He was as beautifully made as she’d remembered in her dreams. Strong, square shoulders, shaped by years of hard physical labor, softened under her hands. She stroked his ribs and felt the roughness of his breathing, the quick beat of his heart. Pressing into him from behind, she laid her cheek against his back, testing the contrast of textures, drinking in his clean scent. At last, almost without thought, she turned her face and touched her lips to those poor, abused muscles.
“Jacquie.” Rhys tightened his hands until he thought his knuckles might break. What she did to him…her hands, her face…dear Lord, her mouth… His body had gone tight as a bowstring. Yes, and the arrow is strung, all right. He almost chuckled at the thought. Did she understand what she’d done to him? Did she expect him just to walk away after this?
Her arms came around him and stilled, with her palms resting over his breastbone. After a moment, she said, “Is that better?”
Then he did chuckle. “Yes. And no.” He turned within her hold and put his arms around her, pulling her tight against his body. “I’ve got a different set of aches altogether now.”
“I think I have the cure.”
Stepping away, she took his hand and led him into the darkness of her bedroom. Rhys lay down carefully on the bed, hoping to keep the spasms at bay, unwilling to take his eyes off the silhouette of Jacquie as she undressed. Disappearing clothes revealed her skin white against the black around her, her hair an occasional flicker of gold. He’d left his slacks on, but when the bed dipped she came to him completely naked, a slender porcelain figure fitting into his hands as if made for him alone.
She is, he thought fiercely. Mine alone.
Her mouth came to his, soft, coffee-glazed lips playing with his own. He cupped her shoulders with his hands, stroked his palms over her ribs and the velvet skin of her bottom.
“Nothing,” he groaned, “nothing has ever felt this good.”
“Mmm.” She murmured against his jawline, nipped at his ear and chuckled when he gasped. “Tell me more.”
He set the words free, then, praising every part of her he could touch, taste, take. Pain forgotten, he rolled to his side, bringing her up against him so that every inch of her lay within his reach. Desire mounted them, drove them on a ride wilder than anything they’d known with a horse. Harsh breaths and soft moans filled the quiet night, while their hands re-learned long-forgotten trails of pleasure. At the end, she sobbed out his name and he answered with a growl of satisfaction. Together, they took the final, magnificent fall.
JACQUIE AWOKE without any recollection of having gone to sleep, or even to bed. Memory came slowly, and with it, awe. And then concern, because she lay alone in her bed.
“Rhys?”
“I’m here.”
She pushed her hair out of her face and sat up, pulling the sheet over her bare breasts. Her love sat in the chair in her bedroom by the low lamp on the dresser, wrapped in a quilt from the waist down. He held a big book in his hands—one of the albums in which she stored pictures of Erin. His daughter.
“Cute baby.” Smiling, he turned the page. “Looks like she kept you moving.”
“She ran as soon as she could walk.” Wrapping the sheet around her, she went to kneel by his side. “That’s her second birthday.” She pointed to the picture of Erin with goats in the background. “That was a petting zoo, and when we went inside, she ran after all the pygmy goats and the lambs, saying, ‘Baa-baa-baa-baa.’ Endlessly. I bet those poor animals have never been so glad to see anyone leave.”
Together they leafed through the pages, while Jacquie tried to give back the years he’d missed.
The last page was an eight-by-ten picture of Erin on her first pony, Dusty. “I wish I’d been there,” Rhys said quietly.
She could have wept at the ache in his voice. “So do I.”
Thinking back, she remembered the first lonely days. “I thought you might try to find me, so I could tell you about the baby, so we could share. But…”
He set the album on the table where she kept the others. “I did look for you. I hired three different private detectives. But you weren’t in your hometown, you weren’t in New York State, and you didn’t show up on employment records anywhere in the country.”
“I came back to New Skye, eventually.”
On a deep breath, he sank a little deeper into the armchair, putting his face in shadow. “I stopped looking after about a year.”
Unwisely, she asked, “Why?”
“What else could I do? The reports were all negative, and it was pretty easy to recognize that you did not want to be found. Plus…”
When he didn’t continue, she prodded. “Go on.”
“My…Andrew’s mother intercepted a bill from one of the P.I.s. Not surprisingly, she threw one of her famous tantrums and threatened to take the baby and leave for good if I didn’t stop the search. I’d already failed once at this marriage. I wanted to give it my best effort. And I had a son to consider.”
“You had a daughter, too.”
“I didn’t know that, did I?”
The momentum had changed between them. Caught between hurt and fear, Jacquie didn’t know how to regain their balance. “You didn’t exactly give me a chance to tell you, that night.”
Rhys leaned over and picked up his slacks from the floor. “You could have told me anything you wanted.”
Still on her knees, Jacquie turned her gaze to the window. She couldn’t bear to see him getting dressed, preparing to leave her. “I hadn’t had much practice in announcing I was pregnant.”
“And I’d already heard it once that day. Believe me, I wasn’t any better at receiving the news.”
“Exactly.” Trailing sheets, blanket and bedspread, she followed him into the living room where he bent to pick up his shirt. “I guess your back is better?”
“Yes, thanks. What does ‘exactly’ mean?”
“You stalked into my apartment and started unloading all this anger and shock on me—how you were trapped, no choices left, nothing to do but go on with the marriage, what a bad time this was for a baby, anyway. Was I supposed to say, ‘Oh, by the way, guess who else you knocked up?’”
He stood rigid in the center of the room. “I made love to you every time we were together. I made love to my wife in one last, desperate attempt to save the relationship. I have never ‘knocked up’ anyone.” After a glance at his watch, he pulled on his sweater. If his back hurt, he didn’t give any indication. “It’s 4:00 in the morning. I ought to be home before Terry gets up, not to mention the kids.”
There it was again, the implication that somehow her daughter had become a permanent part of his life. While she was not.
The time had come to push the issue. “I want to see Erin.”
“I don’t know if she’s ready to see you.”
“Have you asked? Have you talked to her about me?”
His hands went into his pockets, and she heard his keys jingle. “She’ll talk when she’s ready.”
“As a parent, you have a responsibility to make her do what’s right and what’s best, whether she’s ready or not.”
“You expect me to tie her to a chair and lock the two of you in the room together?”
“I expect you to convince her that she owes me a chance to explain, out of love and respect.”
“I’m not ready to force her into a situation she doesn’t want.”
“Instead, you want to gain her love…at my expense. You keep her in your big house and let her ride your wonderful horses, with a minimum of chores and probably more spending money than she knows what to do with.” Rhys looked at the floor, and she saw his face flush. “Right. I’m sure she’s got a great new wardrobe. In the meantime, her horse is starving himself for loneliness and the responsibilities she has in my home are being neglected. That’s not fair.”
Rhys lifted his head. “You’re just one more person whose expectations I can’t measure up to.” He walked past her into the kitchen, opened the back doo
r, then glanced back. “And though I would like things to be different, all I can say right now is…that’s too damn bad.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“GOOD NEWS,” Terry said as Rhys walked into the kitchen two hours later.
“I could use some.” He took down a coffee mug and the bottle of ibuprofen.
“Your dad called. He’s coming down for the Top Flight trials. Bringing the sheikh with him to watch Imperator win.”
“Excellent.” Throwing the pills at the back of his throat, he chased them with a gulp of coffee. “That should make the day a real picnic, since I’ve decided to scratch the horse. His Highness or whatever can just hand over the check and drive off with the goods.”
Terry gripped his arm. “You’re scratching the horse? Giving up?”
“Imp has several years of good competition left in him. Why tie him down, leave him standing around with nothing to do but eat his head off, when he could go somewhere else and practice what he loves? There’s no one to ride him here.”
“I would,” Andrew said from the door to the hall.
Rhys shook his head. “You won’t be ready to ride him at that level until he’s past his prime. I know you love him, but sometimes we have to do what’s best for the creatures we love, even at our own expense.” He winced as he heard his own words echo what Jacquie had said earlier. He’d known at the time she was right, but hadn’t been able to crawl past his own stubborn, arrogant pride.
“You can use him for stud,” Andrew said desperately. “You know he’s worth thousands. That’s why this Fahed guy wants him.”
“True. But before Imperator goes out to stud, he deserves all the success he can win.”
Terry clanked his mug down on the table. “Aren’t we forgetting the teeny fact that the horse still isn’t reliable over the jumps? So far, he’s not looking like winning anything, if you ask me.”
“He’s waiting for his rider.” Erin stood just behind Andrew in the hallway. “Until he can jump with you, Mr. Lew—Rhys, he’ll never be whole again.”
“Yeah, right.” Andrew snorted. “Sounds like a fairy tale to me.”
Terry shrugged. “I’ve heard stranger ideas.”
Rhys had, as well. “What makes you think so, Erin?”
She eased past Andrew and came into the kitchen. “That’s where his failure was, right? He fell and you fell with him. He failed, and hurt you. So I think he wants—needs to take responsibility for keeping both of you safe.”
Her words went with Rhys through the day, especially as he watched Imperator caper in his paddock. He could almost imagine the big horse demonstrating his talents, begging for the chance to make things right.
But Imperator was not the only one with mistakes to repair. When the kids got home from school, Rhys sent Andrew and Terry to the barn for afternoon chores, but asked Erin to take a walk with him to the pasture where they’d turned Imperator out for a few hours of play.
Imp lifted his head for a moment as they reached the fence, greeted them with a toss of his head, then returned to nosing the new-grown grass.
Erin propped her elbows on the top board and her chin on her fists. “He’s so beautiful. Do you think I’ll ever get to ride him?”
“I’ll make sure you do.”
“What if you sell him?”
“You’ll get your ride before he leaves.” The prospect of losing Imperator dimmed the day for both of them. Rhys turned his mind to the reason he’d brought her out. “Erin, we have to talk about your mom.”
She didn’t reply.
He braced his back against the sun-warmed board of the fence. “You were angry, and everybody understands that. But it’s time to grow past the anger. She needs you. And you need her. Mirage misses you.”
“I like it here.” In a lower voice, she added, “But I do miss Mirage.”
“I’m glad that I could help you get through a bad time. It’s time I took a role in your life.” He pulled in a deep breath. “But this…arrangement…was never intended to be permanent. You must go home.”
To his surprise, she hid her face in the crook of her elbow and started to sob. He couldn’t understand the words amongst the tears. “Erin, sweetheart, what’s wrong?”
When he put his hand on her shoulder, his daughter launched herself against him. Automatically he closed his arms around her shoulders, cradling her like the small child he’d never known. “Come on, Erin. Tell me why you’re crying.”
“I’m scared,” she moaned between sniffs.
“What could you be scared of?”
“My mom.” Before he could ask, the words started flowing. “How can she love me anymore? After what I did? How long I’ve been gone?”
Rhys had never been at such a loss. He’d already proved his incompetence as a parent with Andrew—how could he possibly cope with Erin’s fears? What should he say?
“You told me you were able to see Mirage being born, didn’t you?” Ridiculous, but all he could think of.
Erin nodded against his ribs.
“And you’ve been with him since then, training him, taking care of him, watching him grow.”
Sniff. “Yes.”
“We know horses are not really predictable, though. If they are frightened, or feel threatened, they bolt. Or kick. So, suppose you were riding Mirage and…. and…and a kite dropped out of the sky in front of him.”
She drew back to look at him. “That’s weird.”
“It happened to me once, actually, during a dressage test near a city park. So a kite flutters out of the sky and lands at Mirage’s feet. Your horse, thinking he’s about to be eaten by a monster, bolts as if he’s running the Derby, rakes you under some tree branches and finally leaves you on the ground while he gallops back to the stable.”
Giggling, she nodded. “Okay.”
“Do you stop loving him? Do you stop taking care of him because he was scared and reacted with instinct instead of rational thought? Do you sell him to the next person you see for dog meat?”
“Of course not!” She thumped on his chest with a fist, then stepped back, out of his hold. “That’s mean. I’d be mad, but I wouldn’t…” After a pause, she looked up at him and smiled. “I get it.”
He nodded. “Love doesn’t end because the one you love hurts you. Maybe you’re a little cautious for a while. But true love always wins out. And your mom loves you very, very much.”
They began walking back toward the barn. “So I suppose I should call my mom,” Erin said. “Although it’ll be…scary.”
“You’re brave.”
“Sometimes.” After a moment, she said, “I’ll make you a deal.”
“What kind of deal?”
“Well…I’ll call my mom, if you’ll ride Imperator on the jumps.”
Rhys stopped walking. “It’s not at all the same thing.”
“No, my mom is scarier than any horse.”
“True,” he said, and they both laughed. “Erin, I don’t think Imp will magically recover his confidence just because I’m on his back.” And I’m damned sure I won’t recover mine.
“Why not? How can he understand what’s happened, except that he made a mistake and you haven’t ridden him like that since? Wouldn’t you be confused?”
“I suppose I would.”
“Then you have to be brave, if I do.” She looked up at him out of the corners of her eyes. “I’ll watch you take Imperator over the cross-country course, and then I’ll call my mom.”
Laughing, Rhys ruffled her short hair. “Something like that, scamp. Now, go get your chores done, and we’ll put you up on the stallion for a jog.”
“All right!”
His heart lifted as she ran screaming across the yard. Suddenly, even hope seemed possible.
THE HOURS BEFORE Erin’s arrival were the longest Jacquie had ever known. She found herself cleaning up the house, just to stay busy and avoid going insane. Erin probably wouldn’t recognize the place, wouldn’t realize the neat yellow bedroom—with
its vacuumed blue carpet, freshly made bed covered in a galloping-horse print and sparkling clean windows—was hers.
Searching for a vase in which to put a bunch of daffodils she’d picked on the edge of the woods beyond the pasture, Jacquie could barely fight off yet another round of tears. All these surface details didn’t really matter a damn. The facts of her life, and Erin’s, hadn’t changed. And if her daughter couldn’t accept and forgive her mistakes, they would never recover the closeness she’d depended on all these years.
Rhys’s truck pulled into the driveway at exactly four o’clock. Andrew and Erin sat in the back seat, but only Erin got out. She came to the front door and knocked. Nearly suffocated by apprehension, Jacquie opened the door to her daughter.
“Hi, sweetheart.” As the adult, she ought to be able to handle the situation with calm, right? “Come in.”
“Hi.” And then, with much more enthusiasm, “Hi, Hurry! How are you, huh?” She bent to hug the shepherd dancing at her feet. In the process of playing and getting reacquainted, Erin came into the house.
When Hurry had calmed down, she straightened up and looked around at the living room. A deep breath lifted her shoulders. “This is…nice.”
“Thanks. I’ve got some tea made, and some gingersnaps.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Me, neither.” They shared a tentative smile. “This is hard, isn’t it?”
Eyes round with nervousness, Erin nodded.
“Let’s…sit down.” She took her usual seat at one end of the couch and Erin, she was thrilled to see, naturally gravitated to her personal space on the other end. Hurry jumped up between them, curled into her favorite position, and with a satisfied sigh put her head on Erin’s thigh.
Jacquie cleared her throat. “How was school today?”
“Okay.” She stared at her twisting fingers for a moment. “How’s Mirage?”
The Fake Husband Page 21
