Her Secret Thrill(11)

Dear Jake. I’m in town briefly and wondered if you’d like to meet me for a quick hello and a cup of coffee at my hotel tomorrow afternoon. Best, Natalie



She folded the note, wrote the name of the hotel and his name on the front, and slid it across the counter. The concierge barely had his fingers on the edges when she slid it back again. “Wait a minute.” She read the note over and wrote a new one, scratching out the word quick. Too close to quickie. She also changed the part about meeting at her hotel. Or any hotel. Best not to tempt fate by having available beds too close at hand. She ignored the fact that that hadn’t stopped them last time, and shoved the new note across the desk. “Can you deliver this tonight?”

He nodded, and she slid him a tip for his trouble, then left the hotel with very damp palms and…well, damp everything. “It’s only coffee,” she murmured as she got into her cab. He might not even respond to her note.



“OH GOD,” she whispered under her breath when she returned from Liza’s several hours later to find the message light blinking on her phone. Jake. It had to be. She picked up the phone with shaky hands, then put it back down again. She wasn’t sure she was ready to hear his voice. Even recorded. She didn’t know what she’d expected. A note at the lobby desk? She wondered if he’d wondered why she hadn’t called him directly. Oh, this was ridiculous. “Just pick it up and get his message already.”

She stared at the blinking phone. What if he turned her down? Or worse, what if he sounded like a total dork or a jerk, and now she’d have to have coffee with him? Maybe it had been the night and the party and the wine she’d had that had made him seem so sexy and wonderful.

“Get over yourself and do this.” She could always cancel, saying her flight had been moved up. Okay, she was ready now. Escape hatch firmly in place. Palms…and other parts damp, she picked up the receiver and punched in the numbers to get her messages. There was only one. She pushed the button to hear it.

“Natalie.”

“Oh God.” The first word, and she’d already clenched so hard she almost came right then. This was not a good sign.

“I’ve been thinking about you, hoping you’d find the nerve to call me.”

She bristled. Both at the amused little note in his voice and the nerve he had in even suggesting, after what she’d done with him after only knowing him mere hours, that she lacked nerve of any kind. She conveniently ignored the fact that it had taken her two full days here to finally send the note at all.

“There’s a little place off Melrose that makes the most incredible oatmeal.”

“Oatmeal?” She laughed. “So much for a repeat of our last romantic rendezvous.” Not that she’d wanted one, she quickly added. But oatmeal? No one planned a seduction with an invitation for oatmeal. She should be relieved. Despite his teasing, he’d apparently drawn the same conclusion she had. Once had been wild and crazy, twice would only be asking for trouble.

“I have a ten-thirty meeting, so if you don’t mind an early hour, meet me at Aunt Sue’s at eight. Just leave a message at the hotel if you can’t make it.”

There was a pause, and Natalie had her finger on the erase button…well, maybe it was hovering over the replay button—damn his voice was just as sexy as she remembered—but then he said something else and her hand fell limply back to her lap.

“If you have to turn me down, could you please leave a voice message?” A short pause followed by a self-deprecating chuckle, then, “I just want to know for sure if you sound as good as I remember.”

Natalie sighed. The man gave good phone message, no doubt about it. Oatmeal and all.

“Don’t chicken out.”

She was still huffing in disbelief as the click ended the call and the message. Chicken out? She’d never once thought it. Her escape plan had strictly been protection against discovering that her memory of him had been tainted by passion.

It hadn’t been tainted.

“Chicken out,” she grumbled. “I’m a Holcomb. We never chicken out.”



AUNT SUE’S turned out to be a really tiny little restaurant crammed in between a bunch of tony shops just off Melrose. It was all white clapboard and gingerbread trim, but somehow managed to fit in. Very “Hansel and Gretel Do L.A.,” she decided, then took a deep breath and went inside.

She had no idea if the storybook decor on the outside matched the inside. In fact, if asked her name that very moment, she’d likely have drawn a blank. There he is was all she could think. Only the back of his head was visible to her, but she knew that head. Intimately.

“Okay, no thinking about…you know,” she schooled herself, as she had all the way there. It hadn’t worked then and it sure as hell wasn’t working now.

As if he sensed her arrival, he turned and saw her just as she…well, she certainly hadn’t been turning back to the door. She’d merely been looking for a waitress…or something.

Then he stood and smiled, and she forgot what was left of everything she’d ever known.

“Natalie.”

God, he was perfect. Gorgeous as all get-out—and that voice, that hint of a drawl. It was all good and just as she remembered it. Maybe even better.

“Jake.” Damn, she sounded way too breathless. Not good. She held out her hand, just in case he was planning on hugging her. Hugging him would be total sensory overload. She wasn’t even certain she’d make it through the handshake without a telltale little moan slipping past her lips.

She should never have done this. But then she caught the twinkle in his eye, as if he’d noted her slight hesitation in actually taking his hand. Don’t chicken out.

Hardly.

She took his hand in a firm shake, as she would that of any worthy boardroom opponent, and promptly let it go. Good, good. Except, just feeling those thick fingers brush over hers had soaked her panties. Wham, just like that.

She moved past, careful not to touch him, and slid into the booth. As he sat back down, she quickly opened her menu and glanced over the colorful words in front of her, not seeing any of them. Well, it wasn’t every day she had breakfast with a guy she’d spent a wild night with. In fact, it wasn’t any day she did this.

She smiled brightly, still not looking directly at him. She could pull this off. Then get the hell out of here before she did something really stupid. Like end up in bed with him again. Only problem was, at the moment she was hard-pressed to remember exactly why sex with this man—phenomenal sex, if memory served, and she knew damn well it did—was a stupid thing.

“So, they make great oatmeal here, huh?” She dared a quick glance. “Not exactly your normal business breakfast spot.” Although a quick look around proved her wrong. The place was packed, and most of the men and women were in suits.

“I found this place a few years ago. I think a lot of us miss that good bowl of stick-to-your-ribs oatmeal our moms used to make us.”

Natalie laughed. “My mother never made me a bowl of oatmeal.” Her mother would have had the cook do it for her. Except, oatmeal would never have graced the Holcomb table when something more elegant would look ever so much lovelier in the everyday china. “The only time I had it was in boarding school, and then only when I had no choice.”

“Well, you’ll never think about oatmeal the same way after you taste this.”

Natalie sighed in relief that he hadn’t picked up on her unintentional revelation and questioned her about her family. Now she did focus on the menu. “Who knew there were so many varieties?”

Jake gently lowered her menu, forcing her to look at him. It wasn’t hard at all. The problem was…stopping.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of ordering for us.”

A part of her was a bit put off by his take-charge action. But it was a really tiny part. She couldn’t stop thinking about how he’d pinned her hands to the bed and taken charge of her then, how he’d made her hold onto the headboard while he took even more delicious charge of her.

“No.” She had to stop and clear her suddenly dry throat. “I don’t mind.” Not then, not now.

Just then a waitress popped up and took her drink order, and was back in a blink with tea and juice. “Your tray should be out shortly.” Jake smiled and winked at the older woman, who saucily winked right back at him. “I’ll hurry it up, sugar,” she said.

Natalie bit back a smile, but Jake caught it.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just leave it to you to find the one Southern belle in all of L.A.”

His eyes widened. “What did I do?”

“You’re a natural flirt.”

His grin didn’t deny the charge. “I’m just friendly.”

Boy, are you ever, Natalie wanted to say.

“Besides, she’s old enough to be my mother.”

“I’m guessing here, but something tells me age is generally not a deterrent to you. Or to the women in question.”

“Well, in general, you would be right.” He glanced at the waitress who was surreptitiously straightening her apron over her matronly girth. Jake nodded when she looked his way, sending a blush clear up to her teased-tight bun. He looked back to Natalie. “It’s not about age, it’s about attitude.”