Chapter Two
You’re not Nathan.
A terrible idea had blossomed in his mind the second the words left that gorgeous mouth of hers. He hadn’t just hooked up with his brother’s girlfriend, had he? Christ, he’d even liked it. This was not okay.
Gabe bolted off the bed. No way was she getting away that easily. Not without some sort of explanation. He pulled on his pants and threw open the door.
The loft, of course, was empty.
Ignoring the little voice inside demanding he give up and crawl back into bed, he marched to the other bedroom and banged on the door. “You better be goddamned decent, Nathan.” When his little brother grumbled a response, Gabe strode into the room. “Get up.”
Nathan burrowed under one of the five pillows on his bed. “Go away.”
Gabe yanked off his blanket and smacked him on the back. “Up.”
“What the hell?” He lifted his head long enough to look at the digital clock on his nightstand. “Why am I awake at this ungodly hour?”
“You aren’t dating anyone, are you?” It was a long shot with Nathan’s history, but he’d never forgive himself if he’d nearly banged his brother’s girlfriend.
“What? No. Where would you get an idea like that?”
“You know a blonde? Gorgeous, rockin’ body, about yea high?” He held his hand up to his shoulder.
Nathan sat up and ran his hands over his face. “Could be a number of women I know.”
“This one would be nursing a thing for you.”
His little brother cringed. “My coordinator, Elle. Sweet girl, really nice—innocent even. She’s been throwing hints like crazy that she wants me to ask her out, but it’s just not there for me.”
Sweet. Nice. While those words might work, Gabe didn’t believe the innocent part. She might be mostly a good girl, but good girls didn’t crawl into bed intent on seducing a man. Then again, what did he know? Gabe didn’t make a habit of associating with good girls.
“Elle.” He liked the way her name rolled off his tongue, though. Hell, he’d like to roll more than that off his tongue.
“Why are you asking?”
He considered lying, but he’d never get away with it. Especially with his brother. “You swear you don’t want her?”
“I would tell if you if I did.” Nathan narrowed his eyes. “What’s going on?”
Gabe took a deep breath and told him everything. When he finished, Nathan was laughing so hard his face turned a mottled shade of red. Seeing the horrified look on Elle’s face all over again, the perfect “o” of her pink lips when she’d turned on the light and got a look at him, Gabe barely resisted punching something—preferably his idiot brother’s face. “I don’t see what’s so goddamn hilarious.”
“Only you. This would only happen to you.” Nathan made an effort to be serious, but he couldn’t seem to stop grinning. “I never would have guessed she had a scheme like this in her. I’m actually kind of impressed.”
“Ha ha ha. So funny she freaked out in the middle of it, and ran off without even getting dressed first.” Gabe ran a hand through his hair and sat heavily on the side of Nathan’s bed. “Hell, man, she took your sheet.”
That sobered his brother up. “If she quits because of this, I’m not going to be happy.”
So it wasn’t just the loss of his 1,500-thread-count sheets that wiped the smile off his brother’s face. “None of this is my goddamn fault.”
Nathan frowned. “You’re more pissed about this than I’d expect.”
Despite being the younger brother, he’d always been overprotective of Gabe. They were all each other had. But that didn’t mean he wanted to get into the mushy stuff or explain how much it hurt to have Elle literally run from him after the glimpse of heaven she’d given him. “I just… She’s different.”
“Yes, she is, which is why I’m not going to be happy if she quits.” Nathan sighed and climbed out of bed. “Don’t suppose you started coffee before bursting in here? Because obviously I’m not getting any more sleep tonight.”
“Nope.”
“Sadist.”
“You act like you’re surprised.” Gabe followed him into the kitchen and grabbed a stool.
They both watched the coffee fill the pot, one drip at a time. It was only when he’d poured two cups that Nathan finally said, “It’s good to have you back.”
Gabe had been gone longer than normal this time around. It wasn’t planned, but everything that could go wrong had with the L.A. club. “It’s good to be home.” Or it had been until Elle climbed into his bed and then acted like she’d kissed a monster. Not exactly the most encouraging response.
As they drank their coffee, Gabe watched his brother. Nathan looked like shit. Oh, not that the average person would notice, but Gabe was family—he knew when something was wrong with his brother. It had been like this for a long time, but things seemed to be worse every time he came home. “How you doing?”
Nathan shrugged, just like he always did. “Fine. Working on something new and it’s kicking my ass.”
Gabe had the sneaking suspicion the source of his little brother’s demons was a woman from their past, but they never talked about it. “You say that, and then it ends up selling for a shit-ton of money.”
“I’m good at what I do.” He finally grinned. “So how was L.A.? Took your ass long enough to get back here.”
“It was a mess. The G.M. I hired had a thing for pretty redheaded bartenders with more tits than sense, and he was skimming off the top. I finally had to fire the whole lot of them.” A month. A whole damn month to find a decent replacement. “But I found a chick who knows her stuff. Lynn doesn’t take shit from anyone.” Gabe needed a ballbuster to keep all those high-strung bartenders in line.
“How long you sticking around this time?”
“No idea. I’m going to need to visit the rest of the clubs soon—make sure things are running smoothly. You know, the usual.” He tried to do a tour of the clubs he owned at least two or three times a year. It was too easy for things to slip under the radar when he wasn’t around. Then again, he might actually have a new reason to stick around Spokane now. “So tell me about Elle.”
Nathan set his cup down. “Like I said, she’s a good girl. Works hard, though I don’t know much about her private life. I served with her brother in Iraq. He’s a good guy, a better soldier. I can tell you right now Ian won’t like you sniffing around his precious little sister.”
What big brother would? Gabe wasn’t exactly the kind of man women took home to meet their parents. He had the hard life written all over him, from the way he carried himself to the ink on his skin. Always had. The thought made him want to snarl. “She’s the one who started this.”
“Hey, I’m not arguing with you. All I’m asking is, how far do you plan on taking it?”
It was something he hadn’t considered. Gabe took a drink of the cooling coffee. There were too many variables to say for sure. All he knew was that he didn’t want his last sight of Elle to be her fleeing from him. “I don’t know, but I want to find out.”
“Then I suppose you’ll need to ask her out.”
Again, the look on her face appeared in his head. “I doubt she’d say yes.”
“And when has a little thing like ’no’ stood in the way of your goal?”
If Gabe were put off by rejection, he never would have gotten their first nightclub off the ground, inherited money or no. Hell, even if he’d been able to start that first club, there wouldn’t be clubs in all the major West Coast cities. He grinned. “A good point, little brother, a very good point.”
…
Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Elle kept up a steady mental chant as she drove home, barely seeing the road in front of her. “That didn’t happen. There’s no way that happened.” She shook her head even as every part of her body proclaimed the truth. Not only did she orgasm so hard she’d seen stars, but she’d done it with the wrong man.
How the heck hadn’t she noticed the guy she was kissing wasn’t freaking Nathan? Oh wait, probably because the way his mouth seemed to brand her as his made Elle’s toes curl and her thoughts short out. It was like the plot of a daytime soap opera, right up there with sleeping with the wrong twin. Stuff like that wasn’t supposed to happen in real life. It was fiction, too far-fetched to ever be believable. The kind of thing people like Elle rolled their eyes at.
And yet here she was. Apparently stuff like this actually did happen in real life.
It wasn’t her fault, she reasoned. Their bodies weren’t that different, what with those wide shoulders and slightly too-long hair. Sure, the stranger had more bulk than Nathan, but how was she supposed to know what he may or may not have been hiding underneath his dress shirts and slacks? There was that same wicked curl of their lips, too. Really, anyone would have made the same mistake. It didn’t help that she’d lost her mind as soon as he touched her.
But he didn’t look all that much like Nathan in the cold light of day. The man was all marked up, with half of his torso covered in tattoos. Really, really sexy tattoos—
No. She couldn’t afford to think like that. Not again. Not when the guy she’d almost slept with reminded her so much of her miserable excuse for an ex.
She shuddered. She’d been fresh out of high school, and it was so easy to be pulled in by his bad-boy looks and charming smile. And things had gone great…right up to the point where she finally agreed to have sex with him. After he’d jumped the hurdle that was her virginity, it had taken all of forty-eight hours for him to turn around and dump her.
Her ex, Jason, was the reason she’d picked Nathan. He wasn’t the type to sleep around, and her sanity wasn’t swept away whenever they were in the same room together. Nathan was safe. Unlike the stranger in his loft. Where Nathan was refined and classy, this other guy was a bad boy from his rough looks to his brown eyes that seemed to drink her up. Elle shivered.
Why was he even there? In the master bedroom, no less. Nathan never had company, and even if he did, there was a guest room—
She startled so hard, she nearly drove off the road. What if he was Nathan’s lover? She hadn’t seen her boss with a woman the entire year she’d worked for him, and Elle had just assumed that it was because he was a decent man who didn’t jump from bed to bed. What if the reason she’d never seen a woman was because he didn’t swing that way?
The thought made her breath come in short gasps. Oh God, what if her mother found out about this? Elle would never hear the end of it. Not only had she gotten naked with the wrong man, but the man she’d been aiming for might not even like women.
Except, if that guy was sleeping with her boss, why wasn’t Nathan in bed with him? His car had been in the parking lot, so he should’ve been there. And the stranger…he’d been kind of into what they’d been doing. Or at least she thought so. Then again, she’d already proven her radar for these things was seriously broken. But she was pretty darn sure he wouldn’t have done what he did if he wasn’t attracted to her. Maybe he just felt sorry for her?
Lord, she was spiraling. Roxanne would know what to think of this. Her phone lay on top of her purse on the seat next to her, a silent reminder that she’d promised to call her best friend. Elle couldn’t do it. Roxanne had said this plan was a horrible idea from the start—she wouldn’t be able to stop from saying “I told you so” and, right now, that was the last thing Elle needed to hear. No, Roxanne could wait until their Monday coffee for her update.
The completely irrational urge to call her mother came over her, but Elle killed it. She’d made the mistake of going to her mom after the disaster with Jason, and Elle had been regretting it ever since.
The rest of the night stretched before her, hours full of nothing to do but stress out and kick herself for getting into this mess in the first place. She should have asked Nathan out like a normal person, instead of trying to force his hand. But what was she supposed to do? Her mother kept strong-arming her into dinner after dinner with dull men—for her own good, of course—and Elle had been desperate to pick someone suitable for herself. At least she could spend time with Nathan without being tempted to escape out a bathroom window.
She turned into her driveway and glanced around. The street was empty, it being too late for most people to be out and about. She could definitely make it to her front door without anyone seeing. Piece of cake.
Tucking the sheet more tightly around her chest and buttoning up her coat, she climbed out of the car and hurried to the front door. Once inside—and away from prying eyes—she sank to the floor and curled into a ball. “This is my life.” How pathetic. Elle inhaled, fighting for control, but all she got was the spicy smell of the guy she’d almost slept with. She bolted upright. Oh God. “And I don’t even know his name.”
Then she burst into tears. Scrambling to get out of her coat and the sheet, she pushed to her feet and stumbled up the stairs. With every step, she got a face full of his scent. She could still feel his hands on her, calloused palms sending shivers through her entire body. And his mouth…good God, the man’s mouth on her breasts alone had nearly been enough to send her over the edge.
Elle slammed open her bedroom door and rushed into the bathroom. Without waiting for the water to heat up, she stepped in and reached for her body wash and pouf. As quickly as possible, she lathered up and scrubbed her skin, desperate to remove every reminder of last night. No matter how hard she scrubbed, though, she couldn’t erase the memory of his fingers inside her, his lips on hers, his arms holding her close. As if she actually mattered to him. They were complete strangers. What a horrid joke.
She’d apologized to him, she realized. On her way out the door, she’d actually apologized. Indignation cut through the edges of her misery. Why had she apologized? This wasn’t her fault. He was the one who let her make a fool of herself. A man with any sort of morals—no matter how dangerously attractive—would’ve put a stop to her botched seduction the second she slipped into his bed.
Which was just further proof that Elle had awful taste in men.
She ducked her head under the spray and stayed like that for a long time, very carefully not thinking about anything but the way the water seemed to cleanse her, washing away the lingering panic. She refused to think about how good the man had made her feel. How her body still throbbed with latent desire.
Elle got out of the shower, dried off, and threw on an oversize shirt. There was only one thing that would make her even a little bit better right now.
She hurried into the spare bedroom that she’d converted into a studio and yanked out a spare canvas. Forcing herself to slow down, she picked up her palette and started with wide, sweeping strokes, laying the background that the final picture would ultimately emerge from. After picking out one of her favorite stock photos—a gorgeous shirtless man with washboard abs—she flipped on her favorite mix of classical music. Slowly, oh so slowly, the tension left her muscles as she started in on the subject itself.
Everything would be okay. It had to be. With a deep breath, Elle gave herself over to painting, letting herself relax into it. For a time, there were only the motions of dipping her brush, of stroking it over the canvas, of blending the colors together.
The painting evolved slowly, forming into a man’s bare chest. It was a nice chest, with wide shoulders that tapered down to a narrow waist. Not a swimmer’s body like the man in her stock photo, though—there was too much bulk in the muscles for that kind of lean strength.
She blinked. Why did that chest look so familiar?
The realization dawned on her, nightmarishly slow. Oh God, it was him.
With a shriek, she flung her brush across the room. This was ridiculous. It was everything she could do not to haul the painting out back and take a blowtorch to the canvas. Elle grabbed one of the spare sheets she kept to cover the carpet. With careful, concise motions, she draped it over the canvas, turned, and walked out of the room, shutting the door softly behind her.
Last night happened. It was over. Soon, she’d have to face the consequences. But not yet. Tomorrow was another day and she’d deal with it then.
Despite her pep talk, the memories still swarmed on the edge of her consciousness, circling like sharks scenting blood in the water, waiting for one more misstep to tear her to pieces.