by Amii Lorin
Without delving into her reasons, Jen gazed directly into his eyes and answered clearly, "Yes."
The door swung open, and Jen stepped into the room with an outward calm she was far from feeling. She had never been inside a man's room before. Excitement, coiling inside like an insidious reptile, vied with fluttering nervousness.
The room was a smaller replica of the one she shared with Lisa and Terry on the floor above, except there was only one bed—a double. Jen stared at the bed as if she'd never seen one before. The sound of the lock being set on the door sent a quiver of uneasiness zigzagging through her body. The sound of Adam's voice, for all its cool practicality, dried up all the moisture in her mouth.
"You'd better get out of those wet clothes."
They were standing just inside the door, and following his example, Jen pulled off her sodden mittens and cap.
"Just drop them where you stand," he directed quietly. "We'll collect them when we're dry."
Like a well-trained soldier she obeyed without question, her mittens and cap falling to the floor from nerveless fingers. Her jacket followed a moment later, and bending over, her trembling fingers went into battle with the wet zippers on the sides of her boots. By the time that tug-of-war ended, Adam had scooped up the wet garments and was busy draping them over the back of the room's lone chair.
"If you'll bring me the boots," he requested softly, "I'll sit them in front of the register." With a wave of his hand, he indicated the long, narrow heating vent in the far wall below the wide window.
Jen carried the boots to him, then stood staring out the window while he lined them up along the wall. The window looked out of the rear of the motel, but the magnificence of the snow-covered, mountainous terrain was lost on Jen's unseeing eyes. Gazing in at the riot of conflicting emotions pulling in different directions, Jen blinked, startled when Adam's fingers, examining her collar, brushed her neck. Although impersonal, the physical contact made her shiver.
"You can't stay in these wet clothes," Adam stated flatly. "I think you'd better have a hot shower."
"A—a shower?"
Up until this point Jen had not spoken, nor had she looked directly at him. Now, hearing the faint, tremulous sound of her own voice and hating the timidity of it, she looked into his face—and melted. His eyes had that warm velvet glow, and a tender, understanding smile curved his lips. The hand at her collar slid around her neck, his fingers gently massaging the tension-tight muscles.
"There is no reason for you to be afraid, Jennifer," he said softly. "I will ask no more of you than you're willing to give." Bending his head, he touched her mouth very lightly with his. "Now, go have a shower while I dig out something for you to wear." Turning her to face the bathroom, he gave her a gentle push, adding, "Then I'm going for a drink. What would you like?"
Pausing in midstride, Jen asked the bathroom door, "Could I have a cup of tea?"
"Jennifer"—Adam's beguiling voice coaxed her head around—"you may have anything that is within my power to give you." His eyes caressed her face with a touch she could actually feel before, turning away abruptly, he chided, "Now, go jump under a hot shower. I'll hand something in to you before I go for our drinks."
The "something" he handed through the six-inch crack she'd made between door and frame at his knock was a long-sleeved tailored shirt in a silky brown-and-white pinstriped material.
After a prolonged shower that went a long way in soothing her frayed nerves as well as chasing her body chill, Jen procrastinated further by cleaning her teeth with a dab of Adam's toothpaste on the tip of her finger and giving her unruly hair a vigorous brushing with his tortoiseshell-backed hairbrush.
Although she grimaced with distaste, she stepped back into her lacy bikini panties before sliding her arms into the silky sleeves of his shirt. The garment covered more of her than her short nighties, the front and back tails almost touching her knees.
She had fastened every button on the shirt when, lifting her head, she caught her reflection in the mirror and was gripped by silent laughter. Some siren you are, she ridiculed her image. Scrubbed clean of makeup, the sprinkling of freckles across her nose stood out on her shiny face. Added to that, the demurely buttoned shirt gave her a very young, very virginal look.
What in the world could a man who had been all over the world and had probably known—and made love to?— some very beautiful women want with you? she derided her reflection. The thought—more of the other women than her own innocent appearance—sent a fierce surge of competitiveness through her. Something about her had attracted him—he had admitted that—and right now he was waiting for her on the other side of the bathroom door. Was she going to go to him looking like a mature woman or a sacrificial lamb? With steady fingers she opened the top buttons to a point between her breasts, then raised her hands to her head and deliberately tousled her hair. Moving her shoulders sensuously against the silky material, Jen threw a final, defiant glance at her image, then turned and walked calmly out of the room.
Adam had thrown back the bedspread and covers and was stretched out on the bed. His eyes were closed, his head resting on his arms. A cup of tea and an empty glass sat on the small nightstand beside the bed. Opening his eyes, he stared at her expressionlessly before nodding at the stand.
"You'd better drink your tea," he murmured tonelessly. "While it still has some warmth." On the last word his eyes closed again.
Sitting down on the very edge of the bed, her back to him, Jen reached for the cup blindly, wondering if his words held a double meaning, and he was trying to tell her his warmth had dissipated. She gulped thirstily of the tepid brew, emptying the cup in a few deep swallows. After replacing the cup on the saucer she clasped her hands together on her lap and raked her mind for something to say. His still-toneless voice ended her fruitless search.
"Do you want to go to your own room, Jennifer?"
"No!" Jen blurted without thinking. Swinging around to face him, she rushed on tremulously, "Do you want me to?"
With the same gracefully fluid movement he'd displayed the night before, Adam sat up and gazed squarely into her eyes.
"You know the answer to that question," he grated softly. Circling her neck with one hand, he drew her face close to his. "Are you afraid, Jennifer?"
"Yes, a—a little," Jen finally managed to answer honestly.
"But you still want to stay with me?" Adam asked with low urgency.
His caressing fingers at her nape set off a tiny explosion that sent a spear of flame down her spine. The very closeness of his mouth brought a sudden dryness to her own.
"Yes," Jen whispered hoarsely and heard the hiss of his indrawn breath as her tongue slid over her parched lips.
"Do that to me," he groaned an instant before his mouth covered hers. As if to coax her own, the tip of his tongue teased the barrier of her closed lips until slowly, hesitantly, she parted her lips and let the tip of hers meet his.
The shudder that Jen felt ripple through Adam's body instilled confidence, and lifting her hands to clasp his head, she parted her lips still more as she urged him closer. Her small advance was rewarded by a full-scale attack on her senses.
His lips hardening with mounting passion, Adam's mouth plundered hers hungrily. His hands, sliding sensuously over her silky shirt, found, then swiftly opened, the four buttons she'd left closed.
Barely breathing, Jen waited for the touch of his hands on her bare skin. When he pulled away from her, her eyes opened wide in confusion.
"Adam—what—?" The anxious protest died on her lips as she watched him tug his sweater over his head. The sweater went flying through the air, but Jen didn't see where it landed, for, as though drawn by a powerful magnet, her eyes clung to the naked expanse of his shoulders and chest. Her eyes continued to cling when he slid off the end of the bed.
With a boldness she had never before known, Jen watched as Adam flipped open the snap on his jeans, lowered the zipper, and watching her watch him, deftly shucked out
of them. The very brief shorts that covered his loins left little to her imagination. Desire, hot and demanding, surged through her, and lifting her arms to him she whispered, "Adam."
Dropping back onto the bed beside her, he hauled her into his arms.
"Don't be afraid," he whispered against her lips. "I'll be as gentle as possible with you."
His kiss began very gently, but at her eager response his mouth crushed hers and his tongue plunged with the swiftness of a rapier, tearing at the fabric of her natural reserve.
Her inhibitions melting under the warmth of his caressing hands stroking her skin, Jen sent her own hands exploring. The feel of his hair-roughened chest, the way his back muscles tautened against her palms, blurred all rational thought.
His arms tightened, flattening her breasts against his hard body, and Jen felt herself falling with him as he dropped back on the mattress. His mouth moved on hers, searching, devouring, like a starving man offered a banquet. His hands moved restlessly under the shirt until they found her hips. Grasping her tightly, he shifted her over his flat stomach until she was lying between his thighs. The evidence of his growing desire for her fanned the flame his mouth had lit into a consuming blaze.
When his lips left hers to forage hungrily down the side of her neck, she gasped his name over and over again. Jen felt his muscles bunch an instant before he rolled her over and their positions were reversed.
Sliding his hard, sinewy body along hers, his lips ignited small fires from her throat to her quivering concave belly, while his fingers teased her nipples into pebble-hard arousal.
He brought his mouth back to hers to play, to tease, to torment, and to whisper words that shocked at the same time they excited and turned the flame in the lower part of her body into a hard knot of aching need.
As if he sensed the ripe fullness of that need, Adam quickly removed her panties and his shorts. Moving between her legs, he grasped her hips and probed carefully at her maidenhead with his manhood.
"Adam! Adam, it hurts!" Jen silenced her hoarse cry by digging her teeth into her lips.
Adam's body stilled. "I know," he whispered, bending close to her. His lips touching hers, he grated, "Take hold of me and hang on." At his last word his mouth covered hers, and the swift thrust of his body drew blood.
Under his caressing hands the pain and fear that gripped her dissolved, then re-formed into a driving urge toward fulfillment. When it came Jen cried out with the shuddering relief and, for a fleeting moment, teetered on the brink of unconsciousness.
The ragged sound of Adam's breathing drew her from the brink to awareness. His face was buried in her neck, and she could hear the rapid hammer beat of his heart against her chest. Lifting her hand from his back, Jen smoothed the sweat-damp hair from his forehead.
"Am I heavy?" he murmured against her throat.
"Yes." Jen's whisper held a smile. "A little. But it's a nice heavy."
She could feel his laughter rumble through his chest an instant before it touched her ears. Rolling off her, he sat up and pulled the covers up over them. Sliding his arms around her he drew her tightly against his body with a teasing threat. "You'd better have a nap and rest .up; I'm not through with you yet."
CHAPTER 7
A hand nudging her shoulder shook Jen out of her seemingly drugged sleep.
"Up and at it, sleepyhead," Lisa chirped when Jen forced her eyelids to half-mast. "Liz has just informed everyone that we're leaving in as close to an hour as possible."
"An hour!" Jen's eyes flew wide open as she jerked into a sitting position. Adam! The thought of him caused a tightness in her chest. She had to see him! Shaking her head to clear the sleep-induced fuzziness, Jen focused her eyes on Lisa's grinning face. "But why?" Jen cried, jumping out of the bed. "What's the hurry? Are we going on to the lodge? What time is it anyway?"
Lisa stood patiently throughout Jen's bombardment of questions. When she'd finally run down, Lisa answered slowly and concisely. "We are leaving in an hour because, apparently, Ted has decreed it. And no, we are not going on to the lodge. The hurry, according to Liz, is Ted's; he wants to get us all home safe and sound." Lisa held up her hand when Jen opened her mouth to protest. "It seems Ted heard a weather forecast this morning calling for more snow by late this afternoon. That set the match to his fuse, and he sent Liz to roust us out. Liz assured me he was not fooling around. He wants to get going as soon as possible." Lisa turned away, then tossed over her shoulder, "Oh, yes, it's now"—a quick glance at her watch— "nine thirty-five."
Jen stood blankly irresolute for several seconds. Adam. This time the thought of him galvanized her into action. Her need for haste overriding her innate neatness, she tossed her clothes carelessly into her suitcase, leaving out the things she'd need to get ready to leave.
After a quick sluice-down shower she pulled on underwear, jeans, a sweater, and the now stiff suede boots. Making do with a light makeup of tinted moisturizer and clear lip gloss, she then tugged her hairbrush impatiently—thus painfully—through her tangled red mop. Blinking against the tears that sprang to her eyes from the self-inflicted punishment to her scalp, Jen's fingers went to her naked throat and a small, soft smile curved her shiny lips.
Turning from the mirror, she tossed her brush and makeup pouch into the white case and locked it. Glancing at her watch, she nodded with satisfaction. The entire procedure of preparing to leave had taken her exactly thirty-two minutes, for it was now seven minutes after ten.
Having had a head start in their own packing, Lisa and Terry had left the room fifteen minutes earlier, Terry grumbling, "Ted or no Ted, I am not getting on that bus without at least a glass of juice and a cup of coffee to fortify me."
Now, her handbag slung over her shoulder, jacket over her arm, mittens and cap in one hand and her case in the other, Jen, moving as swiftly as her incumbrances would allow, left the room without a backward glance.
After dropping her suitcase to one side of the entrance doors beside the cluster of others belonging to the tour passengers, Jen headed for the dining room. Feeling as though it was becoming a habit, she peered over the swinging doors, her eyes honing in on the table in the far corner. Although Ted and Liz were there, there was no sign of Adam.
Sighing softly, Jen turned away. Was he still sleeping? It had been very late last night—or, more correctly, very early this morning—before he'd given in to the need for rest.
Deciding he was still sleeping, Jen walked purposefully to the reception desk. The clerk behind the counter was one Jen had not seen before.
"May I help you, miss?" he asked politely when she came to a stop at the desk.
"Yes, I—" Jen hesitated, then, her voice stronger, she went on, "I wonder if you'd know if Mr. Banner is still in his room."
"Mr. Banner checked out of the motel early this morning." The clerk's quiet reply held firm conviction.
"Checked out?" Jen exclaimed. Hearing the shocked tone of her voice, Jen swallowed against the sudden tightness of her throat telling herself there had to be a mistake. Much more calmly, she put her thought into words.
"I'm sure you're mistaken. I'm referring to Mr. Adam Banner, in room one-twenty-seven."
"No mistake, miss," the clerk returned politely. "I accepted his room key myself. He left just after six this morning."
Stunned, not even remembering to thank the man, Jen turned away, took three steps, then stopped to stare ahead blankly, seeing nothing. On the edge of her numbed consciousness she knew that soon, very soon, the pain would start, but for these few seconds, a shocked nothingness encased her in unfeeling stillness.
"Miss Lengle. Miss Lengle?"
The concerned edge to Bill Wakefield's tone finally penetrated. Reluctantly emerging from her anesthetized state, Jen blinked against the strained, gritty feeling in her eyes and turned with a vague "Yes?"
"Are you all right?" The concern was sharply evident now. "You're white as the snow outside."
"I'm"—Jen moistened her lips—"I'm
fine." At his disbelieving frown, she added with a forced, ragged laugh, "I—I didn't have enough sleep and I'm not quite alive yet."
"I see." Bill's tone indicated he accepted her explanation with reservations. "I have a note for you from Adam." His eyes still narrowed on her pale face, he held a plain white envelope out to her.
"When—when did he give this to you?" Jen croaked as she took the missive from him.
"This morning, just before he left," Bill answered quietly. Then, more sharply, he asked, "Are you sure you're all right?"
"Yes, of course, I'll—" she began, then, catching sight of Ted and Liz, along with at least a dozen people from the tour, emerge from the dining room, she improvised, "I'll go have a quick cup of coffee to wake myself up." The envelope clutched in her hand, Jen made a beeline for the swinging doors.
After sitting down at a small table for two in a corner of the room that was nearly deserted, Jen tore open the envelope with shaking hands and withdrew the single sheet of motel writing paper. The note was written in a broad, neat hand, and the name Adam was slashed across the bottom. Teeth digging painfully into her lower lip, Jen read the words he'd left for her.
Jennifer, (Jen could almost hear the caressing sound of her name whispering through his lips)
I've received an emergency call that leaves me no choice but to go home at once.
I want so badly to talk to you and explain, but there is so little time, and I don't have the heart to wake you, knowing you have been in bed such a short amount of time.
Why did you go?
I'll ask that question again when I see you.
I must go.
I will call you.
Adam
An emergency call. I'll see you. I'll call you. The words stabbed in Jen's mind and heart like a blade heated red-hot. An emergency call. I'll see you. I'll call you. But would he?
Her teeth punishing her lip, Jen faced the possibility that she may have just read the lines of a classic brush-off.
