by Diana Palmer
He groaned and forced himself to lift his head. Her face was flushed, radiant, her eyes almost worshiping. He touched her cheek with fingers that were faintly unsteady before he eased up beside her on the sofa and turned her so that she was lying across his legs, her cheek against his broad, hard chest, feeling his pounding heart. He stroked her long hair.
"We'll work it out somehow," he said. "You can leave Blake with me when you have to go on business trips. Smith can travel with you, look after you"
"You don't understand." She drew back a little, her fingers tracing his lean face. "I quit."
"You quit what?"
"My job," she said, and smiled through her tears at the expression on his face. "I told my board of directors that Don would do a much better job of it than I had, and I tendered my resignation." She reached up and brushed her lips against his chin. "I told them I had a merger of another kind in mind."
His body tensed. "You didn't tell me."
"You didn't give me a chance," she reminded him. "You barreled in with your guns blazing the minute I got back from Chicago. I couldn't make you listen."
"I had a phone call"
"From one of our directors," she interrupted. "Yes, I know, but he left that meeting early." She leaned forward and kissed him, loving his instant response. "I was going to tell you the night I came home, but you jumped the gun."
"I can't quite take it in," he said. "You gave it all up, for me?" He couldn't comprehend the enormity of it. He felt absolutely humble. "But the corporation was everything to you!"
She shook her head slowly, her gray eyes fearless and proud. "You are that," she whispered. "You, and our son."
His arms contracted hungrily and his face buried itself in her hair. He shuddered from the force of the emotions her confession kindled.
"And there'ssomething else, Cy," she added after a minute, her voice worried.
"Yes." His hand slid down to her belly and pressed there with aching tenderness. "Oh, yes, there's something else," he breathed.
She trembled against him. "You know?"
"I know." His mouth searched along her cheek until it found her soft lips. He parted them with slow mastery and kissed her almost reverently. He lifted his head, his dark eyes smiling into hers. "I won't miss a second of it this time. I'll watch you grow big and I'll take care of you. Smith and I," he added.
Her heart overflowed. She touched his lips with the tips of her fingers, tracing around them. "Oh, I love you so," she said. "I didn't know how I was going to stay alive if you let me go a second time."
"I'd have come to my senses," he said. "In fact, I already had. But my mother threatened me with one of Mrs. Dougherty's iron skillets when I hesitated about coming over here. She was furious because I sent you away. Imagine that," he murmured dryly.
She gave him an indulgent smile. "Your mother and I have grown close," she reminded him. "Between us, we'll take care of you, too."
"I missed you." He searched her eyes. "Every day, every night. The longer you stayed away, the worse it got, until I started finding reasons that didn't exist."
"Fighting it again," she said knowingly. Her eyes grew wistful. "You don't trust it, do you? You're afraid to love, because it's such a risk."
"I'm afraid of losing you," he said. "I thought you were too young to love when you were eighteen. Then I was afraid you were too full of bitterness and revenge when you came back to me. When I discovered who you really were, I was certain that you couldn't settle for the only life I could offer you. I've fought you for years, Meredith," he mused. "Because I knew if I ever gave in to it, there was every chance that I wouldn't be able to keep you."
"I thought it was because you hated the effect I had on you," she recalled.
He shrugged. "That, too. You made me into a lusting boy, without a shred of control." He searched her soft eyes. "But even then, the world began with you," he told her. "You were every color of the rainbow. When you left, the light went out of my life."
Her eyes were troubled as they searched his. "Do you care enough to stay with me?" she asked hesitantly. "Because it can't just be for Blake or the new baby, or because you want me"
He caught her hand and brought it roughly to his lips, his eyes closing as he kissed it. "You want words I've never given anyone," he said gruffly. "Words I've never said in my life."
"No." Her voice was sad, resigned. "Ionly want to know that you want a real commitment. I'll settle for that. I don't have any pride left." She laughed. "I'll settle for crumbs, Cy, if they're all I can have."
"No" His eyes were glittering as they met hers, dark and full of secrets. "No, you don't understand. I've never said the words."
Her heart stopped beating. She stopped breathing. Because if she'd been blind, she would have known everything he felt. It lay naked in his face, in his breathing, in the way he touched her, in the flush of his cheekbones, even in the scent that clung to his dark skin. Perhaps it had been there all along, and she'd been too confused to recognize it. He was telling her that he hadn't spoken the words, not that he hadn't felt them. And she knew suddenly, and without a single whisper, that he loved her. Not just loved. He looked at her, and she was the world and everything in it to him. He was telling her so as clearly as if he'd shouted it.
"Ohmy," she whispered.
"Yes," he replied quietly. "Oh, yes, you know, don't you? You knew it before you left my arms, that last time we loved. Because it had never been like that. We shared something so precious that I choke up just trying to talk about it." He shaped her face with a tender, loving hand. "We made the baby then, didn't we?" he asked.
"Yes." She shivered with the force of the emotion that washed over her. "How do you know, about the baby, when I'm not even sure myself?"
"I looked at your stomach and Smith winked," he said, smiling. "I got cold all the way to my feet thinking about what would happen if I couldn't talk you out of leaving me. Imagine that, Ms. Corporate Magnate. I can eat ten-penny nails, but the thought of living without you terrifies me."
"I can identify with that," she whispered. She curled her hand around his strong neck and pulled. "Kiss me," she breathed.
"What if I can't stop?" he asked.
"You can. You have to marry me very quickly," she said, her eyes holding his. "So that our baby has a name. The right name."
He brushed his mouth over hers. "I'll marry you tomorrow if we can arrange it."
"Blake is your son, too," she said, searching his dark eyes. "We have to do something about his name"
"We'll talk about all that later," he said. He gazed at her hungrily. "Do you know how beautiful you are? I look at you and my heart aches."
She smiled, snuggling closer. "I feel the same way when I look at you." Her arms encircled his neck and she sighed. "I'm so tired lately. I don't sleep well."
"You'll sleep with me from now on. I'll rock you in my arms until you drift away."
"That sounds nice."
He kissed her eyes closed. "I'd kill for you," he whispered at her forehead. "I'd die for you. You are my life."
Tears burst from her eyes and she clung to him, her heart so full that it hurt to breathe. "I thought you couldn't say the words," she managed on a watery laugh.
His nose nuzzled against her cheek. "The next time I make love to you," he whispered. "I'll say them."
Her arms contracted. "You say it without words, when you love me, Cy," she said, smiling against his skin. She moved slowly, sensuously, so that his body hardened at the contact. "You want me, don't you?"
He chuckled. "Did you figure that out all by yourself?"
"Oh, I'm very observant," she whispered, and her hand slid down and stroked him.
He jumped, his breath catching at the unexpected action, his face cording with shocked pleasure. "MyGod, don't do that!" he gasped, jerking her hand away.
"You prude," she accused, sitting up on his lap.
"Prudethe devil!" he got out, trying to get his breath. "You still don't know a lot
about men, do you?"
"I know that when men get like you are, they're very susceptible to suggestion," she whispered wickedly. "Want to hear a suggestion?"
"There are two people in the backyard," he said through his teeth. "One of them would snicker, and the other one would have one hell of a story for show-and-tell at kindergarten."
That was true, she thought. "In that case, you'll have to take me home with you, won't you?" she asked.
"Will you go?"
She nodded. "All of us will. If you're sure it's what you want," she added slowly.
He frowned. "You're the one I'm worried about. Meredith, you're giving up so much"
"I haven't given up my seat on Don's board of directors," she said, "or my inheritance, or my holdings. I still have them. But when the children are bigger, if you have something open at Harden Properties, I might be tempted back to work."
"You'll have to keep your hand in," he advised. "So that you don't get rusty."
She laughed. "And those proxies?"
"If we get married," he murmured, nibbling at her lower lip, "what's yours is mine, Mrs. Harden. It's all in the family."
She opened her mouth to accommodate the slow, soft stroking of his lips. "So it is," she whispered. She moved against him sinuously and he groaned, staying her with lean, rough hands on her hips. "Guess what you've got that I want?" she murmured dryly.
"Meredith!" he groaned.
"Being pregnant seems to affect my hormones," she whispered, "because all I've thought about for days is being naked with you."
"For God's sake, stop!" he gasped.
"If we go and pack, we can be home in thirty minutes," she breathed. "And tonight, I can come to you, or you can come to me, and we can make the softest, sweetest love to each other."
"Yes" His eyes met hers, blazing with need. "Oh, God, yes!"
"It will be like the first time," she said huskily as she held his gaze. "Because there are no more secrets."
His hand rested on her flat stomach, idly caressing as he kissed her with wonder. "I'll make it all up to you, Meredith. I swear it."
She kissed him back. "We both have some making up to do, my darling," she whispered, smiling against his mouth. "I'm looking forward to it."
He managed a husky laugh of his own before he gave in to the temptation of her mouth and arms. The heated interlude was barely begun, though, when Blake and Mr. Smith came bursting in through the back door. And then explanations took precedence. Not that Mr. Smith needed any. The radiance in those faces told him everything.
With an ear-to-ear smile, he and Blake went to pack.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
» ^
Meredith and Cy were married a week later in a small, intimate ceremony in the local Presbyterian church, with Myrna, Mr. Smith, and Blake for witnesses. Afterward Blake and Mr. Smith returned to the house with Myrna while Cy and Meredith boarded a plane for Canada, where they were to spend a brief weekend honeymoon at Lake Louise in Alberta.
"I wish we could stay longer than this," Cy told her regretfully as they stared from their balcony at the towering Canadian Rockies looming over the valley where their hotel was located.
"So do I," Meredith agreed. "But we've both got our little chores to attend to." She smiled up at him, her eyes full of joy. Last week Dr. Bryner had run tests, and since they'd proved inconclusive, he'd had her come in again the day before the wedding. Just as they were getting ready to go to the church for the ceremony, the doctor had called them with some not unexpected but wonderful news. Meredith was, indeed, pregnant.
"It isn't too soon, is it?" he asked, concerned for the first time that he'd forced her into a decision she had the right to make for herself.
"Don't be absurd." She slid her arms around his neck, feeling the immediate response of his body to her nearness. They'd been very circumspect before the ceremony, preferring to wait for further intimacy until they were legally married. This was the first time he'd even touched her since the night she'd agreed to marry him.
"You might not have been as willing to give up your responsibilities if I hadn't take the choice away from you," he said quietly.
"Oh, Cy." She sighed, smiling against his mouth as hers teased it. "Do you honestly think any job would stand a chance when I could have you?"
His teeth ground together and his eyes closed as she kissed him. He didn't deserve this, he thought as he half lifted her against him. He didn't deserve such devotion, such headlong love.
"I've hurt you so badly," he breathed.
She nibbled at his lower lip. "Kiss me better," she whispered, deliberately brushing her thighs against his in a sensuous sweep. "Love me."
His eyes blazed down into hers, dark with feeling. "With my body, I thee worship," he whispered.
"Cy!" She closed her eyes and moved against him, her body throbbing with kindling desire as she felt him go rigid with arousal. "Yes," she whispered, shivering. "Yes, now you can"
He laughed through his own urgency. "You aren't suppose to notice that," he bit off against her feverish lips.
"Who could miss it?" She teased at his mouth. "I'd have to be numb."
"Meredith" he lifted her, despite her protests, and carried her back into their bedroom, his mouth covering hers hungrily.
They undressed each other with hands that barely fumbled even in their haste, so intent on getting closer that reality began to blur around them until they were in a sensual world of their own.
He spread her out across the green-and-gold coverlet, his eyes adoring the soft evidence of her condition: the swollen fullness of her pretty breasts, the growing darkness of her taut nipples, the faint swell of her belly.
"Did you look like this when you were carrying Blake?" he asked, tracing her stomach with reverent fingers.
"Yes," she whispered, smiling sadly. "I'm sorry you missed it. But this time you'll be with me all the way."
He nodded, but there was a deep regret in his eyes as he sprawled beside her, his hair-roughened torso poised just above her while he gazed at her nudity.
She reached up and touched his cheek. "Cy, don't look back. It's in the past, where it should be. You have no reason to resent Henry now."
"At least he cared about you, took care of you," he said reluctantly. "I'm grateful for that."
She drew his hand to her breast and held it there. "I love you," she said softly. "We have the rest of our lives, and a beautiful son. And another child on the way." She touched her stomach and smiled. "You can walk again. The bitterness and hatred are all gone. So many blessings, Cy," she said, searching his eyes. "So much to be thankful for."
"All right," he replied. "I'll stop dwelling on the past." He bent toward her parted lips. "Touch me," he whispered as he took them.
She followed the thick arrowing of hair down his chest to his flat stomach and lightly drew patterns in it, feeling his powerful body tense and arch.
"No," he groaned. "Notlike that, sweetheart."
Her eyes opened and looked into his as he took her hand and taught her what to do, watching her the whole time with the muscles in his face cording like drawn rope.
"I never taught you, did I?" he asked.
"No one ever did," she emphasized, loving the feel of all that tense masculinity under her fingers. "We never had time for foreplay, in the old days."
"We've got time now," he whispered, bending to her breasts. "I'm going to be good to you, little one. No rough loving. Tonight it's going to be the way it was the night we made the baby, all velvet and blues."
"Your back"
He smiled against a hard nipple, feeling her arch as he drew on it with his warm mouth. "Remind me to read you a passage from the book I bought on backache," he whispered. "It mentions the beneficial massage of lazy, rhythmic lovemaking."
"Really?" she whispered.
"Really." He moved slowly until she was beneath him, his forearms catching most of his weight as he brushed his body against hers. "See how exercise pays off
?" he whispered, watching her shiver with the incredibly sensual caress.
"Ohyes!" she gasped. "But wouldn't it be betterfor youon your side?"
"Maybe. But I want you under me this time." He held her eyes while his powerful leg parted hers so that his hips could settle between them. "Help me, little one," he whispered, feeling her body move to accept the fierce arousal of his. "Join us."
She trembled all over from the sheer sensuousness of his husky deep voice, the slow teasing of his body. She arranged her hips to accommodate him and started to close her eyes when she felt him begin the exquisite process of filling her.
"No," he said huskily. "Open your eyes."
She blushed as her eyes met his. "Watch me while we make love," he said, his voice as slow and tender as the movements of his hips as he teased and probed and withdrew. He bent, brushing his mouth over the parted curve of hers. "Yes, like that. We've never watched each other this way before."
"There was neverenough time," she said, gasping as he deepened the slow movement.
"Never like this," he agreed. His breath caught. His jaw tautened as he looked down into her eyes. "I want to drag my mouth over your breasts," he said unsteadily, "but I can't do thatand watch your face. I want to see your eyes whenyou lose control."
She shivered with pleasure. He was possessing her now, almost totally. She had to stop herself from tensing, because he was more potent tonight than he'd been in a long time. Her nails bit into his powerful arms as he hung just above her lips.
"Relax, now," he whispered, sensing the contraction of her muscles. "Just relax. You can take all of me. Slowly, my darling. So slowly." He brushed his mouth with tender reverence over hers and lifted it so that he could see the torment building in her wide eyes. "Like the blues, deep, slow rhythm that climbs up from the depths and shoots like lightning to shatter against the night. Yes," he breathed as she began to move to the rhythm of him, tiny sobs tearing from her throat as her body gave in to him completely.
