Naughty Talk Page 2
Rafe slipped the sandal on her bare foot. “That I’m not going to get a wardrobe credit for the show.”
ANTHONY GAWAIN WAS bored.
The overnight ratings for the first four shows of his sweeps-week series had been respectable, but he’d found the answers his guests had given him more than a little predictable.
The model had wanted a man to love her for whoever she was beneath the one-hour makeup job, and the feminist, of course, had wanted to be treated equally. The lovelorn columnist was of the opinion that the majority of women wanted to be treated in the traditional way, while the housewife and mother just wanted someone who would help.
None of the women had shown much evidence of a sense of humor.
Was that what the war between the sexes had settled into? A cold war? An uneasy truce in which both sides tolerated each other through necessity?
Maybe he hadn’t asked the right questions.
Maybe his guests were boring.
Or maybe he was boring.
He knew he took women for granted, much as the culture did. But at least he recognized it—recognized that his relationships were pretty shallow. Maybe he was going through some sort of period of personal growth. All he knew was that, although he knew the truth about a lot of things, he pretty much kept blinders on when it came to looking at himself.
What he wanted was some sort of exciting dialogue with a woman.
He didn’t hold out much hope that the guest for today’s show would be that woman.
The sex therapist Mark had booked was late.
As he clipped the microphone to his tie, a wild print of scattered pink Cadillac cars, he wondered if his audience had picked up on his lack of interest. He was going to have to snap out of it before his show suffered.
His television success had been very satisfying. And the fact that his success annoyed the hell out of his family was even more satisfying—hard work—nothing more, nothing less—had put him where he was. Lately, however, he’d begun to find his obsession tiring. Maybe he was taking life too seriously, as Mark often told him. Or maybe it wasn’t life, but himself he was taking too seriously.
One thing he knew for certain—he damn well wasn’t having half the fun the Entertainment News columnist seemed to think he was.
“Okay, look alive, Gawain. We’re on in five … four … three ….”
Gawain smiled into the camera. That was something that got harder to do with each show.
“Let’s welcome sex therapist Nicole Hart,” he said.
He turned to look hopefully for her entrance. His jaw dropped as he watched her approach.
“I’m pleased to be invited to be on your show, Mr. Gawain,” she said, taking the seat across from him.
“Anthony. Call me Anthony.” Suddenly he was sweating. It had nothing to do with the bright stage lights. He was used to them.
From the corner of his eye he saw the wide smile of the cameraman.
Nicole Hart was hot!
But not in any obvious way. There was no black leather miniskirt, no three-inch spike heels. Hers was a quiet, but still incredibly sexy kind of hot.
In her eyes was a molten look of challenge, their chocolate color rich with dark secrets. Everything about her said, “Touch me.” He was very much afraid the only way to keep himself from doing just that was to sit on his hands. This was a woman out to make him lose control on-camera—and she had the equipment to do it with ease.
But why?
And how was he going to hold an intelligent conversation with her, when all the while her pouting lips slicked with mat berry-stain beckoned and the studiously casual muss of her shiny brown hair cried out to be touched?
And her outfit—a gray washed-silk jacket and matching pants … The fabric clung provocatively to every curve of her body as she moved, teasing him, daring him to touch and feel the bare skin beneath.
Her collarless jacket plunged all the way to the one-button closure at her waist. And under the jacket was nothing—nothing but temptation.
Nothing but bare sun-kissed skin to drive him crazy. And she knew it.
While he tried to remember what it was he’d been about to ask her, she crossed her legs and offered up the hint of a pleased smile.
Her feet were clad in flat, strappy sandals of grayish metallic leather. Instantly he felt himself developing a foot fetish. And for a brief, insane moment, he wondered if it might not be worth it to end his career by sucking her toes on-camera.
It had only been a minute or two since she’d joined him, but it had seemed like hours. Taking a deep breath, he gained control at last. He looked back up into her eyes. They telegraphed her intention of enjoying every excruciatingly slow moment of the half hour of torture she clearly had planned.
Well, at least he was no longer bored….
2
ANTHONY GAWAIN HAD balls—she’d give him that.
The set of his talk show consisted of two yellow-and-rose chintz love seats set at right angles to some scarred pieces of pine furniture. The furniture wasn’t television-new, but worn and lived-in. It took a man unafraid of his feminine side to pull this look off.
Rather sardonically, Nicole considered two things: One was that the setting wasn’t intimidating. It seemed designed to lull guests into relaxing enough to unwittingly say more than they might if on guard. The second was the fact that Anthony Gawain no doubt knew how very attractively masculine the somewhat feminine setting made him appear.
She watched him shrug out of the two-thousand-dollar Armani jacket he’d worn with jeans, and wondered just what he was up to. She knew she’d unnerved him—as planned—and she was waiting for his counterpunch.
Waiting and ready.
“Well, shall we get down to business, then?” he said, unbuttoning the cuffs of his shirt after casually tossing off his expensive jacket.
Ah, here was the counterpunch, she thought as he began rolling the sleeves of his shirt to his elbows, revealing strong, sinewy forearms dusted with hair the same sleek dark texture as the long hair he’d pulled back in a ponytail. He looked more the rock impresario or the drug dealer than the son of one of the most powerful political dynasties in America.
“I’m ready whenever you’re comfortable,” Nicole replied. The crowd tittered in response to the implicit suggestion that he was more than a little uncomfortable in her presence.
He considered her, one dark eyebrow raised. He started to say something, then thought better of it, settling back into the cushy sofa instead. She took note when he pulled his ankle across his knee, revealing protective body language, chapter and verse.
Nicole smiled, unable to stop herself. She reprimanded herself for taking pleasure in her charade, told herself she shouldn’t be enjoying someone else’s discomfort so. But it didn’t do any good. Today she was playing hookey from being trustworthy. Today she was a woman scorned. Today Anthony Gawain was going to pay. And she was going to enjoy it.
He cleared his throat. “So, Miss Hart, what do women want?”
“What do you think they want?” she countered, catching him off guard.
“Ah … ah …” He turned his hands palms up in a gesture of uncertainty. It was clearly a question he hadn’t given much prior thought to. Flailing about, he finally came up with, “Oh, I don’t know. I suppose Kevin Costner would be the man of the hour.”
“Kevin Costner?”
Anthony nodded.
Chewing her berry-stained lips, she toyed with the silver disk at her earlobe and let him twist in the wind. “I find it rather interesting and markedly conceited that you think a man is what a woman wants—and a celebrity at that. Tell me, Anthony, does Kim Basinger rank number one on your list of what you want?”
His shrug was careless, but his green eyes narrowed at her game. “Kim Basinger is a fine-looking woman. A man would have to be dead not to appreciate her,” he replied, cleverly evasive. “You mean t
o tell me you don’t want Kevin Costner, Miss Hart?”
“Call me Nikki,” she said playfully. “And my answer to your question is no, I don’t want Kevin Costner.”
“Why not?”
“He’s a married man.”
“Not even in your fantasies?” Anthony persisted, his rich voice dropping low and suggestive.
Her fingers were back toying with the silver disk. “My fantasies don’t run to Kevin Costner, no.”
Anthony leaned forward, putting both feet on the floor in an open stance, resting his hands on his knees as he asked, “What do your fantasies run to, Nikki?” The look in his eyes said she’d walked right into a carefully baited trap.
And, although she knew she’d put him off balance at first, it was obvious to her that he now thought he had her where he wanted her—right in his sights.
Nicole leaned forward, copying his stance.
The movement caused a slight gap in the plunging front of her jacket. The contour of her unrestrained breasts beneath the washed-silk fabric had a devastating effect on his concentration. She knew he couldn’t really see anything, but his imagination was on overload. And she was having fun pretending to be someone else.
While he squirmed, she asked, “Have you had a stress test recently, Mr. Gawain?”
“It’s Anthony—and no, I haven’t. Why?”
“Because without one I think it would be ill-advised for me to go into my fantasies,” she informed him with a cat-in-the-cream smile.
“Perhaps I should tell you mine, then,” he countered, not letting her slip from his hook so easily.
The studio audience responded with cheers, hoots and shouts of encouragement.
“There’s really no need, Anthony. I’m sure I can guess,” she answered, nonplused.
“Can you?” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I think I’d like to hear your guess. And I’m sure our studio audience would like to hear it.”
The studio audience voiced their agreement.
He settled back on the sofa, his smile a Rhett Butler gauntlet thrown down in response to her femme-fatale challenge. And there was no doubt in anyone’s mind that what Nicole Hart was conducting was a flirtation worthy of Miss Scarlett herself.
Nicole was unprepared for this turn of events, but she was unwilling to back down. On the hot seat, she searched her mind for just the right scenario. Finding that hard to do on-camera, she searched for any scenario at all.
Rafe came to mind, and she quickly pieced together what a dream date for him would be. After all, a Lothario was a Lothario was a Lothario….
Taking a deep breath, she began, “Okay, you start out by picking up, say … Kim Basinger.”
The audience howled, and Anthony said, “Touché.”
“Then what?” he coaxed.
“Dinner. Let’s see, you’d probably want to go somewhere you could be seen, but not bothered. Say Dominick’s, where you could sneak in the back door and have a steak and fries.”
“Okay, not a bad start …” Anthony agreed. “I pick up Miss Basinger in my Ferrari Testarossa coupe and we have an early dinner at Dominick’s.”
“You have a Ferrari?”
“No. I drive a Jeep four-wheel drive. But it’s a fantasy, remember. I thought I’d be sporting and give you some help with the embellishments.”
“You would pick a testosterone car.”
“Testarossa,” he said evenly.
“Whatever.”
“Okay, we’ve had dinner. Then what?”
“Hmm …” Nicole stuck her finger in her mouth while she pretended to think. She had his full attention when she offered up, “I know—a Lakers game.”
Anthony nodded, if somewhat reluctantly. “Pretty good, pretty good.”
She smiled, relieved she’d gotten off the hook so easily.
“Then what?”
“What?”
“You know.” He sat forward. “What happens after the Lakers game. It’s still early, and I’m a young man—comparatively.” The sexy sparkle in his eyes signaled exactly what he was getting at.
The audience cheered his audacity.
Nicole swallowed. It was her turn to squirm. Oh, dear, how had she let him maneuver her into this spot? More important, how was she going to get out of it? She crossed her legs and resettled herself, playing for time, trying all the while not to notice the young cameraman’s interested smirk.
“Yes, we’re waiting….” Anthony was baiting her, encouraging the audience’s responding shouts of agreement.
And then the gods handed her a reprieve. A way to give her tormentor what he was asking for, though not exactly what he was expecting. She folded her hands calmly and smiled. “Actually, it isn’t all that hard to figure, Anthony. Your fantasy would have to end with Miss Basinger fixing you breakfast, of course.”
“Oh … Nice euphemism!”
“Thank you.” Nicole settled back on the sofa with a quiet sigh of relief.
“I didn’t think sex therapists did that….”
Now what was he talking about? Nicole wondered, her guard back up. “Did what?” she asked, looking at him hesitantly, wondering if she’d blown her scam.
His tongue toyed with the inside of his cheek. “You know—used euphemisms.”
“They do when they’re on television,” she answered, relaxing.
“Speaking of television, my producer is signaling it’s time to break for commercial.”
Nicole turned to watch the monitor where the commercial ran while the producer joined them, checking something with Anthony, clearly not recognizing her as a guest he’d bumped. When the producer walked away after giving Nicole a wink and a circled thumb-and-forefinger “Doing great” sign, Anthony spoke.
“You want to clue me in on what’s going on here?”
“Excuse me?”
“You know, Nikki, why you’re baiting me?”
“Live in five … four … three … two … one,” the producer called out.
Anthony looked into the camera. “We’re back. In case you’re tuning in late—and shame on you if you are—our guest today is sex therapist Nicole Hart.” He turned to face her. “So tell us, Nikki, if women don’t want men, as you indicated earlier in the show—” he used his hands to convey confusion “—tell us, what do women want?”
“You’ve misunderstood me, Anthony. I didn’t say that women don’t want men. They do. But it’s the nineties—a time when hopefully more women are becoming self-sufficient. It follows that when men are no longer considered a necessity for survival, they become a luxury.”
“A luxury?”
Nicole nodded. “Yes, rather like that flashy sports car you covet. Something you don’t need, but want just for the thrills it can give you.”
The audience went wild applauding her comment.
“Boy, you are big on metaphors, aren’t you?” Anthony teased when the audience settled back down.
“I’m not the one lusting after a flashy sports car,” she retorted, her dark eyes bright with sexual innuendo as she moistened her lips.
“I promise we’ll get to what you lust after in a moment,” he answered on a rich laugh.
That retort scored points with the audience—and with Nicole. It displayed his ability to take having his image pricked.
Nicole smiled at his implied threat. He might be a male chauvinist pig, she decided, but at least he wasn’t a male chauvinist prig.
Anthony cleared his throat. “If I understand you correctly now, you’re saying men are a luxury for today’s women. That men are no longer the number-one item on the list of woman’s wants.”
Nicole nodded, ready to mix research and personal opinion.
“That’s correct. Women are slowly moving into the position of being able to make choices based less on what they need and more on what they desire. They can, for instance, begin to choose a partner based on personal preferences, rather than the traditional reaso
n—economic security for herself and any children she might want to have.
“In other words, women are finally becoming able to choose their partners with the same degree of personal indulgence that men have always enjoyed. And it goes without saying, that freedom also includes the ability to make the same colossal mistakes that can be made when a choice is made by caprice.”
“What about women who want to stay home? Women who want to raise their own children and keep a home full-time, women who want a more traditional life and don’t want a career outside the home?”
“I think that’s a great choice, too. But not without the protection they are finally being guaranteed to help them survive abandonment, divorce, or the death of a spouse.”
“Okay, so we’ve established times are changing. What I want to know is, if a man isn’t the first item on a woman’s shopping list any longer, then what is? In the nineties, what do women want?”
“Chocolate,” Nikki answered. She was a confirmed chocoholic.
“I’m serious, Nikki.”
“So am I. I’d do most anything for a bag of chocolate M&M’s candies.”
Anthony’s dark eyebrow lifted. “And here I’m fresh out. What’s the big deal with women and chocolate, anyway?”
“Studies have shown chocolate gives the same rush as sexual desire. And there are no dirty socks to pick up, no toothpaste squeezed in the middle, no toilet seats left up,” she said. She was on a roll now.
“You don’t like men much at all, do you?”
Nicole’s shrug was casually dismissive. “Oh, they do have their uses. They’re good for an extra paycheck and a quick toss, I suppose—with an emphasis on the quick.”
Anthony turned to the audience with a look of consternation. He shook his head at their laughter. When it subsided, he informed them, “Uh-uh, not me. I’m not touching that line.” Turning back to Nicole, he said, “Okay, you’ve stated that women have this mysterious thing for chocolate because of its supposed ability to give them some libidinous kick. But after chocolate, what do women want? What is it they crave and aren’t getting from men?”
“You haven’t any idea? A man the Entertainment News section of the L.A. Times says has a legendary prowess with women?” Nicole teased.