Something Wild (5 page)

He'd never been that swept away—dare he even think dominated—by a woman before. Not that she was rough, by any means—more sweet and sexy than rough—but she'd left him feeling thoroughly seduced, thoroughly …
taken.
He could still hear the tantalizing shift in her voice when it had edged from nervous and explanatory to seductive. He could still feel her soft curves, the lace of her barely there lingerie, the weight of her breasts in his hands. He could still feel the heat of her kiss, her moisture on his fingertips…

Flinching to discover he still stood in the bright light of the breakroom, Ryan blinked back the absorbing memories and reached for his coffee. Taking a gulp, he told himself to concentrate on work and get this woman off his mind. As much as possible anyway.

Still, as he made his way through the lobby and down the hall to Martin's office, his thoughts dwelled on her. Specifically, on how much he'd hated finding out she'd been embarrassed by that hot, sexy side of herself. He wished everything were different, that there could be more between them, that he could show her how incredibly good that part of her was.

But it's best this way. It was crazy for him to even wish for something else with her. Clearly, the girl was wilder than she even understood, or last night wouldn't have happened with
anybody.
And while there was certainly nothing wrong with being a little wild, it was not a quality he needed in a woman right now.

What he needed right now was stability, a dependable job with a dependable income and a dependable future. What he didn't need was an affair with the boss's fiancée, or girlfriend—hell, whatever she was. His mistake at ComData had thrown a wrench into his career, and getting his job at Schuster Systems had been an amazing stroke of luck, since Martin hadn't asked for references. But if Ryan lost
this
job, how would he bounce back? He had come here to start over and he couldn't afford another black mark next to his name.

He drained his coffee cup as he settled back behind the desk, needing that extra jolt of caffeine to get his mind back to work. Work, work, work. It was all that mattered here.

And hopefully last night's escapade would fade away just as she wanted it to, as they both wanted it to.

Except for the memory of the sex, of course. That wouldn't fade.

Taking a deep breath, he reached for the folder he'd plucked from his own closet-size office on his way into Martin's. Martin had dropped it in Ryan's in-box before leaving, telling him it contained the specs on his first major project at Schuster, and that he'd scheduled a planning session for Ryan with the client on Monday afternoon. It was important that this first assignment go well, so he wanted to familiarize himself with the details before the meeting two days from now.

Flipping open the folder, his gaze fell on the neatly typed job form.

Client: Two Sisters Restaurant & Pub

Contact: Penny Halloran

Oh God.

How could this be? How could fate be cruel enough to throw this woman back in his face like this?

When he finally started breathing again, his eyes dropped farther down the page to the bright yellow sticky note bearing the bold print he already recognized as Martin's.

Ryan—meet with Penny at her house on Monday, two o'clock. Grace can give you directions. M

Penny's
house?
If this wasn't awful enough already, why on earth would they meet at her
house
of all places?

Ryan swallowed, hard. This was bad. Really bad. Because unbidden images were already filling his brain.

He saw her in the black bra and panties he'd never really gotten a good look at.

He saw her atop him, in his lap, grinding.

He saw her soft, delicate hand reaching down, wrapping around him.
Oh, yes.

And then he saw everything in this new city, everything in this new job … going horribly, irredeemably wrong…

* * *

Penny closed the payroll book, then locked the checks she'd just written in the desk. Patti had gone to the bank for change, the only server on duty was out running an errand, and Penny was glad to be alone in the quiet of the pub. Business was always slow on Saturday afternoon, Cincinnati's downtown thriving much more during the workweek, but it was a good day to get the accounting and other behind-the-scenes work done.

She only came in on Saturdays if the workload was heavy or if she was bored or needed a distraction from something, and today, she definitely needed distraction. Besides, she was scheduled to spend a lot of her time with a system designer in the coming few weeks, so it didn't hurt to get ahead. She and Patti had decided it was time to get the pub completely computerized from the accounting system to the food orders.

When she'd finally dragged herself in the door last night, Penny had found her answering machine blinking, although she'd known what she would hear even before pressing the button. "Hi, Penny, it's Martin."
Here we are, considering marriage, but he doesn't even expect me to recognize his voice.
"I'm calling from Flagstaff—I left early to meet a client. I hope you didn't try to get in touch with me; I apologize if you were worried. I should have called, but it was a last-minute decision, and I've been busy since the plane touched down. I'll call you after I reach Las Vegas, and of course, I'll look forward to hearing your thoughts on my proposal when I get back."

As Penny had erased the message, she'd thought it sounded more like he'd made a business proposition than a request to spend their lives together. But then, Martin was Martin. A consummate businessman, and she could respect that. And so what if he was a little … stiff?

Oh, Martin, Martin, Martin. What have I done?
Despite coming to work, it was impossible not to dwell on her unwitting betrayal last night. She winced, recalling her total mortification upon discovering she'd had sex with the wrong man. And after returning home, she'd done something she hadn't done in years—cried herself to sleep.

Sadly, she wasn't sure if the worst part was having seduced a guy she didn't even know … or having enjoyed it so darn much.

Exiting the restaurant's small office, Penny made her way behind the bar. Filling a glass with soda from the spray nozzle, she considered adding a little rum, still compelled to try drinking her mistake away. Already battling a champagne headache, however, she resisted the temptation.

Whether she liked it or not, Ryan had helped her live out a fantasy. Her breath caught as she remembered how wickedly fun and exciting it had been. Sure, she'd thought he was Martin, but no matter who he was, he'd done everything so right. Of course, it could be argued that she'd done most of the work, but his hands, touching her … his mouth, kissing her so thoroughly…

She'd never imagined sex with a stranger could be so good. She believed that intimacy had to be there first, before sex. Somehow, though, with him, it had seemed to happen
during
the sex. To her horror, even upon finding out he wasn't Martin, she'd still felt close to him after what they'd shared.

Setting down her glass, Penny ran her hand across the smooth, clean bar top. Another of her loosely formed fantasies involved having sex
there.
She didn't know why. Maybe it was about doing something private in an inherently public place, or maybe it had to do with sort of christening this establishment she'd built herself—along with her sister, of course. Either way, as she stood there alone with her thoughts, she found herself envisioning it easily enough, she and Ryan making passionate love on the long mahogany bar. Ryan, not Martin.

But it only made sense, she reasoned as ripples of sensation snaked down her spine. She and Ryan had shared a terrible, wonderful sort of intimacy last night. And despite her regret, this man knew how to kiss a woman, how to touch a woman. This man was… She rolled her eyes.
The wrong man to be thinking about!
She had to stop it, now. Besides, how would she ever face him again anyway?

When the pub's door opened, Penny flinched, feeling almost as if Patti could read her mind. Plunking a big leather satchel of change on the bar, Patti devilishly raised her eyebrows. "I forgot to ask earlier.
Is
he boring?"

Penny swallowed the lump that rose to her throat. "Um, no." After all, Patti had not specifically identified the "he" in question.

At this, Patti raised her eyebrows even farther. "Can I have details?"

Penny smiled. "No again."

Her sister frowned. "You're no fun."

"I don't think
he
would agree with you on that," Penny said, then wondered what she was doing, perpetuating this conversation.
I must be losing my mind.

And she knew for certain she'd lost her mind when she looked up to see Ryan coming in the door that led from the building's lobby. This couldn't be happening, it just
couldn't!
What on earth was he doing here?

"Hi," he said. He looked incredibly sheepish. And incredibly handsome. How had she not noticed that before? Her skin tingled. "I was hoping you might be here."

"Hi," she replied, but she felt her eyebrows knitting and her lips pursing, and knew she must look as glad to see him as she would an IRS auditor.

Wearing faded jeans and a polo shirt that revealed just a hint of the muscles she'd felt beneath her fingers last night, he stepped up to the bar, his earnest brown gaze shining on her. "Um, I was wondering if I could talk to you alone for a minute."

They both glanced at Patti, whose pale blue eyes were as round as two beer mugs. "Don't mind me," she said awkwardly. "I'll just … put this change away in the office." Hefting the satchel from the bar, she gave Penny a quick last glance, then flurried into the back.

Penny nervously returned her attention to Ryan. He'd taken a stool at the bar and was leaning forward on his elbows, bringing himself closer to her than she expected. She caught her breath, then said, "What's up?" as if they were casual friends or something.

"I just … wanted to make sure you're all right."

"Oh," she replied.
Very clever response, Penny.

"Because last night you seemed pretty upset. I felt bad leaving you."

Oh wow, how sweet. She lifted her gaze to his and realized he'd been doing a much better job of looking her in the eye than she'd done with him so far. Still, she pulled herself together and gave what she thought was a much more convincing answer than she had last evening. "I'm really fine," she lied. "I mean, I was certainly shocked." She even faked a good-natured laugh. "But there's really nothing to do other than put it behind us."

He smiled again, a big, wide, what-a-relief smile. "Good. I'm glad you feel that way, because as it turns out, you and I are going to be working together."

Her mouth dropped open. "Pardon me?"

He added a shrug to his smile. "I just found out Martin assigned me the job of designing your computer system."

"Oh."

"So, is that all right with you?"

"Yeah. Sure." Of course it wasn't all right, but what would Martin think if she refused to work with Ryan? What possible reason could she give? "We'll just have to … put last night behind us, like I said," she added, wondering why she was still talking about it if she was so eager to put it behind them.

"Definitely." He nodded vigorously.

"Of course." She nodded right back.

"I'm really sorry. I know this will be awkward."

"It'll be fine," she insisted too desperately.

"Although I don't know why Martin wouldn't do the job himself, being … so close to you and everything."

She almost laughed then, considering that she'd physically been much closer to Ryan now than she'd ever been to Martin, but the word close just stirred up too many sensual memories. "Actually, Martin doesn't do much designing anymore now that the company's grown, so I knew he was assigning it to someone else."

"And I was, uh, wondering about something else, too. Martin's instructions said we were meeting at your house?"

She nodded some more. "I've been typing all my notes into my computer at home, but I've suffered a series of mishaps over the last few months."

"Mishaps?"

"Well, first, my printer broke. I bought a new one, but something's wrong with the connection, because it won't print. After that, I managed to get a diskette jammed in the floppy drive. Then last week, during a thunderstorm, lightning zapped my modem."

"Wow." He looked dumbfounded by her streak of bad luck.

"So the computer still
works,"
she went on, "but I don't have any way to move the information out of it. Martin has promised to get it all fixed, but he hasn't had time yet, so he suggested that rather than wait, we just work from my place." Then it occurred to her to ask, "Is that all right? I mean, will you be okay with that?"

"Sure. Of course." He nodded.

"Okay." She felt herself nodding again, too. "Good."

"Well then," he said, pushing to his feet, "I'll, uh, look forward to getting together, talking about your needs, and trying to fulfill them." Then he cringed. "Your
system
needs, I mean."

More nodding on her part, repeatedly, almost convulsively. "Yes, right, my system needs."