Macy Beckett - Make You Mine

Oh, hell yes.

He helped her with the belt, then jerked free the button at his waist, his gut clenching in anticipation of finding his own release.

The pounding on her door grew louder, but Marc let the thumps and distant shouts fly to his mind’s periphery. All he could think about was freeing himself from the confines of these damned pants . . . until the smoke detector split the air in a series of shrieks.

Only then did Marc lift his head and focus long enough to hear someone from the hall shout, “Fire!”

“It’s a miracle nobody was hurt.”

Allie frowned at the snowy layer of fire extinguisher foam coating the surface of Regale’s double bed. Thank God the flames hadn’t spread beyond this room, or the Belle’s wooden decks could have caught like a tinderbox. Amazingly, the damage was contained to one ruined comforter and a few smudges of smoke staining the ceiling.

They were lucky.

Too bad no one else saw it that way.

“What rotten luck,” Nick said from the hallway, still clenching the handle of the cherry red fire extinguisher.

Marc ran a shaky hand through his hair and studied Regale, who leaned against the wall by the open window, both arms folded over his barrel chest. Allie noticed from her position near the bathroom door that the hair on Chef’s forearms was singed off, his only injury—remarkable, considering he’d awoken in a burning bed. The man could have been flambéed like the Steak Diane that had made him famous.

Talk about tragic irony.

“You sure you weren’t smoking?” Marc demanded. “Because your story doesn’t make a lick of sense.”

Allie tensed, bracing herself for an angry tirade about “the captain’s squeeze,” and how Marc should have been doing his job instead of her, but it never came. Regale didn’t mention Allie’s bathrobe, nor did he criticize Marc’s loose waves, tangled from her fingers, or the hastily buttoned jacket he’d used to conceal the enormous bulge in his trousers.

In fact, Chef didn’t say anything at all.

He flicked nervous glances in Allie’s direction but couldn’t hold her gaze. Gone were the disdainful stares and the intimidating set of his shoulders. He lowered his forehead like a dog who’d been kicked by its master, afraid of another blow.

That could only mean one thing.

Chef thought she’d done this to him—burned him in his bed. How could he consider her capable of such cruelty? It was even more insulting than his belief that she’d earned this job on her back.

Allie could almost hear her sister’s voice gloating, I’ll bet he won’t mess with you now, but this wasn’t the kind of respect she’d wanted from Regale, the kind born of fear.

Chef glowered at the carpeted floor when he finally said, “I don’t smoke.”

“Well, beds don’t light themselves on fire,” Marc argued.

“I’m tellin’ you,” Regale ground out, regaining a hint of his former sauce, “I took a break to lie down and check e-mail on my cell phone. I dozed off. When I woke up, the goddamned bed was on fire.”

“But that doesn’t add up,” Marc said.

“Doesn’t it?” Regale scoffed and threw a glance at Allie. “The math seems simple enough to me.”

Marc chewed his bottom lip and stared at the bed, no doubt mentally calculating the math. One voodoo priestess + one vengeful hex = Roasted Filet of Chef.

Allie hoped he wouldn’t buy into Regale’s paranoia, but her sinking heart told her that’s exactly what he was doing. He couldn’t help it. His family had ingrained superstition into him as permanently as burning a brand on his soul.

Darn it, she and Marc should be making love right now, starting a very different kind of fire. But judging by the way he dodged her gaze, she’d have to settle for one orgasm. Not that she was ungrateful—she’d never climaxed so hard in her life. The problem was, only ten minutes had passed, and already she wanted more.

So much more.

If her toes weren’t still half curled in ecstasy, she’d cry.

“Well,” Marc said with a sigh, “let’s get it cleaned up in here so Chef can use his room tonight.”

Regale pushed both palms forward. “Whoa, there. I’m not staying.”

“What?” Marc froze in place.

“I’m getting off at the next port,” Regale said. “I’ll take a cab to the nearest airport and catch a flight home.”

“No, no, no,” Marc uttered, shaking his head in denial. “You can’t do this to me.”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t stay here. Not with . . .” Chef looked at Allie and back down at the floor just as quickly in a silent message. It’s her or it’s me.

Allie’s heavy heart sank another inch. This was what she’d hoped to avoid—forcing Marc to choose between her and his duty to the Belle.

Marc scrubbed a hand over his face, staring at the bed as if his dreams had burned along with the linens, clearly conflicted even though the choice was obvious. He had to do whatever it took to keep Chef on board. Nick seemed to know it, too. He furrowed his brow at his older brother as if to will the decision into him.

The seconds ticked by in silence until Allie couldn’t take it any longer.

“You know what?” she said, faking her best chipper voice. “I heard Ella-Claire mention she’s shorthanded at the purser’s desk.” Allie hugged herself with robe-covered arms to keep her disappointment trapped inside. Nobody needed to know how much this hurt. “We’ve got a fantastic galley crew. I’m sure they can get along without me if I leave recipes for them to follow.”

Marc shook his head and chanced a peek at her from the corner of one eye. “Allie, you don’t have to—”

“That’s a great idea,” Nick interrupted tightly, glaring at his brother.

Regale gave a reluctant nod, clearly preferring Allie left the boat altogether, but too chickenshit to say so. “We might be able to make that work.”

“But your recipes,” Marc said. “You sure you want to share them?”

Allie offered a smile. “It’s not the recipe that matters, baby. It’s the love I put into my desserts. I’m not afraid of anyone stealing my thunder.”

“If you’re sure . . .” Marc was giving her one last chance to back out, but Allie saw the relief in his posture and in the gradual unclenching of his jaw.

“Sure as I’m standing here”—she released a shaky laugh—“in my bathrobe.” Hooking a thumb toward her suite, she added, “I’d better get dressed and head downstairs.”

Then she turned and left without another glance in Marc’s direction, saving him the trouble of having to placate her—and from seeing the hurt in her eyes.

An hour later, after she’d styled her hair to perfection and spackled on enough makeup to pass for a televangelist’s wife, she strode to the head desk with her chin tipped and her shoulders squared. She might feel three feet tall, but she projected the confidence of a woman who had the world on a leash.

Fake it until you make it, and all that.

When she approached the desk, she waved at Alex and Ella-Claire, both huddled together over a stack of paperwork. The youngest Dumont, a lanky teenage boy whose name she couldn’t recall, stood by sipping a soda. He quirked a crooked grin, then ogled Allie’s boobs and mumbled something about Cheez-Its.

Strange kid.

“Hel-lo,” the boy said, waggling his brows and eating her up with his eyes like a prepubescent Don Juan. “I’m Jackson.”

“But we call him Worm,” Alex interjected. He ruffled his little brother’s hair. “Worm, this nice lady is Allie Mauvais.” He put extra emphasis on her last name, and it didn’t take long for the message to sink in. Worm’s brows quit waggling and shot up his forehead.

“Aw, balls,” the boy swore, snapping his fingers in disappointment. “That just ain’t right. I was in love for a few seconds.”

Allie rolled her eyes. A true Dumont, that one. “Welcome to my world, kid.”

“Did you really spark that dude in his bed?” Worm asked with a twinkle of admiration in his eyes.

“No,” Allie said. “I’d never do anything like that.” She fired a look at Ella-Claire to make her point, hurt that the woman had been so quick to jump on the blame-the-Mauvais bandwagon earlier that morning. She’d thought they were allies.

Ella blushed and studied her fingernails.

“I think it’s cool,” Worm said. “Wish I could do stuff like that. The asshole yelled at me last night while I was busing tables. Someone should tell him to say it, not spray it.”

“I didn’t . . .” Allie began, and then gave up the fight. There was no point in trying to get a Dumont to listen to reason. She plastered on that familiar fake smile and turned to Alex and Ella-Claire. “Never mind. Now that I’m out of the galley, I’m all yours. What can I do to help?”

The two folded their arms on the counter in a mirrored pose, shoulders barely touching. Their heads tilted toward each other in a way that caught Allie’s attention. To the casual observer, the pair’s body language might not have tripped an alarm, but to someone like Allie who studied minor cues for a hobby, that one action spoke volumes.

At the very least, they were close friends, but if the covert glances Alex kept sliding at Ella were any indication, he wanted more. As much as Allie enjoyed helping lovers find a match, she hoped Alex kept it in his pants. She liked Alex, and she’d hate to see him turned from a stallion to a gelding by his own brother.

“I’m sorry about all this, Allie.” Ella-Claire fidgeted with a sliver frog pendant around her neck, smoothing a thumb over the amphibian’s single emerald eye. “Marc told me you took this job to help promote your bakery, and now you can’t do that.”