by Janet Dailey
"I think we're all glad it wasn't necessary," Judd inserted, and started toward the porch with Valerie at his side.
"Isn't that the truth!" Clara agreed emphatically.
"If it hadn't been for Judd, I wouldn't have found him," Valerie stated, giving the credit for finding Tadd where it was due.
"Someone else had more to do with it than I did." Judd gave the responsibility to someone higher up.
As he took the first step onto the porch, Valerie felt his gaze slide past her to the car. The moment she had been dreading ever since the house had come into sight was there. The trunk of the car was open and all of the suitcases and boxes stuffed inside were in plain sight. Judd stiffened to a halt. As his arm dropped from her waist, Valerie continued up the porch steps, a tightness gripping her throat.
"What's going on here? Is someone leaving?" His low, slicing demand was initially met with pulsing silence.
She turned to face him. Leaving after what they had just shared was going to be a hundred times more difficult, but Valerie knew it was a decision she had to stand behind. The words of response were a long time in coming.
Finally it was Tadd who answered him. "We're going back to Cincinnati. That's why I ran away—'cause I wanted to stay here and have a puppy and mom said I couldn't."
At the cold fury gathering in Judd's gaze, Valerie half turned her head, her eyes never leaving Judd's face. "Clara, will you take Tadd in the house? He hasn't had any supper. He's probably hungry."
"Of course," her friend agreed in a subdued voice. "Come with me, Tadd." Clara ushered him toward the door and into the house.
When the screen door closed behind them, Judd slowly mounted the steps to stand before Valerie. "Is it true what Tadd said? Are you leaving?" His voice rumbled out the questions from somewhere deep inside, like distant thunder.
She swallowed and forced out a calm answer. "Yes, it's true."
"You promised you'd stay," Judd reminded her in a savage breath.
"No, I promised there'd be no more talk about my leaving," she corrected, her jaw rigid with control.
"So you were going to leave without talking about it," he accused. "You knew I was going to call. You knew I wanted to see you tonight."
"And I wanted to be gone before you did," Valerie admitted. He grabbed her shoulders. "Don't touch me, Judd. Please don't touch me," she demanded in a voice that broke under the strain. If he held her, she knew she would give in, whether or not it was right or wrong.
He released her as abruptly as he had taken her. Turning away, he swung a fist at an upright post. The force of the blow shook the dust from the porch rafters.
"Why?" he demanded in a tortured voice and spun around to face her. "Dammit to hell, Valerie! I've got a right to know why!"
For a choked moment she couldn't answer him. A welling of tears had turned his eyes into iridescent pools of anguish. She wanted to reach up and touch the sparkling drops to see if they were real or merely crocodile tears. The sight of them held her spellbound.
"When I discovered your mother knew about us…and Tadd, I realized I couldn't stay no matter how much I wanted to," she explained hesitantly. "Maybe if I hadn't learned that she knew, or maybe if I'd never met her, it would have been easier to stay. Now, it's impossible."
"Why is my mother to blame for your leaving?" Confusion and anger burned in his look as he searched her expression, trying to follow her logic.
"I don't really blame her." Valerie was having difficulty finding the right words. "I'm sure it's only natural that she wants to become acquainted with your son."
"You'd better explain to me what you're talking about, because you aren't making any sense," Judd warned. "In one breath you say you want to stay and in the next you're saying you can't because of my mother. Either you want to stay or you don't!"
"I can't," she stated. Her chin quivered with the pain her words were causing her. "Don't you see, Judd? What will Tadd think when he learns about us? Eventually he will. We can't keep it from him forever. I can't become your mistress. I can't put my wants above Tadd's needs."
"Then you do love me?" His hands recaptured her arms. "Valerie, I have to know," he demanded roughly.
"Yes, I love you," she choked out the admission, and averted her gaze. "But it doesn't change anything. Nothing at all, Judd." Relief trembled through her when he let her go. She closed her eyes and fought the attraction that made her want to go back into his arms.
"I wanted to see you tonight to give you this." A snapping sound opened her eyes. Judd was holding a small box. In a bed of green velvet was an engagement ring, set with an emerald flanked by diamonds. Valerie gasped at the sight of it. "And to ask you to marry me."
Her gaze flew to his as she took a step backward. "Don't joke about this," she pleaded.
"It isn't a joke," Judd assured her. "As a matter of fact, I bought the ring the day after you told me about Tadd. But I didn't give it to you before now because I didn't want you marrying me because of him."
"I don't understand," she murmured, afraid that Judd didn't mean what he was implying.
"I didn't want you marrying me in order to have a father for your child—our child," he corrected. "I didn't want you marrying me for the Prescott name or wealth. I wanted your reason to be that you loved me and wanted me as much as I love and want you."
A piercing joy flashed through her. She stared into the warm green fires of his eyes that seemed to echo the words he had just spoken. She was afraid to say anything in case she was dreaming.
"Until today I wasn't certain how much you really cared about me," Judd continued. "But when I saw the terror in your eyes at the thought that I might have been hurt by the stallions, I knew what you felt for me was real. My name and position meant nothing to you, not even the fact that I'm the father of your son."
Without waiting for an acceptance of his proposal, Judd took her left hand and slipped the ring on her finger. Valerie watched, slightly dazed, as he lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed the emerald stone that was the same vivid color as his eyes.
"You can't really want to marry me." She heard herself say. "I'm not good enough for you."
Anger flashed in his eyes. "Don't ever say that again!"
Valerie glowed under the violent dismissal of her statement, but she persisted, "Your mother told me you'd always said you wanted your wife to have classy breeding, spirit and staying power. My background is very common."
Judd's mouth thinned impatiently, but he responded to her argument. "Class has nothing to do with a person's social position. I became acquainted with your grandfather and know you come from fine stock. That untamed streak in you proves your spirit. And as for staying power, after seven years I believe that has answered itself."
"Judd…" she began.
"No more discussion," he interrupted. "You're going to marry me and that's the end of it."
"Yes!" She breathed the answer against his lips an instant before he claimed hers.
An involuntary moan escaped her throat at the completeness of her love. His kiss was thorough, his masterful technique without fault. Beneath her hands she could feel the thudding of his heart, racing as madly as her own. Yet her appetite seemed insatiable.
"I thought I loved you seven years ago, Judd," she murmured as he trailed kisses down to her neck, "but it's nothing compared to what I feel for you now."
"I was such a fool then, darling," he muttered against her skin. "A blind, arrogant fool."
"It doesn't matter that you didn't love me then," she told him softly. "It's enough that you love me now."
"I was obsessed with you seven years ago," Judd confessed, lifting his head to let his fingers stroke her cheek and trace the outline of her lips.
"I was just someone you made love to." Valerie denied his attempt to have her believe she had been special to him. The past was behind them. The way he felt toward her at this moment was all that counted.
"For every time I made love to you, there were a hund
red times that I wanted to," Judd replied. "It irritated me that a fiery little kitten could sink her claws into me that way. All you had to do seven years ago was crook your little finger at me and I came running. Do you have any idea how deflating it was to my masculine pride to realize that I had no control where you were concerned?"
"No, I didn't know." She looked at him in surprise.
His green eyes were dark and smoldering. There was no mistake that he meant every word he was saying. His caressing thumb parted her lips and probed at the white barrier of her teeth. Unconsciously Valerie nibbled at its end, the tip of her tongue tasting the saltiness of his skin.
"God, you're beautiful, Valerie." He said it as reverently as a prayer and moved to let his mouth take the place of his thumb, which he let slide to her chin.
He fired her soul with his burning need for her. Valerie arched closer to him, pliantly molding herself to his hard length. His hands were crushing and caressing, fanning the flames that were threatening to burn out of control. Just in time, he pulled back, shuddering against her with the force of his emotion and rubbing his forehead against hers. He breathed in deeply to regain his sanity.
"Do you see what I mean?" he asked after several seconds. The rawness in his teasing voice vibrated in the air. "I never intended to make love to you that first time, but your kisses were like a drug that I'd become addicted to. After a while, they weren't enough. I needed something more potent. Even if you hadn't been willing, I would have taken you that first time. It isn't something I'm very proud to admit."
"But I did want you to make love to me, Judd," Valerie assured him, heating the disturbed shakiness in her own voice. "Foolishly, I thought it was the only way to hold you. Also, I wasn't satisfied anymore, either. I wanted to be yours completely and I thought that was the way."
"If you hadn't, there are times when I think I might have crawled all the way to your grandfather to beg his permission to marry you. That's how completely you had me under your spell," Judd told her, and rubbed his mouth against her temple. "But it's something we'll never know for sure."
"No," Valerie agreed. "And I wouldn't want to turn back the clock to find out. Not now."
He couldn't seem to stop slowly trailing kisses over her face. His gentle adoration was almost worshipful, while Valerie felt like a supplicant begging for his caresses. This freedom to touch each other with no more self-imposed restraints was a heady elixir to both of them.
"When I made love to you that first time and realized no other man had ever touched you, I was filled with such a self-contempt and loathing that I swore I'd never come near you again," Judd murmured. "I felt like the lowest animal on earth. Then you confronted me with your justifiable accusations that I'd abused you for my pleasure and dropped you, and I was lost."
"I thought you were avoiding me because I was so inexperienced," Valerie remembered, her fingertips reaching up to explore his jaw and curl into his hair. "Because I hadn't satisfied you."
"It was never that," Judd denied. "You were a wonder to me. I wanted you to know the same feeling of fulfillment that you gave me."
"Judd, there's something I want to ask." Valerie hesitated, hating to ask the question, yet after his revelation it troubled her.
"Ask away," he insisted, lightly kissing her cheekbone.
Her hands slid down to his chest, her fingers spreading over the hard, pulsing flesh. Eluding his caressing mouth, she lifted her head to see his face, and the contentment mixed with desire that she saw reflected in his eyes almost made her dismiss the question as unimportant and as trivial as all that had gone before them.
"Why didn't you ever take me anywhere, ask me out on a date?" she finally asked the question, her look soft and curious.
Judd winced slightly, then smiled. "You were my private treasure," he explained. "I wanted to keep you all to myself. I wanted to be the only one who knew about you. I guess I was afraid if I took you somewhere someone might steal you from me. So I kept trying to hide you, but I ended up losing you anyway."
"Only for a time," she reminded him and sighed. "I thought it was because I was just Elias Wentworth's granddaughter, not worthy enough to be seen in the company of a Prescott."
"I know. Or at least, I realized it that last time we met," he qualified his statement. "I was angered by that. But I was more worried that someone at the party you were so anxious to attend might take you from me. And I suddenly questioned whether you hadn't been meeting me just to eventually obtain an invitation to one of the Prescotts' parties in order to meet someone else. I was enraged at the thought that you might be using me."
"Judd, you didn't!" Valerie protested incredulously, frowning.
"Jealousy is an ugly thing, darling," he admitted, "especially the obsessively possessive kind. Mine was almost a terminal case."
"You don't need to be jealous. Not now and not then," she told him, her throat aching from the love she felt. "There's never been anyone else but you. Oh, I've dated a few times these last seven years," she admitted in an offhand manner that said those dates had meant nothing. "But it seemed that if I couldn't have you, I didn't want to settle for second best."
Judd kissed her hard, as if grateful for the reassurance and angry that he had needed it. "The week after we argued and you stormed away, I practically haunted our place. Then I went into town and overheard someone mention that you'd gone away. For a while I told myself I was glad you'd left because I could finally be in control of my own life again. When I found myself missing you, I tried to make believe it was because you'd been such a satisfactory lover."
"And it wasn't that?" she whispered hopefully. Her hands felt the lifting of his chest as Judd took a deep breath before shaking his dark head.
"No, it wasn't that," he agreed. "After six months, I finally accepted the fact that mere lust wouldn't last that long. That's when I rode over to your grandfather's to find out where you were. Remember that filly I told you I bought from him?"
"Yes," Valerie remembered.
"That's the excuse I used." There was a rueful twist of his mouth. "It took me a week of visits to get the subject around to you. When he finally did mention you, it was to tell me you'd eloped with some man."
"But—"
"I know." Judd staved off her words. "It wasn't true, but at the time I didn't know it. I almost went out of my mind. Half the time I was calling myself every name in the book for letting you go. Or else I was congratulating myself on being rid of a woman who could forget me in six months. But mostly I was insane with jealousy for the man who now had you for himself."
"And I was trying so desperately to hate you all that time." Her voice cracked and she bit at her lip to hold back a sob. "Seven years." So much time had been wasted, unnecessarily.
"Everybody pays for his mistakes, Valerie," he reminded her. "What we did was wrong and we both had to pay. My price was seven years of visiting your grandfather and listening to him talk about your happy family and his grandchild and all the places your husband was taking you to see. I had seven years of endless torture picturing you in another man's arms. While you had to bear my child alone and face the world alone with him."
"In Tadd, I had a part of you. I loved him even more because of that." Valerie hugged him tightly to share the pain they had both known.
"When your grandfather died and Mickey told me you were coming for the funeral, I vowed I wouldn't come near you. I didn't think I could stand seeing you with your husband and child. But I couldn't stay away from the house,"
His voice was partially muffled by the thickness of her tawny hair as his mouth moved over it, his chin rubbing her head in an absent caress. "I think I was trying to rid myself of your ghost. I was almost hoping that having a child had ruined your figure and being married would have turned you into a nagging shrew—anything to rid me of your haunting image. Instead you'd matured into a stunningly beautiful woman who made the woman-child I loved seem pale in comparison."
"When you walked out of that
door, I nearly ran into your arms," Valerie admitted. "It was as if those seven years we were apart had never existed."
"If I hadn't believed you had a husband somewhere, that's exactly what would have happened," he said, and she felt his mouth curve into a smile against her hair. "It wasn't until that night that I found out you didn't have a husband. It was as if the heavens had just opened up and I tried to rush your surrender."
"Before I came back, I thought I'd got over you. All it took was seeing you again to realize I hadn't," she confessed. "I fought it because I knew how much you'd hurt me the last time and I didn't think I could stand it if that happened again. And I…thought all you wanted was to have me back as your lover."
"My lover, my wife, my friend, my everything," Judd corrected fiercely. "It was after the funeral that I told my mother about our affair seven years ago and that this time I was going to marry you no matter how I had to make you agree. But first I had to try to convince you to stay."
"I thought you were trying to set me up as your mistress when you offered to lease the farm," Valerie remembered.
"I was," he admitted. "I knew you still felt a spark of desire for me."
"A spark?" she laughed. "It was a forest fire!"
"I didn't know that," Judd reminded her. "I was simply desperate to try anything that would reestablish what we once had. Later I could persuade you to marry me."
"But when you found out about Tadd…" Valerie began.
"Yes, I had the weapon," he nodded. "I knew that for his sake I could persuade you to marry me. That's when I realized that if you married me without loving me, the hell of the last seven years would be nothing compared to what the future would hold. I had to find out first whether you felt more than sexual attraction for me."
"Have I convinced you?" She gazed into his face, her eyes brimming with boundless love.
His mouth dented at the corners. "I'll be convinced when you stand in front of a minister with me and say, 'I do.' And if I can arrange it, that day will come tomorrow."
"The sooner the better," Valerie agreed, and couldn't resist murmuring the title, "Mrs. Judd Prescott…Valerie Prescott. It sounds beautiful, but I'm not sure it's me."
