by Diana Palmer
She gaped at him. He thought…he thought she was in love with Jim!
He glanced at her, mistaking the astonishment in her eyes. “I always could read you like a book,” he said quietly. “I’ve known all along how you felt about him. I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you.”
She averted her eyes. “I’m sorry things didn’t work out for you,” she seconded. “I…I heard Amanda didn’t come back.”
“Hell, I didn’t want her back,” he said gruffly. “I caught her in her apartment with her photographer. A photographic session, they called it.” He grinned like the old Curry. “First time I’ve ever known it to be done when the photographer and the model had their clothes off.”
“Oh,” she whispered, reddening.
He glanced at her with a raised eyebrow. “It didn’t embarrass me a bit. I took back the ring, wished them luck, and came home.”
“Why didn’t she tell you the truth?”
“Knowing what I’m worth on the market, you can ask that?” he laughed. “My money has powerful attraction for most women, little one, didn’t you know?”
“Only your money?” she asked with a little of her old audacity.
He looked straight into her eyes, and there was something dark and strange and unreadable in his.
“We made sweet fires that afternoon, didn’t we?” he asked her quietly, “and the night before it, too. My women have always been secondhand. It was a first for me as well, touching something innocent, cherishing it…. I’ll never forget how soft your skin was, how eager you were to learn what I ached to teach you that night.”
She licked her lips to take away the dryness, folding her hands before her on the table to stop their trembling.
“It still embarrasses you to talk about it, doesn’t it?” he asked gently.
She nodded, unable to find words enough to answer him. How could she tell him it was the closest she’d ever been to paradise?
“There’s something I’ve got to know,” he said with sudden urgency, one of his lean hands reaching over to clasp both of hers.
“That night…was it me you were kissing, or were you pretending I was Jim Black?”
She framed a reply, but Bessie came in suddenly with the first of the supper, and conversation died away under the smell of fresh greens and perfectly cooked beef.
After supper, Bessie tactfully retired to the kitchen, leaving Curry and Eleanor to sit on the front porch where it was cool and quiet.
She sat down in the porch swing, and he took the place beside her, rocking the swing into a lazy creaking motion.
“I’ve missed you.” He said it quietly, and it sounded genuine. “Miss Maris doesn’t live in. I can’t drag her out of bed at two in the morning to take a letter.” He chuckled.
“I was more accommodating,” she agreed.
He put a careless arm around her shoulders and drew her against him. “Jim doesn’t work you as hard as I did, does he?”
“No.” She let her head rest on his broad chest, relaxing as she heard the slow, heavy beat of his heart under the cotton shirt, felt the warmth of him enveloping her. He smelled of starch and oriental cologne and tobacco, familiar smells that soothed her. This was magic, what was happening now. Magic, to lie against him and feel his breath on her forehead, and know the sweet security of all that lean strength so close to her.
“Bessie says you’re overdoing it,” she murmured against his shirt.
“She’s probably right.” His arm tightened. “I hurt, Norie,” he whispered deeply.
She nuzzled closer, one small hand snaking around his neck to hold him comfortingly. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “Curry, I’m so sorry it didn’t work out for you.”
“Eleanor…” He hesitated, and she felt his other hand come up to tilt her face up to his. “I need you…just for a few minutes…”
She read the hunger in his voice, the ache for what he’d lost, the grief…
“Take what you need, Curry,” she said quietly, her body yielding to his in an unspoken invitation.
“I won’t hurt you…” he whispered unsteadily as he bent to her upturned mouth, feeling it open deliciously as his lips touched it so that the restraint went out of him almost immediately. He lifted her across his knees and kissed her like a drowning man who never expected to feel a woman’s softness again. There was desperation in the rough mouth invading hers, urgency. His arms contracted and hurt her, bringing a soft moan from her lips.
“I’m sorry,” he bit off against her mouth, relaxing his hold just a little. “Oh, God, I want you so, Norie! I want you so!”
“I can’t,” she whispered brokenly.
“I’m not asking you to,” he said in a husky voice. “I’d never ask that of you.”
“But, you said…”
He brought her closer, tucking her face into his throat as he rocked the swing back into motion, cradling her soft body against him in a silence thick with hunger.
“Men are such damned fools,” he whispered gruffly. “We never seem to know what we want until it’s too late.”
“You…you could take her back, you know,” she murmured miserably.
“Hell could freeze over, too,” he replied. He moved her body against his sensuously. “Soft,” he whispered, “soft, like down where you touch me.”
She felt the tremors trickling down the length of her body, new and narcotic. “Don’t,” she protested weakly.
“Another first, little innocent?” he asked at her ear. His mouth slid down to her throat, whispering warmly against it. His hand slid up her rib cage slowly, feeling her tense and surge up against him as his fingers spread out delicately against her softness. She moaned and tried to draw away.
“You let me do it once,” he reminded her softly, “and not through two layers of cloth.”
“Curry, don’t,” she pleaded unsteadily.
“Did you ever let him touch you that way?”
“I’ve never let anybody…!” she protested, falling right into the trap.
She felt the smile she couldn’t see as he gathered her close again and sat just holding her in the darkness.
“I’ve got to go,” she murmured.
His arms tightened possessively. “In a little while. Not yet. Not yet, Jadebud.”
She swallowed down the emotions he was arousing. “More games, Curry?” she asked bitterly. “Isn’t that where you suggest, casually, that I might like to pack up my broken heart and come back to work for you?”
He stiffened like steel against her.
She pushed away from him and got to her feet. “That’s just what I thought,” she said, reading his reaction. “Sorry, I’m not the naïve little girl I used to be, thanks to you.”
“No, by God, you’re not,” he replied, rising to tower over her angrily. “You’ve turned into a hard, cynical little hellcat who can’t see the forest for the trees. Go back to him and eat your heart out. God knows there’s only one way I want you, and it wouldn’t be worth the effort at that!”
He turned on his heel and went into his den, slamming the door behind him.
The days seemed to go by in a haze after that. Eleanor felt as if she’d been torn in two, and the half that was left just barely functioned at all. She didn’t think she could ever forget the whip in Curry’s deep voice as he’d told her bluntly that there was only one way he wanted her, but it wouldn’t be worth the effort. Not that she hadn’t known that all along. It was so obvious.
But what had he meant, she couldn’t see the forest for the trees? That had puzzled her. That, and the fact that he really thought she was in love with Jim. If only it had been true. Loving Curry was a one-way ticket to heartache. She couldn’t stop. It had become a way of life over the years, and life without him was as flat as a soft drink left out in the sun.
Every afternoon, she had Decker saddle a horse for her, and she rode. Sometimes it was for a few minutes, others, for an hour or two. And wherever she went on the property that joined Curry’s, her
eyes searched for him. She’d have given blood for just a glimpse of that tall, commanding figure in the saddle. But it never seemed to happen that way. At least, not at first.
Then, finally, two weeks after the stormy scene with him, she was riding along the banks of the river when he came upon her on his black stallion, an unexpected confrontation that made her heart race as she drew the chestnut to a halt under a spreading oak.
His eyes were cold as they drifted over her slender figure in jeans and a cool blue cotton blouse.
“Lost?” Curry asked gruffly, a smoking cigarette held loosely between the fingers on his pommel.
She shook her head. “Just riding,” she murmured.
“On my land,” he told her narrowly.
“I…I thought the river was the boundary,” she said in a subdued tone, her eyes drawn involuntarily to the hard masculine lines of his face under the brim of his hat.
“It is, most of the way. But not here.” He leaned forward, studying her. “You’ve lost weight,” he remarked quietly. “A lot of it. Doesn’t Black feed you?”
“I eat,” she replied. She studied his haggard face. “You don’t look so terrific yourself.”
“I’m pining away for my lost love, didn’t you know?” He laughed bitterly. “When’s the wedding?”
“Next week. You’re invited.”
“No thanks,” he replied flatly. “I can’t stomach the damned ceremonies. What a hell of a way to get a woman into bed.”
“He loves her, Curry,” she said, meeting his gaze levelly.
“You’d better believe he wants her as well,” he returned. “Loving and wanting go together, little girl, for all that you’d like to believe they’re completely unrelated.”
“I thought you were the one making comparisons between love and the tooth fairy,” Eleanor reminded him.
“In the beginning, I did.” His pale eyes stared blankly at the river. “I was wrong.”
Her heart ached for him. He was hurting in a way she never thought to see him hurt. She hadn’t realized how much he’d loved Amanda.
“Oh, Curry, go to her,” she said gently, compassion in the look she gave him. “Don’t let pride do this to you. Maybe she’s just as lonely as you are, did you think about that?”
He stared at her unseeingly. “Pride doesn’t have anything to do with it, Jadebud,” he said softly. “She doesn’t love me.”
He said it so simply. She doesn’t love me. And the pain was in every syllable, in his eyes, his voice, the hardness of his face.
She dropped her own eyes. “I’m sorry.”
He drew a deep breath. “So am I. Don’t you want to try and console me, little girl?” he asked. “We could console each other. A night in my bed might make your path a little easier, too. I’d make damned sure you didn’t have any regrets.”
She gazed at him quietly. “Do you think that little of me, after all this time?” she asked him. “Is that all I am now, a body to satisfy a passing urge?”
His eyes traced her body carelessly. “What would you like, a declaration of passionate love and a promise of marriage?”
Her eyes flashed. “Not from you, thanks!”
“Don’t worry, I’m not that blind yet!” he flashed back at her, his eyes cruel.
She flinched. “Excuse me,” she said in a choked tone. “I forgot. You’ve told me so many times how undesirable I am, I shouldn’t have had any trouble remembering.” She whirled the chestnut and started back the way she came, whipping the animal into a gallop as she reached the pasture.
Her eyes were misty with tears, and she was leaning over the horse’s neck, wild to get as far away from Curry as quickly as she could, and she didn’t see the gopher hole. Neither did the furiously moving animal, until it caught him and threw him, with Eleanor landing underneath.
The last sensation she had was of crushing pain, and then merciful blackness and oblivion.
The first thing she was aware of was the pressure on her chest. Not hard, not crushing, but pressing against her. There was a voice, too, with anguish in it, murmuring words she couldn’t understand, whispering things. Hands touched her, caressed her, and always and forever came that deep, husky voice.
Through the mists of pain, her hands reached up, and buried themselves in thick, cool hair. It was a head pressed against her breasts, hands gripping her back while a voice pleaded with her not to leave him. She couldn’t understand who would do that, unless it was her friend Jim….
She licked her parched lips and tried to make a sound. “Jim?” she whispered hoarsely. “Jim?”
The head stilled against her, the hands stiffened and bit into her, hurting her soft flesh. Then the warm contact was suddenly gone, and she wondered vaguely if she’d dreamed it all as she dropped back off again.
A light burned against her eyes. Little by little she came back to consciousness to see a man in a white coat bending over her with a tiny light in a steel cylinder. When her eyes opened, he stood erect and smiled down at her reassuringly.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
She searched herself. “My head hurts,” she murmured. She moved in the crisp confines of the white-sheeted bed. “I’m sore…all over.”
“I’m not surprised. A horse fell on you.” The man, who was obviously a doctor, went out the door and a few seconds later Curry came in. He bent over her, meeting her curious gaze with stormy, dark eyes.
“Are you all right, honey?” he asked softly. “The doctor says I can take you home now as long as someone stays with you for the rest of the night.”
She nodded. “Please, I’d like to go home…but, Curry, where is home?” she murmured disorientedly.
“Wherever I am, Eleanor.” He brushed the wild, tumbled hair away from her face. “For now, at least. Come on, baby, let’s see if you can sit up.”
Bessie was waiting on the porch when Curry carried Eleanor up the steps and into the house.
“Hello, sweet,” she said, patting the young girl’s shoulder. “What can I bring up?”
“Some water and ice,” Curry told her. “You’ll have to get her into a gown for me.”
“I’ll get right to it.”
Curry climbed the stairs, holding her close against his taut body, and she leaned back against his broad chest and watched him every step of the way, her eyes quiet and loving.
He looked down into them once and quickly looked away.
“Jim? Will you call him?” she asked.
His jaw clenched. “I already have. I told him I’d take care of you, and he asked me to keep him posted. He’s not coming over, if that’s what you hoped,” he added gruffly.
“I wouldn’t expect him to,” Eleanor said gently. “Curry, I’m sorry I was so stupid….”
“I drove you to it,” he said wearily. “I’ve done nothing but hurt you for weeks.”
She traced a pattern on his shirt with a sharp nail. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Norie, don’t touch me like that,” he said in a haunted tone, and she noticed that his breath was suddenly ragged. She looked up in time to see the flash of desire that darkened his eyes as they glanced into hers.
Her lips parted with the strange hungers she was feeling, the dazed condition of her mind making her careless, reckless, as the nearness of him worked on her.
“Like what, Curry?” she whispered, letting her hand slide inside his shirt against the blazing rough warmth of his chest, tangling her fingers in the mat of hair.
A shudder went through him and he crushed her in his arms, bruising her against his body as he went through the doorway to her bedroom and all but threw her onto the bed. He stood over her, breathing harshly, looking down at her with eyes that made her hungry.
“What are you trying to do?” he asked harshly.
She turned her face away from the accusation in his and buried it in the cool pillow. Her head hurt, her heart felt as if it had been blown into splinters.
“I don’t know,” she whispered shakenly.
“I…I wanted to touch you….”
“You took a pretty hard blow on the head,” he said tightly. “You’ve had a mild concussion, baby, it makes you do things you wouldn’t normally do.”
“That’s so,” she managed shakily. “I’d never beg you to make love to me if I was myself.”
There was a long, static pause. “Is that what you wanted?”
She nodded, her fingers gripping the pillow like a lifeline.
“So that you could pretend I was Jim Black?” he asked bitterly.
“I know who you are, Curry,” she told the pillow. She swallowed. “Don’t mind me, I’m crazy, isn’t that what the doctor told you? Out of my mind with a concussion, and loony. You’d better go before I get up and try to tear your clothes off.”
He chuckled softly. “Baby, I’d let you,” he said gently. “Any time, any place. But I think it might be better if you healed a little more first, because you’re too weak right now for what would happen next.”
She barely heard him. Her dizzy mind was whirling right away from her, and the last thing she heard was the sound of her name being whispered very close to her ear.
She woke up the next morning feeling like a new woman, with no sign of headache, no other symptoms of the concussion she’d suffered.
Her eyes swept the room and found an ashtray beside her bed with a number of cigarette butts in it. She frowned. Only Curry could have done it, but why would he have been sitting by her bed?
The door opened while she sat there puzzling, and she turned her head and looked straight into Curry’s amused eyes. He had a mug of coffee in his hand, which he set beside the bed, his eyes tracing the soft lines of her body which were visible through the thin nylon gown.
She followed the direction of his eyes and suddenly jerked the sheet up to her throat with red cheeks.
“Isn’t it a little late for that?” he murmured. “I sat here and watched you for the better part of the night. You’re very restless in your sleep, little one.”
The gown was a little large, and the straps had a disconcerting habit of slipping off even when she was awake. Asleep…she met his teasing gaze and realized that he’d seen a lot more than the gown. The blush travelled down to her neck.
