“Where is he?” Misty cried, looking around eagerly. “Where’s my baby?”
“Napping,” Cat said. She was going to say, Shhh, don’t wake him. But Misty shot past Cat and headed straight for the bedroom. Cat fully expected her to fling open the door and shout her son’s name. But as she reached the door, Misty’s movements slowed, and she eased the door open quietly.
Cat could only see her profile, but it was enough. She saw the tension in Misty’s face melt, saw in it the maternal softness she felt herself whenever she looked at Harry sound asleep, saw Misty swallow convulsively.
Then she turned to the man who hadn’t moved from just inside the front door. “Come here,” she whispered, holding out a hand to him. “Come see your son.”
Devin looked every bit the tough hard-bitten soldier that Cat had imagined. He was shorter than Yiannis, his face and neck deeply tanned, but the tan ended there. In a short sleeve T-shirt, his muscular arms were pale. His hair, buzzed short, was dark like Harry’s. She could see Harry in his face and in the light blue eyes that flickered to meet hers as he paused on his way across the room. He nodded to her.
Cat nodded back, then stepped aside.
He stood over the crib motionless, just drinking in the sight of the little boy. Then his mouth worked. He drew a shaky breath and put a hand out to touch the boy’s soft cheek.
“Isn’t he beautiful?” Misty whispered.
“The most beautiful baby in the world.” Devin’s voice was ragged. Not remote. Not disinterested. A man who had just fallen in love with his child.
Cat felt obtrusive, like she was invading their privacy as a family. But when she started to move away, he turned. His eyes were damp. “You’re Cat,” he said.
Cat nodded. “And you’re Devin.”
“I’m grateful,” he said, as if it were his name. “I will never be able to thank you enough for taking care of my son.”
“I was glad to do it,” Cat said. She shared a genuine smile with Devin.
And then to her amazement, Misty said, “I owe you, Cat.” There was a sincerity in her tone that Cat had never heard before. And her blue eyes were luminous, her cheeks were wet. And before Cat realized it, Misty flew across the room and threw her arms around her and squeezed her tight.
Cat, after a split second’s astonished hesitation, hugged Misty back. Her own throat tightened, her eyes welled. She blinked hard.
But as they hugged, it didn’t feel awkward. It didn’t feel forced. It felt right. It was the first hug they’d ever shared.
Harry, Cat decided, had a lot to answer for.
“Harry’s going to miss you,” Misty told Cat the next morning.
Devin had packed all of Harry’s gear and was carrying it down to Misty’s car. Misty, holding Harry, had found Cat in the garden where she had gone because she didn’t know where else to go. She had spent the night on the sofa reluctantly, having offered to go to a motel and give them some privacy.
But Misty and Devin had insisted that she stay. She had, but she’d felt like a third wheel. And when Harry woke in the middle of the night, she had been awake in an instant, and had had to stop herself going to him.
But it wasn’t her place to do so.
As soon as she awoke again in the morning, she went out for a walk, not wanting to intrude again. Now she looked up from the weeds she had been pulling and got to her feet.
“I’m going to miss him, too,” she said, her words heartfelt. “He’s absolutely lovely.” She couldn’t help smiling as she said the words, even though she already felt an ache growing inside.
“You should come see him. You can,” Misty added. “The valley’s not that far. You’re welcome any time.”
Cat thanked her. “I’d like that.”
They stared at each other and years of dissension and memories flickered between them. They both looked away. There was only so far you could go after years of estrangement, Cat thought.
But Misty had other ideas. “I’m sorry I was such a bitch to you,” she said bluntly and made a face at the memory. “I was jealous. You had everything I wanted.”
Cat couldn’t help laughing just a little. “You mean like beautiful blonde hair and big blue eyes and guys falling all over me? I don’t think so. That was you.”
“You had Gran,” Misty said. “She was yours, not mine.”
“You had Walter.”
“Grandpa liked the fish he caught better than me.”
“He loved you. He loved both of us. He just … liked to go fishing.” Barely a morning went by that Walter hadn’t gone fishing. She’d never taken it personally. But then Gran had always been there.
“I know,” Misty said. “But it’s taken me a while. You always were smarter than me. But I don’t care,” she added when Cat would have protested. “I’m happy now. Happy with what I’ve got.” And her eyes lit as she said the words. “I love Devin and he loves me. We’ll make this work. And we’ve got the best little boy in the whole wide world.” Her words were fervent and Cat could only agree.
“You do.”
Misty gave her another fierce hug. “Thank you—for taking care of Harry. For holding the fort. For helping us be a family.”
“My pleasure,” Cat managed, past the lump in her throat.
“How did I ever get so lucky?” Misty marveled.
Cat didn’t think there was an answer to that.
She was alone.
No Gran. No Adam. No Misty and Devin. No Harry. No family.
Cat stared around the apartment and tried to relish the quiet. There had been moments in the past few days—especially during Harry’s teething—when she knew she had prayed for a bit of it.
Not now.
Now it was hard to relish what not only felt empty, but lonely.
The cats were here, of course. She wasn’t totally alone. It wasn’t silent. Outside she could hear the occasional car on rain-slick streets. And if she paid very close attention, she could pick out the drops hitting the windows. The rain had started while she was driving home from the hospital that evening.
Fitting, she thought. It matched her mood.
She had spent the entire afternoon and early evening at the hospital with Gran after Misty, Devin and Harry left. She had even had dinner there, picking up a sandwich in the hospital cafeteria and taking it back to Gran’s room to eat when her grandmother did.
“Why not?” she’d said with all the cheer she could muster. “I have no one to rush home to now.”
Gran had been glad of the company.
If she could have figured out a reason to spend the night, Cat thought she might actually have done it. But by eight o’clock Gran was tiring and had begun to ask her if everything was all right.
“Of course it’s all right,” Cat had said. “I just felt as if I hadn’t spent much time up here while I had Harry.”
“Thank you,” Gran said. “You did a wonderful thing for him—and Misty.”
“I’m glad I was able to do it.”
Gran smiled and reached out and took Cat’s hand, giving it a squeeze. “You’re a good girl. Now go home and enjoy your peace and quiet.”
Cat wondered if Gran had any idea how very oppressive peace and quiet was.
It was a shock then to have it broken by a brisk rap on the door.
She opened it to find Yiannis standing there in jeans and a windbreaker, his dark hair plastered to his skull and glittering with rain drops in the glow of the porch light. And the very last person she needed to see tonight.
“What?”
But he didn’t answer and he didn’t wait for an invitation. He stepped past her into the room.
So much for alone.
“Yiannis. I don’t feel like company.”
He was dripping on the carpet, but not leaving. Cat sighed. She supposed she should tell him to take his jacket off.
“Did Milos leave?” she asked.
“Yes. He came to say good-bye, but you weren’t here.”
“Oh
. I’m sorry. Give me his email address and I’ll send him a note.”
Yiannis grunted. He cracked his knuckles. There was some unreadable emotion in his eyes that she couldn’t fathom. But finally he unzipped his jacket and reached inside. “Harry left this.” And he thrust the plush bunny at her.
It was the last straw.
Her cup of loneliness overflowed. Cat reached for the little bunny and cradled its soft furry body in her arms. It was foolish, of course, to let it matter. Harry hadn’t willfully left the rabbit behind. He’d liked it. He’d chewed it happily and given it a kiss. But it hadn’t mattered one way or another to him. Cat knew that.
But it mattered to her.
Saturday afternoon when she and Adam had been leaving the hospital, she’d insisted they stop in the gift shop so she could get something for Harry to remember her by.
“He won’t remember,” Adam had said practically.
Of course he wouldn’t. He was too young. But—
“Oh, God,” Yiannis said now, appalled. “Don’t cry.”
“I’m not crying!” Cat snapped, even as the tears slid down her cheeks.
“It’s a rabbit!” Yiannis protested. He reached out as if he would take it away from her, but she only clutched it tighter.
“I know what it is!”
“Cat.” His voice was ragged. “It’ll be okay. We’ll mail him the rabbit.”
“It isn’t th-the rabbit. It’s f-family.” But she couldn’t explain what she’d hoped—that if Harry had the bunny, maybe Misty would tell him his auntie Cat had given it to him. Maybe it would be a connection, a link. It would make her part of a family. “N-never mind,” she sniffled and started to wipe her face against her arm.
But he stopped her, reaching for her, not the bunny. With a groan, Yiannis wrapped her in his arms and drew her against his chest.
“Yian—”
“Shh.” And he bent his head and began to kiss away her tears.
A man could only take so much.
Desire he could combat. Need he could sublimate. Words he could battle.
But Yiannis couldn’t watch her face crumple at the sight of a stuffed bunny. He was no proof against trembling lips. He couldn’t fight tears.
Didn’t want to, anyway.
Didn’t want anything but what he had—Cat in his arms, her face pressed against his shirt, her gorgeous curls against his lips, the scent of her citrusy shampoo tickling his nose.
He drew in a long breath, savored it, then tipped her face up and kissed her cheeks, tasted the salt of her tears.
It wasn’t why he’d come. Nor was the rabbit, in fact.
He’d come to make her see sense, to be her “friend,” to tell her the truth—that she wasn’t in love with Adam Landry.
And now?
Now—actions spoke louder than words. He’d make a hash of the words anyway. She’d argue with him.
She couldn’t argue with this.
Cat didn’t argue. She clung. She slid her arms beneath his sodden jacket and got closer still, closed her eyes and felt the touch of his lips on her face—her cheeks, her jaw, her mouth.
They’d been tender, gentle kisses for the space of a few seconds. But by the time he reached her mouth, they’d become more. Much more. The heat that had always flared between them could not be denied. The determined reserve she’d managed—or had tried to manage—since she’d arrived, now shattered.
Her lips parted. Her pulse pounded. The bunny slid away unnoticed to the floor as her hands tugged up his shirt and burrowed beneath. Hot skin over hard muscles quivered under her touch.
She made him quake. She always had. For three years Yiannis had told himself he’d forgotten how strong a hold she had on him. But the feel of her body against his, and all the memories came flooding back. The hunger grew.
Whatever he’d come for, now there was only this.
Only her.
He tried to shrug off his jacket, but its wetness thwarted him. It was as drenched as he was. She’d been right. He hadn’t known enough to come in out of the rain. He’d been walking for what seemed like hours, trying to get his head together, to find the words to tell her she was making a mistake.
Now he knew he didn’t need words. If he could just get the sodding jacket off.
“Let me,” Cat murmured, and peeled it the rest of the way off his shoulders and down his arms, dropping it to the floor Then her hands came back, sliding beneath his shirt, cool and wet now against his burning skin. It felt good. It wasn’t enough.
“Cat.” His voice was ragged with need.
“This way.” She nodded toward the bedroom. He kissed her all the way to the bed, hunger feeding hunger until he pushed her lightly back onto it. He wanted to fall onto it with her, rip their clothes off and bury himself in her. Their fingers fumbled. Her shirt tore. He cursed wet denim. But at last they were naked, flesh on flesh. Her skin was so smooth.
When he worked on furniture, he sanded for hours. Making the wood as smooth as Cat’s skin, he’d once told himself. But he hadn’t even come close. Now she lay on her side and he trailed his fingers over her hip and down her thigh, smoothing, savoring. Then he rolled her to her back and parted her knees and knelt between them, ran his hands up her legs slowly, tormenting himself as much as he tormented her.
Cat moved restlessly, watching him from beneath hooded lids. Her tongue touched her lips. At the apex of her thighs, his thumbs brushed against the softness of her, dipped, parted, teased. Her eyes darkened. She made a small urgent sound. He slid his hands back down again. Then up. Touched. Deeper this time. With a finger, stroked.
Her lips parted. Her hips lifted, as if she could draw him in.
She could. Dear God, she could. It was all he could do to resist for a minute. Prolong. Savor.
And then as he slid his hands back down her toward her knees again, she reached out a hand and touched him. One finger trailed lightly along his erection. Made him clench his jaw and tense every muscle in his body to keep from shattering right then and there.
“Cat.” He caught her hand.
“So you can do it and I can’t?” She turned her fingers in his hand and lightly scratched his palm. Hell, even that simple touch was erotic.
He shook his head, smiling. Yes, that was Cat. Contrary even in bed. He grinned and came down to her, parted her. Slid home.
For a moment neither of them moved. He held still, watching her, drinking her in as he felt her body tighten around his. The feel of it nearly undid him.
Cat looked up at him, her face mostly shadowed in the spill of light from the living room. But her lips were swollen, well-kissed, her cheeks flushed, her gaze intent.
“Well?” she said expectantly and gave a little wriggle beneath him.
Yiannis laughed. Laughter and sex—it was so Cat.
“Just thinking,” he murmured. Not true. He wasn’t thinking at all. He was enjoying. And he enjoyed even more as he began to move.
Cat moved with him, against him, caught his rhythm and made it her own. Their gazes locked, their hearts hammered. Cat’s head tossed from side to side, her hips lifted, beseeching him. He moved more quickly, then gritted his teeth as he felt her body begin to spasm around him.
Her hands tightened against his buttocks. Her heels dug into the backs of his thighs. He gritted his teeth and thrust one more time, and then mind and body shattered as he spilled into her.
He came apart. She made him whole.
They loved once, twice, three times that night. Cat wasn’t counting. She was in a world of sensation, emotion, desire. Logic had nothing to do with it. Only need.
If she woke in his arms and tried to be rational, she couldn’t seem to manage it.
And really, why try?
She’d protected herself for three years, and look what it had got her. Three years older. Engaged to the wrong man. And now—right back where she started from.
And every time she got that far, his hand would cover her breast or slip between h
er thighs. He would stroke, he would tease, he would make her tremble.
He would turn her in his arms and make love to her again. And she would know mindless joy for moments.
Now Cat lay with Yiannis’s body snug against her back, his arm curved over her waist, his deep even breaths stirring the hair by her ear as he slept.
Now what?
She couldn’t help wondering. Wrapping her fingers around his hand, she pressed it against her heart—and dared to hope that she would still feel joy in the morning.
CHAPTER EIGHT
CAT woke slowly, languorously, feeling relaxed, sated. She started to stretch. Her muscles twinged. No matter. She couldn’t move far anyway. There was a hard warm body against her back.
“Yiannis?”
She felt his lips curve against her ear. “You were expecting someone else?”
She rolled over to face him, her nose bumping his. He had a smile on his face, satisfied but not replete. She knew that because he loosened his fingers from her grasp and hauled her around and on top of him so that she lay face to face with him, body to body, and she felt his stirring beneath hers.
No, not replete. Hungry. Again.
He framed her face in his hands and kissed her. It was a long, deep kiss that promised another round of the passion they’d shared all night. And she didn’t say no. She wanted it as much as he did. Wanted it now in the clear light of day.
They didn’t speak, they just touched. And looked. She sat above him, straddled his legs and watched the way his fingers played over her skin, stroked her breasts, tweaked her nipples. Then he stroked down her abdomen and slid a hand between her thighs, cupped her, teased her, probed. And all the while she watched him, he did the same, never took his eyes from her face unless it was to watch his fingers find the center of her.
Cat caught her breath at his touch, then felt bereft when his hand left her, only to find herself raised and settled over him again so that she could take him in. As she did, his jaw tightened, his body tensed. The skin grew taut across his cheekbones. He held himself absolutely rigid.
And so did she, enjoying the moment, enjoying the feel of him within her. She looked down at him and smiled, then trailed her fingers down over his chest, circled his navel, bent to plant kisses on hard nubs of his nipples. Waited.
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