Heidi Rice - Back in His Bed

For the time being she was alone, and for the first time in a long time she didn’t mind the quiet. With her stomach still tied in a knot, eating was out of the question, but a glass of wine sounded like a great plan.

She grabbed a glass and a bottle of last year’s Chardonnay and retreated behind her bedroom door.

She still had a lot of thinking to do.

The sun was completely behind the hills and he still hadn’t heard Brenna come in. She’d been gone early, too, probably around dawn, because the coffee she’d left in the pot had tasted old when he’d made his way into the kitchen this morning.

The early morning was to be expected; he remembered all too well the rush to get the grapes in before it got too hot—for the grapes, not the people. But sunup to sunset? That meant something had gone wrong at the winery with the crush, and Brenna would be in a bad mood when she finally did make it back to the house.

He wasn’t going to concern himself with her mood—beyond the fact it would make any conversation even more difficult than last night’s had been. The papers were still on the counter, unsigned, but in a different place than he’d left them, telling him she’d at least looked through them at some point.

He’d spent the day in Max’s office, alternating between talking to his secretary and going through the winery’s books. He didn’t want to leave until he had this settled with Brenna, because he fully intended to never darken the doorway again once he left this time, but he couldn’t be away from the city indefinitely. At some point he did need to finish the preparations for his meeting in New York next week. Unfortunately, he hadn’t been able to come up with many ideas that would both placate Brenna and sever his ties with this place at the same time.

Dianne Hart, whom he only vaguely remembered as one of Brenna’s friends from high school, had brought two plates of dinner to the house late in the afternoon, explaining as she did so that she normally fed Brenna during harvest time, and bashfully explained she’d figured he’d need dinner, too.

She’d chatted to him as she moved easily through the kitchen, balancing a wide-eyed baby on one hip, explaining how she’d moved to Amante Verano five years ago, shortly after Brenna’s mother died. When Brenna took her mother’s place as vintner, she’d hired Dianne’s then newlywed husband Ted as viticulturist. Dianne seemed loyal to Brenna to the core, and had only glowing things to say about her, yet she didn’t seem to share Brenna’s animosity toward him.

Or if she did, she did a better job of hiding it than Bren. He hadn’t missed the way her eyes had strayed to the papers on the counter, though. No doubt Dianne was fully up-to-date on the situation, and he vaguely wondered if Brenna had sent Dianne with instructions to help smooth the path.

But before he could question her, to uncover any underlying motives, she’d been gone. Dianne was Brenna’s polar opposite in both looks and temperament, but she had that same earth mother wholesomeness. Years ago that had been part of Brenna’s allure—so different from the women he’d grown used to at home. He’d learned his lesson well, though. He’d take Gucci over granola any day.

Boredom and an empty house drove him outside to the pool, where he pulled up short. He’d forgotten how Max had recreated his rooftop retreat at Garrett Tower here—only on a larger scale. White flagstones, warm under his feet, formed the pool deck, while large pots of hibiscus, hellebores and yarrow divided the space, providing secluded seating areas and privacy for the hot tub. Eerie. Almost like being at home.

He swam several laps, then hooked his arms over the edge and listened to the quiet sounds of the evening. Even with the sun down the night was still warm—no need to heat the pool here in the summertime. With nothing more than a few vineyards scattered over the surrounding miles, the lack of light pollution made the stars seem brighter, clearer. A few wispy clouds crossed in front of the rising moon, but no high-rise buildings blocked the view.

This was possibly the only thing he didn’t dislike about Amante Verano. When Max had bought the vineyard, this was what had first brought Jack out here, not some love of the vino.

The French doors to Brenna’s bedroom opened, and she stepped quietly onto the patio. Her hair was pulled up and secured with a clip, leaving her profile and the long column of her neck exposed. She drank deeply from a large wine glass as she walked, obviously unaware of his presence, the belt to her short robe trailing behind her on the flagstones. Brenna set the glass carefully on a stone table and shrugged out of the robe.

And then he remembered what else had attracted him to Max’s vineyard.

Even in the dim light he could see the defined muscles in her slender shoulders, arms and back—muscles developed from hauling endless bins of grapes, not on some piece of equipment in a gym. The dark bikini didn’t cover much, allowing him a sight he hadn’t seen in years but had never forgotten. Her body was compact, strong. He knew from experience the power in those thighs, the way the firm muscles covered in soft skin would flex under his hands.

The water, warm just a minute ago, now felt cool against his heated skin, and that old flame sparked to life.

Then Brenna stretched, her back arching gracefully as she lifted her arms over her head, drawing his eyes to the generous curve of her breasts and down the flat plane of her stomach.

And the flame seared through him like a flash fire, fanned by the rush of erotic memories tumbling through his heated brain. He flattened his palms on the pool apron and pushed, heaving himself out of the water.

At the noisy rush of water Brenna spun, the force causing the clip to lose its grip and sending the mass of red hair tumbling around her shoulders. “Jeez, Jack, when did you take up skulking in the dark as a hobby?”

He was already reaching for her when her words registered, and he grabbed a towel instead, busying his hands by drying himself off and knotting the towel around his waist in an attempt to camouflage the raging erection she’d caused. “Since when is swimming ‘skulking in the dark’?”

“Since you started doing it here.” Her hands weren’t entirely steady as she gathered her hair and secured it back on top of her head. He felt as well as saw Brenna’s eyes move over his chest like a caress, tracking downward until her cheeks reddened. When her eyes flew upward to meet his, he recognized the glow there. It had been a while since he’d seen it, and it stoked the fire burning in him.

Brenna shifted uncomfortably as he returned his slow gaze to her body, and she reached for her robe.

“It’s not like I haven’t seen it before, Bren. No need to be modest.”

Her jaw tightened, but the goad didn’t bring a retort. Instead, she stared beyond him into the dark vineyards. The silence stretched out for long minutes as they stood there, until Brenna finally cleared her throat. “If you’d—I mean, are you tr—Um, I’ll leave you to it.”

“Retreat again, Bren?”

Her shoulders pulled back and settled. “No, no retreat. But I came out here to relax, and fighting with you is not on my list of things I’d like to do tonight.”

Images of what he’d like to do tonight swam in front of his eyes, and he forcefully shut them out. His body’s reaction to Brenna might be beyond his mind’s control, but he wasn’t a kid anymore. He’d learned his lesson the hard way and, while she was very tempting…

Who was he kidding? He wanted her. Badly. “Don’t let me stand in the way of your swim.”

“Swim? Oh.” She smiled weakly. “I wasn’t planning on a swim.”