Marie Ferrarella - Las Vegas - Seduction - The Heiress's 2-Week Affair

“Does it matter?” There was an ironic tone to his voice and she knew what he meant. That either way, the outcome was that Candace was dead.

“It might help me figure out who did it,” she explained. “If Candace picked up someone and brought them home, then that explains why the door wasn’t jimmied and points to the killer being a stranger. If it was someone she knew, she opened the door because of that—and whoever killed her did it for personal reasons.”

Matt took her argument a step further. “Maybe the ‘personal’ reasons was that he—or she,” he inserted although it was obvious to Natalie that he really didn’t think that a woman was responsible for Candace’s death, “felt the ring actually should belong to them and not Candace.”

That was an odd thing to say. “I thought the ring was always in our family.”

“I heard a rumor to the contrary the other day.”

Natalie was immediately intrigued. Swinging around to look up at him, her mouth dropped open. She hadn’t realized that Matt hadn’t put anything on when he’d come looking for her. Her present position put her at a definite disadvantage as far as clear thinking went. Clearing her throat, she rose from the chair, doing her best to keep her eyes on his.

“Why didn’t you say anything earlier?” she wanted to know, her voice quavering just a little.

They’d gotten into it pretty hot and heavy almost from the moment he’d walked in the door. She’d been on his mind the entire day. By the time he’d come over, all he’d wanted to do was make love with her until he dropped from exhaustion.

“Earlier I was occupied,” he told her.

No, she wasn’t going to allow herself to get sidetracked. Not this time.

“This is important,” she insisted, hitting his shoulder with the flat of her hand.

He merely grinned. “So was what I was doing earlier,” he answered, before returning to the subject at hand. “Besides, it was only a rumor, and I hadn’t heard anything to back it up.”

Still, it was a new idea, a possible new direction to go in. “We need to follow that up.”

She remembered the note her father had told her he’d gotten. A note that seemed to threaten all of them. She’d kept that little tidbit from Matt on the pretext that she didn’t want him to worry. Now her father’s fear had gotten legs.

“If someone thought the ring belonged to him, or was stolen from his family, well, that could be motive enough to kill Candace when she wouldn’t surrender the ring—” She caught her breath as she felt Matt slip his hand up along her thigh. “What are you doing?”

“Sliding my fingers along the softest, most tempting piece of flesh I’ve ever had the good fortune to touch,” he told her seductively.

Her pulse began to scramble. “I can’t think when you do that.”

“That’s the whole idea,” he admitted. Taking her hand, he began to draw her from the room. “Come back to bed, Natalie. It’s three in the morning. The only people who are up at this hour are the gambling addicts and the pit crews who make their living off the addicts. We’ll pursue this angle in the morning,” he promised her. He pressed another kiss to her temple. “Right now, all I want to pursue is you.”

Damn but he could reduce her to a quivering mound of jelly in an instant. “That would be assuming that I was on the run.”

The grin on his lips grew wider—and all the sexier for it. He was already making love to her with his eyes. “Yeah.”

She could feel the heat radiating from his body. Encompassing her. Making her yearn for contact. “I’m not running.”

“Even better,” he murmured, closing his arms around her and pulling her to him.

Damn it, she was supposed to be concentrating on finding Candace’s killer, not surrendering to a man with whom she had one hell of a past and no obvious future.

What was she thinking?

That was just it, she wasn’t thinking. She was feeling. Feeling an entire cauldron of emotions that were swirling madly through her.

And then, while her mouth was still sealed to his, she felt herself being lifted up in the air. Lifted and carried back to her bed.

The journey, punctuated with a myriad of hot, passionate, open-mouth kisses, was slow going. But half the fun, she knew, was in getting there.

By the time they did, he had her so worked up that she was all but ready to attack him.

The passion escalated to heights she didn’t think could be achieved, especially with someone who knew her the way Matt did.

She knew that in the not-too-far distance, the inevitable waited. Matt would leave again, and she would let him go. Because he felt that ultimately they didn’t belong together, and she had too much pride to beg him to reconsider.

But for now, they had this little piece of paradise together, and she was going to make the very most of it for as long as she possibly could. She knew she was living on borrowed time, and it made every moment that much sweeter, that much more precious.

Matt sat on the bed, watching Natalie get dressed, silently marveling that such a simple act could exude such poetry at the same time. “I could come with you, you know.”

Natalie slipped on a pair of black pumps. Her entire outfit was as tasteful and subdued as Candace’s had always been flamboyant and scintillating.

Her eyes met Matt’s in the mirror above the bureau as she put in a pair of diamond studs.

“I know. But it’s better all around if you don’t.” She was aware that the answer she’d given him wasn’t the one Matt wanted to hear, even though he didn’t challenge her on it. Feeling guilty because he was being so nice about it, she tried to explain. “Seeing you is going to remind my father that he owes your family money and—”

Natalie abruptly stopped talking. What she was saying was making Matt’s point for him, or at least part of it. He’d told her that he felt they couldn’t make a go of it because of their families. That his would always keep reeling him in. That, no matter what he did on his own, he would always be thought of as part of the Schaffer family, a family who had underworld ties and who poisoned everything it touched.

He hadn’t wanted their reputation to touch her.

She’d stopped talking so suddenly, he thought something was wrong. Matt got up off the bed and crossed to her.

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.” She forced a smile to her lips in an effort to convince him that everything was fine. “If you want to come to the memorial service, then come,” she said, inviting him. And then she added, “I’d like that.” Her eyes swept over him. He was dressed in the suit he’d worn last night. It was light gray with a dark blue shirt to set off his eyes. He looked much too vibrant for a memorial service. “Do you have a dark suit?” He gave her a look that all but said, You have to be kidding. “Okay, then,” she decided out loud. “If you’re serious about wanting to be with me, then yes, I’d love to have you at Candace’s memorial service.” She tried not to think about her father’s reaction to seeing Matt there.

“Not that I’m trying to jinx this, but what just changed your mind?”

She gave him an innocent look as she spread her hands wide. “I’m female.”

He laughed then and brushed a quick kiss against her lips. “Yeah, I noticed.”

It took Matt less than a half hour to get ready, a fact that left her in more than a little awe, especially since part of that time included driving over to his place in order to change into a navy-blue suit.

“Approve?” he asked her as he got back into her vehicle.

“Approve,” she replied with a nod and a smile. And so, she added silently, would every woman over the age of five and under the age of one hundred. If they had a pulse, they would definitely approve of the handsome man sitting beside her.