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A few ladies murmur in agreement. Maryanne Carrington even throws in an approving “Mmmm hmmm.”

  “Honestly? Intelligence. Those girls are easily impressed, thus easy to bed. A bottle of champagne, a limo and it’s pretty much a done deal. They don’t want someone they have to work to seduce. That’s what they have you for.”

  “So they want an easy lay?”

  “Precisely,” I nod.

  “But that doesn’t make sense,” Lacey refutes, shaking her head in disbelief. “We’re their wives. Of course they could come to us for sex whenever they want!”

  “Really?” I cross the threshold of my lectern and stride over to where she stands flustered and unconvinced. I invade her space, stepping in closer than what would be deemed comfortable. But that’s exactly what I need from her: I need her uncomfortable enough to be honest. I need her to see where her fault lies so she has no reason to distrust me. I need her to need me.

  I graze her jaw with the tips of my fingers, stroking the skin from her chin to her ear. She moves into my touch, soaking up my warmth as if she is cold and starving. And in so many ways, she is. Starving for attention, affection. Cold from being left alone and unloved.

  These are feelings I understand. Feelings that I’ve exploited to make me a very rich man.

  “Lacey,” I breathe, low and raspy. “You see him for what he is. You see past the money and the cars and the adoring fans. You see him bare and naked. And that scares him. So instead of facing his cowardice, he fucks little dumb twits to make him feel like more of a man. But you don’t want that, do you?”

  I watch the movements of her slender neck as she swallows before answering. “No. No, of course not.”

  “So you know what you have to do, don’t you? You have to be his little dumb twit. You have to be his whore, his groupie. You have to make him feel like he’s on top of the world when he’s with you.”

  “So you want her to dumb herself down?”

  I look up, and my hand instantly drops to my side, releasing Lacey from my trance. Allison stands, eyes narrowed and lips pursed. Even with aggravation clearly etched in her face, an uninvited sensation snakes up my thighs at the sight of her. I grind my teeth, biting down the unbidden feelings.

  “In ways, yes,” I answer, stepping away from Lacey. I almost feel shameful, as if I shouldn’t be touching this other woman. “The wife drives the ship. She is the puppet master. But in order to maintain a happy home, you must let the man believe that he calls the shots.”

  “Is it not enough that we bear their name and let them dictate our future?” Allison scoffs. “Now we have to pretend to be idiots just so our husbands don’t feel intimidated?”

  I want to tell her how right she is to feel indignant, but that would be a total contradiction to what I know and believe. “More or less.”

  “That’s bullshit. You and I both know it. Tell me, Justice Drake, do dumb girls turn you on? Do you like giggling schoolgirls hanging onto your every word? Does stupidity get you hot?” She’s challenging me, hoping to make me eat my own words. I stare back at her, unshaken and totally in control.

  Well…almost. Less the tightness in the front of my slacks.

  Without breaking eye contact, I step back to stand behind the lectern to hide my semi-erection. “No, Allison. They don’t. But as you pointed out last week, I’m not a part of your world. I’m an outsider, remember?”

  I peg her with a mocking glare, daring her to refute my claim, yet hating the way she’s somehow made me feel the need to prove myself. Who the hell is she to me? She’s a client—another stiff, lonely housewife. A Prada-clad paycheck—nothing more, nothing less.

  Allison doesn’t answer me. Just remains standing, silently smoldering, those animated eyes flickering with disdain. I take pleasure in her reaction, craving more. I want to keep pushing until she finally pushes back.

  I lean forward and rest my elbows on the podium, my eyes trained like a sniper, ready for the kill. “And Mrs. Carr, why do you even care what turns me on? Shouldn’t you be more concerned with what turns on Mr. Carr?”

  I watch as the pink in her cheeks bleed crimson, and her eyes turn dark. “I-I don’t. I wasn’t saying-”

  “Oh? So you don’t care what turns him on?”

  “You’re an asshole,” Allison spews. Then she turns rigidly and stalks out of the room.

  Mission accomplished.

  THE DESERT SKY glows in twilight, bringing with it a cool, relieving breeze. I sit out on the verandah, sipping a beer, while listening to the muffled chatter from inside the main house. I look up and close my eyes, blocking it out. That’s what I do with most of the world. Reality is just white noise.

  “What the hell is your deal?”

  I look up to find Allison hovering over me, angry stars twinkling in her pale eyes.

  “Excuse me?” I ask with a cocked brow and an amused grin.

  “Your deal. Your problem. The reason you act like someone pissed in your Cheerios.”

  I sit up and motion for Allison to take the seat beside me, though she doesn’t flinch. “I understand the sentiment, Mrs. Carr-”

  “Ally, dammit. Ally.”

  “Excuse me, Ally; I understand the sentiment, although I’m not sure what you’re referring to.”

  Completely unmovable, Ally stares daggers from those cerulean eyes—so still I’m not even sure she’s breathing. “So that’s your angle,” she finally smirks. “I get it. You think this crap is funny, don’t you? We’re all just entertainment to you—your very own live reality television. You don’t care about helping us; you just want to hurt us more than we already are.”

  I’m on my feet in the next breath, stealing the cool breeze that whips through her scarlet hair. “Don’t ever question my motives, Allison. And don’t ever fucking think I could hurt you. Ever.”

  Her eyes grow wide at my proximity and my heated declaration, but she doesn’t move. She shares this space, this moment, with me. “Fine. But don’t you ever think I’m here for any other reason than to fix my marriage.”

  This would be the perfect opportunity for her to storm away, fire trailing behind her in a blaze of glory. The proverbial period on her fervent statement. But she stays, matching my earnest glare, hers just as obscure as mine.

  Maybe I’m not the only one being dishonest here. In fact, I know I’m not.

  I take my seat on the lounger and pick up my beer. This time, she sits in the chair beside me. The act is an unspoken truce. We’ll lay our swords down for now.

  “I know you’re not the dick you want people to believe you are,” she says after a long beat passes. I open the cooler beside me and retrieve another beer, handing it to her. She smiles her thanks, and I nod.

  “What makes you think I want people to believe I’m a dick?”

  She shrugs, taking a swig of beer. “I don’t know. Easier that way, I guess. You reject people before they have a chance to reject you.”

  “Hmph,” I snort. “I wasn’t aware you had an interest in psychology. Seems as if I’ve missed something in my research.”

  Ally shakes her head before leaning back on her lounger. “Nothing to do with psychology. Everything to do with experience.”

  We sit for several minutes in companionable silence, enjoying the late summer breeze. The stars shine brighter tonight, revealing shapes and patterns on that giant midnight blue canvas. Even the moon appears bigger, closer than ever before.

  “So tell me, Ally. What did bring you here?”

  She turns her head toward me and offers a pained grin. “I thought you knew all about me.”

  My eyes remain trained on the sky, but I see her. I’ve seen her since the day she strolled into my home and into my life, a halo of fire and eyes birthed from the stars. “I do. But I want to hear you say it.”

  I hear her swallow and then the hushed rustle of fabric as she fidgets with a loose string on her dress. “I thought…I thought if I was what he wanted…I thought if I could be-”

  “But
you are.” I don’t know why I interject. But just the thought of her believing that she is anything less than perfect has my hand tightly locked around my beer bottle. I catch myself and put it down before it shatters in my grip. “I mean…you are what he wants. He married you, didn’t he?”

  “Yeah,” she shrugs. “But of course that doesn’t hold the same connotation as I once thought it did.”

  “Once?”

  She doesn’t answer, but I hear her sigh. Then without rhyme or reason, I reach over and grab the bottle out of her hands, placing it next to mine. “Come on,” I say, climbing to my feet.

  “Huh?”

  I hold my hand out, waiting expectantly for her to take it. And why wouldn’t she? Strange man under the influence of alcohol telling her to follow him without explanation, late at night? Sounds legit.

  Yet, with those crystallized eyes trained on my earnest expression, slowly she places her hand in mine. She’s trusting me without question, though I’ve done nothing to earn such a gift. But like the selfish bastard I am, I take it, pulling her to her feet. My fingers impulsively lace with hers, causing a contradicting mix of alarm and comfort to surge in my veins. I look down at our locked hands as we both pull away.

  “Follow me,” I frown, leading her toward the much smaller guesthouse. I’m breaking another one of my rules: Never bring a housewife into my home.

  “I don’t think I should be here,” Ally says, yet she steps inside, taking in my living quarters. I know what she sees: Bare, white walls, no photographs, no personal touches. Nothing to show who I really am. “How long have you lived here?”

  “About eight years,” I reply, watching her as she tries to school her reaction.

  “Oh. It’s so… clean.” She flashes me a sympathetic smile before looking at the floor.

  I frown. I know what she really means: cold and sterile. And the fact that she feels the need to feel sorry for me, as if I am beneath her, irritates the shit out of me. Here I thought she and I shared a common thread—that we were both misunderstood souls in this world of the fake and phony—when, in reality, she is one of them. She has been all along. And how fucking stupid of me to have thought otherwise.

  I’m about to tell her to take those sad eyes and get the fuck out, when she suddenly looks up at me, a genuinely warm smile on her lips. “Don’t tell anyone,” she says with a chuckle. “But I’m kind of a slob. Seriously. Cleaning is not my strong point. Is Housekeeping part of the syllabus? Because I think I could learn a thing or two from you.”

  I release my aggravation in a relieving breath and turn towards the kitchen to hide my own smile. Shit. Why the hell am I grinning like the damn Cheshire cat? And why do I find her confession so goddamn charming? Like the fact that she’s messy makes her sorta…real?

  Without a word, I go to the freezer and set a carton on the marble counter. Allison looks at the container, then looks up at me and, for a moment, I swear I see tears swimming in her eyes before she quickly blinks them away, shielding her face with a curtain of crimson.

  “You bought me ice cream?” she whispers with a strained voice.

  I shrug though she can’t see me, still refusing to meet my gaze. “You weren’t happy with the selection in the kitchen so….” I shrug again.

  Finally, she lifts her head to look at me, her face so full of light that it’s almost blinding. “Thank you.”

  Her grateful smile and the weight of those two words hit me like a two-ton semi, bringing me back to reality. “Well, we try to provide you all with the niceties of home. That includes non-baby poop-tasting ice cream.” I turn to grab a bowl and a spoon before opening the carton and scooping out silken ribbons of cream and chunks of dark chocolate.

  “Oh. Well, still…thank you,” she replies, buying my bullshit excuse. Because that’s exactly what it is: bullshit. What I could’ve and should’ve done was leave the ice cream in the kitchen and let the staff serve it to her when she was craving frozen, sugary goodness. But no…I had to go and complicate shit and bring it back to my house, giving me the opportunity to satisfy her need, as superficial as it may be.

  She’d need me. And not for sex or relationship advice to apply to her marriage. For fucking ice cream.

  I slide her the bowl and wait for her to take a bite. She looks up at me with the same expectant expression.

  “Well?” I ask, tapping a finger.

  A frown puckers her forehead and she wriggles her nose, bringing those freckles to life. “What? You’re not going to have any?”

  I shake my head. “For you.”

  Ally takes a seat and spoons out the first bite, placing it on her tongue. Her eyelids flutter close in ecstasy and a downright orgasmic sound rumbles from her chest. “Oh my God.”

  “Good?” I’m smiling, but only because she can’t see me, too wrapped up in a creamy cocoon of mint and chocolate.

  “Amazing,” she replies through another mouthful. She finally opens her eyes, and a deep blush paints her cheeks as if she’s just remembered my presence. “Thanks for this. Sure you don’t want any?”

  “All yours.”

  Ally takes another bite and puts her spoon down, propping an elbow on the counter and placing her chin in her hand. “If you could only eat one flavor of ice cream for the rest of your life, would you pick Rocky Road or Mint Chocolate Chip?”

  “Excuse me?” I sit on the stool across from hers, brows raised in question.

  “Just humor me. Rocky Road or Mint Chocolate Chip?” She smiles amusingly and digs back into her ice cream.

  I’m not even sure what to make of this girl. First she’s calling me an asshole, and now she’s asking me about ice cream flavors? I frown in confusion.

  “Please?” she says just above a whisper. “I haven’t had a regular conversation about something other than shoes or handbags, or who our husbands could be sleeping with, in days. I just need to…forget. Just for a little while.”

  I nod and let out a breath, my chest suddenly full of some foreign, unnamed emotion. Sympathy? Yes. But something else too. And it has nothing to do with pitying her.

  “Well, being that I’ve never had Mint Chocolate Chip, and I vaguely remember trying Rocky Road as a child, I’d have to go with that flavor,” I reply with a shrug.

  Ally’s eyes grow wide with playful shock. “You’ve never had Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream?”

  I shake my head. “Nope.”

  “Then you haven’t lived yet!” She scoops out a small bite and offers it to me, the spoon a mere inch from my lips. “Go ahead; try it.”

  Ok, I’ve got two choices. Door number 1: I refuse to play along with her little game and kick her out of my house, offending her and demolishing any ounce of trust she has for me. Or Door number 2: I let her innocently spoon-feed me ice cream and force myself to see the act for what it is—a kind, platonic gesture between two adults.

  Yeah right.

  I lean forward so that the cold tip of the spoon just grazes my bottom lip. Ally slowly eases it forward, causing me to open wider for her, my tongue reflexively jutting out to taste the first sweet drops of cream. I wrap my lips around the mound of chocolaty mint and suck it off the spoon, letting out my own erotic sounds of agreement.

  “Good, right?” Ally beams, nodding her head.

  “Hell yeah,” I half-groan against my better judgment. But it’s too late. Allison Elliott-Carr has weakened my defenses with just a spoonful of Haagen-Dazs.

  “I told you! Ice cream is the answer for everything. It’s the ultimate cure-all.”

  I chuckle as she feeds me another bite, and I devour it hungrily. “You might be onto something there, Ally.”

  “I could totally spend the rest of my life eating only this and nothing else.” She places another helping onto her tongue from the same spoon I just made sweet, passionate love to. “I still can’t believe you had never tried it.”

  I shrug, instantly feeling like an idiot because I’ve shrugged at least a half a dozen times tonight. But there
’s just something about Ally that leaves me…uncertain. Maybe a little flabbergasted. She’s unlike any client I’ve ever worked with and the total opposite of any woman I’ve ever found myself attracted to. But there’s something about her—something so genuine and unexpected—that makes me almost enamored with her. Maybe she’s the riddle that I can’t figure out. Or maybe she’s just so damn perfectly imperfect that it’s endearing. But whatever it is, it’s got me. Fucked up as it sounds, it’s got me.

  That’s why it doesn’t surprise me when I find myself saying, “There was a lot of stuff I didn’t get to have growing up. And as I got older, I just learned to go without.”

  Ally drops the spoon and looks at me through those too-large eyes, compassion pouring from turquoise pools. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.

  I wave her off and shake my head. “Don’t be.”

  “Really. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have assumed that you were…you know…”

  And it all comes back to me.

  The very reason why I keep everyone at a safe distance. The assumptions, the sympathy. This shit right here. Right now, Ally thinks she knows me. Hell, she probably thinks she’s better than me. And as much as her bleeding heart may not want to, she pities me.

  How stupid of me to think that I could be seen as more than just a charity case. I’m just the hired help, available to be bought and sold like a glorified indentured servant.

  “Are you done?” I ask tersely, nodding at the half empty bowl.

  “Wha-? Um, I didn’t mean it if I-”

  I snatch the bowl from in front of her and throw it into the sink. The jarring sounds of clattering porcelain and metal echo throughout the room. I look up at Allison just as she flinches, her ruby lips fixed into a grimace.

  “It’s late, Mrs. Carr. I think you should retire to your room for the evening.”

  Without argument, she turns and quickly makes her way toward the door, fire trailing behind her like a sad, shooting star. She pauses marginally at the doorframe, but doesn’t look back, her flame becoming just a distant blur of red, as her whispered “I’m sorry,” carries in the balmy summer breeze.