TEN
Home at last.
Remy breathed in the scent of jasmine, fried food, and horse manure, with top notes of tourist vomit, and thanked the Lord for the glory that is New Orleans. Coming in a day early gave him a chance to catch up with his family, who lived in the Garden District about twenty minutes from the French Quarter. There’d be a big meal tonight with everyone on hand to tell him what needed fixing with the Rebels’ game. His family never let the fact they knew fuck all about hockey get in the way of giving advice.
He loved them anyway.
No doubt he’d have to suffer through the usual chatter about how he needed to settle down, as if the seven nieces his sisters had bestowed on the DuPres weren’t enough. As the only son, he felt a special responsibility to carry on the family name—and he would, in good time.
He cut from Royal onto Pirate Alley, heading for the speakeasy where he was scheduled to meet his cousin Henri for a midafternoon drink. How much would he have to down to exorcise thoughts of Harper Chase? Talk about latching his fantasies on to the wrong woman. Nothing could come out of developing an attraction for his boss, never mind that she was the reason Stroger had a hard-on for doing Remy a serious injury during that game.
Even with all these God’s-honest reasons not to think of Harper in that way, putting that No Trespassing sign on it guaranteed that was the one place his mind would go.
When he was with her, he wasn’t thinking that she was the owner of his team. He wasn’t thinking that she was his employer. He wasn’t thinking at all. His dick was taking over, throbbing to the beat of man-wants-woman.
This man wanted this woman.
He needed to get laid. This shouldn’t have been a problem, because he had any number of opportunities to get laid. Women threw themselves at hockey players, even older past-their-prime jokers like him. Easy should have been his speed, yet all he wanted was hard. The one woman he couldn’t have, because that’s the way the bitch of a universe liked to operate.
New Orleans had always been a quirky town that thrived on difference, and Remy enjoyed his walk through the narrow streets steeped in history, especially as the weather was warmer than usual for early November. New retail establishments had sprung up in the Quarter, fancy boutiques, aimed at affluent locals and well-heeled tourists. His sister Martine probably shopped down here regularly; he could imagine her flitting in and out of these high-priced shops spending all that cash she got from the lawsuits she usually won in her job as a personal injury lawyer. Like most DuPres, that woman could persuade anyone to do anything, and the proof was in her expensive shoes.
Speaking of . . . a large plate glass window showcased a display of colorful heels designed to cut off the circulation of any woman who wore them. He was musing on whether he should risk buying a gift for his sister—and had decided against because he’d have to spend the rest of the day buying something for all of them and his nieces—when he spotted the last person he’d expected to see.
The boss in the honey-toned flesh.
She sat on a sofa in the store, her bare legs stretched out before her, contemplating the shoes on her feet. Red ones that had to be at least four inches tall and sparkled to the point he was dazzled. Or maybe it was just the sight of Harper with that serious look on her face. She looked sad, a little lost, and a whole lot younger than her thirty-one years.
He really shouldn’t, but by the time he’d finished that thought he was already inside the store. The saleswoman caught his eye, and evidently recognizing him as a native, gave him the traditional New Orleans greeting. “Where y’at?”
“All right.”
Harper snapped her head up at the sound of his voice.
“Remy.” A fiery blush crawled up her neck, and to say that pleased him would be the understatement of the millennium. “In town early for some R and R?”
He sat in an uncomfortable-looking armchair across from her. “I have family here, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to spend some time with them.”
That was her cue to tell him why she was here ahead of schedule. A romantic getaway with the lawyer, perhaps?
She didn’t take the bait, just dropped her gaze back to the shoes, which sent his gaze there, too. Damn, those legs were fine. She wasn’t a tall woman, but all her height was in those killer pins. She wore a black-and-white-checkerboard dress in some drapey material that clung lovingly to her breasts and thighs. The hem would have hit above her knee if she were standing, but hitched a few inches higher since she was sitting down.
He approved of the sitting down.
Several boxes lay scattered about. “Need help deciding?”
“One of your many talents?”
“You’d be surprised. Four sisters.”
She shot him a look of understanding. “I didn’t know that. Younger than you?”
“Worse. Older. I’m the baby and they never let me forget it. We’re all about a year apart.”
“Your poor mother.”
He flashed a grin. “Well, with four girls, it very soon became ‘my poor father.’ But yeah, after me, Momma ordered Poppa to get the snip. Five was plenty.” He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “So, let me see.”
“See what?”
“The shoes. Stand up and walk over there a ways.”
It was a risk. She could interpret it as the inappropriate come-on that it was and shut him down, or she could respond to his opening salvo in a way that would please them both.
He watched her wrestle with that dilemma a moment. Finally, she stood.
So did his cock.
Thankfully, her attention was on the shoes, so she didn’t notice that. He leaned forward so no one would notice that.
“Take a spin, minou.”
That baby frown came back, and she was again weighing the pros and cons. She angled her right toe in such a way that it drew focus to the smooth line of her leg. He almost groaned.
“Let’s see how they look from the back,” he encouraged.
Still frowning, she walked a few feet toward the front of the store, and the sway of her hips spiked his pulse. How had he ever thought her too skinny?
Baby, gimme that look. You know the one I mean.
She turned her head and threw a pout over her shoulder. “They’re a little tight.”
So were his jeans. Bada bing!
“You need another size?” the sales associate Remy had forgotten about chimed in.
“Five and a half,” Harper said.
While the saleswoman went back to retrieve another pair, Harper did a catwalk strut to the door and back. Was that for him? He liked to think so. Just as he liked to think of this woman wearing nothing but high heels while he drove into her to the hilt.
Was this really where his mind should be going the day before a game? Anytime whatsoever? This was Harper Chase he was thinking of spreading wide, pumping deep, and—he needed to get a grip.
Nothing like a little reality check to force his mind back on track. “Think you and me should clear the air, Harper.”
“We should?”
“You seem to have made up your mind about me. Like Elizabeth Bennet.”
She stared at him for a good five seconds. He liked how her no-filter gaze made his skin burn.
“From Pride and Prejudice,” he explained unnecessarily. “She makes up her mind pretty damn quick that Darcy is an unsociable moron with a stick up his ass—”
“Well, we’d never call you unsociable. You’re a friend to all, unclothed and barely dressed.”
How did such a tiny thing produce so much vinegar? “See? There you go again, deciding what kind of man I am based on our initial meeting.”
Oh, that had her spittin’. Ms. Chase did not like to be wrong about anything, something they had in common.
“You mean when I had to track you down because you decided to follow your own schedule and not join the team for practice? Or maybe you’re talking about that time when, instead of obeying the terms of your contract and doing your job, you blackmailed me. Your hands all over a stripper’s ass seems like the least of your sins.”
“You missed that pass I made at you in that Irish bar and that kiss I laid on you on the plane ride from Boston.”
She blushed to the roots of her corn silk hair.
“Or maybe they don’t count as sins in my long list of transgressions?”
“I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, assuming that first time was accidental.”
He scoffed. “I don’t do accidental kisses, minou. And I pretty much confirmed that when I tasted you properly the other night.”
Growling in a way that went straight to his balls, she passed over that. “You pulled your own Elizabeth Bennet on me after the Cougars game. Jumping to your own incorrect conclusion.” Her gaze fell to the too-tight shoes. She was clearly uncomfortable bringing this up.
Good. This was his real destination, but he preferred coming in using the back roads.
“You mean you didn’t use me to needle Stroger and make him”—he waved a hand—“jealous?”
“Of course not!” Checking that they were alone, she stepped closer, hands on hips, and peered down at him. He liked closer and he liked how she smelled. Floral, sexy.
“He and I didn’t end well. He blamed me for getting traded out when really he was going anyway because his plus-minus sucked and his attitude wasn’t much better. He was never the most reasonable of people.”
On that they could agree. He still couldn’t believe that a quality woman like this had spent a minute on that waste of humanity, but then lust made people do the strangest things, didn’t it? Case in point: Remy DuPre sitting in a French Quarter shoe store drooling over his boss.
He could tell it was killing her to admit this weakness she’d had for Stroger. Could she tell it was killing him? He should step in, end her misery, but she had more to say, and he enjoyed watching her unravel.
“I shouldn’t have let Stroger poke at me, but he’s always pushed my buttons and—I’m sorry you got caught in the crossfire.”
Aw hell, he felt as dumb as a box of wet mice for making such a fuss of it. In truth, his anger stemmed from knowing she’d given Stroger the time of day. He was man enough to admit that—to himself.
“That’s okay. We all make mistakes. Judge without getting all the facts.”
She gusted out a breath. “We do.”
He stood, suddenly needing to be closer to her. To touch her, take her into his arms, show her how truly sorry he was. He compromised by balling his hands into fists to stop from reaching out.
“I’m not some sort of manwhore, Harper. What you saw when you came to Boston, that was just high jinks that frankly I’m far too old for. That’s not what my life was like there and it’s not what it’s like in Chicago.”
Why the hell was he telling her this? Why was it so important that she knew he wasn’t this nail-anything-that-moves kind of guy?
Why the hell couldn’t he shut up?
“I’m not interested in bimbo trophies looking for a good time. My tastes run to women. Real women who have a little more life experience than suffering through a hangnail.”
Judging by her parted pink-glossed lips and that snatched breath, she liked the sound of that. Hell, he liked the sound of it. Harper wasn’t a girl. She was all woman.
She was starting to feel like his woman.
She lifted her chin and murmured, “I guess we got off on the wrong foot.”
Maybe, but it sure was sexy balancing on that wrong foot. That spark between them was fueled by how much they bugged the hell out of each other. He’d hate to think it might vanish now that they were BFFs.
No better place to get back on the right foot than in a shoe shop, n’est-ce pas?
When Harper spotted Remy DuPre standing before her like a god of sex she’d conjured from her fevered imagination, she’d almost had a heart attack. Just dropped and died on the spot. Addy had instructed her to go to New Orleans early for a little Harper time. Spa day, mani-pedi, shopping. Just try to relax amid all the stress of this season on which her entire future was riding.
She’d hoped Addy would make the trip with her, but her friend was reluctant to travel in her first trimester. Harper had been right about the woman’s amazing boobs looking even more fantastic than usual, but what she hadn’t expected was her own emotional reaction to the news: ovary-busting envy. So strange, as she had never considered herself the maternal type. Or maybe she’d let her problems with men overshadow some profound need to share her love with another human being.
Keep your love for the Rebels, Harper. That’s where she needed to expend all her effort and emotion. Which led her back to her current problem. What the hell was she doing modeling shoes for Remy DuPre?
Somehow it seemed to suit the intimate conversation they were having, the air clearing as he labeled it. He could be blowing smoke up her ass about what she’d walked in on during his send-off in Boston, but he seemed to be taking her explanation about Billy Stroger at face value. The least she could do is give him the benefit of the doubt. It would make things easier if they got along.
She sat and slipped off the shoes, which while beautiful, would likely produce blisters the size of Volkswagens in the first hour of wearing them. DuPre retook the seat across from her, that easy manner of his not putting her at ease in the slightest. He unnerved her. Unhinged her. This extra day in New Orleans was supposed to be the opposite of stressful, but not with the sexy Cajun around. She would try on the other size, make her purchase, and run out of here.
The sales associate returned with the other pair. As she knelt, Remy stood.
“I got that, chérie.”
The woman straightened and split an oh-I-see glance between them. “Sure.” She moved to greet another customer who had just entered the store.
I got that, chérie. Did he mean—?
He folded to his knees, right in front of Harper, and held her right foot. No rub, no massage, merely a cup of his hand to her heel, and she practically had a mini orgasm.
“Remy, you don’t have to do that.”
He peeked up through those criminally beautiful lashes framing sparkling eyes. “Happy to serve, minou.”
That word again. “What does that mean?”
“Serve? Oh, y’know. Perform duties. Fulfill obligations. Be of use.”
She cocked an eyebrow. They both knew that’s not what she’d been asking, but the explanation was not unpleasant. Especially the “be of use” definition. Remy kneeling in front of her in supplication sent her thinking in another direction, to another meaning. Serving up her body. Parting her legs to let him taste her.
Hell. Moving from loathing to understanding was supposed to eliminate this pesky attraction.
She swallowed. The moment stretched between them as his thumb moved along the arch of her foot and pressed lightly. Neither of them spoke. Neither of them drew breath. She’d already had a foot rub this morning during her pedicure and it had come nowhere near this level of pleasure. Her panties dampened.
Because it’s an unseasonably warm November day, right?
Sure, that tingle is weather related. Like rheumatism in your crotch.
“Ready to try on those shoes now?”
“Yes.” Barely a whisper.
Prince Charming unboxed the shoe and slipped it on Cinderella’s foot. It fits!
Would he fit? He was so, so big, and it had been a long, long time.
Nope. The only fitting happening here would be shoes. She let him finish, enjoying the possessive cup of his palm around her ankle as he gentled the shoe onto her foot. In all her years of retail therapy, she had never associated shoes and sex. Now she would never think of shoes again without thinking of Remy DuPre.
His palm lingered on the back of her calf. “How does it feel?”
“Feel?”
“The shoe.”
The shoe. She stood, wiggling her toes while Remy leaned back on his haunches, giving her room. Looking down at him, she had a shocking temptation to place a foot on his chest, a stiletto over his heart, claim him like a Victorian hunter who had taken down big game. A thrill rippled through her at what might come next. She would think she was in control—that she had bagged the king of the jungle—but this huge, dangerous beast would have been faking it. He’d turn the tables, leap from his position of supposed weakness, and overpower her. Before she knew it, she’d be conquered, all because she had underestimated this man.
Such drama. She blinked away that foolish meandering of her mind. What she did know is that Remy DuPre fascinated her in a way that threatened everything she was trying to build. She refused to let him—or her hormones—drag her down.