The Temptation of a Good Man

A knock on the door interrupted her thoughts. On leaden feet, Celeste made her way across the thick carpet, past the four-post bed and antique dresser.

When she opened the door, her stomach felt as if it dropped ten stories. Roarke stood there, his face lacking the warmth to which she’d grown accustomed during their brief time together. His cold gaze met hers, rooting her to the spot.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

“What do you think I’m doing here?” he responded. “Are you going to let me in?”

“It’s not a good idea.” An invisible fist squeezed tightly at her throat. These were not the type of circumstances under which she wanted to see him again.

His face hardened, and his voice turned raw. “You think I don’t know that?”

He didn’t move, waiting, until she stepped aside and allowed him in.

Once inside, he stood with his back to her after she closed the door. Conflicted, her emotions vacillated between happiness and trepidation. She had cradled the memories of their night together like a secret cache she could bring out and enjoy whenever she needed a boost. She’d thought about him often and had longed to see him again. But not like this. Not with the accusatory look in his eyes.

He faced her. “What did my brother tell you about our relationship?”

“Not much.” She stood with her hands clasped in front of her, not sure what to do with them, not sure what to do with her entire body, really, because of the surreal situation. She wanted to touch him, to run her hands over a muscular chest she’d grown to know well, to fall into his arms and hear his easy laughter once more instead of the angry diatribe she feared he would soon direct at her.

“Probably because we don’t have much of one.”

Easy to figure out. “Why not?”

“Ask my brother.” A sarcastic laugh and shake of his head followed. “You—you’re a piece of work. You deserve an Oscar for your performance last week. I asked you, point-blank, if you were in a relationship, and you said no.” His angry eyes raked her from head to toe, filled with nothing approaching the seductive warmth from Friday night. Her fingers tightened around each other. “People like you make me sick. You run around satisfying your own physical lusts, and to hell with everyone else and how it affects them.”

Shocked, Celeste said, “No, that’s not what happened. I’m not the kind of person you think I am. I—”

“Don’t bother with your explanation. Do you really think I give a damn?”

She sucked a painful breath into compressed lungs. “No, I’m sure you don’t. Are you going to tell him?”

With a bark of bitter laughter, Roarke shook his head in disgust. “Is that all you can think about? How much longer can you continue the lie so my brother doesn’t know the kind of woman you truly are? Don’t worry, I won’t say a word. I won’t let anything ruin my sister’s wedding, and I won’t let you forge a deeper rift between Derrick and me. As far as I’m concerned, what happened between us never took place.”

Their night together had been excellent, earth-shattering. Unlike him, she couldn’t pretend it never happened. She’d gone to the university’s Web site to read his bio, and after Googling him, she found links to articles he’d written about astronomy and physics. She couldn’t get him out of her mind and had lost count of the number of times she’d pulled up his online image.

“Thank you.”

“I’m not doing it for you!” The words seemed to be torn from him, and his anger made her insides quiver in distress. He advanced on her and stopped a few paces away. “How did it work? You planned to seduce a man, and I happened to be the fool who came along and walked right into your trap? Ensnared by the high heels, the short little dress, and the sexy voice . . .”—he swallowed hard—“the sexy voice that makes a man wonder what it sounds like when you’re screaming his name? Derrick and I don’t get along, but he doesn’t deserve this. Did you think about him even once when you were clawing my back at the hotel?”

His harsh words stung since nothing could be further from the truth. She’d donned the clothes to be attractive, yes, but he suggested behavior far more salacious than she’d intended. Celeste hadn’t been out trolling for sex, and she resented the charge that she had been.

“Did you really want me thinking about him while I was having sex with you?” she shot back. Her taunt was like brandishing a red flag at an angry bull. A muscle in his jaw pulsed, and his nostrils flared. She half expected to see smoke drift below his nose. Before he could speak, she continued. “We’re both adults, and we both got what we wanted.”

“So, what, you were just looking for a good time? It could have been Lucas, or even Xander, right? He’s married, but that probably doesn’t matter to someone like you.”

“I don’t sleep with married men. For the record, we were two consenting adults, and it was one night.”

“It wasn’t just one night!” He looked about to explode. “It was all night. We couldn’t get enough of each other, or did you forget that part?”

She couldn’t forget, and every word he said was true.