by Penny Jordan
‘I didn’t say anything, Luce, quite simply because I loved you enough not to…Now what are those for?’ he chided her gently as he saw the quick, emotional tears filling her eyes.
‘Oh, Jake, I’ve been so wrong about you; all those years, all those times when you seemed so aloof and uncaring, when I…’
She bit her lip and stopped, and Jake said rawly, ‘When you…? Go on. What were you going to say? Or can I guess? All those times when you treated me as though you loathed the very sight of me?’
‘Is that why you decided to…to help me learn how to become a woman?’ Lucianna asked him tentatively.
His reply surprised her.
‘No,’ he told her firmly. ‘No, it wasn’t…and, whilst we’re on the subject, I did not help you learn how to become a woman, you already were a woman…very much a woman…the woman I loved,’ he insisted sternly. ‘And if other men—another man—didn’t have the maturity or intelligence to appreciate that fact then I was damned if I was going to point it out for him.
‘No.’ He leaned forward, cupping her face, kissing her lingeringly on the mouth and murmuring appreciatively, his hand starting to move towards her breast, until, a little reluctantly, Lucianna reminded him that he hadn’t finished his explanation.
‘No, I haven’t, have I?’ he agreed, apparently unable to resist the temptation to drop a teasing ring of kisses around her now quivering nipple before tugging the duvet back around her and telling her, ‘And with you looking like that I doubt that I’m ever going to. All right, all right. Now, where was I? Oh, yes. The main reason I decided to pick up what my common sense told me was a challenge I shouldn’t go within a million miles of accepting was because of you—for you…
‘I hated to see the way you were hurting so badly,’ he told her tenderly, ‘and I hated as well to see how little others valued you when I knew that if they’d only take the time, look a little closer…Love—real love—has nothing to do with physical attractiveness—at least not for me. It goes deeper, much, much deeper than that. After all, a person’s physical appearance is only their outer shell and it’s the inner personality, the inner person that really counts.
‘No, I wanted to help you to discover the real power of your womanhood, of yourself, for your own sake. If the only gift I could ever allow myself to give you was the gift of your own self-confidence, your belief in yourself as a woman, the sense of self-worth that those idiotic brothers of yours should have—’
He paused and broke off, shaking his head. ‘There were so many times when you were growing up when—’
‘They didn’t mean to hurt me,’ Lucianna acknowledged ruefully. ‘I was just too sensitive…too aware, perhaps, of the way boys of a certain age talked about and reacted to certain things about a girl.’
‘You hid away your femininity because you were afraid of the consequences of it,’ Jake told her gently. ‘I could see that but—’
‘If you loved me so much then why did you leave me…reject me after…when…the night…?’
‘I felt I’d taken advantage of you, broken my own code of morals, used your vulnerability and need, and your growing awareness of your own sensuality, in a way that went totally against everything I’d promised myself the relationship between us would be. And the worst of it was I knew damn well that given the whole situation over again I still wouldn’t have been able to stop myself…to resist…
‘Making love with you was like a drug: one taste wasn’t anywhere near enough and simply served to whet my appetite for even more. All I could feel was the need within me that previously I’d been able to keep under control only because my body hadn’t ever experienced the sweetness of…of you…
‘In the morning, I couldn’t believe that you and I…that we’d…that I…I never knew it could be like that…that I could want…need…feel…’
Lucianna looked away shyly and then told him huskily, ‘In your arms…with you…like that…it felt…it was all the things I’d ever dreamed making love should be but had felt never could be for me. But what hurt me even more than waking up without you then was when I came to your house the next day just as Felicity was leaving. She’d already been round to see me to try and get your name and address. John was always talking about her and I knew…’ She swallowed. ‘I felt so jealous, so full of despair and anger and self-loathing.’
‘You had no need,’ Jake told her lovingly. ‘I’d already made it more than plain to her that I wasn’t interested in what she had to offer…in anything she had to offer…’
Very slowly Jake bent his head to kiss her and Lucianna held her breath, her whole body quivering with suppressed longing and expectation, and then, shockingly, he stopped and looked into her eyes.
‘I nearly forgot,’ he told her sternly. ‘That contract you sent back to me in so many pieces…I could have wrung your pretty little neck for doing that, after all the trouble I’d been to. What on earth made you think I’d done it to buy you off?’ He shook his head. ‘I did it because I wanted to help you…You worked so damned hard to get your business going, and you are a good mechanic, a better than good mechanic, Luce—and don’t ever let anyone else tell you differently,’ he chided her.
‘You realise, of course, that our children are bound to turn out to be little geniuses, don’t you?’ he added, laughing into her eyes at her expression. ‘What with my business brain and your mechanical skills, they’ll probably end up ruling the world…’
Lucianna gave a small shudder. ‘I hope not. That’s the last thing I’d want for them,’ she told him quietly.
‘Then what would you want for them?’ Jake asked her tenderly as he started to stroke her skin, and then he bent his head to nibble on the delicate cord that began just behind her ear, causing her to quiver visibly and longingly, her eyes closing in mute pleasure.
Finally she whispered unsteadily, ‘What I want is for them to be happy and loved…to grow up with confidence, to know that they are worthy of being loved and giving love in return…’
‘They will,’ Jake promised her softly. ‘After all, with our example to follow, how could they do anything else?’
‘Jake, it’s almost morning,’ Lucianna told him as she saw the first signs of light pearling the sky beyond his bedroom window.
‘Good…I love looking at you whilst we make love, Lucianna…I love seeing the expression in your eyes and on your face…I love knowing that I’m pleasing you and I love—’
‘I love you, Jake,’ Lucianna interrupted him huskily. ‘I love you so much.’
‘Do you? Come here, then, and show me,’ Jake challenged her.
Laughing up at him, Lucianna fully discarded the duvet and, proudly glorying in the nudity of her body and Jake’s reaction to it and to her, she crossed the small space that divided them and went into his waiting arms.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-4907-7
MISSION: MAKE-OVER
First North American Publication 2001.
Copyright © 1997 by Penny Jordan.
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*The Crightons
*The Crightons
*The Crightons
