by Sandra Brown
“Takes one to know one,” she said, gouging him in the ribs. “I'll bet you were a regular hellion when you were seven.”
“When I had time to be,” he said pensively. He speared her with a look from his amber eyes that meant he demanded the truth about what he was about to ask. “Why didn't you and James have a baby?”
Startled, she floundered. “Well… there … there was hardly time. He … he died a Utile past our first anniversary.”
“Had you planned to have children?”
Why she didn't tell him it was none of his damned business she didn't know. She heard herself answer, “Yes, sometime in the future we planned to have a family.”
Josh's whole body seemed to sag with relief. Though he had draped an arm around her shoulders, she hadn't realized how tense he'd been until she felt the rigid muscles relax against her. “I wanted to have kids.” He wasn't looking at her now, but at the two youngsters hamming it up on the stage.
Speaking around the hard lump in her throat, Megan asked, “Why didn't you marry and have them?”
“I was close once, but”—he shrugged laconically—“things didn't work out.”
“With Laura.” He nodded tersely. “She's a lovely woman, Josh. I like her.”
“I didn't know you knew her.” He turned away from the stage and faced her. She had his total attention again.
“I don't really. We visited today while you were playing golf. She talked about you.”
“What did she say?” he asked quietly, though Megan could hear him even over thunderous applause as the boys returned to their beaming parents.
“That you were a kind man. That you regretted having to hurt her. That you were unselfish.”
“Did she tell you why I had to hurt and disappoint her?” She nodded, but couldn't speak. “Why was that, Megan? What did Laura tell you?”
“She said you were in love with a married woman.” The words scraped past her throat, pricking it like barbs.
“That's right.”
Oh, Lord, why was he doing this to her? It didn't matter, it didn't matter. The statement reverberated in her head, but it had no meaning. It mattered more than she could have imagined. The revelation brought more pain than she'd ever known.
“I'm still in love with her.”
“I see.”
“No, you don't, but you're getting close.” His enigmatic words brought her eyes up to his. His scarred brow was arched in what she could only interpret as mischievousness. There was a curl of suppressed laughter at the corner of his mouth. “She's no longer married.”
Suddenly rage roiled through her, taking with it every misplaced tender emotion that had been collecting for the past two days. Her back stiffened. “Then why have you put the big make on me? Why didn't you bring her with you this weekend and leave me in peace? You're loathsome, do you know that? A mean, sick—”
He gripped her arms tight and shook her slightly to stop her tirade. “Megan, stop it!” he commanded. She turned her head away and squeezed her eyes shut.
His grip became tighter. “Didn't Laura tell you when I broke our engagement?”
Still refusing to look at him, she said acidly, “No. I didn't want to know. I didn't care. I don't care.”
“The day after you buried James.”
Nine
As she brought her head slowly around to face him, her mouth formed a moue of incredulity. She opened her eyes wide as she stared up into his smiling face.
“You mean… I…?”
His eyes, sparkling like gems as his hands lightened the pressure on her upper arms, congratulated her on her brilliant deduction. “I meant what I said earlier today. I didn't take kindly to your marrying James. I had just found the woman I'd been looking for all my life. That you were about to become another man's wife didn't keep me from loving you, only having you.” He steered her away from the crowd, which was breaking up now that the singer was doing his finale for the evening. “Let's go home,” he suggested softly.
As they walked back to the car, he continued to explain. “About eight months after your wedding someone arranged a blind date for Laura and me. I wasn't enthusiastic about going. I wasn't enthusiastic about anything during that time.” He hugged her tighter. “But I liked Laura's pleasant disposition and the fact that she didn't make any demands on me.”
He unlocked the passenger door of the borrowed car, and Megan slid inside. In the brief seconds it took him to come around to his side, she drew in several deep breaths. It couldn't be. It just couldn't be! Was Joshua Bennett actually telling her that he loved her?
He started the ignition and navigated the car out of Harbor Town before he spoke again. “I began seeing more of Laura. I wanted children. I wasn't getting any younger. She expressed a similar desire to settle down and have a home and family. Your marriage seemed to be solid. I thought you were lost to me forever. I asked Laura to marry me.”
The night was absolutely black, unrelieved by any sizeable moon. The stars winked brightly overhead, but they could hardly penetrate the network of tree branches in the thick woods lining the two-lane road.
Megan was grateful for the darkness. It hid her features from the man who was killing her with every word. It was a painless death, a marvelous one, yet she was dying just the same.
“Some intuition, I don't know-what, made me ask Laura to keep our betrothal quiet for a while. Then in a few weeks, before we even made our engagement public, James was dead.”
“And I was free,” Megan whispered.
He parked the car as near the bungalow as possible. The cessation of the motor's throb sent a blanketing silence over them. “And you were free. The day after the funeral I told Laura I couldn't marry her. I thought she was entitled to an explanation. I didn't identify you, but I guess she figured it out.”
He turned toward Megan, his clothes rustling against the car seat. His fingers sifted through the windblown hair lying against her cheek. “I knew it would take a long time, Megan, for you to accept me as anything but an interloper, a womanizer, an opportunist.”
He shook his head in wry amusement. “That kiss we shared in the gazebo was one of the high points of my life, yet I cursed myself daily for it. You pegged me as a man who would dally with his friend's fiancée; you couldn't see me in any other light. You let your low opinion of me be known all too well each time I tried to contact you after the funeral. I finally realized that the harder I tried to see you, the more stubborn you were going to be.”
He kissed her swiftly on the brow. “That's not an indictment, only a statement of fact. So, as hard as it was, I backed off and waited. I granted you three years. I was willing to wait.”
Conflicting emotions battled inside Megan. She didn't know whether to rail against him, tell him he was accurate about her unaltered opinion of him, or succumb to the persuasive touch of his fingers trailing the lacy border of her sundress, which plunged seductively between her breasts. His lips at the corner of her mouth were relentless in their persuasion.
She never made a conscious decision. When he turned her toward him, she melted against his heated length. As much as the confinement of the car would allow, she molded her body along his, feeling his passion against her thigh and knowing that hers was just as strong.
“Don't make me wait any longer, Megan,” he urged in a horse whisper.
He helped her out of the car and hurried her across the stretch of lawn. His arm was around her waist, cupping her breast lightly where it lay bare beneath the navy-and-white dotted swiss. They stumbled across the yard, laughing nervously at their eagerness.
They pulled up short when they saw two shadows sitting on lawn chairs at the front of the quadraplex. One of the shadows stood up, and Terry Bishop's voice called out to them. “There you are. Gayla and I were just about to give up on you. We thought a game of bridge would be fun.”
The Bishops thought it would be fun until three-thirty in the morning, when a gloating Gayla gathered up the penny winnings for
her and her partner, Megan. Looking at each other wistfully, she and Josh said a chaste good night.
They got a late start the next morning, sleeping in after their long evening. Since it was their last full day on Hilton Head, they wanted to cram in as many activities as possible but not wear themselves out before the grand formal banquet that night.
Josh called room service and had breakfast catered to Megan's patio. They wanted to take advantage of the amenities of Seascape, yet remain as private as possible. “What should we do first?” he asked, his teeth sinking into a crisp, cool slice of honeydew melon.
“I haven't tried out that mammoth pool,” she said. His shirt was open, and the morning breeze stirred the hair on his chest. She envisioned her own breath blowing on it softly to see what tantalizing displacements she could make. It was an enchanting daydream.
“The pool it is, but I hope the suit you wore yesterday isn't the only one you brought.”
“No, why?”
Without releasing her eyes from his, he rose from his chair and came around to her side of the small glass-topped table. Without the least compunction, he placed his hands over her breasts, which were unfettered under the loose caftan of rainbow-striped muslin. He leaned over her until his mouth was at the back of her ear. “It's all right for you to entice my baser instincts, but I don't want you enticing anyone else's. I don't intend to share these with anyone.”
Hours later, blushingly reflecting on his words, she wondered why she hadn't taken exception to his propriety air, as she once would have done. Formerly her back would have bowed and her hackles would have risen and in dressing him down her tongue would have been as quick and as deadly as a viper's. Instead she had basked in the heat of his possessive claim.
After lounging at the pool and soaking up a couple hours’ of sun, they toured the tennis courts. But rather than opting for a match, they checked out a bicycle built for two and struck out along one of the myriad bike trails that crisscrossed Hilton Head.
After several hilarious minutes while they tried to match each other's timing on the pedals, they got the hang of it. Beneath the trees, the bike path was shady and the breeze cool.
“You're not nearly as uncoordinated as I thought you were at first,” Josh told Megan over his shoulder. He had taken the front seat, bragging that he knew better how to steer.
“Watch out for that dip!” she shouted. He whipped his head around in time to avoid catastrophe, but their recklessness set off another round of playfully insulting banter. At a secluded spot on the trail, Josh braked the bicycle and hauled her off. He propped the bike against a tree. “Let's take a walk.”
“Isn't that what one gangster says to another gangster when he parks the car beside the woods?” she teased. Despite her suspicions, she thrashed along behind him through the forest of trees and undergrowth.
“Yeah. Prepare yourself for the kiss of death.”
He braced her against a tree and secured her there with his own body. One arm closed around her waist while the other hand supported her jaw. His mouth came down on her firmly, completely, hotly.
His tongue probed her mouth with delicious thrusts, alternately forceful and gentle. When hers joined the play, boldly investigating the inside of his lips, his groan of satisfaction was like a sweet symphony in her ears. Her fingers traveled up and down the muscles of his back and, after several expeditions, her hands rested at his waist.
He had placed their feet so that one of his knees was snuggled between her thighs and one of hers between his. They both were wearing shorts, and static crackled along Megan's nerves, shocking her, electrifying her. Josh moved his knee slightly, and the soft hair sprinkling it tickled her sensitized skin. When she slid her thigh upward, he moaned her name and buried his face in the curve between her neck and shoulder.
“Megan, that feels so good. Do it again. Higher.” When she obliged him, his mouth opened ardently over her throat and his tongue stroked a message of love. “Your skin is so soft against mine,” he rasped. “I can't wait to have all of you naked beneath me.”
He pulled back to look at her, and his eyes went straight to her chest. She had pulled on a pair of shorts over her maillot, and the peacock-blue nylon did not conceal the shape of her breasts and their impudent crowns. Josh ducked his head and kissed one button-like nipple. His lips turned inward, and he plucked at it gently.
“Oh, Josh, please.” She didn't know if she was begging him to stop now or never. Perhaps her action spoke more eloquently. Her hands slid down to grip hard die flexing muscles of his buttocks as his hips rotated over her. He pumped against her rhythmically. She found a bare patch of skin on the back of his thigh and squeezed tightly.
“Sweet heaven!” he cried, and backed away from her. For long moments he gulped in air and blinked his eyes as though to rid them of an obscuring veil.
When his reason returned, he grinned down at her with chagrin. “I'm going to grow very old and very gray very fast if we have too many more of these close calls.” He heaved a sigh. “But I don't want to make love to you for the first time on a bed of pine needles. We'd better go back to the bike.” As he took her hand, he mumbled, “It's a long walk back to Seascape. I hope nobody's stolen it.”
Indeed, when they came through the last barrier of trees, a couple was scrutinizing the bicycle. There was no chance of their stealing it, for they were each on one of their own. They were surveying the edge of the woods with concern. When the young man saw Josh and Megan emerging, he said in a friendly fashion, “We found your bike deserted. Everything all right? No one hurt or anything?”
“Naw,” Josh said expansively. “She only had to tinkle and was too scared to go in the woods by herself.”
Megan squealed a protest and kicked him soundly in the shin. The other couple pedaled away, laughing as Josh danced on one foot, holding the other leg, and Megan rattled off all the reasons she thought him diabolical.
As Megan walked into Seascape's Grand Ballroom, she saw mat the chandeliers were subtly lit, so that they barely shimmered above the dozens of tables covered with powder-blue linen cloths. Each table was graced by a centerpiece of spring flowers in varying colors.
No longer covered with suntan lotion, but with expensive imported fragrances, the guests at Seascape's grand opening had discarded their play clothes and swimsuits and donned their finery.
Laura Wray, in vermilion chiffon, looked like an angel only slightly fallen from grace. At Terry's insistence, Jo Hampson had been flown in for this night. She wore a copy of a Valentino blouse that was made solely of white organza ruffles, and a red taffeta tulip skirt. It wasn't an outfit Megan would have chosen for the woman's overripe figure, but Jo couldn't look dowdy if she tried. They greeted each other warmly, and Jo haphazardly filled Megan in on what had happened in the office during her absence. Gayla Bishop trailed yards of beaded gold satin that didn't need the strands of diamonds hung around her neck.
Megan felt like the most stunning woman in the room when she met Josh's ardent gaze. When he had escorted her in, a hush had fallen over the room. “Damn those wolves,” he'd growled. “I wish their eyes would fall out of their heads. Don't you have a scarf or something?” But his querulousness hadn't bothered her.
As with all the new items she'd bought for her wardrobe before leaving on the trip, she'd purchased this dress because of its sexiness. The tight long sleeves and bodice were black crepe. Where it attached to the tulle, it was cut into petal shapes that seemed to have barely climbed up an invisible vine to cling to her breasts. Beneath the sheer tulle, her skin, sun-kissed now, shone warm, and inviting.
She wore black satin high-heeled sandals. Her only jewelry was the diamond studs in her ears. Her hair was pulled to the top of her head in a seemingly careless knot Soft, curling tendrils lay coyly on her neck.
Her flustered hand now reached up to tuck a vagrant strand of hair back into her topknot in a gesture meant to cover her nervousness. She had wanted everyone to notice her and Josh toge
ther, but now that the time was here, she wished they weren't so public a couple.
Apparently Josh did too. Once they had circulated and said their hellos, he chose a table away from the others, near the back of the room, where the lighting was dimmer.
“Dance?” he asked softly, and pulled her slowly into his arms. Once they were absorbed into the mass of other swaying couples, he said into her ear, “I really didn't want to dance, because then I can't look at you. But it was the only way I could think of holding you and getting away with it.”
She was caught up in the magic of the beautiful room, of the music played by a string orchestra, of the night that was softly tropical. Most of all, she was enthralled by Josh.
He was a paragon of masculinity, in his black tuxedo and pleated shirt with onyx studs. He'd been dressed like this the first time she'd seen him, and the sight of him affected her just as strongly now as then. Now she knew that the passionate nature only hinted at beneath the austere clothing was real.
Now she knew the texture of his hair, which was silvered at the temples but carelessly, boyishly styled. She knew the cut of the tuxedo wasn't deceptive, that the broad muscles it intimated were actually here. She knew well the feel of his hard chest as it conformed to her soft shape.
“Move … ah, there that's it. Yes, right there.”
Megan caught her breath sharply. With the merest pressure of his hand on her back he had positioned her to cushion the iron proof of his need.
“Now close your eyes and imagine that we're not here at all, but lying naked on your bed. I'm loving you in time to the music. You're just about to take me inside you. And we move, slowly at first, then faster. We make love, again and again.”
Megan's cheeks flamed and her heart pounded at his audacious words. By the end of the dance she was drunk, inebriated by his masculine essence, intoxicated by the picture he'd painted. He led her back through the maze of tables, his dark scowl discouraging any other man who might consider himself a potential dance partner for her.
