True Colors

by Diana Palmer

  "I won't be, I promise. I like cakes."

  "Is it all right?" Myrna asked belatedly.

  "I don't mind. Mr. Smith does." She grinned at Myrna Harden. "What he doesn't know won't hurt us."

  Myrna grimaced. "It's like having Cy duplicated, isn't it?" she murmured. "He's veryformidable."

  "Marshmallow underneath. Honest," Meredith added.

  "I'll reserve judgment. Do you want some coffee?"

  "Yes. Shall I take a cup to Cy?"

  "Let's both do it," Myrna said. "We might take Blake with us."

  "Safety in numbers?" Meredith asked under her breath.

  "Don't you think it's wise?"

  "Considering the language I heard when we first came in, yes," Meredith said without argument.

  Blake was all questions as they went down the long hall to the room Cy was using on the ground floor. It was, like the rest of the house, filled with priceless antiques, including a huge four-poster bed. Cy was lying against pillows on the headboard, a sheet thrown haphazardly across his hips, his broad, hair-roughened chest bare. He glared at them, uncomfortable from the ride in the ambulance and the unfamiliar hardness of the mattress he was lying on.

  "This was my grandfather's bed," he said without greeting them. "No wonder he died young."

  Meredith had to smother a giggle.

  "You came to see my mommy," Blake recalled, going right up to the bed to stare at the dark-haired man in it. He'd been warned about getting on the mattress and shaking the man, but nobody said he couldn't rest his arms on it, and he did.

  Cy hadn't been quite prepared for the fact of the child so close to him. He stared at the young face that was almost a mirror image of his own and felt something sick in his throat. His son. Until now children had been a vague thought. But this was his flesh and blood, part of him. Part of Meredith. His face tautened and color shot along his cheekbones as he stared with pure possession and a shock of joy at the child who looked so much like him.

  "You're Blake, aren't you?" Cy asked to fill the tense silence.

  "I'm Blake Garrett Tennison," the boy agreed, without knowing how the name hurt the man sitting so still in the bed. "I'm five years old and I can spell my name. Do you like iguanas? Mr. Smith has one. She lives with us."

  "She's living with us now," Myrna said. Amazingly, she'd been fascinated with the giant lizard and not at all afraid of it. Something that couldn't be said for the housekeeper and cook, who had threatened to quit on the spot.

  "She likes Tiny," Blake said, his small face animated. "Do you like lizards?"

  "I've never thought about it." Cy hadn't taken his eyes off Blake since the child had come into the room. "I suppose I can get used to one."

  "Tiny has her own cage. She sleeps in it at night. But sometimes she sleeps on the curtain rod."

  "Iguanas like high places, don't they?" Cy asked, his voice more tender than Meredith had ever heard it.

  "Are you sick?" Blake asked.

  "I was in an accident," Cy replied. "I have to stay in bed for a while."

  "I'm sorry. Does it hurt?"

  Cy's jaw went taut. "Yes," he said huskily. "It hurts."

  Meredith knew instinctively that he wasn't talking about any physical injury. She didn't know what to say. While she was trying to formulate words, Cy's dark eyes shot up to catch and hold hers. The look in them was so intense that she blushed.

  "Let's check on your cakes, Blake, shall we?" Myrna asked with a smile, and held out her hand.

  Blake took it unhesitatingly. "I'll come back to see you, if you like. I'm sorry you feel bad," he told Cy.

  "Thanks," the man replied heavily.

  The door closed behind Myrna and Blake, and Meredith looked down at Cy with confused emotions.

  "You let me give you a baby," he said unsteadily.

  "I didn't know anything about birth control," she hedged, folding her arms over her breasts. "I was afraid to admit it. I always thought men took care of that."

  "I assumed you were on the Pill. Or maybe I didn't," he said after a minute. "Pregnancy never occurred to me. Certainly not that first time. I wanted you so badly, I don't even remember how I got you on the ground."

  She flushed, because it had been just that way for her. She stared at her feet.

  "You could have had an abortion," he persisted.

  She smiled at him and shook her head. "That was never an option."

  "Not even after what I believed about you?" he asked with pained eyes. "Thinking I hated you?"

  "When I got to Chicago, one of the first things I did was to get caught in the rain and fall under the wheels of Henry's car." Her eyes softened with memory. "He and Mr. Smith sort of took me over, right there. Before I knew it, I was married."

  "You wrote to me, you said," he asked.

  "Henry insisted. He knew very well how I felt about you." Her face turned toward the curtained window. "He wanted to make sure I knew there was no chance you might still want me. When I got no reply to the letterwell, I assumed you were out for blood."

  "I never saw it."

  Her eyes met his. "What if you had?"

  His face went even harder. "It hardly makes any difference now."

  He didn't want to remember. She read that in his dark eyes. Well, he was right, it didn't make any difference. "Are you hungry?" she asked, changing the subject. "I could bring you a salad or a sandwich."

  "Are you going to tell the boy about me?" he asked.

  She hesitated. She didn't know what to say. Her own emotions were still in a state of flux. She'd lived on vengeance since Henry's death. "I don't know."

  He shifted against the pillows. His back was giving him hell. They'd taken out the stitches that held the incision together, and he was taking painkillers, but all the moving around had made him uncomfortable. And, worst of all, he still couldn't stand by himself.

  "Why can't I stand up?" he asked, slapping at one hard muscled thigh impotently. "Why are they so damned weak?"

  "You've been in a terrible accident," she said softly. "You can't expect to get well overnight. The muscles were badly damaged."

  "My spine was badly damaged as well," he replied, his eyes catching hers. "That's what the surgery was all about, but you and my mother got to the doctor before I did. He won't tell me a damned thing."

  "He's told you me truth," she said firmly.

  "Will I walk again?" he demanded.

  She couldn't have lied to him. Those dark eyes seemed to see right through her. "Yes."

  "You don't know," he persisted. "You don't have the faintest idea if I will or not. You're guessing."

  "I'm not guessing! Will you listen? They wouldn't have let you come home if they weren't sure you'd walk again."

  "So you keep saying."

  "It's the truth."

  "Why are you here? Because you care about me or because I'm Blake's father?"

  "Both."

  His hard face didn't relax. "Did my mother tell you that I was on my way to your house when this happened? Is that why you feel guilty?"

  "No," she faltered. "She didn't know where you were going. She only said that she'd just.. just told you about what happened six years ago."

  His chest rose and fell heavily. "I went wild. The truth was hard to swallow." His eyes were remorseful as they met hers. "I wouldn't listen to you when you tried to tell me you were innocent. That hurt most of all, didn't it, that we'd been intimate and I still took other people's words above your own?"

  "Yes," she replied. She sat down on the chair by the bed, crossing her jean-clad legs. "I loved you." She smiled faintly. "I suppose I had some crazy idea that you felt the same way, that you really meant it when you said we'd get married." She dropped her eyes to her lap, missing the expression that crossed his face. "I should have known better, but I was eighteen and in love for the first time. I wasn't looking ahead."

  "Neither was I. I thought you were twenty. I told myself you were experienced, even though I really knew the truth that fi
rst time, when you cried and tried to push me away" He lay back and closed his eyes. "I couldn't quite handle innocence. Until you came along, I'm not sure I believed it existed in grown women."

  "I knew you wouldn't have anything to do with me if you knew how green I really was," she said honestly. "I lied to you. I suppose you wondered if I even knew how to tell the truth when you found out."

  His dark eyes slid over her face, to her mouth and lower, to her soft breasts outlined under the green silk T-shirt she was wearing. "I was addicted to you," he said. "I dreamed about you, ached for you. When we were apart, you were all I thought about. I was bitterly jealous of you as well. Tony's accusation only emphasized the fears that popped up when I found out your age. I thought you were too young and fickle for any lasting relationship. It was the main reason I let you go." He touched his chest idly. "Afterward, I regretted that assumption. I wondered if my own fear of commitment had pushed you into Tony's arms. I had no idea that my mother had orchestrated the whole damned mess, of course," he added bitterly. "When I began to suspect the truth, it was too late. I couldn't find Tony. I couldn't find you, either."

  "Henry sent me down to the Bahamas after we were married, to his estate. I spent my whole pregnancy there."

  "My detective wasn't looking for Kip Tennison," he agreed. He studied her. "Why Kip?" he asked with a faint smile.

  "I had a passion for kippered herring while I was carrying Blake. Henry had to ship it in by the case for me." She smiled ruefully. "He started calling me Kip as a joke, and it stuck. After a while I forgot that I'd been called anything else."

  "Mother said you had a hard time with Blake."

  She nodded. "They had to do a C-section. I still don't know what went wrong. They let Henry into the delivery roomsomething they never made a practice ofbecause they thought they were going to lose me."

  He scowled. There was something else, something she wasn't saying.

  "Why?" he asked quietly.

  "Does it matter?"

  "Come here."

  She hesitated. He held out his hand, waiting. Finally she gave in, sitting gingerly on the bed beside him while he pressed her fingers to his chest and looked at her.

  "Why did they think they might lose you?" he repeated softly.

  "I didn't want to live," she whispered, staring at his fingers covering her own. "Henry knew it. Hehe stood beside me and talked to me the whole time. He described Blake and how perfect he was, and how I had to stay alive because Blake would need me." She met his eyes. "That's why I talked to you, in the intensive care unit. I remembered what Henry said to me, so I must have heard him. I realized that you could probably hear what the doctors had said, about your back. I had to give you a reason to live, just as Henry gave me one."

  His fingers contracted around hers. "Did you think about me, when you saw Blake?"

  "Yes. Itmade things so much more difficult. Henry loved me desperately. I felt such guilt that I couldn't return his feelings for me." She curled her hand into his and studied it. "The night before he crashed was the first time in three years of marriage that Ireally wanted him. I'm glad," she added, lifting her eyes to his bravely. "I'm glad I gave him that memory, and the hope that I might grow to love him, so that he didn't die with nothing."

  He caught his breath at the feeling that showed in her tormented eyes. "God, what I've cost you Come here!"

  He drew her down into his arms and closed them around her, holding her, letting the hot tears seep onto his bare chest as she gave way finally to all the grief and all the pain.

  His fingers sifted through her soft blond hair and he kissed her forehead absently, aware of her floral scent, her vulnerability. His body began to stir involuntarily, until he could feel the raging desire that she kindled.

  He caught his breath audibly. "My God!" he gasped.

  She lifted her head and met his eyes curiously. "I'm sorry, did I hurt you?" she asked, sniffing as she wiped away the tears.

  "It isn't that." He drew her hand under the sheet and smoothed it gently over the raging force of his desire, his fingers clenching in protest when she instinctively jerked against them.

  "No," he whispered. "Feel it. At least I'm still a man, even if I can't stand up."

  Her hand relaxed, although she blushed scarlet as he positioned her fingers and moved them gently, so that the movement made him grimace and groan softly.

  "Cy," she protested weakly, and drew her hand away. He let her, his chest rising and falling heavily until he managed to get himself under control.

  "It's been a long time," he said with a rough laugh.

  "Surely not," she murmured, still a little embarrassed. "Your friend Lara looks capable of giving you anything you need."

  "She isn't you," he said quietly. "Nobody ever was. What you give me, I can't have with anyone else." He didn't even blink. "I had nothing from Lara. I never slept with her. Once you came back, it would have been impossible with anyone else."

  The memories lay soft and hungry in his eyes, and he laughed suddenly as they teased his body into another fierce arousal.

  Meredith's eyes fell to the sheet. He threw it off, letting her look, his expression half-amused, half-rueful.

  "See what you do to me?" he asked. "One man out of twenty can make love time after time without rest. That's what the book says. My body doesn't know that it's supposed to be incapable of multiple orgasms."

  She looked at him helplessly, her eyes lingering on the evidence of his desire with an almost tangible hunger to satisfy it. But that wasn't possible. Not in his condition. Rosy-cheeked, she forced her hand to move, to pull the sheet back up to his waist, her fingers trembling. "It never did," she whispered. "You never seemed to tire, in the old days. I remember once, we made love three times in a row without even stopping."

  "The last time," he replied quietly. "The night before my mother's surprise." The smile faded. "I don't know if I can ever forgive her for that."

  "You have to," she said. "Life goes on. We can't change what happened."

  "You were bitter when you came back to Billings," he reminded her. "Out for blood, any way you could get it."

  "Yes." She tugged at the thick hair on his chest. "When you wrecked the car, I suppose I got my priorities straight again. I've lived for revenge since Henry died. I wanted your mother to have to confess her sins to you." She winced. "Oh, Cy, if I'd known what would happen to you !"

  He linked his fingers with hers. "You'd have gone away. I'd never have known about Blake. I'd never have seen you again."

  "You've done very well without me for six years," she reminded him.

  "No." He studied her face quietly. "I've had one or two women. But it was physical, not emotional. And when I lost control, it was your face I saw, your name I cried out." His eyes averted to the wall and his jaw tautened. "And I felt guilty. As if I'd committed adultery."

  "That'sthat's how I felt, with Henry," she whispered.

  His eyes slid back up to hers and searched them for a long, long moment. "I still want you."

  "Yes. I know. But you can't," she said huskily. "Not with your back in that condition."

  "You'd let me, wouldn't you?" he asked, one eye narrowing as he studied her. "If I couldn't take you, you'd take me, if I asked you to."

  She swallowed. Her eyes ran hungrily over his broad, hair-matted chest. "Haven't I already proved that?"

  "Yes." He reached up and drew her down over him, so that her mouth was just above his. "You've given me back my manhood. I wasn't sure that I could still function, you see."

  She smiled as his mouth poised just under hers. "I was."

  He chuckled. "Kiss me."

  Her lips brushed his, lifted and settled. His lean hands caught her head and held it where he wanted it while his mouth made slow, hungry love to hers.

  "I want you so much," he whispered, nibbling her lower lip. His whole body trembled with the need. "I want to be enveloped by that hot, silky softness"

  She moaned into his mou
th, the words making her blood run hot. She clung to him, living on his kiss while the world spun around her.

  "Take off your clothes and lie with me," he whispered into her lips.

  "I can't."

  "Yes, you can. Lock the door."

  She smiled against his hungry mouth. "You aren't fit."

  "Yes, I am." He slid her hand down his belly and proved it.

  "That way, but not the rest of you." She nuzzled her cheek against his. "You'll undo all Dr. Danbury's good work."

  He bit her upper lip sensually. "What did he do?"

  "Scooped out the damaged vertebra and did a laminectomy."

  "To relieve the pressure on the nerves."

  "Yes."

  His mouth slid down her throat, hesitating in the soft hollow of it before his lips trespassed onto her silk T-shirt and suddenly fastened onto the throbbing hard tip of her breast.

  "Cy!" she cried out, convulsing almost at once from the merciless stab of pleasure.

  His free hand slid under the shirt and unfastened her bra while his mouth fed on her. Seconds later she felt the air as he pushed it up and nibbled softly at her breasts, lifting her so that he could look at them.

  "Did you nurse my son?" he murmured.

  "Yes," she moaned.

  "Did you let him watch?"

  She trembled. She couldn't think, couldn't breathe.

  "Did you let him watch?" he asked again, his mouth suckling hungrily at her breast.

  "Yes!"

  "Damn you," he bit off, and his lips were fierce and thorough, so that by the time he'd finally had his fill, she was shaking all over and flushed with the force of pleasure he'd aroused.

  He held her firmly, the pain in his back forgotten as he looked up at her. Disheveled blond hair, flushed face, wide gray eyes, trembling, swollen mouth, beautiful bare breasts with hard rosy crowns. He caught his breath at his handiwork.

  "You're going to give me another child," he said roughly. "But this time you won't run away. I'm going to watch you grow big with it. I'm going to be there when it's born. This next one is going to be mine from the instant you conceive it, and I'll never let you go."

  "Cy, youcan't," she whispered.