Well, almost all business.
“Dinner Tuesday would be great,” Lucky said. “What time?”
The women took care of the details with a couple of short, familiar sentences, in that way close friends are able to do. Stu looked slightly uncomfortable and a little apologetic. No man wanted to interfere in another man’s early-relationship wild-monkey sex.
When Kristie and Stu moved on, Lucky and Annie reclaimed their bench. They tried to salvage their earlier, comfortable position, but it couldn’t be recreated. After a few minutes, Annie said, “I don’t know what’s going on, but the hairs on the back of my neck are standing up.”
Lucky didn’t say anything, but he felt the same odd chill.
Someone was watching.
A small part of Annie knew, when she crawled into bed on Sunday evening, that her dreams that night would not be of the pleasant sort. This afternoon in the park she’d felt the killer watching. If Lucky was right about physical proximity playing a role, how could she escape this night untouched by the nightmares of the killer’s mind? She knew what was coming, and still she fell asleep quickly.
As usual, the dreams were disjointed and alarming and very real. She was in the killer’s head…and she was watching herself.
His thoughts were so twisted, she had a hard time making sense of them. He felt entitled to something that wasn’t his, and he lived with an anger that never went away. He hid his rage well, behind smiles and kind words, but the anger was always there, simmering. Growing. All-consuming.
Only one thing would make the rage subside, for a while.
Annie woke with a start and sat up in the bed, looking at the bedside clock and hoping the night was done. It wasn’t even two-thirty yet, but she didn’t want to go back to sleep. The dream wasn’t finished. It would come again, beginning right where it had ended, if she went back to sleep.
Instead of lying down, she threw off the covers and stood, allowing the cool night air to brush her bare legs and arms and wake her up. This afternoon in the park, she’d known the killer had seen her. She and Lucky had walked around the park after that, but no other useful sensations had come to her, and they hadn’t seen anyone suspicious. She saw people she knew—friends and acquaintances. Was the man who’d invaded her head one of them? The postman or the bag boy from the grocery store. The preacher or the economics teacher from the high school. A husband, a son, a father…who?
She opened the door and stepped into the hallway. The television wasn’t on, so maybe Lucky had already gone to bed. He often stayed up very late, and she’d been hoping he was still awake so she could talk to him for a while. She’d tell him the dream—give it to him the way she’d given him her problems—and then maybe she could sleep without interruption.
The door to the spare bedroom was almost closed, but not quite. Lucky left it open at night so he could hear everything that was going on in the cabin. If anyone stepped onto her property, they’d know it. An alarm would sound. Cameras would click. No one was going to get close to the house, but that didn’t mean he’d rest easy.
Did he ever?
She pushed the door farther open, and as she did Lucky rolled over and opened his eyes. His room was dim but she could see him well enough, thanks to the night-light in the hallway. He didn’t look at all sleepy, and she wondered if he’d been lying there awake all this time.
“He saw us today,” she whispered.
“I know.” Lucky sat up, and Annie moved farther into the room.
“He didn’t choose us, but we have grabbed his attention.” She looked down, into those hard eyes that had captured her from the beginning. The light here was too low for her to see and admire the color, but she knew what they looked like by bright light and dim. “I know that’s what we wanted, but…it’s scary. I don’t want him to watch us. I don’t want him anywhere near either of us.”
“You’re shaking,” he said.
“I’m cold.” To reinforce that statement, Annie hugged her arms and ran hands up and down in a search for warmth.
A better method of warming herself was waiting. Lucky drew down the covers and scooted to the other side of the bed, making room for her. She shouldn’t think of crawling into that bed. He shouldn’t ask. But she didn’t hesitate before slipping beneath the covers, into a bed that had been nicely warmed by Lucky’s body heat.
He stayed on his side of the mattress. “Tell me about the dream.”
“Do I have to?”
He hesitated a moment. “No. It can wait until morning, unless you dreamed a name and address.”
She actually laughed a little, something she’d thought impossible just a moment ago. “No, sorry.”
“Go on back to sleep, then. We’ll talk about it in the morning.”
“I don’t really want to go back to sleep.” She realized the possible meaning of those words the moment they were out of her mouth. She was, after all, in Lucky’s bed, and there were other things they could do here besides sleep. She’d dreamed about those things. She’d even had visions. “I mean, I’m afraid I might dream about the killer again, and even though you need to know as much as possible, I don’t want to dream about him again, ever.”
“I know what you mean.” There was a touch of humor in his voice. He knew very well she was embarrassed by her poor choice of words.
She rolled onto her side so her back was to Lucky, and she sighed deeply. “I wish I was normal.”
“You’re as normal as any woman I’ve ever known,” he responded, his voice rumbling softly. “You just happen to know stuff other women don’t.”
“That’s simplifying the matter substantially.”
“Doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
And then he was there, his breath on her neck and his hand on her waist. She held her breath, waiting for what would come next, but Lucky didn’t make a move. He simply settled down there, too close for comfort, not close enough to suit her.
“If you have a bad dream tonight, when you wake up I’ll be here. Right here, Annie. You’ve tapped into something bad and scary, I get that, but there’s no one here but you and me. He can’t hurt you.”
No, but you can. She didn’t say that aloud, and she didn’t move away. She could move, if she wanted to, but she liked the feel of Lucky’s body so close. She liked the solidness and the body heat and the dip of the mattress.
Most of all, she liked not facing these visions alone.
So instead of moving away, she allowed herself to relax against Lucky’s hard, warm body. Her back molded to his chest. He wasn’t wearing a shirt or pajama top. His chest was beautifully bare, marred only by that scar on his shoulder. Beneath the covers, maybe he wore underwear for sleeping. Maybe there were plain flannel pajama bottoms. Then again, maybe he wore nothing at all. Her hand itched to reach down and back to see what she might find…but of course she didn’t.
It was foolish to be here in this bed. It would be foolish beyond reason to take the opportunity to explore.
“Good night, Lucky,” she said.
“Good night, Annie. Sweet dreams.”
She sighed. “Very funny.”
And then, within minutes, the sleep she’d been dreading came upon her swiftly.
How could she do that? How could Annie crawl into his bed and almost immediately go to sleep?
The attraction between them had been there from the beginning, and it increased every day. Of course it did. They were two healthy, unattached adults living in the same freakin’ house. They held hands, they touched in public, they spent every waking hour together. And now here they were in an unwaking hour.
Sex with Annie Lockhart was going to be a mistake, but that didn’t mean he didn’t think it was going to happen. Soon.
But not soon enough.
Lucky did doze, eventually, but he kept waking to see if Annie had moved—away or closer. It was near dawn when he came awake to find her restless. She whispered. No. Her body, which had been so wonderfully relaxed, tensed and curle
d inward, and instinctively she moved away from him.
There was no doubt that he should let the dream run its course. She might learn something important this time. Not the name and address he’d asked her for, but some detail he could use to track down the culprit. He watched her for a few moments, and she grew increasingly more distressed. Her body was tense, the noises she made were pitiful and frightened.
It was the tear that pushed him over the edge. By the soft light of a night-light that burned beyond his opened bedroom door, he saw a single teardrop slip from the corner of her eye.
Rising up on his elbow, Lucky took her arm and shook it gently. “Annie, wake up,” he whispered.
She didn’t immediately do as he instructed. In fact, she seemed to grow more distressed, as if he had only intensified the effects of the nightmare.
He called her name again, in a slightly louder voice. She’d pushed the covers down to just below her waist. The T-shirt she wore to sleep in had ridden up to her belly button, bunching there just beneath the words Drama Queen and offering him just a glimpse of skin. It was skin he’d seen before, since she was fond of small shirts and low-riding jeans, but somehow this was different. Of course it was different. She was in his bed, and when a woman came to a man’s bed everything changed.
His hand slipped just beneath the shirt and settled on her taut stomach. She was warm, and he could feel the pounding of her heart in her soft skin. “Wake up.”
She did, with a gasp and the flinging of one arm, an arm he caught and held steady as she came awake.
Her eyes caught and held his, and in an instant he saw her fear, her surprise and finally her relief. She relaxed very quickly, then she closed her eyes and took a deep, cleansing breath. “He’s closer,” she whispered.
“To the couple he’s been watching, or to us?” Lucky asked. He didn’t release her arm, but dropped it down slowly.
“I don’t know.”
In order for this moment to end as it should one of them needed to move away, but neither did. At the moment, Annie was grateful not to be alone, and Lucky was unable to move. Not only was he inescapably drawn to Annie, he needed to stay under the covers until his extremely inconvenient erection went away.
Some women were pretty in the morning; others weren’t. Annie was actually more beautiful, with her hair mussed and her face warmly flushed with sleep. Her eyes were clear, her cheeks nicely pink. Maybe she was a morning person. Maybe she was just so naturally pretty that she never had to worry about puffy eyes or annoying lines. Some women painted on their beauty. Annie’s beauty was natural. It came from a place deep inside her, and straight from sleep it shone from her.
As they lay there, face-to-face, closer than they had ever been before, Annie’s expression changed. Her eyes narrowed and her lips parted slightly. He knew that look. Her head cocked to one side as she studied him, and she reached out to touch his face with soft fingers that trailed along his stubbled jaw.
“I usually try to wash my dreams away with a shower.”
“That sounds like a good idea.” Maybe if she’d get out of his bed and get her hand off his face, he’d quit thinking about ripping that silly T-shirt off her body and tasting every inch of her.
“But this is better.” That hand trailed down to his neck, and then to his chest. “It’s nice, to be held. To wake up from a nightmare to…to this.”
In that maddening way she had, she immediately changed the subject. “Where did you get the scar?” Her fingers traced the thin, old line on his shoulder.
“Bar fight,” he answered simply.
Annie smiled, just a little. It was a soft, natural, sexy smile. “Never lie to a psychic, Lucky, even a bad one. You never know when you’ll get caught.” She closed her eyes and took one long, deep breath, while one finger continued to trace the scar. Back and forth. Back and forth. “You were very young, and very angry, and the knife hurt more than you thought it would.” Her smile faded and she caught her breath, as if she’d been surprised. “I’m sorry.”
He took her wrist in his hand and drew it away from the scar, before she saw too much.
“Annie…”
“I know. We should stop before it’s too late. We should ignore the fact that this little charade feels more real every day. We should shake hands and be businesslike and take lots of cold showers.”
“Lots of ‘shoulds’ there.”
His hand instinctively returned to her partially exposed midsection, and settled there. Her hand returned to his chest, but she didn’t touch the scar again.
She should leave the bed, but he didn’t want her to go.
“We both know it’s going it happen before you leave,” she whispered. “We’re going to…” She hesitated, searching for the right words. Have sex. Make love. Get off. Do it. Give in. “I would say sleep together,” she finished, “but we’ve already done that and that’s not what I mean, in the literal sense. It’s going to happen, now, or tonight, or tomorrow or next weekend. So, why wait? I know you’re not going to stay, so you don’t have to worry about unrealistic expectations or that nasty commitment you don’t want. I’m not stupid. I probably understand you better than any woman you’ve ever known. I’m not trying to trap you or make this relationship more than it is. I don’t expect you to…I don’t expect anything.” She moved a little closer. “But I need you in more ways than you can imagine, and I know you want me.”
“You do?”
In an unusually bold move, Annie reached beneath the covers and stroked his erection with the tips of her fingers. “I do.”
He was much too far gone to argue with her. “Busted.”
Chapter 8
Lucky’s hand very slowly crept beneath her shirt, climbing up her torso a fraction of an inch at a time. Annie felt herself melting into the mattress, melting against the hard body of the man who held her. Just…melting.
His fingers found and teased her breasts, flicking over the sensitive nipples. Her physical reaction to that caress was surprisingly intense, and Annie heard herself gasp. Her eyes drifted closed, and she drank in the sensations of being touched, of being loved.
She’d never been intimate with a man while her psychic abilities were active, so for a moment or two she wondered if this closeness would lead to jarring and too-personal images and thoughts that would fill her mind until she could see nothing else. But her thoughts remained her own, as Lucky continued to touch her, as he lowered his head to kiss the side of her neck and set a riot of new sensations into motion.
Her body throbbed, and she wanted him now. But oh, she didn’t want this time to pass too quickly. She wanted to savor every second…every sensation.
Annie didn’t just want to be touched, she wanted to be the one doing the touching, too. And she did. Her hands explored and caressed and aroused, just as Lucky’s did. She touched his skin and kissed his shoulder and the side of his powerful neck, finding and tasting his pulse there. She traced nicely honed muscles with her fingertips—Lucky had a chest that sported some crisp black chest hairs, but not too many—and then she tasted those same places, trailing the tip of her tongue here and there. She learned his body, she made him moan, the way he made her moan. And then her hand delved once again beneath the covers.
Boxers. Why was she not surprised?
Lucky lifted her into a half-sitting position and removed her T-shirt. Her sleepwear was tossed aside and she was left mostly naked and caught under his intent perusal.
“Perfect,” he said as his fingers traced her breasts.
Annie knew she was anything but perfect, but for the moment she remained silent. For now, for this moment in time, she could pretend that they were both perfect in every way. She was beautiful and without any abnormal abilities. Lucky wasn’t afraid of being caught in a woman’s web; he knew the difference between trust and love—and he could offer her both. She wanted both, and she wanted them from him. It was a grating thought, and she was very glad that he couldn’t peek into her brain, the way sh
e could sometimes peek into his.
He couldn’t ever know that in the predawn hours, while he aroused her with his hands and his mouth, love entered her mind and her heart. She hadn’t lied to him; she wouldn’t ask for more than he had to give. That didn’t mean the possibility of more couldn’t tease her.
The room grew warm; the covers and what was left of their clothing—her panties and his boxers—were shed and tossed aside. That wasn’t the end of the touching; it was just the beginning, as if they started the process all over again. There was something about lying against a man, totally naked and close—so close—to taking him into her body. It went beyond intimacy…beyond sexual fulfillment. This was trust—complete and primal.
When Annie thought she couldn’t possibly be more aroused, Lucky found a new place to caress or kiss her. He was without inhibition, and for the moment so was she. In many ways, it didn’t feel like a first time. There was no awkwardness—no reticence on her part or his.
And then, it was time. She knew it instinctively, and so did Lucky. He very quickly, without a single wasted movement, retrieved a condom from his small suitcase. While he was out of the bed, for those few seconds, Annie admired his bare body. It was perfectly formed, hard and nicely shaped and manly, with long muscular legs and slim hips and a very nice ass. He was impressively aroused. The only scar she saw was the one on his shoulder. He truly was perfect.
“You travel prepared,” she said as he rejoined her in the bed.
“I bought a box at the pharmacy in Mercerville,” he said, as his heaviness settled over her body in a beautiful and natural way.
“You did?”
“I bought lots.” His head lowered and he kissed her neck again. She responded by wrapping her legs around his and gently pulling him closer. “I thought it would be good for our image,” he murmured against her throat.
Instead of giving her what she wanted and entering her now, Lucky pulled away slightly and took one hard nipple into his mouth. He suckled and nipped and teased, and she settled her hands in his hair and held on tight. Her body began to rock slightly, as if he were already inside her. Her hips rose and fell, and a gentle tremor traveled from her head to her toes.
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