And not just their relief, Caro acknowledged with an increase of the fluttering sensation in the pit of her stomach as she turned slowly to look at Jake and found his darkened gaze fixed on her hungrily. But also the same hunger that had been building inside her for the last few minutes!
Jake gave a rueful shake of his head. ‘Was it like this when her first two teeth came through?’
‘Worse,’ Caro admitted with a smile. ‘I had no idea what was happening the first time, and I’m afraid I panicked completely. I drove hell-for-leather to the doctor’s clinic in the next village.’ She laughed quietly at the memory. ‘I felt a little foolish once he had made his diagnosis.’
Jake sighed. ‘I would have done exactly the same.’
She blinked. ‘You would?’
He nodded, his expression pained. ‘It’s hard to see her like that, isn’t it?’
Caro drew in a ragged breath. ‘You love Magdalena already, don’t you?’
‘From the moment I first set eyes on her,’ Jake confirmed without the slightest hesitation, that dark gaze never leaving her face.
Caro felt her heart sink at the stark honesty of Jake’s admission. They had never discussed having children during their brief year of marriage, and Caro’s pregnancy had been completely unplanned. But she had always wanted to have children with Jake some day, and that desire had become increasingly more apparent to her as their marriage had progressed. However, she had been concerned that Jake would only care for any children they had in the same offhand manner with which he’d cared for her.
The absolute adoration she saw in his gaze every time he looked at Magdalena clearly showed her that his manner was nothing so lukewarm as offhand for their baby. He already loved their daughter as deeply as Caro did.
She swallowed hard. ‘Jake—’
‘Let’s not talk any more tonight, Caro,’ he murmured, even as he held out his open hand to her, to encourage her to place hers inside it. ‘Talking isn’t what we do best,’ he added ruefully as she still hesitated.
Talking was what they should have done more of. Both before and after they were married. Especially before they were married. Then Caro might have at least been pre-warned—might have guarded against the possibility, the pain of Jake’s interest turning to other women as her father’s had done.
‘You’re thinking too much,’ Jake reproved huskily when he saw the increasing unease in her shadowed blue eyes. ‘I promise we’ll talk again in the morning.’
Her eyes widened. ‘But—’
‘No more talk, Caro.’ Jake placed soft, silencing fingertips against her lips and moved so that only the barest whisper of air separated their two bodies.
He could smell her softly elusive perfume now, and the tang of lemon shampoo she must have used on her hair. Her skin had taken on the tone of honey in the soft glow of the bedside lamp, and her eyes were as clear and blue as a summer sky as she stared up at him. Wide, heavily lashed eyes that a man could drown in if he gazed into those sky-blue depths for long enough.
Her cheek felt soft and silky as Jake’s hand moved to cup the side of her face. Her lips, so full and inviting, were slightly parted as she breathed softly, that breath warm against the palm of his hand.
Dear God, how he had ached to taste those lips again! To sip and taste them before crushing and parting them beneath his own and claiming the hot sweetness within.
Caro had been lost the moment Jake placed his fingertips against her lips. Even the softness of that caress was enough to cause a tingling in her body, creating an ache inside her that went bone-deep and then deeper still. She felt her breasts swell and her nipples harden as heat suffused between her thighs.
As she gazed up at Jake she could see naked hunger in the dark green depths of his eyes, and his breath was released in a fierce hiss as he read that same desire reflected back at him in her candid blue gaze.
She gave a half-protesting shake of her head. ‘Jake…’
‘Caro…’ he groaned throatily, even as his head lowered and his mouth captured hers.
Dear God!
Caro had no defence against the heat, the sweet, aching joy of Jake’s lips parting hers as he deepened the kiss. His arms moved about her like steel bands as he pulled her body in close to his, moulding her soft curves to his much harder ones from breast to thigh.
Her arms moved up of their own volition as his mouth continued to plunder, to claim hers, and her fingers became entangled in the dark thickness of hair at his nape as she surrendered, gave herself to that claim.
Tomorrow. They would talk tomorrow. At this moment in time Caro didn’t care if tomorrow never came. She just wanted Jake. Wanted him to make love to her as much as she ached to make love to him…!
Jake’s arms tightened about Caro. She tasted even sweeter than he remembered, her lips full and responsive against his as he continued to kiss her hungrily, fiercely. His hands moved beneath the soft wool of her sweater and he touched the smooth silkiness of her curvaceous back.
Her skin had always been as smooth and soft as satin, her breasts so perfect and round as they fitted neatly into the palms of Jake’s hands.
Those breasts felt slightly fuller than Jake remembered as his hand moved to cup that softness, to caress. The nipples hardened as he ran the soft pad of his thumb against them, causing Caro to groan low in her throat and her thighs to press more urgently against his.
Jake wondered what other changes pregnancy and child birth had made in the delicious body that he knew better than he did his own.
He had to know. To touch. To see.
His mouth continued to plunder hers even as he bent to lift her up into his arms, before turning towards the open doorway to the adjoining bedroom.
Reality pushed through the fierce desire that was fogging Caro’s brain—a totally disorientating feeling much like not having her feet on the ground. She pulled sharply back from Jake to look dazedly about her, realising she really didn’t have her feet on the ground—that Jake had lifted her up into his arms and was now carrying her.
‘Don’t worry—we’ll leave the door open between the bedrooms so that we can hear Magdalena,’ Jake assured her gruffly as he placed her down on the bed before joining her there, his chiselled features all light and shadow from the moon reflecting on the snow outside and coming in through the window.
Caro knew she should stop this. Now. That to allow this to go any further than it already had would be a big mistake on her part.
But as Jake gently pushed her sweater aside to bare her breasts to the heat of his gaze, his hand cupping her softness as he slowly lowered his head and claimed one hardened nipple between his parted lips, drawing it into the heated cavern of his mouth, Caro knew she had no will left with which to fight him. Or the desire blazing completely out of control through the whole of her body.
Instead her fingers once again became entangled in the thickness of Jake’s hair and she held him to her, the sensation of his lips and mouth drawing on her nipple like nothing else she had ever known. Her back arched as she urged him on, crying out her pleasure as his hand claimed her other breast, the dual assault upon her senses driving her ever nearer to release.
A release that Caro craved, ached for, needed as much as she did air to breathe…!
Jake’s mouth came down on hers once more as their clothes, the last barrier between them, disappeared quickly—thrown without care onto the carpeted floor beside the bed.
Flesh against flesh. Shoulders, breasts, thighs, ankles. Their legs tangled together as they sought even closer contact, and Caro felt the pulse of Jake’s hard arousal against her thigh.
It was a hardness she wanted inside her, thrusting deep, again and again, as the two of them pleasured each other.
She moved, rolling slightly so that he was now the one lying back against the pillows, her gaze briefly holding his before she slid slowly, leisurely, down the length of his chest, lips kissing, teeth gently biting as she familiarised herself with all the pleasure spots she kne
w so well.
The hard tip of his nipple. The flatness of his muscled abdomen. The well of his navel. The dip where his legs joined his hips.
Jake’s breath caught in a hiss, his fingers clenching in the sheet beneath him as he felt Caro’s lips and tongue against him, sliding the length of his arousal, that teasing tongue not quite touching the sensitive tip before she began the caress all over again. Again. And again. Every time without quite going far enough.
‘Caro—please!’ Jake begged, raising his head slightly to look down at her.
Just the sight of her red-gold hair cascading over his thighs as she knelt between his legs was enough to increase his need. Then he finally felt her take him inside the heated silkiness of her pleasure-giving mouth.
‘Oh, yes…!’ he groaned achingly, his head falling back onto the pillows as he felt the flick of her tongue against the tip of his swollen shaft. ‘Don’t stop, Caro. For God’s sake, don’t stop!’
Caro could sense Jake’s imminent release as she ran her tongue slowly, leisurely, over his arousal, her own thighs clenching as they pulsed with the same need.
‘I want to be inside you, Caro,’ Jake muttered fiercely. ‘I need to be inside you!’ He reached out to grasp her arms and lifted her over and above him.
The feel of his hardness against her own swollen arousal was almost more than Caro could stand, and she rubbed herself slowly against the long length of him. Again and again as the pleasure built up inside her.
‘I need to be inside you now,’ Jake repeated feverishly as he looked up at her, his eyes dark with desperation in the moonlight.
Her gaze held his as she moved up onto her knees and her hand moved down to encircle him, to guide him into her. She could feel each and every inner convulsion as she took him inside her, inch by slow inch, until she cried out as he touched the deepest heart of her.
‘Am I hurting you?’ It took every ounce of Jake’s considerable will-power to remain still beneath her, to keep from thrusting even more deeply inside her. Caro had been pregnant, had given birth since they’d last made love, and he had no idea whether or not she had suffered any repercussions from that. ‘Caro—’ He broke off, his concern fading to pleasure as he felt her inner convulsions as she climaxed around his increasingly hardening shaft.
Jake gritted his teeth in an effort to stop those convulsions from driving him over the same precipice. He intended making love with her until they were both satiated. Until they were too exhausted to do any more than fall asleep in each other’s arms.
More than anything else Jake had missed holding his wife in his arms as they slept…
CHAPTER EIGHT
IT WAS JUST BEGINNING to get light, and Jake lay looking at the woman who still slept in the bed beside him, face-down on the bed, her hair a silken red-gold curtain across the pillow beneath her, her arms up beside her head, the sheet having fallen back to reveal the bareness of her curvaceous back.
Not that he was surprised that Caro still slept. After that first needy, uncontrollable lovemaking the two of them had made love for a second time. Slowly. Leisurely. Pleasurably. Finally falling asleep in each other’s arms, as Jake had hoped that they would, some time in the early hours of this morning.
Jake’s world had never felt more perfect.
Caro was once again at his side.
His daughter was sleeping peacefully and obviously free from pain when he had checked on her a short time ago in the adjoining bedroom.
Snow still blanketed the ground outside.
And today was Christmas Eve.
The eve of a new beginning for him and Caro, he hoped.
Yes, Jake could honestly claim that his world had never been more perfect.
Now all he had to do was convince her to remain a part of that perfect world…
CARO FELT SLIGHTLY disorientated as she woke to muted silence rather than to the usual sounds of the village wakening: women talking loudly together as they made their early-morning visit to the bakery for bread and pastries to give to the men before they left for work; children chattering happily as they waited for the bus that would take them to school in the next village; car horns tooting; garage doors closing; dogs barking—
Oh, dear God!
The reason Caro couldn’t hear any of those things was because she wasn’t in Majorca! She was in England. With Jake. And last night—
Caro lifted panicked lids—and quickly closed them again as she saw Jake lying in bed beside her, already awake and leaning up on one elbow to look down at her with an expression of complete satisfaction.
Last night they had—
Most of the night they had—
Caro’s hands clenched in the pillow and her lids squeezed tightly closed as she tried to shut out the memories of what she and Jake had done last night. Impossible!
Now that she was fully awake those memories were too vivid to be denied. She could remember every kiss. Each caress. Every moment of pleasure—and there had been many!—was clearly etched on her brain.
And she could still feel the raw sensuality of Jake’s body beneath, above, inside her own…
Caro didn’t care if there had been a blizzard in the night. Even if the snow was now two feet deep outside she was leaving here today! Now! Immediately—
‘I know you’re awake, Caro.’ A finger caressed lightly down the length of her bared spine to accompany that indulgent observation.
‘Don’t do that!’ she snapped fiercely, and she opened her eyes to glare at Jake in warning, at the same time pulling the sheet up over her nakedness and turning on her side. ‘And stop looking at me like that, too,’ she ordered.
Jake gave a lazy smile. ‘Exactly how am I looking at you, Caro…?’
‘Like a cat contemplating a tasty bowl of cream!’
Jake chuckled. ‘More like a cat that would like to lick you all over,’ he corrected ruefully, as he picked up a long strand of her hair and began to play with it.
Caro felt the colour warm her cheeks at the vivid images that instantly flooded her mind. Not imagined ones either. Jake had indeed licked her all over the night before…
She drew in a sharp breath and knocked his hand away from her hair. ‘Last night was—’
‘Beautiful,’ Jake put in softly.
Well…yes, it had certainly been that.
But she wasn’t about to be seduced into thinking last night had been any more than a physical manifestation of circumstances. A typical example of two people who had once been married to each other indulging in a little curiosity as to whether or not they were still physically attracted to each other. Which she and Jake undoubtedly were!
To allow herself to believe that last night had been anything more than that would be madness on her part.
They had both been worried about Magdalena. Emotions had been running high. That was all it had been.
If only Jake didn’t look so good this morning, with his hair slightly mussed and falling endearingly across his brow, his expression one of relaxed indulgence, with all the harsh ness of yesterday smoothed away from the chiselled ruggedness of his face.
Caro didn’t dare even let her gaze wander any lower. She already knew what she would see: wide shoulders, a muscled chest covered in a light dusting of dark hair, a stomach flat and smooth—
Stop it, Caro, she instructed herself firmly. So Jake was still the most physically beautiful man she had ever seen—that certainly didn’t nullify the fact that he was also one of the most unfaithful!
Her mouth tightened determinedly. ‘If you wouldn’t mind, Jake, I would like to get up now and take a shower before Magdalena wakes up wanting her breakfast.’
‘Are you sure?’ Jake’s gaze warmly ran the length of her body. ‘Wouldn’t you rather—?’
‘All I want right now, Jake, is to take a shower!’ she insisted firmly.
‘Pity,’ he drawled as he lay back on his pillows, arms behind his head as he contemplated her through narrowed lids.
Her f
ace was flushed and beautiful, her lips slightly swollen from the force of their lovemaking, and her hair was a red-gold tangle about her shoulders. Bare shoulders showed slight signs of the rasp of the stubble on his chin as he’d kissed every inch of her body.
Making Jake wonder if Caro had other, more intimate signs of their lovemaking…
‘I would prefer it if you left my bedroom before I get out of bed,’ she said.
Jake gave an unconcerned shrug. ‘That would actually be our bedroom, Caro.’
‘Our—?’ She blinked. ‘What do you mean…?’
‘Obviously you didn’t check the wardrobe when you unpacked yesterday. If you had,’ he continued mockingly as Caro continued to stare at him, ‘you would have seen my clothes hanging up in there.’
There had been no reason for Caro to look in the wardrobe when she’d unpacked last night; jeans and jumpers didn’t need to be hung up. ‘You mean this is your bedroom?’
‘Our bedroom,’ he repeated lightly.
‘I— But—’
‘We are still married,’ he reminded her dryly.
‘Technically, yes,’ she conceded with a frown. ‘In every way, Caro,’ Jake corrected as he reached out to lift her left hand. ‘You still wear my ring.’ The gold band on her third finger glittered in the early-morning light.
After Jake’s betrayal a year ago Caro had wanted to rip that plain gold band from her finger and toss it into the Mediterranean Sea! She had wanted to. But she hadn’t been able to.
‘Only because Majorca is a mainly Catholic island,’ she defended in a panic. ‘I didn’t think the locals in the village would be too impressed with a very pregnant unmarried woman moving into their midst!’
Jake’s eyes narrowed to glittering green slits. ‘Are you deliberately trying to create an argument with me?’
Her expression was challenging. ‘Am I succeeding?’
‘Getting there,’ he admitted through gritted teeth.
‘Good,’ she said with satisfaction.
‘We still need to talk, Caro, not argue—’
‘I don’t have anything to say to you, Jake,’ she cut in defiantly. ‘Now, would you mind kindly removing yourself from your bed so that I can get up and go to the bathroom?’
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