Midnight Man (Midnight #1)(9)

He cast a quicksilver glance at her. “Where you wanted.” Though he didn’t say the words aloud, his tone said “of course”.

Suzanne blinked. “Comme Chez Soi?”

He shrugged. “That’s right.”

She gave a half laugh. “You were able to get reservations at Comme Chez Soi on a Friday night?” There was a permanent two-week waiting list. A last-minute Friday night reservation was impossible.

They were moving into the downtown district and she could see his clean, hard profile more clearly. His face was hard, set. “I persuaded them to make room for two more, yeah.”

He’d persuaded…she caught her breath. He’d been armed. Had he pulled a gun on them?

Suzanne brought her fist to her mouth. “Oh my God, John, what did you do to them to get them to give you a table?”

He laughed, a rough low sound. “Not what you’re thinking, honey. I stopped by and gave the maitre d’ a note with a dead president on it.”

Happy the darkness disguised her pink cheeks, Suzanne looked blindly out the window.

‘Honey.’ He’d called her honey. It meant absolutely nothing of course. But her heart had taken a violent leap in her chest. She folded one hand over another and took deep breaths to calm herself down.

It was like being in a cave, just the two of them. A dark cave cut off from the rest of the world. Traffic was light and the sidewalks were deserted. The big machine rode silently through the streets, leaving an arc of water in its wake. The soft whir of the windshield wipers kept time with her heartbeat.

He drove fast but well. She felt utterly safe in a secure cocoon.

“It’s raining really hard,” she said finally. He hadn’t spoken a word in the last ten minutes. She had to learn to make conversation with this man, without her voice or her hands trembling. The weather seemed a safe topic.

“Par for the course here,” he grumbled. “Rains all the time.”

For a moment, she was charmed at the thought of big, bad John Huntington being disgruntled by some rain, as if he was made of spun sugar and would melt. “Well…” she teased gently. “Not all the time. There’s the odd sunny day. Or two. You’re not from around here, are you?”

She couldn’t place the accent in his deep voice. Not western, for sure.

“No, ma’am.”

He looked over and their eyes met. His gaze had such power in it Suzanne had to look away. She felt as if she had been punched in the stomach.

Say something, you idiot. “So, um, where are you from?”

He was silent a moment as he negotiated the tricky intersection off Harrison. “From all over and nowhere in particular. My dad was in the Navy and I grew up on Navy bases. Then when I was old enough to enlist, I followed in his footsteps. I’ve lived on most of the naval bases in this country and a good many abroad. Most of them sunny,” he added wryly. “When I took early retirement, I needed a home base of my own. Weather didn’t factor too much into the choice.”

“So…why Portland?”

“Don’t really know.” He shrugged. “A lot of people told me what a great place it was. I’d met Bud years ago when he was a marine. He said there were good hunting and fishing and sailing close by. Seemed as good a place as any.”

“Bud said he didn’t even know you were in town.”

“Yeah. I thought I was going to build my business up slowly, have time to see my pals, maybe fish and hunt some. Instead, business just took off and I’ve been chasing after it ever since. Haven’t hardly had a chance to catch my breath. I should have looked for larger premises much earlier than this. Though,” this with a sidelong glittering glance at her that took her breath away, “I’m really glad I waited. Really glad.” He swerved and parked. “Here we are.”

Again, he moved quickly for such a big man. A few seconds after stopping the SUV, he was at her door. The rain had stopped and there was a hush in the air. A car whished by, headlights catching him full in the face.

She caught her breath at the intensity of his expression, deep lines bracketing an unsmiling mouth. His arms were open to lift her down. She put her hands on his shoulders and leaned forward. He did too. Their noses touched.

Something in his eyes told her he was a hair’s breadth from—“Don’t kiss me,” she whispered.

“No.” His voice was low and rough. “When I start kissing you, I won’t stop. And the first time we have sex it should be on a bed, not on the front seat of a car on the open highway. So we can take our time.”

He plucked her off the seat and swung her down effortlessly.

They stood a moment, raindrops dripping from the broad oaks above them. His hands were still on her, almost spanning her waist. Suzanne’s heart was pounding. She should be shocked. She was shocked. At the harsh words, at the very notion. She should say…something. Something like “In your dreams, buster,” or “How dare you?”

The images his rough words produced—broad naked shoulders rising hot and hard above her, fevered kisses and powerful heated sex—robbed her of breath.

Power and sex came off the man in tangible waves, totally invincible, unstoppable.

She’d never felt like this in her whole life. Shaky, without bearings, like a toddler taking her first baby steps. She stared up at him mutely, their breath clouding in the chill night air, and then moved away.