Janey stared at the key ring. "Thanks."
"Don't lose them."
The shower felt good and she tried his subtly fragrant shampoo. Janey ran her hands over her skin with a strange awareness that for the first time in her life, she did not feel like her body was entirely hers. A man had rights to it. Rights she had admittedly granted, but still rights. If he touched her, she wasn't going to object.
This must be what it was like to be not a virgin.
When she came out of the bathroom wearing a towel, her suitcase was in the bedroom. She laid it down and rummaged through it, taking out toiletries and one change of clothes. After some consideration, she zipped up the suitcase and shoved it against a wall. She guessed she wouldn't be needing it for a while.
She smelled eggs cooking when she walked out of the bedroom wearing a t-shirt and skinny jeans. "I was going to do bacon," she said, walking into the kitchen.
Nyall was spooning eggs onto two glossy black plates. He was dressed pretty much like her, in jeans, a flannel, sneakers, and a t-shirt. Still, something about the fit of his clothes said they were from an entirely different rack in the store.
An entirely different store. Different class of stores.
A different universe in fact.
He glanced at her, gave her a once-over. "Shit, you almost tempt me to let you wear clothes."
Janey snapped her teeth at him. He chuckled.
"Well?" he said, as he handed her a plate. "What do you think?" His muscular arm gestured to indicate the kitchen as a whole.
She looked around her. With spacious marble countertops and modern appliances, the kitchen was luxurious and well-equipped. She shrugged. "It's a nice kitchen."
"Nice? You're supposed to fall all over yourself with admiration."
She wrinkled her nose. "Sorry, Nyall. Rich people always have kitchens like this. Big stone counters, parquetry floors, fancy islands, copper pots. It's how you know they're rich and never cook. They're inefficient."
He laughed.
"You're not offended?" she said in sudden remorse.
He shook his head. "One of my—" he changed course. "Celia—you remember Celia? Toward the bottom of the list."
Her eyes widened. "Celia. Yes. She was the one who said you were disease-free and disliked pet snakes."
His eyes narrowed. "Right. Well, she had it done. Her brother's an interior decorator. He and one of my cousins did this place. I just live here."
"I see. I think it's pretty nice, aesthetically. It suits you, this place."
"Why do you say that?" He handed her a steaming cup.
She smelled Earl Grey and grinned. "Elegant. Masculine. Comfortable. Pampered. Sophisticated but earthy."
"I see." His tone said he wasn't flattered. "What about 'out of my league?' Or was that next?"
She chewed the inside of her lip. "You're definitely out of my league, even more now that I've seen how you live. But maybe by the end of this week, I'll be in your sexual league. You're kind of mentoring me, in a crash course sort of way." She beamed at him. "Do you have any special requests for the grocery store?"
He frowned at her, then shook his head. "I'll leave the food to you. What do you mean, even more now that you've seen how I live? You think this place is exorbitant?"
She shrugged and sat down. "Not exactly. This is your slumming home, isn't it? The place you really unwind. You obviously use a maid service, because it's immaculate. It's got more square footage than most people's houses." She tasted the eggs and grimaced.
"That's it?" he said. "That what puts me out of the ballpark?"
She ticked off her fingers. "I'm guessing your apartment by the airport is small but comes prefurnished and you keep it all year round even though you hardly stay there. Your place on the beach is probably some kind of resort and I'll bet it's not a time share but that you own it all by yourself. And then of course most people don't own French chalets, do they? As for your house in Sacramento…I have no idea, but just the fact that it's there…" She leaned forward earnestly. "I mean, come on, Nyall. I live in a garden level studio not too far from here in Fremont, and it's pretty run-down. I drive a secondhand van that I use for work. I don't even have an accountant to do my books, or a rule-the-world phone. I shop at Walmart." She rolled her eyes. "So yes, your league is major and mine is little."
He regarded her impassively for a few moments, his arms crossed over his chest.
"I hope that didn't offend you," she said hastily. "I don't mean it in a bad way. I think it's great that you did this all yourself. You're a real success and you're obviously not obnoxious about it. I know one day when I'm old and gray and tell my friends about this week, they'll be impressed when they find out I'm the one that taught the great Nyall Anderson how to make cheesecake." She meant to tease him out of his funk, but somehow it fell flat. She bit her lip. "You're not offended, are you?"
"Finish your breakfast," he said finally. "Then go to the store. Don't linger, just come back here, take off your clothes, put on an apron, and show me how to cook something. And then, little girl, I'm going to teach you to beg for cock."
It was like he'd opened up her arteries and let something hot flood them. Her eyes widened. "Are you angry with me?"
"I'm not sure. Mostly I want to fuck you violently," he said conversationally, "in all your holes, until you're screaming because you want to come so bad." He smiled wolfishly. "That's all, Janey."
Chapter 6
The trip to the supermarket didn't take long.
It would have taken much longer, because contrary to his order not to linger, she very much tried to. Only walking up and down every aisle was proving to be too athletic an activity for Janey's current condition. Her knees felt weak and her oxygen supply lacked something.
It was all Nyall's fault. His last words to her in the kitchen had left her anxious, not to mention apprehensive. And no little bit aroused.
Beg for cock. Screaming because you want to come so bad.
She wondered what his problem was. Maybe he was frustrated. He had to be at least a little bit frustrated, she reasoned. Maybe he had sex ten times a day. A guy like him would be used to doing everything he wanted to with a woman, not holding back because of her virginity. It must be very inconvenient.
In any case, by the time she drove off the lot of the supermarket, she was in doubt that going straight back to his condo was the smart thing to do. Nibbling on her lip, she made a spontaneous turn and in a couple of minutes was pulling up to a library branch.
Inside, she flashed her library card and then sat down at one of the computing stations. In short order, she'd pulled up the long list of Nyall's emails, opened the attachment, and was scrolling through his list of mistresses.
Five minutes later, she was sitting in her van on her mobile.
"Amy Winch," a voice said.
"Amy? This is Janey Pankowski. I don't know if you remember me. I called you a few weeks ago about—"
"Nyall. Yeah, I got it. You're the one who wanted a reference. Can you hold on? Paul, I need you to test this code without going into the database. That possible or should we wait till Monday? Great. Sorry. It's crazy here since the server went down yesterday."
"You're working on Saturday?"
"What's that?"
"You work every day of the week?'
"Oh, yeah. There's my regular job and then there's my own projects."
"Um, so I wondered if you might be available to talk for a few minutes."
"About Ny? Sure."
"So I'm having one or two problems. You gave me some great advice before."
"Oh, yeah?"
"'Don't get possessive or sappy or bossy or lie.' I can't say I've followed all of that to the letter, but most of it. And you're right, he is a great guy." She could sense Amy was getting bored, so she rushed on. "I know you said he's not into pain and the other girls he goes out with all say he's safe and everything, but…do you think there's a chance that if he gets really angry, he might, um, hurt a girl?"
There was a pause. "Pardon. Angry?"
"Yeah, you know. Frustrated and angry."
"Nyall?" Amy laughed. "Nyall doesn't do frustrated or angry. You don't need to worry."
"Well, maybe I'm just imagining it," Janey said doubtfully.
"What did he say, out of curiosity?"
Janey blushed. "I'd rather not tell you because it's kind of crude. But when I asked him if he was angry, he said he wasn't sure."
"No kidding." Amy paused, then raised her voice. "It's out of paper. If Svenna's not around, just look in the cabinet. You there? I wouldn't worry about it, Janey. He likes you a lot. He wouldn't hurt you physically."
Janey's jaw dropped. "What do you mean?"
"He's just not the mean sort. He actually got a colleague of mine out of a bad situation. She was taking crap from a dick who—"
"No, I mean—that's great, but—what you said about him liking me."
"Yeah, he thinks you're funny."
Janey stared at the phone as if it had grown legs.
"Janey, I'm sorry, but I've got to go pretty soon. Look, if you want to meet for coffee later—"
"No! I mean, um, I'm busy today, too. But can you just answer—how do you know he thinks I'm, um, funny? Did he tell you?"