by Tracy Sumner
As if it were happening to someone else, she watched him make love to her hand. The same sweeping tilt she experienced when he kissed her, an earth-shattering shift, rocked her where she stood.
"This is what I want to do to your entire body, sweet. This is what I will do. I promise you."
A weak sound rose from her throat. A flush of need and embarrassment crossed her face. The juncture between her thighs caught fire; her nipples contracted beneath her corset.
Leaned against the wall, he hooked his feet at the ankles, a deceptive pose when she could see his chest lifting with ragged breaths. His gaze traveled from the tips of her new leather boots to the ends of her recently trimmed hair. "You desire me as much as I desire you. And you love me, even if you don't want to."
"Yes, I want you."
Raw hunger replaced confidence. His stance stiffened as he pushed off the wall. "Spend the night with me. Come to my house."
She walked back a step, stumbling over an uneven brick. He followed, his depraved expression exposed by a strip of moonlight.
Helplessly, she whimpered.
He squinted, his hands falling to his side. "You're terrified of me. Completely terrified."
"I am," she said, pride yielding to honesty.
Naked sorrow swept his face, making her feel the guilty party. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have come here, forced myself upon you. I just figured with what happened on Devil." He closed his eyes and touched the bridge of his nose. "That you only needed to hear me say the words. I assumed my foolishness was keeping us apart." He turned and walked into a gaping recess of shadow. "I guess that's what my limited experience with women gets me."
Lacking reason, she raced forward and caught his sleeve between her finger and thumb. "What did you say?" Impatient and confused, and as always, impulsive, she said, "What did you just say?"
His gaze slid her way, and he blinked. As he remembered, a flush she observed even in the dim moonlight flooded his cheeks. "Nothing." He fingered the neat golden arch above his ear. "I didn't say anything."
"How you touched me, you were confident. Clever." She worried her bottom lip between her teeth, a movement he watched with blind attentiveness. "How many?"
His frown deepened, creasing his lips. "Elle, this isn't something we should discuss."
"Why? You've never kept secrets from me before."
"Secrets?" He groaned. "It isn't a secret."
"Then tell me." She swallowed, preparing for the worst. "How many? Too many to count?"
"Too many to count?" He leaned in, searching her face. "Is that what you think?"
She nodded.
"Sweet—"
"It's all right. Don't tell me. We're not children anymore, whispering under a spread of scrub pines, dangling our feet over the side of a dock."
Bricks shifted. A rock cracked the wall. "Two." His labored sigh echoed along the passageway. "In college, a professor's daughter. Engaged to a very wealthy man her father had selected for her. She was testing the waters, being rebellious, I suppose. She made her interest known, and I accepted her invitation. One time, at her father's summer cottage. Later, in Chicago, a woman I met at a university function. Widowed, attractive, not interested in an attachment. There were other, well, opportunities... but a nagging sense of discontent always held me back."
Elle opened her eyes to find him watching her, his gaze guarded and wary. "Once with her, the widow, too?"
He jammed his hands in his pockets and shook his head.
"Oh, now I understand what Caroline meant."
"What Caroline meant," he said and knocked the toe of his oxford against the ground. "Listen to me, the things we did, most of them were as new to me as they were to you. If it appeared I was overly confident or possessed a great degree of knowledge, hell, I don't." He lifted his head, a wicked smile growing. "Just beginner's luck."
"I'm scared," she said, startled to hear the confession.
His smile dimmed. "Why?"
"Everything's all mixed up." She pressed the heel of her hand to her throbbing temple. "My father attempted to determine my future, guide my hand. He told me so often that my choices were foolish, sentimental, and preposterous. I've come to wonder if he's right."
"Elle, he was not right. I told you the same thing, and I wasn't right, either. The young girl grasped our connection. She was wise and brave, and I loved her as much as I love you."
"You don't understand. I'm not a girl anymore, living on dreams of the future and believing in your love above all else. I can't pin all my hopes on you. Give you my heart like I could before. I just can't."
"Time? Do you need time?"
She bowed her head, the uncertainty on his face bringing to mind the boy she'd cherished. Damn and blast, it made her want to shout at the unfairness, the gross irony, of life.
"I'm going to the coast for a few days. Research at a commercial fishery in Georgetown. I had hoped to ask you to go with me, somehow schedule around your classes. I can see now, that won't happen."
"Will you come back?"
He tilted her chin, forcing her gaze to his. "You're slow to get the idea, sweet, but I'm not leaving South Carolina without you."
"But—"
He stopped her denial by capturing her lips beneath his, a kiss of gentle honesty, not persuasion. Entirely too compelling, this side of him. "I can't live without you," he said, then slanted his head, assaulting from another angle, his hands sliding into her hair to cradle her head. He tasted of citrus and mint, wonderful, appealing.
Time slowed as he leaned against the wall and spread his thighs, fitting her hips to his. She followed every movement, mirrored the thrust of his tongue, the rock and grind of his pelvis. Somewhere, the clang of a church bell and a horse's shrill whinny resounded. The world outside meant nothing. For her, there was only his thumb sliding beneath her collar, pressing against her pulse. His lips brushing her cheek and moving lower. Liquid heat, a shower of color—red, green, and gold. Her low mewl of assent. Her hands tugging at buttons, seeking what she knew he would give.
At the ingress of her finger through a loosened buttonhole, he set her from him. "Either we stop now"—he sucked air into his lungs—"or we make love on the ground."
"What?" She blinked, her vision blurred.
His jaw tensed. He fisted his hands by his side. "I'm sick to death of alleys and beaches. I want to lie with you on my bed, your bed, any bed. Wake next to you and listen to you breath. Curl our feet together under the blankets. I want to be more than your lover. I want to be your husband, the father of your children. I want you, forever."
She could not stifle her bewilderment, just as he could not stifle his anger. "I'm leaving for Georgetown at dawn, sweet. When I come back, I'll find you. Don't think to run from me again."
"My life is here, why would I run?" Foolish to act confident with her knees knocking together.
He thumped his chest, for once, brute strength and mulishness. "Your life is with me. Don't ever forget that."
Dazed, she realized this was not the time to argue. She walked from the alley, not even sure which direction she took. He grasped her hand and led her to the library, where they retrieved his spectacles and her textbook. Not a word passed between them.
Noah dropped her off at the boardinghouse the female students shared, left her standing on the front porch with nothing more than an authoritarian glare of possession and a light, lingering kiss on her cheek. Elle watched him stride across the lawn, his tall form fading into the darkness.
Stark exhilaration raced through her, followed closely by sheer terror. Merciful heaven, against her wishes, or because of the thousands she'd once exacted, it appeared as if Noah Garrett meant to keep her.
18
"After a careful consideration of the results of recent investigations, we are strengthened in our confidence."
~ C. Wyville Thomson
The Depths of the Sea
The first gift arrived the next day. A square bundle wrapped in bro
wn paper and sitting on the top step. He'd scrawled her name across the front in his now-familiar script; a yellow ribbon, one she had inadvertently left on Devil Island, held the package together.
She unwrapped the paper with trembling fingers, an autumn gust tugging at the loose knot of hair on her head. Her eyes stung from lack of sleep, from twisting and turning, from replaying everything Noah said to her and wondering if his words could be true.
Deep inside, praying they were true.
She opened the tin box, trying to deny the quiver of excitement. This was the first gift a man had ever given her, outside of a modest present or two for her birthday. Nudging the swath of velvet aside, her breath caught. Her mother's brooch lay amidst the plush maroon folds. Hands shaking, she pinned the piece to her collar, blinking past the tears. She sold it the day before she left Pilot Isle, to help pay expenses. Promising to keep the heirloom in her family, Mrs. O'Neil, the jeweler's wife, paid a fair amount.
How had Noah known?
Elle lifted the scrap of material to her nose, wishing his scent remained. She could visualize him arranging the velvet just so.
A slip of parchment fluttered from the box. Heart racing, she grabbed the sheet.
* * *
Sweet,
This belongs to you, as I do.
I love you.
Noah
* * *
Elle replaced the velvet and closed the lid. With wooden movements, she followed the hallway to her set of rooms and collapsed on her bed.
She missed her morning classes.
Two days turned to four, four to six, six to eight. Her tension mounted with each package she found on the step, each hour that passed waiting for Noah to leap from behind a pine tree or pop his head from beneath her desk. As he had no doubt known would happen, her resistance melted, her love for him increasing each time she read one of his notes.
First the return of her mother's brooch. Then Noah's pilot coat wrapped around a set of leather-bound books she had admired, weeks ago, in the mercantile window. A parasol with pink-and-green ribbon loops came the next day. Or was it the shot silk dress, trimmed with black-velvet bands and guipure lace? The loveliest item of clothing she had ever seen, one she plainly had no place to wear. Sighing, she set the hat on her head. This morning's gift, trimmed with roses and a striped fabric, perfectly matched her parasol.
Noah had wonderful taste in women's apparel. With an angry kick, she scattered a pile of burnished leaves. Better to spend her time worrying about what she was going to tell him when he returned than imagining how he had come to have such good taste.
I love you, and yes, I'll marry you.
No, no, that sounded brazen, as though her earlier rejection had been a feminine ploy. But, she needed to have an answer. Soon. He had begun asking her questions in his daily missives. Blatant queries, often underlined for emphasis. What church shall we say our vows in? Should we go back to Pilot Isle? His methodical certitude made her smile and laugh aloud, her classmates looking on in stupefaction. Who but Noah would think to champion his cause, fact by listed fact, while never even showing his face?
And how had he known the tactic would work?
Curiosity killing her, she rose one morning at dawn and watched Professor Stanford creep into the yard and place a gift on the step. Although she should have resisted, she leaned from her window and yelled to him. He lifted his head, his face turning colors in the dawning light. Now, he avoided her gaze in class and had not called on her to answer a question once.
She expected to score a high mark in biology.
A sudden gust tugged at the lapel of Noah's pilot coat and sent a shiver down her spine. Elle shoved her hands in the pockets, drawing the wool close. She leaned her cheek against the material and sniffed. She punished herself by wearing the coat because it provided such an inescapable sense of closeness to him.
He had probably anticipated her reaction. She had to remember the man did nothing by chance.
Closing her fingers around the apple in her pocket, she brought the fruit to her mouth and took a healthy bite. Mrs. Holden really needed to hire someone to clean the yard—
Elle stumbled to a halt, the apple dropping from her hand. She spun in a small circle. Where was he? A black-and-white cat crossed the street at a dawdling pace, a grocery cart rolled past, the driver lifting his hand in greeting. Kicking the fruit from her path, she walked forward. Carved in the trunk of the only tree in the yard: Noah loves Elle. Not deep etching, like Christa's. This was a hasty attempt. She brushed the letters and raised her hand to her face. A raw scent clung to her skin; her fingertips glistened. Moist, the bark was still moist.
Calling his name, she completed another turn, even tipped her chin, and searched the copse of branches above her head. A sudden burst of emotion... longing, trepidation, inevitability. He was close; she could feel him. She sprinted across the yard, grass snagging in her bootlaces, leather soles skimming the scattered leaves. She watched a gust of wind suck the lace curtain inside her bedroom window.
She had closed the window before leaving for class.
The air was cooler in the hallway, a pale burst from an electric bulb lit her way. She tiptoed to her door. Something different.... She sniffed. A cloying odor, syrupy and floral. Hair on her arms rising, she twisted the beveled knob, and the door swung in without a murmur.
Candles covered every vacant surface, flames wavering in the open window's breeze. Rose petals, red and yellow, littered the heart-pine floor and the unmade bed. Elle closed the door and slumped against it. A faint sound, a whistling release of breath. She turned her head.
Noah sat in a chair in the far corner, arms folded over his stomach, feet propped on the rattletrap desk she and Mrs. Holden had moved from the attic. She stepped closer, saw he slept deeply. Candlelight lit every angle of his whiskered cheeks, silhouetted the gradual rise and fall of his chest. His frock coat lay in a tangle on the floor; his fingers gripped his neckpiece. The edges of his waistcoat curled, revealing a snowy white shirt open past the point of decency, and, oh... a wealth of chest hair showed.
Drawing the wrinkled cloth from his hand, she unbuttoned his collar, and dropped it to the desk. He murmured and sighed. She brushed his hair from his brow, slid his spectacles from his face, and placed them on a shelf above his head. Only after she had covered him with a thin woolen blanket, making sure his feet did not poke out, did she take a long, leisurely examination. She perched on her bed and she stared, marveling at her good fortune. Noah rarely let anyone view him like this—splendidly ruffled, utterly undone. She could look all she pleased, caress if she chose to. The notion of touching him sent a molten rush through her.
The candles dripped wax in melting plunks; the world retreated behind lace curtains and dying sunlight. The low flames bathed them in warm brilliance, creating an island of solitude and understanding. How had she ever imagined living without him? Pride, her damnable pride. Simply because he had not discerned his love as promptly as she would have liked. True, he had rejected her impassioned ardor at one time. But he had also been her closest confidant, her strongest ally. Wasn't that worth its weight in gold?
She placed her lovely hat on the floor and curled into a ball, sinking into the feather mattress, rose petals sticking to her skin. She blinked, yawned. In response, Noah mumbled her name, once, softly. Beautiful. Beautiful and brilliant, and he claimed to love her. She started to rise, to go to him, thinking to slide her hands inside the gaping neck of his shirt and press her lips to the tender area behind his ear, an act which never failed to drive him wild. She wanted to drag him to her bed and shock him with the strength of her desire.
She shook her head, determined to observe him until he woke.
They had time enough for everything.
For a long moment, Noah stood beside the bed, staring at the woman who meant more to him than life itself. The sun had set, leaving only a few sputtering candles to caress her skin, her hair, a glorious, rusty spill across the c
ream sheets. Funny, now that he had let her love into his heart, he could not bear to live another second without it.
When had Elle come to belong to him so completely? The first time he saw her, in the schoolyard? From that day forward, she had certainly thought he belonged to her.
Curled on her side, she stretched, innocently raising her skirt, baring a slender thigh he knew the shape of very well. Her cambric drawers did not hide much. No, not nearly enough. He remembered her legs wrapped around his waist, firm muscle tensing with each thrust. Groaning, he raked his hand over his face. He had to keep his mind free, clear. He needed to talk to her, wanted... oh, God, to explore the exceptional bond between them. He wanted to hear an accounting of every minute of her life.
He wanted to drink her into his soul.
As if she witnessed his struggle, and wished to destroy his good intentions, her mouth parted on a sigh, her tongue sneaking out to touch her bottom lip.
Ah, what was a man to do?
He pressed his knee into the mattress and it sank deep. Feathers, he realized, and smiled. He had never made love on a feather bed before. With a gentle sprawl, he lay behind her and pulled her against his chest. Elle was, if he remembered correctly, a very deep sleeper. Proving that, she shifted, crowding her buttocks into his groin, all the while humming low in her throat, her sensual kitten growl. The sound, and the press of her bottom, shattered the last of Noah's noble intent.
Nudging her hair aside, he placed feather-soft kisses along the nape of her neck, searching for, and finding the hidden nook behind her ear. He caressed her jaw, her temple, traced her arched brows with his lips. The scent of her drove him wild. The faintest hint of lemon and crisp autumn. And roses, he thought, smiling as he peeled a petal from her cheek. He unfastened the buttons on her practical blouse, wondering if she had worn the dress he had given her. He would have liked to give her lace-trimmed underdrawers, something secret and naughty for him alone. He had no word for the piece of clothing he pictured her wearing for him.
