She kissed him back, sucked the tip of his tongue into her mouth. Leaned into him, rubbed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, her pelvis against him.

Zach groaned.

"Yes," she whispered, "yes, do it, do it, take me, now, now, now..."

There was a cabinet behind her. He lifted her, sat her on the edge of it, ripped aside her panties and drove into her.

Her scream of ecstasy pierced the silence of the room.

The room spun around her. She hung on the brink of consciousness, the brink of the universe; her lover's name fell from her lips again and again and again as he filled her, filled her until she thought they might die this way, together, always together in a world of light and color and music that only they could hear, and then it happened again, that transcendent rush through blood and body and heart. Jaimie screamed again; Zach said her name as no one had ever said it before and the world went away.

Moments slipped by. Zach held Jaimie tightly in his arms; her arms were wrapped just as tightly around him. Her face was buried against his throat; the taste of his skin, salt and sweat and man, was on her tongue.

Then Zach stirred.

"Jaimie? Honey, are you all right?"

She nodded. She didn't have the energy to speak.

"Baby." He tried to draw back; he wanted to see her face. She wouldn't let him. "Jaimie. Did I hurt you?"

"No."

Her voice was low. The barest whisper. G.o.d, what had he done? He'd never taken a woman this way before, blind to everything but need. No kisses. No caresses. Just him, deep within her.

"Jaimie. Look at me. Honey, I didn't mean-"

Jaimie raised her head. Her eyes were wet with tears. Ah, dear Lord. He had made her weep. He had made her cry. And that was the last thing he'd ever wanted to do to her.

"Baby. I'm so sorry-"

"Zacharias." Her lips curved in a smile he knew he would never forget. "That was-it was -She laughed. "Will you stop looking at me like that? That was wonderful."

Zach blinked. She laughed again, leaned forward and kissed his mouth.

"Forget that pizza. I want a steak. Rare. A baked potato with b.u.t.ter and, to h.e.l.l with it, sour cream. Chocolate cake. And cheesecake. And whipped cream. And..." Her eyebrows rose. "I don't see you taking notes, Mr. Castelianos. How are you going to remember all this? And you're going to have to. A woman needs to keep her energy up if she's going to make amazing, incredible, out-of-this-world love with an amazing, incredible, out-of-this-world man like you."

A slow smile eased over Zach's mouth.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," Jaimie said, sweetly enough to give him a sugar high, "but on second thought, before you call room service, maybe we should see if what just happened was a one-time fluke or the real-"

Zach silenced her with a kiss.

He was still kissing her as he carried her into the bedroom.

Eventually, he phoned room service. By the time they'd showered and wrapped up in terrycloth robes as thick and plush as carpets, a table had been set in the sitting room.

Steaks. Baked potatoes. Everything Jaimie had said she wanted and more.

Zach drew out her chair. She sat down and watched as he opened a bottle of burgundy.

"Wow," she said.

Wow, indeed.

She'd stayed in luxury suites before. When your father was a general who a.s.suaged his guilt about never being home by flying his daughters to wherever he was stationed during their school vacations, you tended to spend considerable time in five-star accommodations.

Marble bathrooms, sinfully deep tubs, walk-in showers, stunning views and beds that were, indeed, pretty close to the size of football fields were all things she'd experienced.

This was different.

Sharing all those luxuries with your sisters was nothing like sharing them with your lover.

With the man who made you happy. So happy. With a man who had been a stranger she'd fled from weeks ago and now was the man you-the man you- "Whatever it is you're thinking," Zacharias said, as he handed her a gla.s.s of wine, "I like the way it makes you look." He smiled. "Want to share it with me?"

"No," she said, before she could think.

Zacharias grinned. "That private, huh?"

"That private," Jaimie said.

And that foolish.

She ate every bit of her steak, all of her potato, and somehow managed a bite of chocolate cake.

"No more," she groaned, when Zacharias pointed innocently to the slab of cheesecake and the bowl of whipped cream.

"Eyes too big for your stomach, huh?"

Jaimie laughed. "One of our housekeepers used to say that."

"It was my old man's favorite dinnertime remark."

"Great minds, and all that."

"Yeah."

"What? You don't think it's true?"

"The eyes too big part? Sure. The great-minds-think-alike-bit?" He shook his head. "Not very likely."

"I'll have you know our housekeeper was a smart woman. You got punished by being ignored when you asked for seconds the next time around."

"Seems reasonable."

"Is that what your father did?"

"No."

"You mean, you got away with asking for something and leaving it over?"

"I mean," he said, trying for a light tone, "I'd get sent to my room."

"How little parents know, right? Send a kid to his room. Sounds good-but he probably has a computer in that room, and maybe whatever you call those video game thingies, and all kinds of toys and books..."

"My room was four walls, a bed, a chair and a bureau."

"Oh."

"And the reason for being sent there was to wait for him to finish eating. Then he'd come in and mete out the appropriate punishment."

"Oh."

The "oh" was softer this time. Zach told himself to stop while he was still ahead. You didn't get very far entertaining a woman by telling her the sad stories of your life.

"What was the appropriate punishment?"

He looked up. She was watching him with such tenderness that he felt his throat constrict.

"Depended," he said, still trying for a light tone. "On what you'd said you wanted and hadn't eaten. Hot dogs, hamburgers, cake, pie... He had a system. So many whacks for one, so many for the other."

"He beat you?"

Jaimie's voice was hot with disbelief. Dammit, why was he telling her this? n.o.body knew anything about his childhood. Why should they?

"Zacharias. Did he-"

"Yeah. And I don't know why in h.e.l.l I told you about it."

"I'm glad you did."

"I bet. Nothing like a sob story on a Sat.u.r.day night."

"Zacharias."

Zach pushed back his chair. "Honey, look, I have some business calls to make..."

Jaimie grabbed his hand. "I've been lucky, you know? A pretty easy life. Sisters. Brothers. I know it isn't that way for everyone."

"I'm not complaining. Life is what it is."

"I know you're not complaining." She stood up, moved close to him and brought his hand to her cheek. "You're a good man, Zacharias. I'm not sure you know that, but you are."

A good man.

He wasn't. He had done things he could never talk about. They'd been the right things at the time, at least, he'd believed they were, but that didn't change the fact that he'd done them.

And now, with her, he was the worst kind of liar.

A good man?

The only good thing about him was this woman. She had come into his life by accident and she wouldn't be in it for long, but while she was, he would protect her. Take care of her...

"There's that look again."

"What look?"

"The one that says you're a thousand miles away."

Zach smiled, cupped his hand around the back of her neck, drew her to him and kissed her.

"I'm going to make those calls. Then we'll do something really exciting with the rest of the evening."

"For instance?"

"We'll go out. Dancing. Clubbing. Your pick it."

"How about digging up an old movie on TV and ordering up popcorn?"

"What a woman! Clint Eastwood? Robert de Niro?"

"Reese Witherspoon. Meg Ryan. "

Zach sighed. "n.o.body's perfect."

Jaimie made a fist, punched him in the arm. He laughed, they kissed...and then Zach took his phone from his pocket, went into the bedroom, shut the door partway, and got to work.

It was Sat.u.r.day night and it was late. Talk about double whammies.

Yes, but Zach had what people called connections, and it was time to use them.

He made half a dozen calls; those calls led to half a dozen more. In between placing the calls and having them returned, he watched a movie that turned out to be newer than old, without Meg Ryan or Reese Witherspoon and with, instead, a bunch of actresses whose names he'd never heard before. They were, Jaimie said, from TV.

He rarely watched TV, which explained it.

A chick flick, after all. But to his surprise, it wasn't.

It was funny and clever, and if his head hadn't been in two places at once, he might actually have enjoyed it, but his head was in two places at once, and that meant that he was, too.