Courting Disaster
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“It looks rather deserted, don’t you think?” asked Oliver Wentworth, squinting in the direction of the empty pasture, and Demetri tried to see the stables through Oliver’s eyes.
Oh, yeah, the grounds of the Preston homestead were impressive. A thousand acres, perfect for the Thoroughbred horses that were being trained there. At one time, there had been over five hundred horses stabled on the premises. Today the numbers were dwindling. The practice track stood silent, only a few horses wandering in the pasture, grazing quietly.
Demetri took it all in, and shook his head sadly. He didn’t want to see Quest through Oliver’s eyes.
Next to him, Oliver leaned against the wooden fence and looked around, completely unimpressed. “So this is what a horse farm looks like?” he asked.
“Normally Quest is a little busier,” Demetri answered, feeling the need to defend the proud stables because of course, soon “Oliver” would be stabling horses here, as well, but they had a long way to go, and Demetri was going to have to work this slowly. Oliver was from England, and his idea of horses ran toward polo ponies and fox hunts, not Kentucky Thoroughbreds.
At first, Oliver hadn’t wanted to come to the barbecue, but Demetri had casually mentioned that there might be women there—single, attractive and lonely women—which immensely perked up Oliver, who was tall and golden haired, with a playboy’s eye.
When Oliver had made the team last year, the press had kidded that Demetri was like an older brother to him—a lousy older brother. People expected a lot from the elder sibling. They expected responsibility, maturity, vigilance and watchfulness. Demetri had none of those qualities. He never had, and he wished that people would stop expecting it from him. No matter how wild his antics, or how reckless his driving, they still expected more. Idiots. At one time, he’d had a younger brother, Seth. Demetri had come up short for Seth, and he hoped that Oliver wasn’t watching too closely, because he worried that someday he would come up short for Oliver, as well.
Demetri had yet to tell Oliver his grand plan to have Oliver stable some Thoroughbreds at Quest, because Oliver’s first priority was always Oliver, and Demetri had yet to figure out an angle, or possibly a debt obligation, which he could hold over Oliver’s head. But he would. Eventually.
Oliver grinned. “Fascinating, now can we go have dinner?”
“You’re hungry?” Demetri felt vaguely disappointed that Oliver hadn’t gone all cowboy at the sight of horses. It seemed…un-American, which, considering Oliver was British, wasn’t a total surprise. Still, Demetri had hoped.
“I’m not hungry for food, old man. I’m only here for the women.”
Demetri slapped him on the back, not hungry, either—except for her.
Elizabeth.
A smile crossed his face, and he could feel the burn inside him. “Watch and learn, Oliver. Watch and learn.”
It took a foolish woman’s heart to skip a beat when she saw six-foot-something worth of trouble walk out onto the manicured lawn. The barbecue dinner for Amanda and Robbie had gone along smooth as molasses, but then he walked outside, and Elizabeth found herself looking, which turned into ogling, which turned into lusting, and it was all downhill from there.
Dressed in dark jeans, exactly like ninety-nine percent of the other men, he still stood out. He was handsome, but there were other nice-looking men here, too. No, there was something distinctly different about Demetri Lucas. Some dangerous song that called to every woman in the place, some unspoken melody that played havoc with the female senses. Greece is where the gossip sites had said he was born, and now Elizabeth understood the appeal of exotic, foreign men.
His face was proud and arrogant, as if he didn’t care what anyone thought, and Elizabeth mused to herself that well, if you looked like that, you didn’t have to care, because the women were already lapping it up in spades. She could tell. They’d walk by him, a flirty gleam in their eyes, hoping to earn a smile or even better a touch, but Mr. Demetri Lucas was too busy looking at Elizabeth.
There was a dark gleam in those appraising eyes, as though she were some prime piece of horseflesh, rather than the bubble-brained woman who smashed up his car.
What was even worse than that was the shiver in her arms, the compulsive need to lick her lips and the general twitch under her skin that made her nervous as a twelve-year-old.
Frankly, that wasn’t quite the truth. That wicked gleam made her feel every single bit of her twenty-eight years, reminding Elizabeth that she was long past puberty, knew the real story about the birds and the bees and had woman parts that were designed to fit a man’s parts—perfectly. Although she’d recorded a few songs that delved into the shadowy mystery of passion, they’d been written by someone else, because Elizabeth had never felt the burn herself. She had never known that long lick of desire between her shoulder blades. Never truly felt that heavy throb between her thighs.
Until now.
Restlessly she stalked around the yard like a stray dog looking for a place to land. She moved from one place to another, always trying to escape the magnetic draw of his eyes, but never quite succeeding. Elizabeth pulled up a lawn chair and talked with Melanie, with Uncle Thomas, and Aunt Jenna, chattering like a blue jay, all nonsense, because if she didn’t talk, she’d find herself looking in his direction, checking to see if he was still watching.
Which he was.
Elizabeth shivered again.
Oliver was already in his element at the party. The junior driver for Sterling Motor Cars was standing next to Demetri, and in less than an hour, he’d met one long-legged blonde, one brunette with sultry eyes and one redhead with pouty red lips. Still he wasn’t satisfied. Oliver loved them all with passion rarely seen in Britain, his stunts nearly, but not quite, eclipsing Demetri.
From across the way, Hugh met his eyes, and Demetri nodded once, lifting his beer. If Hugh had noticed the way Demetri’s attention kept slipping toward Elizabeth, he showed no sign of it. In the large crowd, it was unlikely, and Demetri’s attention slipped toward her once again.
Oliver saw where Demetri was looking, and nudged him in the ribs. “Do you know who that one is?”
Demetri frowned. “She’s one of the Prestons,” he said, sounding as if he knew exactly who she was.
“It’s Elizabeth Innis. Country-and-western singer. Her last eight records went platinum. Pity she’s not your type,” commented Oliver, his wandering eyes firmly fixed in Elizabeth’s direction.
“I didn’t know I had a type,” said Demetri, stepping in between Oliver’s wandering eyes and the country-and-western singer that Hugh—who was his friend—had warned him off.
Oliver sidestepped Demetri neatly. “That white dress isn’t just for show. Pure as the lamb, but eyes that promise so much more. Sexy, but innocent enough to drive a man wild with anticipation. The advertisers have been after her in droves since she first went platinum, but she consistently tells them no. I think even Valencia was trying to get her to sell some toothpaste or shampoo or something. She told them no, too.”
“Definitely not my type,” said Demetri with a regretful sigh, but wishing he could change types—for a little while.
Oliver grinned as if he could read his mind. “What a shame. Why, if you were to hook up with someone like her, we’d have sponsors plying us with money left and right. Advertisers love that happily-ever-after fairy-tale world that she sings about.”
“Why don’t you go into advertising?” asked Demetri, because Oliver lived to manipulate the press, always thinking of new and better ways to play games. At twenty-two, Oliver was too young to know that the man who lived by the media, died by the media. Demetri knew it, only he usually didn’t care.
“I hate the pesky buggers, but a man has to survive, and until I get your notoriety, then I’ll content myself with my little machinations.”
“That’s fame, not notoriety,” corrected Demetri.
“You say tomato, I say, how do they say it in Kentucky? Horse pucky. Now, if you took up with a woman like that, it would benefit the team immensely,” said Oliver, nodding back in Elizabeth’s direction.
Demetri shook his head regretfully, his eyes never leaving Elizabeth. “When I look at her, I’m not thinking about a PR opportunity.”
Oliver quirked a golden brow. “Even better.”
Demetri knew Oliver’s bent for trouble, and he felt the need to intervene. Prudent. Sensible. Responsible. “No, Oliver.”
Demetri’s teammate watched Elizabeth, a wicked gleam in his eyes, and he heaved an exaggerated sigh. “If you won’t, then maybe I should,” he said, with just enough lust in his voice to make Demetri look twice.
“Stay away from that one,” warned Demetri.
Oliver only smiled.
Chapter Three
The late-afternoon sun provided a fitting setting for the couple, poking gilded holes through the clouds sending yellow sunbeams playing on the lawn, until it finally settled down low over the horizon. After that, the air turned a little cooler, and people filtered inside the house, where there was plenty of room. The wedding rehearsal was all through, nothing left to be done but have a good time.
A lively band played in the corner, and bubbles frothed from a silver champagne fountain in the center of the room. However, Elizabeth was too nervy to dance or drink. She had thought she had managed to escape the spider’s web, but exactly when she felt most safe, she bumped into a long, hard thigh, and the temperature notched up three hundred degrees. She didn’t even have to turn around. She knew. She hadn’t planned on giving Mr. Demetri Lucas the satisfaction, but then he laughed at her, deep, with a huskiness that was best described as criminally sexy.
Curious as a cat bent on suicide, she turned, not quite managing to stop the moonstruck sigh.
Dang.
“Imagine that,” he said. “Crashing into me again? It’s becoming a habit. Or fate?”
Elizabeth cocked her head, staring up at him, locking her knees so she wouldn’t embarrass herself and swoon. This was silly. He was a man. A mere man. She frowned, at the moment not caring what her stylist said about premature wrinkles. If ever there was a time for forbidding frowns, this was it.
When he grinned at her like that, a momentary flash of teeth, she felt something stop inside her, and she hoped it wasn’t her heart. That would be bad.
For the devil, he sure had a nice mouth. A nice, firm mouth. A kissing mouth, she thought, and then quickly tamped the image back down. None of that, Elizabeth.
If only he wouldn’t look at her, the dark eyes trapping her, hot waves of want spiraling inside her. She’d had men look at her with desire before, but this felt personal. Way too personal. She could feel that look in places that he had no business affecting.
Elizabeth summoned up the forbidding frown once again. “If you’ll excuse me, I believe I see someone I need to talk to,” she muttered, completely lacking in manners. She didn’t think he’d mind.
“But not me?” he asked, obviously minding.
She stopped and gave in to temptation, looking her fill, as she’d been wanting to do all night. Not surprisingly, that only made things worse.
Truth be told, this was the most dangerous-looking man she’d ever met in her entire life. The boldness in his dark gaze, the wicked twinkle that said, “what the hell,” better than words ever could. That same devilish twinkle fired her blood, and the phrase “what the hell” tumbled from her own mind, too.
There was danger in him, and she knew it. He was fairly humming with it, like a live wire destined to burn the living daylights out of anyone that dared to touch. But oh, she wanted to touch. Her body ached with that want. Words that she’d never even known were suddenly haunting her lips. Pictures she’d never dreamed of before flashed behind her eyes, tempting her with sins that she’d never ached to commit. It would be easier if she couldn’t see those same pictures of those very same sins reflected in the warm russet depths of his eyes.
Sweet mercy, those were fascinating eyes.
It took her a second to breathe again. “No. Definitely not you,” she answered, trying to put as much certainty as possible in her voice, but it didn’t sound certain enough.
“What a shame,” he said, still watching her with that bold gaze, and something inside her started to melt. Slowly, treacherously…and stupidly.
“Isn’t it, just?” she answered, and without another word— which was a true testament to her fears—she ran.
After that, Demetri had actually planned on leaving her alone. He sat through endless toasts, and didn’t even glance in her direction. It wasn’t easy because one heated look from her had shot straight to his groin, and made him ache ever since. However, trying to be on his best behavior, he had counted and recounted the hundred and one reasons he should stay away. First and foremost, Hugh was his friend. A man he owed a tremendous debt. A man he was here to help—not hurt by tangling with a lamb. He normally didn’t mix with “lambs”; they were too complicated, and Demetri didn’t have time for complicated. His life was too fast, the racing circuit too demanding a mistress.
And then there was that dreamy light in those bright blue eyes that scared the hell out of him.
Everything was going along well, until after dinner, and he saw her dancing with Oliver—the junior driver formerly known as his friend.
Demetri couldn’t help himself.
She’d changed from the virginal white dress she’d worn earlier, and this new one killed off brain cells left and right. It was green, a short jade green silk that was cut low in the front and back, flowing around her hips like water. It was a dress meant to be pulled off inch by luscious inch, and his fingers flexed, greedy and more than up to the task.
As they danced around the floor, Demetri could see she was light on her feet, the green fabric catching the candlelight and reflecting its glow. He tried to tell himself that of course she could dance well, every move was probably professionally choreographed. Somehow it didn’t help. All he wanted to do was touch her, and see if she was real, or some vision that had stepped out of his boyhood fantasies. And that was the biggest part of the problem. She wasn’t some X-rated goddess that a man tumbled into bed with one night and then forgot the next.
Elizabeth Innis was Hugh Preston’s niece.
But even with all the alarms flashing inside him, he couldn’t help it. She was irresistible.
Once more, damning the fates, Demetri tapped on Oliver’s shoulder. “You don’t mind if I cut in,” asked Demetri, more of an order than a request. Seniority had its privileges after all.
His teammate released Elizabeth—reluctantly. Suck it up, Oliver. “Not at all,” Oliver answered.
“Excuse me. Did anybody here think that I might mind?”
Demetri took Elizabeth in his arms, and swept her up in the lilting strains of the “Tennessee Waltz.” “No,” he said, getting used to the way her eyes lit up when she was mad. “One dance for running into my car. It’s the least you can do.”
“I absolve myself of all responsibility, because your sort of driving— Well, it’s a train wreck waiting to happen.”
When she talked, it was like warm honey, and he could all too easily imagine what that voice would sound like, whispering in bed. His arms tightened around her, his fingers sliding over the smooth skin of her shoulder, just once, just to know.
“I told myself I was going to stay away,” he admitted, willing himself to remember how to dance. “Hugh told me to stay away.”
“Are you waiting for me to tell you to stay away, too?” she asked, never missing a step.
“Would you?”
She paused. One second. One momentary hesitation, before answering, “Of course.” However, she didn’t pull away, and they danced together, Demetri expertly leading her around the other dancers. One hand memorized the curve of her hip, the warm clasp of her fingers in his other hand fitting as if it were custom-made. Something was making him dizzy, the tempo of the music, the snap of her eyes, the full pout to her lips, he wasn’t sure what. In the blur of that moment, the hundred and one reasons to stay away from her—reasons that he had carefully recited to himself all evening—faded into nothing. There was no way in hell he was walking away. Not tonight.
When the song came to a close, the crowds drifted one way, and Demetri lifted two glasses of champagne from a passing waiter. Then he guided her through the tall glass doors that led out to the sanctity of the veranda, his hand pressed firmly against the soft skin of her back, shamefully taking advantage of another chance to touch her.
Outside, the moonlight flickered through the trees, bathing the veranda in a soft glow. Demetri handed her a glass, then clinked it once, toasting to absolutely nothing.
“What are you afraid of?” he said, as if he didn’t know. The dreamy eyes narrowed to sapphire slits of death. He didn’t even mind.
“You don’t have one single move that hasn’t been tried before. Don’t think I can’t take care of myself.”
But he could do such a better job, Demetri thought to himself, studying the full upper lip, and the tiny depression there that was made to be savored. “You’re Hugh’s niece?”
“Great-niece, but not by blood. My aunt Jenna married into the Preston family, but he doesn’t mind when I call him uncle, and I protect him just like he was my own,” she answered, eyeing him over the rim of the glass. There was suspicion and disdain, but there was a flicker of other things in those eyes, too. Things that gave a man hope.
“I’ve been trying to help them,” he told her, hoping to erase some of the suspicion. “Just like you.”
“But they turned you down. Smart of them,” she answered, suspicion still the emotion du jour.
“Do you always make up your mind so fast?” he asked, as if he didn’t live and die by snap judgments as a race-car driver.
“Not normally, no, but your track record isn’t so stellar, Mr. Lucas.”
“You know?”
“Maybe,” she said, shrugging carelessly.
“Why didn’t Thomas and Hugh accept your offer?” he asked, needing to talk about her, not his past indiscretions. His past wasn’t interesting. She, on the other hand, was fascinating.
“They don’t want my help,” she answered quietly, the perpetually smiling mouth pulled into a frown. Demetri wanted the smile back in place.
“Ah…”
“And you don’t need to be ahhing here, like you understand everything, because you don’t.”
“Why don’t you tell me?” he invited, because he wanted to understand everything about her.
She studied him for a minute, and he must have passed some test, because she shook her head, resigned. “Do you really want to know why I’m mad?”
“I’m dying to know.”
Then she started to pace around the space, high heels clicking on the stones, green skirts twirling, exposing a long length of leg. His attention was torn between watching the sway of her hips and the restless way she circled the champagne flute in the air. “I have tried every which way to get my family to take money, ever since I heard about the problems with Leopold’s Legacy, but nobody will listen. A few years back I had…some financial issues, and the Prestons wanted to help. I told them all no, that I didn’t need it. I could take care of myself. I wasn’t some poor cousin looking for charity handouts. And now, well, who knew that they’d listen to my own words so well. I have money, but oh, no, I’m not in the horsey business, I’m in the ‘music’ business. Elizabeth, she’s just a simple little thing.” She downed her glass in one gulp, and he handed her his.
“They turned me down, too. That should make you feel better.” She polished off his glass, too. “And that’s the only reason I’m still dancing with you, Mr. Lucas.”
“Technically, we’re not still dancing.”
“Don’t get all particular on me. I get enough of that when I’m working, thank you very much.” She lifted herself up on the edge of one of the wooden railings, crossing one delectable leg over the other, exposing more thigh than he thought she realized. Wisely he didn’t say a word.
“Sorry,” he answered, trying to keep his gaze firmly fixed on her face.
“Apology accepted,” she said, her mind still firmly fixed on helping her family.
“Do you know your way around Louisville?” he asked, his mind firmly fixed on other things.
“Some.”
“Enough to show me around?”
She shook her head once. “I bet there’re a lot of women that would be interested in showing you around, Mr. Lucas. Fast women who aren’t a thing like me. I’m not your type.”
He crossed his arms across his chest, sensing a depressing change in the infamous Lucas luck with women. “Why does everyone keep telling me I have a type?”
“If the shoe fits….” she answered, one heel bobbing up and down.
“I’m trying to reform,” he said. It was not quite the truth, but if he thought it’d earn him a dinner, drinks and long hours in her bed, he’d be willing to try.
“Ha!” Her arms crossed her chest, plumping her breasts nicely.
“Don’t be so skeptical,” he answered, his eyes glued to her face as if his life depended on it. Currently he thought it might.
She watched him, noticed that his gaze kept dipping down. “Sorry. Skeptical is my nature.”
Reluctantly, he looked up from her cleavage. “No, that’s not even close to your nature. You don’t have a skeptical bone in that luscious body—excuse me, that slipped out, but it’s true. The nonskeptical part. Actually, the luscious part is, too.” Demetri stopped. “Sorry.”
She started to smile. “That’s all right. I liked you better, then.”
Humility seemed to work with her. He would remember that. “Why can’t I take you to dinner?”
“I don’t think that’d be wise.”
“Why not?” he answered, although he knew there were one hundred and one reasons that it wouldn’t be wise. That wouldn’t stop him from trying.
“Trust me,” she replied, and he knew people did. Contrary to trusting him, people would trust her with their life.
“You crash into my life, and one dance is all I’m going to get?” he asked, not hiding the disappointment in his voice.
She nodded.
From the distance, he could hear the sounds of music once again, but he didn’t want to go back to the crowd. He could stay here forever. Alone with her, listening to the soft music of her voice, drowning in the teasing light of her eyes. Forever wasn’t normally a word in Demetri’s vocabulary. He drove fast cars for a reason. When the world went by in a blur, you never knew what you missed, and Demetri had a feeling that he missed a lot. Yet sitting here, doing nothing more than talking with this woman, made him want to slow down.
“I don’t know if I’ll survive with only one dance,” he told her, the words harmless enough, but deep down, he wondered if it was the truth. He’d never felt this before. This obsessive need to do nothing more than sit in her presence and breathe.
“You certainly turn a lady’s head.”
“But not yours?”
The teasing light in her eyes dimmed. “Not enough,” she said. There was some imaginary line in the room, some piece of rope between them, and she was determined not to cross it.
“What if I made you a deal?” he asked softly.
“I don’t make deals with the devil,” she said, obviously seeing temptation for what it was.
“There you go again with the name-calling.”
“If the shoe fits…”
He glared, and she had the grace to look ashamed—a little. “Tell me what you’re proposing, and it had better be aboveboard.”
He wanted her across the line, and there was an easy way to get what he wanted, and he wasn’t above using it. “You want to help your family?”
She angled her head, watching him carefully. “Yes.”
“So do I. We should team up.”