Twisted By Love, Reincarnation Tales, Book 1 Read online

  It was actually a bit impersonal. A cloisonné vase here, a figurine there, no family photographs, no books laying around, no DVDs or CDs, though those could have been in cupboard portion of the entertainment center. There wasn’t a mat or an empty bowl or even a magazine on the two-person table in the dining nook. Curtains hung over a sliding glass door leading out to a balcony, but in the darkness outside, he couldn’t see if she had flowerpots.

  Looking at her home, she was still an enigma. The only personal element was the scent of lavender drifting in from what he assumed was the bedroom hallway.

  She backed toward the kitchen. “I’ll open this,” she said for the second time, and he realized she was nervous. “I’ve got some cheese and crackers, too.”

  The kitchen was shiny and modern, the cupboards glass-fronted and not a dish or glass out of place. She opened a drawer, brought out an opener, and handed it to him along with the wine bottle. She didn’t look at the label. “You do the honors.”

  She removed a chunk of cheddar from a fridge that certainly wasn’t overcrowded and found crackers in the long pantry cupboard next to it.

  “Is that the new outfit you bought?” He wanted to touch the flirty, flouncy skirt. “It’s lovely.”

  She looked down, shook her head, smiled. “Thank you, but no. My friend did the majority of the shopping. I just bought a couple of things for work.”

  “You were going to model for me.” He’d thought to make it a joke, but her face flushed with embarrassment.

  “Sorry,” she muttered, then set about cutting cheese and setting it on a plate. She didn’t make an artful arrangement, simply placed the slices next to a pile of crackers. “I hope this is okay. I don’t have anything fancy.”

  “It’s fine,” he assured her. He liked that she hadn’t made a feast in the two hours since she’d called. Instead, she’d taken a bath and filled the condo with the scent of lavender.

  “There.” She stepped to the stainless steal sink to toss in the dirty knife.

  And screamed.

  * * * * *

  A lizard. Oh God, she’d almost touched it when she put the knife in the sink. It was like the dream, washing dishes, slicing up cheese, doing something so normal, peaceful.

  Her breath sawed in her throat, and it wasn’t until Bern had his arms around her, whispering in her ear—“It’s okay, it’s okay”—that she realized she’d screamed.

  “It’s just a lizard,” he was saying.

  Lizards, snakes, they were all bad. She still hadn’t caught her breath. “How did it get in there?”

  “Want me to get rid of it?”

  “Yes. Please.” She felt like an idiot, but she had to step away from the sink so she couldn’t see it anymore.

  “Do you have a plastic bag or something?”

  Thank God he didn’t wash it down the sink and turn on the garbage disposal. She’d have nightmares of it coming back in bloody pieces. She grabbed a bag from a drawer, handed it to him, then backed away. What if he dropped it and it skittered across the floor at her?

  When she was a kid, a lizard had crawled up through the bathtub drain. She’d almost stepped on it getting in the tub. She’d screamed and screamed. Her dad tried to explain that it happened all the time. They got in the sewers.

  But she’d always thought Toni had done it.

  Just like she thought Toni had done it now.

  But really, why would her sister take the trouble? Because she’d been upset Livie had gone shopping instead of spending the day with her? That was ridiculous. Toni would have to search high and low outside, then carry it all the way back in. She wouldn’t.

  Bern turned the bag inside out over his hand, then fished around in the sink. Livie shuddered. God. What would he think of her, acting like a ninny over a lizard?

  He had it, flipping the bag right side out again and zipping it closed. “I’ll be right back.”

  She didn’t ask where he was taking it, didn’t count how many minutes he was gone. She simply poured the wine, then snagged a piece of cheese. As she sipped the wine and nibbled the cheese, she could see from her vantage point that he’d left the front door ajar.

  The chardonnay was exceptionally good, yet she couldn’t stop shaking. The bad dreams were increasing in regularity, and the lizard had appeared in the sink as if she’d conjured it right out of her nightmare.

  “I guess it’s safe to assume you don’t like lizards,” he said, closing the front door behind him and heading into the kitchen.

  “Sorry about that.” She felt foolish. “Not just lizards, but any crawling thing, especially snakes.” Most especially snakes. “Thanks for getting rid of it.”

  Crossing the kitchen, he stopped in front of her, up close, in her personal space. He smelled too good, earthy, tantalizing.

  “The wine is good,” she said, suddenly nervous. Inviting him over had been stupid.

  “I’m glad you like it.” His gaze fell to her lips, and the green of his eyes seemed to darken to a deep forest shade. His voice dropped to a huskier note. “Let me taste.”

  She handed him her glass. He took it, holding it aloft rather than raising it to his mouth. His head descended, blocking out the kitchen light. Then his lips were on hers. Livie didn’t move, didn’t put her arms around him, didn’t touch. She merely angled her head and let him take her. His tongue stroked hers, tasting the wine. It was a slow yet erotic exploration. He made her dizzy, and she braced her hands on the counter’s edge.

  Everything that had been simmering inside her rose to boiling. She kissed him back, sighed with need and desire. She heard the chink of the wineglass on the counter, then his fingers tangled in her hair as he deepened the kiss. Livie moaned and clutched his arms. He was hard against her. She pressed closer. He dropped his hands to her hips and rocked.

  It was crazy, but she wanted him now, here. She had the sense to realize she’d been thinking about this for days, needed it. Why deny it? Why keep pretending?

  She curled her leg around his calf, opening herself slightly. It was all the invitation he needed. Dragging his mouth from hers, he reached behind to shove the plate of cheese out of the way, then hauled her up onto the counter.

  The short skirt flared and she opened her legs, inviting him in, until he nudged her center with his erection.

  “I wasn’t going to move so fast this time, but you make me crazy,” he said before taking her mouth again.

  She wanted him crazy. Livie tightened her legs around him and planted her hands on his hips. Close, so close, so good. He smelled of need and sex. His taste was sweet like the wine, as if he’d drunk from the glass, too.

  “Too fast,” he muttered.

  “Too slow,” she answered. Then she pushed him back, held him away with a palm on his chest. “Make me feel the way you did the other night.”

  She was the aggressor, pulling his hand down between her legs. His pupils were large and dark. She made him touch her with his fingers, caress her through her panties. “I don’t know why you make me want this so badly, but you do.”

  He played along her flesh. “So you called me just for sex.”

  “Yes.” She closed her eyes briefly as he hit a perfect spot.

  “But Friday you didn’t let me finish what we started.” He mesmerized her with the stroke of his fingers. “You were nervous.”

  “I’m not nervous if it’s just sex.” She let her head fall back, steadying herself with her legs around him and her hands on his biceps.

  “So that’s all you want from me.” Still playing her with one hand, he edged the silky material off her hip.

  “Yes. God, yes.”

  Then he used both hands to yank on her panties. She lifted, felt the material slide away, and he stepped back, tossing the panties onto the floor. She was naked beneath the skirt. Free.

  Between her thighs again, he held her hand to his erection. “Is this what you want?” His face was a mass of tense lines.

  “Yes. Please.” She squeezed hi
m until he groaned. “I don’t know why you make me feel this way. I’ve never been like this with anyone else.” She found herself admitting things she wouldn’t if she were in her right mind.

  “You’re like this with me, only me.” He tugged on his belt, opened, unzipped over the hard bulge in his briefs.

  It was so different from the other night. Then he’d been playful, coaxing, leading her. This time it was her, demanding, needing. She pulled him free, stroked the thick length. He put his fingers on her again, one inside her. She could hardly breathe. “I want you. Now.”

  “You’re so wet.”

  She rocked with his movements on her. “It’s been so long.” So long since she’d felt him inside her. So long since she’d taken him. So long since...

  His clever fingers stilled, left her. “Look at me.”

  Brushing aside the thoughts feathering through her mind, she let her gaze trace every inch of his face. “I’m looking.” God, he was perfect, far from handsome yet all hot, hard masculinity.

  Shifting, he pulled a condom from his pocket. “We were thinking the same thing.”

  She let her lips curve. “I had some in the bedroom.”

  He tore the packet, tossed the wrapper on the counter, and rolled the condom down.

  “First I want to watch you come.” He glided over her flesh, sending heat and sensation coursing through her. “I want to remember how you look.”

  Once again, she wrapped her legs around his hips, leaning back on her hands. “Make me come,” she whispered. “Then I want you in me.” It was like another woman talking, begging. “Oh, God, yes.” Her body undulated with his touch. She was on fire inside.

  She closed her eyes, colored lights playing behind her lids like a kaleidoscope. There was only her body, and his touch. In what seemed like only moments, she exploded for him. Her head bumped the cabinet, but she didn’t care. She rode the climax.

  “Now,” he said, his voice far away and yet so close. Then he braced her with a hand at the small of her back, and before she’d even come down off the orgasmic high, he thrust.

  Livie screamed. This time it was pure pleasure.

  Chapter Ten

  She was like a glove around him, soft, yielding yet the fit tight and consuming once he was deep inside her. Bern held still a long moment, savoring her heat and the ripple of her muscles along his length.

  “Christ,” he whispered into her hair. The locks were soft, her skin scented with lavender and the sweet, sexual perfume of arousal.

  Being inside her was like coming home after a long, arduous journey, one he thought he’d never survive. He’d dreamed of her every night, and those dreams had brought him through. It didn’t feel like three weeks, or a month, or a year. It felt like a lifetime.

  He began a slow, sweet pump inside her.

  “Right there,” she whispered. “Exactly there.”

  He didn’t know what she meant, whether he’d found the perfect place inside her, or if, like him, this was the place she needed to be.

  They clung to each other. She held her hands to his hips, tightened her legs around him, and urged him deeper, faster. He’d seen her climax, and now, though his eyes were closed and his face was buried against her neck, he could see the beauty of desire on her face. He felt as if he’d had her a thousand times and yet it had never been enough.

  Then he let sensation rule, the silk of her flesh around him, the heat of her skin against him, the sweetness of her hair in his nostrils. He pumped and ground, his legs shaking, his breath sawing. She met him thrust for thrust, her body working him. He knew the moment her orgasm began. She dragged him along with her, pulsing around him. The explosion rocked his world, pulled him under, and he knew she fell into the abyss right along with him.

  How long he held her, still throbbing deep inside her body, he didn’t know. Long enough to feel the beat of her heart slow against his chest. He didn’t want to move. He didn’t want to pull out. If he did, he knew he’d lose her.

  Then Livie tipped her head back, her eyes a rich, luscious chocolate. “Why don’t we go into the bedroom? A bed would be a little softer than my kitchen counter.”

  Bern’s heart kicked up the pace. He’d take her wherever she wanted to go.

  * * * * *

  Livie stood at the railing of her balcony, the glitter of lights down the long stretch of hill before her, the dark hollow of the bay beyond. The balcony, doors opening onto it from both living room and bedroom, was what had sold her on the condo.

  Though the usual evening wind had died down, she’d wrapped herself in her robe against the chill of the night. She sipped the wine he’d brought. They hadn’t drunk much of it. They’d touched, kissed, licked, and stroked, making love in her bed.

  No, it wasn’t making love, it was sex. You couldn’t make love with a man you’d known a couple of days. But damn, the sex was good. Down and dirty on the counter, then long and leisurely in her bed. She’d give him major points for knowing exactly where and how to touch her.

  Then they’d fallen asleep. She’d woken some time later with the sense of something different. A man in her bed. She hadn’t asked Bern to spend the night, yet it felt...right. Good. Luxurious. She hadn’t had a nightmare either. She wanted to get used to this. And that’s what had driven her from the bed. She wasn’t ready to need him.

  It was close to midnight. The cars running up and down the streets below were few and far between, though she could pick out a steady stream down on the freeway and across the San Mateo Bridge.

  Behind her, the door slid in its tracks. Bern. She could smell his sexy masculine scent. Something about him had called to her from the moment she saw him. It was the stuff of romance novels. Livie would have said she was too practical for that.

  “Have you finished reading it?”

  It certainly wasn’t what she expected him to say. “Read what?”

  “The Fountainhead.”

  He came to stand behind her, holding the railing on either side of her, his chin above her shoulder, his cheek against her hair. She should have felt trapped, but he managed to make her feel safe. His arms were bare. She could feel through the robe that the rest of him was naked as well, but she didn’t ask if he was cold. His body heat seeped through the thin material.

  “It’s a long book,” she said. “I haven’t finished it, but I’ve made a good dent.” The book purchase telegraphed her interest in him.

  “What do you think so far?”

  “It makes me wonder if the arrogant architect who won’t compromise his vision is a bit like you.”

  He chuckled softly. “I compromise, but I still hope there’s something of Roark in me.”

  She held up her wineglass and he took it, drinking, then handed it back. She couldn’t say why, yet she viewed him as a man of vision and integrity. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t be as attracted. She wanted to know more about him, but was afraid to ask. The more she knew, the deeper she’d fall. She went for something neutral instead. “I’m enjoying the book. I didn’t think I’d like something that old. The writing style back then was a lot more wordy.”

  He removed one hand from the railing and wrapped it around her waist, the unmistakable imprint of his hard body against her. Again he gave her the unexpected. “Do you come out here often to watch the lights?”

  “If I can’t sleep. It’s not the lights so much as how the bay seems to swallow everything like a black hole. Except when there’s a full moon. Then you see it glittering in the water.”

  Parting the robe, he slid a hand in to cup her breast. Her nipple beaded against his palm and her center melted for him. “It makes you wonder about all the cosmic possibilities.”

  His breath was warm across her cheek. He pinched her nipple lightly, and suddenly the night was hot. She held the wineglass in one hand, gripped the railing with the other.

  “So many possibilities,” he whispered. Then he dropped his hand from her breast to the robe’s opening below the tie.

&nb
sp; She’d thrown on the robe, but no panties, and he unerringly slid between her folds. Livie closed her eyes, moaned, held the wineglass a little tighter so she wouldn’t drop it.

  “You’re still wet.”

  She couldn’t say a word as he stroked her. The lights were like stars behind her lids.

  “I can’t get enough of you.” His hand was gone, and she tipped her head slightly, opening her eyes to see him suck her juice from his fingers. The sight was incredibly arousing. “I love your taste,” he murmured.

  She’d never known anyone like him. So sensual. Far beyond a wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am, he seemed to relish every touch, every taste.

  Holding her gaze, he said, “I want you right here.” His words were needy, intense, calling to her the way everything about him did.

  The balcony was dark. And while there were nearby apartments, they were farther down the hill. The street was empty, parked cars but no movement. It they were to be seen, someone would have to know to look up here, and she didn’t think they’d see more than shadows. Yet even if it had been blazing daylight, Livie would have wanted it.

  “Yes,” she told him.

  “You want it, too,” he said, as if he wanted her in the same place he was, needing it, here and now, with him.

  She was blind to the night, wanting it badly. “God, yes. Here. I need you right here.”

  He plucked the glass from her fingers, set it on a table, then lifted her robe. “You’re perfection.” He traced the curve of her butt, then pushed his leg between hers, forcing her to a wider stance. “I want you like this.” He stroked in from behind, testing her readiness. “Hold onto the railing.”

  Livie held on with both hands, fingers wrapped tightly. He tugged her robe aside, and cold air washed over her. Then he slid along her center, coating the condom with her moisture. He must have been wearing it when he came out. He’d planned it. Livie didn’t care.