She looked more than a little annoyed with him. “Did I say something funny?”
He pushed back the chair and got to his feet. “You’re cute. A cute woman.”
Now she was annoyed. No doubt about it. She drew her strong shoulders back and aimed a thumb at her nicely rounded breasts. “I am five-foot-eleven and you should see me chop wood. I am not, nor have I ever been, cute.”
“Cute,” he repeated and came around the table toward her. “Just completely…cute.”
When he reached her, he held down a hand. She looked at it, narrow-eyed, and then up at him. “What are you up to now?”
“Come on, take my hand.”
“Bill…”
“Take it.”
With a small, impatient huff of breath, she put her fingers in his. He pulled her upright.
She rose with easy grace. At her full height, they were almost eye to eye. He estimated he was maybe two inches taller than she was. He found he liked that. A woman who could drag a man out of a blizzard and into her house, get him undressed and bandaged up and into her bed. A resourceful woman. A woman of substance.
“The best kind,” he whispered.
“What are you talking about?”
“You.” He grasped her waist and pulled her just a little bit closer.
Her mouth quivered. She bit her lower lip to make it stop and put her hands on his shoulders to keep him at bay. Her body trembled slightly in his hold and that pleased him. “This is…a bad idea, Bill.”
“What?” He tried to look as innocent as possible, given that he was not.
“I think that maybe you’re thinking…of kissing me.”
“You do, huh?”
“Well. Are you?”
He crinkled his brow, as if deep in thought.
“Are you?” she demanded, more strongly that time.
He smiled at her. Slowly. “As a matter of fact, I am.”
Chapter Five
“Bill.” She said his new name kind of breathlessly.
“That’s me.” He touched her chin. Smooth. Warm. Full of life. He traced the back of a finger down the side of her neck, just beneath the soft fall of her hair.
“I…um…” Her breathing was agitated. He could see in those beautiful eyes that she wanted him to kiss her, no matter what that mouth of hers was saying. “You shouldn’t. Really.”
“Yeah. I should.”
“Bill, I don’t…”
He took her mouth. Because he had to kiss her. And also to make her stop telling him not to. He gathered her in, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her close enough that her breasts pressed against his chest.
She sighed. Her body went pliant.
So he kissed her some more, deepening the contact, pulling her into him, thoroughly enjoying the strong, substantial shape of her all along the front of him. She allowed that, allowed him to press his body to hers. He tasted the slick surfaces beyond her parted lips. Good. She tasted so good…
Eventually, with considerable regret, he lifted his head.
She gazed at him through stricken eyes. “You shouln’t have done that.”
He touched her chin again and idly stroked her soft cheek. “Yeah. I should have. I want to do a lot more…”
“Bill. Please. We hardly know each other. And neither of us needs this kind of trouble.”
“Wrong. I do. I need it. I need it a lot.”
“This is crazy.”
He couldn’t have agreed with her more. “Yeah. You’re right. It is. Crazy in a very good way.”
She didn’t look all that pleased. “Time for you to go to bed. Alone.”
He slipped his hand under the silky fall of her hair and clasped the back of her neck. What a woman.
“Bill.”
“Okay.” He released her, stepping back. “Good night, Tessa.”
She blinked. “I…good night.”
He turned and left her standing there.
Tessa watched him until he disappeared into the hallway at the other end of the kitchen. She heard him quietly close the bedroom door. Once she knew she was alone, that he wasn’t coming back, she lifted her hand and touched her lips where the warmth of his kiss still lingered.
She sank back to her chair, feeling sucker-punched.
She couldn’t believe she had done that, let him kiss her. Kissed him back.
It was…inappropriate. Beyond tacky, to have kissed him. He was in no condition to be kissing anyone—although she had to admit, for someone who didn’t even know his own name, he sure knew what to do with those warm lips of his.
But what was she thinking? Until around noon that day, she’d been in love with Bill Toomey—hadn’t she?
Uh, well, judging by how quickly and thoroughly she’d put him from her mind, apparently not. She felt…embarrassed, at how effortlessly she’d recovered from losing him, when she’d told everyone in town that she was certain, this time, she’d gotten it right. That this time, she’d found the guy for her.
Yeah. She was embarrassed, and a little ashamed.
Tessa knew what people in town said about her. And she hated being forced to admit that they were probably right. For a solid, dependable person who pulled her own weight in almost every aspect of her life, she was a total idiot when it came to love and romance.
Eventually, after sitting at the table alone for maybe fifteen minutes, calling herself all kinds of irresponsible fool, she rose and went upstairs to get the pajamas she’d taken from her own room earlier. She used the hall bath for a quick shower and to brush her teeth. After that, she turned off most of the lights on the lower floor, leaving one on low in the hallway, just in case. She turned down the heater and adjusted the damper on the stove. And then, at last, she climbed the stairs to her temporary bed, Mona and Gigi at her heels.
Under the covers, with Gigi at her feet and Mona already making those sleepy snorking sounds beside her, Tessa called herself a fool again and tried to convince herself that she was going to be more wary of the stranger sleeping in her room.
Really, he was far from the type of guy she would normally look twice at. He was too handsome, too…smooth. Worst of all, there was an excess of testosterone going on with him. As a rule, she never went for the super-manly type. She liked men who were shy and sweet. Innocent, even—men nothing like the wild males in her family.
Yet, handsome, smooth and macho as he clearly was, the stranger named Bill had charmed her. He seemed honestly to like her—to admire her, even—and to be so grateful for the way she’d taken care of him.
But it could all be an act. He could murder her in her bed.
A low laugh bubbled up at the thought. She stifled it with a hand over her mouth. Just look at her. Laughing at the idea that the man downstairs might harm her. She needed to be more careful around him—and she would in the future.
However, she simply couldn’t buy that he presented a physical danger to her. She just didn’t believe it. She had this absolute certainty that if he was a threat to her, it was to her heart and not to her safety.
Tessa rubbed her eyes. All this stewing wasn’t going to change a thing. She needed to put her doubts and fears aside and rest a little while she could. In an hour or two, she would be getting up and going down to check on him again. She set the clock by the bed for 3:00 a.m. And then she yawned, pulled the covers close and turned on her side.
Within minutes, she was deep in dreams.
In Tessa’s bedroom, the man who called himself Bill was still awake. He’d taken off the purple sweats and the thick borrowed socks and climbed under the covers naked.
Propped against the pillows, he’d been channel-surfing. He flipped through the few available channels, staring blankly at the TV screen, telling himself he was looking for a news flash about someone fitting his description going missing, but not really paying a lot of attention to what he was watching.
For the most part, he kept his mind as blank as his stare. Straining to remember who he was and where he came fro
m only made the headache start stabbing.
No. For now, he might as well accept that he was Bill. Bill, who had claimed a first kiss from Tessa Jones. The taste of her was on his tongue and the clean scent of her stayed with him, arousing to him. She had kept him alive. And now, she was giving him memories. Good memories. Sweet ones.
He wanted to kiss her some more. He wanted to take off all her clothes and touch her naked body everywhere. Making love to Tessa. Now, that would be a memory to treasure. Beneath the sheet, he felt himself hardening.
He raised the blankets and took a look. That particular piece of equipment was not only intact, but apparently working A-OK. Good to know. Too bad about his brain.
But a man can’t have everything.
He stared at the TV a while longer, thinking about the family story Tessa had told him. She had two sisters and two brothers. And her dad loved his wife. It all sounded pretty good to him.
Did he have a family beyond the mother he’d vaguely remembered—or imagined he remembered—earlier that day? Did he have a dad? Brothers and sisters?
In his head, the faint throbbing started. He shut his eyes, thought about nothing, until the throbbing went away.
Then he stared at the TV some more, his mind mostly occupied with thoughts of Tessa, of how, if he had to start his life all over again with a blank slate for a mind and nothing in his pockets, so be it. At least he’d had the good fortune to end up at the tender mercy of Tessa Jones.
He glanced at the clock. It was almost 2:00 a.m.
He shut off the television, turned out the light and stretched out on his back to wait for sleep. It was a long time coming. But eventually, the darkness behind his eyes faded and he dreamed.
In his dreams, he found his family. He walked the rooms of the big ranch house at Bravo Ridge, where he’d grown up. He stood in the grand entry hall and talked to his mother, Aleta, who kept changing, her face melting and reforming into an older woman and then a younger one.
One minute, she was as he remembered her in his childhood, bluebonnet eyes shining, her skin soft, her slim hands smooth and veinless. But tired. She was always tired back then. With nine children in ten years, who wouldn’t be?
And then she was herself, now, in her fifties, but still beautiful, her chestnut hair showing no gray.
“Ash,” she said. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
“Of course.” His voice was flat, without inflection.
“But will you be happy?”
Happy. As if that was the question. Still, he loved his mother and he told her what she wanted to hear. “You bet. I’m the happiest man alive.”
Aleta shook her head. She looked so sad. He started to tell her not to worry, it was a hell of a match, good for everyone, and everything would be okay. But she was fading. He could see the far wall through her body. She disappeared.
The walls melted and reformed around him and he was in a board meeting, one that went on forever. Once all the arguments were made, his father spoke. His brother Gabe, an attorney, the family fixer, said he’d see what he could do.
The dreamer looked down and saw he held a small velvet jewelry box. He flipped the box open. A diamond engagement ring and a wedding ring to match. The enormous engagement diamond gleamed at him, blinding in its hard brightness.
“What do you think?” he asked, looking up.
Gabe said, “Are you kidding me? It’s gorgeous. She’ll love it.”
The dreams of home faded. He forgot the names of the people in them. He forgot everything.
The world exploded and he was spinning, falling, down and down, the universe above him, clouds around him, the world somewhere below, rising to meet him, bringing the end of him…
And then, a soft hand on his forehead, a gentle voice whispering, “Shh. Shh, now…”
He freed an arm and grabbed the wrist of that hand in a punishing hold. He heard a gasp. And he opened his eyes. The lamp he’d switched off was on again. A woman loomed above him, her wrist in his grip. Blond hair. Eyes green and rayed with purest gold…
“Tessa.” He released her.
She rubbed her wrist where his fingers had manacled it and forced a trembling smile. “You’re awake. And you know who I am.” She let out a long breath of pure relief. “Good.”
He was covered in sweat again, same as when he woke up from that other nightmare. He started to push back the covers, but remembered in time that he was naked. With a ragged sigh, he let his head drop back to the damp pillow.
She said, “I came down to check on you. You were moaning in your sleep, tossing your head from side to side, mumbling, ‘No,’ over and over again.”
“I…hurt you.” He despised himself.
She dropped her arm to her side, her pajama sleeve falling over it, so he couldn’t see her wrist. “It’s nothing. Really.”
“No. Let me see…”
“Bill. It’s okay.”
He reached out. “Let me see.” He caught her gaze. Held it. “Come on…”
Reluctantly, she gave him her hand. He pushed back the flannel sleeve. The soft skin around her wrist was red where he’d grabbed her.
“It’s fine,” she insisted. “Truly.”
“Tessa.” He held her eyes again.
Her broad shoulders sagged. “What?”
He brought her wrist to his lips and he kissed the soft flesh where he’d hurt her. “I’m so sorry. I never want to hurt you.”
“I know you don’t. You haven’t. Really. It’s only a little redness. No big deal. It’ll fade in a few minutes.” Her voice was a trembling whisper. She opened her hand and caressed the side of his face the way she liked to do.
And he went on looking at her, with her gold hair sleep-tangled around her face, in cute red pajamas with little snowmen all over them. He couldn’t get enough of looking at her. Her mouth was so pink and soft, it made him start to get hard again, just looking at it. He remembered the kiss before she’d sent him to bed. How could he ever forget that kiss?
He couldn’t.
He wouldn’t.
And he wanted another.
He reached up, slid his fingers around her neck, feeling that amazing silky hair falling over the back of his hand. “Tessa…”
“Oh,” she said. “Oh, see, we shouldn’t. We really…” Her protests trailed off into silence.
Good. He pulled her down, until her mouth touched his. She sighed, her lips parting. He breathed her in, tightening his hold a little, bringing her just that much closer, so he could kiss her more deeply, taste her more fully.
He eased his tongue between those inviting lips of hers and ran it, stroking, over the smooth, wet surfaces in there. Her tongue met his, shyly. He groaned at the feel of that.
She moaned low in her throat and he brought his other arm out from under the covers to pull her down onto the bed with him.
But she didn’t allow that. Reluctantly, with a low sound of regret, she pulled away and straightened to her height. She gazed down at him, eyes so soft, mouth softer still. “I promised myself I wouldn’t do that again.”
He spoke low and roughly. “A promise like that just begs to be broken.”
A low whine came from the doorway. He lifted his head to look. The bulldog and the white cat sat there, side by side.
Tessa chuckled. “They don’t like it when I get out of bed in the middle of the night—go on,” she told them. “I’ll be up in a minute.” They stood and stretched, more or less in unison, and then they turned and left the doorway—as if they’d understood exactly what she said. She touched his forehead on the uninjured side. “You’re covered in sweat.” She stroked his hair. “Are you uncomfortable?”
He saw a way to keep her with him longer—and went for it. When it came to her, he had no shame. “Yeah. You got an extra set of sheets, maybe?”
“It so happens I do. You want a shower, too?”
“A quick one. That would be great.”
“How ‘bout this? You go ahead and
take that shower. While you’re in there, I’ll change the bed.”
He could have offered to change the sheets himself, suggested that she leave them on the bed and he’d deal with it once he’d showered. But if he did that, she’d climb the stairs to join her dog and cat, leaving him alone, without her.
“Great,” he said.
“Okay, then. You’ll probably need to put fresh bandages on your knees. There’s a first aid kit under the sink.”
He thanked her. She left him to get the sheets and he threw back the covers and made for the shower, grabbing the sweats she’d loaned him from the rocker in the corner on the way. He went ahead and removed the bandages before getting in.
After he’d washed off the sweat and towel-dried, he checked the cuts on his knees again. They were no longer bleeding. The cuts were shallow, hardly more than bad scrapes. All the gauze and tape seemed like overkill. He used a couple of big adhesive pads instead. They worked fine.
When he returned to the bedroom, showered and wearing the sweats, she was spreading the blankets back on the bed. He helped her finish the job, then he sat in the rocker and put on the socks.
She shook her head. “I thought you were going back to bed.”
He sent her a grin. “Soon. Right now, I’m in the mood to raid your refrigerator again—if that’s all right with you.”
“Of course it’s all right. I’ve got some cold chicken, I think…”
He stood. “Now you’re talkin’.”
She led the way to the other room and started pulling stuff out of the fridge. She had cheese and she got some crackers from a cabinet. And there was the chicken. She put it all on the table. “Okay, then. Help yourself.” She turned and started to go.
“You’re leaving?” He tried to sound excessively needy and just marginally pitiful.
It worked. She faced him again. “You want me to stay?”
“Just for a few minutes, if you’re not too tired…”
So she sat at the table with him while he wolfed down a chicken leg and thigh and a big hunk of cheese and several handfuls of Triscuits. He washed it all down with milk.
“Excellent,” he said, setting his empty milk glass down with satisfied finality.
The Stranger and Tessa Jones Page 5
