Notorious

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  “Okay.” She swallowed and tried another smile, but it faltered. “Back to basics?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re leaving after this, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah.”

  Her grip tightened on his back and she closed her eyes. “I thought so,” she whispered, her voice choked.

  “Keely, open your eyes.”

  She shook her head.

  “Please.”

  Her lashes fluttered upward, and her eyes glistened with tears.

  Those tears hit him like a fist in the gut. “You’re crying,” he said, his throat raw.

  Her voice was tight. “I think I have something in my eye.”

  “Bull. You don’t want this to end any more than I do.”

  “It has to end.” Her voice quivered. “I can’t go back.”

  His heart sank. “To the ranch?”

  “To the ranch, to my family, to my old life, to anything.”

  She didn’t think he was worth the sacrifice. He could beg her to change her mind. And then what? Convince her to live a life she didn’t want because he couldn’t imagine giving her up? No.

  “I guess this is it, then,” he said.

  “Yes, this is it.”

  “Well, you’d better hang on, sweetheart, because it’s gonna be one hell of a goodbye.” He began slowly, making each stroke count, and even her tears couldn’t put out the flame in her eyes. “You know this is about more than sex,” he murmured.

  She didn’t reply, but the flame burned brighter.

  “It’s about more than games and thrills.” He increased the pace, building that flame. She cared about him, damn it. He could see that she did. “It’s about more than orgasms.”

  Tears dribbled from the corners of her eyes, and her gasps sounded almost like sobs, but she kept her eyes open and her gaze locked with his.

  “But if I can’t give you anything else, at least I can give you that.” Shifting his angle slightly, he came in high and tight, stroking relentlessly now, drawing broken cries of pleasure from her lips. “Good, isn’t it?”

  “Yes!” she cried, helpless in her need.

  “The best, right?”

  “Yes, oh…yes.” She met him thrust for thrust.

  “Even just the basics.”

  Her fingers dug into his back. “I love…the basics,” she said, panting.

  His heart wept. She’d nearly said it. “I love…the basics, too,” he murmured.

  “Oh, Noah…Noah…now!”

  As she tightened around him and pushed upward, he spiraled out of control with a groan of surrender—to his passion, to Keely, to a future that would not include this flame-haired woman. Shuddering, he held her close and gulped back a sob of frustration. It was over.

  KEELY STAYED IN BED, cocooned in the covers while Noah dressed. Part of the time she watched him and part of the time she closed her eyes and battled tears. The gutsy move would be to get up and put her clothes on, too, but she couldn’t bear to leave the haven they’d shared for so many hours. She wanted to stay here for as long as his scent remained in the sheets.

  They’d had lots of sex in this room, but they’d only made love once, this last time. That cataclysmic event had nearly destroyed her. Their love, unspoken but real, was incredibly beautiful and absolutely hopeless.

  Oh, if they could live their days in this room, if they never had to put on the clothes that branded each of them with the roles they’d chosen, then they might be able to make a go of their relationship. He’d just proved to her that they’d crossed into a whole other realm, one in which the mating of bodies was overshadowed by the joining of souls.

  But they couldn’t live in this room, and he was already dressed in the clothes of his chosen profession. Buckling his belt, he went in search of his hat. He was headed back to his ranch, and she had a story to finish for the magazine. In the real world they’d make each other miserable. She had to let him go.

  He might think he wanted her around, but good sex had muddled his brain. Maybe, in the hot flush of desire, he’d imagined that he could mold her into the kind of rural woman he needed by his side. She, on the other hand, had never even considered asking Noah to become a city man.

  As if he ever could. He stood in the middle of the hotel room smoothing the brim of his black hat, his long legs tucked into denim, his broad shoulders covered in soft chambray. He might own a computer and understand the principles of investing in the stock market, but in his heart he was a cowboy.

  And she loved him that way. She wouldn’t urbanize Noah even if she had the power.

  He looked at her for a long moment. “I’ll stop by the desk and settle up with them about the sheet.”

  She propped herself up against the headboard while holding the bedspread over her breasts. They’d dared everything with each other, and yet nudity seemed inappropriate now. “What are you going to say?”

  A faint smile touched his mouth, the mouth she would never kiss again. “I’ll tell them we each took a strip of it for a souvenir.”

  “That’s an idea.”

  He pulled a rolled strip of white material out of his back pocket and showed it to her. “I thought so.”

  She stared at the piece of sheet he’d carefully preserved and meant to take home with him. For some reason, that sentimental gesture got to her more than anything else, and she swallowed several times, praying she wouldn’t break down.

  “I have to go,” he said softly.

  She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

  “I’d better not kiss you goodbye, or I’ll never leave.”

  She cleared her throat. “Okay.” She clutched the bedspread and tried to breathe normally.

  He walked toward the door.

  In that moment she imagined how a condemned person must feel in the last few seconds of life. She’d known heaven today. In less than a minute she’d know hell.

  Perhaps she could make things easier for herself if she looked away while he twisted open the dead bolt and reached for the doorknob. But instead, she watched every move, cherishing each second that he remained.

  He turned the knob and opened the door. She braced herself. Then, slowly, he closed the door again and faced her. Her heart thundered with new hope, even though she couldn’t imagine that he’d found a solution.

  “At least come to B.J. and Jonas’s wedding,” he said.

  Her heart twisted with agony. The wedding. Of course. What had she expected, that he’d fall to his knees and declare he couldn’t live without her? That only happened in the movies. Somehow she managed to speak around the lump in her throat. “I’d only cause problems.”

  He shook his head. “I really think B.J. would love to have you there, and so would Arch.”

  She didn’t know where she found the reserves to discuss this with him, but she dug deep and came up with a reasonably coherent response. “I haven’t spoken to either of them for ten years. I can’t just waltz in there in the middle of B.J.’s big day. That wouldn’t be fair to anyone.” And loving Noah as she did, she’d want to touch him, hold him, make love to him. Knowing that she couldn’t would be torture.

  “All right,” he said quietly. “What if I mentioned to them that I ran into you and—”

  She started. “Noah, you can’t be planning to tell them what we—”

  “No. I wouldn’t do that, Keely. What we’ve done this weekend is our own private business.”

  “Thank you.” The panic quieted in her chest. Noah had been a safe choice for adventure because he would never endanger her, physically or mentally. She knew that, but he’d given her a scare for a moment.

  “Would you like to be at the wedding?” he asked.

  Such a complicated question. But in the end, when she considered that her baby sister was getting married, that it was a day that could never be repeated, there was only one answer. “Yes.”

  “Then let me mention that I saw you. I’m sure they’ll want you there, but I can drop you a line and
let you know for sure, so there’s no doubt that they’re expecting you.”

  “There’s another issue.” She held his gaze, her heart thumping. “We both agree there’s no future for us, right?”

  His expression was guarded. “That’s what you said.”

  “It’s what I believe.” She ran a tongue over her dry lips. “So how will that be, if I come back to the ranch for a couple of days? Can we handle that?”

  His glance settled briefly on her mouth and heat flickered in his eyes. Then he looked away and cleared his throat. “Looks like we’ll have to, for B.J. and Jonas’s sake. Like you said, we don’t want to take the focus off their big day.” He faced her again and his chest heaved. “If you can deal with it, then I can.”

  She had no idea if she could or not. “Like you said, we’ll have to. For the sake of the people we love.” And she included him in that category.

  “Right.”

  “Thank you for suggesting that I go,” she said, meaning every word. “Assuming B.J. and Dad want me, it’s the right thing to do. After all, B.J. and Jonas will probably have kids someday.”

  “Yeah, they probably will.” His response was rich with longing.

  Of course, he wanted children, she thought with a pang of regret. She hadn’t ever considered kids, but if she could have one who called Noah daddy, that would be…special. Talk about a daydream. “I’ll want to see my nieces and nephews,” she said, “so I need to get past this awkwardness with B.J. and Dad, and the sooner I do that, the better.”

  He nodded. Then he stood there gazing at her until the air seemed to crackle between them.

  She wondered what he’d do if she flung back the covers and opened her arms. From the look in his eyes, he’d miss his plane. But he didn’t really want to do that.

  So she would help him. “You need to go,” she murmured.

  He closed his eyes. “Keely—”

  “Go, damn it! I can only be noble for so long!”

  Without another word he left, closing the door carefully behind him. The automatic lock clicked into place.

  She lost track of time as she sat staring at the closed door, willing him to knock and ask to be let back in. She stayed rigid and motionless until her head pounded and her eyes stung. But no knock came. He’d accepted her decision to end this amazingly beautiful connection between them.

  The words she’d never spoken aloud rose in her throat, demanding to be free. “I love you, Noah,” she whispered hoarsely into the silence.

  KEELY DIDN’T WANT his love. Noah struggled with that knowledge as the plane left Las Vegas. In spite of everything, he’d been about to tell her that he loved her, but she’d cut him off, as if she didn’t want him to make the mistake of declaring his feelings and saying things he couldn’t take back.

  Maybe she even loved him a little bit, too. He would have sworn that was love he’d seen in her eyes toward the end of their precious time together. But loving a guy like him would only tie her down, so she’d do her best to get over it. He wondered how well she’d succeed. As for him, there was a hole in his heart big enough to drive a truck through.

  Suggesting that she come to the wedding had been a desperate attempt to maintain a tie with her. He suspected that B.J. and Arch would be thrilled to have her come home for the big day, and Jonas would be happy about it, too. Noah was more than willing to do them a favor, but his motives were purely selfish. Keely might not want his love, but the closer he came to Arizona, the less he was prepared to accept that as a final decision.

  Still, he knew there were rough times ahead, and he was glad he’d arranged to get Keely back on Twin Boulders soil, where he was thoroughly grounded. In order to perform a miracle and coax Keely into his life, he needed all his strength, and he drew that strength from the land where he was born.

  Yet he had to be careful that he didn’t overpower her and force her into a life she didn’t want. He was counting on the fact that she might not know what she wanted, or more precisely, what she needed. She’d convinced herself that she couldn’t possibly fit in at the ranch, but he wanted to see that for himself.

  Maybe she was right. Maybe when he looked at her and visualized her surrounded by their children, he was experiencing hallucinations brought on by the greatest sex he’d ever known. But after making love to Keely the way he had that last time, he couldn’t imagine anyone else as his mate or the mother of his kids. A few other times in his life when he’d been sexually involved with a woman, even thought himself in love, he’d tried to picture that woman pregnant with his baby. The image had never come into focus.

  But now…now it was clear as a bell. He could feel himself thrusting deep inside Keely and spilling his seed. Then, in a few weeks, they’d share the joy of knowing that she’d conceived. He could picture her eyes lighting up at the moment they knew for sure. Her body would grow round and ripe, sensuous in a new way. The image brought a rush of anticipation. Then the hour would come when she would give birth, and he would hold the child they’d created, the baby who was a visible sign of their passion….

  He must be going crazy. Only a crazy man would fantasize about making a woman pregnant when she didn’t want to admit that she loved him and certainly didn’t want him to tell her of his love. Only a crazy man would think he had enough imagination, enough moves, enough love to satisfy a wild child like Keely Branscom.

  But Noah would give ten years of his life for a chance to prove that he was the only man fit for the job.

  18

  “I’VE DECIDED we need a piece on cyber-infidelity. The angle I had in mind was ‘Are you cheating with an online lover?’” Carolyn clicked her ballpoint pen repetitively as she glanced at her editorial staff seated around the conference table. “Keely, why don’t you see what you can do with that?”

  Keely nodded automatically. She didn’t want the assignment, but she’d take that up with Carolyn later. One of the younger writers might really get into the topic, but it didn’t do a thing for Keely.

  Although five days had gone by since she’d made love to Noah, her body still hummed with memories. After being touched like that, she had zero interest in the subject of cybersex. The idea of screen-to-screen hanky-panky paled next to being in the same bed with a man like Noah, skin-to-skin.

  As the meeting droned on, she evaluated the other story assignments Carolyn handed out in case one of them would work as a potential trade. Unfortunately, they all sounded like a major yawn. She probably needed more caffeine.

  Or more sleep. Sleep would be a good thing. Sleep had not been her friend since leaving Vegas. She gazed out the office window. Maybe the air quality was dragging her down. L.A. had been suffering through a major inversion the last couple of days and the air was the color and odor of dirty gym socks.

  A day at the beach catching those California rays and she’d be right as rain. Sure she would. Like hell she would. She missed the guy, missed him like crazy.

  She wondered how long she’d feel the effects of her weekend with Noah. Anyone would think she’d broken off a five-year relationship the way she was moping around the office and her apartment. Nothing interested her, with the exception of one brief shopping trip when she’d bought a dress to wear to B.J.’s wedding. She might have been premature in that purchase, because for some reason Noah hadn’t sent her the all-clear signal yet. The absence of that signal nagged at her constantly.

  She’d realized several hours after he’d left that she hadn’t given him her home e-mail address, so she’d begun worrying that he wouldn’t think to send the e-mail to her office address. If he’d thought of doing that, she wondered if he’d know to look inside the magazine’s cover for the address. Not everyone realized that the publisher could be reached at—

  “Keely? Yo, Keely!”

  She glanced up with a start and discovered everyone at the conference table smirking at her, including Carolyn.

  “We’ve all taken bets,” Carolyn said, “and most of us, myself included, think you
met some hunk in either Vegas or Reno, which explains why you’ve been so whacked since you came back. Care to enlighten us?”

  “No.”

  “I was right!” said Andrea, a cute blonde of twenty-two with a bright future in journalism. She’d be perfect for the cybersex story. “I said if she refuses to dish, then it was more than a fling.”

  Keely pushed back her chair. She really didn’t need this. “It’s flu, is what it is, and if you guys aren’t careful I’ll plant a big kiss full of icky germs on each one of you.”

  Denise, the outer-office receptionist, poked her head in the conference-room door. “Excuse me, but I have a guy out here who needs to deliver his singing telegram, and he’s late for his next gig. Can you spare Keely for a minute?”

  Keely groaned. “You guys didn’t have to do this. I promise to cheer up. Just don’t make me face a singing telegram.”

  Carolyn looked around the room, her eyebrows raised. “Well, I didn’t order the singing telegram. Did one of you?”

  Their chorus of denials didn’t convince Keely. She leveled a stern look at all of them, but nobody cracked. She sighed. “Okay, I might as well get this over with.” She stood and headed for the door. “Note to self—stay perky on the job or you’ll be sent a singing telegram and be embarrassed like you wouldn’t believe.”

  Her cohorts trailed out after her, the better to view her humiliation, she assumed. She’d never received a singing telegram before, so she didn’t know exactly what to expect, but definitely not a guy who looked as if he played pro football. He wore a baseball cap backward, a T-shirt and multiple gold chains.

  “Miz Keely Branscom?” he asked.

  Keely grimaced. “I’m afraid so.”

  The man nodded and began to chant in a rap beat, gyrating to the rhythm.

  “Well, you gotta come home, ’cause your sister’s gettin’ hitched.

  Girl, the knot will be tied and the rice will be pitched.

  So we just wanna know if you’re comin’ or you’re not,

  ‘Cause to give it to you straight, we been missin’ you a lot.”