Part 7 (2/2)

”Yes, sweetings?”

”Don't do that,” Maggie said, shutting her eyes. ”Don't call me sweetings in that voice of yours-you know what voice I mean. That s.e.xy drawl. And don't look at me like that. Don't try to seduce me.” Her eyes shot open as a sudden thought hit her. ”You are trying to seduce me, aren't you?”

His smile had her stomach doing a small flip.

”To descend somewhat into the vernacular, I believe I like the way you think, my dear.”

Swallowing was becoming a problem. ”Well, um, I'd rather you didn't. I think. But you do agree with me? Oh, G.o.d, did I just ask that? What a lousy love scene. Bernie would be blue-marking it all over the place.”

Alex moved closer, gently insinuated his right thigh between her legs as he rested his hands on her hips. ”Perhaps if we borrowed from an expert? 'For G.o.d's sake hold your tongue, and let me love.' ”

”That's ... that's John Donne, isn't it? I had you quote him in The Case of the-okay, never mind,” Maggie said.

”Shhh, sweetings ... and let me love ...”

Maggie watched, mesmerized, as Alex lowered his head to hers, her eyes closing when he captured her mouth with his own. I'm your huckleberry ...

She tried to protest. Really, she did. Even as she opened her mouth and Alex took sweet advantage of her new vulnerability to deepen their kiss. Even as her hands somehow found their way up and over his shoulders, to hold his head still as she broke the kiss, took a quick, deep breath as she looked deeply into his eyes, and then raised herself up on tiptoe to kiss him back.

Maggie felt his arms go around her, lifting her. ”The door. Sterling,” she managed to say as he rained kisses down the side of her throat.

”Taken care of,” he whispered into her ear before nipping at her earlobe, lightly licking the sensitive skin behind her ear.

She buried her face against his shoulder as he carried her down the hall, toward her bedroom. ”You did plan this, didn't you? I wasn't wrong. You planned to seduce me tonight, didn't you?”

They were inside her bedroom now, and Alex set her down on her feet, his arms loosely looped around her waist. ”Among other things, yes. I will admit I had hopes.”

”Other things? What other things?” Why couldn't she shut up?

He'd moved his hands now, hadn't he? Not a sudden move, but a very smooth and practiced one that ended with his palms lightly brus.h.i.+ng the outsides of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Nothing too overt. Just a gentlemanly hint of what could be, if she were willing. ”Do you really want to know, sweetings? Now?”

”Oh, h.e.l.l, no,” Maggie admitted truthfully, unable, as she would say of one of her Regency heroines in this situation, to summon a lie. And that was pretty much the last even remotely coherent thought she had for quite some time ...

Chapter Ten.

Maggie awoke slowly, wondering why she was smiling in the darkness.

Oh. Right. Now she remembered.

Still smiling, she turned onto her side and stretched her hand out and over the sheets, expecting to encounter Alex's sleep-warm body. Maybe kind of sort of walk her fingers over his bare hip and ...

... nothing.

She scooted more to the middle of the king-size bed, stretched out her hand again, ran it up and down the surface of the mattress.

Still nothing.

Panic, the kind that freezes the blood in your veins and p.r.i.c.kles the hairs on your arms, sliced through her.

He was gone? How could he be gone? Sure, she'd wondered about it, wondered if ... if doing what they'd done would change something somehow. Maybe make him poof back out of her life just as unexpectedly as he'd poofed into it.

But that was ridiculous. He'd been here for months. He wouldn't leave now.

He couldn't leave now.

Oh, G.o.d, what had she done?

She'd made love with a figment of her imagination, that's what she'd done!

And now that she had, maybe that would be the end of it; fantasy fulfilled. He'd leave, go away, go back into her head or wherever he'd come from, and she'd never see him again.

Because there had to be rules to this sort of stuff, right? Look, don't touch? Some sort of line they shouldn't have crossed? Like, hey, people can fall in love with imaginary heroes, sure. But they don't actually make love with imaginary heroes.

It was like that old joke about talking to G.o.d. When you talk to G.o.d, that's called praying. But when you start to think you hear G.o.d talking back to you, it's time for a psychiatrist.

Was it time for a psychiatrist?

h.e.l.l, she had one of those.

Sure. Like she could tell Dr. Bob any of this. Yeah, that would happen ...

”Oh, jeez, calm down, will you?” she ordered herself, turning onto her back, blinking as her eyes became accustomed to the near darkness. Then she saw the time as it was digitally projected onto her ceiling thanks to the nifty new clock she'd treated herself to last month. After all, if the hero could have a Foreman grill, the heroine-that would be her-could have a nifty gadget of her own.

Seven o'clock.

Well, that wasn't so bad, was it? It was morning, or at least it was on the other side of her room-darkening shades. Alex wouldn't have wanted to upset Sterling, so he was probably just back in his own condo across the hall. He hadn't poofed. He wouldn't dare poof. Would he? He could control that stuff. He'd poofed in, right?

”Right, that's settled then,” Maggie told herself sternly as she stumbled toward the shower, dragging fresh clothing with her as she went. ”Shower, dress, wait for him to show up again. No panic, no reason for panic, no-ah, h.e.l.l. How do I even look at him again after last night?”

She got her answer sooner than she'd expected, once she was showered and dressed more carefully than was her custom-which meant she'd actually put on mascara and lipstick. When she walked out into her large living room, it was to see that the dishes and gla.s.ses on the table were gone, so that she retreated down the hallway, past her bedroom door and into the kitchen, to see Alex at the sink with his back to her, rinsing a winegla.s.s.

Okay. This was good. This was great. He hadn't poofed. He was still there, and looking good in the clothing she'd come fairly close to ripping off him last night.

Very good. Except for one thing.

What was she going to say to him? What happens now? Where do you go after you've been to bed with each other? Because there's no going back.

”Good morning, Maggie,” Alex said without turning around. ”I attempted to be quiet until I heard your shower running, but the mess is fairly well cleaned up now. Are you hungry?” he asked, finally turning around to face her, the hint of morning beard on his face kicking off a series of b.u.t.terfly flutters in her stomach.

”Ah. Yeah. Famished.”

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