by Janet Dailey
“I don’t meant to.” A rueful smile curved the firm line of his lips. “It’s just that ever since you left this afternoon, I’ve been thinking about what we said. Sheila, I can’t wait a year to marry you.”
“It seems like forever,” she agreed with a wistful sigh.
Brad leaned forward, transmitting a sense of urgency. “We don’t have to wait to be married. You’re twenty years old. You don’t need your parents’ consent.”
“I know I don’t, but—”
“What will waiting a year accomplish?” he argued in a persuasive tone. “We don’t have to prove anything to your parents—and definitely not that we love each other. As for their blessing, I wish we could have it, but if they choose to withhold it or attach conditions to it, like this year’s wait, then we can do without it. Once we’re married, they’ll have to accept me.”
“Are you suggesting that we should elope?” She nibbled at her lower lip.
“Yes. I don’t want to wait a year, six months, or even a week,” he declared.
“But what about college, your job? Where will we live?” Sheila found herself arguing.
“I know it isn’t practical or logical to get married now,” Brad admitted, raking his fingers through his thick blond hair. “We should at least wait until summer, when I get my degree, but when was love ever practical or logical? It’s a physical and emotional need.” He breathed in deeply. “I don’t know.” He released the breath in a long sigh. “Maybe it’s not the same for a woman as it is for a man. Maybe you don’t feel these needs as strongly as I do.”
“That’s not true,” she denied quickly. “I do feel them.”
He searched her face for a silent span of seconds. “Do you know how much I want to proclaim to the world that the beautiful woman at my side is my wife, Mrs. Sheila Townsend?”
“As much as I want to hear you say it.” She never guessed that Brad was so romantic, masterful—yes, and even possessive, but she had not glimpsed this traditionally romantic side of him before tonight. It seemed out of character.
“Then let’s run away and get married tomorrow, or no later than the day after. We can drive to Mexico and be married in a matter of hours.”
“I want to, yes—” The upward lilt of uncertainty in her voice kept it from being a total agreement.
“But what?” He spoke the qualifying word that she had only implied.
“I—I need time to think.” Elopement was the obvious solution, but Sheila wasn’t positive it was the only alternative, although it had been the one her mother had chosen.
He captured the hands twisting together in her lap and held them firmly. “If you are worrying about your parents, honey, you are going to have to choose. You either hurt your parents, or you hurt me. They have each other, but I have only you.”
When he put it that way, there was really only one choice she could make. He pulled her forward onto her knees, then slipped his hands around her waist. Sheila’s fingers curled over the muscles of his broad shoulders as she gazed at him.
“Elope with me, Sheila,” he ordered, reverting to the commanding Brad she knew best.
“Yes.” Her acceptance needed no elaboration.
The hands on her spine exerted pressure to draw her down. His mouth closed moistly over hers, tasting the sweetness of her surrender in a tenderly passionate kiss. Sheila warmed to the loving ardor of his caress, its glow spreading through her veins. Never had she dated anyone who was so adept at arousing her desire as Brad was.
His exploring lips trailed over her cheeks and the fluttering gold tips of her lashes. Following the graceful curve of her temple, he nuzzled the lobe of her ear and and the sensitive skin below it before hungrily returning to her mouth. Her senses clamored in a heady response.
Twisting her halfway around, Brad pressed her backward until her head was nestled on the pillow. He continued to plunder the vulnerable softness of her lips while the wayward caress of his hands excited a feverish longing.
When Sheila felt his fingers loosening a button of her scarlet nightshirt, she realized she was losing what little control she had over the situation. The unmade bed was too intimate a setting for a long series of passionate kisses to remain unfulfilled.
“Brad, don’t,” she protested and tried to check his actions.
“Yes,” he insisted and ignored her interfering hands to expertly free the rest of the buttons. He raised his head to look at her, smouldering fires of desire brightening his dark eyes. “I can’t help wanting you, Sheila, and wanting to make love to you.”
All the while he was talking to her in a seductive murmur, his hand was insinuating itself beneath the satin-smooth material of her nightshirt. It slid slowly and instinctively across her ribs to the rounded curve of her naked breast. Sheila felt it swell to his touch as she was unable to control the response of her flesh.
“No.” She pushed ineffectually at his hand.
“Don’t deny me, honey.” His mouth brushed over her lips, teasing with them, while his hand continued to caress the thrusting roundness of her breasts. “You have such beautiful, firm breasts. I want to touch them and see them and know that soon they’ll be mine alone to caress.”
His thumb circled her nipple, then circled it again and again until it was button-hard. She shuddered, the tantalizing caress draining her will. The nightshirt slid to the side, a scarlet backdrop for her naked torso, and she couldn’t force herself to object.
The lamplight illuminated the porcelain globe of her breast and the rosy bud of her nipple to Brad’s burning gaze. He plucked lightly at the hard button, stimulating the nipple to a higher point. Sheila moaned unwillingly, his teasing touch driving her senses wild.
“You like that, don’t you, my spoiled little brat?” His gaze glinted back to her face, his mouth crooking in satisfaction at the feverish glow in her cheeks and the trembling moistness of her panting lips. “It feels good, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, yes,” she breathed in tortured longing.
Her head moved in agitation against the pillow as his fingers stopped playing with her nipple and cupped the underside of her breast to push it upward. Her half-closed eyes saw his head bending toward the rosy point.
“Brad, no, you mustn’t,” Sheila protested and groaned when his lips encircled the pink nib.
His darting tongue licked its hardness, rolling it around, as if savoring the sweetness of a grape. When Brad bit into it lightly. Sheila gasped at the pain, which was strangely pleasurable. Immediately, his mouth opened over the nipple, taking it and its surrounding pink base into his mouth. As he erotically suckled her breast, Sheila felt the aching throb in her loins worsen, the burning emptiness pulsing to be filled.
Unexpectedly, he diverted his attention from her breast to return to her lips. Hard, punishing kisses bruised her mouth, bewildering Sheila as she wasn’t permitted to respond with the passion that was consuming her. Finally, Brad lifted his head, breathing hard, a dark gleam in his eyes that suggested anger.
“I should make love to you,” he said thickly, “here in your own bed, right under your father’s nose. That’s what he deserves.”
His hand glided down the side of her ribs, his exploring fingers encountering the elastic waistband of her panties. He lifted it just enough to slip the tips of his fingers beneath the band and followed its straight line across the quivering muscles of her stomach.
“Brad, no.” This time her denial was definite. The look in his eyes frightened her into protesting in earnest.
His knee forced its way between her legs while his weight pressed her suddenly struggling body against the mattress. Sheila was aware of his superior strength and knew that he could overpower her if he chose to.
Brad laughed softly in his throat. “I’m not going to make love to you—not until you ask me, remember?” He eased his weight from her slightly, no longer pinning her down. “Besides, even if I possessed your body, I’ll never be convinced you are mine until we’re married. Maybe your old-fashioned rules ar
e contagious. Do you have a white dress to wear for the ceremony, my virginal Sheila?”
She relaxed, no longer feeling threatened by him. “I have a white dress. It’s very summery, though.” The dark glow she was accustomed to seeing returned to Brad’s eyes.
“We aren’t going to worry about fashion.” He kissed her cheek and rolled to the side to lie next to her. Self-consciously, Sheila pulled the front of her nightshirt together, missing the mocking twist of his mouth. His finger crooked under her chin and turned it toward him. “You will marry me in Mexico tomorrow, won’t you?” Immediately, he grinned. “Not tomorrow, I guess, since it’s already today, but tomorrow’s tomorrow.”
“No one could stop me,” murmured Sheila with a languorous smile.
“I did some checking tonight while I was on duty. All we need to get married in Mexico is identification and a tourist visa,” Brad explained.
“I have tons of identification,” she assured him, “student card, driver’s license, credit cards, passport. We’re going to be happy together, darling,” she sighed and snuggled into the crook of his arm, gazing dreamily at the ceiling. “I know we are.”
“Before we can make that a reality, we have to be married. And that means we have to make some plans.” He gently pushed her away and sat up. “This is one case in which a prone position is not conducive to thinking.”
Reluctantly, Sheila raised herself up into a half-sitting position against the pillows while Brad sat on the edge of the bed facing her. Flicking a wayward lock of hair from her cheek, she wrapped the nightshirt more securely around her.
“What are the plans?” Sheila asked, certain that he had considered everything before presenting this proposal to her. Brad was thorough in just about everything he did.
“First is the matter of transportation,” he began. “My motorcycle would get us there and back very economically, but traveling almost halfway across the state of Texas would not be very comfortable, not with you and me and our luggage. As much as I hate the idea, logic suggests we should take the car your parents gave you. Is the title in your name? I wouldn’t want us to have any trouble crossing the border with it.”
“It’s solely in my name,” she nodded in assurance, “title, registration, insurance—everything.”
“If we’re going to drive that distance to get married, it would be foolish not to spend a couple days in Mexico on our honeymoon, right?”
“Absolutely.” A wide smile of agreement beamed across her face, topaz eyes sparkling with pleasure. “Where are we going in Mexico?”
“Juárez.”
“Juárez?” Sheila repeated in astonishment. “But that’s a day’s drive from here. Why not cross at Laredo or Eagle Pass? Any place would be closer than Juárez.”
“Keep your voice down.” Brad frowned. “I am well aware of the geographical distances, but there are other considerations to take into account. If your parents do happen to find out what we’re planning and try to stop us, they’ll immediately assume that if we’re crossing the border, we’ll pick one of the closer places you just mentioned. I’m sure it would never occur to your father that I could be so ‘stupid’ as to drive clear to Juárez. It’s a case of reverse psychology,” he finished with a faintly smug quirk of his mouth.
“You might be right.” But it seemed to her that Brad was taking unnecessary precautions. She didn’t like the way he insisted on regarding her parents as villains.
“I know I’m right,” he said decisively, and she didn’t try to argue. Brad reminded Sheila of a little boy playing a game, and she smiled secretly at the thought. “Anyway,” Brad continued, “I know my way around Juárez better than the other border towns.”
“I haven’t been to Cuidad Juárez since I was a child. This time you can act as my tour guide and show me the sights,” she suggested.
“Be glad to.” There was a provocative gleam in his eyes as he ran his gaze over her length, taking in the feminine curves accented by the tightly wrapped scarlet nightshirt and the bare expanse of her long legs. “Providing we don’t spend most of our time pursuing other pleasures.”
Strangely, the implications of his remark didn’t stimulate her desire. It made Sheila feel vaguely uncomfortable.
“We can’t spend all our time in a hotel room.” She attempted an off-handed shrug. “We have to come out sometime to eat.”
“Maybe,” Brad conceded with a faintly leering curl of his lip. He straightened from the bed and took two steps from the edge, his back to Sheila. “But that brings up another matter.”
Sheila tipped her head to the side. “What?”
“Money.”
She stiffened. Their afternoon quarrel was still too recent for her to forget his bitterness and sarcasm on the subject. She stared down at her fingers clutching the front of her gown.
“I thought we weren’t going to talk about that anymore,” Sheila said with taut quietness.
“Believe me, I don’t want to bring it up.” Brad massaged the back of his neck, a grimness in his tone. “This isn’t going to be easy for me to say. I’m practically broke.” He sighed heavily. “This week’s paycheck had to go for rent. I have only a few dollars left to get me by until next week’s payday.”
“Oh.” There was a wealth of understanding in the small word.
“God, I hate this,” Brad muttered beneath his breath, then squared his shoulders. “Sheila, do you have any money of your own—I mean, besides the trust fund you’ll get when you’re twenty-one? I don’t want you going to your father to borrow any money. It would tear my guts out to elope with you on ‘his’ money.”
Sheila felt an initial astonishment. He was actually asking her for money. He had always been adamant, almost neurotically so, about not taking any money from her, regardless of how strapped he was. Now he wanted to use her money for them to get married.
It was a good sign. It meant that she would be able to persuade Brad to use her money and inheritance to further his career without him feeling guilty that he was living off of her. The future looked rosy-bright. Her parents would be upset by the elopement, but Sheila knew they would be won back to her side when her marriage to Brad was presented to them as a fact.
“I have my own money,” she told him, “a savings account my father set up for me with almost ten thousand dollars in it. It’s supposed to be a practical lesson in the value of money to be used for my living expenses this year.”
Brad half-turned to look at her. “But is it yours?”
“Completely my own, with no other signature on the account,” Sheila assured him.
“Good.” He nodded crisply. “We’ll use that, then. You can draw it out tomorrow and we’ll have that obstacle out of the way.”
“What about your job and classes?”
“The classes will have to be skipped and I’ll arrange for Tom to call in sick for me. There isn’t any problem there.” He raked a hand through his thick blond hair. “We both have things to do today. I’d better be leaving so we both can get some sleep.”
“Do you have to go?” Sheila sighed.
“This time.” He nodded. “I’ll meet you this afternoon at four in front of the hotel and we can decide on what time we’ll meet and where.” His mouth touched hers briefly. “And, remember, not a word about our plans to anyone. I’m not going to take any chance of it filtering back to your parents.”
“Yes,” she agreed reluctantly.
“Remember to lock the door,” he said, then smiled broadly. “Just think, honey, in a little more than twenty-four hours we’ll be on our way to Mexico.”
A brief smile touched her lips. When he withdrew his arm from around her shoulders, Sheila felt cold. The disquieting sensation increased as Brad slipped into the night and she closed and locked the door behind him. She was shivering as she crawled into bed. Bridal nerves, Sheila told herself.
Chapter 3
In a Juárez hotel room, Sheila smiled at the telephone receiver. “Yes, that is what I said, Mot
her.” And she repeated the statement she had made seconds ago. “Brad and I were married twenty minutes ago by an official of the Civil Registry.”
Brad stood beside her, his arm curved possessively around her shoulders. Sheila directed her smile to her husband’s handsome face. His touch was warming the confusing coolness that had plagued her all day. In retrospect, her apprehension seemed silly.
“Don’t be so upset, Mother. Brad and I are going to be very happy. We’re going to have a two-day honeymoon in Juárez; then we’ll be home. We simply loved each other too much to wait.”
When the explanations were over, she turned into the circle of Brad’s arms, his hands locking together near the small of her back.
His mouth moved over the thick mane of tawny hair near her forehead. “Were they angry?”
“No,” Sheila answered as she studied the plain gold band on her ring finger. “There weren’t any heavy recriminations, just an unspoken disappointment that we didn’t tell them before.”
“I’m glad.” Brad drew his head back to look at her. “I am glad for you,” he elaborated to remove any indication of hypocrisy that he cared himself.
“So am I,” she agreed before he kissed her.
“The next thing we should do”—he nuzzled the corner of her lips—“is to go down to the hotel lounge and have a couple of margueritas to toast our wedding. From there, we can go to the restaurant and have an intimate dinner by candlelight. I noticed you hardly ate anything when we stopped for lunch, and I don’t want you fainting from hunger later on tonight, Mrs. Townsend.”
“That’s me, isn’t it? Mrs. Townsend,” Sheila realized with a twinge of sobriety. “I’ll have to get used to that.”
“You’d better,” he warned with mock gruffness, tightening the circle of his arms for a threatening instant before releasing her completely. “Put some lipstick on and we’ll go down.” He gave- her a playful slap on the rump as Sheila turned to obey. “Wait a second.” Brad called her back, a rueful twist to his mouth. “My pockets are empty. If you don’t want me to spend our wedding night washing dishes to pay for our dinner, I’ll need the money from your savings account. Give me all of it. There is no sense in taking the chance of someone swiping your purse.”
