent.

“I was at home,” he said, nuzzling her neck. “You’re welcome to come there any time.”

His words were teasing, but she could see the questions in his eyes as he wondered what had kept her at the office later than usual this evening.

But she didn’t want to tell him right away. There would be plenty of time for that after dinner.

“We should eat,” she said lightly as she climbed off his lap, “before the pizza gets cold.”

She opened the pizza box and pulled a slice onto one of the paper plates Cooper had brought. As Cooper did the same for himself, she crossed to the small refrigerator that was built into the far wall of her office. “Soda or beer?” she asked.

“Silly question,” Cooper answered.

“Right,” she said, grabbing a couple of beers. “Did you get caught up today?”

“Not quite,” he said, smiling his thanks as she handed him one of the bottles. “I would if I could put in another day like today, but I can’t.” He took a long swig of beer directly from the bottle. “I’m going to call the client and tell ’em I need an extension. I’ve got a basketball game tomorrow that I can’t miss.”

“Can’t?” she asked, eyebrow raised.

He grinned. “Can’t,” he repeated. “The guys would kill me if I didn’t show. The client will only be annoyed.”

Josie shook her head and laughed.

“Old Dave seemed strung pretty tight,” Cooper said, breaking the silence that had fallen over them. “What’s bugging him these days? Besides me, I mean.”

“You know he hates it when you call him Dave,” Josie said. “Why do you purposely antagonize him?”

“It gives him something to focus on,” he said.

“Trust me,” Josie said, “he’s got plenty to focus on without any help from you.”

“Oh, yeah? Like what?”

“We’re considering taking on a new project,” Josie said vaguely. “He’s a little tense.”

“A
little
?!” Cooper laughed. “I’m not sure which he needs more—a laxative or a good lay.”

Josie laughed. “He’s my friend, Coop, so you just stop that talk.”

“You can’t deny that I’m right.”

“No comment.”

Cooper took another slice of pizza from the box and put his feet up on the edge of the table as he leaned back and ate. “I brought you a change of clothes,” he said. “I thought we could catch a late movie. What d’ya say, babe? That new DeNiro film starts at ten after ten at the AMC theater—”

“Do you mind if we don’t go tonight?” Josie interrupted him.

“No,” he said. “Of course not.”

“We need to talk.”

Cooper ate in silence for a moment. Her words had set off an alarm bell in his head. They always talked. Communication wasn’t something that they had to work particularly hard on. Was it? Unless he’d missed something important. Unless . . .

When he and Josie were first married, they had decided to wait five years before even discussing things like having a family, having children. At the time, Josie’s business was limping along, and he had been happy to table the subject. To be perfectly honest, he hadn’t given it much thought at the time, and he still hadn’t spent any time considering the question.

But five years had passed, and Josie’s business was booming. She was only thirty years old, but maybe she was ready to break away from the long hours at work. Maybe she’d seen too many of those diaper commercials on TV, all those cute little round babies gurgling happily at their beautiful mommies and handsome dads . . .

But how did
he
feel? Was
he
ready? Would he ever be ready? Cooper had always liked kids, but he’d never imagined himself as a father. He couldn’t see himself handing out punishment like some stern but kind all-powerful ruler. He couldn’t see himself driving a station wagon or—God—changing a diaper.

Babies cried a lot, didn’t they? He and Josie would never get any sleep, they’d never be able to make love without being interrupted, the apartment would be filled with sticky fingerprints and crayon marks . . .

Add on top of that the fact that New York City was one hell of a bad place to raise a kid. His own childhood had alternated between city streets and tropical beaches. As a child, he would have sold his soul to stay on the beaches. The city, despite all its magic and excitement, still was filled with rules and locks and fear and hostility. That was hard enough to deal with as an adult . . .

“I’ve got some good news and some bad news,” Josie said, interrupting his thoughts.

Some good news and some bad news.

Cooper froze, staring up at her in shock. His eyes were suddenly dark blue and very serious. “No,” he said, slowly. “That’s the same thing you said before you told me about your contract with Duncan Industries.”

She’d told him about the contract, and then she had disappeared for three solid months, sucked into the black hole of overtime.

His answer was the guilt he could see in her dark brown eyes. But her excitement far overpowered it.

“This one’s even bigger, Coop,” she said. “Fenderson Co., Incorporated. They want to hire us to update their system. Totally overhaul the entire thing. We’re talking new hardware along with the programs we’re going to create. It’ll give us more than two
million
dollars in profits—”

“What’s the deadline?” he interrupted her.

“It’ll be tight, but they’d like everything in place within thirteen months.”

“Thirteen
months
!” Cooper covered his face with his hands and started to laugh. “
Shit
!”

“Coop, it’s not that long—”

He gave her a look of incredulousness. “It’s one month longer than a
year.
” He threw his pizza down on his plate. Suddenly his appetite was gone. “The contract with Duncan only took three months,” he said. “I spent three months sitting around at night trying to remember what my wife looked like. When you
did
come home, you were too tired to do anything besides fall into bed and pass out. I was miserable and lonely and horny as hell—”

“Just because I was tired, it didn’t mean I didn’t want to make love,” Josie said defensively.

Cooper laughed, but the sound was harsh. “Sorry babe, but it’s more fun for me when you’re at least semi-conscious.”

“So in other words, you’re saying you don’t want me to have the chance to earn two million dollars because you’re afraid you won’t get enough
sex
,” she said tightly. “That’s nice, Cooper. Very nice. David was right. You
are
a child. A
selfish
child.”

He jerked back, as if she had slapped him. “What?” he said, even though he had heard her quite clearly.

She had gone too far. She could see the icy glint of anger in his eyes. She’d seen him angry before, but never this way, never at her. His lips were pressed tightly together, and his nostrils flared as he took a breath in.

He stood up, his shoulders, his entire body tense.

“Sex is only part of it, and you know it,” he snapped, his voice getting louder with each word.
“Goddamn
it, Josie,
I’m
being selfish? You’re never home
now
! How often do I see you? I’m lucky if you leave the office before seven-thirty, and you’re usually in bed by eleven, so you can get up at five-goddamn-thirty and start it all over again! Shit, I had to threaten dire consequences and negotiate the
hell
out of you to get you to take
Sundays
off. But I’m gonna lose even that for the next thirteen months, aren’t I?”