Midnight Touch

“Yeah, I noticed. Where I come from, we cover those things up. We don’t display them to the entire United States and all of South America, too.”

“What a shame. You’re such a Yankee, mi amorcito. Women are beautiful. Why not appreciate them?”

“I’m not your little love-morsel, you flirt. And it’s fine for women to be attractive, but I think they can be that way without baring their cracks to the planet.”

He laughed softly.

“And the flashy men! What’s with all the Rolexes and gold bracelets and rings? Talk about conspicuous consumption.”

“You’re not in Boston anymore, Dorothy. It’s just a different style here. Casual but elegant.”

Don’t you mean tacky?

“You will get used to Miami soon. And,” he said provocatively, “I think you’d look wonderful in a thong yourself.”

“You couldn’t get me into one of those if I were dead, sport.” She shuddered. “And people wonder why there are shark attacks in Florida?”

She watched, scandalized, as one of the bathing beauties sat up, rubbed oil shamelessly all over her bare gazangas, and then lay back down tits-up. Unbelievable.

“When in Rome, Kate.”

“At least in Rome they wore togas!”

“Yes, before and after the orgies.”

“Orgies? How did we get onto this topic, Alejandro?”

“I believe you asked me how Miami women can wear thongs. It’s because they’re not uptight like Yankees.”

“I am not uptight.”

“Describe your own bathing suit, then.”

“It’s a navy blue one-piece.”

He chortled. “That says it all, Kate.”

She felt like growling. “Well, if I’m so uptight, then why do you want to work with me? Why are you riding to my rescue with a pot-bellied pig?”

A long pause ensued. Finally he said, “Because I think you’re bright and beautiful and in a class by yourself.” All traces of teasing were gone from his voice.

Kate’s knees wobbled, and she sat down abruptly on the rough cement of her balcony. Tears pricked at the back of her eyes. “Who paid you to say that?”

“Nobody paid me, tesorito. What’s the matter, you can’t take a compliment?”

A lump formed in her throat and she knew she needed to get off the phone before she embarrassed herself. “I can accept a compliment,” she insisted. “But I’m thinking you need an eye exam, since you’re a little young for cataracts. I’ve got to go, Alejandro. See you in class Monday.”

“Oh, very flattering. I say something nice, and I’m told I need an eye appointment. I suppose I need a cane and some Viagra, as well?”

“You tell me,” she said, before she could stop herself.

“I’d be more than happy to show you that I don’t.”

Kate experienced a flash of heat, but she just laughed.

He cleared his throat. “It’s been a pleasure talking with you, my stiff-necked little Yankee. Enjoy your weekend.”

“You, too.” Suddenly she didn’t want to end the conversation, but she’d already given the signal. She wondered what gorgeous, strapping Latin men did on weekends in Miami, then looked down at the row of juicy bottoms in their thongs again and decided she didn’t want to know.

Despite her Harvard degree, Alejandro had the last word. “And Kate? While I maintain that I don’t need Viagra, you definitely need new shoes.”

4

KATE STARED AT the forty-seven-pound miniature pot-bellied pig outside her building’s freight elevator. It stared right back with a porky little grin.

“Meet Gracious,” said Alejandro, who had her on a leash just like a dog.

Kate was torn between helplessly admiring his biceps and chest in the tight, black T-shirt he wore, and fascination with the animal. The men she knew wore loose golf attire or heavy, cable-knit wool sweaters. They didn’t look as if they’d stepped off the set of Miami Vice. And if they had anything on a leash, it was more likely to be a springer spaniel or a golden retriever, not Vietnamese livestock.

Alejandro was perfectly proportioned, like a classical statue out of a coffee table art book. His torso stretched in a triangle from wide shoulders down to a trim waist over long, lean legs. Snug denim covered those. The black T-shirt was tucked into the jeans, he wore no belt, and on his feet were black European-style slip-on shoes of high-quality leather. The only other accessory he wore was that killer white smile of his. Oh, and the dreadful gold chain around his neck—but she decided to ignore that.

“Gracious,” he said as they rode up to her floor in the elevator, “likes raisins, dried fruit, grapes, melon and veggies. Her favorite thing in the world is dried apricots.”

Gracious was black with light brown eyes and fuzzier than Kate had expected, though the fuzz was wiry and her skin was visible in places. She had pink discolorations on her snout that looked like big freckles. Kate swallowed as the pig cocked her head at her and came forward to sniff at her ankles. She made a grunting noise and looked up at Kate with surprising intelligence. The animal was quite cute in a homely way.

“How did you, er, meet Gracious?” Kate asked, starting to regret her impulsive decision to board the pig while Cousin Wendell mooched her guest room.

“She belongs to my next-door neighbor, and periodically she gets under the fence and hangs out in my yard.”

“And your neighbor is okay with loaning her out?”

“He’s an artist with a great sense of humor. I told him that Gracious was needed for a family pest-control situation.” Alejandro grinned.

They exited the elevator and walked to her apartment, where she unlocked the door and held it open. “You’re sure that Gracious is house-trained?”

“Positive. She even has a litter box. She’ll also go outdoors, though. She’s happier outside during the day, but unless she has her baby pool it’s just too hot right now.”

“Baby pool?”

He nodded. “Pigs don’t sweat, and they overheat very easily. So my neighbor always has one of those kiddie pools going for her. You’ll need to take her for regular walks, twice a day minimum.”

“Wendell will just love this.” Kate smirked.

Alejandro handed her the pig’s leash while he hauled a bag of food and a large plastic under-bed storage container into her condo. “I’ll have to go back down for the litter. I left it in the car.” He took a moment to look around. “Nice place, Kate. But what do you sit on?”

“The floor. I’ll get around to furniture one of these days.”

“Where do you study? Do you pull a chair up to the stove?”

“I read and work on my laptop in bed.”

His eyes gleamed, and suddenly she had an image of his lean, muscular body and smooth brown skin against her cool white sheets. The moisture disappeared from her mouth; it felt filled with sand.

She rejected the image. She was here in Miami to get an MBA and figure out who Just Kate was, not to party naked with a dangerously attractive, highly unsuitable Peruvian man. She didn’t want to lose her identity to some guy before she even had a handle on it herself. Especially not a guy who was so smooth that he could probably talk her clothes into flying off her body by themselves.

Kate frowned and changed the subject, before she could reflect that partying naked with Alejandro could fit in quite nicely with that revolution she was planning—and might even lead straight to the table she wanted to dance on.

“Gracious is probably here illegally. I doubt the zoning in this building allows livestock, so I’ll use the freight elevator when I take her out and just hope nobody sees me.” Alejandro nodded. “I have a bag of toys for her. If she doesn’t have toys to play with, she’ll root, meaning you could find tiles or molding pried up.”

While he went to get the toys, the pig walked over to the window and stood looking out at the view. She sat down on her haunches.

Kate eyed her and went to the refrigerator to see if she had any acceptable piggy cuisine. Alejandro had said something about grapes, hadn’t he? She pulled out a bowl of seedless purple grapes and plucked a couple off the stem. Then she walked back into the living room and sat down a few feet from the animal.

“Look what I have, Miss Piggy. Would you like one?”

Gracious trotted over immediately and snuffled the grape out of her palm. She made happy little porcine noises as she consumed it, and Kate laughed. She scratched the pig’s head, surprised that she didn’t smell bad at all.

They’d made friends by the time Alejandro got back—the pig sat leaning into Kate’s thigh, her eyes closed as she savored having her ears rubbed.

“She’ll sleep with you if you let her,” he said. The gleam shot back into his eyes, as if to say that he would, too. “But if you don’t want her on your bed, you can just fold up a blanket on the floor for her.” He walked to the sliding glass door and looked out at Biscayne Bay.

“You have an amazing view.”

While he looked out at the water, she couldn’t help looking up at him. Up the length of those long, masculine legs to the certifiably fine ass and the casual cock of his hips. He was so close that she could smell the detergent he used to wash his jeans and the leather of his shoes. She caught a whiff of breezy aftershave, too.

Gracious seemed to understand and empathize with her appreciation of the man. She emitted a little squeal. Kate got up to get her another couple of grapes, and felt small next to Alejandro. He turned his head and looked down at her, his eyes black, enigmatic and beyond the outer boundaries of sexy. The adjective that leaped to mind was compelling.

If she didn’t look away from those eyes she was going to do something stupid. So she dropped her gaze to his chest again, the defined contours of muscle clearly visible under the black cotton. “Kate,” he said softly.

She leaped away, fixating on the first thing she saw, the shallow plastic box for the pig’s litter. “So what do you use to line this with?”

“A large trash bag.” He’d dropped some into the sack of litter, and now he pulled one out and shook it open for her.

“I can’t believe I’m resorting to these measures to get rid of my cousin,” she babbled.

He shrugged. “It does seem a little out of character. I mean, you had no problem telling Kurtz he was wrong. So why can’t you tell this cousin to go somewhere else?”

She picked at her ragged cuticles.

He watched her, seemed about to say something, and then looked away and shut his mouth.

“I don’t know. This is different. Wendell is a pain in the ass, but…he doesn’t really have anyone else. And he’s family.”

“You’ve hinted that you came down here to get away from your family.”

“Yes. Sometimes it’s harder than you might think.”

“You are close to them?”

She expelled a breath. “Close? I’m not sure how to answer that. We certainly fight a lot. We see each other a few times a year, since most of us have seats on the board, and everyone’s scheming and maneuvering to get their particular interests and projects green-lighted. So there are alliances…” She stopped. You’re talking too much, Kate. “It’s not exactly the Brady Bunch.”

Gracious started to turn circles and dig at the molding in a corner of the living room. “What is she doing?”

“Do you need to go out, little one?” Alejandro asked. He picked up the end of the leash and looked at Kate, tongue in cheek. “Señorita, would you care for a romantic stroll on the beach with Miss Piggy?”

“Sure, I’ll tag along.” Kate sent him a sidelong glance. “But you might want to liquor her up before you make any smooth moves on her.”

He raised an eyebrow and glanced sharply at her. “What are you implying, Kate?”

“Nothing.”

“I’ll have you know that my intentions—at least regarding Gracious—are purely honorable.”

ALEJANDRO THOUGHT KATE looked even more beautiful in knee-length, baggy khaki shorts—they were awful, but at least he could see her long, slim legs—with her hair flying around her face in the wind.

Gracious had a difficult time on the beach with her short little legs sinking into the sand, but she was able to sample various aperitifs: seaweed, driftwood, even a rotting fish. So she was happy enough.

They got some odd looks regarding the pig, but other than a couple of kids who ran up to pet her, nobody bothered them.

Alejo wanted to bother Kate, however, in the worst way. He wanted to kiss each of those arrogant cheekbones, taste her smart Yankee mouth, steal her breath away. But he did none of those things, contenting himself with teasing her and savoring the way she looked all wild and free and windblown.

“I see that you went to the most exclusive grocery store aisle for your new shoes, Kate.” He gestured to the rubber flip-flops on her feet.

“Yeah, I saved up and had them custom-made,” she said dryly. “Like them?”

“They’re gorgeous.” If ever a woman was in dire need of a pedicure and a manicure, it was Kate Spinney. But to say so crossed the line between teasing and just plain rude.

“They bring my total for shoes up to six pairs—the loafers, some cross-trainers, snow boots, ski boots and one pair of serviceable black pumps.”

“You’re kidding me, right?”

She shook her head.

“My last girlfriend had one-hundred and forty-six pairs of shoes.”

Kate goggled at him. “Was her name Imelda? What does any human being do with that many shoes?”

Actually, she’d liked to wear a lot of them in the bedroom, but he didn’t think it was a good idea to mention that. Alejandro shrugged. “She was very stylish.”

Kate shoved her hands into the pockets of her wrinkled shorts and grimaced. “Oh. How nice for her. And you, I guess.”

He liked the fact that the topic of his ex-girlfriend obviously irritated her. But he also took his cue. “She wasn’t nearly as beautiful as you are.”

Kate snorted, sounding very much like Gracious. In fact, the pig’s head came up and she looked around for other porcine companions. Disappointed, she went back to rooting in the sand.

“Do they teach you to do that at Harvard?” Alejandro asked, grinning.

“Yeah. We take Barnyard Noises 101 our first semester. Didn’t you know that? It’s part of the language requirement. You probably took something useless like French.”

“Spanish. I knew a lot from my mother, but I needed the grammar and the spelling.”

“Ha.” Kate shot him a look. “You needed a blow-off class.”

He laughed. “Okay. Guilty as charged.”

“Where did you go to school?”

“Right here at Miami.”

“Wasn’t it hard to study with the beach and the night-life and all?”

He shrugged. “Nah, you get used to it. You start to take it for granted. I’ll admit that Miami is probably not the intellectual capital of the world, but the university is a good one.”

“So are you from a big family?”

“No. Not here. I do have extended family in Peru. But growing up, it was just me and my mother and Tia Carlotta, her friend.”

“Friend or friend?”

Alejandro stopped and looked down at her. “Kate, are you asking me whether my mother was a lesbian?” He dissolved into laughter.

“What?” she said. “So what if I was?”

“It’s just that she’s spinning in her grave right now,” he gasped. “And Tia Carlotta would grind you up and stuff peppers with you. It’s just a rude thing to ask about! What’s your mother’s sexual orientation?”

“Sorry,” she muttered. “I guess I am pretty…direct. As for my mother, I don’t think she really has a sexual orientation. She just plays a lot of golf, and she’s heavily involved with the symphony.”

Gracious was pulling them ever closer to the water, leaving little hoof tracks in the wet sand. Alejandro tugged her back a little, and she tried to be clever and bypass him by going around Kate. The result was a tangle, with Kate somehow snugged up against his chest.

To be honest, he could have solved the problem quite easily. But he could smell the sweet citrus scent of her hair as it blew across his chin, and his arm seemed to fit perfectly around her, and then she looked up at him with those wary green eyes. “Alejandro?”

He really couldn’t help it. He bent his head and kissed her, tasting and parting her lips—those lips that were way too soft for the words that came out of them.

She went rigid for a moment, and then relaxed in his arms and melted into him with a sigh.

He brought his free hand up and cupped her jaw, tangled his hand in her hair and kissed her even more deeply, exploring her mouth with his tongue, touching hers, stroking. Kate made an incoherent sound and backed away, only to catch the heel of her flip-flop in the sand and fall over Gracious.

Their tender moment ended in an explosive squeal, flying sand and an undignified shriek. So much for romance.

He was Mr. Smooth. But as Alejandro helped Kate up, dusted her off, calmed the pig and steered all of them back to the stretch of sand outside her condo, he knew one thing: he definitely wanted to keep kissing this woman. He wanted to kiss her in much steamier places, and without anything baggy and ugly obscuring her body.

“Don’t do that again,” Kate said, avoiding his gaze.

“Why not? You liked it.”

“Because I’m not sure why you did it.”

“I did it because I liked it, too.”

“Is that the only reason?”

He stared at her, half amused and half annoyed. What, did she think he was after her money?

Her hair flew out around her face in all directions, courtesy of the wind. With her thin frame, she looked like a suspicious Yankee dandelion. “Should there be another reason?”

Kate avoided the question with yet another one. “Besides, how do you know I liked it? I might have been faking it, melting into your arms just so I could yank off your nuts.”

“Dios mio!” Alejandro dropped the pig’s leash and took Kate by the shoulders, while she looked up at him with mingled fear, belligerence and hope. Then he dropped his mouth to hers again. “You, mi vida, are a head case.”

He parted her stubborn mouth with his and slid inside, finding sweetness where she pretended only vinegar lived. He found her sharp tongue and sucked it until it softened and mated with his. He could taste her reluctance but also a growing excitement, a core of wildness that he wanted to split open and savor.

When he raised his head, he played to that wildness. “You know where I’m going to do that next, mi amorcito? Hmm?”

She gazed up at him and shook her head.

“Between your legs.”

Grinning, he caught the hand that came up to smack him and wrapped it around the pig’s leash instead. “Good night, Kate. See you in class.”

She appeared to have lost her voice. When she found it again she yelled after him, “I’ll see you in hell, sport.”

He turned and grinned at her as he walked away into the night. “Great. I hear they have plenty of beds there.”

5

THE LATIN LOVER had kissed her. Kate still couldn’t quite believe it. Or rather, she could believe he’d done it, but not that she’d let him. She lectured herself sternly.

He’s a hound. He’d seduce anything in a skirt, and he’s just after you because of the Spinney money and the challenge. Remember, he said that flirting is a genetic trait in him—he can’t help it. So what are you doing, letting him stick his tongue into your mouth? What are you doing, allowing him to talk to you that way?

But his dirty words had given her a dirty thrill. Heat, moisture and electricity had flashed to the very place he’d said he wanted to kiss next. And they flashed there again as she thought about him.

She poured a little Purina Mini Pig Chow into a bowl for Gracious, amused that the pig started drooling and making noise as soon as she saw the bag. Then her amusement vanished.

Is that what I’m doing? Drooling and squealing over Alejandro Torres? Well, that’s disgusting.

Still, the guy could kiss. And his chest! She could tell, even through the T-shirt, that his torso rippled with muscle. Was his family business a chain of gyms? Did he work on engines all day? No—no grease under the nails. In fact, they were immaculate. But whatever Alejandro did, it was very male-oriented.

Kate found herself wondering just what he looked like without his shirt. Then she wondered what it would be like to kiss him without his shirt, be captive against that solid, hard chest. And finally she dispensed with his pants, too—who needed those, after all?

Alejandro strutted stark naked through her mind, and then turned around and strutted back. He winked at her. Kate turned down the air-conditioning, since the temperature seemed to be rising in the condo.

The problem was that however outrageous, the man made her feel things, made her feel alive. Shocks had rushed through her as soon as he touched her lips, threaded his fingers into her hair, hauled her against him. She’d almost liquefied.

Spinneys didn’t liquefy. She was certain of it. None of those prune-faced people peering out from the gilt frames in her parents’ formal living room had ever had a sexual urge: impossible. Spinneys didn’t make love; they bred the next generation.

Spinneys especially didn’t hook up with very tan, muscular hunks o’burnin’ love who could model tighty whities on a billboard or star in a Bowflex commercial. But…maybe Just Kate did. And hadn’t Maria Shriver married Arnold Schwarzenegger?

Hadn’t Kate come down here to Miami to escape being a Spinney? Break out of the preppy WASP mold? Wasn’t her goal to shake her booty on that table and have a good time?

Yes, it was.

So where did that leave her as far as twining tongues with Mr. Latin Lover? He’d probably helped dozens of women dance on tables. So maybe she shouldn’t act so predictably, Waspishly outraged at his words. Maybe she should hold him to his dirty promise, and use him for her own ends. Maybe Just Kate had a new boy toy, and the power could be all hers. She just had to figure out how to take it.

THE FLUORESCENT LIGHTING in the auditorium flickered and vibrated, hurting Alejandro’s eyes and annoying him. Thank God there were only fifteen minutes left of marketing and then they only had to get through the last class of the day: stats.

He’d come in a couple of minutes late as usual, earning a glare from Kurtz. And Kate hadn’t saved him a seat—stupid to be disappointed, since she’d tried to slap him for what he’d said to her, but he was. So he sat in the back row in case he fell asleep.

“Now for your semester projects,” Kurtz announced. “They will be worth fifty percent of your grade, so be thorough. I want you to work in pairs, and each pair will identify a business in the Miami area that you feel could benefit from a marketing analysis, new direction and plan. You will complete the analysis, come up with that new direction and forge a business plan that supports and executes the new approach. It’s a bonus if you can get the business to actually implement it, but of course I won’t grade you on that aspect. Any questions?”

Kurtz clarified a few things that students had concerns about. Alejandro wondered if Spinney Industries had a Miami office he and Kate could study. Or there was always Benito’s, the restaurant around the corner from After Hours. Benny hadn’t been doing so well lately, since a bottle of chianti had fallen on a customer’s head and given the guy a concussion. Benito was worried about a lawsuit, and his concerns had affected his cooking.

Alejo waylaid Kate as she exited the auditorium. “Hello, mi amorcito.”

“Well if it isn’t the Latin Lover,” she said with a smirk.

Interesting. He’d been expecting the silent treatment. “No, no. You can’t call me that. It’s far too generic. I’m unique. You wouldn’t just kiss any Latin Lover, would you, Kate?”

“Lower your voice,” she snapped, looking around to see if anyone had heard. She was so repressed it made him smile. He pushed her even harder.

“You’re embarrassed to kiss me? Why is that? Are you afraid that once we sleep together, I’ll wave your panties around like a flag? I won’t, you know.”