Why was it that the first woman he fell in love with proved to be so troublesome? He thought about some of the women he had been with in the past. They certainly wouldn’t have made him as crazy as Kali did, but they wouldn’t have given him the joy, either. He exhaled a shuddering breath as he turned off the water and stepped out of the shower.
Their meal was consumed in silence, neither of them eating much at all. Travis offered to wash the dishes while Kali took a shower. When he walked into the living room with two glasses of brandy, he found her sitting in front of the fireplace brushing her hair dry. The firelight flickering across her pensive features and hair added even more beauty to the scene. Without thinking twice, Travis set the glasses down and headed for the bedroom to dig something out of his duffel bag.
Kali looked up when he returned, and she froze when she saw the leather-covered item in his hands.
“What is that?” Her voice was tense.
He smiled wryly. “After all these years you still can’t recognize one?” He took the camera out of the case and checked the shutter speed and experimented with the flash attachment to make sure it worked properly.
Kali looked down at the brush in her hand, not surprised to find her hand shaking.
“It’s just that I can’t imagine you’re going to take pictures of the scenery at this time of night.” There was a return of her old sarcasm.
“There’s your idea of scenery and my idea of scenery.” He took off the lens cap and set it to one side. “Mine doesn’t necessarily have to be outside.”
Her eyes narrowed. Her mouth felt cottony and her eyes burned, but she wasn’t going to allow him to frighten her. “If you want to take my picture, it’s going to cost you five thousand dollars.”
As if he had anticipated her rash dare, Travis dug into his jeans pocket and pulled out a checkbook. He filled it out and handed it to her. Kali looked at the amount and the boldly scrawled signature across the bottom, folded it in half, and put it in her robe pocket. Smiling with only her lips, she stood up.
“What kind of pose do you wish?” She moved from side to side, looking provocative with each graceful movement. “Demure? Sensual? Downright sexy?” She lowered the shoulders of her robe until the curves of her breasts were revealed almost blatantly. “Do you want to see some leg?” She lifted the hem and extended her bare leg, her toes pointed daintily. “Perhaps you’d like me to use some makeup? My skin tone tends to wash out under the bright lights if I don’t wear the proper base. Do you want me to wear heavy eye makeup? Light? Surely you have your preference.” Each word carried a cutting edge. “Just tell me and I’ll give you whatever you want. After all, you’re paying for it.”
Travis remained impassive, aware that she was trying to bait him to anger.
“Give me what you feel most comfortable with.” He lifted the camera to his face.
Kali was determined to do that and more. She adopted her most haughty look and whirled around, the full hem of the robe swirling around her ankles. She raised her arms and lifted her hair up, her head tipped back and eyes closed. Travis didn’t hesitate and shot frame after frame, using the firelight as a backdrop and adjusting his f-stops to accommodate the lesser light.
Working to a nameless tune in her head, Kali moved from one pose to another, her lips moist and parted, her eyes half closed, her thick lashes looking like dark crescents against her pale skin. To Travis she had never looked more beautiful. Pretty soon her movements flowed into a sensual dance. She may have started out angry, but she couldn’t remain that way for long. Unconsciously she wanted to show Travis just what she could do in front of the camera. She was unaware that Travis had hurriedly reloaded the camera two more times so he would miss as little as possible. When she eventually halted, her skin was damp from her exertion, her shoulders bowed with weariness. Travis lowered the camera and remained quietly in his crouched position, watching as she lifted her arms over her head to ease cramped muscles.
“You seem to make me do things I don’t want to,” she said finally, pulling her robe up and bending to pick up her brush. “You talk about what’s between us, and I’ve been wondering about that. All I can see is the physical attraction. The stuff affairs are made from.”
“All you want to see.”
“It’s a free country. You see what you want to. After all, I see what I want to. You’ll be leaving for Los Angeles soon.”
“Yes, in about three days.” He saw no sense in lying to her. “I told you I could only stay a couple of weeks, and I’ve been gone longer than that now.”
Her lips curved in a bitter smile. “Three days. No wonder you thought you should bring out your camera as a softening-up technique. You knew you didn’t have very much time left. What a shame it didn’t work.”
Travis thought differently. His actions were far from some land of “softening-up technique.” He had brought his camera along because he never went anywhere without one. This trip had enabled him to take pictures of the scenery during his ride, and also of some very interesting people he had met along the way. He even had taken several pictures of a very proud J. C. the day he had gone into town alone.
As for the pictures he had taken of Kali, he knew they were good without having to look at the finished product, and vowed to develop them as soon as he got back to his studio. Kali may have thought she needed a special base makeup and proper lighting to look beautiful, but he knew otherwise. All she needed was the right setting.
“I probably shouldn’t have done this tonight after all you’ve gone through today, but usually emotion helps a model give more to the camera instead of hindering her.”
Kali collapsed on the rug, the very same rug she and Travis had made such beautiful love on hours before. She took several hairpins out of her pocket and twisted her hair on top of her head, securing the knot with the pins. She had three days. Would she allow Travis to walk out of her life, or would she agree to go to California and pose for his book? She thought all her major decision making had been done years ago. She should have known better.
“I should have shot you that very first day.”
He grinned. “To be honest, I’m surprised you didn’t. You looked more than prepared to do so.”
“I was thinking very seriously about shooting first and asking questions afterward. You just caught me at a weak moment, that’s all.” Her earlier fire had returned with a vengeance.
Travis dropped the rolls of film in airtight containers and cleaned the lenses before putting the camera back in its case.
“Believe me, I’m glad you gave me the chance to talk first.” He walked over to her and began kneading her neck and shoulders with strong fingertips. Kali rolled her head forward, groaning in appreciation as the tense muscles began to relax under his ministrations.
“Why anyone thinks posing is easy is beyond me,” she murmured.
“Maybe you should try a hot shower to get the kinks out.”
“If I wanted the kinks out, I would definitely have shot you weeks ago.” Laughter laced her tone now that her earlier anger toward him was gone.
“Am I to assume you aren’t mad at me any longer?” he asked softly.
“You make it pretty hard to be,” she admitted with a sigh. “You’re right, a hot shower would do me a lot of good.” That she wanted to be alone was implied, understood, and honored.
They didn’t make love when they retired for the night but instead curled up in each other’s arms, not falling asleep for a long time. Both were thinking of what would happen in three days’ time when Travis left Virginia and Kali was left alone again.
The subject was left unspoken the next day by mutual consent. Instead, they spent the day riding up to the meadow they had gone to long ago and talked about any other subject but the one that preyed most on their minds. Kali withdrew more and more as the day progressed. She didn’t want Travis to leave, and she couldn’t bring herself to return to L.A. to pose for him. Was she being selfish? Probably, but she didn’t kn
ow any other way.
She thought about many troubling things that evening as they cleaned up the kitchen after dinner.
“How about a few hands of poker?” Travis suggested, folding the dish towel and putting it to one side.
Kali shrugged. She knew how to play, not very well, but well enough to hold her own. She had come to a few decisions and knew she should voice them before her courage ran out.
“I’ve decided that I will pose for you,” she said quickly.
Travis watched her closely. He sensed there was a condition behind her agreement, and he didn’t have long to wait to hear it.
“But I have to pose for you here,” Kali told him, her tone telling him she wouldn’t consider otherwise. “I made a vow I wouldn’t go back to my old way of life in California, and I intend to keep it. If you want to photograph me so badly, you’ll have to do it here—and my whereabouts must be kept secret. I want that written in the contract.” She faced him with her chin held high.
Travis took his time taking the deck of cards out of the desk drawer and popped them out of their package. “Then I’m afraid it’s no deal. I have other commitments that I must keep, and I have no more time to roam around the countryside according to the whims of one subject.” He finished shuffling the cards and slipped them back into the package.
Kali flinched at his blunt choice of words. “Then you must not want me very badly.” She kept her chin in her usual gesture of defiance.
Travis’s dark eyes were hot in their intensity as he watched her. “Oh, I want you, all right. I want you badly enough that I wouldn’t think twice about carrying you into that bedroom and making love to you so long and hard, you wouldn’t know what had happened to you. But as a model, no, I can’t afford to want you that badly. I’ve dealt with temperamental models enough in the past, and I won’t give in to one now. Not even you.”
Kali smiled to herself. So he saw her as a temperamental model, did he? Well, perhaps she was acting like one, but her true reasons for her harsh demands were much more complicated than that. Didn’t he understand how impossible this was for her?
Travis walked up behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. “Maybe it’s best that I’m leaving soon,” he said quietly, resting his chin on top of her head. “All of this has happened so fast that maybe some time on our own is what we need to sort it out.”
The tears she had denied all day filled her eyes. “I don’t want to say goodbye.”
“But you don’t want to come to L.A., either.”
She opened her mouth, closed it, moistened her lips. “I can’t.” Her voice cracked. How could she explain her fear of going back to that fast-paced town? Too much had happened there for her to feel comfortable. Here she was safe; there were no media people, no pressures, no worries, except for her dream of getting Cheryl back.
“I could always try a bit of emotional blackmail,” Travis said, breaking into her thoughts. “Such as, if you love me.”
She stiffened and spun around. “That isn’t fair, Travis.” Her voice trembled with sorrow.
“Is it fair to want to keep me here in this hideout with you for as long as you can?” he asked harshly, his fingers digging into her arms. “That’s what you really want, isn’t it? For me to stay here keeping you satisfied in bed while you run away from all your troubles?”
“My, you really think you know me well, don’t you? You know every inch of my body, exactly what buttons to push—” She would have gone on, but Travis’s mouth had covered hers in a hard, wild kiss. She was helpless in his embrace. Then suddenly his touch changed. With soul-searching tenderness his tongue slid across her lips, caressing them with unhurried thoroughness before wandering back inside her mouth to tempt her into a straining union that lasted until they were both breathless.
“Maybe we’re better off keeping our discussions personal,” Travis muttered roughly, covering her face with biting kisses. “This seems to be a better way to communicate.”
Kali’s hands clenched his shoulders tightly. Her head was thrown back, exposing the slim column of her neck to his marauding mouth. Long moments later, Travis lifted his head and looked down at the soft mouth he’d just tasted, the slightly parted lips glistening with moisture from his own mouth.
“You taste so delicious, I could keep this up for days,” he murmured.
Her slumbering eyes were answer enough. Take your time, they invited silently.
Travis’s mouth descended again. He was determined to take his time, to discover and claim every inch of her as if he had never tasted her before.
Feeling the fire race through her veins, Kali let her hips arch up against the taut cradle of his thighs. Keening moans left her lips in a plea for possession, but he ignored her. He was determined to give her a night she would never forget, and one he would carry in his heart for all time, because until they reached a compromise, they could never have a life together. Her insistence on staying in Virginia couldn’t be part of that compromise.
He picked her up and carried her into the bedroom with all the expertise of Rhett carrying Scarlett up that long stairway. He could easily identify with the man. Both dealt with extremely strong-willed women.
No lights were on. Travis set Kali on her feet long enough to strip her of her robe before guiding her to the bed. His own clothing was discarded quickly. He stood before her, his darkly tanned skin glistening with perspiration, his body hard and aroused. Kali gasped at the sight of him. Even if this were to be the last time they made love, she never would be able to forget him. She lay back against the pillows and watched Travis slowly approach the bed.
For the longest time he stood there, one knee bent on the bed. He watched her, imprinting her in his mind. He didn’t need artificial light for this; he knew the exact color of her eyes and hair, the delicate peach blush of her skin, the enticing mole just above her right buttock. The more he looked at her, the more he began to hate her for doing this to them. They could have so much if only she was willing to trust him. By now she should know he would never hurt her. If anything, she was the one doing the hurting, and he had the pain in his gut to prove it. That was when he made his decision: This would be a night never to be forgotten by either of them.
Travis stretched out on the bed next to Kali. He noted her watching him with unspoken questions in her eyes. Without a word, he rolled onto his side, facing her. One hand coasted along the delicate curve of her shoulder, the gentle slope of her breast, the narrow indentation of her waist, and down to her rounded hip. With each touch he left fiery imprints on her skin. After his fingers trailed over the sensitive skin on the back of her knee, they moved back up to her throat. This time the path veered, beginning with her throat, down to the valley between her breasts, keeping that straight line down to her navel. Kali quivered under his touch. She wanted more than this light, maddening touch but knew her pleas wouldn’t be heard. He intended to drive her crazy, and he was doing an excellent job of it. Travis’s fingertips danced downward, barely brushing against her, but it was enough to send shock waves traveling through her body.
A dark, sensual cloud blanketed the lovers as Travis began trailing his fingertips over her side again. All the time his eyes snared hers, watching the way her pupils dilated. Her skin was flushed and moist, her breathing erratic. When Travis’s hand brushed over the damp nest of curls, he found her more than ready for him.
“You are making me crazy,” she whispered.
“I’m making both of us crazy,” he countered, bending his head to press a light kiss against the curve of her shoulder. Now his lips duplicated each caress his fingers had begun. Kali closed her eyes, allowing each sensation to seep through her by touch only. Besides, she didn’t need to have her eyes open to see the lambent fires burning in his eyes, and the deliberate way he aroused her. It was all so calculated, her heart told her. Oh, he might be making love to her, but it wasn’t the same as the other times. This time it was all deliberate, as if he meant to prove something to
her. She was afraid he was doing just that, and she knew the reason why. He was showing her that this was much more than physical attraction. Lust could never bring about this dark intensity between two people.
Unable to he still any longer, Kali began exploring Travis’s taut body. When his velvety mustache touched her navel, her hands traced the muscles along his shoulders and down to his buttocks. The skin was slick, the muscles fluid under her fingertips.
“You are so beautiful,” she whispered, pressing her lips against his hair.
Instead of answering, Travis parted her thighs gently with his tongue. Kali gasped and arched up as the lightning seared her veins. Travis held nothing back. His tongue probed, his breath teased, and his voice murmured dark, loving words against her sensitive skin. Kali’s head thrashed from side to side on the pillow. She couldn’t get enough air into her tortured lungs as she flew out into the stars. Just when
she began to return to earth, Travis moved up and thrust into her with one deep stroke. Kali’s eyes opened wide.
“You fit me so perfectly that I doubt you’ll ever find another man to replace me,” he told her in a voice of midnight. “That’s why I intend to leave you with a lot of memories to tide you over those long, cold nights, my love.”
Oh, what beautiful memories he made! Kali felt filled and possessed by Travis. She wrapped herself around him, inhaling the musky scent of his skin and relishing the feel of him. She chose not to listen to his words because a naive part of her still felt he never would leave her.
Travis made love to Kali all night, giving them scant time to rest. She fell asleep sprawled across Travis, her body limp and satiated. He remained awake, stroking her hair and the lines of her body until his own body hardened with desire. He began touching her intimately until she moaned and woke up. She didn’t protest when he lifted her on top of him because she wanted him just as badly. Afterward Travis fell into an uneasy sleep.
Only Love Page 15
