Carrie felt a shock run through her. She stared at him, her color fading. "What do you mean?"
Slowly he got to his feet and came across the room. He loomed over her, his tawny head bent. Then his hand came out and caught her arm, pulling her to her feet. "I've spent the past ten days trying to convince myself that I ought to give you a divorce if that is what you want. I know now I can't do it."
Carrie turned her head away, trembling. She felt confused, incredulous.
"Look at me, Carrie!"
Her lashes swept down over her eyes, resting against her hot cheeks, but she could not raise her head and let him see the unshed tears. His hand moved over her shoulder and along her neck, his thumb beginning almost absently to stroke her nape in a slow caress.
She was limp under his touch, and her eyes lifted slowly to his face questioningly. "What are you trying to say, Josh?"
The golden depths of his eyes had taken on a tormented look, and his mouth was compressed with intensity. "You know what I'm saying," he muttered.
"No," she whispered. "Tell me."
His fingers slid into the silky brown strands of her hair, caressing her skin. "You are determined to humble me, aren't you?"
She felt the blood racing through her veins as though some icy barrier had suddenly broken down. She was aware, with a thundering of her heart, of Josh's thickened breathing as he bent toward her, his mouth brushing her hair, her forehead, her cheeks.
She heard the hard intake of his breath, then he crushed her against him, his mouth seeking out hers relentlessly, a long-denied hunger surging out of bounds between them. She clung to him, winding her arms around his neck, her mouth responding eagerly under his, her fingers twisted in the thick tawny hair, pressing his head closer.
After a while he lifted his head and stared down into her face, his eyes devouring her. "I love you. I tried to tell you before, but could never say it."
She pressed her body against him. "Josh, darling…"
He buried his face against her throat, kissing it sensuously. "I love you," he murmured into her skin. "I told myself at first that I was marrying you for Mike's sake. You were the most physically desirable woman I'd ever known, but I convinced myself that's all it was. Do you remember when I took you home on our wedding day, when I kissed you in your bedroom? I knew then that I was starting to fall in love with you."
She blinked away tears of happiness. "Oh, Josh, I love you, too. That's why I couldn't bear staying with you, thinking that you were in love with another woman. Did you really love me on our wedding day? The first time you made love to me, you loved me then?"
He lifted his head and looked down at her adoringly. "That's when I knew I would always love you."
She hugged him fiercely, pressing her cheek against his shoulder. "Then it's all right," she sighed raggedly. "Our baby was made with love."
After a moment of sudden stillness, he turned her face up to his. "Our baby?"
She smiled. "I'm pregnant, Josh. It happened that first time." Then she sobered. "You don't mind, do you?"
"Mind!"
"It's so soon—"
His mouth cut off the words and she felt her blood catch fire under the possession of his lips. At last he whispered thickly, "We'll take Mike home, and then we'll spend a few days alone together at the family lodge in Sun Valley."
"Do you think it will be all right for me to ski in my condition?" she asked teasingly.
"You," he said thickly, "are going to have much better things to do than ski."
Carrie laughed and he lifted her into his arms. "Do you think Jan would mind if we borrowed her bedroom?" he whispered into her ear.
"I don't think she would mind at all," Carrie murmured and lifted her lips for the burning seal of his kiss.
Wonder and Wild Desire Page 17
