Untamed

by JoAnn Ross

  "And she with him," Tara murmured. "So he's not the baby's father?"

  "No. Apparently he died."

  "It couldn't have been all that long ago. I can see why she'd want to wait before rushing into things."

  Gavin shrugged. "Since we've managed to get through an entire evening without a single argument, I hate to disagree with you, but I have to take Mac's side on this one. When people belong together, I don't see much point in waiting."

  He had, Tara admitted privately, a point. And in truth, she'd never seen a couple who so obviously belonged together.

  Unless, an errant little voice in the back of her mind suggested, it's you and Gavin.

  Shut up, Grandy, Tara retorted.

  It was obvious that Noel Giraudeau and Mackenzie Reardon shared a deep and abiding love. While what she and Gavin were experiencing was lust, pure and simple.

  And Tara had no intention of allowing her grandmother to try to convince her otherwise.

  Despite her earlier protestations, Tara proved that she was a good sport by going downstairs after dinner and dancing to the country-and-western band Nick had discovered playing in a Flagstaff bar. Gavin was right, she admitted as he twirled her through the steps—so long as she let him lead, she managed to keep from making a fool of herself.

  It was when the music slowed that she got into real trouble. Smiling with satisfaction at the change of pace, Gavin drew her to him, fitting her slender curves against the rigid male lines of his body. As she linked her fingers together behind his neck, it crossed Tara's mind that they were, at least in this way, a perfect fit.

  Gavin rested his chin against her hair, inhaling a spicy scent that reminded him slightly of the potpourri Brigid had given him as a welcoming gift when he'd first arrived in Whiskey River.

  When he pressed his lips against her silken hair, she sighed. When he spread his fingers against her back, warming her flesh beneath the antique lace, she tensed momentarily, then softened. Body, mind and heart.

  "This is nice," he murmured against her ear. Actually, nice didn't begin to cover it. It was, he decided as he nuzzled her fragrant neck, pretty damn near perfect.

  "Nice," she agreed, drawing in a quick, shaky breath when his teeth tugged gently on her earlobe.

  The singer up on the nearby stage was singing the tale of a love between a man and woman that was predestined to last a lifetime. As she drifted contentedly in Gavin's arms, Tara found herself wishing desperately that she could believe in such a thing.

  There had been a time, when she was younger, that Tara had believed every couple were like her mother and father. That people married not just because they were in love—whatever that meant—but because they were devoted to each other.

  Her friends' divorces, plus her own experience with Richard, had led Tara to the unhappy conclusion that her parents were an anomaly. It was then she'd decided to adopt one aspect shared by all the other Delaney women save her mother.

  She'd spend her life alone. But never lonely. Her life would be full. It would have meaning. She just wouldn't have a husband. Or children.

  Although that was her plan, carefully conceived, logical to a fault, she hadn't been prepared for the low ache created deep in her most feminine core at the sight of the very pregnant Noel. Although it was a cliché, the woman had literally glowed.

  Gavin tilted his head back and looked down into her face. "Something wrong?" he asked, noticing the faint lines marring her forehead.

  "No." Looking up at him, reading the depth of emotion in his dark eyes, she allowed herself to relax and enjoy the wonder of his closeness, to go with the flow. "Everything's wonderful." She smiled as the romantic ballad seemed to swell inside her heart. "Actually, I can't remember when I've had a more perfect night."

  "Not quite perfect," he murmured, gazing down at the lush lips he'd been waiting all evening to taste. "But I think we can get a little closer."

  She did not have to possess second sight to realize Gavin's intention. Her eyes invited, her lips parted instinctively, as she watched his head slowly and deliberately lower.

  Although he'd reminded himself that this was a public place, and despite the fact that he'd intended merely to give her a light kiss that would offer a promise of more to come, the moment his mouth touched hers, there was a flare of heat.

  They both felt it jolting through them like electricity. As startled as she, he momentarily lifted his head, stared down at her and viewed the answering desire— and fear—in her remarkable eyes.

  "Again," he murmured huskily.

  "Again," she agreed in a low, throaty tone, even as she splayed her fingers against the back of his head and pulled his lips back to hers.

  This time they were prepared for the shock. Lights still flashed behind the closed lids of her eyes, but Tara welcomed the dazzling kaleidoscope colors. Heat poured into his groin, but Gavin managed, just barely, to keep from dragging her into the nearest dark corner and ripping off her clothes. Their lips clung and held as they stood in the center of the dance floor, surrounded by the other couples moving around them.

  Gradually, Gavin became aware of a hum of conversation. The crowd parted on either side of Tara and him as the dancers returned to their tables and waitresses hurried to take drink orders during the band's break.

  "The music's stopped."

  "Perhaps for you." She smiled dazedly up at him, reminding him vaguely of a woman sleepwalking. "But I still hear it."

  He laughed, a bold, rich, satisfied sound, anticipating the music they'd spend the rest of the night making.

  "Ready to leave?"

  "Absolutely."

  "Your place or mine?"

  "Mine." Her smile turned her eyes to polished emeralds. "It's closer."

  11

  Tara's head cleared the moment they walked out of Denim and Diamonds into the October night. The mountain air was crisp and cold; a slight breeze blew away the cobwebs clouding her mind.

  She could no longer deny what was happening between them. He wanted her, and she wanted him. They were two unattached individuals who wanted to jump each other's bones. If she'd been any other woman— any totally mortal woman—such shared desire should be simple.

  Unfortunately, love had never been the slightest bit simple for the Delaney women.

  Not that this was love, she reminded herself firmly.

  Gavin pulled up in front of the house, cut the engine and pocketed the key. She'd been getting more tense with each mile until even his own nerves were beginning to feel the strain.

  "I think I need to say something," she said softly.

  "You've changed your mind." He could change it back again, Gavin knew. With just a touch of a fingertip here, a brush of his lips there. A few slow, deep kisses…

  "No. Yes. Oh, hell." She dragged her hand through her hair. "You have to understand, I'm not like Brigid. Or Moira."

  "So you keep telling me." He took hold of her hand after it made another sweep through her hair.

  "I have a master's degree in business. I'm an M .B. A. And a C.P.A."

  He managed, just barely, to keep from smiling at that. "So Brigid told me. She also said you're damn good at your work."

  "I am." His thumb was stroking tantalizing circles on the sensitive skin of her palm, threatening to make her forget her carefully planned speech. "The point is, I've always felt the need for order in my life. For predictability."

  "That can get a little boring." He lifted their joined hands and nibbled lightly at the fleshy part of her thumb.

  "Not for me."

  When his only response was a raised brow, she sighed. "All right, perhaps you're right. But I like boring. I like to map out my life. And I always stick to the plan."

  "And I wasn't part of your life plan."

  She made a sound that was part laugh, part groan. "Not hardly."

  "How about this? Did you plan for this?"

  He leaned over and captured her mouth with his with a force that would have caused her kne
es to buckle if she hadn't already been sitting down.

  He dived into the kiss, into her, dragging her along with him, out where the emotional currents ran fast and deep. Logic deserted her as his dark taste sent her senses swimming. Reason, protests, were washed away by the ever-rising tide of desire. Breathless, she clung to him as she felt herself being pulled into the maelstrom.

  Arousal pounded through him, hot and familiar. He wanted her beyond reason. Beyond sanity. He hadn't experienced such a visceral sense of need since Pamela, but this was somehow different. Because, he realized as he reluctantly surrendered her lips, Tara was different.

  "Tell me that isn't worth a detour on your carefully mapped-out life." With a tenderness that was at direct odds with the powerful heat of his kiss, he trailed a finger around her lips. "You're right. This probably isn't the smartest thing either one of us has ever done. But I want you, Tara. And there's no way in hell you're going to convince me that you don't want me back. So are you really going to make both of us suffer another night of hot dreams?"

  She knew what she should do. Tara took a deep breath, closed her eyes and tried to gather up what remained of her scattered wits. She looked up at him and slowly shook her head.

  Gavin hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath until he felt the air escape his lungs on a long, relieved whoosh.

  His arm was around her waist as they walked up onto the porch. Tara was grateful that people didn't lock their doors in Whiskey River; she wasn't certain she could have managed to get her key into the lock.

  She turned on the light as she entered the front parlor. It took a minute for what Tara was seeing to sink in.

  Gavin's curse was harsh and succinct. He glared at the room, which, only hours earlier, had been so tidy and now looked as if a hurricane had blown through it. The cushion on the red velvet chaise had been slashed, as had the upholstery on the matching wing chair. Drawers had been pulled out of the marble-topped end table, paintings had been ripped from their frames.

  "Get back into the truck." Grabbing hold of her arm, he dragged her from the house. "I'll call the sheriff."

  One thing she'd always prided herself on sharing with the other Delaney women was her fierce spirit of independence. But as Tara watched Gavin calling on his cellular phone from the truck, his voice low and angry but controlled, she had to admit that she was more than a little grateful for his presence.

  "It shouldn't be long," he said after he'd hung up. "Wait here, I'm going to go back in and make sure the bastards aren't still inside."

  "I don't understand," she said. "After we scared them off, I was certain we'd solved the problem."

  "This wasn't done by kids."

  "How do you know?"

  He didn't have an answer to that, but Gavin knew just the same. Throwing rocks was one thing. Trashing the inside of a house was another.

  "It doesn't feel like kids." He ran his hand down the side of her face in a gesture meant to calm. "Don't leave this truck. Whatever happens."

  That said, he went back into the house, leaving Tara to wait with tangled nerves for the sheriff.

  She was more than a little relieved when the house proved to be empty. Twenty minutes later, she was back in the parlor with Trace Callahan and Gavin.

  "It doesn't look like vandalism," Trace said, echoing what Gavin had already told her. "It'd be my guess that someone was looking for something. Did your grandmother keep any valuables in the house, Ms. Delaney? Jewelry, money, stock certificates? Anything like that?"

  "The only jewelry my grandmother owned was either costume or made by my father, which, while valuable in its own way, doesn't have any precious stones that could be removed and sold. She kept her money in an old-fashioned passbook savings account, and although I tried to talk her into investing in mutual funds, the only stocks she owned were the floral kind she grew in her garden."

  Trace rubbed his jaw as his gaze swept the room again. "It could be a random burglary," he mused. "Except we don't tend to have burglaries in Whiskey River. And then there's the television in the bedroom."

  "What about it?"

  "It's still there. They didn't take it. Or the VCR."

  "Oh." Tara thought about that for a minute. "I wonder… No." She shook her head. "That's impossible."

  "What?" Trace's gaze was swift and sharp, and suddenly she realized she was no longer looking at the laid-back small-town Western sheriff, but the former big-city cop he'd once been.

  "It's nothing." She began twisting her hands together, wishing she'd just kept her mouth shut.

  "Why don't you let me be the judge of that?" Trace suggested mildly. Encouragingly.

  "It's just that ever since I've moved in, I've thought I heard sounds."

  "What kinds of sounds?" Gavin asked quickly before Trace could get the question out.

  "Nothing I could put my finger on. Just the usual night sounds. Once I thought someone was trying to get in the window, but it turned out to be the wind blowing a branch against the glass." She'd used a pair of long-handled pruning shears she'd found in the gardening shed to cut the branch away the next morning. "And sometimes, when I'm lying in bed, I think I hear the attic floor creaking overhead. But I'm sure it's just the house settling. Old houses do that," she said, her tone inviting agreement.

  "That's probably all it is," Trace said. "But I think I'd better check the attic again, just in case."

  "I was up there this afternoon, Sheriff," Tara said. "Everything looked all right."

  "Would you have known if something was missing?"

  She thought about all those boxes and trunks. "No."

  "I'll check one more time just the same." He slanted a look at Gavin. "You stay with Ms. Delaney. This won't take long."

  "I feel so foolish," she murmured when she and Gavin were alone again. He'd poured her a glass of brandy and as she sat on the ripped sofa she sipped slowly, feeling the comforting warmth entering her bloodstream.

  "For what? Your home was broken into, Tara. And trashed. What the hell do you have to feel foolish about?"

  "I sounded like some hysterical female from a made-for-television movie."

  "That's ridiculous. And why didn't you tell me you were hearing noises?"

  "Because they were nothing." Even as she said it, Tara heard the lack of conviction in her tone and wondered whom she was trying to convince, Gavin or herself.

  "I'm afraid I'm going to have to disagree with you on that one," Trace said, returning to the room just in time to hear Tara's statement. "Unless you happen to own a pair of size-ten running shoes."

  Her hands tightened around the balloon glass. "I don't understand."

  "There are some footprints up there in the dust that look pretty new. Since Gavin and I both wear boots, I'd say you've had yourself some company."

  The idea was unthinkable. "Are you saying—"

  "I'm saying that either you've got the largest, best-shod mouse in the county living in your attic, or someone thinks you've got something stashed away in this house worth risking a jail term for."

  Tara couldn't answer. She merely stared up at him, shock sending a chill all the way through her.

  "Well, that settles that," Gavin said, his tone as grim as Trace's expression. "You're spending the night at my place."

  It had been a long day, a day of emotional highs and lows. Mentally, physically and emotionally drained, Tara couldn't think of a single reason to argue.

  She was grateful when Gavin didn't speak during the drive to his cabin. She wouldn't have had the energy to answer. As she'd packed an overnight bag, she'd felt as if she were operating on autopilot. She'd been vaguely aware of his carrying her suitcase downstairs, of locking the door—although, as Trace had pointed out, it was probably a bit late for that—of helping her into the truck.

  After that, she must have tuned out because the next thing she knew she was standing in Gavin's bedroom.

  "You're in luck," he said. "I changed the sheets just this morning."

&nb
sp; In the event she might come back with him after dinner, Tara guessed correctly.

  "Just let me get some stuff out of the bathroom, and—"

  "Why?"

  "I figured I'd sleep on the couch." Gavin wished she wouldn't look at him like that. So needy. So vulnerable. It was easier to keep his emotional distance when she was arguing with him. "You've had a rough night, and you're obviously upset, so…"

  "I don't want you to sleep on the couch."

  He stood absolutely still. His eyes narrowed as they swept over her face. "I want you to be very sure what you're saying, Tara." His voice was low, rough and unmistakably needy. "You've had a shock. I don't want to take advantage of that."

  "I've had a shock," she agreed. "But that didn't suddenly make me unable to know my own mind, Gavin." She held out her hands. They were trembling, but only slightly. "I want you to stay with me. I want you to make love with me."

  "Sweetheart, I thought you'd never ask." He wrapped his arms around her, drawing her close.

  She put her head on his shoulder, drawing from his strength, allowing herself to feel absolutely protected. If this was dependency, Tara thought, it wasn't so bad.

  They stood that way for a long time, and Gavin experienced a tenderness wider and deeper than he'd ever felt toward anyone before.

  He combed his fingers through her hair, and tilted her head back with the gentlest of tugs.

  Tara gazed up at him, her heart shining, unguarded for once, in her eyes. Neither spoke. But in that perfect, magical way shared by lovers since the beginning of time, words were no longer necessary. Thoughts and emotions were exchanged with a stroke of his knuckles up her cheek, the gentle caress of her fingertip along his square jaw, the touch of lips against lips, brushing lightly at first, then dinging as emotions heated and needs rose.

  With a deep, heartfelt sigh, Gavin drew her even closer, kissed her more deeply. Although the passion was still there, simmering below the surface, Gavin reined it in.