by Nora Roberts
“I hadn’t bent over them yet.”
“You would have.”
“Yeah.” He held her closer a moment. “I would have. Looks like I reneged on the last part of the deal. I don’t have any flowers for you.”
“It doesn’t matter.” She pressed her lips against his neck.
“I’ll have to make it up to you.” Drawing back, he took both of her hands. “Aurora…” He started to lift one, then saw the caked blood on her knuckles. “What the hell have you done to yourself?”
Blankly she looked down. “I don’t know. It hurts,” she said as she flexed her hand.
“Come on.” He led her to the sink and began to clean off dried blood with cool water.
“Ow!” She would have jerked her hand away if he hadn’t held it still.
“I’ve never had a very gentle touch,” he muttered.
She leaned a hip against the sink. “So I’ve noticed.”
Annoyed at seeing the rough wound on her hand, he began to dab it with a towel. “Let’s go upstairs. I’ve got some Merthiolate.”
“That stings.”
“Don’t be a baby.”
“I’m not.” But he had to tug her along. “It’s only a scrape.”
“And scrapes get infected.”
“Look, you’ve already rubbed it raw. There can’t be a germ left.”
He nudged her into the bathroom. “We’ll make sure.”
Before she could stop him, he took out a bottle and dumped medicine over her knuckles. What had been a dull sting turned to fire. “Damn it!”
“Here.” He grabbed her hand again and began to blow on the wound. “Just give it a minute.”
“A lot of good that does,” she muttered, but the pain cooled.
“We’ll fix dinner. That’ll take your mind off it.”
“You’re supposed to fix dinner,” she reminded him.
“Right.” He kissed her forehead. “I’ve got to run out for a minute. I’ll start the grill when I get back.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m going to be chopping vegetables while you’re gone. I’m going to take a bath.”
“Fine. If the water’s still hot when I get back, I’ll join you.”
She didn’t ask where he was going. She wanted to, but there were rules. Instead A.J. walked into the bedroom and watched from the window as he pulled out of the drive. Weary, she sat on the bed and pulled off her boots. The afternoon had taken its toll, physically, emotionally. She didn’t want to think. She didn’t want to feel.
Giving in, she stretched out across the bed. She’d rest for a minute, she told herself. Only for a minute.
David came home with a handful of asters he’d begged from a neighbor’s garden. He thought the idea of dropping them on A.J. while she soaked in the tub might bring the laughter back to her eyes. He’d never heard her laugh so much or so easily as she had over the weekend. It wasn’t something he wanted to lose. Just as he was discovering she wasn’t something he wanted to lose.
He went up the stairs quietly, then paused at the bedroom door when he saw her. She’d taken off only her boots. A pillow was crumpled under her arm as she lay diagonally across the bed. It occurred to him as he stepped into the room that he’d never watched her sleep before. They’d never given each other the chance.
Her face looked so soft, so fragile. Her hair was pale and tumbled onto her cheek, her lips unpainted and just parted. How was it he’d never noticed how delicate her features were, how slender and frail her wrists were, how elegantly feminine the curve of her neck was?
Maybe he hadn’t looked, David admitted as he crossed to the bed. But he was looking now.
She was fire and thunder in bed, sharp and tough out of it. She had a gift, a curse and ability she fought against every waking moment, one that he was just beginning to understand. He was just beginning to see that it made her defensive and defenseless.
Only rarely did the vulnerabilities emerge, and then with such reluctance from her he’d tended to gloss over them. But now, just now, when she was asleep and unaware of him, she looked like something a man should protect, cherish.
The first stirrings weren’t of passion and desire, but of a quiet affection he hadn’t realized he felt for her. He hadn’t realized it was possible to feel anything quiet for Aurora. Unable to resist, he reached down to brush the hair from her cheek and feel the warm, smooth skin beneath.
She stirred. He’d wanted her to. Heavy and sleep-glazed, her eyes opened. “David?” Even her voice was soft, feminine.
“I brought you a present.” He sat on the bed beside her and dropped the flowers by her hand.
“Oh.” He’d seen that before, too, he realized. That quick surprise and momentary confusion when he’d done something foolish or romantic. “You didn’t have to.”
“I think I did,” he murmured, half to himself. Almost as an experiment, he lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her softly, gently, with the tenderness she’d made him feel as she slept. He felt the ache move through him, sweet as a dream.
“David?” She said his name again, but this time her eyes were dark and dazed.
“Ssh.” His hands didn’t drag through her hair now with trembles of passion, but stroked, exploring the texture. He could watch the light strike individual strands. “Lovely.” He brought his gaze back to hers. “Have I ever told you how lovely you are?”
She started to reach for him, for the passion that she could understand. “It isn’t necessary.”
His lips met hers again, but they didn’t devour and demand. This mood was foreign and made her heart pound as much with uncertainty as need. “Make love with me,” she murmured as she tried to draw him down.
“I am.” His mouth lingered over hers. “Maybe for the first time.”
“I don’t understand,” she began, but he shifted so that he could cradle her in his arms.
“Neither do I.”
So he began, slowly, gently, testing them both. Her mouth offered darker promises, but he waited, coaxing. His lips were patient as they moved over hers, light and soothing as they kissed her eyes closed. He didn’t touch her, not yet, though he wondered what it would be like to stroke her while the light was softening, to caress as though it were all new, all fresh. Gradually he felt the tension in her body give way, he felt what he’d never felt from her before. Pliancy, surrender, warmth.
Her body seemed weightless, gloriously light and free. She felt the pleasure move through her, but sweetly, fluidly, like wine. Then he was the wine, heady and potent, drugging her with the intoxicating taste of his mouth. The hands that had clutched him in demand went lax. There was so much to absorb—the flavor of his lips as they lingered on hers; the texture of his skin as his cheek brushed hers; the scent that clung to him, part man, part woods; the dark, curious look in his eyes as he watched her.
She looked as she had when she’d slept, he thought. Fragile, so arousingly fragile. And she felt… At last he touched, fingertips only, along skin already warm. He heard her sigh his name in a way she’d never said it before. Keeping her cradled in his arms, he began to take her deeper, take himself deeper, with tenderness.
She had no strength to demand, no will to take control. For the first time her body was totally his, just as for the first time her emotions were. He touched, and she yielded. He tasted, and she gave. When he shifted her, she felt as though she could float. Perhaps she was. Clouds of pleasure, mists of soft, soft delight. When he began to undress her, she opened her eyes, needing to see him again.
The light had gone to rose with sunset. It made her skin glow as he slowly drew off her shirt. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, couldn’t stop his hands from touching, though he had no desire to be quick. When she reached up, he helped her pull off his own shirt, then took her injured hand to his lips. He kissed her fingers, then her palm, then her wrist, until he felt her begin to tremble. Bending, he brushed her lips with his again, wanting to hear her sigh his name. Then, watching her, waiting until s
he looked at him, he continued to undress her.
Slowly. Achingly slowly, he drew the jeans down her legs, pausing now and then to taste newly exposed skin. Pulses beat at the back of her knees. He felt them, lingered there, exploited them. Her ankles were slim, fragile like her wrists. He traced them with his tongue until she moaned. Then he waited, letting her settle again as he stripped off his own jeans. He came to her, flesh against flesh.
Nothing had been like this. Nothing could be like this. The thoughts whirled in her brain as he began another deliciously slow assault. Her body was to be enjoyed and pleasured, not worshiped. But he did so now, and enticed her to do the same with his.
So strong. She’d known his strength before, but this was different. His fingers didn’t grip; his hands didn’t press. They skimmed, they traced, they weakened. So intense. They’d shared intensity before, but never so quietly.
She heard him say her name. Aurora. It was like a dream, one she’d never dared to have. He murmured promises in her ear and she believed them. Whatever tomorrow might bring, she believed them now. She could smell the flowers strewn over the bed and taste the excitement that built in a way it had never done before.
He slipped into her as though their bodies had never been apart. The rhythm was easy, patient, giving.
Holding himself back, he watched her climb higher. That was what he wanted, he realized, to give her everything there was to give. When she arched and shuddered, the force whipped through him. Power, he recognized it, but was driven to leash it. His mouth found hers and drew on the sweetness. How could he have known sweetness could be so arousing?
The blood was pounding in his head, roaring in his ears, yet his body continued to move slowly with hers. Balanced on the edge, David said her name a last time.
“Aurora, look at me.” When her eyes opened, they were dark and aware. “I want to see where I take you.”
Even when control slipped away, echoes of tenderness remained.
10
Alice Robbins had exploded onto the screen in the sixties, a young, raw talent. She had, like so many girls before her and after her, fled to Hollywood to escape the limitations of small-town life. She’d come with dreams, with hopes and ambitions. An astrologer might have said Alice’s stars were in the right quadrant. When she hit, she hit big.
She had had an early, turbulent marriage that had ended in an early, turbulent divorce. Scenes in and out of the courtroom had been as splashy as anything she’d portrayed on the screen. With her marriage over and her career climbing, she’d enjoyed all the benefits of being a beautiful woman in a town that demanded, then courted, beauty. Reports of her love affairs sizzled on the pages of glossies. Glowing reviews and critical praise heaped higher with each role. But in her late twenties, when her career was reaching its peak, she found something that fulfilled her in a way success and reviews never had. Alice Robbins met Peter Van Camp.
He’d been nearly twenty years her senior, a hard-bitten, well-to-do business magnate. They’d married after a whirlwind two-week courtship that had kept the gossip columns salivating. Was it for money? Was it for power? Was it for prestige? It had been, very simply, for love.
In an unprecedented move, Alice had taken her husband’s name professionally as well as privately. Hardly more than a year later, she’d given birth to a son and had, without a backward glance, put her career on hold. For nearly a decade, she’d devoted herself to her family with the same kind of single-minded drive she’d put into her acting.
When word leaked that Alice Van Camp had been lured back into films, the hype had been extravagant. Rumors of a multimillion-dollar deal flew and promises of the movie of the century were lavish.
Four weeks before the release of the film, her son, Matthew, had been kidnapped.
David knew the background. Alice Van Camp’s triumphs and trials were public fodder. Her name was legend. Though she rarely consented to grace the screen, her popularity remained constant. As to the abduction and recovery of her son, details were sketchy. Perhaps because of the circumstances, the police had never been fully open and Clarissa DeBasse had been quietly evasive. Neither Alice nor Peter Van Camp had ever, until now, granted an interview on the subject. Even with their agreement and apparent cooperation, David knew he would have to tread carefully.
He was using the minimum crew, and a well-seasoned one. “Star” might be an overused term, but David was aware they would be dealing with a woman who fully deserved the title and the mystique that went with it.
Her Beverly Hills home was guarded by electric gates and a wall twice as tall as a man. Just inside the gates was a uniformed guard who verified their identification. Even after they had been passed through, they drove another half a mile to the house.
It was white, flowing out with balconies, rising up with Doric columns, softened by tall, tall trellises of roses in full bloom. Legend had it that her husband had had it built for her in honor of the last role she’d played before the birth of their son. David had seen the movie countless times and remembered her as an antebellum tease who made Scarlett O’Hara look like a nun.
There were Japanese cherry trees dripping down to sweep the lawn in long skirts. Their scent and the citrus fragrance of orange and lemon stung the air. As he pulled his car to a halt behind the equipment van, he spotted a peacock strutting across the lawn.
I wish A.J. could see this.
The thought came automatically before he had time to check it, just as thoughts of her had come automatically for days. Because he wasn’t yet sure just how he felt about it, David simply let it happen.
And how did he feel about her? That was something else he wasn’t quite sure of. Desire. He desired her more, even more now after he’d saturated himself with her. Friendship. In some odd, cautious way he felt they were almost as much friends as they were lovers. Understanding. It was more difficult to be as definite about that. A.J. had an uncanny ability to throw up mirrors that reflected back your own thoughts rather than hers. Still, he had come to understand that beneath the confidence and drive was a warm, vulnerable woman.
She was passionate. She was reserved. She was competent. She was fragile. And she was, David had discovered, a tantalizing mystery to be solved, one layer at a time.
Perhaps that was why he’d found himself so caught up in her. Most of the women he knew were precisely what they seemed. Sophisticated. Ambitious. Well-bred. His own taste had invariably drawn him to a certain type of woman. A.J. fit. Aurora didn’t. If he understood anything about her, he understood she was both.
As an agent, he knew, she was pleased with the deal she’d made for her client, including the Van Camp segment. As a daughter, he sensed, she was uneasy about the repercussions.
But the deal had been made, David reminded himself as he walked up the wide circular steps to the Van Camp estate. As a producer, he was satisfied with the progress of his project. But as a man, he wished he knew of a way to put A.J.’s mind at rest. She excited him; she intrigued him. And as no woman had ever done before, she concerned him. He’d wondered, more often than once, if that peculiar combination equaled love. And if it did, what in hell he was going to do about it.
“Second thoughts?” Alex asked as David hesitated at the door.
Annoyed with himself, David shrugged his shoulders, then pushed the bell. “Should there be?”
“Clarissa’s comfortable with this.”
David found himself shifting restlessly. “That’s enough for you?”
“It’s enough,” Alex answered. “Clarissa knows her own mind.”
The phrasing had him frowning, had him searching. “Alex—”
Though he wasn’t certain what he had been about to say, the door opened and the moment was lost. A formally dressed, French-accented maid took their names before leading them into a room off the main hall. The crew, not easily impressed, spoke in murmurs.
It was unapologetically Hollywood. The furnishings were big and bold, the colors flashy. On a baby gran
d in the center of the room was a silver candelabra dripping with crystal prisms. David recognized it as a prop from Music at Midnight.
“Not one for understatement,” Alex commented.
“No.” David took another sweep of the room. There were brocades and silks in jewel colors. Furniture gleamed like mirrors. “But Alice Van Camp might be one of the few in the business who deserves to bang her own drum.”
“Thank you.”
Regal, amused and as stunning as she had been in her screen debut, Alice Van Camp paused in the doorway. She was a woman who knew how to pose, and who did so without a second thought. Like others who had known her only through her movies, David’s first thought was how small she was. Then she stepped forward and her presence alone whisked the image away.
“Mr. Marshall.” Hand extended, Alice walked to him. Her hair was a deep sable spiked around a face as pale and smooth as a child’s. If he hadn’t known better, David would have said she’d yet to see thirty. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m a great admirer of journalists—when they don’t misquote me.”
“Mrs. Van Camp.” He covered her small hand with both of his. “Shall I say the obvious?”
“That depends.”
“You’re just as beautiful face-to-face as you are on the screen.”
