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  Simon groaned at the thought of missing that.

  “What? Am I hurting you?” Georgina asked, rising off of him, until she was crouched over him on her knees, her long curly hair falling over her shoulders. Her head was tilted a little to the side, surveying him through dark eyes lit, not with passion, but concern.

  He had a beautiful, intelligent, naked woman (that just happened to fantasize about men paying her to get off in front of them) crouched over him and here he was worrying about what might not have been.

  “Moron,” Simon muttered.

  Georgina’s eyes widened. “Pardon me?”

  “Not you,” Simon said, slipping his hand between her legs, his palm resting over her clit as his fingertips flirted with the damp entrance to her body.

  “Simon,” she hissed.

  “I’m down to four-fifty,” he said, gently massaging her until she once again whispered out his name.

  “Four-hundred.”

  “No fair.”

  “Who said anything about fair?” he asked, tangling his fingers in her pubic hair then gently giving a little tug. She arched her neck and moaned.

  “Like that?” he asked.

  “Yes, oh God, yes,” she whispered.

  “Then get off me,” he said. “If I don’t get inside you within the next two seconds…”

  Georgina rolled onto her back, pushing her hair out of her face with shaking hands. Simon got his jeans off, the condom on and was back between her thighs so fast he was surprised he hadn’t hurt himself. He came down over her by degrees, until they touched from mid-chest to crotch. His cock twitched, thickened…

  close, he was so goddamn close.

  “Oh God,” she whispered, a soft sound of despair. “We’re actually going to do this, aren’t we?”

  “Say no and I’m gone,” Simon whispered, even as he settled his hips more firmly between her legs, bracing his elbows on either side of her head, careful not to catch her hair too close to her scalp.

  “You could have asked,” Georgina whispered, curling her hands around his upper arms.

  “And risk you laughing in my face?” Simon asked.

  Instead of answering, Georgina slipped her hand between their bodies and wrapped her long, cool fingers around his cock. “Under me, over me, however I could get you,” she whispered, reaching farther, cupping his balls then scratching back up to the base of his cock, ever so gently, until Simon closed his eyes and groaned.

  “Say yes,” he ground out, his control slipping. “Goddamn it, just say…”

  “Yes,” she whispered, hissing out the end of the word as he slowly entered her. The feeling of being enveloped within her by degrees washed over him. Her body yielding to his was a primal surrender Simon had never appreciated until now. The scent of her skin, the feel of her sheath pulsing as he hilted, the glide of her inner thighs against his hips, her breasts soft and giving under him…

  her breasts…

  Simon closed his eyes on a full-body shudder as images of her rose up behind his eyelids, like a slow-motion montage from some crazy, pornographic chick-flick. He saw her as she had been not half an hour ago, teasing out her blood-flushed nipples, biting her lush lower lip as he pulled her panties down her legs to reveal her slick fingers playing between her legs… Then, out on the beach, smiling up at him, charming, pretty, laughing with him, at him…

  Then, earlier still, up in this same attic, striving for contained politeness, hiding her nerves behind a cool façade. Turning him inside out with one single kiss in the gallery. Turning her nose up at him at Valerie’s party…

  “Simon…” Georgina moaned his name, half question, half-plea, ripping him back into the moment as her body arched under his.

  Under him… the annoying spinster-librarian with the hooker’s mouth, the long-legged brunette with the dirty mind who had wanted him from the second she’d met him, even as she’d pushed him away… was under him, moaning out his name, digging her nails into his back, silently urging him to move by clenching up, deep inside. He was…

  Inside her… ah, God, yes. Finally.

  Simon let out the breath he’d been holding, drew back his hips and thrust back into her, hard, suddenly angry that she had made him wait so long to have her. Georgina’s head went back, exposing her throat to him, another surrender that fired his blood as she slid her leg up his until her knee hooked around his hip, locking him against her.

  Yeah, like he was the one that kept trying to get away.

  At the thought of her leaving him, Simon clutched her even tighter, shoving in high and hard then staying there, trying to calm himself down before he thrust too hard and hurt her.

  Georgina groaned and bit his shoulder, sending a bolt of heat from where she’d bit him straight to his dick.

  Simon shoved one shaking hand under her head and gripped

  the back of her neck but Georgina just growled and bit him again, fighting his attempt to subdue her, jamming her hips against his.

  “Harder,” she demanded, the word going right into his ear and he just lost it. Every last bit of his control spun away and he took her, harder and faster than he had ever taken a woman before, focused on getting as deep inside her as he could, taking everything she offered and then demanding more, his hands rough on her body as he whispered God knew what into her ear.

  She was working with him… against him, frustrating his urge to grind her into the bed for making him wait for her, goading him on, writhing and panting, demanding that he make her come with graphic, filthy language that drove him on until they were both sweating and swearing, straining to get as close as possible… it was nothing less than fast and furious sex at its finest and he loved it, loved that she was with him the whole way, their bodies slick with sweat, tendrils of her hair sticking to his shoulders and chest as she met his every thrust until her orgasm ripped through her, stunning him with the force of her response.

  Georgina clutched at him with her whole body, arms and thighs as well as deep inside, her pussy clenching tight then milking his cock with long, hard pulls that made him groan. He gave over to the intensity of her response, feeling it firing his own and there was pleasure everywhere, not just in his cock but in his head because she was under him… the annoying spinster librarian with a hooker’s mouth… Georgina Kennedy, the woman with the soft hands and delicious mouth.

  Where have you been all my life?

  With that truly terrifying thought careening through his mind, Simon rested his forehead against Georgina’s and, in what was possibly the least romantic gesture in a life pretty much devoid of them, muttered, “Aw, well… shit.”

  Simon Says: Chapter 4

  Simon Says column, Wednesday, February 18th

  Have I mentioned that I have six brothers? I do and they’re all cursed, to the tune of seven simple words: Where have you been all my life

  Yup, sad but true and corny, too. My eldest brother started it. He bumped into his future wife at a deli, heard those words whisper through his muddled brain and then spent the next two months talking (stalking?) her into marrying him. Pretty much the same thing has happened to three of my other brothers.

  Never fear, this curse thing does not apply to yours truly (for reasons that should be obvious). I bring this up not to make you nervous that I am contemplating a trip down the aisle but rather to announce that yet another one of my brothers is getting married.

  Congratulations, Ryan. You don’t deserve her.

  And here, a reassurance for the bride-to-be: My brother will eventually stop following you around every second of every day. Be patient. He’s just concerned that you’ll come to your senses and leave his sorry ass before he can get you to say ‘I do’. Of course, my brother Steve is still dogging his wife’s footsteps and they’ve been married for two years, but that’s only because he is, outside of me, the biggest loser in the family. He has more than one reason to be concerned that, when his wife says she’s just going out to get some milk, in reality she’s got a on
e-way ticket to Brazil, her passport and a fortune in traveler’s checks tucked away in her purse.

  ***

  Saturday

  Georgina couldn’t say for sure, never having actually seen a man with his pants on fire, but she was willing to bet that if Simon’s pants had indeed been in flames he couldn’t have left her any faster than he did last night. He’d been on his feet, in his pants and out the door before her heart rate had returned to normal.

  She would have been insulted if she hadn’t, somewhere in the back of her mind, been expecting it. A man like Simon didn’t stick around to cuddle after the fact. Nope, he showed a girl a good time then took off, apparently, at warp speed.

  “I really hate it when I’m right,” Georgina told her reflection.

  She was standing in the little bathroom connected to the attic attempting, with absolutely no success, to get her hair under control.

  Only a few hours into the dreaded ‘morning-after’ and she was already a total wreck. Simon’s scramble to the exit had scattered her hairpins and she simply hadn’t had the energy to hunt them up. She’d found a pair of chopsticks in the desk drawer and had thought a kicky up-do involving Asian eating implements would make her feel better.

  It didn’t. Her head looked like Sputnik.

  “Oh, who cares? It’s not like anyone’s going to see me up here,”

  she muttered. She yanked the sticks out of her hair, threw them at the mirror then stomped out of the bathroom, only to be confronted with the bed she and Simon had shared the night before. She’d stripped the sheets at dawn, shoved them under the bed, covered the bare mattress with the comforter, artfully arranged the pillows and then, in a fit of adolescent pique, flipped it the bird.

  “You knew he was only good for one night,” Georgina said,

  turning her back on the bed as she yanked a dark blue linen shift on over her head.

  And if she’d secretly hoped that he would stay with her, at least until sunrise? Well, silly girl, one-night stands were for clear-eyed realists, not a romantically addled librarian that had spent the remainder of the night crying into her pillow wondering how she was ever going to forget how incredible it had felt to express her sexuality, not in print but rather in glorious flesh. It was something she had never thought she would be able to do. At least, not without freaking out her partner. But she had found that freedom with Simon. Effortlessly, never once telling herself to calm down and let him lead. She had thrown herself into the experience, given herself up to, lost herself in it…

  Georgina bit back a sob, clenched her hands together and

  shoved the memory of last night into the deepest, darkest corner of her mind (right next to all the Algebra she had ever learned and where she’d put the key to her backyard shed). Snatching a short stack of poetry books off the coffee table, Georgina muttered,

  “Steady on, old girl,” and got to work.

  Five hours later, the attic door flew open and hit the wall with a crash.

  “Valerie,” Georgina yelped, grabbing onto the shelf in front of her to keep from falling off the rolling library ladder she was standing on. “Next time knock! You scared the hell out of me.”

  Valerie kicked the door shut with an unrepentant grin then strolled over and plopped down onto the couch. Georgina hid a smile at her cousin’s version of beachwear: a black string bikini top and a vintage gypsy skirt in seventeen different colors.

  “How’s it going?” Valerie asked, looking around the book-

  strewn attic.

  “It’s going. What are you doing up here?”

  Valerie shrugged. “Hiding from the guests, wasting your time, I’ve got a myriad of reasons. Have you eaten today?”

  “No, I’ve been too busy…”

  “Avoiding Simon?” Valerie offered.

  “Absolutely.” Georgina said then snapped her mouth closed, turning a glare on her nosey cousin.

  Valerie laughed. “Thought so.”

  “Don’t want to talk about it,” Georgina said, resolutely going back to shelving books.

  “Wanna talk about the fact that everyone downstairs knows that my mild-mannered cousin is in fact the infamous Abigail Scott?”

  “Nope. Go away.”

  “Wanna tell me why Simon’s walking around looking like a

  kicked dog?”

  Georgina bit back a snide snicker at that. “Couldn’t care less.”

  “Did you shamelessly use him for your own pleasure, then kick him out?”

  Dropping the books she’d been holding, Georgina whipped

  around so fast she again had to grab onto the ladder. “No! Valerie, how could you even think that?”

  Valerie shrugged. “You wouldn’t be the first nice woman that did.”

  “That stinks.”

  Wait, that’s exactly what he did to me. No sympathy! No sympathy!

  “Yup. Which is why Simon sticks to professional hot chicks.

  You know, dingbats with dazzling looks and long legs and not much else.”

  “That leaves me out,” Georgina said, climbing down off the ladder to collect the books she’d dropped.

  “Not last night it didn’t.”

  Crouched down on the floor, Georgina glared over at Valerie.

  Then she sighed. If she didn’t throw her cousin a bone, Valerie was going to sit there for the rest of the day badgering her.

  “Look, things just got out of hand. I accidentally told him about Abby…”

  Valerie’s eyebrows shot to her hairline. “Accidentally?”

  “I know, hell of a thing, huh? I’ve never even once come close to letting that slip but I was a little drunk and nervous and it just,”

  Georgina opened her mouth, flicking her fingertips away from her bottom lip, “fell out. And then I, well, um… let him watch me masturbate,” Georgina lost her nerve and kind of mumbled the last word.

  Valerie shot forward. “You let him watch you do what?!”

  “Oh, you heard me,” Georgina said, tossing the books onto the coffee table.

  “I most certainly did. Why did you let him watch you?”

  “Oh, I don’t know, because I’m an idiot?” Georgina asked, sitting on the floor.

  Valerie just waited.

  “Fine… he dared me to let Abby decide whether or not he could watch me… uh… you know.”

  Valerie snorted. “Tell me another one.”

  “It’s true!”

  “Let me get this straight. Simon just, out of the blue, dared you to let Abby decide whether or not to let him watch you masturbate?

  Come on, even Simon isn’t that…”

  “Sleazy?”

  “I was going to say perceptive. There’s no way he could have figured out in such a short period of time that you can’t say no to a dare, especially one that would appeal so strongly to your twisted sexuality.”

  “Hey! I’m not twisted!”

  Valerie laughed. “You most certainly are, and I meant that in the best possible way.”

  “Gee, thanks. I think.”

  “And then what happened?”

  Georgina opened her mouth then quickly shut it. “Surprise, surprise. Here I am talking about something I don’t want to discuss.

  Valerie, just leave it alone, okay?”

  “Hey, I just wanted to make sure that you hadn’t toyed with then dumped a friend of mine.”

  “Me! Have you asked your dear friend, Simon about what happened last night?”

  “I mentioned your name and he snarled. I was afraid if I pushed it he’d lunge for my throat.”

  Georgina refused to read anything into that statement.

  Instead, she said, “Well, I didn’t kick him out. He left.”

  “Are you sure you didn’t ask him to leave?”

  “You aren’t listening. He. Left! As in man with his pants on fire, left! As in ‘Oh my God, the building is on fire’, left! As in the boat is sinking and it’s every man for himself…”

  “I think I get the pic
ture,” Valerie said.

  “Left! Fled might actually be a better description, okay? And I wasn’t about to try and stop him because, you know what? The saddest words in the English language are not ‘if only’ but rather

  ‘ as if’.”

  “Oh, Georgina,” Valerie whispered, her expression softening into one of pity.

  The last thing Georgina’s battered ego needed was pity.

  Stiffening her backbone, Georgina rose to her feet then turned to face the shelves she’d been working on. “I have a lot of work left to do, so if you’ll excuse me…”

  “Georgina, I’m so sorry. It never once occurred to me that you’d become attached to Simon.”

  “So if you’ll excuse me…” Georgina repeated, going a little dizzy as the word attached screamed through her brain. She promptly wrested it into the ‘shed-key’ corner of her brain.

  “Okay, I’ll leave you to it but I’ll bring you up some lunch…”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “And you’ll eat it.”

  Georgina whirled around at Valerie’s tone but her cousin appeared resolute rather than pitying so Georgina caved. “And I’ll eat it.”

  “Good,” Valerie said, getting to her feet. She had the door open and was halfway through it when she paused, turned and with one finger in the air, said, “One more thing.”

  Georgina laughed. “What, are you channeling Colombo?”

  “No. Why? Is Peter Falk dead?”

  “Valerie. ”

  “Going,” Valerie shrieked, slamming the door after her.

  ***

  Simon was in the living room, trying to enjoy his first drink of the afternoon and failing miserably. All he could think about was that he had finally met the woman he had been waiting over half his life to meet and he couldn’t have her.

  Simon didn’t delude himself into thinking that The Curse was a guarantee of happily-ever-after. Until last night, he hadn’t even believed that the damn thing applied to him.

  And it didn’t, not really. Because how could he expect Georgina to proudly introduce him to her friends and family as her boyfriend, let alone her fiancé? If he had a daughter and she showed up with someone like Simon Says for Sunday dinner, he’d drive the little bastard out of his little girl’s life with a rusty butcher knife.