CHAPTER EIGHT
Were there others who understood true passion? Wrapped in Carlo, absorbing and absorbed by Carlo, Juliet knew she hadn’t until moments ago. Should it make you weak? She felt weak, but not empty.
Should she feel regret? Yes, logically she should. She’d given more of herself than she’d intended, shared more than she’d imagined, risked more than she should have dared. But she had no regrets. Perhaps later she’d make her list of the whys and why nots. For now, she wanted only to enjoy the soft afterglow of loving.
“You’re quiet.” His breath whispered across her temple, followed by his lips.
She smiled a little, content to let her eyes close. “So are you.”
Nuzzling his cheek against her hair, he looked over to the slant of moonlight through the window. He wasn’t sure which words to use. He’d never felt quite like this before with any woman. He’d never expected to. How could he tell her that and expect to be believed? He was having a hard time believing it himself. And yet…perhaps truth was the hardest thing to put into words.
“You feel very small when I hold you like this,” he murmured. “It makes me want to hold you like this for a long, long time.”
“I like having you hold me.” The admission was much easier to make than she’d thought. With a little laugh, she turned her head so that she could see his face. “I like it very much.”
“Then you won’t object if I go on holding you for the next few hours.”
She kissed his chin. “The next few minutes,” she corrected. “I have to get back to my room.”
“You don’t like my bed?”
She stretched and cuddled and thought how wonderful it would be never to move from that one spot. “I think I’m crazy about it, but I’ve got a little work to do before I call it a night, then I have to be up by six-thirty, and—”
“You work too much.” He cut her off, then leaned over her to pick up the phone. “You can get up in the morning just as easily from my bed as yours.”
Finding she liked the way his body pressed into hers, she prepared to be convinced. “Maybe. What’re you doing?”
“Shh. Yes, this is Franconi in 922. I’d like a wake-up call for six.” He replaced the phone and rolled, pulling her on top of him. “There now, everything is taken care of. The phone will ring at dawn and wake us up.”
“It certainly will.” Juliet folded her hands over his chest and rested her chin on them. “But you told them to call at six. We don’t have to get up until six-thirty.”
“Yes.” He slid his hands down low over her back. “So we have a half-hour to—ah—wake up.”
With a laugh, she pressed her lips to his shoulder. This once, she told herself, just this once, she’d let someone else do the planning. “Very practical. Do you think we might take a half hour or so to—ah—go to sleep?”
“My thoughts exactly.”
* * *
When the phone did ring, Juliet merely groaned and slid down under the sheets. For the second time, she found herself buried under Carlo as he rolled over to answer it. Without complaint, she lay still, hoping the ringing of the phone had been part of a dream.
“Come now, Juliet.” Shifting most of his weight from her, Carlo began to nibble on her shoulder. “You’re playing mole.”
She murmured in drowsy excitement as he slid his hand down to her hip. “Mole? I don’t have a mole.”
“Playing mole.” She was so warm and soft and pliant. He’d known she would be. Mornings were made for lazy delights and waking her was a pleasure just begun.
Juliet stretched under the stroke and caress of his hands. Mornings were for a quick shower and a hasty cup of coffee. She’d never known they could be luxurious. “Playing mole?”
“An American expression.” The skin over her rib cage was soft as butter. He thought there was no better time to taste it. “You pretend to be dead.”
Because her mind was clouded with sleep, her system already churning with passion, it took a moment. “Possum.”
“Prego?”
“Playing possum,” she repeated and, guided by his hands, shifted. “A mole’s different.”
“So, they’re both little animals.”
She opened one eye. His hair was rumpled around his face, his chin darkened with a night’s growth of beard. But when he smiled he looked as though he’d been awake for hours. He looked, she admitted, absolutely wonderful.
“You want an animal?” With a sudden burst of energy, she rolled on top of him. Her hands were quick, her mouth avid. In seconds, she’d taken his breath away.
She’d never been aggressive, but found the low, surprised moan and the fast pump of his heart to her liking. Her body reacted like lightning. She didn’t mind that his hands weren’t as gentle, as patient as they’d been the night before. This new desperation thrilled her.
He was Franconi, known for his wide range of expertise in the kitchen and the bedroom. But she was making him wild and helpless at the same time. With a laugh, she pressed her mouth to his, letting her tongue find all the dark, lavish tastes. When he tried to shift her, to take her because the need had grown too quickly to control, she evaded. His breathless curse whispered into her mouth.
He never lost finesse with a woman. Passion, his passion, had always been melded with style. Now, as she took her frenzied journey over him, he had no style, only needs. He’d never been a man to rush. When he cooked, he went slowly, step-by-step. Enjoy, experience, experiment. He made love the same way. Such things were meant to be savored, to be appreciated by each of the five senses.
It wasn’t possible to savor when you were driven beyond the civilized. When your senses were whirling and tangled, it wasn’t possible to separate them. Being driven was something new for him, something intoxicating. No, he wouldn’t fight it, but pull her with him.
Rough and urgent, he grabbed her hips. Within moments, they were both beyond thought, beyond reason….
His breath was still unsteady, but he held her close and tight. Whatever she’d done, or was doing to him, he didn’t want to lose it. The thought flickered briefly that he didn’t want to lose her. Carlo pushed it aside. It was a dangerous thought. They had now. It was much wiser to concentrate on that.
“I have to go.” Though she wanted nothing more than to curl up against him, Juliet made herself shift away. “We have to be downstairs at checkout in forty minutes.”
“To meet Big Bill.”
“That’s right.” Juliet reached onto the floor for her robe, slipping it onto her arms before she stood up. Carlo’s lips trembled at the way she turned her back to him to tie it. It was rather endearing to see the unconscious modesty from a woman who’d just exploited every inch of his body. “You don’t know how grateful I am that Bill volunteered to play chauffeur. The last thing I want to do is fight the freeway system in this town. I’ve had to do it before, and it’s not a pretty sight.”
“I could drive,” he murmured, enjoying the way the rich green silk reached the top of her thighs.
“Staying alive is another reason I’m grateful for Bill. I’ll call and have a bellman come up for the bags in—thirty-five minutes. Be sure—”
“You check everything because we won’t be coming back,” he finished. “Juliet, haven’t I proven my competency yet?”
“Just a friendly reminder.” She checked her watch before she remembered she wasn’t wearing it. “The TV spot should be a breeze. Jacky Torrence hosts. It’s a jovial sort of show that goes after the fast, funny story rather than nuts and bolts.”
“Hmm.” He rose, stretching. The publicist was back, he noted with a half smile, but as he reached down for his own robe, he noticed that she’d broken off. Lifting his head, he looked up at her.
Good God, he was beautiful. It was all she could think. Schedules, planning, points of information all went out of her head. In the early morning sun, his skin was more gold than brown, smooth and tight over his rib cage, nipped in at the waist to a narrow line of hip. Letting out a shaky breath, she took a step back.
“I’d better go,” she managed. “We can run through today’s schedule on the way to the studio.”
It pleased him enormously to understand what had broken her concentration. He held the robe loosely in one hand as he took a step closer. “Perhaps we’ll get bumped.”
“Bite your tongue.” Aiming for a light tone, she succeeded with a whisper. “That’s an interesting robe.”
The tone of her voice was a springboard to an arousal already begun. “You like the flamingos? My mother has a sense of humor.” But he didn’t put it on as he stepped closer.
“Carlo, stay right where you are. I mean it.” She held up a hand as she walked backward to the doorway.
He grinned, and kept on grinning after he heard the click of the hallway door.
Between Juliet cracking the whip and Bill piloting, their Houston business went like clockwork. TV, radio and print, the media was responsive and energetic. The midafternoon autograph party turned out to be a party in the true sense of the word and was a smashing success. Juliet found herself a spot in a storeroom and ripped open the oversized envelope from her office that had been delivered to the hotel. Settling back, she began to go through the clippings her assistant had air expressed.
L.A. was excellent, as she’d expected. Upbeat and enthusiastic. San Diego might’ve tried for a little more depth, but they’d given him page one of the Food section in one spread and a below-the-fold in the Style section in another. No complaints. Portland and Seattle listed a recipe apiece and raved shamelessly. Juliet could’ve rubbed her hands together with glee if she hadn’t been drinking coffee. Then she hit Denver.
Coffee sloshed out of the cup and onto her hand.
“Damn!” Fumbling in her briefcase, she found three crumpled tissues and began to mop up. A gossip column. Who’d have thought it? She gave herself a moment to think then relaxed. Publicity was publicity, after all. And the truth of the matter was, Franconi was gossip. Looking at it logically, the more times his name was in print, the more successful the tour. Resolved, Juliet began to read.
She nodded absently as she skimmed the first paragraph. Chatty, shallow, but certainly not offensive. A lot of people who might not glance at the food or cooking sections would give the gossip columns a working over. All in all, it was probably an excellent break. Then she read the second paragraph.
Juliet was up out of her folding chair. This time the coffee that dripped onto the floor went unnoticed. Her expression changed from surprised astonishment to fury in a matter of seconds. In the same amount of time, she stuffed the clippings back into their envelope. It wasn’t easy, but she gave herself five minutes for control before she walked back into the main store.
The schedule called for another fifteen minutes, but Carlo had more than twenty people in line, and that many again just milling around. Fifteen minutes would have to be stretched to thirty. Grinding her teeth, Juliet stalked over to Bill.
“There you are.” Friendly as always, he threw his arm over her shoulder and squeezed. “Going great guns out here. Old Carlo knows how to twinkle to the ladies without setting the men off. Damn clever sonofabitch.”
“I couldn’t have said it better myself.” Her knuckles were white on the strap of her briefcase. “Bill, is there a phone I can use? I have to call the office.”
“No problem at all. Y’all just come on back with me.” He led her through Psychology, into Westerns and around Romances to a door marked Private. “You just help yourself,” he invited and showed her into a room with a cluttered metal desk, a goosenecked lamp and stacks upon stacks of books. Juliet headed straight for the phone.
“Thanks, Bill.” She didn’t even wait until the door closed before she started dialing. “Deborah Mortimor, please,” she said to the answering switchboard. Tapping her foot, Juliet waited.
“Ms. Mortimor.”
“Deb, it’s Juliet.”
“Hi. I’ve been waiting for you to call in. Looks like we’ve got a strong nibble with the Times when you come back to New York. I just—”
“Later.” Juliet reached into her briefcase for a roll of antacids. “I got the clippings today.”
“Great, aren’t they?”
“Oh sure. They’re just dandy.”
“Uh-huh.” Deb waited only a beat. “It’s the little number in Denver, isn’t it?”
She gave the rolling chair a quick kick. “Of course it is.”
“Sit down, Juliet.” Deb didn’t have to see to know her boss was pacing.
“Sit down? I’m tempted to fly back to Denver and ring Chatty Cathy’s neck.”
“Killing columnists isn’t good for PR, Juliet.”
“It was garbage.”
“No, no, it wasn’t that bad. Trash maybe, but not garbage.”
She struggled for control and managed to get a very slippery rein on her temper. Popping the first antacid into her mouth, she crunched down. “Don’t be cute, Deb. I didn’t like the insinuations about Carlo and me. Carlo Franconi’s lovely American traveling companion,” she quoted between her teeth. “Traveling companion. It makes me sound as though I’m just along for the ride. And then—”
“I read it,” Deb interrupted. “So did Hal,” she added, referring to the head of publicity.
Juliet closed her eyes a moment. “And?”
“Well, he went through about six different reactions. In the end, he decided a few comments like that were bound to come up and only added to Franconi’s—well, mystique might be the best term.”
“I see.” Her jaw clenched, her fingers tight around the little roll of stomach pills. “That’s fine then, isn’t it? I’m just thrilled to add to a client’s mystique.”
“Now, Juliet—”
“Look, just tell dear old Hal that Houston went perfectly.” She was definitely going to need two pills. Juliet popped another out of the roll with her thumb. “I don’t even want you to mention to him that I called about this—this tripe in Denver.”
“Whatever you say.”
Taking a pen, she sat down and made space on the desk. “Now, give me what you have with the Times.”
A half hour later, Juliet was just finishing up her last call when Carlo poked his head in the office. Seeing she was on the phone, he rolled his eyes, closed the door and leaned against it. His brow lifted when he spotted the half-eaten roll of antacids.
“Yes, thank you, Ed, Mr. Franconi will bring all the necessary ingredients and be in the studio at 8:00. Yes.” She laughed, though her foot was tapping out a rhythm on the floor. “It’s absolutely delicious. Guaranteed. See you in two days.”
When she hung up the receiver, Carlo stepped forward. “You didn’t come to save me.”
She gave him a long, slow look. “You seemed to be handling the situation without me.”
He knew the tone, and the expression. Now all he had to do was find the reason for them. Strolling over, he picked up the roll of pills. “You’re much too young to need these.”
“I’ve never heard that ulcers had an age barrier.”
His brows drew together as he sat on the edge of the desk. “Juliet, if I believed you had an ulcer, I’d pack you off to my home in Rome and keep you in bed on bland foods for the next month. Now…” He slipped the roll into his pocket. “What problem is there?”
“Several,” she said briskly as she began to gather up her notes. “But they’re fairly well smoothed out now. We’ll need to go shopping again in Chicago for that chicken dish you’d planned to cook. So, if you’ve finished up here, we can just—”
“No.” He put a hand on her shoulder and held her in the chair. “We’re not finished. Shopping for chicken in Chicago isn’t what had you reaching for pills. What?”
The best defense was always ice. Her voice chilled. “Carlo, I’ve been very busy.”
“You think after two weeks I don’t know you?” Impatient, he gave her a little shake. “You dig in that briefcase for your aspirin or your little mints only when you feel too much pressure. I don’t like to see it.”
“It comes with the territory.” She tried to shrug off his hand and failed. “Carlo, we’ve got to get to the airport.”
“We have more than enough time. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“All right then.” In two sharp moves, she pulled the clipping out of her case and pushed it into his hands.
“What’s this?” He skimmed it first without really reading it. “One of those little columns about who is seen with whom and what they wear while they’re seen?”
“More or less.”
“Ah.” As he began to read from the top, he nodded. “And you were seen with me.”
Closing her notebook, she slipped it neatly into her briefcase. Twice she reminded herself that losing her temper would accomplish nothing. “As your publicist, that could hardly be avoided.”
Because he’d come to expect logic from her, he only nodded again. “But you feel this intimates something else.”
“It says something else,” she tossed back. “Something that isn’t true.”
“It calls you my traveling companion.” He glanced up, knowing that wouldn’t sit well with her. “It’s perhaps not the full story, but not untrue. Does it upset you to be known as my companion?”
She didn’t want him to be reasonable. She had no intention of emulating him. “When companion takes on this shade of meaning, it isn’t professional or innocent. I’m not here to have my name linked with you this way, Carlo.”
“In what way, Juliet?”
“It gives my name and goes on to say that I’m never out of arm’s length, that I guard you as though you were my own personal property. And that you—”
“That I kiss your hand in public restaurants as though I couldn’t wait for privacy,” Carlo read at a glance. “So? What difference does it make what it says here?”
She dragged both hands through her hair. “Carlo, I’m here, with you, to do a job. This clipping came through my office, through my supervisor. Don’t you know something like this could ruin my credibility?”
“No,” he said simply enough. “This is no more than gossip. Your supervisor, he’s upset by this?”
She laughed, but it had little to do with humor. “No, actually, it seems he’s decided it’s just fine. Good for your image.”
“Well, then?”
“I don’t want to be good for your image,” she threw back with such passion, it shocked both of them. “I won’t be one of the dozens of names and faces linked with you.”
“So,” he murmured. “Now, we push away to the truth. You’re angry with me, for this.” He set the clipping down. “You’re angry because there’s more truth in it now than there was when it was written.”
“I don’t want to be on anyone’s list, Carlo.” Her voice had lowered, calmed. She dug balled fists into the pockets of her skirt. “Not yours, not anyone’s. I haven’t come this far in my life to let that happen now.”
He stood, wondering if she understood how insulting her words were. No, she’d see them as facts, not as darts. “I haven’t put you on a list. If you have one in your own mind, it has nothing to do with me.”
“A few weeks ago it was the French actress, a month before that a widowed countess.”
He didn’t shout, but it was only force of will that kept his voice even. “I never pretended you were the first woman in my bed. I never expected I was the first man in yours.”
“That’s entirely different.”
“Ah, now you find the double standard convenient.” He picked up the clipping, balled it in his fist then dropped it into the wastebasket. “I’ve no patience for this, Juliet.”
He was to the door again before she spoke. “Carlo, wait.” With a polite veneer stretched thinly over fury he turned. “Damn.” Hands still in her pockets, she paced from one stack of books to the other. “I never intended to take this out on you. It’s totally out of line and I’m sorry, really. You might guess I’m not thinking very clearly right now.”
“So it would seem.”
Juliet let out a sigh, knowing she observed the cutting edge of his voice. “I don’t know how to explain, except to say that my career’s very important to me.”
“I understand that.”
“But it’s no more important to me than my privacy. I don’t want my personal life discussed around the office water cooler.”
“People talk, Juliet. It’s natural and it’s meaningless.”
“I can’t brush it off the way you do.” She picked up her briefcase by the strap then set it down again. “I’m used to staying in the background. I set things up, handle the details, do the legwork, and someone else’s picture gets in the paper. That’s the way I want it.”
“You don’t always get what you want.” With his thumbs hooked in his pockets, he leaned back against the door and watched her. “Your anger goes deeper than a few lines in a paper people will have forgotten tomorrow.”
She closed her eyes a moment, then turned back to him. “All right, yes, but it’s not a matter of being angry. Carlo, I’ve put myself in a delicate position with you.”
Carefully, he weighed the phrase, tested it, judged it. “Delicate position?”
“Please, don’t misunderstand. I’m here, with you, because of my job. It’s very important to me that that’s handled in the best, the most professional manner I can manage. What’s happened between us…”
“What has happened between us?” he prompted when she trailed off.
“Don’t make it difficult.”
“All right, we’ll make it easy. We’re lovers.”
She let out a long, unsteady breath, wondering if he really believed that was easy. For him it might be just another stroll through the moonlight. For her, it was a race through a hurricane. “I want to keep that aspect of our relationship completely separate from the professional area.”
It surprised him he could find such a statement endearing. Perhaps the fact that she was half romanticist and half businesswoman was part of her appeal to him. “Juliet, my love, you sound as though you’re negotiating a contract.”
“Maybe I do.” Nerves were beginning to run through her too quickly again. “Maybe I am, in a way.”
His own anger had disappeared. Her eyes weren’t nearly as certain as her voice. Her hands, he noted, were twisting together. Slowly, he walked toward her, pleased that though she didn’t back away, the wariness was back. “Juliet…” He lifted a hand to brush through her hair. “You can negotiate terms and times, but not emotion.”
“You can—regulate it.”
He took both her hands, kissing them. “No.”
“Carlo, please—”
“You like me to touch you,” he murmured. “Whether we stand here alone, or we stand in a group of strangers. If I touch your hand, like this, you know what’s in my mind. It’s not always passion. There are times, I see you, I touch you, and I think only of being with you—talking, or sitting silently. Will you negotiate now how I am to touch your hand, how many times a day it’s permitted?”
“Don’t make me sound like a fool.”
His fingers tightened on hers. “Don’t make what I feel for you sound foolish.”
“I—” No, she couldn’t touch that. She didn’t dare. “Carlo, I just want to keep things simple.”
“Impossible.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Then tell me, is this simple?” With just his fingertips on her shoulder, he leaned down to kiss her. So softly, so lightly, it was hardly a kiss at all. She felt her legs dissolve from the knees down.
“Carlo, we’re not staying on the point.”
He slipped his arms around her. “I like this point much better. When we get to Chicago…” His fingers slipped up and down her spine as he began to brush his lips over her face. “I want to spend the evening alone with you.”
“We—have an appointment for drinks at ten with—”
“Cancel it.”
“Carlo, you know I can’t.”
“Very well.” He caught the lobe of her ear between his teeth. “I’ll plead fatigue and make certain we have a very quick, very early evening. Then, I’ll spend the rest of the night doing little things, like this.”
His tongue darted inside her ear, then retreated to the vulnerable spot just below. The shudder that went through her was enough to arouse both of them. “Carlo, you don’t understand.”
“I understand that I want you.” In a swift mood swing, he had her by the shoulders. “If I told you now that I want you more than I’ve wanted any other woman, you wouldn’t believe me.”
She backed away from that, but was caught close again. “No, I wouldn’t. It isn’t necessary to say so.”
“You’re afraid to hear it, afraid to believe it. You won’t get simple with me, Juliet. But you’ll get a lover you’ll never forget.”
She steadied a bit, meeting his look levelly. “I’ve already resigned myself to that, Carlo. I don’t apologize to myself, and I don’t pretend to have any regrets about coming to you last night.”
“Then resign yourself to this.” The temper was back in his eyes, hot and volatile. “I don’t care what’s written in the paper, what’s whispered about in offices in New York. You, this moment, are all I care about.”
Something shattered quietly inside her. A defense built instinctively through years. She knew she shouldn’t take him literally. He was Franconi after all. If he cared about her, it was only in his way, and in his time. But something had shattered, and she couldn’t rebuild it so quickly. Instead, she chose to be blunt.
“Carlo, I don’t know how to handle you. I haven’t the experience.”
“Then don’t handle me.” Again, he took her by the shoulders. “Trust me.”
She put her hands on his, held them a moment, then drew them away. “It’s too soon, and too much.”
There were times, in his work, where he had to be very, very patient. As a man, it happened much more rarely. Yet he knew if he pushed now, as for some inexplicable reason he wanted to, he’d only create more distance between them. “Then, for now, we just enjoy each other.”
That’s what she wanted. Juliet told herself that was exactly what she wanted—no more, no less. But she felt like weeping.
“We’ll enjoy each other,” she agreed. Letting out a sigh, she framed his face with her hands as he so often did with her. “Very much.”
He wondered, when he lowered his brow to hers, why it didn’t quite satisfy.