Midnight Touch Read online

  T-bone farted.

  Kate nodded. “Yeah! It does stink. The whole situation stinks. But I’m not damn well apologizing to some jerk who lies to me and lets me believe he’s an accountant!”

  T-bone rolled over and licked at her stitches.

  “Don’t do that, sweetie. Picking at a wound only makes it worse.”

  The dog raised her head and looked at Kate for a long moment, her eyes warm and liquid and wise.

  “You’re right,” Kate said finally, with a sigh. “We should get out of this dark bedroom and go for a walk.”

  “SHE’S GOT SOME nerve!” Alejandro shouted to Marly. “I will not apologize first. She thought I romanced her for her money! How insulting is that?”

  Peggy, who stood in the corner of the kitchenette with them, sighed. “Well, you did lie to her, Alejo.”

  “I didn’t lie, exactly. I omitted.” He folded his arms across his chest and clamped his hands in his pits.

  “You lied,” Marly said matter-of-factly. “You said Señor Manos was a Peruvian product.”

  “He is,” Alejandro insisted.

  His two partners exchanged a long glance. He was getting really tired of that. They’d conspired against him from the beginning, these two.

  “What?” he bellowed.

  Peggy shoved a hand through her hair. “You’re both idiots. And you’re both wrong. So you’re perfect for each other.”

  “I know that.” Alejandro glared at her.

  “But if neither one of you apologizes, then you’re at an impasse.” Marly stated the obvious. “By the way, she never wants to see you again, except to kill you.”

  “Great. Unfortunately, we have classes together. And we have the damned marketing project to pull together, too.”

  “E-mail,” Peggy said, “is a wonderful thing.”

  He glowered at her. Then he stalked into the office and closed the door, glaring at the computer.

  MS. SPINNEY, KATE read later when she checked her e-mail, still in her pajamas.

  As you are aware, the marketing project is due next Friday. Please find attached the spreadsheet and cost analysis you requested.

  A.T.

  Glaring at the screen, she typed back:

  Mr. Torres,

  I am fully aware of when the marketing project is due. I am in receipt of the spreadsheet and cost analysis. They look quite competent, considering they were executed by someone who is not, after all, an accountant.

  However, I do not find attached an apology. It must have gotten lost in cyberspace.

  K.S.

  Ten minutes later she had his response:

  Ms. Spinney,

  You must be right. However, I have checked the stored documents on my computer, and cannot find the apology in question, so I’m unable to attach it. Many things do, of course, disappear in cyberspace: things such as trust and human emotion. Amazing, though, how sheer gall never seems to get lost.

  If you should unearth an apology in your own files, please, by all means send it.

  A.T.

  She lost no time in sending her reply:

  Like hell.

  Faster than electricity, he responded, too.

  Stiff-necked little Yankee bruja.

  Give me five minutes with you naked on a mattress, and I’ll have you begging me to let you apologize.

  Kate spit her coffee onto the keyboard. Bastard! While she wiped the N, M, space bar and alt keys with a paper towel, she tried to think of a suitably withering response, but her brain seemed to be malfunctioning. Probably because the thought of being naked on a mattress with Alejandro was rather distracting. Jerk!

  For example, there were his broad shoulders to consider, and the gorgeously sculpted muscles of his biceps, triceps and forearms, lightly dusted with dark, masculine hair.

  Yeah, the big, dumb primate.

  Not to mention the terrain of his chest, with those flat, coppery nipples and defined six-pack, his flat stomach and, lower down, his heavy, thick—

  Stop it! She scolded herself. Any horse is well-hung, too. It doesn’t mean the animal is fit to be ridden, much less kept in your stable.

  And his legs. God, Alejandro’s legs. Long, hard and packed with defined muscle. Legs that seemed oh, so talented at tangling with her own and prying her knees apart.

  Yeah, and probably all of his bosomy customers’ knees, too.

  The way he spoke soft Spanish to her in bed, and caressed her jaw and the backs of her ears and her scalp. He could have her ready for him without even touching her below the neck—and that took serious talent.

  Gah! He is Satan. He lied to you about his job—so what else is he lying about?

  Kate stalked back to the computer with her answer for Alejandro. Stabbing each key, she wrote back.

  I’d rather ride my broomstick and get splinters. Give me five minutes naked on a mattress with you, and you’ll be a gelding!

  Chapter 23

  Alejandro didn’t have any intention of giving Kate warning. No, by God, he’d catch her completely unaware, and to do that he had to bypass the main entrance where the kid named Kevin would force him to wait while he called her unit.

  Instead, Alejo remembered the freight elevator they’d used to take Gracious down to the beach one night. He walked around the building and found a back entry which, conveniently, some maintenance worker had wedged open with a brick. He slipped inside. Geld him, she’d threatened? They’d just see about that.

  He reached her floor and stalked to her door, rapping on it with no hesitation.

  “Who is it?” Kate’s voice called warily.

  “Pizza guy.”

  “You!” she said, furiously. She threw open the door and stood resplendent in a scruffy white T-shirt and pajama bottoms with mallards on them. “What do you want?”

  “I’m here to be gelded, Kate.”

  “What?”

  “Five minutes on a mattress, we agreed. And see, I even brought you a Swiss Army knife. Your choice of straight or serrated blades. There’s even a small scissors in it.” He grinned and pressed it into her hand.

  “You’re insane.”

  He nodded. “Definitely, most men would consider me insane. Now come along, Kate.” He poked her in the stomach with an index finger and when she didn’t move, he shrugged and pushed past her, whipping off his shirt and kicking off his shoes.

  T-bone growled at him and bristled.

  “Yeah, well, I brought you something, too.” Alejo reached into his pocket and took out a dog treat.

  “Don’t you dare take that, T-bone!” Kate snapped. To him, she said, “Get out.”

  T-bone eagerly gobbled the treat and wagged her tail, sniffing around for more.

  Alejandro unbuckled his belt with one hand and scratched the dog behind the ears with the other one.

  “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “Five minutes naked on a mattress,” he said again, patiently. “We agreed. It’s even in writing.”

  “I agreed to nothing,” she declared, as he dropped his pants. “Put those back on, damn it!”

  He smirked at her and dropped his drawers, standing completely nude in front of her, and with a healthy erection, too. He swiveled his hips so it waggled at her.

  She turned her back on him, shaking with emotion.

  “So which will it be, mi corazon? I’d very much prefer that you not use the scissors. That would take a long time, and they’d probably be irreparably blunt afterwards.”

  She hunched forward, shaking even harder and let out something that sounded like a sob. He frowned and was at her side in an instant, all seriousness. “What is it, mi amor? I’m sorry—I did not mean to make you cry!”

  Her body wracked with new spasms and he started to get alarmed. Then she finally raised her head and he saw her face, contorted with mirth. She could hardly breathe, she was laughing so hard. Finally she made a sound somewhat like a donkey in labor and went into more convulsions of giggles while he grinne
d back at her. He was a pretty funny guy, if he did say so himself.

  When she caught her breath, leaning over with her hands braced on her knees, she said, “Hah.”

  “Hah?”

  “You apologized!” she declared in triumphant tones.

  “I did no such thing.”

  “You did! You just did! You said, ‘I’m sorry, mi amor.’”

  He scoffed. “That’s when I thought you were crying. It doesn’t count.”

  “It most certainly does.”

  “No, it does not.”

  “Look, do you want to be friends again or not?”

  “What I want is my five minutes on the mattress.”

  “That is so not going to happen, sport.”

  “You are obviously afraid of succumbing to my masculine charms, mi amor.” He smirked at her.

  “Oh, please.” She turned her back on him again, which was a mistake. He de-pantsed her in a single fluid motion and saw with great satisfaction that she wore no panties under her pajama bottoms.

  “Hey!”

  Then he picked her up, the jammies still twined around one of her ankles, and rubbed the length of himself between her legs. She was slick for him already and he made the mistake of permitting himself a smug smile as he slowly slid inside her to the hilt.

  Though he knew very well that she’d enjoyed the sensation as much as he had, she pulled off of him in a single fluid motion. “I sure hope that felt good to you, sport, because that’s the only taste of it you’re going to get. Now put me down.”

  Bruja. Little flauta. “Oh, yes?” he asked softly. He made a single motion of his own, transferring all of her weight to his left arm, leaving his right hand free to play. He reached beneath her, awkward as it was, and maneuvered his fingers along the slippery cleft between her legs. He slipped them back and forth rapidly and then found the small nub at her very center, circling it gently and then stroking it.

  “Stop that,” she said, but her voice began to lack conviction.

  “A gentleman always obliges,” he said. He shoved her shirt up and bent his head to her breasts instead.

  “Put me down,” she told him, faintly.

  Alejo walked into the bedroom with her and set her at the edge of the mattress, but remained between her legs. He stripped off her mangy T-shirt so that he could have better access to her breasts, which were now jutting forward and pebbled at the tips. He took one in his mouth and sucked, hard.

  “I really don’t like you very much,” Kate said, on the crest of a moan.

  “I don’t like you much, either,” Alejo told her, taking the other breast into his mouth. “But we’ve got to get through five minutes naked on this mattress. Now, are you still inclined to geld me?”

  She reached down and grabbed his rascal, wrapping her hands around it snugly. She shook her head.

  “What are you planning to do with that?”

  She guided it to where she wanted it to go.

  Though it just about killed him, he removed her hands and shook his head. “No, no. I’ve had my one stroke, remember? I’m trying not to be greedy, mi amor.”

  She cussed weakly at him and he gave her an insolent smile. “I’ve got something we could clean out your dirty mouth with, though.”

  Kate bared her teeth at him.

  “On second thought,” he mused, “we could just get mine dirty instead.” He pushed her thighs apart so that they were almost parallel to the side of the mattress, and took his time for a moment, enjoying the view.

  Then he swooped down and took her with his mouth in a single motion. She gave a small scream of pleasure, writhing under his tongue.

  “Like that, mi corazon?” he laughed softly, scraping his five o’clock shadow along her inner thigh.

  She moaned. “Yes.”

  “But you want my cock in you even more.”

  “Yes,” she admitted, flushing with embarrassment.

  He bent his head and teased her some more. “You want it fast and hard? Or slow and sweet?” He maneuvered his hands under her bottom, squeezing a warm cheek in each.

  She raised her hips. “H-hard.”

  “Yes?” He stabbed his tongue inside her and then raised his head again. “Well, you give me a fast, hard apology, and then I’ll give it to you that way.”

  She froze and he watched with amusement as she gritted her teeth. Pride fought a duel with lust all over her face.

  “Screw you,” she said.

  He chuckled as she made an attempt to wriggle back and away from him, and held her still while he slid his tongue over her, back and forth, until she was panting and gripping his skull.

  “Are you sorry, Kate? That you doubted my motives and accused me of being a scumbag?” He went in for the kill, a figure-eight maneuver with a flutter at the center.

  “Haaaaaaaaah,” she gasped, shaking all over, but this time not with mirth.

  “Want me inside, baby? One little word. That’s all it takes.”

  “S-sorry!”

  “Thank you,” he said, standing and driving into her tight heat. She convulsed around him at once, thrashing under him helplessly.

  Then she added, “You lying rat bastard.”

  SOME TIME LATER, Kate opened her eyes and looked at Alejandro. “If your apology doesn’t count, then neither does mine.”

  “Yours definitely counts,” he said, rolling over. “You yelled it. There was a lot of remorse behind that sorry, judging by volume alone.”

  She squinted at him. “There was not. It was given under circumstances of coercion.”

  “Mmm,” he said, his expression happily reminiscent. “I could always make you apologize to me again….”

  She figured she’d better not argue with him. “Look,” she told him severely. “Let’s just call this a draw. You don’t apologize to me for being a lying creep, and I won’t apologize to you for thinking you were pond scum. We’ll forget that I’m mostly right because you really were lying to me….”

  His face had darkened and she hastily moved out of his grasp. “And I’ll tell you about my absolutely brilliant marketing solution for After Hours.”

  “First, Ms. Spinney, let’s clear the air between us, apologies or not. I couldn’t give a crap about your money, and you can invest it in flamingo racing for all I care. Second, there are so many damned things that Spinneys won’t or don’t do that I wouldn’t want to be connected to them in any way. And third, the only reason I lied to you is that I didn’t want to be less of a man in your eyes. Got it?”

  She finally nodded. “I think it’s ridiculous, but I guess I understand, you being such a big, macho lunkhead. Now, will you let me tell you my marketing idea? It’s truly ingenious.”

  “No false modesty about you, Kate, is there?” he teased. “At least when it comes to ideas.”

  “I don’t understand,” she complained. “In Boston, we’re supposed to hide our breasts and display our intellect. In Miami, it’s the reverse!”

  He laughed. “Go on. Tell me all about your genius.”

  When she was finished, he simply stared at her. Then he fell on the floor laughing. And finally, he seized her and kissed her until she could barely breathe.

  “Kate, mi corazon, this is why I romanced you—not only for your beauty but for your mind. Though how anyone can be so knot-headed and brilliant at the same time, I’ll never understand.”

  “It takes real talent,” she told him.

  “Yes, I know.” Alejandro rubbed his knuckles gently over her cheekbones, and the realization he’d been avoiding rushed him and knocked him down.

  He was one hundred percent in love with this maddening woman. He sat there reeling with the sudden discovery, and finally cleared his throat. “That’s why I want you forever—for your many talents.”

  Kate actually blushed. “You want me forever?”

  He looked deep into her eyes and nodded, then tucked her hair behind her ears. “I love you.”

  She absorbed that, knitting her eyebrows.
“You do? Are you sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure. You bring out the moron and the caveman in me. That’s how I know. With other women, I’m suave. With you, I just want to toss you over my shoulder and drag you back to my lair and keep you naked.”

  “Are you proposing to me, Alejandro?”

  That caught him off guard, but he thought about it. He cocked his head to one side. “Would you hit me if I did?”

  “Probably.” Kate grinned at him. “I’m a feminist, remember? We don’t get into all that mushy stuff.”

  “Then how am I ever going to achieve my fantasy of being a kept man?”

  She laughed and kissed him before saying the words he most wanted to hear. “Alejandro, I love you, too.”

  Yes!

  “But…I don’t know if I’m ready to get married. Can I keep you without papers?”

  To tell the truth, he didn’t know if he was ready to get married, either. This was all a little sudden. “For a while. But only if you wear my gold chain. It will mark you as mine, all mine.”

  Kate looked repelled for a moment, before her face split into a dazzling smile. “Deal! It’s a deal. Oh, cool. And I thought I’d never get that tacky necklace off you….”

  Epilogue

  One Year Later

  After Hours overflowed with people of every age, sex and lifestyle, and most of them were dancing. If they refrained from toe-tapping, then they laughed long and loudly. And if they didn’t dissolve into mirth, they flirted wildly and spent buckets of money.

  Alejandro still couldn’t quite believe it. They’d been popular before, with a good crowd most nights, but this went beyond all expectations. He caught Kate’s eye across the room, and she grinned, her hair as messy as it had ever been in spite of Marly’s best efforts to tame it.

  He loved her crazy hair. As much as he loved her.

  He wanted to marry her. He really did. The realization hit him in the face, along with Heather Carlton’s pink lizard handbag.