Always On Her Mind: Playing for Keeps / To Tame a Cowboy / All He Ever Wanted

His face went dark with guilt, his hand gravitating to her face until he cupped her cheek. “I should have protected you better.”

“We both should have been more responsible.” She put her hand over his without thinking, her body going on autopilot around him as it always had, whether with touches or with music.

In less than a day, they’d fallen right back into the synchronicity they’d shared before, and God, that scared her spitless. She’d dated other men—slept with other men—but being with them never had this sense of ease. Already, she felt herself swaying toward him as his body leaned into hers.

Magnetic.

His hand still held her face, the calluses on his fingers familiar, a reminder of the countless hours he devoted to playing the guitar. Music hummed through her now, the sound of the two of them occupying the same space.

Her lips parted in anticipation—

The doorbell rang.

She jolted back as it rang again. How had she missed someone coming up outside?

Malcolm stood, his hand sliding away, then coming back to stroke her jaw once again. “That’s dinner.” He frowned. “And my phone.”

He pulled his cell from his pocket.

“Supper?” she parroted, surprised she could even speak at all. She vaguely recalled him mentioning sending his driver/bodyguard for food. He had a whole staff at his disposal day and night, another reminder of how different their worlds were these days.

On his way to check the door, Malcolm said over his shoulder, “My chauffeur will set everything up while I take this call. All I need is a blanket and pillow for the sofa.”

Before she could answer, he’d opened the door, waving his driver inside and stepping outside with his phone. Clearly, he didn’t want her to hear his conversation. Which made her wonder a little about what he had to say.

And wonder a lot about who he said it to.

How the hell had he almost kissed her?

Malcolm gripped the wooden rails of Celia’s small balcony landing just outside her front door. With ragged breaths, he drew in muggy night air as he listened to his driver setting up dinner inside. Bodyguards were stationed in the yard below and outside the brick-wall fence.

Malcolm’s cell phone continued to buzz, and he knew he had to answer. And he would return the call—as soon as his heart rate settled back to normal.

He’d come here to make amends with Celia. To put his feelings of guilt to rest by helping her now like he couldn’t before.

Where did sex factor into that?

It didn’t. It hadn’t. Until he’d seen her again.

These days he had control over his libido, enjoying healthy, safe relationships. He’d sure as hell never forgotten to put on a condom ever again. But he knew protecting Celia was about more than safe sex. That wouldn’t keep either of them safe from the heartache of resurrecting something that was long done.

Plucking his phone from his pocket, he thumbed Redial and waited for Colonel John Salvatore to answer. His old headmaster from boarding school.

Now his Interpol handler. The man had traded in a uniform for a closet full of gray suits worn with a red tie.

“Salvatore here,” his longtime mentor answered in clipped tones, gravelly from years of barking military orders.

“Calling you back, sir. Any word on Celia Patel’s vehicle?”

“I checked the local department’s report and they lifted prints, but with so many students in the school, there are dozens of different impressions.”

His frustration ratcheted up. “And the security cameras?”

“Nothing concrete, but we did pinpoint the time the flyer was placed on the vehicle. We just couldn’t see who did it. Kids were on lunch break, and a large group passed in front of the camera. Once they cleared, the flyer was under the wiper.”

Malcolm scanned the street beyond the brick security wall, monitoring the lazy traffic for warning signs. “So whoever placed it there appears to be cognizant of the school’s surveillance system.”

“Apparently. One of my people is in between assignments and agreed to look into it.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Salvatore oversaw a group of freelance agents and field operatives, mostly comprised of former students. People who knew how to push the boundaries. Individuals with high-profile day jobs that allowed them to move in influential circles for gathering intelligence.

Except, today Malcolm needed Salvatore’s help, and as much as he hated to ask anyone for anything, when it came to Celia … well, apparently he still had a weak spot. “I have a favor to ask.”

“With what?” Salvatore answered without hesitation.

“I need an untraceable car and some ID delivered here tonight.” A safeguard in place to escape with Celia in the morning, just in case his gut feeling played out. He’d learned to trust his gut.

“Not that I’m arguing, but just curious,” Salvatore said drily. Nothing had gotten by the old guy when he’d been headmaster, either. “Why not have your personal detail take care of that? You’ve got a top-notch team.”

In fact, some of them were former agents.

“This is too important.” Celia was too important. “If it were just me, I could take care of myself. But with someone drawing a target on Celia’s back …”

His fist thumped the railing, words choking on the dread in the back of his throat.

“Fair enough.” The questions ended there. The two of them worked that tightly together with that kind of faith. “Whatever you need, it’s yours.”

“Thanks. I owe you.” More than he could ever repay.

Colonel John Salvatore had become his father figure. The only real father figure he’d ever known, since his biological dad cut out on his family in the middle of the night, moving on to play his next honky-tonk gig. The bastard had sent a birthday card from the Florida Keys when Malcolm turned eleven. He never heard from him again.

“Malcolm,” Salvatore continued, “I can put security in place for her here in the States so you can go ahead with your tour without worries.”

“She’s safer with me.”

Salvatore’s chuckle echoed over the line. “You don’t trust her to anyone else. Are you sure you trust yourself with her?”

God, he hated how easily Salvatore could read him.

“With all due respect, sir, the word games aren’t necessary. I would do anything to keep her safe. Anything.” His eyes scanned the small patio garden beside her carriage house with flowers blooming in splashes of purples and pinks. He recognized the lavender she used to love. His mother would have known the names of them all. Some were planted in the ground, others in pots. A fountain had been built into the stone wall, a wrought-iron chair and small table beside it. One chair. She sat there alone.

He didn’t have any right to wonder about who she saw. But he couldn’t deny he was glad she hadn’t added a chair for her principal buddy yet.

Salvatore pressed, “What if I decide you’re needed elsewhere?”

“Don’t ask me to make the choice,” he snapped.

“Apparently you’ve already decided.”

“I have.” Celia’s safety would come first, even if it meant alienating Salvatore. Malcolm just hoped it wouldn’t come to that. “Sir, I’m curious as to why the reports on Celia were incomplete.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” he answered evasively.

“I respectfully disagree.” Malcolm held his temper in check. Barely. “You’re just trying to get me to say what I found out on my own in case I didn’t learn everything. Then you can continue to hold back.”

“We can play this game for a long time, Malcolm.”

“Are you for or against me? Because I thought we were supposed to be on the same side.”

“There are more people on your side than you know.” When Malcolm kept his silence, Salvatore continued, “Celia’s father did you a favor in getting you sent to my school. Without his intervention, you would have gone to a juvenile detention center.”

Whoa. Hold on. He’d always thought the judge had pulled strings to get him out of Celia’s life. The thought that her father had actually had a hand in helping Malcolm avoid jail time … He wasn’t sure what to feel. He didn’t want special favors. An important part of his life now consisted of helping to make people pay for their crimes.

After resenting Judge Patel for so long, this felt … strange. But then, because of his own dad, his gut made him naturally suspicious of other father figures. Which brought him right back around to the fact that Salvatore hadn’t told him everything.

“What about this guy Celia’s been seeing? The principal at the high school?”

“It didn’t appear serious, so we didn’t include it in the report. Apparently it is important to you, and that should tell you something.”

“There are any number of ways that information could be important. What if he’s the jealous type?” Um, crap, he could understand that too well. “Or if someone else is upset over the relationship. Details are important. Did you think I would go after him? You should know I’m not a headstrong idiot teenager anymore.”

“You never were an idiot. Just young.” Salvatore sighed, and Malcolm could envision the guy scratching a hand over his close-shorn salt-and-pepper hair. “I apologize for not including the principal in my report. If I find out anything else, I’ll let you know. Meanwhile, whatever you need for protection, just ask and I’ll make it happen.”

Malcolm’s temper inched down a degree. “Thank you, sir.”

“Of course. Good night and be careful.” The line disconnected.

Malcolm tucked his phone away but didn’t go inside. Not yet. He couldn’t avoid the truth staring him in the face. He’d just vowed he wasn’t a headstrong idiot—yet he had acted like one in snapping at Salvatore, the man who had power and resources Malcolm needed. He’d all but proved the old man right, and all because he’d been knocked off balance by just the simple possibility of a kiss.

Except, nothing with Celia was simple.

It never had been.

His hands braced on the railing, he hung his head, staring down at that little garden grotto. He wanted to bring Celia down there and have a moonlit dinner together. The scent of those purple and pink flowers filled the air, while the music of the fountain filled the silence.

But he couldn’t run the risk of someone seeing them. Not the bastard who’d been tormenting her. And not the press that hounded him.

Rather than regrets, he needed to focus on what he had. He had Celia to himself for the rest of the night. And by morning, he would have her rock-solid promise to come with him to Europe.

And he would keep his hands to himself.

Dinner together had been surprising.

Celia tucked the last of the dishes into the dishwasher while Malcolm checked the window for the umpteenth time. She’d expected him to press the issue of how close they’d come to kissing each other. She’d expected a big scene with oysters and wine and sexy almost-touches.

Instead he’d ordered shredded barbecue sandwiches that tasted like none she’d had before, served with Parmesan French fries and Southern sweet tea. There had even been pecan pie à la mode for dessert. The differences in their lifestyles didn’t seem so big at moments like this.

She closed the dishwasher and pressed the start button. No busywork left to occupy herself, she had no choice but to face Malcolm—and the simmering awareness still humming inside her at the thought of kissing him again, touching him, taking things further. When they were teenagers, they’d spent hours exploring just how to make the other melt with desire.

Her face went hot at the memories.

“Thank you for ordering in dinner. That beat the dickens out of a warmed-over panino.”

He turned away from the window, his deep blue eyes tracking her every move. “I hope you don’t mind that I indulged myself in some selfish requests. I travel so much that I miss the tastes of home. Next meal, you choose. Anything you want, I’ll make it happen.”

Anything?

Best not to talk about exactly what she wanted right now. She’d already let her out-of-control attraction to him embarrass her once this evening.

“What a crazy concept to have whatever you want at your fingertips.” She curled up in an overstuffed chair to make sure they weren’t seated close on the sofa—or piano bench—again. “Are you one of those stars with strange, nitpicky requests, like wanting all the green M&M’s picked out of the candy dish?”

“God, I hope not.” He dropped back onto the piano bench, sitting an arm’s reach away. “I like to think I’m still me, just with a helluva lot more money, so I get to call the shots in my life these days. Maybe I should take a Southern chef with me on tour.”

She hugged a throw pillow. “You always did like pecan pie.”

“And blackberry cobbler. God, I miss that, and flaky buttermilk biscuits.”

“You must have picked up some new favorites from traveling the world.” Even in his jeans with a torn knee, he still had a more polished look with his Ferragamo loafers and … just something undefinable that spoke of how much he’d accomplished. “You must have changed. Eighteen years is a long time.”

“Of course I’m different in some ways. We all change. You’re certainly not exactly the same.”

“How so?” she asked warily.

“There. Just what you said now and how you said it.” He leaned back against the piano. “You’re more careful. More controlled.”

“Why is caution a bad thing?” Her impulsive nature, her spoiled determination to have everything—to have him—at any cost had nearly wrecked both their lives.

“Not bad. Just different. Plus, you don’t smile as much, and I’ve missed your laugh. You sound better than any music I’ve heard. I’ve tried to capture it in songs, but …” He shook his head. His blue eyes went darker with emotion, just the way they’d done all those years ago, and in that familiar moment, she felt his presence as deeply as she ever had from his kiss.

“That’s so … sad.” And incredibly touching.

One corner of his mouth kicked up in a wry smile. “Or sappy. But then, I make my living off writing and singing sappy love songs.”

“Off of making women fall in love with you.” She rolled her eyes, trying to make light of all the times the tabloid photos of him with other women had made her ache with what-ifs.

“Women aren’t falling for me. It’s all an image created by my manager. Everyone knows it’s promo. None of it’s real.”

On a certain level, she got what he was saying, but something about his blasé attitude niggled at her. “You used to say the music was a part of you.” She waved toward the antique upright behind him. “You were so passionate about your playing and your songs.”

“I was an idealistic teenager. But I became a realist.” He scooped up a stack of sheet music off the stand beside the piano. “I left this town determined to earn enough money to buy your father twice over, and music—” he rattled the pages in his hand “—was the only marketable skill I had.”

“You achieved your financial goal. I truly am happy for you. Congratulations on succeeding in showing up my old man.”

“More than succeeded.” His eyes twinkled like stars lighting the night sky.

“So you can more than buy him out twice over. How many times over, five?”

He shrugged, his eyes still smiling.

Her jaw dropped. “Eight?”

He tossed the sheet music—scores she’d written for private students—back onto the side table.

“More than ten?” Holy crap.

“That’s fairly close.”

“Wow.” She whistled softly. “Love songs pay well.” A lot better than the little compositions she made for her students with dreams of putting them into an instruction book one day.

“People want to believe in the message,” he said drily.

“You sound cynical.” That made her sad when she thought of how deeply he’d cared about his music. “Why sing about something you don’t accept as true? You obviously don’t need the money anymore.”

“You used to like it when I sang to you.” He turned on the bench and placed his hands on the keyboard, his fingers starting a simple ballad, hauntingly familiar.

“I was one of those sappy women falling for you.” When she’d been in Switzerland, his baby growing inside her, she’d dreamed of how they could repair their relationship when she got back and he finished his probation. Except, his letters to her grew fewer and fewer until she realized what everyone had told her was true. Theirs was just a high-school romance.

He tapped out another couple of bars of the melody line of one of the songs he’d written for her back when they’d dated. He’d said songs were all he had to offer her. This particular tune, one he’d called “Playing for Keeps,” had always been her favorite. His fingers picked up speed, layering new intricacies into the simpler song he’d composed long ago. When he finished, the last note echoed in her tiny carriage house.

In her heart.

Her breath caught in her throat, her eyes stinging with tears that blurred the image of his broad shoulders as he sat at the piano. She ached with the urge to wrap her arms around him and rest her cheek on his back. She hurt from the lost dreams of what she’d let slip away. Apparently, he’d let a whole lot slip away from him, too. She didn’t want to think about how cynical he’d grown.

Swallowing hard, she let herself dare to ask, “Was it real, what we felt then?”

He stayed silent, turned away from her for so long she thought he wouldn’t answer. Finally, he shifted around again to face her. The raw emotion on his face squeezed at her heart.

A long sigh shuddered through him before he spoke. “Real enough that we went through a lot of pain for each other. Real enough that sitting here together isn’t some easygoing reunion.”

With that heavy sigh of his, she realized he’d suffered, too, more than she’d ever realized. Somehow, that made her feel less alone. Yes, they’d hurt each other, but maybe they could help each other, too. Maybe the time had come for a coda of sorts, to bring their song to an end.

“Malcolm, what’s Europe going to be like if just sitting here together is this difficult?”

“So you’ve decided to come with me? No more maybes?”

She shoved to her feet and walked to him at the piano. “I think I have to.”

“Because of the stalker?”

She cupped his handsome, beard-stubbled face in her hands. “Because it’s time we put this to rest.”

Before she could talk herself out of something she wanted—needed—more than air, Celia pressed her lips to his.

Five

Malcolm might not have planned on kissing Celia, but the second her mouth touched his, there wasn’t a chance in hell he could pull away. She tasted like the sweet, syrupy insides of pecan pie and more—more than he remembered. Familiar and new all at once.

The tip of her tongue touched his, sending a bolt of desire straight through him until he went so hard at the thought of having her that he ached. His body surged with the need to take her, here, now. Because based on even this one kiss, he knew it would be even better for them than when they had been inexperienced, fumbling teens learning their way around … then learning the pleasure of drawing it out.

God, she was flipping his world upside down all over again.

Then the kiss was over before it barely started.

Celia touched her lips with a trembling hand, her chewed nails hinting at how frayed her nerves had been lately. “Not the smartest thing I’ve ever done. I pride myself on being wiser these days.”

No offers to make up the couch for him. Definitely no offer for him to come to her room. He hadn’t expected otherwise … although a man could hope.

“We don’t always want what’s good for us.”

“True enough. I got caught up in the memories from the music. The fact that you remembered the song from before … Well, I would have to be heartless not to be moved. Except, now reason has set in. If I follow through on that kiss, Europe is going to be very awkward—”

“Celia, it’s okay. You don’t need to explain or say anything more.” He traced his thumb along her mouth. “I won’t go psycho because you don’t invite me into your bed after one kiss.”

Still, his mind filled with the fantasy of tearing each other’s clothes off, of carrying her over to the piano and sitting her on the keyboard, where he would step between her legs and bury himself deep inside this woman who’d always moved him in a way no other could.

Which had him wondering if perhaps they could indulge in more. If it was every bit as inevitable now as it had been eighteen years ago.

Indecision shifted in her dark brown eyes. Could she really be considering it? His pulse ratcheted up to never-before-tested speeds. Except, then she shook her head and turned away.

“I can’t do this,” she mumbled, backing away until his hand slid from her face. From the hall closet, she pulled out a stack of sheets and a pillow, then tugged a quilt from the back of the sofa. “Good night, Malcolm.”

She thrust the linens against his chest and pivoted on her heels before he could say a word. No question, she was every bit as rattled as he was. Resisting the urge to go after her, he still allowed himself to savor watching the gentle sway of her hips as she left. His body throbbed in response, and he knew the feel of her would stay imprinted on him long after she closed her bedroom door.

Silence echoed after her, the scent of lavender wafting up from the sheets she’d given him. He hadn’t slept on a sofa since his early days in the music industry, going to college on scholarship in the mornings, still half-asleep from playing late-night gigs. He’d gotten a degree in music with a minor in accounting because, by God, no manager was ever going to take advantage of his finances. He refused to be one of those musicians who made billions only to file for bankruptcy later. He knew what poverty was like and how it hurt the people around him—how he’d hurt the people around him because of his own dumb decisions.

He was in control these days.

Shrugging the tension out of his shoulders, he tossed aside the sheet and shook out the blanket. He stayed at five-star penthouse suites on a regular basis, but he’d never forgotten where he came from—and he damn well never would. The day a person got complacent was the day someone robbed them blind.

He refused to be caught flat-footed ever again. The lowest day of his life had been sitting in that police cell, arrested for drug possession. Wondering what Celia thought. Hating that he’d let his mother down.

The part that still stuck in his craw? For some twisted reason, his brush with the law made him all the more alluring to fans. The press had spun it into a “bad turned good” kind of story. He didn’t want fans glorifying him or the things he’d done.

His mistakes were his own. He took responsibility for his past. Atonement wasn’t something to parade around for others to applaud. Receiving praise diminished the power of anything he might have done right.

Speaking of atonement …

He tugged the leather briefcase from beside the sofa. His driver had left the essentials. He pulled out his tablet computer to check for an update from Salvatore on Celia.

Because, with memories of that kiss still heating his blood, he sure as hell wasn’t going to fall asleep anytime soon.

Celia kept her eyes closed even though she’d woken up at least ten minutes ago after a restless night’s sleep. Her white-noise machine filled the room with the sound of soothing waves. She snuggled deeper under the covers, groggy and still so sexually strung tight her skin was oversensitive to the Egyptian cotton sheets. Just one kiss, and she was already burning up for Malcolm Douglas again.

The thought of facing him was mortifying—and a little scary. What if she walked out there, lost control and plastered herself all over him again?

Last night’s kiss had rocked her to her toes. And the way Malcolm hadn’t pressed her to hop right into bed together? That rattled her even more. But then, he hadn’t pressured her as a teenager, either. She’d been the aggressor. She’d known him for years. They’d shared a music teacher, even performed at recitals together. But something had changed when they both came back from summer break, entering their sophomore year.