She could see into his eyes now. They were troubled, and more. She tilted her head back. "You loved me all along," she said. Tears filled her eyes again, but what did it matter? "Cal, I couldn't resist you from the first time you kissed me, but I told myself it was just sex, that it was separate from our business together, something we could keep separate and I wouldn't have to be vulnerable. That way I couldn't get hurt. Then, the night you came to Dorothy's and carried my into my bedroom..."
"That night," he said raggedly, "I could feel you slipping away from me. You were half asleep, and even in your sleep you tried to put distance between us, to shut yourself off. Sam, I was a complete jerk. I manipulated you, tricked you into letting me kiss you, telling you it was only a good-night kiss, that I wasn't going to try to make love with you—"
"You didn't actually say that."
"I let you believe it, and then I very deliberately set out to make you want me."
She freed her hands and touched his face. She felt a muscle jerk in his cheek. "I wanted you," she whispered. "That night, when you loved me so selflessly, so tenderly, I knew, really knew deep inside, what you meant when you said you loved me. You didn't mean my mother's kind of love, just for her. You treasured me, and I'll never forget how that felt. I couldn't talk afterward. I was so filled with you, with loving."
"I made you cry."
"Oh, Cal! You made me feel. You made me love. I know I really messed it up, but I do love you so much. I was stupid enough to think it would go away, but it's not an episode or a—it's me and you, and I—" She'd gotten this far, surely she could go the rest of the way. "Cal, I need to know. Could you—do you still love me?"
She felt a shudder go through him. "Samantha Moonbeam Jones, I love you with all my heart."
But he hadn't kissed her, wasn't moving to kiss her even now.
Maybe it was her turn.
She stretched her arms up and looped them around his neck. "I'm going to kiss you," she said softly. "And I should warn you...."
She saw his lips twitch in a half smile and felt her heart lurch. He loved her. It wasn't too late.
"Warn me of what?"
"I might try to seduce you into something more." She covered his lips with hers, then softly drew them away to kiss his cheek, the tangy smell of aftershave below his ear.
He pulled her tight and took her mouth with harsh hunger. "Sam... darling...."
She kissed him back and initiated her own hungry kiss. "I was afraid you'd send me away tonight. I was afraid you wouldn't listen, more afraid it was too late, that you wouldn't care."
He held her away from him, his eyes raking over her face, her shoulders, and her breasts. "What are you wearing?" he demanded. "You almost gave me heart failure when I opened the door and saw you get out of your car. I was terrified to go near you. How the hell was I supposed to keep my hands off you, when I could see your breasts move with every breath you take? When I couldn't stop remembering... I desperately needed you to have come because you couldn't stay away. I prayed for that, feared it was something else until I saw you were wearing my ring. Sam, if you keep breathing like that, in that thing you're wearing, we're not going to get as far as the bedroom."
"This thing I'm wearing, my grandmother made it for me."
"Dorothy? You're kidding?"
"She said it was a man catcher. I've never worn it before, but I have some very pleasurable memories of times when you didn't keep your hands off me, and I was hoping I could tempt you to do it again." She tilted her head and studied him. "Is it important for us to get as far as the bedroom?"
"You'd tempt a monk." He slid his hand over her breast and she pressed against him, taking his erection against the softness of her belly. She felt his response and saw his eyes darken.
"I want you to make love to me, Cal." She said it very clearly, deliberately, and felt a thrill of sensation when she saw his eyes heat and felt his body's response. "But first, there's one more thing I need to say."
His hands slid to her hips, then slid slowly over the lacy shell, forming her back. She leaned into him and let herself enjoy his touch. She'd missed this so much, missed him so much.
"Enough talking," he murmured, bending to place his mouth over the lace covered mound of her breast.
He was seducing her again. She moaned and let his hands on her back take her weight. How could she have waited? How could she have let her fears make them both miserable for two whole months?
"I can't think when you—I need to say this, Cal."
"Say it," he growled.
"I'll be here tomorrow. I mean afterward, in the morning. I'm nervous about it, so if I—What would you do if when I woke up tomorrow and you were already up, and I came out and you were in here, working on the computer... and I climbed into your lap and kissed you good morning?"
"Tomorrow?"
She nodded soberly.
"I'd probably pick you up in my arms and carry you back to bed. But I'm not going to be working on my computer tomorrow; I'm going to be right there, in bed, holding you when you wake up. But in a few weeks, or a few months—I'm not sure it's ever going to happen, but if we get to the point where we can share a kiss without both of us going off like rockets, then I'll kiss you back and make sure you know that I want you here, every morning, forever."
She wondered exactly what it was she'd been afraid of.
"Could you put some music on?"
He walked to the stereo and gave her soft music. She felt muscles quiver deep inside. Anticipation. She hadn't had a lot of experience, but Calin Tremaine was an incredible lover and her body was already singing.
Deliberately, she waited for him to turn back toward her before she slipped off her sandals, then reached to unfasten her jeans. She slid them off her hips, then slowly down past her hips. She felt a flush of embarrassment on her cheeks as she moved to the music.
"Samantha...." His voice sounded choked.
She stepped out of her jeans.
He was frozen, watching as she danced closer to him She remembered the last time he had loved her, so slowly, so tenderly, soft seduction, not touching her sexually until she was throbbing with sensation, quivering with need.
"Stay there," she said and very slowly drew the shell over her head.
"Darling, are you trying to drive me mad?"
She dropped the shell onto a chair and danced closer to him. Not close enough for him to touch, not yet. Just close enough to tease.
"Yes, Calin Tremaine, I want very much to drive you mad." She smoothed her palm over the satin of her camisole, "Is it working?"
"Oh, yeah."
She danced closer, brushed against him, stopped him when his hands lifted to touch. "Not yet," she murmured. "You must admit, it's my turn."
"You've got thirty seconds," he said harshly. "I've been aching for you for two months, and it may be your turn, but—" He caught her hand and pulled her into him, ran his hands over her in long sweeping caresses that left her shuddering.
"You said I had thirty seconds." She slid her hands up under his shirt and smoothed a caress over his chest.
"It's been at least an hour," he said, lifting her into his arms. "We're going to the bedroom. I promised myself that if I ever got you back, I'd take you to bed for a week."
She pressed her mouth to the pulse in his throat and felt his heartbeat. "We've got the weekend. Dorothy and Kippy will understand if you put me down for long enough to phone them."
"There's a phone by the bed."
She laughed and let her head fall back. "Do you have any idea how much I want this? I've dreamed of you every night. Will you come to Paris with me? I have to go to Paris next week. I told Tim I would, but I don't want to leave you, not for about seventy years or so."
"Ah, Sam—" He lowered her to the bed. "I'd better confess."
"What?"
"Paris is a setup."
"What do you mean?"
He sat beside her and took her hand with his. She pulled it to her breast.
"The job in Paris is a friend of mine. I thought if I could get you to Paris, if you walked in and it was me, not some stranger who'd sent for a miracle worker—I gave you two months, Sam. I told myself I'd wait three, but it was too damned long."
"I should have known." She placed his hand where he could feel her heart beating. "I've watched you for a year and a half. When you want something, you don't give up. I'm going to have my hands full with you, aren't I?"
"Probably." He slid his hand under the edge of her camisole; brushed her breast with a touch so light she couldn't stop herself arching to him for more. "But you know how to handle me."
"Yes, I do," she agreed, "but I want more than the eighteen years we signed for. I want our children and I want—"
"Everything," he promised. "We'll tear up that contract, get married again in a church, the way it should have been, until death do us part. We'll have children together, and Kippy, if Dorothy needs us."
"Yes." She held him tight and stopped trying to hold the tears back. "Yes, please."
"Darling, do you have any idea how glad I am that you came tonight? Have I told you how much I love you?"
"Oh, Cal, I love you so. It fills me, and I—please, darling, stop talking and start loving me. I've ached for you inside me."
"You'll have me," he promised. "Forever."
Then he covered her lips with his, and together they loved.
The End
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from Vanessa Grant's
If You Loved Me
Excerpt from
If You Loved Me
by
Vanessa Grant
Dedication
Thanks to Ann, Lynn, and Dr. Bill
for answering all those medical questions
Prologue
He left her alone in the car, ten miles outside town with darkness all around. She was seventeen years old and it was the first time in her life she'd ever been alone, no walls around her and not a building in sight.
"There's a light up there," he said. "A house. I'll phone for help."
After he'd gone, Emma sat in the car and shivered. She wished she had insisted on going with him, but he'd been so impatient.
"You think your dad will kill you for being late?" he'd asked. "Mine's going to flip when he learns I've blown up the damned car."
After he left, she realized how lonely it was out here. She fought off fantasies of all the things that could happen to a girl alone in a car.
She wished she could turn on the lights, but Paul had warned her not to, muttering that he didn't need a dead battery on top of everything else. So she sat in the dark, feeling the way she had when she'd been lying alone in a hospital bed the night before surgery. When she heard a sound from outside, she rummaged in her purse for her glasses, and then put them on so she could see the shadows better.
She was reciting a long soliloquy from Shakespeare when she saw car lights up ahead—maybe someone going to the dance she and Paul had left half an hour ago. Or maybe Paul, returning with help. Or—
The headlights swung away into the trees as the car crossed to her side of the road, spreading a halo of light. Wheels crunched on the gravel road, then the driver's door opened.
A man got out. A big man.
Someone else got out the passenger side of the car and Emma rolled down the window a couple of inches.
"Paul? Is that you?"
"Stay in the car, Emma."
It was Paul. She let out a sigh of relief.
"In the trunk," said the stranger, his voice was deep and gravelly. "I'll get them."
Emma pushed open the door and stumbled out onto the gravel shoulder. She couldn't see the man with Paul, just his shape standing in front of the headlights, all glare and shadows and broad shoulders.
"Why don't you get into my car and stay warm?" the stranger said. "My heater's on."
"I have to get home." She hugged herself as a breeze penetrated her thin dress. "I'm already late."
"For Pete's sake, Emma!" Paul's long shadow swam out of the darkness. "What the hell do you expect me to do? The car's trashed. You'll get home when you get there."
"I'll get tools," the stranger said.
She followed his shadow with her eyes until it disappeared behind the other car. A trunk opened, then closed. Shadows shifted around the two cars. Emma hugged herself tighter and wondered why she hadn't had the sense to bring a jacket.
The stranger lifted Paul's hood. From their conversation, she decided he knew about engines.
"So that's that," Paul said in a truculent voice.
She cleared her throat. "If I'm late, my dad's likely to call the police."
"Emma, give it a rest!"
"I could give you a ride," said the stranger.
As she pushed her long hair behind one ear, the light from his headlights in her eyes.
The stranger said, "I'll leave the tools and the work light with you, Paul, then drop your girlfriend off and come back. I'll pick up some oil while I'm gone."
Emma was swallowed by sensation, as if she were already alone in a car with the stranger. Being alone with Paul had never felt intimate. Exciting, yes, because it was new having a boyfriend when she was seventeen and had only recently been permitted to date. But this, the thought of a car surrounding two people and shutting out the world, looking across the length of the front seat and finding him staring back at her...
She didn't even know what he looked like, only his shape with the light behind, and his deep, take-charge voice.
"Let's go," he said. "I'm taking you home."
"Who are you?"
Paul made an impatient sound. "For God's sake, Emma! You wanted to go!"
"I'm Gray MacKenzie."
So this was Paul's best friend, the one who had spent the summer prospecting up north in Canada. She pushed her glasses up on her nose.
"I'm Emma Jennings."
"I know."
* * *
It was quiet inside his Chevy. She studied Gray's broad jaw, frowning mouth, and wavy brushed-back hair that looked as dark as the forest outside. As he drove, his heavy brows cast shadows where his eyes should be. He didn't speak until they arrived at the junction with the highway.
"Where do you live?"
"Oak Street." She twisted strands of her hair around one uneasy finger. "Across from Connaught School. I—thanks for driving me home."
He turned and looked at her. She stared back. From Paul, she knew Graham MacKenzie was in his second year at the community college, taking science courses for transfer to the University of Washington next year. She also knew he shared an apartment with a father who spent most of his time prospecting for gold up north.
You had to be determined to do what Graham MacKenzie had done. He'd won scholarships to pay his way through two years at the local college, was heading for university next year with nothing behind him but brains and determination—because according to Paul, Graham MacKenzie's father was perpetually broke.
When he broke their locked gazes and pulled his car out on the highway, she felt the shock of withdrawal.
"You're not what I expected," she announced in a husky voice.
"Has Paul been giving me bad press?"
"No."
When he laughed, she stole another look. Gray's shoulders made her feel crowded even though they weren't touching. She had only a hazy idea what prospecting might be like. Paul had talked as if it were a game, but hard muscles flexed in Gray's forearms as he turned the wheel to take a sharp corner.
"Paul's jealous of you."
He laughed as if he didn't believe her. "What time were you expected home?"
"Ten o'clock."
"Will you be in trouble?"
When she grimaced, it turned into a laugh that he shared. He threw her
another one of those quick glances, assessing her in fast snapshots. When he looked away, she realized her heart was pounding uncomfortably.
"My dad's pretty strict. He worries."
"Dr. Jennings?"
"You know Dad?"
"I went to him for a broken leg last year."
He kept glancing at her and she wanted to take her glasses off, but was afraid he'd realize she wanted him to think she looked pretty.
"We had a difference of opinion," said Gray.
"Over your leg?"
"Yeah."
"How did you break it? Is it okay now?"
"Just fine. Why does your father worry about you?"
She shifted uncomfortably. "I'm trying for scholarships this year. He's strict about my getting home early."
"What are you planning to study?"
"Medicine. I'm going to be a doctor." She pushed her hair back again and shoved her glasses up. She felt fiercely self-conscious. "I don't usually tell people."
If he stopped now they would be in the middle of nowhere. If he turned to her and pulled her close and pressed his mouth to hers, would his lips be cool the way they looked, or hot like the flush she felt on her cheeks?
She pressed her palm against the side of her face and bit her lip hard. Thank heaven he couldn't know her thoughts. There was no way he could know she felt naked in the silence between them. She could feel the purr of his car engine in her veins. She stared at the trees whipping past outside, then closed her eyes and saw the breadth of his shoulders, felt the way his size made her feel restless and uncomfortable. She thought of the heated lovemaking in the pages of the romance novel beside her bed at home and her body flushed.
Think About Love Page 22
