The Maid's Daughter. Janice Maynard

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      Now, they were at a point where they wanted to enjoy retirement. So Devlyn was in control of everything. Nothing short of brilliant, he worked as hard as he partied.

      Gillian was not immune to his appeal. But he was way out of her league. She preferred bookish, intellectual men, guys who were more like house-trained pets than wild, night-roaming creatures.

      Devlyn was incredibly dangerous and yet so very attractive.

      She hugged her arms around her body and decided she had had enough. Her limbs trembled with fatigue, and it was time for another dose of painkiller. Things always seemed so much worse at this hour … her bleak employment future, the lack of male companionship in her nunlike life … the hole in her emotions left by her father’s passing.

      Blinking back tears of self-pity that she refused to let fall, she turned and immediately tripped over a root, stumbling to her knees on the cold and muddy ground.

      “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”

      Devlyn’s outraged voice startled her as much as the fall. In an instant, his hands were under her arms, lifting her effortlessly to her feet. Seeing the state she was in, he cursed beneath his breath and shrugged out of the thick, fleece-lined jacket he wore. He wrapped it around her and scooped her into his arms.

      “You can’t spend all your time carrying me around,” she muttered. But it was a token protest at best. His warmth surrounded her even as his strength filled her with an odd contentment.

      It was a false sense of security. She knew that. But for this one moment, this single, unlikely and unsettling reunion, she decided to pretend that she had a right to be here in Devlyn Wolff’s embrace.

      She had left the double, glass-paned doors to her room unlatched. After negotiating the narrow stairs, Devlyn deposited her on her feet long enough to remove her muddy boots and his shoes, before urging her inside, locking the doors and drawing the drapes.

      Gillian had left a single lamp burning. The confusion in Devlyn’s eyes mirrored her own. “I’m sorry I disturbed you,” she said, the words stiff. “I couldn’t sleep.”

      “Same here.” Still he stared at her. “Sit down on the bed, Gillian.”

      He stepped past her, and moments later she heard water running in the bathroom. When he returned, he had a damp washcloth in his hands. “I said sit down.”

      She sat.

      Why was she enabling his bossiness? She was a mature woman with a life that clicked along quite well. She didn’t need a man to take care of her.

      He took her fingers in his and gently wiped away the mud where she had landed, hands down. His touch was gentle but firm, removing the bits of leaves and grass that clung to her skin.

      Next he removed his coat, the one he had wrapped around her. His eyes went to the muddy knees of her pajamas, and her stomach clenched. Surely he wouldn’t—

      “Lift your hips.”

      Like an automaton, she obeyed, watching the tableau unfold as he bared her legs and dragged the pants down to her ankles and away. “Get under the covers,” he said.

      Her face flaming with color, she obeyed, painfully conscious that he didn’t even bother to avert his gaze. When she was covered from the waist down, she removed the sweater, managing to tangle her hair in the process. Devlyn disappeared into the bathroom a second time and came back holding a brush still wrapped in cellophane.

      He sat down beside her, opening the package. “Turn away from me,” he commanded.

      She felt one hand settle on her shoulder. With the other, he dragged the brush through her hair. Her eyes closed and a whimper of delight escaped her lips. Her head lolled on her shoulders as the simple pleasure unfolded. Occasionally, as he encountered a knot, she felt his fingers sift through her straight, thick tresses.

      Gooseflesh erupted all over her body, and her breasts grew heavy with arousal. Did he try this on all his women? God, the man was a genius. He never seemed to tire. The gentle pull of the bristles against her scalp went on and on. Sleepiness gradually replaced sexual excitement.

      Dimly, she heard him speak soft words as he eased her onto her back. She felt hard, warm arms encircle her.

      After that … nothing.

      Four

      Devlyn awoke abruptly, his internal alarm clock set for 6:00 a.m. For a moment, he was completely disoriented. And then everything came flooding back. Gillian Carlyle.

      Though it was an anomaly to begin the day fully dressed in a woman’s bed, the details were clear. He’d been driven by a combination of guilt and lust, determined to take care of the prickly woman who was a thorn in the side of his past.

      He rubbed his gritty eyes, wishing he had the option of going back to sleep. But Wolff Enterprises expected him at the helm this morning, and he had already made one costly mistake because of this woman.

      Gillian sighed in her sleep and nestled more closely into his embrace. He was on top of the comforter, hard and ready to take her. All she was wearing was a pajama top, and below the covers a next-to-nothing pair of panties. Unable to help himself, he slid a hand beneath the sheet and caressed her bottom.

      Gillian sighed and turned to curl an arm around his neck. Now her breasts were pressed snugly against his arm. He slid his fingers beneath the silk at her hip and felt her warm skin. His body throbbed with arousal. A few more inches and he would be touching her most intimate secrets.

      Somewhere in the house he heard muffled laughter. The sound snatched him back to sanity. God in heaven. What was he doing? Had he learned nothing from the past?

      He slid from the bed with all the care of a cat burglar hoping to elude detection. It took everything he had to turn his back on Gillian and return to his room. As he showered and dressed, he reminded himself of all the reasons he couldn’t start something with his overnight visitor.

      First and foremost was Gillian’s clear discomfort about the fact that her mother worked for Devlyn’s father. Devlyn could not care less, but even so, he acknowledged the difficulty of coaxing Gillian into his bed with little or no privacy for their fledgling relationship, especially when either or both of their parents might not approve.

      Secondly, he owed Gillian more than a verbal apology for his shameful actions in the past. Acknowledging that he had been merely a boy when it happened was not enough. He was determined to clean the slate, and he knew just how to do it. He told himself that in this instance he was doing the right thing and not merely perpetuating his tendency to play hero to every woman who crossed his path needing help.

      In college, he had supported his roommate’s pregnant girlfriend, both emotionally and financially, when the father of her baby dumped her. That altruistic action on Devlyn’s part had severed his relationship with a young man he had considered his best friend.

      Not only that, the girl had latched on to the idea that lovers were interchangeable … and she set her sights on Devlyn. Only by graduating and moving hundreds of miles away had he been able to extract himself from the messy situation.

      Unfortunately, it was a pattern that repeated itself in subsequent years. СКАЧАТЬ