by Nora Roberts
much either.”
“Well, that can be fixed.” Louella paused on the stairs, listened to the sounds of women. “I like both of you.”
“I should have asked you to come,” Tess murmured. “I should have asked you to visit months ago. It shouldn’t have been Willa inviting you. Partly I didn’t because I thought you’d be uncomfortable. And partly I didn’t because I thought I would be. I’m sorry.”
“Sweetie, you and me, we’re as different as Budweiser and Moët. Doesn’t mean they don’t both have their points. God knows, I’ve scratched my head over you as often as you’ve scratched yours over me.”
Louella gave Tess a quick squeeze. “Listen to that hen chatter. Reminds me of my chorus girl days. I’ve always had a fondness for women carrying on. Can’t be uncomfortable with that, or with a wedding in the works. And I sure do like your sisters, honey.”
“So do I.” Tess firmed her chin. “Nothing’s going to spoil the wedding for us.”
H E WAS THINKING THE SAME THING. HE COULD HEAR THE sound of women’s laughter, of women’s voices, pretty as music. It made him smile. He liked to think of Lily inside, in the center of it, soft and sweet. She’d be dead if not for him, and he’d been hugging his secret heroics to his heart for weeks.
He’d saved her life, and he wanted to see her married.
When those pretty images paled, he could always bring the picture of what he’d done to Jesse Cooke to the front of his mind. Sometimes he liked to fall asleep with that replaying through his head. A fine, colorful dream, scented with blood.
He’d been very careful since then, and when the lust for killing became overpowering, he cooled it in the hills and buried his prey. It was odd how much stronger that lust was now, more than the need for food, for sex. Soon, he knew, soon, it wouldn’t be satisfied by rabbit or deer or a calf from pasture.
It would have to be human.
But he would hold it back, he would control it until after Lily was safely married. He was bound to her now, and where he was bound, he was loyal.
He feared she was worried that something would happen. But he had fixed that as well. He’d printed the note with great care, pondered the words like an exercise. Now that he had written it, now that he had slipped it under her kitchen door, he was lighter of heart.
She wouldn’t worry now. She would know someone was looking out for her. Now he could relax and enjoy the sounds of the female ritual. Now he could dream of wedding bells that would herald the breaking of his fast for blood.
As the sky washed with red over the western peaks and the party broke up, some of the women who drove past waved. He lifted a hand in return. And he wondered whom he would choose to hunt when the time was right.
TWENTY-SEVEN
“I THINK YOU SHOULD SEE THIS.”
Her brow arched, Willa took the sheet of notepaper from Lily’s hand. She’d been ready to turn in after a long day of socializing when Lily had come to her room. It took only the first glance to wash the fatigue away.
I don’t want you to worry. I won’t let anything happen to you, or Adam, or your sisters. If I had known what J C was up to, I would have killed him sooner, before he scared you. You can rest easy now and have a nice wedding. I’ll be there, looking out for you and yours. Best wishes, a friend.
“Christ.” The chill sent a shudder through her. “How did you get this?”
“It was under the door in the kitchen.”
“You showed it to Adam?”
“Yes, right away. I don’t know how to feel about this, Will. The person who sent this killed Jesse. And the others.” She took the paper back from Willa, folded it. “Yet he seems to be trying to reassure me. There’s no threat here, and yet I feel threatened.”
“Of course you do. He was practically in your house.” She began to pace, her stockinged feet soundless. “Goddamn it. Goddamn it! We’re back to the center again. This was put there today, dozens of people coming and going. It could have been anyone. No matter what I do I can’t narrow it down.”
“He doesn’t mean to hurt me, or you, or Tess.” Lily drew a calming breath. “Or Adam. I’m holding on to that. But, Will, he’ll be at the wedding. He’ll be there.”
“You’re to let me worry about this. I mean it,” she continued, putting her hands firmly on Lily’s shoulders. “Give me the note. I’ll deal with it, see that it gets to the police. You’re getting married in a few days. That’s all you have to think about.”
“I’m not going to tell my parents. I thought about it, talked it over with Adam, and decided not to tell anyone but you. Whoever you think should know is fine with me. But I don’t want to upset my mother and father.”
“This won’t touch them.” Willa took the note, set it on her dresser. “Lily, the wedding means almost as much to me as it does to you. I’ve got, I guess you could say, a double interest.” She tried to smile, but it wouldn’t quite gel. “Not everyone can say their brother and sister are getting married. At least not in Montana. Just concentrate on being a bride. It’d mean a lot to me.”
“I’m not afraid. I don’t seem to be afraid of much anymore.” She pressed her cheek to Willa’s. “I love you.”
“Yeah. Same goes.”
She closed the door behind Lily, then stared at the folded note. What the hell was she going to do now? The answer wasn’t going to bed for a good night’s sleep. Instead, she picked up her boots and walked to the phone.
“Ben? Yeah, yeah, we saved you some cake. Listen, I need a favor. You want to call that cop who’s working this case and ask him to meet me at your place? I have something I need to show him, and I don’t want to do it here. No.” She cradled the phone between her ear and shoulder, tugged on a boot. “I’ll explain when I get there. I’m on my way. I don’t have time for that,” she said when he started to argue. “I’ll lock the doors of the rig and carry a loaded rifle on the seat, but I’m leaving now.”
She hung up before he could shout at her.
“D AMN. STUBBORN. PIGHEADED WOMAN.”
Willa had stopped counting the number of times Ben had called her that, or a similar name, over the past two hours. “It had to be dealt with, and it’s done.” She appreciated the wine he’d poured her, though it had been a surprise. She hadn’t thought Ben went in for wine, or that he would be playing host after the session with the police.
“I’d have come for you.”
“You damn near did,” she reminded him. “You were nearly halfway to Mercy when I ran into you. I told you I’d be all right. You read the note yourself. It wasn’t a threat.”
“The fact that it was written at all is threat enough. Lily must be frantic.”
“No, actually, she was very calm. More concerned that her parents not be upset by it. We’re not telling them about it. I guess I’ll have to tell Tess. She’ll tell Nate, but that’s as far as we’ll take it.”
She sipped again while he paced. She supposed his quarters suited a muscle-flexing type of man. The walls were paneled in honey-toned wood, the floors matching and uncluttered by carpet or rug. The furniture was big, heavy, and deeply cushioned in unadorned navy. There wasn’t a single fussy pillow or feminine knickknack in sight.
There were, though, framed photos of his family crowding the pine mantel over the fireplace, a set of antique spurs, and a pretty hunk of turquoise on a shelf where books leaned against each other drunkenly.
There was a hoof pick tossed on a table along with a bone-handled pocketknife and some loose change.
Simple, basic. Ben, she decided, then decided further that she had let him pace and complain long enough.
“I appreciate you helping me handle this right away. We could get lucky and the cops could do cop things with the note and figure out who wrote it.”
“Sure, if this was a Paramount production.”
“Well, it’s the best I can do for now.” She set the half-full glass aside and rose. “I’ve got a wedding in less than a week and a houseful of company, so—”<
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“Where do you think you’re going?”
“Home. Like I said, I’ve got a houseful of company, and morning comes early.” She took out her keys; he snatched them out of her hand. “Look, McKinnon—”
“No, you look.” He tossed her keys over his shoulder, and they rattled into a corner. “You’re not going anywhere tonight. You’re staying right here where I can keep an eye on you.”
“I’ve got the midnight shift.”
He merely picked up the phone, punched in numbers. “Tess? Yeah, it’s Ben. Willa’s here. She’s staying. Call Adam and tell him to adjust guard duty accordingly. She’ll be back in the morning.” He hung up without waiting for an assent. “Done.”
“You don’t run Mercy, Ben, or me. I do.” She took a step toward her keys and found the room revolving as she was slung over his shoulder. “What the hell’s gotten into you?”
“I’m taking you to bed. I handle you better there.”
She swore at him, kicked, and when that failed wiggled into position to take a bite out of his back. He hissed through his teeth, but kept going.
“Girls bite,” he said when he dumped her on his bed. “I expected better from you.”
“If you think I’m going to have sex with you when you treat me like a maverick calf, you’re dead wrong.”
His back throbbed where her teeth had dug in just enough to make him mean. “Let’s see about that.” He shoved her back, pinned her, and handcuffed her hands over her head. “Fight me.” It was a pure dare delivered in steel tones. “We never tried that before. I might like it.”
“You son of a bitch.” She bucked, twisted, and when he lowered his mouth to hers, bit again. He rolled with her, careful to keep her hands—and nails—away from his exposed flesh.
Her aim with her knee was off just enough to make him grateful, close enough to make him sweat.
He used his free hand to rip her shirt, then the thin cotton beneath, but didn’t touch her. It was the grapple, the excuse for violence he thought they both needed to scare away the fears.
And when she lay still beneath him, panting, her eyes closed, he thought he knew what they both needed next.
“Turn me loose, you coward.”
“I’ll tie you to the headboard if I have to, Willa, but you’re staying. And when we’re done, you’ll sleep. Really sleep.” He touched his lips to her temple, then her cheek, her jaw in a sudden shift to tender.
“Let me go.”
He lifted his head. Her hair was tumbled over the dark green corduroy spread of his bed. There were flags of angry color riding high across her cheekbones. Her eyes burned so hot he was surprised his skin didn’t blister.
“I can’t.” He lowered his forehead to hers, wondering if either of them would be able to accept it. “I just can’t.”
His mouth found hers again, quietly, slowly, deeply, until she felt something inside of her quake to the point of shivering apart. “Don’t.” She turned her face away, tried to struggle back to level. “Don’t kiss me that way.”
“It’s rough on both of us.” He turned her face back, saw her eyes were damp and dark now, the heat burned out of them. “It may get rougher yet.” His mouth met hers again, lingered so that the shock swept through him. “God, I need you, Will. How the hell did this happen?”
He dragged her where he was bound to go, making her head reel and her heart break open to pour out secrets she’d kept even from herself. She sobbed out his name, then simply lost her grip on the slippery ledge she’d clung to for longer than she’d known.
When he lifted his head again, she stared into his face, one she’d known her whole life, and saw fresh and new. “Let go of my hands, Ben.” She didn’t struggle, didn’t shout, but only said again, “Let go of my hands.”
So he did, gentling his grip, then releasing it. When he started to lever himself away, those hands came to his face, framed it, and brought him back. “Kiss me again,” she murmured. “The way I told you not to.”
So he did, deepening the moment, then drowning in it.
He pushed aside her tattered shirt to find her, claim her, his hands sure and slow. She surrendered to it, the sensation of those hands gliding, scraping, stroking. Gave in to it, the taste of that mouth drawing and drinking from hers. Yielded against it, the heat of that body, the hard angles pressed into the curves of hers.
Whatever he wanted tonight, she would give. Whatever he seemed to need, she’d find. The quiet, unspoken desperation seeped from him into her, and the pleasure of knowing she possessed whatever it was he searched for.
The violence was spent. Now there were only sighs and murmurs, the whisper of flesh sliding over flesh, the quick moans of surprised delight.
The moon rose, unnoticed, and the night birds sang to the light. Wind, gentle with full spring, teased the curtains and wafted like water over their heated skin.
There was the long, long groan of that first lazy climax, one that shimmered through her as silver as the moonlight and left her glowing. He drew her up so they were torso to torso, so that he could lose his hands in her hair, sweep the weight of it back from her face. When her lips curved, so did his.
He held her like that, just held her, with their hearts pounding together, her head on his shoulder, his hands in her hair. And still holding her, he laid her back and slipped inside her.
Slow and deep, so that each thrust was like a velvet slap. He watched her come, watched it happen, the darkening eyes, the trembling lips, the sudden racking shudder. The silky movements quickened, driving them both toward the brink.
This time when she fell, he let her drag him with her.
I T WAS A PERFECT DAY FOR A WEDDING, LACED WITH WARM breezes that teased the scent of pine down to the valley, stirred the perfume of the potted flowers Tess had ordered arranged in banks around the porches and terraces of the main house, Adam and Lily’s house, even the outbuildings.
There wasn’t a hint of rain, or the hail that had come so fiercely forty-eight hours before and sent Tess and Lily into a tailspin of worry. The willow tree by the pond that Jack Mercy had ordered built, stocked with Japanese carp, then forgotten, was delicately green.
There were tables with striped umbrellas, a snowy white canopy to shade the wedding feast, and a wooden platform that the men had cheerfully constructed to stand as a dance floor.
It was a perfect day, Willa mused, if she ignored the fact that cops would be sprinkled among the guests.
“Gosh, look at you.” Misty-eyed, Willa reached up to adjust the tie of Adam’s tux. “You look like a picture out of a magazine.” Unable to keep her hands off him, she brushed at his shirtfront. “Big day, huh?”
“The biggest.” He caught a tear off her lashes, pretended to put it in his pocket. “I’ll save it. You hardly ever let them fall.”
“The way they keep backing up on me, I have a feeling plenty are going to fall today.” She took the tiny lily of the valley boutonniere—his own request—and carefully pinned it on for him. “I know I’m supposed to let your best man do all this, but Ben’s got those big hands.”
“Yours are shaking.”
“I know.” She laughed a little. “You’d think I was getting married. This whole thing didn’t make me nervous until this morning when I had to put this getup on.”
“You look beautiful.” He took her hand, laid it on his cheek. “You’ve been in my heart, Willa, since before you were born. You’ll always be there.”
“Oh, God.” Her eyes welled again. She gave him a hasty kiss, then whirled. “I’ve got to go.” In her blind rush out the door, she barreled into Ben. “Move.”
“Just hold on, let me look.” Ignoring the teary eyes, he turned her in a circle, admiring the flow and fit of the slim blue gown. “Well, well, well. Pretty as a bluebell in a meadow.” He brushed a tear from her cheek. “With dew still on it.”
“Oh, save your fancy talk and go do what you’re supposed to do with Adam. Make man noises and tell bad jokes or something.
”
“That’s what I’m here for.” He kissed her before she could wriggle free. “The first dance is mine. And the last,” he added, as she dashed away.
It wasn’t fair, Willa told herself as she hurried toward the main house. It wasn’t fair that he had her stirred up this way. She had too much on her mind, too much to do. She damn well didn’t want to be in love with Ben McKinnon.
Probably wasn’t, she thought, and swiped a hand under her nose.
It was just so embarrassingly female, this reaction of hers. Imagining herself in love with him just because they went to bed
