Best of Temptation Bundle Page 12

  She sat down and noticed that Yaya was slipping something into a white plastic bag. Eva captured the scrap of material, finding it to be a continuation of the pink, blue and white blanket her grandmother had been working on earlier in the day.

  “Yaya—”

  “Eat, Eva, eat,” her grandmother urged, pushing a full plate in front of her.

  Eva clutched the bag and the blanket in it, then stuffed both under her chair, out of her grandmother’s reach. The white-haired woman merely smiled and filled a glass with milk for her.

  Eva turned toward Adam and he winked at her. An ardent flush swept across her skin and she shifted her gaze to her plate. It was piled high with seafood.

  “You’re going to have to tell them soon, Eva,” Adam murmured, his breath stirring the hair over her left ear.

  She shivered, not sure what bothered her more. The way he insisted on using the Greek pronunciation of her name, or the electric way she reacted to him.

  “Did you do this?” she whispered, gesturing toward her plate.

  His smile told her he had.

  She picked up the plate and used her fork to carefully transfer the oysters, shrimp and lobster on top of his already generous helpings.

  “I’m allergic to shellfish,” she said quietly, hoping her father wouldn’t overhear.

  Adam’s eyebrows lifted above the rim of his glasses, his gaze probing and intimate.

  Eva wasn’t sure she was comfortable with the perusal. Adam Gardner was coming to know more about her than anyone else ever had. Including Bill. She grimaced. Especially Bill.

  “Here,” her grandmother said on the other side of her. “Have some fish.”

  Eva raised her hand to protest the healthy helping, then she slumped back in her chair. Just because the scaly thing was on her plate didn’t mean she had to eat it.

  The atmosphere around the table was much different from the night before. Eva guessed it might be because they were outside but suspected it had more to do with her father’s open participation tonight. She glanced at him, noticing his cheeks were flushed with color, his dark eyes sparkling with mischief in the light from the three gas lanterns on the table. Apparently his appetite had returned to normal as well, evidenced by the way he lifted another oyster on a half shell to his mouth.

  “Is everything all right?” Adam murmured.

  Eva realized she had sighed. She glanced at him. “Sure, I’m fine.”

  “So, Adam,” Eva’s Uncle Theo asked from across the table. “You haven’t told us yet how you met our Eva.”

  Eva’s gaze still resting on his face, she lifted an eyebrow, hoping he remembered what she had told him. But when she saw a devilish gleam in his brown eyes, her heart surged into her throat. She anchored her hand to his thigh under the table and squeezed to let him know she would handle this.

  “At work. We met at work,” she said quickly, nearly knocking over her glass of milk as she reached for it with her other hand. “I was working on his business accounts. Two years ago this January, in fact.”

  Her uncle grinned. “Two years, huh? You must be a fast worker to have gotten Eva to marry you so quickly.”

  Eva’s father hmmphed, but everyone seemed to ignore him. Everyone but Eva.

  “You know how true love goes,” Adam said smoothly. Too smoothly. Eva studied him, trying to ignore the way he had trapped her hand against his thigh…ignoring the way his thumb scraped against her palm. “I knew the moment I laid eyes on her that she would be the woman I’d spend the rest of my life with.”

  Something within Eva went soft. Adam turned toward her, his eyes holding a curious shadow she couldn’t quite define. An honesty that made her heartbeat speed up, her stomach flutter and her knees squeeze tightly together.

  She urged her gaze away, telling herself she was being ridiculous. Adam had made that part up to convince her family that their fake courtship had been natural. But the way she felt now was far from natural. Not considering that the man sitting next to her was not her husband, and they had never gone out on a date, much less courted each other.

  He tried to release her hand. She found herself preventing the move, clasping his fingers tighter as she forked her red snapper.

  “And the wedding?” Eva’s mother asked from the other end of the table.

  Eva swallowed. Why was her mother doing this? She’d told her everything the day after the ceremony. “Bill and I went to the county courthouse. A judge performed the ceremony.”

  Her father stared at her as if she’d grown a second head. It wasn’t until then that Eva realized she’d said “Bill.”

  Adam cleared his throat and tightened his hold on her hand. “Eva often calls me Bill since that’s how most of my friends refer to me.”

  There were several nods, and quiet exchanges as the meal continued.

  “Then you’re not married in the eyes of the Church.”

  Eva wasn’t surprised by her father’s blunt statement. Her cheeks burned under his scrutiny.

  “And if you’re not married in the eyes of the Church, you’re not married in the eyes of God.” He pointed a finger toward the darkening sky.

  Eva rested her head against her other hand, not up to an argument. Not tonight. Not after all that had happened in the past two days. Lingering in her mind was the question of what her father would do if he knew she and Adam were sharing a room in his house, but weren’t married in anybody’s eyes, much less God’s.

  “Actually, we’ve talked about that,” Adam said, picking up the conversation. Eva jerked involuntarily, pulling his hand from his thigh to hers under the table. The back of his fingers caused tremors of sensation as they rasped against her knee. Eva nearly jumped, the warmth in her belly seeping lower. “We were thinking about arranging a church ceremony.”

  Eva focused on his face, battling between the erotic awareness caused by the innocent touch of his hand, and the baffling comments coming from his all-too-tempting mouth.

  “Not now, but at some point soon,” Adam clarified.

  Inexplicably hungry for more than the food on her plate, she released her grip and urged his palm down against her bare knee. The forbidden heat of his skin chased the breath from her lungs, seeming to manipulate strings attached to her heart. She’d had a scare this afternoon, slept far longer than she had intended, and was facing her father’s disapproval. Despite all that, Adam’s command of the conversation brought her a measure of comfort…while her command of his hand under the table caused a restlessness that had more to do with sensual need than difficult questions.

  “Oh, how wonderful,” Katina said. “You must have the ceremony down here. You know, so family can attend.”

  Adam glanced at Eva, his expression telling her he knew exactly what she was doing as she slowly urged his fingers higher on her fevered skin. The contrast between his awkwardly reluctant participation in their kiss the night before, and his hesitant yet willing participation as he touched her now threatened to make her head spin. But she refused to continue to seek answers to questions that might not have any answers. She was tired of trying to figure out the enigmatic man next to her. In that one moment, she resolved to give herself over to the wonderfully feminine and desirable way he made her feel instead.

  Lured by the safety of their under-table play, Eva uncrossed her legs and scooted a little closer to the table, making sure the long, white tablecloth concealed her secret activities. She was pleased by the surprise that marked Adam’s handsome face.

  “Uh, yes,” she said softly to her mother’s suggestion that they have the church ceremony in Louisiana. “We might consider doing it—down here.”

  Eva had only the faintest notion of what she had agreed to. All she could concentrate on was the hand that had stopped maddeningly on her thigh. Adam stabbed an oyster with his other hand and lifted it to his mouth. She watched the action with rapt attention, opening her mouth as if she were going to take in the salty morsel. She wished for the first time in her life she didn�
��t break out in hives just smelling the shellfish. Most people believed the oyster an aphrodisiac. Raised in Louisiana, Eva knew the rumor to be a fact. Eating the molluscan shellfish increased the blood’s level of zinc, thus elevating testosterone levels in men. So every time Adam slipped one more oyster into his mouth, he was promising that the next time they were alone together, it would be harder for him—and her—to pull away.

  Forcing herself to pretend at least a passing interest in the meal, Eva tried to concentrate on her own plate…and nearly choked when Adam’s hidden hand drifted farther up between her legs and grazed the thin, damp material of her panties. Liquid fire erupted throughout her limbs. He took in her surprise and began moving his hand away. She just barely stopped herself from yelling no and trapped his hand where it was, shamelessly pressing her hips against the thumb that rested against her exquisite pressure point.

  Her cheeks ablaze, she glanced around the table, smiling at her aunt when she caught her gaze. She turned back to Adam, drinking in the curiously wicked gleam in his eyes. Embarrassment swept through Eva. But mingling with it was a provocative allure that no one knew exactly where Adam’s hand was. They had no idea that even now the pad of his thumb outlined the edge of her panties, guided by her own hand. They’d never guess that he was slipping that same thumb in—

  “Tell us a little about yourself, Adam,” her aunt said.

  The air rushed from Eva’s lungs as the tip of his finger brushed maddeningly against her pubic hair. Her knee jerked against the table and the contents tottered. She shuddered in near climax and quickly thrust his hand back to the safety of his own thigh.

  Adam’s hoarse chuckle swept over her. Eva quietly groaned, both in longing and in horror at her own brazen behavior.

  “Oh, I don’t think you’d be interested in hearing about me,” he responded. “My life is one long boring story.”

  “Are you from New Jersey?” Eva’s cousin asked, ignoring his evasion.

  Still, Adam’s hand remained under the table and the temptation to guide those strong, long fingers back…Eva swallowed hard and searched his profile. She tried to quash the sensations clamoring for release, but was slowly coming to understand that ever since their not-so-innocent kiss the night before, she might never get rid of the hunger growing inside her, her craving for a man who was an awkward, charming nerd one minute, then a rakishly handsome, almost seductive rogue the next. The longing to know as much about the man as he was coming to know about her. She cleared her throat and trailed her hand down the cold side of her milk glass, restraining herself from acting on needs better ignored.

  She couldn’t exactly ask Adam about his past. Not in present company. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t listen.

  “No, I’m not from Jersey. I’m from a small town in Ohio outside Toledo,” he said quietly, his gaze trained on his food. He used the hand that had intimately touched her moments before to push up his glasses.

  “How did you end up on the coast then?” her mother asked.

  “I…relocated for career reasons.”

  Eva’s eyebrows drew together. She watched the lean-fingered hand he rested on top of the table with fascination. Business reasons? One didn’t decide to move halfway across the country to get an entry-level job at an accounting firm.

  “Yes, I suppose you can’t do much stock trading in Ohio,” Eva’s uncle said.

  Bill was the stockbroker. Of course, Eva thought, Adam was playing the role they’d agreed on.

  Adam laughed and nodded, but Eva saw the tension in his jaw.

  “What about your family?”

  “My family?” Adam repeated.

  Eva’s cousin smiled. “Certainly you have one.”

  Adam put down his fork and stiffened in his chair. “Actually, no, I don’t,” he said quietly. “My mother…my birth mother gave me up to the state when I was three. I never knew who my father was.”

  Eva reached out and lay her hand against his thigh. Not to restrain him. Not to incite passion. But for reasons that had nothing to do with either. She wanted to comfort him, let him know she felt more than sympathy, that she cared.

  Adam glanced at her. Eva saw that telling her family just this little bit had cost him a lot. She also suspected he hadn’t said it solely for their sakes. The intense look in his eyes told her the open, casual format of the conversation had allowed him a way to open up to her. And he now watched her for her response.

  She gave it to him by way of a squeeze of his thigh and surprised even herself when she leaned over and spontaneously pressed her lips against his clean-shaven cheek.

  When she slowly pulled back, Adam laughed and pushed up his glasses again. “I told you it was a long, boring story.”

  The awkward statement brought caring protests from those around the table, but thankfully, the moment proved to be the impetus to urge the conversation back to lighter territory. Under her hand, Eva felt Adam’s hard muscles relax.

  Much later, the informal get-together broke up and the women began clearing the table. As Eva slowly stacked plates and gathered glasses, she realized her movements were jerky and nervous, the need to be alone with Adam her primary focus.

  “Leave them,” her grandmother said, touching her arm. “We can take care of the dishes.”

  Eva nudged her hand away. “I can help, Yaya.”

  “Better you should show your sweet Adam your moon down on the bayou, no?”

  My moon. Eva gave a little smile. In her early teens, she used to sneak out of the house in the middle of the night and steal down to the dock, spending long hours telling her dreams to the moon. Once, her grandmother had secretly followed her, obviously out of concern, but said nothing when Eva had sneaked back into the house just minutes before her father would rise to go oystering. Yaya had been sitting in the kitchen, giving her a conspiratorial smile as Eva hurried past her to make her way back upstairs.

  Funny how she forgot things like that in the harsh, rational light of adulthood. Funny how merely remembering it brought back a swell of nostalgia. And a desire to show Adam her moon.

  Giving her grandmother a kiss on the cheek, Eva threaded her fingers through Adam’s and tugged him to his feet.

  “Go, go,” Yaya said when he hesitated.

  Eva gave him a glance that told him to come.

  8

  THE DEWY GRASS was soft under their feet as they walked, the fragrance of nearby jasmine intoxicating. Adam glanced toward the trees and underbrush that bordered the property. On his order, the two agents he’d met up with outside the warehouse should be constantly skirting the place, on the lookout for anything suspicious. He knew that the evening’s visitors would make it difficult for the agents, but he’d had no control over that. What he could do was make sure that if the house was being watched, the watcher would be spotted. His first concern was keeping Eva and her family safe. Coming in a very close second was solving this case, no matter the consequences.

  And the urgency of both objectives grew with each moment that ticked by.

  He’d broken Eva’s password code on her laptop and found nothing of use on the hard drive. Nothing but legitimate accounts and postings. Neither had a search of her purse turned up any sign of the Honeycutt diskettes. And there were no unusual deposits listed in her checkbook register. No suspicious names in her address book. Nothing that tied her to anything that was happening. Which was the source of tremendous relief…and worry. If she wasn’t involved, what did she have that someone wanted? And could he find it before that someone did?

  Adam shifted his gaze to where his fingers were still laced with Eva’s. He wondered at the feeling that pulsed beneath the wary tension that filled him. The undefined emotion had less to do with sex and more with the woman who walked next to him. He had never said to anyone what he had told Eva’s family earlier that evening. And while it wasn’t the entire reason he turned love and commitment away, what he had experienced at revealing the little he had was oddly cathartic. A relief and a re
assurance that what had happened to him all those years ago had little impact on the man he had become…the man he was this minute. The man holding Eva’s hand, needing little else, yet burning for so very much more.

  “I want to thank you for what you did back there,” Eva said quietly, the pale moonlight illuminating her features.

  “And here I thought you might object.”

  He felt rather than saw her gaze. “Why would you think that?”

  He shrugged and tightened his grip on her hand. “Maybe what I said wasn’t what you wanted me to tell your parents.”

  Maybe because I hadn’t acted like the nerd you said you wanted me to be. A role he didn’t want to play. Not now. Not tonight.

  He heard her laugh, a soft sound that vied with the chirp of cicadas, and the hushed trembling of cyprus leaves in the light, humid breeze. “I have to say, I don’t know what to make of your saying we were thinking about a church wedding.” Apparently something occurred to her and she tried to remove her hand from his. He didn’t allow her the escape.

  “What?”

  “I just realized that I should have told them long ago that Bill and I were considering a church wedding.”

  He tried to penetrate the darkness to see her eyes. “And had you?”

  “What? Considered a church wedding? No. Bill refused to even talk about it.” She brushed her free hand through her hair, then rested it against her neck. A place Adam would have liked to put his mouth. “I suggested we get married down here. But Bill, well, he wasn’t interested in a full-blown family get-together.” It was her turn to shrug and she dropped her hand from her neck. “That’s how we ended up at the county courthouse.”

  She glanced at something unseen in the distance. Adam followed her gaze, hoping she hadn’t spotted one of the agents. He had left a standing order that if he was anywhere in the vicinity, they were to move on to cover another area. He’d issued the request with the intention of keeping the entire property protected. Now he realized it also gave him a measure of privacy.