Page 14 of Damaged Billionaire Daddy (The Lanes Series #1)

Chapter fourteen

Richard

I couldn’t believe my ears. Most of the women I’d dated would have been delighted with the dress and had raptures over it. She sounded as if she was afraid to touch it.

But when she finally called back, she said it fit perfectly, including the green satin ballet flats. She was such a bitty little thing that I’d hesitated over the choice of shoe, but we were going to be standing a lot, and probably dancing.

There was no point in making her miserable by having her balance on top of a pair of stilts. Momentarily, I wondered if I could get her to do that sexy dance she’d indulged in the night I met her.

No, probably not — not in that dress.

* * *

I had a heck of a time waiting until the end of the week. But I managed.

Of course, the weather picked this week to rain, demonstrating that sunny California wasn’t always so sunny. It was perfectly capable of dumping half the Pacific Ocean and maybe even part of the Atlantic on the southern end of California.

I was concerned about what the rain would do to that dress, but that was the least of my worries. We would be dancing at this event, and rain brought out the very worst part of my football injuries, especially my artificial knee and the pin in my hip.

I wanted to stroll in, show off the prettiest girl in all the fifty states and leave that prick of a bridegroom and every other male in attendance wishing they were the lucky man getting to squire her around. Oh, and it wouldn’t hurt my feelings at all to put this bride in the shade.

She’d stood me up at the altar, and now had the gall to invite me to the wedding. The official wedding. As I understood it, they went straight to a Las Vegas marriage chapel. She didn’t even change her dress.

With all this in mind, I had Caleb drive so I could stretch my legs out on the trip. It would take us at least two hours to get there. Should I get a hotel room and plan to change clothing there?

Nah. I was already putting out enough money to rent that dress. I hoped it would live up to my expectations. I wished I had been able to see Kandis in it before today.

I needn’t have worried. When Caleb brought my spacious limousine to a stop on the Quinn’s driveway, she was waiting on the porch. She looked as if she was floating as those dainty little ballet flats scampered down the steps.

The velvet top part of the gown hugged her hips, waist, and bosom like a lover’s embrace. The wide scoop neckline modestly concealed her breasts but showed off her lightly muscled shoulders and slender neck to perfection.

Drape sleeves that were as delicate as a dragonfly’s wings fluttered from her shoulders, meeting in the back to form a light cape. They were caught up at her wrist with those amazingly expensive jade buttons.

And what those buttons did! Wow. They marched in a line down her front, accentuated the swell of her bosom above the perfectly toned plane of her stomach, drew the eye of the beholder from her beautiful face and then pulled it downward to a V that pointed to other regions.

Heat began to pool in my loins, remembering the rich, feminine scent of those “other regions.”

The skirt billowed out around her as she hurried down the walk.

She looked as if one of her grandmother’s flowers had come unmoored from its stem and was fluttering toward me.

The effect was devastating. I wanted to grab her up right then and there, run back into that tidy little room of hers and . . .

But then she was at the car. Caleb was opening the door, and helping her in, making sure that all parts of her silken draperies were inside before he closed the door.

“Well?” she asked. “Does the dress live up to your expectations?”

My mouth was dry. I rolled my tongue around in it and swallowed hard, trying to find words. “Yeah,” I replied. “I’d say that it does, and you wear it well.”

She made a face at me. “It’s floofy,” she said. “I could do with about three fewer layers of chiffon. The bodice is nice, and the beads and buttons are delightful. I do thank you for choosing ballet flats.”

She picked up some layers of fluff, stuck up one foot in a most unladylike fashion, and wiggled it to show off the slipper.

I could see what she couldn’t. The clouds of drifting silk framed her, like Venus rising up out of the sea.

I imagined Kandy on the half shell, minus the bodice and buttons.

Speaking of buttons, I was going to bust some if I didn’t get my mind off what was underneath those layers of silk.

Just a few more minutes of feasting my eyes, and I was going to be advertising my interests, big time.

I decided to tease her, just to break the mood that was building between us. “Didn’t your mom teach you how to sit like a lady?” My voice came out rough and husky. What the heck? I was responding to her like a kid with his junior prom date.

She got a wicked little glint in her eye. “Them’s fightin’ words, pardner,” she quipped, mimicking a certain wild, west hero. “I’m a wild west pioneer, and I’ll sit however I darned well please.”

She hiked the froth of chiffon up to her knees and placed both her dainty slippers on the air conditioner vent that ran along the base of the privacy wall between driver and passengers.

Her ankles were delicate and trim. For the first time I understood why ankles were once considered erotic.

Nice as they were, it wasn’t the ankles.

It was the implication of the knees above them, and what lay a little farther north of that.

Why was I responding this way? Never in all my life had I found an ankle erotic! To cover my confusion, I opened the mini-fridge that was tucked on my side of the vehicle. “Wine?” I asked.

“In this dress?” She shook her head. “I’d spill it on myself, for sure.

She had a point, and it wouldn’t do to ruin my plan before we even got started. “I got just the thing,” I said. I dug into a compartment concealed in the comfortable arm rest and took out a blue and white checkered plastic tablecloth.

It was sized to cover a large picnic table, which might have been a little overkill. But it would serve as a giant bib to protect the expensive, rented dress. Maybe I should have bought it. Then I could have sent it home with her so no one else would ever wear it.

I spread the tablecloth over her. “That should keep the dress safe,” I said. “I’ve got some bagels and lox in here, pecan sandies, canapes, and white grapes. I put in a bottle of white for the trip down, and red for the ride back.

“Sure. One glass then,” she agreed. “Do you have any cheese? And maybe some crackers?”

“Sure,” I said. I hoped she was that easy to please for the whole weekend. I dug into my cache of goodies and pulled out an unopened box of snack crackers, then rummaged in the mini fridge for the goat cheese I kept there.

When my old injuries ached too much and I was taking pain meds, the soft Vermont specialty cheeses and plain old butter crackers sat easier on my abused stomach than burgers and fries.

I pulled out the goodies and offered her a choice of cheese rolled in dried blueberries or rosemary. She selected the blueberries, and I poured half a cup of wine into a plastic wine glass. Not really classy, but crystal wasn’t safe in a car.

Kandis nibbled at the cheese, an expression of bliss spreading over her face.

Her stomach rumbled, and she giggled. “I think I forgot to eat. I was so nervous about getting something on the dress.” She took a bite of cracker, another nibble of the cheese, then licked some of the crumbs of cheese off her fingers.

They were long, delicate fingers with almond shaped nails that were either innocent of nail polish or coated with a protective clear film.

Her pink tongue chased an errant blueberry, catching it just before it dropped off the side of her hand.

She looked at the glass of wine, realizing that she would have to put something down or grow a third hand.

She looked so pitiful, I chuckled. I just could not help it. Her soft gray-green eyes had taken on nearly the same shade as the jade buttons. There were no tears, her lower lip didn’t tremble. But there was only so far a gentleman could push such a determined stiff upper lip.

I touched a button, and a small table folded out of the dividing wall. She set the crackers down on the table but did not relinquish the cheese.

I handed her the wine, and she inhaled the aroma of it, then sipped at it delicately. “Hank Dumont’s,” she said. “The pressing was about ten years ago. It’s a respectable year, and it is good, but not as good as Pop’s red.”

“No,” I agreed, because her grandfather’s wine was hearty, robust, and tasted like the hills on a summer day. Somewhat like his granddaughter, now that I thought about it.

Kandis nibbled some more of the cheese, the tip of her tongue licking a blueberry off her upper lip, and it was almost more than I could take.

I felt ready to explode. I wanted her. I wanted her now, and be damned to the dress. But she wasn’t that experienced.

Our first time had made that clear. And even though I’d spent some time educating her, she still had an innocence about her that was unexpectedly appealing. I corked the bottle, tucked it back in the fridge, then leaned over and kissed the blueberry stain on her lip.

She looked at me with those innocent eyes, a little startled. Then she kissed me back. She might not have been experienced in all ways, but it was clear she’d put in some practice kissing. Beyond that, she brought a sincere hunger to tasting my mouth that was erotic beyond belief.

I slid my hand under the tablecloth and past the frothy barrier of the skirt. She was right. There was enough fabric there for ten dresses, and way too much of it at the moment. But I persevered, my questing digits making their way through the defensive hedge.

I glanced up just in time to catch an expressive eye-roll from Caleb as he activated the privacy screen. My hand found stockings and a garter belt. Teasingly, I undid one garter.

Her eyes grew wild, and she tossed back the wine, having a presence of mind enough to set the glass down on the table.

“What are you doing?” she gasped, as my fingers spidered their way past stocking and found soft smooth flesh.

“Should I stop?” I asked, pausing my hand scant inches from my goal. Gods, I wasn’t sure I could stop, but I waited for her answer.

“No,” she said. Then, “Yes! What about the gown?”

“Fuck the gown!” I undid another garter, found a silky wisp of panties, and slid them down, hobbling her thighs. She was wet, so hot. “Last chance,” I said, slipping two fingers into that warm, moist cavern that was calling to me. Tight muscles closed around my fingers.

“I promised anytime, anywhere,” she gasped, arching to meet my hand, trying to open herself to me in spite of the panties.

That was all it took. I had permission, and I gave in to the insistence of my lower member. It was like a dive into paradise.

She was more than ready and tried to angle her hips to accept all of me.

I had intended to hold back, but there was something about her warmth, the softness of the velvet, the slippery drift of silk.

I was lost in a sea of sensation, keeping only enough sense to hold myself up off her enough not to crush her with my weight.

The elastic on her panties snapped, and she rose up against me, welcoming me, her legs pulling me in deeper. We caught a fierce, savage rhythm, kissing like mad things, and in minutes or an eternity we both reached a shuddering climax.

We clung to each other for a moment, lost in that haze where nothing matters but the most primordial dance of all.

Then she broke the spell. “Where are we going?”

Memory came crashing in on me. “We are going to my best friend’s wedding. He’s marrying my ex-fiancée.”

“A wedding? There will be people? Those people? Richard!” She struggled to sit up.

“Hold on,” I said, handing her some napkins to help clean up. “Let’s see if we can preserve at least some of my deposit.”

“Your deposit! You asshole! We’re going to walk into a church full of people, rumpled and smelling . . .”

“As if I got lucky,” he said, kissing her. “All you have to do is cling to my arm and look at me like I’m the best thing since sliced bread.”

Then she got it. “Your best friend and your ex-fiancée.” She began to grin wickedly. “So, I should looked just a little rumpled?”

“Just a little,” I agreed. “But not too much. Charmingly sexy, not ravaged.”

Her grin got wider, and we both burst out laughing. Oh, vengeance was going to be sweet!