Working Overtime

He pulled back the blanket as she’d suggested, then shrugged out of his jacket, pulled off his tie and began unbuttoning his shirt. All he wanted to do was fall down on the bed and close his eyes, but he waited while she opened drawers, looking for bedding.

Her hair had come completely loose by now, and it swirled around her pretty face in a way that made him want to kiss her nose. She looked so beguiling with the tanned skin of her long legs gleaming in the lamplight. But when she’d found the sheets and turned, coming back toward him, he had to laugh at the picture she made. Her legs were lovely, but it did look as though she were wearing two very angry Persian cats on her feet.

“What?” she said indignantly, stopping in her tracks. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” he said quickly, shrugging out of his shirt and dropping it onto a nearby chair. “Nothing at all.”

She was going to say more, but one look at his muscular chest rendered her speechless and she looked away quickly, praying that she wouldn’t turn red as she moved toward the bed with the fresh sheets. The picture Sherry had created in the calendar had nothing on the reality. It had been a long time since she’d been this close to a real live shirtless man. She wondered, fleetingly, if he would notice if she turned up the air conditioner. It seemed to be getting awfully hot in the room.

“Here, grab this side,” she ordered as she tossed the sheets down and began to pull the fitted one into place.

He did as he’d been told and they got the sheet on in no time. Chareen reached for the top one and gave it a swish, looked up and caught Michael’s eye as he grabbed his side, and her heart did a flip in her chest. There was something in the way he was looking at her…

“Pull it tight,” she ordered, avoiding his gaze and trying to keep her equilibrium. Just a few more minutes and she would be out of here.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, his voice like a purr.

“Tuck it under, like this,” she said, demonstrating a hospital corner.

He gazed at her balefully. “What is the point?” he asked, making no effort to attempt one.

With an exasperated sigh, she charged around the end of the bed to do it herself, but he didn’t make way fast enough, and when he did move, it was in the wrong direction. She turned right into him, their bodies collided, and the next thing she knew, she was falling down onto the bed, and he was falling on top of her. She gasped. He broke his fall with his arms, bracing himself over her, looking down into her face.

“Sorry,” he said, but he didn’t move.

She knew she should say something, but she seemed to have lost all power of speech. Her gaze was locked with his, and she felt as though she were lost, wandering in the shadows of his hazel eyes, unable to find a way out. His hard, warm body was pressed to hers in so many places. To have a man so close, so strong, was unbelievably intoxicating. It had been so long since a man had held her in his arms and made sweet love to her.

Suddenly, she ached to have that feeling again. Her senses drank in every nuance of his presence, his clean, manly scent, the brush of his breath against her hair, the hard muscles of his thighs pressing on hers. Her hands were flattened against his naked chest, and she could feel his heart beating a pulse into her palm.

“I hold your heart in my hand.” The sentiment flickered through her mind and for one very scary moment, she was afraid she might have said it out loud.

But there wasn’t time to worry about that, because her body was turning traitor. A shudder ran through her soul and she knew she wanted him in a strange, deep and very primitive way. The need had an urgency that took her breath away and seemed about to convulse her body, as though she’d been taken over by a libidinous spirit that would soon render her helpless to resist. Her lips parted and she found herself arching toward him, begging for his kiss. There was a moan starting deep in her throat. Was it a moan of surrender? Of triumph? Of overwhelming desire?

She would never know, because at that moment there was a new sound from the hallway.

“Mama? Mama?”

As though a switch had been thrown, her eyes snapped wide and she used those hands that had been kneading into the muscles of his chest to throw him off her. Springing to her feet, she called out, “Just a minute, baby,” and glared at where Michael was sprawled on the bed, looking as though he wasn’t sure what had just happened here.

“If you need anything else, Mr. Greco,” she said evenly, “you can wait for Hannah to get back. I’m off duty. See you in the morning.”

She stared at him for a short moment, as though she could hardly believe what they’d just shared could have really happened, then she spun around, threw open the door and headed into the hallway.

He rose slowly from the bed, still throbbing deep down with the need for her. His mind was fogged with exhaustion and desire, and he really wasn’t sure what was going on. Reaching the doorway, he leaned against the jamb and looked out into the hallway, watching as she scooped two little redheaded boys into her arms.

“Where did they come from?” he asked, completely at sea and mainly intent on getting her to come back into the room.

She looked up at him and her chin lifted. “They’re mine,” she said proudly. “Ricky and Ronnie. Say hello to Mr. Greco, boys. He’s my boss.”

Chapter Three

Michael groaned softly.

Char was not going to be coming back in the bedroom. Not only that, but he now had ample evidence that his first impression had been the right one. She wasn’t the type to be interested in a quick roll in the hay. Especially not with two kids in tow.

The boys both blinked at him sleepily. One boy waved. The other frowned and turned his head away, pressing into his mother’s neck. Michael stared at them. He was not a kid person.

“You didn’t tell me you had children,” he said, resignation clear in his voice.

“You didn’t ask.” She turned into her room, looking back at him. His attitude had cooled completely and she wondered why. But she had two children to look after and she didn’t have time to dwell on it.

“Good night,” she called back over her shoulder.

He didn’t answer, but she heard his door close as she put the boys back to bed. Frowning, she closed her own door and leaned against it for a moment, remembering what had happened on the bed. It was crazy, of course. She must have been half out of her mind. She didn’t do things like that, not ever.

But she couldn’t say that anymore, could she? She’d responded to him like a flower to sunshine, as though she’d been waiting for him to awaken something in her that had been sleeping too long. Was she really that lonely? Did her body and soul really hunger so deeply for a man’s love that she was ready to drop down on a bed with the first guy who grabbed her?

Or was it something else? Was it because he looked so much like Danny? Was that what had loosened her inhibitions and made her respond to him the way she had?

“Hah!” she said to herself scornfully. No such luck. She couldn’t claim that as an alibi. Her mind had been on nothing but the touch, the scent and the heat of Michael Greco. Which was why he was more dangerous to her peace of mind than any man she’d known in a long, long time.

“Mama, kiss!” Ronnie demanded from his bed, holding his little arms out to her.

Smiling, she started toward him, loving the way his little fireplug body looked in his Pokémon pajamas.

“Forget about Michael Greco,” she told herself sternly. “Your kids are all that really matter.” And she wiped him from her mind as her children claimed her full attention.

Michael went to bed, but despite his exhaustion, he found himself lying still, staring at the ceiling. Maybe he was too tired to relax. Or maybe he was still trying to get over his encounter with his neighbor.

He could still feel the way her body had pressed against his. Every delicious part of her fulfilled the promise that rich, husky voice laid out. It had been a long time since a woman had turned him on quite so easily and quite so thoroughly. And here he’d thought he was finished with that sort of thing.

It had been four years since his wife, Grace, had given up on him. He’d had his share of women since then, and over time, the nameless, faceless encounters had begun to seem sleazy and pointless. He’d made a decision to forget about women and concentrate on business. He had ambitions. Right now he was on a trajectory toward a vice presidency. That should be enough. And it was, damn it!

He couldn’t have a life like other men because he wasn’t like other men. He accepted that. He could live with it. But it had been bad luck to end up so close to Chareen Wolf and her crew. Something in her had reached right through his defenses and latched onto his soul from the beginning. He hadn’t wanted it to happen. But she reminded him of what life could have been like if only…

“If onlys” didn’t change anything. He was a pragmatic man and reality was all he cared about. And reality dictated that he stay away from women like Char—women who had family in mind.

Poor Grace. Suddenly he had a clear picture of her, of that awful pleading look in her eyes. Even after all these years, that look made him shrivel up inside. All she’d ever wanted was a family. And that was exactly what he couldn’t give her.

Char was nothing like Grace, but she had similar interests. He had to stay away from her. For his own sanity, for her peace of mind. And with that decided, he finally fell asleep.

Michael’s eyes drifted open a crack. Sunlight spilled into his room. He glanced at the clock. Damn. He’d forgotten to set the alarm. He closed his eyes again. No use getting up until he was sure the coast was clear. Might as well get a little more sleep.

This was his third morning in the old Victorian. On the first and second he had very carefully awoken early and cleared out before Char and her children got up, getting breakfast at a local coffee shop and heading for work in time to avoid all contact with the little family across the hall. He’d had to deal with Char a few times at the office, but he’d managed to keep the contact short and sweet—and very reserved. Neither one of them had made any reference to the incident on the bed. Relations between them were strictly professional and they were going to stay that way if he could manage it.

But this morning he’d misjudged. He’d gotten in so late last night, he’d prepared for bed like a robot and fallen asleep instantly. Now he was going to have to spend some more time in his room if he was going to wait them out and emerge after they’d left the house. So he dozed, barely noticing as doors opened and closed up and down the hall, as little feet pattered past, as Char’s heels made a staccato but muffled tattoo on the corridor carpet.

He had a short, seductive dream in which he reached out and touched Char’s shoulder, his hand sliding in between two silky strands of her beautiful blond hair, and she turned, dressed in the cranberry-colored, scoop-necked wool sweater she’d worn to work the day before—a sweater that did for her form what a layer of powdered snow did to the Sierras—and he reached down into the scoop and…