Slow Fever

by Cait London

  He closed his eyes for one brief heartbeat. He’d known there was another person in Karolina’s vehicle, but he’d prayed it wasn’t Kylie. He’d been followed by Karolina before, and he knew that if he’d walked toward them, she would have squealed her tires, sailing off into the night. He’d had no time to deal with his fears then, because Jeanne’s husband had come at him, raging and cursing. Kylie had seen what he was—who he was, tough, savage, too skillful at fighting.

  “A doctor is on the way, but I can do the job, barring complications. Your mother taught me and Dr. Thomas White has his own reasons for helping. He’s driving here now, and we’ll be talking over the telephone,” Michael returned grimly as he placed the woman on the bed. In her pain, Jeanne batted at his hands, and showing more age than his years, Michael turned to Kylie. “She doesn’t want a man’s hands on her.”

  “Hello, Jeanne. I’m Kylie,” her voice ran smooth and warm as she gently pushed Michael from the room. She undressed Jeanne and slid a gown onto her bruised body. When Michael reentered the room, his expression concerned and frustrated, Kylie understood instantly. “Because of your sister?”

  He nodded grimly. “Lily married the same kind of man as my father. Restraining orders don’t always work. That’s where Rosa and I come in. If everything else fails, we move to save the woman’s life and give her a new one. All we can do is make the offer, but it has to be her decision. There are others helping along the way.”

  Jeanne cried out and her hand tightened painfully on Kylie’s. “Well, then. We’ve got work to do, don’t we, Jeanne? You know, at one time my mother brought most of the babies into Freedom Valley. She was a midwife and a good one, too. People tell me I’m like her and that’s why I know that you and I are going to do a good job with this baby. My mother taught Michael, too, and he’s not going to let anything happen to you or your baby. A doctor will be here soon, and we can call him at any time,” Kylie murmured quietly, smoothing back the woman’s damp hair. She began to massage Jeanne’s swollen belly, amazed at the new life waiting to be born. “Soon you’ll have a tiny part of you, the best part, to hold and to love and your baby will be safe.”

  She turned to Michael, and found tears shimmering in his lovely eyes. “Tell me what to do, Michael. And, by the way, I love you.”

  Ten

  After a lover’s storm, there is nothing like the making up and love goes on, stronger than before.

  —Anna Bennett’s Journal

  “You’ve done fine work, the both of you. I’ll take care of her now,” Thomas White said. His smile was warm, his black hair—winged by gray—swept away from his narrow, aristocratic face. Stiletto lean and dressed in a three-piece suit, he was obviously wealthy. His rich, melodic voice lilted with an accent Kylie could not define. He held the new baby boy that Michael had just delivered, a touch of pride in his grin. “Good job, my friend. Go on now before you fall of exhaustion and break something I have to mend.”

  Jeanne, exhausted and happy, her eyes aglow caught Kylie’s hand. “Thank you both.”

  Michael nodded, but one look at him, and Kylie knew that for all his cool coaxing during the birthing, he was deeply moved. He stood, all angles and open hands at his side, clearly spent. The harsh lines set more deeply in his face now, those lovely eyes the color of a rain drenched meadow. “I’ll go make some coffee,” he said, his voice deep and uneven.

  “He’s such a kind man,” Jeanne noted softly after he had gone.

  “He’ll surely cry when his baby is born. He’ll not be able to keep his emotions buried then.” Thomas snorted as he gently cleaned the baby. “On the other hand, he’s a poker shark. Cares less if he takes the last dollar in my pocket… Kylie, you and Michael are exhausted. Get some rest.”

  “You’ll be safe here,” Kylie said as she straightened Jeanne’s bed and helped draw a clean gown onto her.

  “You’ll stay, too, won’t you?”

  “I’ll stay.” How many times had Michael and her mother helped women like this?

  Thomas’s grin flashed in the shadows. “Too bad I didn’t catch you first, Kylie. The world could do with more hearts like yours.”

  In his living room, Michael paced in front of the blazing fire. He stopped to cross his arms in front of his chest and frowned at her. “I love you and that’s all there is to that.”

  Kylie poured herself onto the couch and sipped the tea Michael had prepared. Now wasn’t the time to sort out their love. She wanted to come to him, free of the past, courting him as he deserved. She would have truth running between them, not the leashed, though magical, lovemaking of that single, perfect night. Kylie smiled to herself, planning how she would vamp him, and her smile grew as Michael’s wary frown deepened. “If you’re set to argue,” she said, stretching her body to watch the impact upon him, which was perfect and hot and hungry, just as it should be. “I’m too tired. Come hold me.”

  His expression went blank, then he crossed to her, gently scooped her up in his arms and carried her into his bedroom, still mussed from their lovemaking. She held him tight as he lay beside her, drawing the covers over them and gave herself to sleep and the safety of Michael’s arms.

  For the next two weeks, she would come to Michael’s arms every night. Lying tucked against him, returning his slow, thorough sweet kisses was enough. Throughout the nights, she and Michael took turns helping Jeanne. During the days, Soft Touches was heavily scheduled. Kylie worked very hard, keeping her lunch hour free to go to Michael, who always had lunch ready. In the evening, when she dragged herself home from Soft Touches, he was there to hold her, to tell her about Jeanne and the baby’s progress.

  Adept at cradling the baby in one arm and managing simple household tasks with his free hand, Michael surprised Kylie. He’d be a perfect father, she decided, stunned as he rocked the baby, cuddling him outrageously. Jeanne’s recovery went well and in two weeks—on a mild December morning—Thomas returned to retrieve her. “Wanting to keep a closer eye on my patient,” he’d said, with a merry twinkle in his eyes.

  “How perfectly like Michael,” Kylie muttered the next afternoon, for she was dressed for courting Michael and he was nowhere to be found. She touched the earrings and locket he’d given her as a teenager and wondered if he’d remember. Pausing to glance in his bedroom mirror, she tried to smooth her hair, the first of December wind and rain turning it into a wild, free mass framing her face. A touch of shadow deepened the blue of her eyes, a bit of buttery lip gloss made her lips seem fuller. A brush of a wand added color to her cheeks, though that color came natural enough when she thought of how she would love Michael, once his defenses were down. There would be no more holding himself away, leashing what ran deep and raw inside him. They were both exhausted once Jeanne left, and Michael had stayed away that night, leaving her alone in the bed they’d shared.

  She’d had appointments to keep and couldn’t hunt him down. Canceling her afternoon appointments had brought a few protests, but her clients were happy enough to reschedule. She’d hurried to her mother’s house, jerking the long forgotten dress from her closet. But Michael’s house had been empty, the shower still beaded with water and smelling of soap and man.

  “There will be no more of that, Michael Cusack,” she murmured. Just as Thomas was driving away, she’d caught Michael’s expression before he shielded it. The burning flick of his eyes told her of his passion; the hard lock of his body and the grim set of his lips said he was withdrawing behind his shields.

  Unaccustomed to dresses and cosmetics, Kylie decided she’d done all she could with what she had. She hadn’t been a man-hunter, but now one special man deserved hunting and capturing. She fluttered her eyelashes at the woman in the mirror and smoothed the dress flowing tightly across her hips. Basic black and long sleeved, cut just above her knee, the dress was too much for the Wagon Wheel Café and the Silver Dollar. Still, her statement was important to make, an instinctive ritual for the woman wanting all of her love’s attention. Kylie inhaled dee
ply and her eyes widened at the deep vee at her chest. She tugged at the dress. “It’s your fault, Michael, for feeding me so well. I’m not long and lithe at my best, but more packed and solid.”

  At the sound of hoofbeats, she peered out of the window. Michael bent against the chilling North wind, riding Jack into the barn. In the distance, his face was harsh, his hair pushed back from his fierce scowl. The brooding gray day, heavy with mist suited him, tearing her back to the night when he’d been so savage, efficiently dealing with the bully.

  She had to run to him, tearing from the house, to hold him in her arms and keep him safe from his shadows.

  Inside the barn, Michael unsaddled Jack. The wind swept through the barn, signaling an opened door. One glance at Kylie hurrying toward him, her eyes round and concerned, and Michael knew that he could easily hurt her. A loving woman, she should have more than a back alley fighter, scarred from life. He’d show her what he was and she’d turn away— “You should have worn a coat. You’re shivering.”

  Michael tore off his coat, scented of him, and stuffed Kylie’s arms into the sleeves, buttoning the front up to her throat. “Here, I want to show you my life,” he said, snaring her wrist and tugging her to the stairs.

  He wasn’t meant for a pretty life, he decided as he punched in the key code that would open the upstairs bolted door. He tugged Kylie through and slammed the door shut behind them. Words rapped out of him, the dangerous life he’d led. “Bodyguard work, security for threatened politicians, communities, child retrieval, rescue work, safe installment, insurance and basic protection. I’m a silent partner in a company that manufactures and installs security devices. I test them—don’t move until I turn off the alarms, or you’ll take an electric jolt that will knock you on that fabulous backside. You can’t see the detection beams. They’re just there.”

  Michael tapped off the sensors that could painfully trap an intruder. He leaned against the wall as she padded over the thick carpeting, meant to contain sound, to a wall lined with weapons. Sealed under glass, the armory was vicious and high tech. Sensor equipment lined another wall, dials and machines made to protect. Kylie’s face was pale, her lips vivid against her skin, her eyes blue and rounded with the impact of his life. Messages purred off his fax machine, digital readings ran across another machine, and a computer blinked, waiting for a response.

  Kylie looked like a fairy wandering amid a demon’s lair, lightly touching as she passed. She turned to him and stripped away his coat. She kicked off her high heels as she stepped on his training mat. “Well, then, Michael Cusack. What am I to think? That you make a lot of money with these gizmos? Do you think that matters to me? Money?”

  “This is what I am,” he murmured, crossing to her, so that she would make no mistake. “I’m like my father, you see. Tough. You knew him. I could be like that eventually.”

  Her head went up and she sniffed delicately while surveying the walls lined with weapons. Then her blue eyes locked with his. “You think this will put me off, don’t you?”

  “It would most women.” He couldn’t stop his eyes from taking that raw, hungry stroll down her body, leaving him drooling. She was all woman, his woman, packed into a fragrant package of curves and— He remembered her body moving beneath his, over his, feminine and powerful and warm and lush. He swallowed roughly at the sight of her breasts, burgeoning from the deep vee. To keep from curving his hands around each softness to take it to his lips, Michael forced himself to breathe evenly, gathering his control. When he managed to pry his gaze upward, he found her smirking. She moistened her lips and slid him a sultry sidelong look. “Well?”

  “Kylie, this is serious. Not playtime.” Michael tried to force his hardened body to relax and failed. Kylie wasn’t a woman to play games and clearly now, she was flirting with him. Who was she, this dazzling woman?

  She tossed her hair and gave him the most feminine, appealing look he’d ever seen. “I know what I need to know. You asked for me. What did you say then? Did you mean it?”

  He raked a hand through his hair and paced the length of the workout mat. “You know I did. We’re about to be spread all over Sarafina Malagay’s lovelorn newspaper column.”

  “So you think that will make me shiver, do you? Having Sarafina’s nose in my love life?” Her hands shoved him from the back, jarring him. He pivoted, finding her snarling. “You think so little of me, Michael Cusack? You think all these gizmos and what you do—what you’ve done to survive—could stop what I feel, how my heart beats for you? You think this could stop me from loving you? Then go to hell.”

  He caught her before she could step off the mat, his arms circling her from behind. “Oh, sweetheart,” he murmured as if the words were torn from his heart.

  They were enough to tell her what she needed and Kylie turned in his arms. She gave him no chance to think, but locked her arms around him, fisting his hair. His mouth was hot and open on hers, tasting of hunger and passion and nights that would be long and satisfying. “You think too much, dear heart,” she whispered, her eyes wide and blue upon him, her hand smoothing his cheek.

  He wasn’t thinking at all; he was straining to keep control. Amid the lethal gear of his life, Kylie was too untouched, too trusting. “Let’s go into the house.”

  In the house, Michael paced in front of the fire he’d just stoked to life. “Aren’t you going to say something about how I look, dear heart?” she asked carefully. “I’m asking you for a date—”

  Then Michael’s arms were around her, crushing her to him, his mouth hard and hungry over hers. “You drive me—” he said roughly against her cheek. “I’m trying to be Mr. Nice Guy and it isn’t working. I thought we’d take time—”

  The pounding of his heart told her that enough time had passed without him. “We both know what we want. Don’t talk. Just feel.”

  She touched her ears, the gold studs gleaming in them, and the locket at her throat. “You gave me these. It doesn’t matter, none of it, Michael. Just you and me, here together.”

  His finger prowled an earring, then circled her ear. “It’s no gentle feeling in me now, Kylie, dear heart. Better step away and let me cool. I’d prefer to go slow and easy with you— You’ve got to understand—you’re my rosebud, my angel and my torment all rolled into one perfectly curved, hand-fitting hot-blooded woman. It’s hard for a man to adjust to all that—those big blue eyes eating him, that mouth tasting like forevermore and fire and heaven at the same time. How can you know what you mean to me, how you fill my heart and soul and how I don’t know if I’m breathing or not until you’re near? I can barely keep from—I can see you nursing our baby, holding that perfect little girl with blue eyes like yours against your breasts and nothing else makes any sense. You fascinate me, so feminine and sweet and caring. You’re part fairy, part dream, and all woman with knowing, mysterious smiles that curl inside me, warming me. You move and my heart leaps, my hands tremble, and I wonder how could this marvelous creature want me? On the other hand, I’m quite greedy for you,” his voice roughened and a fingertip strolled down between her breasts, “when you touch me, I’ve only one thought—making love to you anywhere, anytime.”

  She tried to swallow, tried to close her lips and couldn’t. “Is that how you feel about me?”

  “Like I’d like to spend every minute with you for the rest of my life,” he stated slowly, firmly. He looked away, his jaw set, the color rising on his cheeks. Then his dark green gaze flashed at her. “I’m not taking it back, none of it. And that’s that.”

  “You haven’t said anything about my dress, Michael.” Who was this wonderful man, this lover she had taken to her heart and her body? How much more marvelous could life be? She wanted to hear more, to savor the wary way he gave his heart to her.

  He rammed his hand through his hair, the trembling of it, telling of his deep emotions. “It’s the woman beneath that I love, and I’m wanting to take it off and hold you close and tight and naked against me. It’s a need I fear I�
��ll probably never lose. Just for you.”

  As always, Kylie followed her instincts. With happiness blooming inside her, she leaped upon him, caught her arms around his shoulders and her legs around his narrow hips. Michael staggered back with the force, his hands finding and supporting her bottom. They burned her bare skin and Michael’s head reared back, his green eyes widening. As he carried her down the hallway to his bedroom, one big hand slowly explored the garters running to her hose, found the snaps and released them as he shuddered, the heat between them growing. She nibbled at his bottom lip, and he kissed the sensitive corner of hers. Then he tugged the back zipper of her dress down and smoothed the silky skin beneath. Pressed so tightly against him, she barely felt the black lace of her bra release. Then his mouth was open on her, tugging and sending out hot waves to curl and lick at her.

  They fell onto the bed, Michael drawing away her clothing and then his, and then that one fierce look told her she’d have everything. That she’d have the truth that ran between them. Michael’s hand slowly stroked down her side, pausing to cup and cherish her breast, to splay across her belly, and to stroke her thighs, his eyes glittering above her, his face taut with desire. “Oh, you’re all woman, Kylie, dear heart. Luscious and hot and fragrant.”

  Filled with happiness, she laughed out loud, and Michael scowled down at her. “Well, you are,” he stated as if she’d challenged him.

  He sucked in air roughly as she touched him, explored him intimately. She read his desperation, felt it jar and mirror in her own body, and then as Michael’s gaze flickered down their bodies, hers pale against his rougher one, she smoothed his chest and knew that his heart raced for her, that his body lay hot and thrusting against hers. “I love you, Michael,” she whispered as his hands moved more firmly upon her, cupping her, smoothing her upper thighs as if he fought his need.