Wild Lover Complete Series (5 page)

“Juana is on the prowl, that girl. For a wealthy man.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty obvious.”

“She heard talk of a software mogul docking his yacht there, at Bartlett’s. Some boat worth millions of dollars.”

Mia shrugged. “All the boats I saw were fishing boats.”

“Oh, too, bad.” Maria winked. “Perhaps you could have found someone to help you forget about baldy Jeff. You’re so much prettier than Juana, and from what Theresa said, Juana was all a twitter about this man.”

Mia sipped her coffee. It seemed too coincidental. Juana not only liked her men rich, she liked them handsome. Blaine was definitely the only handsome man at that marina when she visited. The rest were either fat and middle aged, or teenagers working on the docks. “Did she mention the man’s name?”

Maria took out her phone and scrolled through her texts. “I think so…she said he was
Eng—Oh, here.” She held her phone toward Mia. The message leapt into Mia’s face.

He’s English. Blaine Daniels.
Oooh-lala! ;)

*

Mia drove straight back to Blaine’s condo. She rang the doorbell three times. His tired voice came over the intercom. “Who is it?”

“It’s Mia.”

A pause, then, “Come up.”

He reminded her of the code and she punched it in. The elevator opened on the elegant foyer and she strode into the apartment. She still wore her clothes from last night, but he hadn’t changed out of his gym shorts, so she supposed they were equal.

“Hey,” he said. “I thought we said goodbye.” To her surprise, his eyes were red. She didn’t put too much stock in it. It could have been from lack of sleep, or a bit of a wine hangover.

“Blaine Daniels. Software mogul,” she said. She opened her phone’s Internet browser and read aloud. “Founder of BMD Integrated Systems. Credited with revolutionizing
meta data—” She didn’t even know how to pronounce what came next. “—something or other. Sold BMD Systems to Oracle for $750 million dollars in 2012.”

His face paled with her every word.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked.

Blaine stood and began rinsing cups in the sink. “Now you know. Surprised you didn’t Google me before now.”

She laughed. “I didn’t have time to Google you. Besides, I’d rather get to know you the old fashioned way. By you telling me about yourself.”

He scrubbed harder.
              “I can see keeping your background a secret if you were a convicted felon. But not if you’re a genius.”

He threw the washrag into the sink. “It’s not about being a genius—” He blushed. “Not that I am. Bill Gates is a genius. Stephen Hawking. I got pretty lucky.”

“That’s crap, Blaine. You should be proud of your accomplishments!”

He walked around the granite-covered island bench top. “Don’t you get it? How did you even know who I was?”

She blushed. “My mom told me. Some woman we know was stalking you out. She asked if I’d seen you at the marina.”

“See! These women come after me without knowing anything about me but my supposed bank account numbers.” He laughed. “They don’t know I put more than half of it into my charitable foundation. But I guess a few hundred million give or take doesn’t mean much to them.”

“So you thought I’d be like that? Just after your money?”

He crossed his arms over his chest. “I’ve been burned before. Seriously burned. “

“What happened?”

“Why did you come back here?”
              Mia wanted to scream. “Why won’t you answer my questions? I know the truth now. Just tell me something!”

He spoke with his mouth, but not in the way she expected. He kissed her. He pinned both her arms to her sides and walked her backwards to the couch.
              She fell into the cushions, and looked up at his hungry face. His blue eyes and clenched jaw destroyed all her resolve. She reached up and yanked his gym shorts toward his ankles. As always, he was already hard. She took his hot cock into her mouth. He groaned and buried his hands in her hair. “Mia, you’re so good at that. You’re so—” He thrust toward her, just a bit, and she had to pull away.

“I’m sorry—I can’t. You’re too…” She still found it hard to say such things.
              He leaned over her. “It’s all right. But I—” His eyes went from hungry to pleading, and in that moment she was sure the redness that lingered had nothing to do with wine or sleepiness. “Please. Will you let me feel you again? Be inside you?” He nuzzled her neck. “Please, baby. I want to feel you, tight around me.”

“Yes—yes.” She didn’t even bother chastising herself anymore. Once this man touched her, there was no turning back.

“I want to see your bottom. I want to see me slide into you and watch you move on me.”

She obediently flipped onto her stomach and spread her legs. He slid a finger inside her, as if to make sure she was ready, and then placed a pillow under her hips. Her bottom lifted to meet his cock. He spread her cheeks just slightly and slid into her wetness.

They groaned together. She turned her head, so she could watch him watching her body. He shifted his hands from her hips to her ass and back again. The muscles in his lower abdomen clenched and released and clenched again. He bit his lower lip.

She pushed back against him and he reached under her belly. He found her slit, and then her magic button. Somehow he managed to grip her ass with one hand and stroke her with the other, all while thrusting into her. She looked back at him again. Sweat dripped down his naked chest. “Mia, baby. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. You’re so amazing—“

“Shhh—not now,” she said. “Just make love to me.”

He picked up the pace, with his fingers and his cock, and Mia felt the orgasm coming. She could sense it, just out of reach. Those seconds of grasping for it almost matched the climax.
Almost, but not quite.

She came, her hips bucking against the pillow. Both of his hands were on her hips now, and three more hard thrusts brought her another mini-orgasm. He pulled out and came across her back with a guttural moan.

They panted together on the couch. He kissed the back of her neck and she shivered. “Mia, beauty,” he said. He jumped up and grabbed a clean white towel from the linen closet outside his bedroom. She kept her eyes closed as he gently wiped the remains of their lovemaking from her body. He threw the towel on the floor and lay down beside her. She faced the fireplace and he tucked her body into his. She felt the warmth of his cock, sleeping beside her bottom. She assumed it wouldn’t sleep for long.

Conflicting emotions swirled inside Mia. Again, she’d gone against her better judgment and fallen into this man’s arms. He hadn’t been truthful with her. He’d purposely mislead her into thinking he was a simple wandering fisherman. She understood his reasons, but could she ever trust him? Moreover, even now that she knew his identity, he’d still blown off her questions.
In a way that blew her mind, but still.

Blaine breathed deeply into Mia’s hair. “What now?” he asked.

She took a moment to answer, and then she told him the truth. She hoped he’d do the same, but she had so many doubts. “I don’t know, Blaine,” she said. “I really don’t know.”

Wild Lover Book 2

Mia Tennyson jumped into her car in the public library parking lot. She’d spent the past three hours tutoring children. Math facts and phonics hopped around in her head. The last mom had been almost thirty minutes late to pick up her son. Now Mia herself was running late for lunch with Blaine Daniels.

The conundrum of Blaine ran through her head as she drove down the Interstate. The blinding South Florida sun beat its way through her sunglasses. She had a headache, but she couldn’t really blame her sore brain on fidgety kids and too much glare.

Could she forgive Blaine for basically lying to her about his identity? Portraying himself as a simple wandering charter boat captain, when he was really a retired software mogul? When she thought about it, it was better that way than reversed. Better to think Blaine to be of modest means and find out he wasn’t, than
vice versa.

She admitted that she found his humility and lack of need to flash his money around appealing. She probably could have forgiven him, because when she really considered it, he’d withheld information from her, but he hadn’t actually lied. It was his continued evasiveness that truly bothered her. Now that the cat was out of the bag, you’d think he’d just tell her everything, but he continued to push off her personal questions.

She punched the entry code into the keypad on the front door of Blaine’s waterfront building. She took the elevator and entered his condo to find him sitting at the kitchen bar. He wore jeans and had bare feet.

“Do you have something against shoes?” she asked him.

He turned and smiled. His tan skin accentuated his deep blue eyes. “You’re here. I thought you’d changed your mind.”

“One of the moms was running late. She has four kids, so I can’t get too mad. That’s a lot of juggling tutors. And she pays me well.” Mia sat in the stool beside Blaine. “What’s for lunch?”

“I made paninis.” He pointed at two sandwiches on a platter beside the stove. “I hope they aren’t cold.” He retrieved two plates from the cabinet. He brought her a plate with a sandwich and a few sliced strawberries.

“Looks great,” Mia said. She wasn’t really in the mood to eat, but the anticipatory
expression on his face made her take a bite. Mozzarella and peppers and Portobello mushroom. She smiled at him. “Great. Really yummy.”

“Good,” he said. He looked truly relieved, as if he expected her to storm out if the sandwich hadn’t been up to snuff.

“So,” she said.

“Yeah. So.”

              “To tell you the truth, I wasn’t sure, this morning. If I was going to come over.”

“I figured that much.”

              “I—” Mia struggled to find the right words. “I’m not sure there’s much point in us continuing. Even if I’m okay with you keeping your real identity from me. You’re leaving soon, right? Going to St. John to fish.”
              Blaine returned to the stool beside her. “I don’t know. I thought I was going to leave… but now that you know about the—” He blushed, as if he were talking about some kind of embarrassing disease instead of millions of dollars. “—the money. Maybe…maybe I can stay for a bit. We can see what happens.”

His response took Mia aback. She’d sort of figured that his desire to leave town would negate her really having to make a decision about continuing to see him. “Oh,” she said. Her mind raced. She suddenly had to find a way to address her concerns.

“Unless you don’t want me to stay?”

“No…it’s not that. But—if you’re going to stay… that is… if we’re going to keep seeing each other…” Why was this so hard? She was only asking the man to be honest with her. She took a deep breath. “You can’t keep dodging my personal questions.”

“Okay.” He twisted his napkin in his hands. “Ask away.”

“Uh…okay. Where did you grow up?”

“Dorset. In the south of England.”
“Family? Education?”

             
“Parents divorced when I was ten. I have a younger sister and a younger brother. Went to university at Cambridge. Internship at Microsoft led me to start my own software firm. I had some good ideas, and some luck with venture capitalists. During the boom years.”

Mia scooted toward him in her seat, as if he’d just shown her the opening scene of a great movie. “How long have you been in the US?”

“Since ’01. I lived in Seattle, and then Palo Alto.”
              Mia asked the question she both needed an answer to and dreaded. “That all makes sense. Are you married?”

“Yes, twice.”

Mia shook her head, her stomach plunging. “What do you mean? Are you one of those weirdos who lives a double life with two families?”

Blaine’s eyebrows came together. “Two families—” He laughed. “No, no. I’ve been married twice. I’m not married to two women. I’m divorced. Twice.”

Mia breathed a sigh of relief and exhaled her own giggle. “Oh—oh of course.” She had the feeling she was treading on thin ice. “Been divorced long?”

Blaine took a long minute before answering. “First one lasted three years and ended six years ago. I met my second wife three years ago, and our divorce was final about six months ago.”

Mia didn’t like the sound of that. “So, it’s pretty recent.”

“Yeah.”
“Painful, I guess.”

“Yeah.”

She sensed she was losing him to his fear of talking about it. “Is that why you’re so hesitant to open up to women? Because of your—”
              “They both used me for my money. The first one was bad enough—but I think at some point she actually loved me. The second one—I’m sorry. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

Mia stood and put her arms around him. “It’s okay. We don’t have to talk about it anymore. Thank you for telling me what you can.”
              “Maybe we can talk about it more later—but it’s just really…” He trailed off, and she sensed she’d get nowhere trying to pull more information out of him. Besides, his hands roaming under the skirt of her sundress didn’t exactly make her want to talk.