"I'd like to make it to the bed this time," he growled, "but if you do that again, we'll be lucky to make it out of this room."
She looked up at him with a languorous, contented smile that made him smile back with nothing less than pure, male satisfaction.
"I've never felt so lucky," she murmured, moving to repeat the action, laving a path across the muscled curve of his chest to his other nipple, circling it with her tongue until the flat disc puckered and she heard him groan.
He made it to the bed, yanked back the covers and put her down gently. She let her hand trail down his side as he released her, a sliding, brushing caress that made him shiver.
"Remember what you said?" he asked huskily.
"I said a lot of things."
"You said we could go slow later." He stretched out beside her, throwing one leg over hers, cupping a breast in his palm while his thumb crept up to tease her nipple to erect tautness. "It's later, Nicole. And this is going to be very, very slow." He bent to circle that hard little peak with his tongue. "And it's going to take most of that night you said we had."
And it was. And it did.
Somewhere, far away, an alarm clock went off. Nicki murmured a protest, and was pleasantly surprised when the noise stopped. She huddled back into the covers, snuggling up to the heater she was sleeping with, reaching out for the mists of sleep once more.
Her heater was making odd, rumbling noises. She tried to ignore it, but despite her efforts the noises coalesced into almost familiar sounds to her numbed mind. Almost words. Her heater was talking. Because her heater was Travis.
That startled her out of the deep sleep she'd been in, to a still groggy semi-awareness. She realized she was on her side, tucked into the curve of his body at her back. Her head was pillowed on his arm, and she could feel the solid, strong length of him. Just as she had all night.
Color crept up into her cheeks as she remembered last night. Remembered everything he'd done to her, and how she'd responded so fiercely, so wantonly. And then how she'd taken everything he'd taught her about pleasure in the dark and put it to use on him in the dim light of dawn. And how he'd responded in the same way, with a wildness that gave her a sense of feminine power she'd never known before.
He'd been right, she thought. It had been meant to be. That's why it had never been right before, with anyone else. She'd told him, in the moments before they'd at last drifted into an exhausted, sated sleep, about her single, rather grim experiment while in college.
She'd been tracing circles across his chest, through the sweat still sheening his skin from his last explosive climax, when he had shown her how to ride him so sweetly it made her soar to heights she hadn't known were possible.
"I hated it," she told him. "I never wanted to try again. I thought it was just me. After that, when somebody kissed me and I didn't feel anything, I knew there was something wrong with me." Her hand slid down and came to a stop, lying flat on his belly. "But it was just that it wasn't you."
He'd whispered her name and held her close, until, feeling safer than she could ever remember, she'd slipped into sleep. A sleep that had lasted until that darned alarm had sounded. But if it was an alarm, why was he talking to it?
Because it had been the phone, dummy, she told herself, at last surrendering her grip on both sleep and the sweet, hot memories that had flooded her. That was why he was twisted partly away from her now, leaving her shoulders cold and forlorn. She started to move toward his heat again, then stopped. She must have been, on some subconscious level unclouded by sleep and memory, hearing him for some time, for she realized that what he was saying was what had stopped her.
Or rather, how he was saying it.
"I know, Chuck. But I can't do anything about it right now. Things are going to have to stay long distance for now."
He was keeping his voice low, and his head turned away from her to keep, she supposed, from waking her.
"You'll just have to handle it. I'll call him this afternoon and explain. What about the Chandler deal?"
A pause, then. "All right. Let's go for it. Express the forms here. I'll sign them and have them back to you by the next day."
He shifted slightly, adjusting the receiver. "I know, Chuck. I'll try to get back there next weekend. Just hold the fort for me until then, will you? What else?"
She felt him tense behind her, then heard him say, a bit louder, "She what?" He listened for a moment, then she felt a chuckle rumble up from his chest, but he smothered it before it got past his lips. "I should have known." Another pause. "Yes, she is. And you will, I hope."
She lay still as he hung up the phone. He didn't move for a long moment. Then he leaned over to press a gentle kiss on her tangled hair before he disentangled his legs from hers and slipped carefully out of the bed. She heard him moving quietly around the room, felt a rustling at the foot of the bed, but she didn't move.
She didn't understand this. Any of it. Whoever had been on the phone had obviously been waiting to talk to him. Waiting for decisions. And Travis had answered him like a man used to making decisions. And giving orders.
She lay there, turning it over in her mind, until she couldn't stay still anymore. She sat up, glancing around to see if there was a clock on either bedside table. It was there next to the phone, reading a late—for her these days—seven o'clock.
She swung her feet to the floor and stood up, color tinging her cheeks as she became aware of some sore spots on her body she'd never felt before. She looked around the room, wondering if she could find her way back to the bathroom where her clothes were no doubt lying tangled with his on the floor. Then she saw the robe lying across the foot of the bed, and realized what he had done earlier. Touched by his thoughtfulness, she slipped it on.
And stopped still, breathing in the mixture of woodsy after-shave and masculine scent that meant Travis clinging to the thick gray velour. And the memories of the night came rushing back once more as she stood huddled in the garment that he'd worn.
It swam on her, trailing on the floor and over her hands, making her realize again just how big, how strong, how solid the man was, the man she'd turned her body over to for his pleasure, and her own.
After a moment she was able to move again, and padded downstairs, following her nose. He looked over his shoulder at her the moment she stepped into the kitchen, led by the smell of the coffee he was brewing.
"Hi," he said, a soft smile curving his mouth. His hair was tousled, his feet were bare below his jeans, and he looked utterly, boyishly adorable. Except for the fact that he was shirtless, and the muscled expanse of his bare chest was anything but boyish. And made her remember how it felt under her hands. And her mouth.
Stop it, she told herself firmly, or you're going to be hotter than that coffee.
She walked toward him, eyeing with a frown the bruise on his cheekbone, and the worst of the marks on his chest that were already purpling. "Are you all right?"
He grinned, that flashing, devilish grin, and if she'd thought it had incredible effects on her before, after last night it was indescribable.
"I never felt better in my life," he said, and she blushed.
He reached out to touch her hair, and she wished suddenly that she'd tracked down a hairbrush somewhere. It had been wet from the bath, then tangled by his fingers most of the night, until it had dried in a flyaway mass that was probably untamable.
"You look beautiful," he said softly. "All sleepy-eyed, with your hair mussed like it was last night."
He said it as if he'd known exactly what she was thinking about, and a tiny spurt of heat flashed through her. Okay, she muttered inwardly, forget the hairbrush.
"I was hoping you were still asleep," he said. "I was going to bring you breakfast."
She looked at the plate he had out, her throat tightening when she saw her favorite English muffins smeared with boysenberry jam. Even this he'd remembered.
"Thank you," she said. Or tried to; it came out a little squeakily. Sh
e sat in the chair he indicated, leaning out of his way as he shoved aside some papers that were piled on the bar. Among them she saw the distinctively striped cardboard envelopes from one of the express delivery companies she occasionally used.
Odd, she thought. He'd said the owner only used the house rarely, yet this was obviously a pile of business correspondence. Then she noticed the top express envelope was addressed to him. Her brow creased.
"Nicole? Are you all right?"
She nodded, reaching hastily for the muffin he'd slid over to her. She had to jerk her arm back when the too big sleeve of the robe headed straight for the jam. Her elbow hit the pile of papers, sending them sliding sideways. With a sigh she reached for them, straightened them, then turned up the sleeve of the robe before reaching for the muffin he'd fixed.
And stopped dead when something midway down in that stack of papers caught her eye. A letter. On letterhead stationery. With a logo she had spent a long time staring at in her office. The logo that summoned up all those long-ago memories of summer days in the shady cocoon of her tree.
She frowned, puzzled. Her gaze was drawn by the small yellow stick-on note at the bottom of the letter. "T—For your signature." it said.
With the speed of a row of toppling dominoes, the pieces fell into place. And the untouched muffin dropped back to the plate. Slowly, she lifted her gaze to his face.
"Travis?"
Her tight, strained tone had his attention immediately. He set down the coffeepot and looked at her. "What?"
"Who's Chuck?"
She saw his jaw tighten, and his eyes flicked instinctively toward the stairway. "You were awake."
"Who is he?"
"He's… I work with him."
She grimaced at the vagueness. "What's his last name?"
He took a deep breath. He studied his coffee cup. He brushed away an imaginary crumb. He let the breath out, closing his eyes. And then, with an expression that told her he knew exactly what he was about to do, that he dreaded it but was going to do it anyway, he told her.
"Howell."
A tiny gasp escaped her, not of surprise but of stunned confirmation. Her eyes searched out that betraying piece of paper, with the graceful, flowing logo in the corner, printed in the exact green of its inspiration.
"Oh, God. Willow Tree. Willow Tree Corporation. I should have guessed."
"Nicole—"
"I heard how you talked to him. Like a boss. His boss. And he's a vice president." She shivered. "And I guess I know what that makes you."
He let out a long, taut breath. "Nicole, I—"
"Why didn't you tell me? Why did you lie about—"
"I told you I've never lied to you. I couldn't lie to you."
She laughed harshly. "Oh, no? The car—"
"It's a company car. Just like I said."
"And everything else?"
"It's all true. It's just not all of the truth."
"A fine line, isn't it? Why did you let me think … what I thought?"
His head came up sharply then. "Why did I let you think what you wanted to? What I knew you were going to think, that I was a—how does Richard put it, a peon? Just a guy breaking his back with honest, physical labor because that's all he knows how to do? That's what you thought, isn't it? What you assumed, with all that Lockwood assurance?"
"What was I supposed to think?"
"Exactly that," he said, bitterness tinging his voice.
"Travis—"
"Well, I've been just that. I started at the bottom, literally. I've dug ditches, carried garbage, all of it. And I'm not ashamed of it, either."
"Did you think I would be? Why didn't you tell me?"
"Why? Because I'm about sick to death of never being good enough for the Lockwoods. And damned if I was going to buy my way in with who I am now."
"The president of Willow Tree Corporation."
He met her eyes evenly. "Yes."
She looked at him, her heart and mind so full of whirling thoughts and emotions that it was long, silent moment before she could speak.
"You were always good enough for the real Lockwoods, Travis," she said softly. "It was only you who didn't think so."
She'd taken the wind right out of his angry sails. She'd made him remember all the time he'd spent wrestling with his feelings of inadequacy back then, feelings he'd thought long behind him. He stared into the dark circle of his cooling coffee.
"I didn't want you to know," he said at last, "because I was afraid you might… That it might make a difference to you."
"You thought I'd play some kind of phony game, lie about how I felt? So tell me, Mr. Halloran, did I pass your little test? Does last night earn me the right to know who you are really are?"
The coffee in the cup sloshed as he jerked around to face her. "Stop it! Damn it, last night had nothing to do with any of this!"
"God, I want to believe that."
"Believe it. You said it, Nicole. Just us. You and me. Nothing else." His hand clenched around the cup as he stared down into it once more. "Don't defile what we had last night. It was good and pure and right, and nothing can change that."
"That's what I thought. Before I realized that you … thought you had to keep this a secret from me. You have a pretty high opinion of me, don't you?" she finished sardonically.
"Yes," he said, confirming her words, not the tone. "But I learned the hard way to expect the worst, too."
The hard way. He'd done everything the hard way, she thought. He'd had to. It was a moment before she could speak.
"I've read so much about Willow Tree, before we made this bid… How could I not have come across your name?"
She heard him take a breath. "I… Not many people know who I am. Those who do, know I try and stay out of the limelight. And my people do as I say. The last thing I want is a bunch of stories about the boy from the wrong side of the tracks made good. Or about my … record. That's behind me. I want to keep it that way."
She stared at his bent head, for some reason her eyes fastening on the nape of his neck below the thick tangle of dark hair. It made him seem oddly vulnerable, and brought back with a rush the moments when she feared she'd lost him forever. The hurt of his lack of trust still stung, but when she thought of all the reasons he had not to trust, her anger drained away.
"Will you … tell me now?"
The sudden softness in her voice made him lift his gaze to her face, his eyes searching. As if he'd found something in her expression that decided him, he nodded.
"Let's go outside."
She followed him out to the deck that rimmed the ocean side of the house; the salt air carried on the morning breeze and it felt wonderful. The sound of the surf was steady, rhythmic in the distance.
He dropped down on one of the lounges, lifting the leg that had been bruised the most yesterday and stretching it out straight. He rubbed at it as if it were bothering him, and she remembered how she had gently washed the cut on that knee last night. And what had happened next.
She turned her face toward the ocean before he could see the heat pinken her cheeks.
"I haven't kept any of the money from Lockwood," he said suddenly, as if she'd accused him.
She stared at him blankly. "What?"
"It's in an escrow account. It will revert to the company when the six months is up."
With a pang she remembered her nasty words that first day, about him being so successful that he didn't need the Lockwood money. Never would she have guessed how close her angry jab had struck to the truth. Willow Tree. It still stunned her.
"How, Travis?" she repeated.
He gave a self-conscious chuckle. "I don't know where to start."
"Try the beginning."
He ran a finger around the rim of his cup, then lifted his head to stare out at the blue Pacific. The breeze lifted the tousled strands of his hair, then abated to leave them tossed over his forehead.
"I'm not exactly sure where that is," he said at last.
; "Did you… You were still in school when…"
She trailed off awkwardly, and he chuckled again, a little sourly this time.
"Yes, I finished high school. The youth authority doesn't give you much choice. You went, you cooperated, or you wound up in lock-down. A couple of weeks of that, never even seeing the outside, and cooperation was a small price to pay."
She shivered; she never felt so naive as when he talked about this.
"I was … lucky, though, I suppose. There was a teacher there, one they brought in from outside. He helped me. He kind of adopted me as his charity case of the year—"
He broke off, shaking his head. "No, I don't mean that. Larry was sincere. And he really did help. When I finished the high school requirements, he made sure I got into the advanced classes. And he got me on the furlough program, so I could work outside… I think I would have gone crazy, except for that."
She could think of nothing to say. She'd never been able to deal with the thought of him caged, and she couldn't now.
"Anyway, he got me a job with a construction crew that was building a junior college about thirty miles away. His brother-in-law was the contractor. And when I got out, they hired me."
When he didn't go on, she prodded. "And?"
He shrugged. "You wanted the beginning. I guess that was it."
"Travis," she said warningly.
His mouth curved into a rueful smile. "Not enough, huh?"
"No."
He sighed. "Yes, ma'am," he said dutifully, "but there's really not much more to it. When Bill hired me, it was part of a deal with his brother-in-law. I could work for him as long as I kept going to school." He shrugged again. "So I worked on one part of the college all day, and went to classes in the other part at night."
"That must have been tough."
"I didn't mind. It kept me from thinking too much. I was too tired most of the time."
She didn't have to ask what he hadn't wanted to think about; she knew. She'd spent enough time herself not thinking about it. That old, familiar ache rose in her, but he went on easily enough.
SUSPICION'S GATE Page 19
