Early to Bed Read online

  "Not a problem."

  It occurred to her then that no one in her family had ever taken her side or come to her defense the way the Romanos just had, and for a brief moment, she'd felt an odd sense of belonging.

  A bit flustered by the sensation, she turned to the other two men. "And thank you, too."

  "Sam and Drew, I'd like you to meet Lily McNeil."

  Sam and Drew nodded at her in turn, but their eyes were almost as cool as her stepbrother's had been. Neither extended a hand. That was fair. She told herself it was relief she was feeling and not disappointment. "They have to get to work," Tony said. For a second neither of them moved. Then Sam turned to Tony. "I'll call you as soon as I get something."

  "Ditto," said Drew as he turned with Sam and headed toward the revolving doors. "I thought they'd never leave," Tony said in a low tone.

  She couldn't prevent her lips from curving as she turned to him. He was looking at her and not his brothers, and the quiet intensity of his gaze made the breath stop in her throat. On some level, she was aware that people streamed around them, moving into and out of the lobby, but for a second, she had the strangest sensation that time had slowed, narrowing to this moment

  and this man.

  "Who's the man who kissed your hand?" he asked. The question helped her regain her focus and she shifted her gaze to Giles who was moving toward the elevator. "My ex-fiancé, Giles Fortescue."

  Tony's gaze narrowed. "From Fortescue Investments?"

  She nodded.

  "Do you still care for him?"

  The question was so unexpected that Lily answered before she thought. "No." Then, finding that it was true, she turned to Tony again. "No."

  "Good."

  Before she could sense his intention, he gripped her shoulders, urging her upward ever so slightly so that she rose on her tiptoes. Then his mouth covered hers.

  The kiss was everything she remembered—possessive, demanding. And at the same time, his mouth was so soft and fit so perfectly against hers. Pleasure streamed through her. She should push him away. But she couldn't seem to feel her arms. She couldn't feel anything but the warm sense of belonging that had moved through her before. Enticing. Irresistible.

  Then his teeth scraped against her bottom lip and a new round of sensations erupted. Pleasure turned sharp—pinprick explosions of it raced along every nerve ending. Why would she ever consider pushing him away? How could she when he made her feel this way? The heat came next. His hands gripped her shoulders, his mouth moved on hers. They touched nowhere else, and yet she could have sworn that flames licked along her skin and flared deep in her center. Nothing, no one had ever made her feel this...wanted. And she wanted the feeling to last....

  As suddenly as he'd begun, Tony broke off the kiss. His hands dropped to his side and Lily found herself standing on legs she couldn't feel.

  "We'd better take this somewhere more private," Tony murmured.

  Later, she would wonder what she might have said if she hadn't just that moment caught sight of Jerry staring at her through the glass entrance doors. A short distance away, Tony's brothers stood on the curb, and they were watching the scene, too.

  "No."

  "No?"

  "No." It was even harder to say the second time. She didn't think her mind had ever been more at odds with her body. But she was the new Lily. And she was supposed to know what she wanted. "I'm not going anywhere private with you."

  She wasn't going to look at him. If she did, she was almost sure her resolve would collapse. But she could feel him shift his gaze to the entrance doors of the hotel just in time to see Jerry step into a taxi.

  "You're a tough nut to crack, Lily McNeil." Not true, she thought. Tony Romano had gotten through her shell, and he'd just made sure that pretty much everyone knew it.

  "Good thing I'm a patient man," he said as he urged her toward the elevator.

  What she needed was some time to thicken her shell again. Some time to regroup and clean that slate off. And she needed to do it alone. As he nudged her onto the elevator, she said, "I need some time to think." "It won't help." She looked at him then.

  He shrugged. "I've already given it my best shot, and for the life of me, I can't figure out what I'm going to do about what's happening between us."

  Her eyes narrowed. "Well, I'll give it my best shot and I'll let you know."

  He grinned and ran a finger down her nose. "You have a habit of squinting your eyes just before you fire off both barrels. It's cute."

  She had her mouth open ready to fire them off again when the elevator doors slid open.

  "Half an hour", Tony said as he nudged her through the doors , then stepped back. "That's when we're scheduled for our run"

  As the doors of the elevator slid shut, separating them, Lily tried to focus on the bright side. The good news was that Tony was not coming up with her to the penthouse suite. The bad news was that she wanted him to.

  ______5______

  Slipping into the elevator with Lily was something that Tony debated doing right up until the second that the doors slid all the way shut. He might have done it if he hadn't needed to take care of some business before he joined Lily for her run. He'd spoken nothing less than the truth when he'd told his brothers that Lily wasn't involved in any kind of sabotage, but he wasn't at all sure that he could put something like that past her father or her stepbrother. Or someone else?

  There was something hovering around the edges of his memory—something that had been nearly dredged up when Dame Vera had mentioned the Ides of March. He was almost certain that was the day that Lily had first called to talk him into seeing her. That's when he would have heard her voice for the first time. The day planner he kept in his office would help him remember. But first, he needed to talk to Dame Vera and Alistair.

  When he turned and headed toward them, he noted that the teapot had disappeared, and Dame Vera was now gazing intently into her crystal. He moved quickly toward them and seated himself across from her. Whatever she was staring at in the crystal had all of her attention, and for a moment, he hesitated.

  "You're thinking about the Ides of March," she said as she raised her gaze to meet his. "Good."

  "Sometimes, I really wonder about you, Dame Vera," Tony said.

  Behind his paper, Alistair chuckled. "Join the club."

  "That will be quite enough, Alistair," Dame Vera said. "I'd send you away, but Anthony has come to ask us both a favor."

  "How did you—" Tony cut himself off and said, "Never mind. I do need your help."

  Alistair lowered his paper and drew his chair closer. "Something rotten in Denmark, old boy?"

  Tony debated for a moment about how much he should tell them. These two were part of the responsibility that his father had turned over to him with the hotel, and he didn't want to worry them unnecessarily.

  Dame Vera closed her eyes for a moment. "Something about the plumbing."

  "You might as well spill it," Alistair said. "She'll eventually figure it out, anyway."

  "The plumbing problem wasn't just a catastrophe of aging pipes," Tony said, keeping his voice low. "Murphy says someone deliberately and very cleverly cut the pipes."

  "Disaster is near," Dame Vera murmured.

  It might have been a trick of light—a short perhaps in the chandelier that hung from the ceiling, but Tony could have sworn he saw something move in the crystal that sat on the table.

  "What can we do to help?" Alistair asked.

  "First, I want to know if you've noticed anyone in the hotel—someone dressed as a delivery person or a repair person of any kind. Someone you've never seen before."

  Dame Vera and Alistair looked at one another, then turned to Tony and spoke in unison. "The exterminator."

  "He came to my door early yesterday morning, and said that he was doing my suite and all the rooms underneath," Dame Vera said. "I was still in my nighttime attire. I hadn't even had my tea. He told me I had to leave and not return for two hours, so that
the insecticide would have time to fade away."

  Alistair took one of her hands and raised it to his lips. "And we spent a very enjoyable morning together, my dear."

  Vera extracted her hand and turned to Tony. "I accused Alistair of hiring him on purpose as a ploy to get me into his apartment." Alistair raised both hands. "I pleaded innocent, but she didn't believe me."

  "Can you describe him?" Tony asked.

  "I can do better than that." Alistair pulled a pen from his smoking jacket and drew a napkin closer.

  "He's not a bad sketch artist," Vera explained. "If he hadn't made it in acting, he could have been a painter."

  Alistair paused for a moment and winked at Tony. "She should know. She's seen my etchings often enough."

  Because he thought it was prudent, Tony bit back a grin. But he had to agree with Dame Vera's assessment as a face began to take shape on the napkin. "That's the man," Dame Vera announced when Alistair finally lifted his pen.

  "Thanks," Tony said. "I'm going to fax this to Drew, and see if he can come up with a match in one of the mug books down at the precinct."

  "Good idea," Vera said. "What else can we do?"

  "I want the two of you to keep your eyes and ears open. If you see anyone like this exterminator—or any one else—even a guest—who seems to be acting suspicious, let me know."

  Dame Vera's eyes lit up. "Excellent. It's always been a secret dream of mine to be cast in one of the Thin Man movies. Myrna Loy and William Powell always looked like they were having so much fun playing Nick and Nora Charles."

  "It probably had something to do with the vast number of martinis they were always drinking," Alistair said.

  "Sam is sending over a couple of men to keep an eyes out. I'll introduce them to you." Tony rose and then remembered. "About the Ides of March, Dame Vera, can you tell me anything more specific?"

  Vera shook her head. "Lily is the one to ask about that."

  Lily stared at her image in the bathroom mirror. The woman staring back at her was the new Lily—slender and fit in running shorts and a T-shirt that fit like a sec-ond skin. This Lily could have whatever she wanted.

  She had to believe in that. The problem was she had to make sure she remembered what that was. And it wasn't—it couldn't—be Tony Romano. She stole a quick glance at her watch and prayed she could re- member that when she saw him ten minutes from now.

  Ten minutes. That was all she had to regroup. After hurrying into the bedroom, she picked up the pen and message pad that lay on the bedside table. Her island guru had preached writing down your goals. People who did were about ninety percent more certain of achieving them.

  She printed the words. "I want Henry's Place." Then tearing off the page, she climbed up on the bed and placed it in front of her. Once she was in the lotus position, she stared down at the paper, then closed her eyes and pictured the words in her mind. Visualization was also a powerful tool, and she needed all the help she could get. After drawing in a deep breath, she let it out on the count of ten while she formed an image in her mind. She was walking into her father's office, carrying her report on Henry's Place. She could see her father open it, and then he smiled at her. "Good job."

  Those were two words he'd never spoken to her, not even when she'd graduated first in her class at Stanford. And she was so close to hearing him say them. All she had to do was—

  The chiming bells of her cell phone had the image fading from her mind. She pulled the phone from her purse and glanced at the caller ID, then felt a quick skip of panic. Her father. Jerry had wasted no time letting J. R. McNeil know what he'd seen through the glass doors of the lobby. One of these days, she was really going to have to kick her stepbrother. Hard. Drawing in a deep breath, she said, "Hello, Dad." "What in hell do you think you're doing?" "I'm doing what you asked me to do," she said. "I'm getting information on Henry's Place for you."

  There was a beat of silence on the other end of the phone. "Are you sleeping with Romano?"

  J. R. McNeil was not known for beating around the bush. But Lily hadn't been his daughter for twenty-five years for nothing. This time she was one jump ahead of him. She'd already crossed her fingers. "No."

  Of course, technically, she was telling the truth. She was not sleeping with Tony Romano right now. Although they had made love—several times—on the very bed she was sitting on.

  Outside the window, lightning flashed and lit up the darkening sky.

  Wincing a little, Lily began to pleat the edge of the bedspread between her fingers as she listened to a short silence on the other end of the line.

  Then another voice, much fainter, said, "You never should have sent her. She's going to ruin this for us, and we have to have that hotel."

  Lily recognized the speaker—Pamela Langford-McNeil.

  "You have to replace her with Jerry before—"

  The sound was abruptly cut off. Lily knew exactly what her father was doing—pacing back and forth be- hind his desk and frowning. She'd seen him do the same thing the day he'd finally agreed to let her take on the job of making sure that Tony Romano sold Henry's Place to McNeil Enterprises. He always paced when he had to make a decision.

  Pamela would be in front of his desk, her voice controlled but determined, cataloguing all of Lily's past failures. It was a scene she'd witnessed many times before, and her usual reaction had been to run away and try to fight another battle on another day.

  "I don't think you can handle this on your own," her father finally said.

  "Yes, I can," she replied as the pain in her chest sharpened. Would he ever just simply believe in her?

  "Kissing Romano in the lobby. What were you thinking? You're not falling for him, are you?"

  "No." Just the thought brought on another skip of panic. She couldn't be falling for him. She'd only just met him. And slept with him. And she wanted to sleep with again. But that wasn't love.

  "Dammit, Lily, I'm sending Jerry in to help you," he said finally. "This deal is crucial. When I heard you were stuck in Tahiti, I thought it was for the best. We aren't the only ones who want that hotel, and Jerry has more experience. I've brought him up to speed. He's all set to handle this."

  Lily tightened her grip on the phone. She was not going to give way. "We had an agreement. This is my job. Jerry nearly got into a fight with Tony and his two brothers. Did he tell you that?" There was another stretch of silence. "I've already established a friendly rapport with the Romanos." At least with some of them. "Your best bet right now is me." She had all of her fingers crossed as she held her breath. There was another beat of silence. "This is a crucial deal."

  "Dad, I can handle it." Closing her eyes, she tried to ignore the headache that was beginning to pound behind her eyes. One thing she was discovering about the new Lily—she was learning to lie like a pro. "I'll get you what you want."

  Lily counted three beats this time and held her breath.

  "I'm depending on you."

  Before she could reply, her father cut the connection, but she held on to the open phone, just staring down at it. Her father had always been a man of few word Hello, goodbye, how are you, and I love you—those words were simply not part of his vocabulary.

  She sighed as she dropped her head in her hands, The good news was he hadn't fired her or sent Jerry, The bad news was he was depending on her to deliver Henry's Place. Neither made her want to celebrate.

  You can have anything you want.

  The words had barely formed themselves in her mind when she sensed that Tony was there in the room with her. How long had he been there? How much had he heard? Ignoring the panic bubbling away in her stomach, she tried to rerun her conversation. What had she said? "I'm getting information on Henry's Place for you." Not good. "I'll get you what you want." Even worse. As a spy, she would never make the 007 level. James Bond would probably never even choose her as one of his girls. And she couldn't sit here with her head buried in her hands forever.

  "Lily?"

  Glancing up
, she met Tony's eyes, and for a moment the pleasure of seeing him wiped every thought and concern from her mind.

  A black T-shirt fit him like a second skin. Worn gray sweats hugged his hips and only emphasized the length of those lean, muscled legs. The man gave new meaning to the word gorgeous. All she had to do was look at him and she wanted him. It was that simple, that terrifying.

  As her skin heated along with her thoughts, she remembered that she was sitting on the bed they'd made love on only hours earlier. Was he thinking about that too? Was he feeling even part of what she was feeling?

  Even as the questions raced through her mind, Tony moved to the foot of the bed. "What exactly did your father say to you?"

  The words triggered one skip of panic, then a second. The third was far more than a skip. It was a full-blown wave. Was her cover completely blown?

  "Nothing." She dropped her gaze from his as she tucked her cell phone into her purse and edged herself off the side of the bed.

  "He said something." Tony had a pretty good idea what the conversation had been about. Any doubt that she was part of her father's plot to get his hands on Henry's Place had vanished as he'd stood in the doorway and listened to her side of the conversation. He'd deal with that later. Right now he was going to deal with the expression on her face when her father had ended the call. It took him only two steps to circle the bed and reach her. "Whatever he said to you, it made you sad." "He's concerned that I'm not doing my job. That's nothing new."

  He tilted her chin up so that she had to meet his eyes. The mix of fear and sadness had a knot tightening in his stomach. He thought he understood the fear. She was wondering just how long he'd been standing there eavesdropping on her conversation. She definitely had secrets to hide. But he couldn't ignore the sadness. It pulled at him, angered him. She'd looked so forlorn, almost defeated, when she'd finished talking to her father. He'd wanted nothing more than to go to her and take her in his arms.