by Diana Palmer
“My God.” The way he spoke was reverent. But there was no revulsion, either in the words or in his face. There was only pain, for what she must have suffered.
“Oh, please,” she whispered, humiliated.
“There’s no need to look like that,” he said quietly. “Lie still. I’m going to take you out of this dress.”
“No…!”
He caught her flailing hand and brought it to his mouth, kissing the palm gently. His dark eyes met her wild ones. “You need to be made love to,” he said softly. “More than you realize. You’re not hideous, Jessica. The scars aren’t that bad.”
She fought tears and lost. They fell, hot and profuse, pouring down her cheeks. Her hand relaxed its hold on her dress and she lay still, letting him smooth away it and her half-slip and panty hose until she lay there in only her briefs and bra.
He bent and she felt with wonder the touch of his mouth as it traced the thin white lines from her breasts down her belly to where they intersected just below her naval.
His big, lean hand held her hip while he caressed her with his mouth, his thumb edging under the lace of the briefs to touch her almost, but not quite, intimately. She caught her breath at the sensations he was teaching her and arched involuntarily toward the pleasure.
“You crazy woman,” he breathed as he lifted his head and looked down into her dazed, hungry eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought… They’re so ugly.”
He only smiled. He bent and his mouth brushed lazily over hers, parting her lips, teasing, tasting. And while he held her in thrall, his hand went behind her to find the single catch. He freed it and lazily tugged the bra away from her firm, high breasts.
She didn’t protest. His eyes on her gave her the purest delight she’d ever known. She gazed up at him with rapt wonder while he looked and looked until her nipples grew hard and began to ache.
Then, finally, he began to touch them, and she shivered with sensations she’d never known. Her lips parted as she tried to catch her breath.
He chuckled with appreciation and triumph. “All that time wasted,” he murmured. “They’re very sensitive, aren’t they?” he added when she jerked at the faint brush of his fingertips. He took the hardness between his thumb and forefinger and pressed it gently, and she cried out. But it wasn’t because he was hurting her. She was responsive to a shocking degree. That embarrassed her, because he was watching her like a hawk, and she tried to push his hand away.
“Shh,” he whispered gently. “Don’t fight it. This is for you. But when you’re a little more confident, I’m going to let you do the same thing to me and watch how it excites me. I’m just as susceptible as you are, just as hungry.”
“You’re…watching me,” she got out.
“Oh, yes,” he agreed quietly. “Can you imagine how it makes me feel, to see the pleasure my touch gives you?” His fingers contracted and she shivered. “My God, I couldn’t get my head through a doorway right now, do you know that? You make me feel like ten times the man I am.”
He bent and put his mouth where his fingers had been. She whimpered at first and pushed against him frantically.
He lifted his head and looked into her eyes, seeing the fear.
“Tell me,” he said softly.
“He…bit me there,” she managed hoarsely.
He scowled. His eyes went to her body and found the tiny scars. His expression hardened to steel as he touched them lightly.
“I won’t bite you,” he said deeply. “I promise you, it won’t hurt. Can you trust me enough to let me put my mouth on you here?”
She searched his face. He wasn’t a cruel man. She knew already that he was protective toward her. She let herself relax into the soft cushions of the sofa and her hands dropped to his shoulders, lingering there, tremulous.
“Good,” he whispered. He bent again, slowly. This time it was his tongue she felt, soothing and warm, and then the whispery press of his lips moving on soft skin. The sensations were a little frightening, because they seemed to come out of nowhere and cause reactions not only in her breasts, but much lower.
His hand slid down her body and slowly trespassed under the elastic.
She should protest this, she should tell him to…stop!
He felt her nails bite into him, heard her moans grow, felt her body tauten almost to pain.
He lifted his head and stopped. Her face was gloriously flushed, her eyes shy and hungry and frustrated. She looked at him with wonder.
“Your body is capable of more pleasure than you know,” he said gently. “I won’t hurt you.”
She arched back faintly, involuntarily asking for more, but he moved away. He wasn’t touching her now. He was propped just over her, watching her face, her body.
“Why did you stop?” she whispered helplessly.
“Because it’s like shooting fish in a barrel,” he said simply. “You’ve just discovered passion for the first time in your life. I want to be sure that it’s me, and not just new sensations, that are motivating you. The next step isn’t so easy to pull back from, Jessie,” he added solemnly. “And I don’t know if I can make love completely with my shoulder in this fix.”
She blinked, as if she hadn’t actually realized how involved they were becoming.
His eyes dropped to her taut breasts and down her long, elegant legs before they moved back up to meet her shy gaze. He didn’t smile even then. “I didn’t really understand before,” he said. “You were involved in the crash that killed Fred, weren’t you? You were damaged internally in the wreck.”
She nodded. “Fred was released because of a technicality six months after he went to prison. He blamed me for all his trouble, so he got drunk and laid in wait for me one night when I was working late. He chased me and ran me off the road. I was hurt. But he was killed.” She shivered, remembering that nightmare ride. “They had to remove an ovary and one of my fallopian tubes. Even before the accident the doctors thought I’d be unlikely to get pregnant, and now… Well, it would be a long shot.”
His face didn’t change, his expression didn’t waver. He didn’t say a word.
She grimaced. “You need children, Sterling,” she said in a raw whisper, her eyes mirroring the pain in the words. “A wife who loves you, and a home.” Her gaze fell to his broad, bare chest and her hands itched to touch him.
“And you think that puts you out of the running?” he asked.
“Doesn’t it?”
His fingers pressed down gently over her belly, and his hand was so big that it almost covered her stomach completely. “You’re empty here,” he said, holding her gaze. “But I’m empty here.”
His hand moved to his chest, where his heart was, before it dropped back down beside her to support him. “I’ve never been loved,” he said flatly. “I’ve been wanted, for various reasons. But my life has been conspicuously lacking in anyone who wanted to look after me.”
“Bess did,” Jessica recalled painfully.
He touched her mouth with his fingertips. “Bess is young and unsettled and looking for something that she hasn’t found yet. I’m fond of her. But I never felt desire for her. It’s hard to explain,” he added with a humorless laugh, “but for me, desire and friendship don’t usually go together.”
She searched his face. “They didn’t, with Bess?”
“That’s right. Not with Bess.”
He emphasized the name, looking at her with more than idle curiosity.
“With…anyone else?”
He nodded.
Obviously, she was going to have to drag it out of him, but she had to know. “With…me?” she asked, throwing caution to the winds.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “With you.”
She didn’t know how to answer him. Her body felt hot all over at the look he was giving her. She’d never known passion until now, and it was overwhelming her. She wanted him, desired him, ached for him. She wanted to solve all the mysteries with him. The inhibitions she’d
always felt before were conspicuously absent.
She felt her breasts tightening as she stared at the hair-matted expanse of his muscular chest.
“Are you surprised that you can feel desire, after all you’ve been through?” he asked gently.
“Yes.”
“But then, strong emotions can overcome fear, can’t they?” He bent, nuzzling his face against her bare breasts, savoring the softness of her skin against his. “Jessie, if my arm didn’t throb like blazing hell, I’d have you right here,” he breathed. “I ache all over from wanting you.”
“So do I,” she confessed. She slid her arms around his neck and pressed her body completely against his, shivering a little when she felt the extent of his arousal.
He felt her stiffen and his hands were gentle at her back. “Lie still,” he whispered. “It’s all right. You’re in no danger at all.”
“I never dreamed that I could feel like this,” she whispered into his throat, where her face was pressed. “That I could want like this.” Her breasts moved against the thick hair that covered his chest and she moaned at the sensations she felt.
His lean hand slipped to the base of her spine and one long leg moved, so that he could draw her intimately close, letting her feel him in an embrace they’d never shared.
Her intake of breath was audible and she moaned harshly. So did he, pushing against her roughly for one long, exquisite minute until he came to his senses and rolled away from her. He got unsteadily to his feet with a rough groan.
“Good God, I’m losing it!” he growled. He made it to the window and stared out, gripping the sash. He fought to breathe, straining against the throbbing pain of his need for her.
She lay still for a minute, catching her own breath, before she sat up and quickly got back into her clothes. Her long hair fell all around her shoulders in tangles, but she couldn’t find the pins he’d removed that had held it in place.
He turned finally and stared at her with his hands deep in his pockets. He was pale and his shoulder hurt.
“They’re in my pocket,” he told her, smiling gently at her flush. “Embarrassed, now that we’ve come to our senses?”
She lifted her eyes to his. “No,” she said. “I don’t really think I can be embarrassed with you. I—” she smiled gently “—I loved what you did to me.”
Twelve
For a minute, he didn’t seem to breathe at all. Then his eyes began to soften and a faint smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
“In that case,” he said, “we might do it again from time to time.”
She smiled, too. “Yes.”
He couldn’t remember when he’d felt so warm and safe and happy. Just looking at Jessica produced those feelings. Touching her made him feel whole.
“I should go,” she said reluctantly. “Meriwether will need his food and water changed, and I have other chores to do.”
He thought about how the house was going to feel when she left, and it wasn’t very pleasant. He’d been alone all his life and he was used to it. It had never bothered him before, but suddenly, it did. He frowned as he studied her, wondering at the depth of his feelings, at his need to be near her all the time. Once he would have fought that, but something had rearranged his priorities…perhaps getting shot.
“Okay,” he said after a minute. “Let me feed Mack and we’ll go.”
Her heart flew up. “We’ll go…. You’re coming home with me?”
He nodded.
Her lips parted as she looked at him and realized that he didn’t want to be separated from her any more than she wanted to be apart from him.
“Did you think it was one-sided?” he asked, moving toward her. “Didn’t it occur to you that in order for something to be this explosive, it has to be shared?”
Her expression mirrored her sense of wonder. So did his. He pulled her against him, wincing a little when the movement tugged at his stitches, and bent his head. He kissed her with slow, aching hunger, feeling her instant response with delight.
“If I go home with you, people will really talk about us,” he whispered against her mouth. “Aren’t you worried?”
“No,” she said with a smile. “Kiss me….”
He did, thoroughly, and she returned it with the same hunger. After a minute, he had to step back from her. His chest rose and fell heavily as he searched her eyes.
“Do you have a double bed?” he asked.
“Yes.” She flushed and then laughed at her own embarrassment. That part of their relationship was something she’d have to adjust to, but she wasn’t too worried about being able to accomplish it.
He touched her mouth with aching tenderness. “I was teasing,” he chided. “I can’t stay, as much as I want to. But I’ll stay until bedtime.”
“You could sleep on the sofa,” she offered.
“I know that. I’ll have one of the guys pick me up and drive me home. I don’t want you alone on the roads late at night.” He gently touched her cheek, which was flushed at his concern for her. “It’s going to be rough. I don’t want to be apart from you anymore, even at night. Especially at night,” he said with a rough laugh.
“Yes, I know. I feel the same way.” With her fingertips, she traced his thick eyebrows and then his closed eyelids, his cheeks, his mouth. “It’s…unexpected. What are we going to do now?”
“Get married as soon as we can,” he said simply. He smiled reluctantly at her expression. “Don’t faint on me, Jessie.”
“But you don’t want to get married,” she protested. “You said you never wanted to.”
“Honey, do you think we could live together in Whitehorn without raising eyebrows?” he asked gently. He smiled. “Besides that, when my shoulder heals, I’m going to have you. It’s inevitable. We want each other too badly to abstain for much longer. Let’s do this thing properly, by the book.”
She traced a pattern in the thick tangle of hair on his broad chest. All her dreams hadn’t prepared her for the reality of this. She could hardly believe it. “Marriage,” she whispered with aching hunger. She lifted her eyes to his lean, hard face. “Someone of my own,” she added involuntarily.
“There’s that, too. Belonging to another person.” He brought her hand to his lips. His teeth nipped the soft palm and she laughed. The glitter in his eyes grew. “You’ve never had a man, have you? Except for that one bad experience, you’re untouched.”
“Not anymore,” she murmured demurely. “I’ve been all but ravished today.”
He chuckled. “If you think that was ravishment, you’ve got a lot to learn.”
She searched his eyes and sadness overlaid her joy. “It’s a lovely dream. But it isn’t realistic. It will matter to you one day, not being able to have a child of your own.”
He touched her mouth and his face became as serious as hers. “Jessie, if you could have a child with another man, but not with me, would you marry him?”
She looked confused for a minute. “Well, no,” she said.
“Why?”
“Because I lo…because I care for you,” she corrected.
He pulled her close. “You’re not getting away with that,” he said. “Tell me. Say the words.”
She gnawed at her lower lip, hesitating.
“All the way, Jessie,” he coaxed. “Say it.”
“You won’t,” she said accusingly.
“I don’t need to,” he asserted. “If sex was all I wanted from you, I could have seduced you long ago. If it isn’t just for the sake of sex, what other reason would I have for wanting to marry you?”
He hadn’t said it, but she looked at him and realized with a start that he was telling her he loved her with everything except words. He couldn’t bear to be parted from her, he wanted to marry her even though she couldn’t give him a child….
“Of course I love you,” she whispered softly. “I’ve loved you from the first time I saw you, but I never dared to hope—”
The last of the sentence was lost under th
e soft, slow crush of his mouth on her lips. He drew her close and kissed her with tenderness and passion, savoring her mouth until he had to lift his head to breathe. Yes, it was there, in her eyes, in her face; she loved him, all right. He began to smile and couldn’t stop.
“You’re surprisingly conventional,” she mused, staring at him with loving eyes.
“Depressingly so, in some ways. I want the trimmings. I’ve never had much tradition in my life, but it starts now. We get engaged, then we get married, in church, and you wear a white gown and a veil for me to lift up when I kiss you.”
She sighed. “It sounds lovely.”
“It’s probably Victorian.” He chuckled. “Abstinence until the event and all. But a little tradition can be beautiful. All that separates people from animals, I read once, is a sense of nobility and honor. These days people want instant satisfaction. They don’t believe in self-denial or self-sacrifice, or patience. I do. Those old virtues had worth.”
“Indeed they did. I’m just as old-fashioned at heart as you are,” she said gently. “I believe in forever, Sterling.”
He drew her close and held her, hard. “So do I. We’ll have differences, but if we compromise and work at it, we can have a long and happy life together.” He kissed her forehead with breathless tenderness, grimacing, because holding her pulled the stitches and made his arm throb. But it was a sweet pain, for all that.
“My job…” she began.
He smoothed her hair away from her face. “I work. You work. We won’t have to worry about someone staying home with a child.”
Her face contorted.
“Don’t,” he said gently. He scowled with concern. “Don’t. We’ll be happy together, I promise you we will. It’s all right.”
She had to fight down the tears. She pressed against him and closed her eyes. She would never stop regretting her condition. But perhaps Sterling was right. There would be compensations. First and foremost would be having this man love her as she loved him.
It took several weeks for McCallum’s arm to heal completely, but they announced their wedding plans almost immediately. No one was really surprised, especially not Bess.
