by Diana Palmer
There was a gift shop at the samurai fort where they could purchase soft drinks and souvenirs. Judd bought Christabel a beautiful red and black fan and postcards of the fort to carry home. Then it was back into the van, which featured white lace trim and the most courteous of drivers, and on to Mr. Kosugi’s restaurant for a late lunch. The food was delightful in Mr. Kosugi’s restaurant, especially his beef, which rivaled the famed Kobe beef that Japan was famous for. He used many of the same techniques which produced it, including massaging the cattle. The Dunn imported cattle would be similarly raised. They had a beef dish with noodles that was absolutely delicious.
Christabel was becoming more expert with chopsticks since Judd had tutored her. She hadn’t been able to get the hang of it when Cash had shown her how. She made the mistake of mentioning it while she dipped noodles expertly from a bowl into her mouth.
Judd had been exuberant and smiling all day. But at the mention of Cash’s name, he went cold. Even his appetite seemed to suffer. He made every effort to be polite to their hosts. They toured a temple and spoke to the Buddhist monk, who even autographed the little book Christabel bought as a souvenir of the fascinating temple, with its sprawling Zen gardens of sand, and beautiful koi in a pond near the temple. But later, after another train ride back to Osaka, and then a ferry ride down the river to their hotel, Judd’s pleasant manner went into eclipse. By the time he and Christabel were alone in their hotel room, it was a different story.
“Maybe I should have stayed home and let Cash come with you,” he said with barely contained fury. “He can even speak the language, can’t he?”
She stiffened. “Yes, he can, quite fluently,” she retorted, brown eyes flashing. She pushed back her long blond hair, disheveled from the wind. In beige slacks and a floral blouse, she looked slender and neat and very pretty.
Judd turned, moving toward her with a suddenness that left her heart hanging in space. He was still wearing navy blue slacks, but he’d shed his jacket and tie and hat, and unbuttoned the top buttons of his shirt. The thick dark hair that covered his muscular chest was revealed blatantly, and she was remembering how it felt to be held against it in the darkness.
“But he hasn’t had you,” he said abruptly, towering over her. “And he won’t!”
Her breath rushed out and she stared up at him with wide, perplexed eyes. “You don’t want me...” she began.
His lean hands shot out and drew her to him gently, wrapping her up against the muscular length of him. “Blind, deaf, dumb and numb from the neck down, are we?” he asked with black humor as he pressed her hips into his.
She felt the irony of the statement keenly. He was completely aroused, and he’d barely touched her. She swallowed hard. Delicious little skirls of pleasure were dancing in the back of her mind. She remembered pleasure so deep it was almost pain, and sounds coming out of her throat that barely sounded human.
Her hands pushed softly at his shirt. “Don’t, Judd,” she said huskily. “You’re just upset over all that’s happened. It will wear off.”
“I’ve been noble since they took you to the hospital,” he said through his teeth. “I’m tired of it. I don’t eat, I don’t sleep, I can’t even work. I remember your voice moaning in my ear like the cry of the damned while I was having you,” he bit off, bending to her mouth. “You couldn’t get enough of me. You couldn’t get close enough to me. Your face when I fulfilled you...I ache every time I think about it. And you think it will wear off?”
She was losing ground. Her body was reacting predictably to having him this close, and not in any way that was going to convince him. Already her breasts were flattening against his diaphragm, her legs were carrying her closer to that magnificent arousal. She felt him all around her and she wanted him insanely.
She watched her own hands sliding inside his shirt with a feeling of horror, but she had no power to stop them. She lifted her face to his and saw the same helpless, hopeless desire reflected in his glittery black eyes.
“This time, I’m not putting out the light, Christabel,” he said as he bent, lifting her clear of the floor. “And you’re going to love what I do to you.”
His mouth opened on her parted lips. It was like an explosion of joy inside her. To her shame, she did nothing that looked like a protest. She clung to him, answering the fierce hunger of his mouth with an insane passion, rubbing her body against his and moaning piteously.
By the time they ended up sprawled on the bed together, she was beyond words at all. Her hands were as impatient of obstacles as his, her breath jerky and quick in the utter silence of the room.
“We’re having dinner...with the Kosugis,” she choked as he skinned off her slacks and dragged her blouse over her head.
“In two hours,” he whispered roughly, his hands going to her underwear with deadly efficiency. “With a little luck, you’ll still be able to walk by then...!”
She moaned against the harsh pressure of his mouth. He found his way down her body, removing obstacles with little finesse and much urgency until they were riveted together in a nude tangle on the sheets.
“Slow down,” he whispered huskily as she writhed under the brush of his lips on her breasts. “Slow down, baby. Don’t hurry. There’s no need. No need at all.”
She sobbed, her voice loud in the stillness that was unbroken except by the soft hum of the air-conditioning. “The maids,” she gasped.
“I closed the door.”
She was going to mention that they had a passkey, but his lips were on the inside of her long legs and she was going crazy with pleasure. She’d never dreamed that her own desire would peak like this, explode like this, the minute he touched her.
“Maybe...I’m not normal,” she choked out, clinging to him.
“Why?”
“I’m on fire,” she laughed jerkily. “I’m dying for you. I’d do anything, anything...!”
“So would I. Anything to please you.” He slid alongside her and cradled her head in his hands, tenderly assaulting her face. “It’s been so long, honey. So long!”
His voice ended in a harsh groan as she ran her hands through the thick hair that covered him. She wondered if men felt the same as women did about intimate caresses. Driven to find out, she bent to his chest and explored him with her mouth, lingering on the flat male nipples that were the counterpoint of her own.
He arched, shuddering.
“Do you like that?” she whispered at his collarbone.
“I love it,” he ground out. “Do it again.”
She did, following his lead. But when her mouth reached just below his navel, he shook all over and suddenly dragged her body under his, tangling their legs together while he searched for her mouth.
His hands were in between them now, working magic on her taut body, making her writhe and moan with delicious sensations. She opened her legs to let him touch her even more intimately.
He lifted his head and looked into her eyes while his hands learned her all over again with slow, tender explorations that sent her mindless with pleasure.
“I’ve never wanted anyone this badly,” he said in a rough tone. One long, hair-roughened leg slid in between both of hers and he moved, very gently, into complete intimacy with her. “No, don’t lift your leg,” he whispered. “Move this one...here, like this.” He shivered. His eyes searched hers. “Now come closer. Feel me going into you. Slow and easy, honey. Slow and easy. It’s good, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” she breathed. Her hands bit into his shoulders as she looked up at him, feeling his body slowly merge with her own. She’d expected discomfort, if not pain. But there was no barrier now, no impediment. Her eyes reflected her surprise and pleasure at the ease of his passage.
“You excite me,” he bit off, watching her as he moved. “Everything about you excites me. I hated having the lights out the first time. I
wanted to see your face, your eyes, while I loved you.”
It was an unexpected expression. Her breath stopped in her throat and then rasped as he shifted over her, gathering her legs in between both of his.
“Remember how it felt before, when I did this?” he asked, his voice deep and sensual as he shifted again.
“Yes,” she replied. Her hands went up to touch his face, to trace his straight nose, his wide, sexy mouth, his jutting chin. She gasped as pleasure lifted her up into his body.
“There?” he whispered, and moved again, with more confidence when he saw her expression. “Yes, you like that, don’t you?” His hips lifted and fell, and with each slow movement, she gasped and stiffened.
Her nails bit into his upper arms as she hung there, suddenly in a vise of building ecstasy that was as sharp as it was joyful. “Judd!” Her voice exploded with the tension and her body suddenly went rigid. She looked into his eyes with near panic. “Please...don’t stop,” she pleaded, her voice splintering.
“Right there?” he asked urgently, and pressed deeper, harder. His teeth clenched. His eyes closed. “Yes. Yes! Right...there!”
She was moving with him now, as if bound to him by invisible strings. She forgot the past, the future, the pain, the uncertainty. She knew only one thing, now, the desperate search for pleasure that was just barely out of her reach. She focused on it with every ounce of strength she possessed. Her breath rasped, like his. Her body trembled with each deep movement of his hips. Her eyes were blind looking straight into his as her body became demanding in its mad search for completion.
“It was never like this for me,” he whispered hoarsely as his own body began to roughen on hers. He groaned and his big hands clenched the sheet on either side of her head. “I’m going to lose it...!”
“It’s all right,” she whispered, her voice high-pitched, urgent. “Oh, Judd...Judd...!”
His mouth bit into hers as the rhythm became chaotic and rough. “Come for me, baby,” he whispered into her open mouth. “Come for me...!”
The suddenness of fulfillment caught her unawares. One instant she was reaching for some impossible height. The next, she was sobbing like a child, clinging to him, feeling her body explode with joy as it buckled and convulsed over and over and over again.
She could hardly see him in the madness that followed. Her eyes were wide-open, like her mouth, as she convulsed in one final agony of delight that seemed to throb endlessly through her body in a wave of lava-hot savagery.
His hips thrust down violently into hers and he stilled, stiffened, and cried out in the endless heat of exploding passion.
“Oh, God, oh, God...!” he choked, shaking. “Never like this...never...never!”
She held him to her, cradled him, comforted him while he shook helplessly in her arms. A long time later, he convulsed and then collapsed on her in a damp, spent tangle.
She savored the feel of his big body completely on hers, her arms holding him there in the intimacy of satiation.
Her mouth touched his shoulder, his throat. She ran her hands over his wet back, feeling the muscles ripple, feeling him shiver as each little movement of her body kindled new jolts of pleasure in the aftermath.
She felt his mouth at her ear, husky and warm as he nuzzled his face against hers.
It was the most tender interlude she could ever have imagined, after such mad, ardent lovemaking. She clung to him, trying to breathe normally, her body still intimately joined to his, their legs tangled, their bodies all but boneless with exhaustion.
He lifted his head and looked down into her eyes. He studied her as if he hadn’t seen her for a very long time. His hand brushed back her damp, disheveled hair, and then traced her swollen mouth intently.
“I’m part of you,” he whispered, and he sounded dazed. “I can feel you, all around me, like soft, warm silk.”
She flushed and her face did an embarrassed nosedive into his damp throat.
His fingers tangled gently in her hair. He rolled over onto his side, taking her with him. His chest rose and fell heavily. “Did I hurt you?”
“Of course not.”
His hand slid down her side to where the wound had been, to the slight ridge that had formed there. “Are you sure?”
“The doctor said I could resume normal, routine activities,” she mused. “I guess that meant...any...activities.”
He laughed huskily at her temple. “This isn’t normal,” he murmured, kissing her eyelids. “Or routine.”
Her hands slid around his neck and she lay her head on his damp shoulder with a shaky sigh. “It’s scary to feel like that.”
“Yes.” He didn’t have to ask what she meant. He smoothed her hair down her bare back absently while his eyes found the wall beyond the bed. He scowled, thinking how close he’d come to losing her forever. He’d been a fool. But maybe, just maybe, he still had a chance.
“You haven’t said any more about the divorce,” she whispered, hating to even bring it up. But she felt frightfully vulnerable and uncertain of him.
“I told your friend Cash that hell would freeze over before you got one,” he said quietly.
She stiffened against him slightly. “Wh...what?”
His lean hand smoothed down her back, over the faint scars, to her hips and drew her even closer. He shivered at the delicious intimate contact, and his body began to move involuntarily.
“If you’re sore, you’d better tell me right now,” he said in a barely controlled tone. “Before I lose it again.”
She could feel his instant response to the intimacy they were sharing. It was delicious, to feel her own body opening to him, responding to him without reserve. She lifted one leg slowly to deepen his possession, and heard him catch his breath.
“I wouldn’t tell you even if I was sore,” she whispered huskily. “I want it again. I want you again. I want...to be...part of you.”
He made an odd noise, deep in his throat. Seconds later, his mouth bit into hers and his body moved helplessly against her, pressing her hungrily down into the mattress. He’d never known that it was possible for a man and woman to share a body, but they were certainly doing it. And that was the last sane thought he was able to snatch before he went down into the flames again.
* * *
He drew her into the shower with him, somber and quiet, bathing her as naturally as if he’d done it all their lives.
She was shell-shocked by the sudden intimacy of their relationship. They’d barely touched each other since Christmas, and now they were lovers. Really lovers.
He kissed her tenderly in between soaping and rinsing her smooth body. He traced her breasts with breathless appreciation and kissed them before he gave her the washcloth and coaxed her into using it.
They were like children, exploring each other in a silence throbbing with joy.
He dried her, wrapped her in a towel, and did the same for himself. Then he led her to the built-in hair dryer and used it on her long hair.
It was as if time had stopped still for them. She couldn’t remember ever feeling so close to another human being in her whole life. Her eyes searched his hungrily, hoping for something more than the exquisite pleasure she’d seen in them earlier.
“What are you looking for, Christabel?” he asked gently.
She averted her gaze with a quick smile. “Nothing.”
He put the hair dryer down and tilted her chin upward. His scrutiny was intent, and his black eyes were solemn. “There’s no tomorrow. Only now. We live one day at a time, until we go home. Okay?”
She swallowed, meeting his eyes. “Okay, Judd,” she whispered.
He bent, brushing his mouth slowly over hers. Then he led her back into the bedroom and dressed her himself, with a new tenderness that made her heart ache.
After that, th
ere was no going back. They held hands going places. Judd smiled at Christabel as if he’d never looked at another woman. He held doors open for her, walked on the street side of her, pulled out chairs for her. He presented her with the sexiest red negligee set she’d ever seen and coaxed her into modeling it for him. The result was predictable. Every night, she slept close in his arms, loved to sleep with a tender passion that grew more exciting with each passing day. She dreaded the very thought of going home. But of course, the trip ended. They boarded a plane for Dallas, and fears of losing what she had with Judd kept her silent and remote the whole way home.
Judd noticed, and his conclusion was that she was having second thoughts about continuing their relationship. He backed off, to give her space. And that, of course, led her to the certainty that he had regrets of his own and she was just now seeing them.
16
Not too long after they returned from Japan, Crissy started losing her breakfast. The first time it happened, Maude wasn’t home. The second, she pretended to have forgotten something in her room and barely made it to the bathroom in time. She slipped into town, bought a home pregnancy test, and waited until Maude was away at her sister’s on the weekend to use it.
She was staggered by the results. It was all her fault. She’d let Judd believe she was on the Pill, and then he’d continued to believe it when they were intimate in Japan. Now she was pregnant and he was avoiding her. He denied it, but she knew he was going to marry Tippy. The film company was back for a reshoot and he was always around to drive the model back and forth to her hotel. He couldn’t apparently bear to look at Christabel since they’d come back from Japan, and after so many exquisite, wonderful nights in his arms. But what if he found out about the baby? He’d feel obliged to stay married, of course he would. She’d ruin his life, Tippy’s life, her own life...
