Carolina Moon

by Nora Roberts

  "That was my impression."

  "In a very attractive package." He grinned and sipped his beer when Tory merely lifted her brows. "Just thinking of you, darling. An attractive clerk is a business asset. You think she'll wear those little shorts?"

  "No," Tory said firmly. "I don't."

  "Bound to draw a lot of male customers if you let that be her uniform. That's a girl with very nice pins."

  "Pins.

  Hmmm. Well, she and her pins depend on how her references check out. But I imagine they will." Tory swept up the last of the debris, dumped it in the trash. "That seems to be the best that can be done."

  "Feel better?" "Yes." She crossed the room to put away the broom and dustpan. "Considerably.

  And I'm very grateful for the help." "I'm always open to gratitude." She took the pitcher from the refrigerator, poured herself a glass of iced tea. "The bedroom closet's not very big, but I made some room. And there's an empty drawer in the dresser."

  He said nothing, only drank his beer. Waited. "You wanted to be able to have some of your things here, didn't you?" "That's right." "So." "So?" "We're not living together." She set down her glass. "I've never lived with anyone, and that's not what this is." "All right." "But if you're going to be spending so much time here, you might as well have a place for some of your things." "Very practical." "Oh, go to hell." But there wasn't any heat in the response.

  "You're not supposed to smile when you say that." He set his beer aside, then slid his arms around her.

  "What do you think you're doing?"

  "Dancing. I never took you dancing. It's something people who aren't really living together ought to do now and then."

  It was an old, shuffling number with a boy asking a girl to stand by him when the land was dark. "Are you trying to be charming?" "I don't have to try. It's just part of my makeup." He dipped her, made her laugh. "Very smooth." "All those miserable hours of cotillion had to pay off." "Poor little rich boy." She rested her head on his shoulder and let herself enjoy the dance, the feel of him against her, the scent of him. "Thanks." "You're welcome." "When I was driving home tonight, I was thinking of you."

  "I like the sound of that."

  "And I was thinking, so far he's made all the moves. I let him because I wasn't sure if I really wanted to make any of my own, or counter any of his. It was sort of easy to be . . ."

  "Maneuvered?"

  "I suppose. And I was thinking, I just wonder how Kincade Lavelle would react if I got home and I fixed us a nice supper."

  "He'd have appreciated that."

  "Yes, well, some other time. That part of the thought process didn't pan out. But there was this second part."

  "Which was?" She lifted her head from his shoulder, met his eyes. "How would Kincade Lavelle react if after that, once we were all relaxed and quiet, just what would he do if I set out to seduce him?" "Well ... " was all he could manage as she pressed closer, ran her hands intimately down his hips. The stirring in his blood was a not-so-quiet delight. "I think the least I can do, as a gentleman, is let you find out." This time it was she who unfastened buttons, his shirt, then her own. She laid her lips over his heart, on the warm skin and vibrant beat. "I've had your taste with me since the first time you kissed me." While her lips played over him, she eased the shirt away. "I can bring tastes back, and I've done that with yours so many times already."

  She trailed her hands over his chest, his belly—a quiver—up to his shoulders. Such broad, tough shoulders. "I like the feel of you. Long, hard muscles. It excites me. And your hands, roughened from work, riding over me." She peeled her shirt open, and let it fall to the floor to join his. Watching him, she unhooked her bra, let it slide away.

  "Touch me now."

  He cupped her breasts in his hands, the warm, soft weight of them, skimmed the nipples with the edges of his thumbs.

  "Yes, like that." Her head fell back as heat balled in her belly. "Exactly like that.

  My insides go liquid when you touch me. Can you see it?" Her eyes, long and dark, met his. "I want ... "

  "Tell me."

  She moistened her lips, reached for the button of his jeans. His hands flexed on her, one hard caress. "I want to feel what you feel. I want what's inside you inside me. I've never tried that with anyone else. Never wanted to. Will you let me?"

  He bent his head, rubbed his lips over hers. "Take what you want."

  It was a risk. She would be open, gaping, so much more defenseless than he. But she wanted it, all of it, and that exquisite bond of trust.

  Once more she lay her lips on him, and opened mind, heart, body.

  It was a bolt, a lightning strike, the power of those coupled needs, images. His desire, layered and tangled inside her with her own. It slashed through her, dark, bright, swollen with energy. Her head snapped back from the punch of it, and she came in one long erotic gush.

  "God. God. Wait."

  "No." He'd never experienced anything like it. The twisted bonds of unity only knotted tighter in a bold and beautiful mass of arousal. "More." He set his teeth on her shoulder, craving flesh. "Again. Now."

  She couldn't stop it, it lashed through her like a storm full of fury and brilliance. It was she who dragged him to the floor, she who panted out pleas, demands, threats as they tore at clothes.

  She clawed at him, nipped as they rolled over the floor. His pulse was inside her, a savage beat that crashed against her own. The taste of him, the taste of herself, brewed together to saturate her.

  When he plunged into her she felt the urgent pumping of his blood, the desperate maze of his thoughts. Lost. She cried out, once, twice. They were both lost.

  She heard her name, his voice calling it inside her mind seconds before it burst from his lips. When he came inside her, dragged her with him, the glory of it made her weep.

  20

  Wade had his hands full—what was left of them after the ornery tabby badly misnamed Fluffy mangled them during her shots. Maxine was deep into finals, and he'd given her the day off, which meant he had only two hands to pit against four claws and a number of very sharp teeth.

  He'd concluded, an hour before, that he'd made a mistake of horrendous proportions by springing Maxine. He'd started the day with an emergency that required a house call and put him solidly behind. Add the minor war in the waiting area set off by a personality clash between a setter and a bichon, the Olsons' baby goat who'd managed to eat the best part of Malibu Barbie until her arm became lodged in his throat, and Fluffy's vile temper, and he'd had a pisser of a morning.

  He was cursing, sweating, bleeding, when Faith rushed in through the back. "Wade, honey, can you take a look at Bee for me? I think she's feeling poorly."

  "Take a number."

  "It'll only take a minute."

  "I haven't got a minute."

  "Oh now . . . goodness, what happened to your hands?" Faith watched as Wade narrowly avoided another swipe and tucked the cat firmly under his arm. "Did that mean old pussycat scratch you, darling?"

  "Kiss my ass" was his best response.

  "Did she get you there, too?" Faith called out as he marched into the waiting area. "It's all right, baby." She nuzzled the puppy. "Daddy's going to take good care of you in just a minute."

  He came back in to scrub up and dug out antiseptic.

  "She's been whimpering and sort of moaning all morning. And her nose is a little warm. She doesn't want to play. Just lies there. See?"

  Faith set Bee down, and the pup squatted by Wade's feet, looked up at him pitifully, then proceeded to throw up on his shoes.

  "Oh! Oh! For goodness sake. Must've been something she ate. Lilah said I shouldn't give her all those cookies." Faith bit her lip but couldn't quite hold in the giggle. Wade simply stood staring at her, antiseptic in one hand, a thin trickle of blood on the other, and puppy vomit on his shoes.

  "We're awfully sorry. Bee, don't you eat that. That's just nasty." She scooped up the puppy. "I bet you feel so much better now, don't you, sw
eetheart? There, see that, Wade? She's wagging her tail again. I just knew if I brought her in to you, everything would be fine.” "Is that how it looks to you? Like every-thing's fine?”

  "Well, Bee's sicked up what was worrying her, and I don't imagine it's the first time you've had a little doggie puke on you."

  "I've got a waiting room full of patients, my hands are scratched to shit, and now my shoes are going to stink for the rest of the day."

  "Well, go on up and change them then." She stepped back when he made one of his hands into a claw. She loved the light that came into his eyes when his dander was up. "Now, Wade."

  He bunched the claw into a fist, then punched it lightly between his own eyes. "I'm going to go ditch these shoes, and when I come back, I want you to have cleaned this up."

  "Clean it up? Myself?"

  "That's right. Put your dog back in surgery, get a mop and bucket, and deal with it. I don't have time for this." He reached down, pulled off the ruined shoes at the heels. "And make it fast. I'm behind schedule."

  "Daddy's a little cross this morning," she murmured to Bee, as Wade strode out to the garbage. She looked at the floor, grimaced. "Well, at least you got the best part of it on his shoes. It's not so bad."

  When he came back she was dutifully if inexpertly mopping. There were suds gliding across the linoleum on little waves of water. It almost seemed to him they had a current. But he didn't have the heart to complain.

  "Almost done here. Bee's in the back playing with her squeaky bone. She's bright-eyed and frisky again." Faith dumped the mop in the bucket, sloshed more water. "I guess this needs to dry off some."

  As an alternative to screaming, he rubbed his hands over his face and laughed. "Faith, you are unique."

  "Of course I am."

  She stepped back as he picked up the bucket, emptied it, rinsed off the mop, then began to slop up suds and water.

  "Oh. Well, I suppose that works, too."

  "Do me a favor. Go on out there and tell Mrs. Jenkins to bring Mitch on back. That's the beagle who's been howling the last half hour. And if you can find a way to maintain some sort of order out there for the next twenty minutes, I'll buy you a fancy dinner at your choice of restaurants."

  "Champagne?"

  "A magnum."

  "Let's just see what I can do."

  He got his twenty minutes, barely, when he heard the urgent cry.

  "Wade! Wade, come quick!" He bolted out, saw Piney Cobb staggering under the weight of Mongo.

  "Ran out into the road, right in front of me. God almighty. He's bleeding pretty bad."

  "Bring him in the back."

  He moved fast. The dog's breathing was labored, his pupils fixed and dilated. His thick fur was matted with blood, and more was dripping on the floor.

  "Here, on the table."

  "I hit the brakes," Piney muttered and stood back. "Swerved, but I clipped him anyway. I was heading into the hardware for some parts, and he come barreling out of the park right into the street."

  "Do you know if you ran over him?"

  "Don't think I did." With trembling hands he pulled out a faded red bandanna and wiped his sweaty face. "Knocked him’s what I think, but it happened fast."

  "Okay." Wade grabbed toweling, and since Faith was standing beside him, he simply took her hands, pushed them onto the cloth. "Press down, hard. I want that bleeding under control. He's in shock."

  He yanked open the drug cabinet, grabbed a bottle to prepare a hypo. "You just hang in there, boy. Just hang on," he murmured, as the dog began to stir and whimper. "Keep the pressure firm," he ordered Faith. "I'm giving him a sedative. I need to check for internal injuries."

  Her hands had shaken when he'd pressed them to the wound. She thought she'd seen straight down to the bone in the gash gaping down the dog's back leg. And her stomach had flipped over.

  She wanted to snatch her hands away from all that blood, to rush out of the room. Why couldn't Piney do it? Why couldn't someone else be here? She started to say so, the words jumping into her throat. She could smell the blood, the antiseptic, and the sour stench of Piney's panic sweat.

  But her gaze landed on Wade's face.

  Cool, composed, strong. His eyes were flat with concentration, his mouth firmed into one determined line. She stared at him, breathing through her teeth. Watching him work, the quick efficiency of it, the focus, calmed her even as the dog went still again beneath her hands.

  "No broken ribs. I don't think the wheel went over him. Might have a bruised kidney. We'll deal with that later. Head wound's pretty superficial. No blood in the ears. The leg's the worst of it."

  And that, he thought, was bad enough. Saving it, and the dog, was going to be tricky.

  "I need to move him into surgery." He glanced back, saw that Piney had dropped into the chair and had his head on his knees. "I need your hands, Faith. I'm going to lift and carry him, you have to stay with me. Keep the pressure firm. He's lost too much blood. Ready?"

  "Oh but, Wade, I—"

  "Let's go."

  She did what she was told because he left her no choice. She jogged beside him, fumbling for the door with her free hand. Bee sent up a joyful bark and ran between her feet.

  "Sit!" Wade said so sharply, Bee's butt plopped obediently to the floor. The minute he'd laid the sedated dog down he grabbed a thick apron, tossed it to Faith. "Put that on. I've got to get pictures."

  "Pictures." "X rays. Go to his head. Hold him steady as you can."

  The apron weighed like lead, but she dragged it on, did what she was told. Mongo's eyes were slitted, but it seemed to her he was watching her, pleading with her to help.

  "It's going to be all right, baby. Wade's going to make everything all right. You'll see."

  The sound of her voice had Bee whining and scooting over to huddle by her feet. "Get rid of the apron now." While he waited for the film to develop, Wade shot out orders. "Come back here and apply pressure again. Keep talking to him. Just let him hear your voice."

  "Okay, all right. Urn." Swallowing what tasted like bile, she pressed the thick padding over the gash. "Wade's going to fix you up just fine again. You . . . you have to look both ways before you cross the street. You remember that next time. Oh Wade, is he going to die?"

  "Not if I can help it." He slapped the X rays onto a lighted panel, nodded grimly. "Not if I can help it," he said again, and started gathering instruments.

  Sharp silver tools glinted in the hard overhead light. Her head seemed to circle in time with her stomach. "You're going to operate? Now? Just like that?"

  "I have to try to save the leg."

  "Save it? You mean—"

  "Just do what I say, and don't think."

  When he peeled back the compress, her stomach gave a nasty lurch, but he didn't give her time to be sick.

  "You hold this, press this button here when I tell you I need suction. You can do that one-handed. When I need an instrument, I'll describe it. Give it to me handle first. I'm going to knock him out now."

  He lowered the light, cleaned the field. All Faith could hear now was the slurping noises of her hose when he demanded suction, the click and clatter of tools. She averted her eyes, wanted to keep them that way, but he kept snapping out orders that required her to look.

  Before long, it was like a movie.

  Wade's head was bent, his eyes cool and calm, though she saw beads of sweat pearling on his forehead. It seemed to her his hands were like magic, moving so delicately through blood, flesh, and bone.

  She didn't even blink when he slid the protruding bone back into place. None of it was real.

  She watched him suture impossibly tiny stitches inside the gash. The raw yellow of the sterile wash he'd used stained his hands, mixed with the blood until it was all the color of an aging bruise.