He had to stop kissing her. To find the strength to pull away and explain everything. Oh, but her mouth and what it was doing to his was divine...
Reluctantly, he eased back a little, then brushed his lips over hers one last time before straightening. She dropped her hands—all contact was broken—and he blinked hard to make his mind work. She gazed up at him, her eyes unfocused and her lips rosy from their kiss, and previous thought deserted him. In that moment, all that mattered was that Harper Lake knew she’d kissed him. Knew she’d made love with him. Nick Tate.
So, with his voice as rough as gravel, all he heard himself say was, “I’m not Malcolm.”
* * *
Harper gripped the edge of the door for balance but didn’t take her eyes from him as she said, “I know.”
If there was one thing for sure in the world, it was that the man in front of her was not the man she’d spoken to less than an hour ago. He might look like her boss, but there was an intensity in every part of him—from his gaze to the way he held himself—that easygoing Malcolm had never had.
And now that she was paying more attention, his hair was shorter, and there was a tiny scar in one eyebrow. But how was that possible? Then she remembered a little-discussed feature of Tate Armor Limited—it was jointly owned by Malcolm and his brother, Nick. A brother none of the staff had met and many of whom wouldn’t know existed.
“Twins,” she whispered, and he nodded.
All the pieces finally fit into place—her world made sense again. She’d been confused about why she’d never been drawn to her boss before the night of the masked ball, and why he hadn’t stirred a reaction in her since. But she’d made love with Nick that night. Things between them had happened so fast that even though she’d thought she’d sensed something different about him, she hadn’t had time to stop and question it. He’d kissed her and she’d melted and all coherent thought had stopped.
And it was also why Malcolm had been able to act like they hadn’t shared a night of passion when she saw him the next morning at work. At the time she’d been surprised—and relieved—that Malcolm had been able to carry on working with her as if they had an unspoken agreement to never mention their night together again. The first day had been awkward, but he hadn’t batted an eye when she’d walked into his office with contracts for him to sign.
As if nothing had happened.
Because nothing had happened with him.
Nick, on the other hand...well, he’d rocked her world.
She drew in a long breath and gripped the door a little tighter.
Nick was watching her warily, waiting to see what her reaction would be. Or perhaps he’d been as disoriented by their kiss as she had. Either way, they needed to talk, and standing on her porch was not the place to do it.
“You’d better come in,” she said as she opened the door wider and stepped back into the hall to let him pass.
Once they were in her kitchen, she made him a coffee and herself a peppermint tea—something that seemed to be keeping the morning sickness steady.
Nick accepted the steaming mug, set it on the counter beside him and blew out a long breath. “Look, about the ball—”
“No need,” she said, cutting him off. It wasn’t something she wanted to revisit in the cold light of day. “We’re beyond that now.”
He shook his head sharply. “I have to say it. I should have been up front. Told you who I was.”
Looking at him now, dominating her kitchen with no effort at all, she wondered how she could have confused the brothers, but hindsight was twenty-twenty.
“If I’d known Malcolm’s brother was his identical twin, I might have put two and two together on the night. I’ve worked with Malcolm. He’s attractive, sure, but he never made my knees go weak.”
“And I do?” Nick said, a cocky grin forming on his lips.
“I think we’ve proven that. Twice now. But that’s not what you’re here to talk about.”
The grin widened, then faded again. “I just wanted you to know that I wasn’t deliberately deceiving you.”
She arched an eyebrow. “You were there on Malcolm’s ticket. That’s pretty deliberate.”
“That’s a fair point,” he said, wincing. “There was something I needed to do for Malcolm.”
“Deal with his stalker?”
Nick’s head jerked up and he met her gaze, surprise clear in his eyes. “You saw that?”
The whole staff at Tate Armor knew about the guy—an ex-customer—who’d been so angry at Malcolm personally that he’d begun to make threats. Malcolm, nice as ever, had been trying to use diplomacy to defuse the situation. No one else had believed that had a chance of working. And the fact that the entire town was on edge thanks to the blackmailer Maverick only made things worse. There were whispers in the office that the guy might be working for Maverick, but Harper had always thought it was unrelated—Maverick’s modus operandi was completely different. Which had left them with a run-of-the-mill jerk who wasn’t responding to Malcolm’s way of dealing with the situation.