CHAPTER 9
MITCH HAD BEEN hot for two days now, and it had nothing to do with the unexpected warm front that had blown in from Mexico.
He stalked his office, pacing back and forth, going over details for the show that had nothing to do with what was really bothering him.
“Mitch?” Accompanying that low, soft voice on the other side of his closed office door came a light knock.
Dimi. The root of all his problems in one hot little package.
“I’m not here,” he said testily, and when he heard her laugh, he ground his teeth.
What had gotten into her? Suddenly it wasn’t him coaxing her to be funny and sexy, she just was those things.
Effortlessly.
Suddenly he was the one having trouble, and it all centered on how she’d started looking at him—as if he was a twelve-course meal and she was starving.
She opened his door and danced in, wearing—
“Oh, my God.” He clapped a hand over his eyes, making her laugh again.
“Oh, good,” she said. “You like it.”
It, of course, referred to her outfit, which he peeked through his fingers to see. It consisted of two spaghetti-strapped tank tops layered over each other, one bright white, the other bright red. Her denim skirt was a short, snug wraparound, which meant that as she walked toward him, one smooth, long, glorious leg after another was bared.
The camera was going to eat her up, and so would he if she came any closer.
Which she did.
She’d been doing that for two days, invading his space, smiling at him as if she knew some huge secret and generally making his life—and his body—a living hell.
“They wanted me to tell you,” she said, almost purring. “Fifteen minutes until air time. You’re needed on the set pronto.”
He removed his hand from his eyes, and they promptly attached themselves to her body. “You have to wear a bra on television.”
“I am.”
He stared at her full, round, perfect breasts, both of her nipples hardening under his scrutiny. “You are not.”
She reached up and peeled down the two straps of her tanks from her right shoulder, revealing the top of her right breast.
“What are you doing?” he demanded, covering his eyes again.
“Showing you I’m wearing a bra. Suzie sewed the cups in so I wouldn’t be bouncing all over the place. See?”
He squinted one eye open to realize she wasn’t uncovering any more of herself, only enough so he could see the white of the sewed-in bra cup. But that’s not where he looked. No, he looked at the curve that the bra barely restrained, at the tantalizing creamy flesh making his mouth water.
“We’ve got to run,” she said, and as if he were a child, she grabbed his hand and led him from the room. He followed, his gaze drawn to her hips, which wriggled enticingly in the heels she’d adopted.
Had he ever really imagined her in need of sprucing up? Not sexy? Ha!
She had him hot, horny and hard, and he’d been in that state for so long his mind had gone fuzzy from lack of blood.
Peeking at him over her shoulder, she shot him a smile designed to heat his blood even more, so he didn’t even try to talk, try to tell her he knew the way to the damn set, that he could get there under his own steam. He just stupidly followed her, conserving what little brain matter he had left for the show.
At the set, he sank to a chair and rubbed his temples, wondering if a man could die of an ignored erection.
“What’s the matter?” Dimi asked, her voice silky. “You have a headache?”
Before he could respond, she was standing behind him, her hands stroking his neck, urging his head back, pillowing it against her incredible breasts. Then her hands skimmed upward, sank into his hair and started massaging his head.
His entire body quivered.
And he actually forgot. Why was he resisting her? Exactly why didn’t he grab her, pull her around and into his lap, and give them what they both wanted with a terrifying desperation?
Oh, yeah.
Because he was leaving.
Because he wasn’t the type to want a woman to such distraction.
Because he hadn’t opened up his heart in two long years, and it hurt to think about letting someone in, someone who could mean as much to him as Daniel had.
Just when he thought he had a handle on that and could resist her, she bent and put her mouth to his ear, breathing into it as she whispered, “Better?”
Any better and he’d embarrass himself right then and there. He was spared having to answer by the call to their marks.
His most pressing problem was how to remain behind the counter for the rest of the show so as to not exhibit the fact that the front of his pants was a permanent tent.
* * *
Dimi was well aware that she was playing with fire. And skating on thin ice. All at the same time.
It was part of her plan. Make Mitch want her while not giving him a chance to actually get her.
But she was weakening on that resolve. She’d created a monster. This…thing between the two of them was out of control.
It was just a game, she kept reminding herself. She was getting even with him for turning her into the cooking sex kitten.
Only problem with that theory…she liked what he’d done to her. She liked the clothes that made her feel sexy, liked the freedom it gave her to loosen up a bit and enjoy herself. She smiled more, and not just because he’d asked her to.
She felt happier.
Not happy enough to sleep with him, though. That would be a colossal mistake, because then there’d be no avoiding involving her heart.
And there was the teeny tiny little detail of his impending departure.
So she avoided being alone with Mitch at all costs.
But one day she found herself alone at a table in the lunchroom with him, because the two grips sitting between them finished eating and left.
“I’ll eat later,” Dimi said, rising, grabbing her plate of veggies—she’d given up her beloved junk food to better fit into her costumes—but Mitch stopped her with a hand on her wrist.
“Scared of me?”
She saw the dare in his gaze and slowly sank down, because no way was she going to let him think that. She even laughed. “Hardly.”
“Uh-huh.” His teeth sank into his peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and he watched her with an endearing mixture of wariness and good humor as he chewed. “You’ve been avoiding being alone with me,” he noted, downing some milk. She could hear him swallow, and darn it, his lunch looked a whole heck of a lot more appealing than hers.
“And vice versa.” Daintily she bit into a carrot stick while begrudging the fact it didn’t smell nearly as good as the peanut butter.
“You always eat rabbit food?”
For about the millionth time she cursed her curvy, fat-loving body, especially when he dug into a big bag of chips. Barbecue. “You’re going to plug your arteries.”
“I think you’re jealous.” He lifted the bag, offering, shrugging when she shook her head. “Suit yourself.” He put a big chip in his mouth, closed his eyes and licked his fingers.
Dimi stared at her pathetic little rabbit lunch of carrot sticks and celery and wanted to smack him. “Okay, maybe just one.”
“Nope,” he said, pulling the bag to his chest. “Too late.”
“Give me a chip.”
He smiled. “What will you do for it?”
She could already smell and taste it. She had to have one and would have done anything, anything at all for it, until she saw the gleam of triumph in his dark gaze.
“Come on,” he taunted. “Surely you can think of something you’re willing to do for a chip. Why don’t you…oh, I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me why you’re all of a sudden trying to drive me crazy with that incredible body of yours. Not that I mind, you understand. I’m just wondering.”
“Maybe there’s no reason.” She reached for a chip, but he withheld them with a shake of his head.
“There’s a reason,” he stated flatly.
“Okay.” She lifted a shoulder. “You got me. It’s because you’re easy. Now give me a chip.”
He offered her the bag, watching her dig in. “I’m not always easy,” he muttered.
“Yeah, right.”
“It’s true.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Just for you.”
Her gaze jerked up from the precious chips, and she studied him, uncertain if he was kidding, but she decided he had to be. “Sure. I believe that one.”
Did she imagine the flash of hurt that crossed his face?
Definitely.
But when she found herself alone at lunch with him the next day, as well, and then the next, too, and each time he was nothing but funny, sharp-witted and all around enjoyable, if not too damn sexy for her mental health, she had to wonder.
“Lunch tomorrow,” he said on the fourth day. “At a restaurant this time. With food someone else prepares.”
She went still. “Just you and me?”
“Yep.”
“As in…a date?”
“Yep.”
“But we’re not dating.”
He looked at her.
“We’re not!”
“I’m not asking you to grow old with me, Dimi. Just have lunch. It won’t be something you haven’t done before.”
So why did she feel like a trembling virgin? “Um…”
“Yes or no.”
“I, uh…okay. Yes.” And all she could think was, she’d live to regret this, big time.
But she didn’t. They had lunch.
They had dinner—three nights running.
“This wasn’t a date,” she told him on the fourth night.
Again, he looked at her.
“This isn’t a relationship,” she told him on the seventh night when he walked her to her door.
And he just smiled.
* * *
The wraparound dress was Suzie’s idea. It took Dimi forever to figure out all the various little places to tuck and wrap so she was finally completely covered in a light but vibrantly colored Indian silk.
“Gorgeous,” Suzie declared, backing up, studying her with a critical eye. “Just double knot that tie,” she said, pointing to the one at Dimi’s right hip, which by some miracle kept the entire ensemble together and her body decently covered.
“If I double tie it, I’ll never get out of it.”
They both studied Dimi’s reflection in the mirror. It was an earthy, sexy, fun look that definitely worked. It was relatively conservative, if one discounted the wicked hint of a length of leg and the low dipping neckline.
“Just be careful,” Suzie said, frowning at the knot on Dimi’s hip.
Famous last words.
On the set only half an hour later, while explaining to both the camera and Mitch the complicated process of layering the ingredients for her special enchilada mix, Dimi skimmed around the counter, hands full, mouth going a mile a minute, and caught herself on one of the loose tiles on the corner.
Right at hip level. Which meant that delicate Indian silk, and the knot that had so worried Suzie, loosened.
Then gave completely.
Later Dimi would console herself with the fact that most people had a phobia of losing their clothes in front of their peers. It was why so many had nightmares of going to school without their clothes on. Dimi had had this nightmare herself, plenty of times.
As it was, standing there in front of a live camera, hands full, mouth open in shock, looking at herself as her dress fell away from her body, Dimi felt nothing but the horror of what tomorrow’s headlines would be.
Sex Kitten Corrupts Innocent Viewers During Family Hour.
Whirling her back to the camera, Dimi dropped the dish in her hand to the counter and grabbed the material, wrapping it around herself as she heard Mitch order a cut to commercial break.
Good. Commercial. That was really good.
“Trouble?”
She wasn’t ready to turn and look at the face that went along with that extraordinary voice. She just wasn’t. But when she continued to fumble with the new knot—which she’d double and triple tie, dammit—a set of big, warm hands firmly turned her around.
“If you laugh at me, I swear,” she said in a warning tone, “I’ll—”
“I’m not going to laugh,” Mitch assured her grimly as he shoved her hands away and took care of the knot himself. “I might beg, but I won’t laugh.”
“What would you beg for? You’re not the one who flashed her plain white cotton underwear to the entire world.”
“Maybe not. But baby, there’s nothing plain about that underwear you’re wearing, trust me on this.”
His face was tight in a grimace she would have thought was pain, only he hadn’t hurt himself. So that pain must be…yep, definitely she’d gotten to him, and good. Enough to make a grown man want to beg.
It made her public humiliation only slightly bearable.
“No one saw anything,” Leo called, his eyes glued to the repeat of the take he was watching on the monitor as he spoke. “Thank my quick trigger finger for that, sweet cakes.”
“Really? Oh, Leo, I could kiss you!” Dimi declared.
Leo looked thrilled until he caught Mitch’s glare. “Um…you have a minute left of commercial time.” He scrambled out of sight.
Mitch’s fingers were still working the dress, quickly and efficiently figuring out the complicated mess in a quarter of the time it had taken her. He lifted his head and pierced her with a look of such unadulterated heat she went weak. “Thank you,” she said.
“I’m coming over tonight.”
At his near growl, a shiver of a thrill shot through her. “I’m busy.”
“Doing what? Devising new ways to torture me?”
“No. I…have to wash my hair.”
Slowly he shook his head. “We need to talk.”
“Talk?” Okay, she could do that. Maybe. Probably. “That would be okay, I guess. Just talking.”
“Yeah. Among other things.” And then he walked away, leaving her clinging to the counter for balance in a world where there was no balance to be had.