Right Of Possession

by Jayne Castle

  light, the possessive satisfaction in his eyes a palpable wave of heat as he drank in the sight of her.

  Reva stared back at him, her wide, questioning eyes reflecting her inner thoughts as the full impact of the situation hit her. What had she done? What had she done?

  "Does this mean," Josh inquired with the wicked humor of a man who knows he's just had his victory handed to him on a platter, "that I no longer have to play sick?" He put out an arrogant hand to rest warmly on her bare stomach, clearly enjoying the feel of her.

  It was not the lead-in statement Reva had expected to the conversation she knew must come, and she blinked her sea-colored eyes as she struggled through its meaning. Surely he hadn't tricked her! She couldn't have been that stupid.

  "What are you talking about, Josh?" she said very carefully, trying to adjust herself to the odd direction of the discussion. She must have misunderstood!

  "I mean that, as much fun as it is lounging around your apartment all day and having you wait on me hand and foot, I think it would be even more amusing if I could revert to my normal, disgustingly healthy self. Not that I haven't enjoyed the cosseting, you understand. It's a rare experience for me and I shall treasure it, but . . ."

  "Josh!" she interrupted with gathering fury, but still managing to keep her temper within bounds, "Have you been lying to me this weekend? You weren't really sick?" She wanted to make very certain of his guilt before unleashing the full force of her abused feelings, she told herself righteously.

  "Not exactly, sweetheart," he murmured, the fingers on her stomach tracing an idle little pattern. "Let's just say I was a little sick to find out I wasn't going to get the hero's welcome I had been expecting."

  Reva struggled to a sitting position, the beginnings of an infuriated glare drawing her fine features into a tight mask. Her eyes deepened their sea shade until they became angry pools in the dim room. Her anger was as much at herself as it was at the man watching her intently, but, being larger, he made the better target, she decided.

  "Hero's welcome!" she bit out tightly. "What on earth gave you the idea you deserved such a welcome? I don't normally go around thanking men who do me favors by letting them into my bed!" She became suddenly aware of her own nudity and snatched up the sheet, holding it to her throat with one hand while she braced herself against the back of the couch with the other. Her hair spilled around her shoulders in a tousled disarray and her eyes blazed.

  "I guess I wanted to be the exception," Josh grinned unrepentantly. He was eyeing her intently, but the hint of wariness she'd seen in his expression from time to time during the weekend was gone. Josh thought himself home at last, she realized bleakly. And that catlike satisfaction was as difficult to fight in him as it had been when she had first seen it in Xavier the night she had relented and given him the first saucer of milk.

  "Then consider yourself rewarded," she hissed spitefully, her chaotic emotions making it difficult to even think straight. What was she going to do now? "You can pack your bag and get out of here," she added vengefully, "because there won't be any follow-up rewards. I can guarantee that! I've been a fool for the past couple of days to be taken in by your little act and I was an even bigger fool tonight, but fortunately that sort of stupidity is curable. Damn you, Josh! How could you do this to me? You said you liked me.... You claimed you wanted to marry me! How could any man who felt anything meaningful for a

  woman trick her and lie to her?" Her voice was threatening to crack, Reva thought, horrified. She mustn't lose her self-control. It would be the ultimate humiliation. She edged farther away from him, dragging the sheet with her. Her eyes were suspiciously damp as she watched him in mingled reproach and fury.

  "Calm down, honey," he smiled soothingly, making no move to stop her from sliding to the edge of the bed. "There's nothing to be upset about and you know it. I had to do something to stop you from kicking me out of your apartment and getting conveniently ill was the only thing that came to mind on the spur of the moment. It gave you a chance to relax and get to know me again, didn't it? For some reason you'd spent the last four months building up a mental barrier against me. You looked absolutely shocked when I found you in that restaurant the other night." He shook his head slightly, as if finding her fears on a par with those of a child.

  "On the contrary," Reva snapped, "I find it extremely upsetting to know what a fool I've made of myself. I can't believe I've gotten myself into such a mess," she groaned, twisting to sit up shakily on the edge of the bed, the sheet wrapped around her. Unable to meet his eyes now she stared fixedly across the room at the Chinese screen that decorated the far wall. "It's that crazy nightmare," she whispered, half to herself. "If it hadn't been for that . . ."

  "You would have still been sleeping peacefully in your own bed and I would have still been sick in the morning," Josh finished gently, as he sat up behind her. With astonishingly sensitive fingers he stroked the line of her spine beneath the partial covering of the sheet and Reva shivered in response. "Now, thanks to your instincts which told you to come looking for me when you're afraid, every-

  thing's out in the open. We can both go on from here. Stop fighting yourself, Reva. You're only wasting time. You belong to me and I'm going to keep you with me. It's all very simple, really."

  "Simple!" She could have wept with bitterness and frustration. "What's simple about it? I keep telling you, Josh, that there's no basis for any kind of lasting relationship between us. We're different, so different. ..."

  "I suppose we are in some ways," he surprised her by admitting in a musing tone. His fingers continued to massage her spine as he talked. "I'm all the things you said I was: hard and ill-mannered at times and perhaps overly aggressive when I'm going after something I want . . ."

  "That's putting it mildly!"

  "And you're softer, more civilized and sophisticated," he went on, ignoring her. "You like the finer things in life and you're accustomed to men who will leave you at your front door with a good-night kiss even though they know there's another man waiting inside."

  "You listened! You were awake when Bruce said good night to me out there in the corridor?" she accused furiously, swiveling around to face him.

  "How could I sleep knowing you were out with another man, even if I was certain you'd be coming home to me?" He shrugged blandly. "Naturally I was awake and I know he simply kissed you good-night and went on his way. Not that I intend to allow even that much in the future," he added with a promising little smile. "But tonight you were lucky. I decided to tolerate it. If he's such a fool as to let you keep me under the same roof, he's really not worth worrying about."

  "Bruce is a very understanding person," Reva defended

  her escort. "I wouldn't expect you to comprehend what that means, of course, but..."

  "It means he's either not very bright or he's gotten a little too sophisticated and soft. Perhaps he's just too young," Josh declared dismissingly. "In any event, it doesn't matter. He's obviously not going to put up much of a fight so I can't get overly concerned. Besides, that's all behind us, Reva."

  "Why didn't you say something when I came in this evening if you were awake?" she gritted, thinking of this man calmly waiting up for her to make sure she came home to him and then turning over and going to sleep. It was enough to annoy any woman, but she wasn't exactly certain why. Surely she hadn't wanted him to make a scene! She hated scenes!

  There was a slight pause as if Josh was not certain whether or not to reply, and then he said neutrally, "The truth is, even though I don't really see your Bruce as a threat, I didn't find the notion of you spending the evening with him particularly good on the nerves or the temper. I didn't want an argument with you that would put you even more on the defensive, so I decided it was best to keep quiet and let you tiptoe off to bed. How was I to know you would take matters into your own two lovely hands and put everything right before the evening was over?"

  "Making a fool out of myself doesn't put things right, Josh. It on
ly complicates them terribly. Why can't you see that? You'll have to leave."

  "I have no intention of leaving. An intelligent man doesn't walk out when he's finally retrieved his treasure," he told her tersely. "But why do you keep saying that? You don't really want me to leave and you know it. You can't make love to a man the way you just made love to me and then decide you've changed your mind again!"

  "Why not?" she whispered bleakly, scanning the crinkling lines at the corners of his eyes and wondering how she was ever going to get herself and her life back to normal. She could not be in love with this man. That's all there was to it. She would not allow it!

  "Reva," he told her with the first touch of harsh impatience in the deep, rough voice, "don't try and convince me you're thinking in terms of a one-night stand. I know you too well."

  "You still think you want marriage?" she husked, looking away from him.

  "It's the only answer for us, Reva. I want a home and you and that means marriage. I've rattled around alone long enough and I'm tired of it. I want a home of my own with a warm and vital woman who will fit me into her life-style even though I'm a little alien to it. I want slippers and a hearth and a huge chair in which I can lounge in the evenings with you on my lap and Xavier at my feet. I don't want to be left out in the cold any longer with only an occasional fleeting encounter to warm my nights. Is that so hard to understand? Perhaps if I'd had all that when I was younger I wouldn't appreciate it or long for it like I do. I know other men my age who go crazy and leave it all behind chasing some brief adventure. But I've had my fill of the adventuring, both physical and emotional. When I found you in that jungle in South America everything crystallized for me. I knew you were my ticket to everything I'd missed."

  "A fixation," Reva said dully. "It's as I said that first night you came back. You've developed some sort of fixation on me."

  "Call it whatever you want," he grated softly. "But you've developed the same for me!" "No!"

  "Then why haven't you told Tanner about the nightmares?" he snapped back instantly. "Why haven't you invited him into your bed, used him to comfort yourself when you woke up afraid!"

  "Stop it, Josh!" Reva begged, her voice ragged with a sense of despair.

  "Not until I finally wring some of the truth out of you," he vowed, moving with a surprising swiftness to wrap one arm around her middle and haul her back into the bed. Startled and painfully angry, she lay beneath him as he anchored her into the bedclothes.

  "Damn it! Take your hands off me!" she ordered, infuriated.

  "You're mine, Reva," he growled, not releasing her. The honey-colored eyes were filled with pure determination and impatience. "I made you mine four months ago and you finally acknowledged it on some level at least when you came looking for me tonight."

  "That's not true! It was the nightmare----" she began

  desperately.

  "And was it the nightmare that brought you out to my bedside last night?" he put in coolly, using his weight quite unmercifully to pin her. His hands framed her tortured face, his thumbs stroking the hair back at her temples. "I could have reached out and taken you then. Did you realize that, Reva? Instead I contented myself with the feel of you trying to soothe my fevered brow." He smiled abruptly. "I was afraid you'd realize I was getting well fairly quickly when you couldn't sense any sign of a temperature, but it was worth the risk to have you show me some compassion."

  "I was worried about you," she explained a little sadly, thinking of her stupidity. "I honestly thought you were sick and you'd seemed restless."

  "I was restless. I had a hell of a time sleeping knowing you were in the other room!" he chuckled with fond wry-ness. "But when you came out to check on me I was afraid to make any move which might frighten you off again, so I relaxed and let you pet me. And my patience paid off, didn't it, little one? Tonight you didn't come out here just to pet me. Tonight you came looking for what we'd had together in that hut."

  "You don't understand," Reva wailed, knowing there were no more lines of defense. How could she begin to explain the fact that she'd crawled into his bed of her own free will? The nightmare tale only went so far as an excuse. And that's all it had been, she admitted to herself. An excuse.

  "You don't understand yourself, honey," he told her, lion eyes gleaming. "But one of these days you will. In the meantime there's no point fighting me and your instincts. I'm like your cat. I've found a home and I've moved in. You'll never be rid of me, Reva." There was undisguised triumph in him and something very female in Reva reacted to it at once.

  "Never, Josh?" she breathed. "What about when you go back to work in Houston?"

  There was a second's blank astonishment in the eyes which glittered so close to her face and she knew a small but despairing sense of success.

  "You'll come with me," he stated matter-of-factly. "You'll have to come with me."

  "I won't, Josh," she whispered with growing certainty. "I once gave up my job for someone I thought loved me and it was a disaster. I'm not about to repeat that disaster for anyone. Especially not someone who's developed some sort of thing about hearth and home. A whim which could disappear overnight."

  "You think I would ask you to give up your life here and come to Texas with me if I didn't intend to take care of you?" he demanded, sounding incensed.

  "I think you mean well at the moment, Josh, but who's to say how you'll feel in a month or two?" He had developed some sort of obsession, constructed some sort of myth about what she represented in his life, Reva told herself over and over. He was not in love with her. Men like this didn't think in terms of love. They thought in terms of possession and desire. She must remember that always. He was much too hard and tough to know the meaning of love. And it wasn't as if she were in love with him, she added silently to herself. Josh Corbett was unique in her life and she could admit, with some shame, to a desire for him which had overwhelmed her this evening. But she could control that. She must.

  "You don't trust me to look after you, Reva?" he asked disbelievingly. The palms framing her face seemed to tighten and she could feel a new tension in him. "Honey, I would never ask you to give up your life here if I wasn't fully committed to taking care of you. You must believe that!"

  "Josh," she sighed bleakly. "There's so much more to it than that. Why is it so easy for a man to ask a woman to give up a career and follow him thousands of miles to a strange place where she'll have to start all over? Do you know what it's like rebuilding a career? It's fine to leave one job for a better position, but to walk out of something good and established and satisfying in the hopes of finding something equal to it is a very traumatic experience."

  "I agree," he said gently. "And it should only be asked in a situation where the man knows his own mind thoroughly and realizes the woman he's asking to make the sacrifice is the one woman for him. I know some men

  probably make the request lightly, unthinkingly, but I'm not one of them. I must have you with me, Reva, and I'm fully prepared to help you absorb the shock of the change. I've got some influence in Houston. I'll be able to help you find another position."

  "That's not the point!" she cried wretchedly. "I don't want to move! I want what I've built here. It's as simple as that. Tell me, Josh, Would you move to Portland for me? Would you give up your job in Houston for the unknowns up here?"

  "Reva, that wouldn't make any sense. I respect the work you do here, but I've got a good, solid hunch my job pays more and if we're going to live on one salary it's only reasonable it should be the larger. Besides, how could I ask you to marry me if I didn't have a job?"

  "You're not answering my question. Yes or no?" she said tightly.

  There was a fractional, almost curious pause before he said in a very low tone, "Are you asking me to do that, Reva?"

  "No!" she flung back at once, sensing moisture behind her eyes as she met his gaze. "No. I would never dream of asking a man to give up everything for me."

  "Why not, Reva?" he said quietly, a tinge o
f remoteness in the set lines of his craggy face. She was very conscious of his weight pressing her deep into the bed and a fleeting, treacherous tendril of thought reminded her of what that weight had been like while they were making love.

  "Because I know that it would be asking too much of any man," she answered in a colorless tone.

  "Asking too much of him because you couldn't make the commitment it would entail? It would mean everything, Reva," he said with a new and rather strange intensity. "I understand that. I realize that some men may have

  become blind to the responsibilities and the depth of the certainty involved, but don't include me in their number. I am as fully conscious of them as you are. And I would not ask you to come with me to Texas unless I was sure of myself and of what we have together."

  "But I am not as sure of us as you are, Josh," Reva sighed wistfully. "We are so different. The risk would be too great. And I can promise you I would not be the perfect little wife while I hunted for another job in Houston," she added with a bitter smile. "I know myself too well after the last experience. I would be resentful and tense and very unhappy. You would soon realize the dream wife you've conjured up in your imagination was only an illusion and then where would I be? If we no longer even had the strength of your .. . your fixation to hold us together we'd have another full-scale disaster on our hands, or, at least, I would have another disaster on my hands," she corrected herself bitterly. "You, of course, would have your work to console you. I would have nothing. Again."

  "You were right," Josh said distantly, thoughtfully. "You really did learn your lesson when you were twenty-five, didn't you?"

  Reva said nothing, only nodded her head once in an agonized kind of way that told its own story.

  "And you're still not prepared to admit what you feel for me, either," he went on slowly. "Even though you're willing to share my bed."

  "It won't happen again," she swore, more to herself than to him. "In spite of the evidence, I do have some self-control!"