by Sandra Hill
All she could picture was Stan, naked except for a sheet and a smile.
No, Stan naked except for the smile.
Stan. Naked.
Dana groaned and flopped over on her back, cursing the accompanying chorus. If the man had any decency, he’d be suffering like she was. He was the one who’d started it! The teasing. The smiles. The chocolate frosting he’d insisted on wiping off the corner of her mouth at dinner.
The kisses . . .
He didn’t deserve to have a decent night’s sleep!
With an angry huff and an obnoxiously loud squeal of wood against wood, she flopped on her right side, then, after a moment, back on her left. When that didn’t help, she started counting all the hellish ways she could make him sorry.
After five minutes of disappointing silence when he wondered if Dana had actually managed to fall asleep and, if she had, what that said about his usually irresistible sex appeal, Stan was relieved to hear another wooden shriek from the room next door. The shriek was immediately followed by a hard thunk as her feet hit the floor. The thunk, in its turn, was followed by silence, then the sound of feet—properly shod this time—crossing the floor to the door. Her door to the hallway opened, then shut. A moment later her footsteps faded into silence.
Stan awkwardly got to his feet—he hadn’t considered the challenge that getting up would be when he’d had that teenager dump the mattress on the floor—then scrambled as best he could into his clothes, slipped his feet into his shoes without bothering about socks, and followed Dana.
The hallway was cold and dark; nothing shone beneath the doors he passed. He halted at the sixth door down, startled. Now he knew why the Parkers, under Slick’s encouraging direction, had made such a point of keeping an empty room or two between each occupied room—the Rosses had gotten a bed that was every bit as squeaky as Dana’s.
Stan grinned at the rhythmic squeak-squeak-squeak coming from the couple’s room. If this was what a happy marriage could do for you, even after all these years, he’d have to reconsider his opposition to getting shackled.
Squeak-squeak-squeak.
The sound pursued him down the hall, growing fainter with every step he got closer to Dana.
With every step, his need to find her grew more urgent.
One night with her, that’s all he asked. One long, hot, passionate night in front of the fire, and to hell with the lumps in the mattress.
One night ought to do it. Just a few hours of her—all of her— should be enough take the edge off this hunger that had tormented him from the first moment she’d walked around the corner of her house and into his life.
Not that he wouldn’t want more, of course. He couldn’t imagine settling for just one night with her if he didn’t have to.
And not that he was thinking serious, here, or long-term or anything foolish like that. That wasn’t going to happen. Not to Stan Kijewski. Not if he could help it.
But first he had to find Dana.
She wasn’t in the main hall, but she’d turned on the Christmas tree lights and laid a couple more logs in the fireplace beside the tree. Tiny orange tongues of flame were beginning to stir in the embers and dance across the logs. The lights were reflected in the night-dark windows like jewels on black glass.
The glass-paned doors to the dining hall stood open. A streak of light under the door into the kitchen drew him on.
Dana was just taking a steaming mug out of the microwave when he entered. At the sight of him, she froze.
“Cocoa?” he said. “And you didn’t make any for me?”
“Here’s a cup.” She grabbed a mug from the shelf and set it on the counter in front of him. “Milk’s in the fridge,” she added coolly. “Instant cocoa’s in the can.”
She was trying to freeze him out, but he knew how to handle that. “This mug has a bunny rabbit on it.”
“Easter’s right around the corner. Live with it.”
“This the milk?”
“You’re asking me? And wipe up the spills. I’m not your mother.” Thank God!
“How long do I heat it? How do I turn this thing on?”
“What? You’ve never used a microwave?”
He gave her his best hurt-puppydog look.
She rolled her eyes, then heaved a sigh. “Two minutes. Punch this, and this, and Start. You can manage that, can’t you?”
Stan stifled a grin at the growing irritation in her voice. She was getting hotter by the second. There wasn’t a trace of frost in sight.
He picked up the can of instant cocoa and scowled at the label. “How much cocoa do I add? A cup? Two cups?”
“Oh, for pity’s sake!” She snatched the cup out of his hand and started mixing it herself.
Pleased, Stan leaned back against the counter and watched her work. He could have fixed it himself, of course, but then she would have raced back to her room and locked him out. When you were planning a blitz, you didn’t give the opposing team a chance to grab the ball and run.
Mug in hand, he followed her back to the fire. With a wary glance at him, she settled at the end of the old leather sofa nearest the fire, then tucked her feet up under her.
With a groan, he settled on the opposite end. Fortunately, it wasn’t a very big sofa—two broad cushions that tended to sag toward the middle. Very convenient. And you could slide on leather a lot easier than over cloth.
“Great cocoa.”
She took a sip from her cup and pointedly ignored him.
“Love the tree.”
The tree was spectacular. Just what a Christmas tree should be—a little lopsided and covered from top to bottom with the motley collection of ornaments unearthed from Mike’s boxes, stray items like toy trumpets and plastic teddy bears from the Big-Mart box, and nineteen big, red bows. Wishing ribbons, Morey had called them when he brought out the roll of ribbon, the scissors, and the marking pens. At his insistence, everyone from the Parker twins to the colonel had written their Christmas wish on the ribbons, then tied the bows so the wishes were hidden in the knots.
Stan knew right where Dana’s ribbon was. He’d watched her hang it on that scrawny little branch right there near the bottom, not too far from the slightly lop-sided ribbons that Tyler and Taylor had hung with such care. He hoped it counted with Santa and the elves that he hadn’t pulled hers off and read the wish, like he’d wanted.
Unfortunately, she hadn’t tried to read his, either. Since his wish was to find her in his bed come Christmas morning, maybe it was just as well.
“I always wanted a tree like this,” she said softly. Her knees were drawn up to her chin, her hands clasped around her ankles. Like the boy earlier when she was telling stories, he thought. The memory made him shift uncomfortably on the old sofa.
“I liked your tree,” he offered. “I liked your whole house, actually.”
Her head came up at that. He could see the reflections of the Christmas lights in the corner of her eye.
“Really? You liked the house?”
“Oh, yeah. Great house.” He meant it, and he could tell she knew he did because the tension in her shoulders eased a little and she let go of her ankles. “Thanks.”
“If Beerson’s was anything like White Mountain, the holiday decorations were pretty generic.”
“Yeah, they were. It wasn’t a bad place, though,” she added quickly. “They did their best for us.”
“But there were too many kids and never enough money.”
She nodded. “Guess it was like that at White Mountain, huh?”
“Yeah. If it hadn’t been for Slick and JD, I doubt I’d have made it through high school.”
“And George?”
“George was . . .” He groped for the right words that would explain exactly what George had meant to them, how much he’d done, but there weren’t enough words in the dictionary for that. “George was great. If it hadn’t been for him, the three of us would have ended up in neighboring cells in the state pen. As it was, he had to fish us out
of detention more than once. We must have driven him nuts, yet he was always there for us, every single time.”
She smiled at that, a wide, warm, wonderful smile that spiked right through him. “He told me that you three were his toughest job . . . and his proudest accomplishment.”
“George said that?”
She nodded.
Stan shifted, uncomfortable with the undeserved praise, then winced at a stab of pain in his hip and leg. All this climbing on and off buses—and getting off mattresses on the floor—wasn’t doing his hip any good. Fortunately, Dana was on his right so there wouldn’t be any trouble sliding his good right arm around her . . . if he got the chance.
Under cover of propping his legs on the battered coffee table, he slid closer. Half a cushion to go and he’d have her. Casually, as if he didn’t really notice what he was doing, he stretched his right arm along the back of the sofa. He had to fight against the urge to run his fingers through her hair.
“So George thought we turned out okay after all?”
“He has scrapbooks of all his kids.’ Did you know that? Every single one. But the books for you three are enormous. He’s got programs from Blue Angel demonstrations, newspaper clippings about JD’s exploits, sports articles about you. George swears he doesn’t have to lift weights to keep in shape, he just hauls your books around.”
Guilt slammed him. “We should have come back more often, come visit instead of just calling.”
“He understood. And at least he could watch your games on television. He gave me my first poster of you.”
“You’re first?”
“A poster,” she hastily amended. She wasn’t a very good liar.
Stan slid closer still, close enough so he could catch the scent of flowers in her hair. Creme rinse, he told himself, even though he knew it was really magic. Her magic.
“You said first,” he insisted. He tipped her chin up, forcing her to look at him. “How many other posters do you have?”
“Uh . . . mmm . . .” She chewed on her lower lip, which was a waste, because he should be the one chewing on it. Kissing it. Sucking it. Licking it.
Stan dragged his thoughts back from that dangerous precipice. “How many?
“Eleven?”
He grinned. “You’re asking me?”
“I . . . uh . . .” She was having a hard time breathing.
Good thing he knew how to provide mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. But not yet. Not quite yet.
He shifted slightly, trying to relieve the pressure in his groin. It didn’t work.
“I don’t recall seeing any posters of me in your house.”
“What do you think? That I framed them?”
Stan leaned closer. He was starting to have a hard time breathing. Her eyes were huge, her mouth wet and open for him.
“How many did you frame, Dana?”
She was looking at his mouth, mesmerized. Her breath was quick and warm on his chin. “Three. I only framed three.”
“And where’d you hang ’em, Dana?”
“I . . .”
“In your bedroom?” he murmured, his lips mere inches from hers. The ache in his groin was exquisite. “Did you hang them in your bedroom?”
She closed her eyes, struggling to still her breathing. “Yes.”
His fingers squeezed convulsively around the silken strands of hair he’d captured.
God! He was going to explode if he couldn’t kiss her! But she was still fighting against her need for him. He wanted her to admit that she wanted him, wanted her to recognize that this fire that was between them was right and good and sweet instead of something to be feared.
“Dana?” He said it low. Almost a whisper, definitely a caress.
Gently, he ran the tip of one finger down the side of her face, tracing the delicate curves, the perfect features. The motion hurt a little—he had to lift his hand higher than his damaged shoulder liked—but he was damned if he was going to let go of the golden silk he’d trapped in his right hand.
He had her. He knew he had her. The only thing left was for her to realize that she had him—any way she wanted him.
Instead of kissing him, though, she shifted away from him, and glanced at the tree. If she noticed the grip he had on her hair, she didn’t show it.
“What did you write on your wishing ribbon?” she asked.
“What?”
“Your wishing ribbon,” she repeated, deliberately not looking at him. “What did you write on it?”
“If I told, I might not get my wish. Isn’t that the way it works?” He’d get it. He’d never been more sure of anything in his life.
“Taylor and Tyler, they wished they could stay here always.”
Stan flinched. He wasn’t really in the mood to think about the dreams and hopes of a pair of six-year-olds. Not right now.
On the other hand, he couldn’t help but understand exactly how they felt. Years ago, he’d longed for a home, too, a place he belonged, a family who loved him. The closest he’d come to having that dream was Slick and JD and George. Friends that good and true and strong didn’t come along every day of the week, either, so he guessed he’d been lucky.
Hell, yes! he’d been lucky.
But right now, watching her stare at that Christmas tree, he wondered if maybe, after all these years, there wasn’t a chance for all the rest of it, too.
It was a crazy idea, but somehow, with Dana . . .
“What did you wish for?” he asked, very softly.
Without a word, she tugged her hair free of his fingers and got to her feet—gracefully, like everything else she did. He didn’t have to ask which ribbon it was she plucked from the tree. It was hers.
For an instant, she just stood there, head bent, her back to him, her hair liked liquid gold in the firelight. Then she squared her shoulders and turned to face him, the ribbon tightly clutched in her hands.
“I wished for you.”
I wished for you.
It wasn’t a total lie. She had wished for him. But in writing his name, she’d asked for more, too. Love. Marriage. A home. A family. All the things neither one of them had ever had.
The wish was so big and bold, so . . . so greedy that it took her breath away.
Making a wish that big was asking for trouble. It was dangerous because the minute you risked your heart, life was pretty well sure to take it and stomp it into the ground. She’d learned that the day her mother dropped her off at the Beerson Home, then disappeared without a word of farewell.
Stan would know what that was like.
At least he’d had his friends as well as George. She’d had George and her fantasies. But George had warned her about letting the fantasies be substitutes for the real thing.
“Don’t let wishful thinking run away with your good sense,” he’d told her when she was young and uncertain. “And don’t ever be afraid.”
Now she was grown and she was still uncertain and afraid, and she was definitely letting her wishful thinking get the upper hand, at least when it came to Stan Kijewski.
Right now, she didn’t much care. Right now was now, and Stan was here in front of her, and he wanted her as much as she wanted him. Of that fact, at least, she was absolutely certain.
It was nice to be absolutely certain about something.
The protesting rustle of the ribbon she was crushing brought her back to her senses. What she had left of them, anyway.
With a calm she was far from feeling, she tossed the crumpled bow aside and moved to stand in front of Stan. He was leaning back on the old leather sofa, trying to look casual and sure of himself and not doing nearly as well at it as she would have expected. His hunger for her hit her like a wave.
She leaned forward to prop her hands against the sofa on either side of his head. The old leather was soft against her palms. She caught the faint scratch of his hair against it as he tilted his head back to meet her gaze.
For a moment—for what seemed darn near eternity—they remained li
ke that, their faces a foot apart, the air between their bodies charged with the electric need arcing between them. The only sounds she could hear were the crackling of the fire and their low, too-fast breathing and the pounding of her own heart.
Dredging courage out of the hunger that threatened to consume her, she closed the gap between them. Her mouth crushed down on his, forcing his head deeper into the cushioned back of the sofa.
Stan didn’t seem to mind. He gave a low, growling moan of pleasure, then clamped his hands around her waist and dragged her forward and down until she was on her knees on the sofa, straddling his lap.
His erection pressed against her center, hard and demanding even in the strait jacket of his jeans, yet he let his hands slide up her body, up under her sweater, up the bare skin over her ribs. Not down to the zipper on her jeans. Up.
When his hands closed over her unbound breasts, she gasped and pressed against him. Their mouths were open, their lips still locked in a kiss that threatened to consume her if the heat rising from below didn’t do it first. Tongues touched, tangled, plunged deeper. His hands burned her skin. His palms cupped her breasts, flattening them even as her nipples tightened painfully.
She gasped and broke the kiss, fighting for breath.
“I’ve been driving myself crazy trying to figure out whether you’d be wearing silk or sensible cotton under that baggy sweater,” Stan said, his voice ragged. “I never once thought you’d be wearing nothing at all.”
Her eyes closed against the exquisite pleasure of his touch—he’d shifted his hold on her breasts until her nipples were pinched between his thumbs and the first two fingers of each hand—and the even more exquisite ache where their bodies pressed so close together.
“I want you, Dana. All of you. Now. Please.”
She was a sucker for please.
“Your room?” she whispered, arching into his touch, forcing herself against him. “Or mine?”
“Mine,” he said between gritted teeth. His grin looked a little mad and very, very hungry. “Your bed would make enough noise to wake the dead, let alone all the busybodies in the lodge.”
