Only he didn’t leave. He followed her inside. Saw the filthy kitten that was no longer filthy but looked as if it had visited a pet day spa. The animal nuzzled her and she nuzzled it back and he felt a moment’s jealousy. Of a cat!
‘I should go.’
‘Oh, sorry. We both need to take showers and start the day. Let me feed Lucky and I’ll see you out.’
He waited, feeling antsy.
She walked toward him with a shy smile on her lips that made her so damn cute. ‘So, uh...’
Lukas grabbed her and pulled her into him. ‘You mentioned a shower.’
* * *
The third time he woke up he was alone. It took him longer to orient himself this time because he was coming out of a sex-induced coma that seemed to suck him down deeper every time he and Eleanore made love. When he realised he’d fallen into a deep sleep in her bed he scowled.
He thought about the conversation they’d had from the hallway to the bathroom.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you were a virgin?’
She’d stiffened in his arms and he’d cursed his bluntness.
‘Does it matter?’
It did but he wasn’t sure how. Other than to give him some caveman sense of pride in being the first man to touch her so intimately. The first man to give her such pleasure. The first man to join his body with hers. Not that he would be the only man to do those things, he reminded himself. When she returned to New York she’d have plenty of men after her...plenty of lovers who would kiss her and stroke her smooth skin. Plenty who would watch her as she climaxed. Lukas cleared the uncomfortable thoughts from his head.
Naturally enough he hadn’t said any of that at the time. He’d told her that of course it didn’t matter. Well, it did, he’d said, but only in the sense that if he’d known he would have gone slower. Been more gentle. And perhaps he might not even have started anything, though there was no guarantee of that.
‘It was fine,’ she’d said. And then she’d frowned up at him in the bright light of the small bathroom, her hair like a tousled brown cloud around her creamy shoulders. ‘How was it for you?’
‘Velikolepnyy,’ he’d answered truthfully.
‘What does that mean?’
‘Magnificent.’
And it had been true. Touching Eleanore seemed to go beyond the basic physical need for release he usually experienced with a woman. It seemed to reach into the very core of him and make him feel warm.
He, who hadn’t noticed the cold in so very long.
Then she’d smiled that slow, sensual smile of a woman just coming into her own power and scattered his wits like a summer breeze.
‘Yes, it was,’ she had said, reaching up to stroke his stubbled jaw. ‘And the other word? What is it that you call me?’
‘Beauty.’ He’d yanked her sweater over her head, cupped her breasts in the palms of his hands. ‘My beauty.’
A banging sound further down the hallway brought his mind back to the present. He heard a muffled curse and smiled. Probably something to do with the cat.
He thought about the last time he’d woken up in a woman’s bed. It wasn’t that uncommon an occurrence, though it had been a while. What was uncommon though was waking up with a woman in his arms.
Growing up pretty much alone meant that he was used to a lot of space. And he liked it. Now he found the empty bed beside him more disconcerting than welcome and that he wanted Eleanore back in his arms.
Clearly one night was not going to be enough to quench the fires still raging inside of him. Even now he was ready to go and that wasn’t like him at all. But okay, it was nothing to panic about. He liked Eleanore. And he really liked having sex with her.
In fact, it was not only the best sex he’d ever had but it had been fun. What they’d done in the shower...the way she had used her mouth... He groaned. She was a fast learner and now he was hard again.
Time to get up.
A sweet smell greeted him as he rose from the bed. Was that...? He sniffed the air and stepped into his jeans. Was that baking? Surely a career woman like Eleanore wasn’t baking.
He heard what sounded like the oven door slamming shut and pulled his sweater over his head. He walked into the kitchen and stopped dead.
Eleanore was dressed in a slinky silk robe with what looked to be nothing underneath; her feet were bare and her hair was put up haphazardly with those silly chopsticks she’d had in her hair the first time he’d met her. And yes, she most definitely had been baking if the hot pan full of something on the granite bench was anything to go by.