Love was nothing like she'd expected it to be.
It was so much more brilliant.
She needed the hope, the faith, that on one of the days left to her he would wake up and feel what she did.
Love, she discovered, was so huge it filled every space inside with brightness. There was no room for shadows, for doubts.
She was in love, with the man, with the place, with the promise. It wasn't just in the rush of an instant, though there was that thrill as well. But twined with it was a lovely, settled comfort, an ease of being, of knowing. And that was something she wanted for him.
For once in her life, she vowed, she wouldn't fail. She would not lose.
Closing her eyes, she touched the star that hung between her breasts.
"I'll make it happen," she whispered, then with a happy sigh, she started breakfast.
He didn't know what to make of it. He couldn't have said just what state the bathroom had been in before, but he was dead certain it hadn't sparkled. There may or may not have been fresh towels out the last time he'd seen it. But he thought not. There hadn't been a bottle of flowers on the windowsill.
The shower had dripped, that he remembered. He'd meant to get to that.
He could be certain that it was a great deal more pleasant to shower and shave in a room where the porcelain gleamed and the air smelled faintly of lemon and flowers.
Because of it, he guiltily wiped up after himself and hung the towel to dry instead of tossing it on the floor.
The bedroom showed her touch as well. The bed was tidily made, the pillows fluffed up. She'd opened the windows wide to bring in the sun and the breeze.
It made him realize he'd lived entirely too long with dust and dark.
Then he stepped out. She was singing in the kitchen. A pretty voice. And the scents that wafted to him were those of childhood. Bread toasting, bacon frying.
There was a rumble he recognized as the washer spinning a load. He could only shake his head.
"How long have you been up and about?" he asked her.
"I woke up at dawn." She turned to pass him a mug of tea over the counter. "It was so gorgeous I couldn't get back to sleep. I've been piddling."
"You've a rare knack for piddling."
"My father calls it nervous energy. Oh, I let Hugh out. He bolted to the door the minute my feet hit the floor, so I figured that was the routine."
"He likes to run around in the mornings. Dog piddling, I suppose."
It made her laugh as she scooped his eggs from skillet to plate. "He's terrific company. I felt very safe and snug with him curled up at the foot of the bed last night."
"He's deserted me for a pretty face." He sat, then caught her hand.
"Where's yours?"
"I had something earlier. I'll let you eat in peace. My father hates to be chattered at over breakfast. I'll just hang out the wash."
"I'm not your father. Would you sit? Please." He waited until she took a seat and for the first time noticed nerves in the way she linked her fingers together. Now what was that about? "Allena, do you think I expect you to cater to me this way? Cook and serve and tidy?"
"No, of course not." The lift had gone out of her voice, out of her eyes. "I've overstepped. I'm always doing that. I didn't think."
"That's not what I meant. Not at all." His eyes were keen, part of his gift, and they saw how her shoulders had braced, her body tensed.
"What are you doing? Waiting for the lecture?" With a shake of his head, he began to eat. "They've done what they could, haven't they, to stifle you? Why is it people are always so desperate to mold another into their vision, their way? I'm saying only that you're not obliged to cook my meals and scrub my bath. While you're here you should do what pleases you."
"I guess I have been."
"Fine. You won't hear any complaints from me. I don't know what you've done with these humble eggs unless it's magic."
She relaxed again. "Thyme and dill, from your very neglected herb bed.
If I had a house, I'd plant herbs, and gardens." Imagining it, she propped her chin on her fist. "I'd have stepping-stones wandering through it, with a little bench so you could just stop and sit and look. It would be best if it was near the water so I could hear the beat of it the way I did last night.
Pounding, like a quickened heart."
She blinked out of the image, found him staring at her. "What? Oh, I was running on again." She started to get up, but he took her hand a second time.
"Come with me."
He got to his feet, pulled her to hers. "The dishes_"
"Can wait. This can't."
He'd already started it that morning with the sketch. In his head, it was all but finished, and the energy of it was driving him, so he strode quickly out of the house, toward his studio. She had to run to keep up.
"Conal, slow down. I'm not going anywhere."
Ignoring her, he shoved open the door, pulled her in after him. "Stand by the window."
But she was already moving in, eyes wide and delighted. "You're an artist. This is wonderful. You sculpt."
The single room was nearly as big as the main area of the cottage. And much more cramped. A worktable stood in the center, crowded with tools and hunks of stone, pots of clay. A half dozen sketch pads were tossed around. Shelves and smaller tables were jammed with examples of his work. Mystical, magical creatures that danced and flew.
A blue mermaid combed her hair on a rock. A white dragon breathed fire.
Faeries no bigger than her thumb ringed in a circle with faces sly. A sorcerer nearly as tall as she, held his arms high and wept.
"They're all so alive, so vivid." She couldn't help herself, she had to touch, and so she ran her finger down the rippling hair of the mermaid.
"I've seen this before," she murmured. "Not quite this, but the same feeling of it, but in bronze. At a gallery in New York."
She looked over then where he was impatiently flipping through a sketch pad.
"I've seen your work in New York. You must be famous."
His answer was a grunt.
"I wanted to buy it_the mermaid. I was with my mother, and I couldn't because she'd have reminded me I couldn't afford the price. I went back the next day, because I couldn't stop thinking about it, but it was already sold."
"In front of the window, turn to me."
"That was two years ago, and I've thought about her a dozen times since. Isn't it amazing that she was yours?"
Muttering an oath, he strode to her, pulled her to the window. "Lift your head, like that. Hold it there. And be quiet."
"Are you going to draw me?"
"No, I'm after building a boat here. Of course I'm drawing you. Now be quiet for one bloody minute."
She shut her mouth, but couldn't do anything about the grin that trembled on her lips. And that, he thought, was precisely what he wanted. Just that trace of humor, of energy, of personal delight.
He would do a clay model, he thought, and cast her in bronze. Something that gleamed gold and warmed to the touch. She wasn't for stone or wood. He did three quick studies of her face, moving around her for a change of angle. Then he lowered his pad.
"I need the line of your body. Your shape. Take off your clothes."
"Excuse me?"
"I have to see how you're made. The clothes are in the way of you."
"You want me to pose nude?"
With an effort, he brought himself back from his plans, met her eyes.
"If this was a matter of sex, I wouldn't have slept on that rock in the corner last night. You've my word I won't touch you. But I have to see you."
"If this was a matter of sex, I wouldn't be so nervous. Okay." She shut her eyes a minute, bolstered her courage. "I'm like a bowl of fruit," she told herself and unbuttoned her shirt.
When she slipped it off, folded it, set it aside, Conal lifted a brow.
"No, you're like a woman. If I wanted a bowl of fruit, I'd get one."
Chapter 6
She was slim,
leaning toward angular, and exactly right. Eyes narrowed, mind focused, he flipped up a fresh page and began.
"No, keep your head up," he ordered, faintly irritated that she should be so exactly right. "Hold your arms back. Just a bit more. Palms down and flat. No, you're not a flaming penguin, spread your fingers a little.
Ah."
It was then he noticed the faint flush spreading over her skin, the stiffness in her movements. Moron, he told himself and bit back a sigh. Of course she was nervous and embarrassed. And he'd done nothing to put her at ease.
He'd grown too used, he supposed, to professional models who undraped without a thought. She liked to talk, so he would let her talk.
"Tell me about these lessons of yours."
"What?"
"The lessons. You said you'd taken a number of lessons on this and that. What was it you studied?"
She pressed her lips together, fought back the foolish urge to cross her arms over her breasts. "I thought you said I wasn't supposed to talk."
"Now I'm saying you can."
She heard the exasperation, rolled her eyes. What was she, a mind reader?
"I, ah, took art lessons."
"Did you now? Turn to the right just a bit. And what did you learn from them?"
"That I'm not an artist." She smiled a little. "I'm told I have a good eye for color and shapes and aesthetics, but no great skill with the execution."
Yes, it was better when she talked. Her face became mobile again. Alive again. "That discouraged you?"
"Not really. I draw now and then when I'm in the mood."
"Another hobby?"
"Oh, I'm loaded with them. Like music. I took music lessons."
Ah, she was relaxing. The doe-in-the-crosshairs look was fading from her eyes. "What's your instrument?"
"The flute. I'm reasonably adept, but I'm never going to have a chair with the Philharmonic."
She shrugged, and he bit back a sharp order for her not to change the line.
"I took a course in computer programming, and that was a complete wash.
As most of my business courses were, which scuttled the idea I had of opening a little craft shop. I could handle the craft part, but not the shop part."
Her gaze was drawn back to the mermaid. She coveted that, not just the piece itself, but the talent and vision that had created it.
"Stand on your toes. That's it, that's lovely. Hold a minute. Why don't you take on a partner?"
"For what?"
"The shop, if it's what you want. Someone business-minded."
"Mostly because I have enough business sense to know I could never afford the rent in New York, the start-up costs." She moved a shoulder.
"Overhead, equipment, stock. I guess running a business is a study in stress. Margaret always says so."
Ah, he thought, the inestimable Margaret, whom he'd already decided to detest. "What do you care what she says? No, that's not right. It's not quite right. Turn around. You have a beautiful back."
"I do?" Surprise had her turning her head to look at him.
"There! Hold that. Lower your chin a little more to your shoulder, keep your eyes on me."
That was what he wanted. No shyness here. Coyness was something different altogether. There was a hint of that in the upward angle of her gaze, the tilt of her head. And just a bit of smugness as well, in the slight curve of her lips.
Allena of the Faeries, he thought, already eager to begin in clay. He ripped the sheets off the pad, began tacking them to the wall.
"I'll do better with you as well as the sketches. Relax a minute while
I prep the clay." As he passed, he touched a hand absently to her shoulder. He stopped. "Christ, you're cold. Why didn't you say something?"
She was turning toward him, a slow shift of her body. "I didn't notice."
"I didn't think to keep the fire going." His hand skimmed over her shoulder, fingers tracing the blade where he imagined wings. "I'll build one now." Even as he spoke he was leaning toward her, his eyes locked on hers. Her lips parted, and he could feel the flutter of her breath.
He jerked back, like a man snapping out of a dream. Lifted his hand, then held them both up, away from her. "I said I wouldn't touch you. I'm sorry."
The rising wave of anticipation in her broke, then vanished as he walked away to yank a blanket from the cot. "I wish you weren't. Sorry, I mean."
He stood with the table between them, the blanket in his hands, and felt like a man drowning. There was no shyness in her now, nor coyness. But the patience was there, and the promise.
"I don't want this need for you. Do you understand?"
"You want me to say yes." She was laid bare now, she realized.
Much more than her body laid bare. "It would make it easier if I said that
I understand. But I can't, I don't. I want that need, Conal. And you."
"Another place, another time," he murmured. "There'd be no need to understand. Another place, another time, I'd want it as well."
"This is here," she said quietly. "And this is now. It's still your choice."
He wanted to be sure of it, wanted to know there was nothing but her.
"Will you take that off?"
She lifted a hand to the pendant, her last shield. Saying nothing, she slipped the chain over her head, then walked to the table, set it down.
"Do you think I'll feel differently without it?"
"There's no magic between us now. We're only who and what we are."
He stepped to her, swept the blanket around her shoulders. "It's as much your choice as mine, Allena. You've a right to say no."
"Then and" She laid her hands on his shoulders, brought her lips to within a breath of his. "I've also a right to say yes."
It was she who closed that tenuous distance so mouths and bodies met. And she who let the blanket drop when her arms went around him.
She gave, completely, utterly. All the love, so newly discovered in her heart, poured out for him. Her lips seduced, her hands soothed, her body yielded.
There was a choice. She had made hers, but he still had his own. To draw back, step away and refuse. Or to gather close and take. Before his blood could take over, before it was all need and heat, he took her face in his hands until their eyes met again.
"With no promises, Allena."
He suffered. She could see the clouds and worry in his eyes, and said what she hoped would comfort. And be the truth as well. "And no regrets."
His thumbs skimmed over her cheeks, tracing the shape of her face as skillfully as he'd drawn it on paper. "Be with me, then."
The cot was hard and narrow, but might have been a bed of rose petals as they lay on it. The air was chill, still damp from the storm, but she felt only warmth when his body covered hers.
Here. At last.
He knew his hands were big, the palms rough and calloused from his work, and very often careless. He would not be careless with her, would not rush through the moment they offered each other. So he touched her, gently, giving himself the pleasure of the body he'd sketched. Long limbs, long bones, and soft white skin. Her sigh was like music, the song his name.
She tugged off his sweater, sighing again when flesh met flesh, and again murmuring his name against the pulse of his own throat. With only that, she gave him the sweetness he'd denied himself. Whatever he had of that simple gift inside him, he offered back.
Under him she lifted and moved as if they'd danced this dance together for a lifetime. Flowed with and against him, now fluid, now strong. And the quickening pulse that rose in her was like his own.
Her scent was soap, her taste fresh as rain.
He watched her glide up, the faerie again, soaring on one long spread of wings. As she crested, her eyes opened, met his. And she smiled.
No one had brought her so much, or shown her how much she had to offer. Her body quivered from the thrill of it, and in her heart was the boundless joy of finding home.
She arched up, opened so he wou
ld fill her. As he slid inside her, the beauty dazzled, and the power hummed.
While they took each other, neither noticed the star carved in silver, glowing blue as flame.
She lay over him now, snug under his arm with her cheek upon his chest. It was lovely to hear how his heart still pounded. A kind of rage, she thought, though he'd been the most tender of lovers.
No one could have shown her that kind of caring if there wasn't caring inside.
And that, she thought, closing her eyes, was enough.
"You're cold," he murmured.
"Am not." She snuggled against him and would have frozen to the bone before she let him move. But she lifted her head so she could grin at him.
"Allena Kennedy." His fingers trailed lightly down the back of her neck. "You look smug."
"I feel smug. Do you mind?"
"I would be a foolish man to mind."
She bent down to kiss his chin, a sweet and casual gesture that moved him.
"And Conal O'Neil is not a foolish man. Or is he?" She angled her head. "If we can't go beyond a certain point and walk to the village, wouldn't it follow that no one from the village can come here?"
"I suppose it would."
"Then let's do something foolish. Let's go swim naked in the sea."
"You want to swim naked in the sea?"
"I've always wanted to. I just realized it this minute." She rolled off the cot and tugged at his hand. "Come be foolish with me,
Conal."
"Leannan, the first wave'll flatten you."
"Will not." Leannan. She had no idea what it meant, but it sounded tender, and made her want to dance. She raked both hands through her hair, then the light of challenge lighted her eyes. "Race you."
She darted off like a rabbit and had him scrambling up. "Wait. Damn it, the seas are too rough for you."
Bird bones, he thought, snatching up the blanket on his way. She would crack half a dozen of them in minutes.
No, she didn't run like a rabbit, he realized. She ran like a bloody gazelle, with long, loping strides that had her nearly at the foaming surf. He called out her name, rushing after her. His heart simply stopped when she raced into the water and dived under its towering wall.
"Sweet Jesus."
He'd gotten no farther than the beach when she surfaced, laughing. "Oh, it's cold!" She struggled to the shallows, slicking her hair back, lifted her face, her arms. For the second time his heart stopped, but now it had nothing to do with alarm.
Books by Nora Roberts Page 312
