"Jarrod, you know that was different."
"Maybe, but when you woke up you didn't move your arms. And you stared at me for a full half hour before curling those long legs around me and going back to sleep."
Catherine gasped. "You were awake!" Her ears burned with embarrassment.
He said nothing.
"Why didn't you say something?"
"From where I lay, words were totally unnecessary.''
"Jarrod, you know what happened was unintentional. And we're home now. We cannot stay together here."
Catherine needed to forget that morning in Montana. She was warm with feelings she had no right to even think about, let alone know and understand. She'd let her defenses down for that short period. She'd looked at Jarrod as a woman who could fall in love. She never dreamed he was aware of her.
"Why not'"
"Think about it, Jarrod. Where do we put your clothes, in the guest room? Then every morning you can get up, make the bed and come to my room before Jenny and Christian arrive to cook us breakfast."
"Isn't it usually the other way around?"
"This is serious, Jarrod."
"Catherine, it's not the end of the world. What are the consequences if we don't share a room?" Jarrod stared her.
"Audrey will know." Why wasn't he taking this seriously? "Jenny will mention it to someone and Audrey will find out. She'll tell my mother. The two of them will think we're arguing, and it's too soon for that."
"Then you'll have to tell them this is all a pretense and we'll need to return all those gifts." He indicated the stack that flanked the wall and extended out until there was little room to negotiate around them. "And all of Newport will know about our scam."
His sarcasm irritated Catherine. "You're not going to try and help me, are you?"
"In sickness and in health, darling. In sickness and in health. . ." He dangled the vow at her.
Jenny came in then with their meals. She set plates in front of them with succulent London Broil under a light gravy, parsley potatoes and asparagus arranged for both visual appreciation and ease of hunger. The aroma caught Catherine's attention and her stomach growled in anticipation. She didn't know if Jenny had felt the tension in the room before she left. It was the first time Catherine actually felt that Jarrod was truly trying to work against her. And she had no idea why.
They ate in silence. The food was every bit as good as it looked. Unfortunately, it didn't solve their problem.
"We'll work it out, Catherine," he said when they finished eating.
"Would you like coffee?" Jenny reentered.
"I'll have it in the den," Jarrod answered immediately. "I have to make some phone calls."
"None for me," Catherine said.
Jenny left again, and they both stood to leave the room. Catherine walked a few steps in front of Jarrod.
"How?" she asked, turning back. "How can we work this out?"
"We could fire them," Jarrod suggested. Catherine's head snapped up to look at Jarrod. His expression belied his words. "Or we could sleep in the same room." He dropped a kiss on her surprised mouth and left her.
Catherine stopped as he walked across the hall. Why had he done that? Said that? She looked toward the den. She couldn't see it from here. She should go there and—what, she asked herself. He was only trying to shock her. She'd engineered this farce. Jarrod was telling her it was her problem. She could solve it herself.
Anger seized her. Catherine wanted to throw something. She settled for stamping her foot and heading up the stairs. Jenny snapped her suitcase closed as she walked into the room.
"Oh," Catherine said, surprised. "I was going to do that."
Jenny smiled, as if Catherine should know unpacking was no longer her job. "Ms. Audrey instructed me to move your winter things to the attic and make room for Mr. Greene." She picked up a card from the dresser and handed it to Catherine. On it, again in her sister's handwriting, only this time meticulously printed, was an apparent diagram of the dressers and closets. Where Jenny should hang clothes or place things like lingerie, socks, Jarrod's shirts and her panty hose.
"Thank you, Jenny." Catherine dismissed her.
Alone, she steamed. The nerve. The gall of her sister to go so far as to organize her underwear.
***
“My mother says hello." Jarrod startled her. Catherine hadn't realized she was standing in the middle of the room. She had no recollection of how long she had stood there.
"How is she?"
"She invited us to lunch tomorrow."
"Oh," she said, distracted.
"Catherine?" Jarrod must have noticed her absent-mindedness. "Are you all right?"
"I've made up the guest room." She sounded as if she was beginning a conversation in the middle. "You can sleep there. It was where I always intended."
Jarrod came into the room. She stopped talking at his approach. She wanted to move. For some reason she wanted to run, but something wouldn't let her. Jarrod wouldn't let her. He was holding her in place as surely as if he touched her.
"You sleep here?" Jarrod looked around the room. Catherine resisted following his gaze. Behind her was the bed, and she didn't want to look at it.
She nodded.
"And you never want to be married. For-real married?"
She shook her head.
"Why such a big bed, then?"
She had to look around. Her bed was king-sized, with a padded headboard. It had a green-and-white comforter covering the mattresses that matched the wallpaper on one wall, the curtains and the tablecloth on a circular table that sat in front of a window. The room had a fireplace with a fantail screen covering it. The dark cherry dresser and armoire left plenty of room to move around, but Catherine felt as if the air was being pumped out of it.
"I need plenty of room when I sleep," she answered, then remembered their earlier conversation. Jarrod thankfully let her comment pass.
"What time will they come in the morning?" He changed the subject to Jenny and Christian.
"I don't know."
"Well good night, wife. I'll see you in the morning." He walked to the door. "Early morning."
She was going to have to get used to his parting comments. It seemed Jarrod was back to his teasing ways. He'd always done it, but she'd forgotten that in the last few weeks. Returning home tonight, it was as if their time in Montana was lost forever. They were home, and at home this was how they acted. For a moment she was lost in the Montana sky, with the stars hanging overhead and Jarrod cradling her on the landing.
She pulled a drawer open to get a nightgown. Jarrod's underwear lay where her gowns used to be. Catherine stared at the garments. They weren't cotton boxers, BVDs or Fruit of the Loom underwear. They were bikini briefs in leopard-skin silk, bright red, navy blue and midnight black. She picked them up, feeling like a voyeur sneaking into someone's private world, but the excitement that aroused her took control over everything else in her mind.
Put them back, Catherine told herself. She should close the drawer and consult the card to find out where her gowns were, but she was fascinated by Jarrod's choices. She admitted she'd never thought of him in underwear. If she thought of him under his clothing, her mind went straight to naked skin. She understood now why men got aroused over women's underwear. This was more than erotic. It was downright sinful. Thoughts of Jarrod wearing this flimsy fabric made her nipples harden.
"I think you'd better give those to me."
Catherine jumped. Jarrod stood in the doorway.
"I came for my razor and toothbrush, but I think I'd better take that too."
"Jarrod, do you wear these?" She didn't intend to say that. "I'm sorry. I—"
"Yes," he interrupted with a single nod.
Catherine didn't move, but Jarrod came in and took the garment she was holding. She didn't let go. The two of them each kept a piece, like a bond between them.
"My gowns," she started. "They're. . .Jenny unpacked. . . she mo
ved. . .I didn't mean to. . ."
Jarrod didn't say anything. His eyes searched her face. Catherine stopped babbling and remained standing under his gaze. Her throat went dry, but she didn't swallow. She was afraid to move. She felt as if there was some invisible casing around them, something so fragile and light that even a breath could destroy it.
She looked into Jarrod's eyes. There was no anger there, no humor or confusion. Something else looked back at her, something soft and dark and mysteriously inviting. She knew exactly what it was. They'd been avoiding it since he returned to Rhode Island. It sparked in the gazebo. On their honeymoon, it was the kiss in front of the fire and the long night of holding each other in the hall. Now they were home, alone and together. Showdown, Catherine thought.
The space between them shortened of its own volition, or maybe she moved toward him. She couldn't tell. She only knew Jarrod moved his hand, the one holding hers. He twisted it around her back, circling her waist and pulling her against him. She felt his body heat through her clothes. Her breath came slower. She was conscious of it, dragging it into her lungs to keep from suffocating.
His free hand touched her face and his mouth lingered over hers for a moment. Catherine stared at him. She couldn't take her eyes away. She didn't want to. She wanted nothing more than to remain here, with his arm around her and his body pressed to hers. He didn't kiss her, but dropped his mouth to within a centimeter of touching her. Only a moment passed before he moved back. He didn't move away, only deviated an inch. The lingering scent of his aftershave clung to him. It was an exotic fragrance to her senses, potent on its own. She felt it take her senses, her defenses, and weave them in a tantalizing smoke that curled about her, drawing her nearer to him as if it were a rope coiling about them in ever-closing circles.
Jarrod continued his teasing dance while she stared into his eyes and leaned into his kiss just as he moved away. The cat-and-mouse action made her want to end the game. Then his lips touched hers. Her eyes closed and fire exploded in her head. It traveled the full length of her, running down her neck and passing into her chest, flooding through her arms, into her stomach and through both legs until it warmed even her toes. She swayed in his arms, turning into the kiss.
Letting go of the silky bikinis, Catherine didn't see them flutter to the floor. Her arms wound around Jarrod's neck and shudders raced through her. Every one of the things she remembered about Jarrod rushed into her mind as his tongue filled her mouth. The way he looked at her as they sat on the beach during the summers before he left. The smile he offered her when they'd run into each other jogging. Why had she never seen the truth in his eyes? Why had she refused to acknowledge the playfulness for what it was—a disguise for true feelings?
Catherine felt his whole body pressing into hers. Jarrod overtopped her by six inches, yet she fit perfectly into every contour of his body. His hands banded her back, gathering her as close to him as he could get her without squeezing the life out of her. They slid over her features, down her torso and over her hips. She felt her body burn in the path made by his hands. Then they were under her sweater, on her skin. She sighed at the pleasure that fissured through her when warm skin met warmer skin.
Her knees grew weak. Jarrod supported her with his arms. She felt as if her clothes would either melt or spontaneously combust. Jarrod raised his hands under her sweater until they brushed over her breasts. Catherine bit her lip, trying to remain solid. Her body wanted to liquify. He pulled the garment over her head. It and her hair fell at the same time. The sweater dropped to the floor while her hair cascaded over her shoulders and hung down her back.
"Cathy," Jarrod said on a guttural breath. Then, as he had when they entered the house, he lifted her and carried her to the threshold of the bed. Slowly he lowered her onto the coverlet and sat with her. He kept his arms around her waist. Her arms remained around his neck. "I want you, Cathy, more than I thought possible."
His kiss wasn't sweet this time, but hungry, potent, demanding. Catherine met it with her own need. Her heart raced, blood rocketed through her body like out of control lightning. Jarrod slipped the hooks of her bra free, unlocking the lace cloth that held her breasts from him. Slipping the straps down her arms, he followed the offending fabric until his mouth closed over her nipple. She clung to him for support and to continue the wonderful sensation that spread through her. He pressed her back and removed her jeans. In a flash, he took off his own clothes and joined her on the bed. Catherine thought of nothing except the present, the here and now, the raging emotion that came over her when he joined with her.
It had been a long time since any man touched her, and she felt as if it was the first time. Jarrod's body was hard, muscular. She smoothed her palms over his arms, his back, down his legs, the moon-shaped curve of his buttocks. She felt the snap in him, the eddy of control that tried to contain the whirlpool of passion that matched the storm raging inside her.
With one fluid movement, he spread her legs and entered her. Catherine bit her lip to keep from crying out. Rapture as bright and electric as any thunderstorm sent shockwaves through her.
"Jarrod!" she cried, unable to contain the word. Jarrod sank completely into her. Catherine called his name again. His body filled her, her legs moving to increase the pleasure. Jarrod's mouth covered hers as his hands lifted her, keeping her close to him, joined to him in the most intimate way, in the ways of man and woman since the first man met the first woman. Catherine was first. She felt first, felt as if she and Jarrod were the only ones to walk this path, the only ones to know each other, know the experience of giving and taking pleasure, reveling in rapture, intimate with the knowledge of the fathers and the mothers, the only ones to taste the sweet waters of life and understand its meaning.
Catherine writhed back and forth, lost in the realm of time that suspended Jarrod and herself. She met Jarrod, taking his body into hers and loving the feel, accepting the hardness of his legs, the powerful thrust of his body as it met hers, joined hers, annexed, bridged, associated, cemented, intertwined with hers as if the two of them were the only perfect fit in the whole universe. Millions upon millions of combinations of couples on earth, and the two of them had been lucky enough to discover each other, discover the secret of coming together, the secret of being made one.
Catherine's body convulsed. She clung tighter to him, unable to control herself, digging deeper, accepting the pleasure-giving sacrifice Jarrod offered, taking what she needed, wanting what he gave. Jarrod found the chord in her, the central core that, if touched, would drive her to a burning river of need. Jarrod knew where it resided, knew that he alone had the ability to take her to the heights of desire, suspend her over the abyss of explosion that rose like a colossal wave and shattered into a spangle of lights simultaneously pressed deeply onto all her pleasure points, overloading her with the supreme rapture that only he could elicit.
On a knife-edge between pleasure and pain, Catherine dangled, sure at any moment that her life would end. No one could stand this kind of torture, this enchantment that robbed her of everything except the dying vow that it wouldn't stop.
Catherine heard a scream. She was surprised to realize it was her voice. Blessed release came. Jarrod collapsed on her. Her body was drenched in sweat and her arms were around him, crushing him to her and holding on to the feeling that shrouded her in its midst, a feeling that Jarrod had produced in her. One that only the two of them would ever know.
***
Jarrod woke reaching for Catherine. He didn't open his eyes. He didn't want to destroy the euphoria that overtook him at the memory of making love to her. His hand found her naked body and pulled her into his arms. He aligned his legs with hers, his body with hers. She was as warm as brandy and he was instantly aroused. Catherine took his hand and drew it to her breasts. Jarrod relaxed, smelling her hair, feeling the strong, steady beat of her heart.
It hadn't been what he expected. It was indescribably better than anything his mind could conceive
, design or build. No experience equaled it or matched what had happened to them when they made love. Catherine was incomparable. He could associate cement to natural rock, bridges to skyscrapers, lemon cake to lemon meringue, even Catherine's lopsided croissants to a three-tiered cake from any of Audrey's caterers, but for Catherine there was nothing in his arousal that gave him an inkling of what being with her was going to be like.
At this moment Jarrod took back all the jokes he'd ever played on her, retracted all the awful things he'd ever said and thought about her. At this moment, all he wanted to do was go on holding her for the rest of his life.
He wondered when it had happened. It wasn't in the swing at Audrey's, although that was a catalyst that triggered the feelings he'd been hiding. He knew now there had always been something in him that wanted Catherine. It was the reason he teased her, joked with her. It was the reason he never tired of her presence in a room, and the reason he often found himself sitting with her when there was a storm brewing or they were alone without an audience. He wanted her attention, so he got it in the only way he knew how. He played jokes. The jokes were over now. There were hundreds of things he wanted to do with Catherine. Joking was only one of them, and this time he wanted to joke with her, not make her the butt of the amusement.
Jarrod moved his hand over her breast. Her nipple pebbled and she murmured a sleepy sound. He snuggled closer to her. Their combined heat made the rose scent stronger. Roses in Winter. He had a name for what she reminded him of. Under the covers, with the aftermath of love redolent in the air, glowing embers in the fireplace, and Catherine's body hot in his arms, Jarrod wished he could bottle the fragrance, open it at any time and bring this feeling, this Catherine to his mind.
She stretched against him, her bottom against his belly, brushing his erection and causing his stomach to tighten. Jarrod ran his hand over her smooth, even skin, extending it down her shapely legs and back to repeat the procedure, feeling the shudder that passed through her.
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