Blush(44)

Mia had offered to cook Cruz dinner earlier. He’d politely, too politely, declined. So he was still cranky and adamant on his rejection policy, apparently. So much for his offer to let her be in charge tonight. If she was really in charge, she’d order him to get his naked ass upstairs and wait for her.

He’d come in when it started to rain in the late afternoon, and had used the steamer on the entry- and hallway’s hideous wallpaper. It had been a pleasure to watch him every time he passed the open door as he worked, his sweaty muscles flexing. At seven he’d taken a shower. Interestingly, when Mia tried the door handle, the bathroom door had been locked.

Shocked, Mia had stood out in the hallway staring at the door. What man didn’t want sex? Even if he was annoyed about something? And, damn it, shower sex was on the list. She was ready for him when she heard the water turn off.

Draped in a barely-there purple negligee this time, she’d perched her butt on the chilly kitchen counter, feeling a little silly vamping when he wasn’t even there to see her sexy pose.

She shook her head as Pink’s “U + Ur Hand” reminded her that she’d been just fine before Cruz Barcelona sauntered into her damn life, and maybe that’s why he’d locked the door. He was taking care of that lovely erection all by himself. Selfish bastard.

She slid the baking sheet into the oven.

Without coming into the room, he’d yelled that he was leaving, and slammed out of the house to go to his cramped camper and the company of his dog. Mia had slid off the counter, deflated. Wow. Not very flattering, but clearly he had something serious on his mind. Unless he was no longer interested in having wild monkey sex with her.

Seriously? He’d lost interest? So soon? Possible, although she’d seen the heat in his eyes when he was watching her earlier. He’d quickly shuttered the look.

She hummed along to “Perfect” as she removed the fragrant pastry from the oven. She had mastered baking. Time to move on. No more eggs either. She needed new cookbooks pronto. She didn’t need a song to tell her he was less than perfect.

Hell, maybe she wasn’t as good a judge of character as she’d always believed. Perhaps, being isolated like this from Blush, she was losing her edge. Or maybe it was the heavy humidity that was making her brain soggy and her raging hormones scream for more sex with Cruz that had her brain misfiring.

She went upstairs to blow out the candles and change into shorts and a tank top. So much for her romantic seduction plan. His loss. Some men didn’t want the challenge of a powerful woman. Maybe he felt threatened. Maybe he didn’t want to jeopardize his job by sleeping with the boss. Maybe she was a big disappointment in the sex department. Who the hell knew what the man was thinking?

Back in the kitchen, she fixed a salad and put wild monkey sex out of her mind. But her body, constantly on edge when he was around, wasn’t so easy to convince.

Pink belted out “Blow Me.” “Hmm. Blow me one more kiss? A farewell screw would be even more welcome,” Mia muttered. “But will I get it? No, apparently not!”

Damn it, she wasn’t asking for love and marriage. All she wanted was more of what he’d already given her. Mindless, awesome, sweaty sex. Was that too damn much to ask?

“Focus. Think about something else.” She forked a red, ripe cherry tomato into her mouth and chewed, thinking now of the marks on Daisy’s arms and her alarmed reaction when her little boy had screamed.

Mia wondered again if she should at least say something as she poured herself a glass of crisp Riesling. She looked kind of pathetic in her reflection in the black windowpane. Sitting alone, eating off fine bone china, drinking good wine from a crystal glass, mooning like a teenager over some itinerant laborer—

She shook her head. That line of thinking was ludicrous, and she knew it. If the man didn’t want to have sex with her, that was his prerogative. She couldn’t do anything to lead that particular horse to water, but she could do something about Daisy.

Offer—what? Counseling for her husband? Herself? Shelter? Mia wasn’t sure what, if anything, she should do in this situation. And she and Cruz could be way off the mark. Daisy could just be a shy woman who bruised easily. She could have fallen and someone had broken her fall by grabbing onto her, just as Cruz had grabbed Mia when she nearly fell off the ladder. She looked at her own wrist, not totally sure there wasn’t a bit of bruising there. Or on her neck from their rough lovemaking the other night.

She ate dinner in lonely, quiet splendor with her pretty china and a crystal wineglass. No music, just the gentle whirring of the ceiling fan and loud rhythmic croaking of the frogs, and all the chirps and cheeps and grunts that the crickets, alligators, and other swamp creatures were making beyond the closed windows. The insects and wild things were content in the heavy night air, while the man who was always on her mind seemed discontented.