Secret Admirer: Secret Kisses / Hidden Hearts / Dream Marriage

Matt liked the way the wind blew the girls’ hair, especially Jane’s. When they opened their backpacks and pulled out two towels, the wind caught hold of the towels so that they flapped like orange and purple flags. Slowly, the threesome ambled over to some flat rocks sheltered by a high limestone cliff. The girls positioned their towels and then lay down on them with their legs in the sun and their heads in the shade. They began to read. Meanwhile, Grizzly ran about, sniffing rocks and chasing rabbits. Once when the Lab raised his leg on a rock not far from the boys, they were sure the dog would catch them. Fortunately, they were downwind from the beast, and the Lab trotted back to the girls, who petted him.

Jane looked so beautiful and peaceful as she read and petted the Lab that Matt started snapping pictures of her. Her legs were long and slim and curvy. When she raised her T-shirt a little, he saw she was wearing a pink polka-dot bikini bottom.

Her butt was tight and round, just great. He took a few more pictures and then stopped when she slowly got up and went over to where the hose was. She lifted it. Splashing her face first, she then began to sip.

Then Mindy got up and snuck up behind her. Playfully grabbing the hose, Mindy sprayed her. Jane yelled and the girls began fighting over the hose, drenching each other.

The wet T-shirt revealed Jane’s huge breasts, which she always took such pains to hide at school.

“Hot damn,” Jerry Keith said. “Her nipples are as big as chocolate Oreos. Zoom in on ’em.”

Matt was cold and hot and hard at the same time. When Jerry Keith grabbed his camera, he got so mad he nearly yelled.

Grizzly was the next to get sprayed.

“I’ll be damned,” Jerry Keith said, taking more pictures as Matt lunged for the camera. When the girls dropped the hose and looked over, Matt had it in his hand. Her cheeks reddening, Jane tried to cover herself with her hands. Grizzly started barking. Teeth bared, the animal lived up to its name and raced toward them.

The boys scrambled up the nearest oak tree.

Matt wasn’t concentrating on driving, when Jane screamed.

“Watch where you’re going!”

Instantly he came back to the present.

“Red light!” she cried. “Stop! Or you’ll kill us in this thing!”

He slammed on his brakes and the Porsche skidded to a halt as they hit the last red light before leaving town.

She drew a deep, relieved breath but said nothing. He did the same.

His feelings were overpowering him the way they always did when she was too close. Maybe it was her perfume that had him so crazy. What was it—roses? Or jasmine?

Craving fresh air, while she continued her pout or whatever it was, he lowered his window. But the warm cedar-scented breeze just made him hotter.

He’d tried to be nice. He’d paid for his sins in high school. Boy had he paid. He’d even asked her on a date. He hated rejection and he always had to win. Hell, he was out on a limb here. Nobody but Jane Snow ever made him feel this crazy.

And then it happened.

She’d glanced out her window again, so she didn’t see it coming. Thus, she didn’t flinch or pull away when he leaned closer, cupped her chin and crushed her lips to his.

The second his mouth claimed hers, the same magic that had knocked him senseless under the mistletoe zapped him again, only harder. Must’ve zapped her, too, because her fingers came around his neck and threaded themselves into his hair. As she began kissing him back, he felt her breasts quiver and go soft against his chest. He pressed her closer into his hard body.

“What’s happening?” she whispered, pulling back a little. Her blue eyes were soft and crushed and vulnerable.

“This is what you’re so scared of, isn’t it?” he murmured. “You want me, too.”

“This can’t be happening.”

His big hands worked through her hair. Before she could cry out, pins showered onto her seat. Next came tangles of platinum-blond hair falling onto her shoulders. Out of the corner of his eye, he noted that the light changed but he was afraid to drive for fear he’d lose her.

“Fire and ice. That’s what you are,” he whispered as he began kissing her again.

He didn’t want to stop kissing her. Not ever. This was better than last Christmas. He’d never felt such mindless lust or need for anyone. Whatever it was, it lit an unquenchable fire in his being.

The guy behind him sat on his horn.

Somehow Matt managed to let her go. Breathing hard, he stepped on the gas and drove carefully, but the first chance he got, he pulled off onto the shoulder—to resume kissing or whatever it was they were doing.

“Work,” she said. “We’ve got to get to work.”

“Later,” he muttered, grabbing her again. “Kissing the enemy is way more fun.”

“This is downright embarrassing,” she whispered on a raspy shudder.

“Yeah, it damn sure is. You’re a witch, and I’m helpless in your spell.”

“Don’t tease me.”

“Can’t help myself, darlin’. Do you have a better explanation?”

“I’m the one girl in town you haven’t slept with yet. You want to add another notch onto your gun belt, so you’re pouring on the sexual charm mighty strong.”

“If you really think that, my reputation as a lover damn sure exceeds the reality. But don’t tell anybody.”

He smiled down at her and for the first time, maybe ever, she smiled back. He caught his breath. His heart beat wildly. He wanted her to like him. He wanted it more than anything.

He kissed her neck, and then the hollow of her throat. Barely conscious of what he was doing, he began un-buttoning her blouse, kissing the tops of her huge breasts until his mouth came to a lacy pink-and-black bra.

“I never figured you for the sexy-underwear type,” he murmured. “Nice.”

“Type. I’m not a type.”

“Of course not,” he agreed, his mouth nuzzling a nipple. He’d spent years dreaming about her breasts. Years. “I’ve been waiting for somebody like you all my life.”

“Somebody like me?”

“Shut up and kiss me.”

For once she obeyed him. Their mouths came together again, her tongue mating with his.

“Let’s call in sick and go to bed,” he whispered.

Before he could stop her, she slipped out from under him faster than if she’d slicked herself with butter. Opening her door, she flung herself out of his car just as Ol’ Bill Sinclair drove by on his way to the Gazette. When she began buttoning her blouse, the old coot tooted.

“God, now everybody in town will know,” she wailed, turning red.

“Get back in the car before anybody else sees you.”

“Only…only if you promise not to touch me.”

“Hell.” When he jumped out of the car too, she started to run back to town. “Okay. Okay.” He held up his hands. “I promise. No touching.”

She turned and ran toward him just as he recognized Helen Geary’s giant beehive hairdo as she whizzed by in her brand-new red Caddy, her eyes out on stems. Helen, being Helen, honked at them too, of course.

“I can’t believe this,” Jane moaned. “She’ll tell everybody.”

“What the hell was that all about?” Matt asked once they were both in his Porsche again. He stared at her while she groped on the floor for her hairpins.

“You tell me. You started it, Harper.”

He turned the key in the ignition. “That takes me back to Red Rock Public School. That’s what you said after you tossed my cowboy hat back at me after you’d sat on it and squashed it flatter than a Frisbee.”

“You started that one too, Harper. You shouldn’t have pulled the ribbons out of my pigtails.”

“Did you know I still have one of those red ribbons?”

“Just like you probably still have the negatives of those pictures.”

He growled. “I don’t have them. I told you that already.”

“Liar.”

“There’s no use talking to some people,” he grumbled.

Aware that she was warier than ever of him, he drove the rest of the way to Fortune TX in a tense, electric silence. He did nothing more to try to break the wall of ice between them. The traffic on the interstate was thick and fast, so he shifted and downshifted, paying attention to his driving instead of her.

When he pulled into his space at the parking garage, she said in the frosty voice he was all too accustomed to, “Let’s not go in together.”

“Right,” he said, his tone as clipped as hers. “Business as usual.”

She’d disappeared by the time he had his shirt buttoned, his tie with the flamingos back on and his hair combed. He was about to get out himself when he noticed the corner of a manila folder under her seat. It must’ve fallen out of her briefcase. After picking it up, he couldn’t resist thumbing through it.

It was mainly boring lists that had to do with that after-school care fund-raiser she was chairing.

He read through it and laughed out loud.

She was good, but so was he.

Bake sale. Down-home cooking.

Silent auction at the baseball game in Red Rock.

Then he came to the last item.

She was planning to auction her “down-home” cooking services to the highest bidder.

In a flash he saw a way to turn the tables on her both in work and play.

She wouldn’t like it.

Or would she? She’d damn sure kissed him back. Still, it was risky. No matter what, he intended to play his hand for all it was worth. Unlike her, he was a gambler.

Happy birthday, darlin’.

He was whistling “The Yellow Rose of Texas” when he got out of the car.

Chapter 4

How could she have been so stupid? What had she done?

Jane stood in front of the glass doors of Fortune TX and slapped her forehead with her open hand. Harper wanted to be director of market research. He didn’t want her. His little seduction routine was just his own perverse version of a game of hardball!

Last week he’d impressed Andrea, Jane’s supervisor, and all their bosses in that meeting when he’d demonstrated how the company could best use the Internet to defend brand assets. He’d been creative. She couldn’t let herself ever forget that he’d do anything to win. Anything.

Harper was part of the good-old-boy network. That was one of the reasons he was so successful. He didn’t work as hard as she did because he didn’t have to. He schmoozed. He drove a jazzed-up car to impress people. He was into image rather than substance.

He would probably tell every man at the water-cooler first thing how easy and hot for him she was. He’d get a few laughs, and the male executives would start snickering behind her back. They might even ask her out to get more of the same. If any of them even winked at her, she’d never be able to face anybody again.

Fool that she was, she still felt turned on by the darkly handsome jerk with the talented mouth and hands. She’d even liked the way he’d touched her breasts.

The sun was getting hotter, or was it just thinking about him that made her feel the heat? There was nothing for it but to go inside and face the music.

When she reached her floor, Jane still felt hot and wet and trembly as she skittered past the receptionists, mumbling her hellos so fast neither woman could start a real conversation. Not that they didn’t try.

“You look great,” Stephanie said.

“Different,” Melanie agreed. “What’s with the looser hairstyle and those top buttons undone? New look?”

“New man,” Stephanie whispered.

“Gotta go,” Jane said, not meeting their eyes. She couldn’t even manage a smile in her mad desire to escape to her own office where she could close her door, be alone and try to regroup.

“Have you seen that cute green dress in the shop downstairs? It’d be perfect for the new you,” Melanie said.

“There is no new me,” Jane muttered, horrified that she felt faintly tempted to take a look at the dress.

Even before she got to her office and saw the huge bouquet of daisies, roses, irises and lilies, she didn’t have an inkling about how to proceed with her day. She hated teasing or sexual innuendo, even talks about sex and boyfriends between women. She hated sex on television. Love scenes in books made her skim pages until she got past them. That’s why Matt’s sexy pictures of her had undone her.

Just why sex scared her so deeply was a mystery. Maybe her mother had been too open and flamboyant. Maybe it had to do with the whole town laughing because she’d been born in the pool hall. To Jane, sex was not something to be viewed through keyholes or to be flaunted the way Matt had flaunted those pictures of her.

Jane was at her file cabinet, with her back to the huge vase of lilies and roses and daisies on her desk, when Stephanie popped her head inside the door.

“We’re all dying to know. What’s the special occasion?”

Jane turned and gasped when she saw the flowers Stephanie was looking at. Moving toward them, Jane said, “Oh, I didn’t realize you followed me.”

“Couldn’t resist.”

“I guess…It’s my birthday,” Jane mumbled.

“Looks like somebody remembered big-time. Who?”

“I—I haven’t a clue. My mom maybe.”

“So, read the card.”

With trembling fingers Jane plucked the small envelope from the flowers. Leaning over them, she couldn’t help but inhale their sweet fragrance. “Mmmmmmmm.”

Oh my, she did love flowers.

“Name withheld upon request,” she read aloud. Then she flipped the card over. “That’s all.”

When she looked up, Stephanie was still hovering expectantly. “Well?”

“I’m sure you’ve got work to do,” Jane said hastily.

Ducking her head, Stephanie scurried away.

Jane set her briefcase down and began to search for her folder with the information on the fund-raiser. She needed to get approval from her boss, Andrea, for the booth at the baseball game Wednesday night.

But the fund-raiser folder wasn’t there.

“Damn.”

Frowning, she was shaking the contents of her briefcase out onto her desk when Matt ambled into her office. A mischievous smile lit his dark face, and his hands were behind his back.

“Hi,” he said in a low tone.

She glanced down at the contents of her briefcase, hoping he’d go, but he stayed, lounging in the doorway, his long legs planted widely apart.

“You’re the last man on earth I really want to see,” she said.

“At least I’m in a class by myself.”

Something electric in his deep voice made her look up.

His smile widened, and she felt herself soften. She was mush when she sank in a heap into her chair. How could he do this to her with just a smile? He looked male and arrogant and yet charmingly boyish all at the same time and friendlier than a puppy wagging his tail too fast. He appeared to genuinely like her.

He’s not to be trusted.

“Aren’t you thirsty? Shouldn’t you be hanging out at the watercooler or something?” she snapped. “Saying impressive things about that car.”

“Later.” He smiled again. “Flowers.” He strode closer and put his dark, handsome face into the blossoms and inhaled deeply. “Mmmmmmmmmm. Secret admirer?”

For no reason at all she thought of Ol’ Bill’s anonymous letter in the Gazette.

I know we belong together and I’m sorry I haven’t told you what’s in my heart.

“You tell me,” she whispered, teasing him, in spite of herself.

Oh, why couldn’t she stop looking at his lips? Or his sparkling green eyes? His eyes were wooing her, sucking her into their depths again, stealing her soul, so she cast her gaze down quickly.

“Read the card,” he said softly.

“Been there. Done that. He didn’t sign his name.”

Matt was so close she could smell his tangy after-shave. For a long delicious moment she even forgot to breathe.

“So you think it’s a man?”

The intimacy in his gorgeous eyes made her shiver.

“Any guesses as to who?” he persisted.

The warm flush running through her body was terrifyingly pleasurable. He was leading her, teasing her. Why?

Suddenly a lightbulb went on in her brain.

Had he sent them? Just like he’d written that letter? Was he as shy about intimacy as she was about sex? Was it possible he was afraid to tell her? Was it possible that he couldn’t put himself out like that, not when she’d rejected him for so many years? What if he really felt bad about those wet T-shirt pictures? If so, the whole thing, the letter, the flowers, was sweet in a way.

Don’t be a fool. He’s the enemy. He’s after your job.

“Are you here to take credit for the flowers?” she whispered, challenging him.

“I’ll take any credit I can get,” he said smoothly. “Lord knows where you’re concerned I damn sure need it.”

“You’re not afraid,” she said shyly.

“Why the hell should I be?”

“What does the card say then?” she asked, testing him.

“Ah, a test.”

She stared at him in shock, realizing that she was enjoying this exchange way too much.

“Love, Matt.” He blushed when he said it. He actually blushed. His quick smile was unpretentious and sweet.

She felt her own face growing hot beneath his steady gaze. “P-please—don’t tease me about this.” With fingers that trembled, she placed the card in his. “You know what you wrote…and it wasn’t Love, Matt.”

“Name withheld upon request,” he read aloud in his deep baritone, watching her. “This guy is good. As good as me.”

“I wonder why?” Those green eyes of his were still on her. She felt him reading her mind, her heart. Strangely she didn’t mind as much as she usually did. “If you really sent them, write the words you didn’t say,” she said, stealing the sentiment from his anonymous love letter in the Gazette.

He took the card and laid it on her desk. With a flourish of black ink, he wrote, “Love, Matt,” and then placed the card in her palm. “There. Satisfied?”

Their fingertips touched and again she sizzled.

At her gasp when she pulled her hand free, he gave her another startled look. “Happy Birthday then, darlin’.”

“It’s been quite a birthday,” she said. “Full of surprises.”

“For me, too. It’s not even 9:00 a.m. yet. Your smiles are getting friendlier. Does this mean you’ll go to the Spring Fling with me?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Don’t say no yet. I’ll forgive you for high school if you’ll forgive me.”

“What?”

“After your father talked to the superintendent, I got expelled, remember?”

“It’s just too sudden,” she said.

“Okay,” he murmured. “I guess we’d both better get to work. Happy birthday, beautiful.”

“I’m not beautiful. My sister, Mindy, is beautiful. Your Carol is beautiful.”

“You’ve always been way too hard on yourself.”

“I can’t believe you know that about me.”

“I pay attention—when I’m interested. And you are beautiful,” he repeated. “Furthermore, just to set the record straight, she’s not my Carol anymore. In fact, she never was. We went out a few times. People in Red Rock thought it meant more than it did.”

“Carol thought so, too.”

“So you’re tuned into the twenty-four-hour grapevine.”

“Isn’t everybody?”

“I’m a free man, darlin’, unless some pretty lady takes pity on me and decides to love and reform me.”

“You could definitely use some reforming.”

“I’d prefer the lovin’ part, but more on that later.” He was grinning as he strode out of her office, pulling the door shut behind him.

Alone with his sweet-smelling flowers, she plucked a daisy out of the bunch, went to the window and twirled it against her nose. She was so wrapped up in her conflicting thoughts and feelings about Matt that she had no idea how long she’d stood there when voices outside in the hall snapped her out of her reverie. Quickly she jabbed the daisy back into the vase and went back to her desk to search for the fund-raiser folder.

Much to her surprise, it lay on her desk on top of the clutter she’d shaken out of her briefcase.

Crossing her arms, she shook her head in confusion. Then she opened the file to make sure all the papers were inside it, and even though they were, she felt vague little prickles of alarm.

She could have sworn it hadn’t been there before Matthew Harper had come in to see her.

The River Walk was idyllic. The brown serpentine river sparkled, and sunlight shone through the cypress trees. Jane and Mindy were sitting in a shady spot under a red-and-white umbrella beside the water. There were enough tourists on the old limestone walkways so that Jane and Mindy had people to watch, but their riverside French restaurant wasn’t too crowded. Not like a happening Saturday night when all the restaurants, shops and clubs were jammed.

“I hate to cut this short, but I really do have to get back to the office,” Jane said. “I have an important presentation.”

“First we have to light your candles on your chocolate birthday cake so you can make a wish.”

For a birthday that had started off all wrong and had been filled with unsettling surprises, Jane couldn’t remember when she’d had more fun. Why was that? she wondered.

As Mindy struck a match to light her candles, Jane closed her eyes.

“Think of something you truly truly want, and your wish will come true,” Mindy said softly.

Jane tried to concentrate on the position of director of market research but drew a blank. Instead she conjured a broad-shouldered hunky giant with a sculpted mouth and black-lashed, green eyes, who was wearing a red tie with even hotter pink flamingos flapping all over it.

She squeezed her eyes tighter and tried to focus on the job she wanted. Matt’s image was as stubborn as the man himself and refused to budge.

“Are you thinking of something you really want yet?” Mindy quizzed hopefully.

“No!” she snapped and mentally stuck out her tongue at the vision of Matt.

“Mind if I sit down?” murmured a deep, familiar baritone.

Her eyes flew open, and there he was—as if she’d truly conjured him. Mom would love this.

“I certainly do mind. I was trying to make a wish before my candles go out.”

He sat down anyway and closed his eyes. A look of fiendish bliss transformed his dark, rugged features. His eyes opened. He leaned forward and blew out her candles.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

“I made a wish for you on your birthday.” He began plucking candles out of the cake and licking chocolate icing off their bottoms.

“You can’t do that.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, it’s a done deal, darlin’.” He licked another candle. “Besides, you were blocked and I was feeling creative. When are you going to realize we’re a team?”

“No, we’re not.”

“We could be—if you’d let it happen.”

“What did you wish for?” she asked him, to change the subject.

“I can’t say, or it won’t come true.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t make my wish.”

“I think it’s sweet,” Mindy said, watching them both far too intently.

“How did you find us?” Jane asked. “No—don’t tell me. Mother?”

He grinned. “She called me again.”

“What if I don’t want your wish to come true?”

“Then it won’t.” He signaled the waiter and ordered a piece of cake just like hers.

The cake was thick rich chocolate and sinfully delicious. Being a cook, she was wondering about the exact ingredients as she ate it, while he simply savored his. He began taking a bite of his cake every time she took a nibble from hers. He watched her, and she watched him. Soon she forgot all about cooking. When she ran her tongue across her upper lip, he did the same. There was a rhythm to it. The river flowed by, tourists laughed and chattered, and the chocolate melted on her tongue just as his ripe kisses had.

“Dark, oozy chocolate’s my favorite flavor,” he said.

“Mine too,” she whispered.

“At least there’s something we enjoy together.” He moved his face nearer hers so that he could whisper. “Besides kissing.”

When she felt his warm breath against her cheek, she jumped away from him. Still, it had been a long time since she’d enjoyed anything more than eating chocolate cake while staring into his sparkling green eyes.