Banish Misfortune

by Anne Stuart

  "Oh no, what did I do?" she moaned, lifting her head to stare sightlessly at the moon-silvered ocean.

  "That's what I was wondering," Springer drawled, removing that marvelously soothing hand from the back of her neck. "What happened in there?"

  Wrapping her arms around her long legs, she rested her chin on her knees with a weary gesture, still refusing to look at her rescuer. "I don't really know. I think it was the Scotch."

  "The Scotch?"

  She did turn to him then, her face composed, belying the continued trembling in her limbs. "He was breathing Scotch fumes on me. I don't like Scotch drinkers," she said simply.

  Springer was watching her out of those unreadable eyes. "What were you doing in his room at two in the morning?" he questioned suddenly.

  A mocking smile curved her mouth. "Don't be naive, Springer—you know as well as I do what I was doing there. Cementing a business merger."

  "Well, I think you may have botched it up," he replied mildly enough, not rising to her bait. "Lincoln didn't look very happy. Nor, for that matter, did your future father-in-law. Tell me, do you do this sort of thing often?"

  She considered lying to him, but the trembling in her body, instead of lessening, was unaccountably increasing. She wished he'd put his hand back on her neck, soothing the strained muscles, that he'd put his arms around her again and press her against that soft white shirt. She shook her head, to banish such demoralizing thoughts, and answered honestly enough. "No." Her voice was low. "No, I don't."

  "Then why did you tonight?" His voice sounded no more than distantly curious, for which she was glad. If she'd caught a note of pity in that deep, husky drawl, it would have been the final straw.

  "It didn't appear that I had any choice," she replied faintly. Light shivers were rippling over her body, and surreptitiously she pulled the caftan closer around her shoulders. The silk offered her no warmth at all, not when she needed the warmth of a human touch.

  And it wasn't human touch she wanted, she realized belatedly. She had no desire at all to track down Peter and seek the comfort she knew he would offer. She wanted Springer's warmth, Springer's comfort. Damn him.

  "Why the Scotch?" he said suddenly. He must have seen her shivering, for suddenly his large strong hands reached out and caught her trembling shoulders, kneading them with a light, sure touch that sapped some of the tension from her.

  Raising her head, she closed her eyes, arching into his touch like a starving kitten. "I suppose because my parents were alcoholics," she said distantly. "Though I don't remember either of them drinking Scotch. It was bourbon when they were younger, and then vodka to hide the smell, and then pills so they could pretend they were straight, and then vodka again." Why didn't he slide those large, beautiful hands down over her shoulders, she wondered, and pull her back against him? She needed more warmth than his hands were providing.

  "I suppose that might explain it," Springer agreed, watching her out of narrowed eyes as his hands continued their steady kneading. He found he wanted to slide his hands down and pull her closer, against him. He wanted to protect her from whatever had terrified her enough to scream like that, her ice-blue eyes a blank of horror; he wanted her to warm up, body and soul. And he wanted her to warm up to him.

  That was the last thing she needed right now, though. He should take her back to Peter, and let him do the comforting, the warming. Jessica Hansen was nothing but trouble, and she was someone else's trouble, not his. He'd take her back to the house and go find Peter.

  He didn't move, couldn't move. She smelled of hyacinths, sweet and musky, and tinged with innocence, and the unexpectedness of it startled him. He would have thought she'd prefer something cool and sophisticated, something modern. Not the delicate, old-fashioned scent that brought to mind summer dresses and hillside picnics.

  She was cold, so cold, and she needed his warmth. Without further wavering she leaned back, coming up against his solid body, his warm chest. She could feel his surprise, his momentary hesitation, and then his hands slid down from her shoulders, his arms circling her frail body, pulling her back against him. Jessica let out a long, shuddering sigh, closing her eyes once more. She was safe at last.

  At least, until he chose to leave her. The sudden thought that he could, would do exactly that, sooner or later, panicked her.

  "What is it now?" he murmured behind her, apparently entirely at ease in this strange situation, "Relax, Jessie."

  But that was just what she couldn't do. She needed him, needed the warmth and comfort his body could give her, and she knew from experience that she'd have to pay for it, pay for the holding and soothing. At that point no price would have been too high.

  Turning slowly in his arms, she slid her hands up around his neck. He was looking down at her, an ar-rested expression on his dark face. And there on the windswept, deserted beach, she reached up and pressed her mouth against his unsuspecting one.

  Deliberately she kept her mouth soft, pliant, waiting for him to make the next move. She could feel his hesitation, indecision, and she increased the pressure, reaching out with the tip of her tongue to lightly touch his lower lip. She heard a low, muffled groan, and then his hands were cupping her close-cropped head, holding her gently as he deepened the kiss, his mouth warm and wet and hungry on hers.

  Jessica accepted her success complaisantly as she felt her body wrapped closer to his protective bulk, and tilted her head back under his onslaught, willing the clouds to return, the clear, sailing blue sky, the birds...

  And then suddenly she was alone, released unceremoniously from his embrace as if she were contaminated. Scrambling to her knees in the sand, she stared at him with a mixture of shock and confusion. He was sitting there staring at her, his breathing a little heavy, his eyes angry and opaque, his mouth thinned in contempt.

  "Is that how you usually do it, Jessie?" he demanded.

  "What are you talking about?"

  "Close your eyes and dream yourself away? I don't need performances, in bed or out of it. I prefer flesh-and-blood companions whose mind and emotions are involved along with their bodies. You're not really capable of that, are you?"

  Denials, protests, insults flooded her mind but stopped short of her mouth. She just knelt there, her caftan still pulled loosely around her, staring at him in numb surprise. "I...I..."

  The anger left him as swiftly as it had come, and he reached out his hand, that large, gentle hand that held such warmth, stroking the side of her face, and his voice was very sad. "You really wouldn't have known the difference between me and Lincoln, would you? If he hadn't been drinking Scotch you'd be doing your little act right now, writhing underneath him while your mind was a thousand miles away—"

  "Don't!" She thought it would come out in a scream, but instead it was barely audible. "Please, leave me alone. Go away."

  He continued to stare at her, and then he rose to his feet. For a moment Jessica thought he really would leave her, abandon her on this empty stretch of midnight beach. But as his words ripped her apart, his hands healed her as they reached down and pulled her gently to her feet.

  "Come back to the house, Jessie," he said softly. "I won't let the demons get you. Not tonight."

  She looked way, way up at him, the beginnings of a question in her haunted eyes. But she could read no answers. Letting her slight hand rest in his large, capable one, she followed him into the house.

  Chapter Seven

  The house had once more regained its silent stillness, almost as if Jessica's hysteria had never ripped apart the thick velvet texture of the night. No lights had been left burning to guide them back—even Peter's bedroom light was extinguished. The hand that enveloped her slighter, trembling one led her past Peter's closed door, past her own darkened room, down the silent, carpeted hallway. She made a token effort at pulling away, just slight enough to tell herself she tried, but his grip only tightened. And then they were in his room, the sliding glass doors open onto the windy beach, the salty air filling t
he darkened confines of the back guest bedroom. Springer didn't turn on the light, just pulled her in and shut the door behind them, but Jessica knew the room very well. They had put her in it the first time she'd visited the Kinseys, long before she and Peter became involved, when old Jasper was still having occasional lustful thoughts in her direction. It had been sheer luck that nothing had come of it, nothing that would interfere with her plans for Jasper's son.

  At the sudden memory of her almost-fiance she looked up at the dark, silent figure standing motionless beside her. She was slowly regaining her equilibrium, and this time when she pulled her hand away he let it go, leaning back against the door with a lazy grace accentuated by the darkness of the room.

  "So what do we do now?" she queried, and was pleased to hear her voice come out brittle and composed.

  He said nothing, leaning against that door as if he had all the time in the world, and Jessica could feel her regained composure begin to slip once more.

  "I should thank you for rescuing me," she managed with a bright laugh. "I really don't know what got into me—probably just a little too much to drink tonight."

  "You didn't drink anything." His slow, deep voice broke the darkness.

  "What?" The interruption unnerved her.

  "I said you didn't drink anything tonight but Perrier and lime. I was watching you."

  Somehow the thought of those dark, unreadable eyes following her every move was even more unnerving. "Why?" she asked abruptly, the brittle composure shattering.

  She could see his teeth flash in the moonlit bedroom, and his eyes glittered. He was so close, yet not close enough. His warmth was tantalizing, his scent intoxicating—of warm flesh and the ocean and the faint, pleasant smell of brandy, not Scotch, on his breath. "Why do you think?" he countered, raising a hand to gently stroke the side of her face.

  Before his flesh could touch hers she flinched, trying to pull away from him. But she was backed into a corner, with no way to get past him, and he followed her, holding her still with his imprisoning body, forcing her to accept his gentling hand on the chilled skin of her face. "What are you afraid of, Jessie?" Springer whispered against her skin.

  The trembling began in her ankles, sweeping upward over her chilled body, racking her with shivers so tiny as to be imperceptible if the man hadn't been standing so close. I'm afraid of you, she thought desperately. I don't want to be alone in the darkness with you—I'm afraid you'll steal my soul. And even worse, I'm afraid you'll leave me, alone in the darkness without you. I'm afraid of everything about you.

  But she couldn't tell him that. She struggled for a reasonable excuse and came up with it. "I don't want to be another notch in your thighbone," she murmured, still imprisoned by the heat and force of his body. The only part touching her was his hand, gently caressing the side of her averted face.

  "And I don't want to be one on yours," he countered softly, and Jessica flinched. "That's the danger when you use sex for more than recreational purposes. When you use it to advance your career, or to convince yourself you're a man, or to blot out unpleasant memories. You forget you can make love just for the pure pleasure of it."

  Jessica couldn't help it; she laughed in his face, the bitterness raw in the calm night air. His hand stilled on her flesh, and she could feel the tension in his tall, wiry body. "Oh, Jessie," he said finally, his voice a weary rush of sadness. "It doesn't have to be that way."

  The sadness was almost more demoralizing than his nearness, the gentle, undemanding stroke of his strong, slightly callused hand. "Tell me about it," she said in a light, mocking voice. "You ought to know. Your mother says you've had every available female on both coasts in the past fifteen years."

  She waited for his withdrawal, but it didn't come. "Then you can trust my experience," he murmured. "Come to bed with me, Jessie."

  She didn't move. She could have pushed him away, and he would have let her. She could have strode past him, out of his room, out of his life, and he would have let her. She didn't move.

  A thousand protests screamed through her mind, a thousand drawling insults to put him in his place. She didn't say a word.

  A hundred misgivings filled her mind. Peter and Jasper and Kinsey Enterprises. And X. Rickford Lincoln, his heavy face masked with lust and then anger. She needed Springer MacDowell like she needed a hole in the head.

  "I'm going back to my room."

  "No, you're not."

  "Are you going to try to stop me?"

  "No." The word was low and beguiling, and his other hand slid up her arm, lightly touching, tantalizing, but in no way restraining. "You can go if you want to. But you don't want to. Do you?" His head moved closer, blotting out the light, his other hand holding her still for his kiss. The lips were warm, flesh on her flesh, a gentle exploration, a question, a soothing balm for her lacerated soul. "Do you?" he whispered again against her lips.

  She would have shaken her head in denial, but it would have broken the tantalizing bond. "No," she said silently against his mouth. And liking the way her lips moved against his as she formed the word, she tried it again. "No."

  It seemed to be all the permission he needed. His arm slid around her slender body, pulling her up against him, and the warmth began to seep into her chilled flesh once more. His mouth moved on hers, soft, damp and tantalizing, his tongue deftly tracing the soft contours of her lips before slipping inside. Jessica told herself she could remain passive, stand there in the comforting circle of his arms, with his mouth on hers, and be unmoved. It would be easy enough to view it as a performance, she told herself. After all of Springer's practice he must be rather deft—she could watch him with interest, see how he managed to move her from the corner of the bedroom to the wide queen-sized bed several feet away. Would he carry her? She'd rather liked it when he carried her out on the beach— what she could remember of it, that is. Men didn't usually attempt to carry her. Despite her current birdlike weight, her five-foot-eight-inch proportions made her an unwieldly package, unwieldly enough to discourage even closet romantics like Peter.

  But Springer was tall enough and strong enough to do the thing with grace. He might even—

  Suddenly she jumped, startled, and stared up at him in amazement. Springer had just bitten her on the nose.

  "When I kiss a woman I like her complete attention," he observed politely. He still had her tightly wrapped against his body, and she recognized belatedly the feel of his hardened flesh against hers.

  "I was just wondering how you were going to get me over to the bed," she said, hoping to puncture that imperturbable calm of his.

  "Who said anything about a bed?" he drawled, nudging her hips with his blatantly aroused pelvis. "I thought we could make love right here."

  She knew he was goading here deliberately, making her angry enough to shatter the dreamworld she built up every time he kissed her, but it didn't halt her rage. Shoving him back with a sudden surge of strength, she caught him off-balance. He fell back against the door, and she was free, racing across the room toward the sliding glass door and an unwanted freedom.

  She didn't get very far. A large foot stuck out, catching her ankle, and she tripped, sprawling sideways across the rumpled bed, with Springer beside her, half on top of her, his hands catching her pale shoulders and pressing her against the sheets.

  "That's how I'm planning to get you on the bed," he said, his voice breathless with suppressed laughter and something else. Jessica looked up at him then, recognizing that laughter, and to her amazement, released a small, rusty laugh of her own.

  "Very adept," she said dryly, ignoring the unfamiliar tightening in her loins. Even with him supporting the majority of his weight on his elbows he was still heavy, his hips pressing against hers, one long leg flung carelessly over hers, imprisoning her. And yet it wasn't a prison, she thought. It was safety, protection from the outside world. And very dangerous protection it was.

  "Well, well," Springer said softly, his breath warm and damp and sweet o
n her suddenly vulnerable face beneath him. "I've done very well with you tonight,

  Jessie, love. I've made you laugh—" his mouth gently brushed her temple "—and I've made you angry—" he kissed her nose "—I've frightened you—" he kissed her ear "—and I've turned you on." He pulled back to eye her speculatively. She could feel the warmth of his flesh through the open shirt, feel the rigidity of his desire through the heavy denim jeans. "That's quite a torrent of emotion from a Snow Queen."

  The room grew suddenly still as Jessie lay beneath him. She could hear the distant sound of the Long Island surf, the quiet rustle of the sheets around them and the springs beneath them. Everything else was silent.

  "I wonder," Springer murmured with a vague, almost clinical interest, "if I could make you cry?"

  "Would you want to?" she whispered back.

  "Very much. Not from sadness," he said, moving closer to kiss each fluttering eyelid. "I want to make you moan and weep from pleasure. And I want you to cry when you need to, and something tells me you need to a lot."

  "I don't cry," she said, ignoring the strange emptiness in the pit of her stomach. "And I hate to disappoint you, but I make love in total silence."

  She could see the grin slashing across his face in the midnight room. "Liar. I'm sure you make all the appropriate noises at the appropriate times. You're a professional actress, poor Jessie. You know your part and you play it to the hilt."

  "Then what am I doing here?" She wanted the words to come out stubborn and challenging; instead, they merely sounded plaintive and just a tiny bit lost.