Angels and Outlaws

by Lori Wilde

  She had no more restraint. Abandon claimed her and she thrust herself against his hard body.

  But he was gentle and caring. He acted as if she was going to snap into a million pieces if he so much as breathed on her.

  She must have shut her eyes again because all she registered, remembered registering were sensations. Moist, soft, sweet, hot, hard, seep, slide, ooze, slick, hard, hard, hard, hot, hot, hot.

  Cass enfolded her legs around his lean waist and with a deferential groan, he plummeted into her. She felt so amazingly secure with him. She let go of control and let him carry her along with his masculine tempo. She surrendered, abundantly, wholly, without faltering. Unleashed her hesitation and relinquished everything to him.

  She felt his penis and then his tongue and then his penis inside her again and again and again. He was everywhere but she was conscious only of the delicate tip of steel that this ardent man, darkly radiant with desire for her, was drawing down the center of her being.

  The orgasm was large inside her. So massive. Spreading and spiraling. A wildfire. Out of control. The air vibrated a chorus. Humming his praises. “Sam, Sam, Sam.”

  The sensation rushed through her melodious deepness, hot, intense, flaming, burning like a slant of dazzling light far up inside her, diffusing through her and fanning in starbursts of joy.

  She shattered against him as he shattered into her.

  “Oh, Sam.” She breathed. “Sam.”

  “I love you, Cass,” he whispered. “With all my heart and soul. I love you.”

  CASS FLOPPED OVER onto her back, listening to the sound of her blood rushing through her ears. Sam was breathing nice and steady and she timed her breaths to match.

  Holding her hand directly above his hip bone, she absorbed the sensation of his body heat radiating up through her palm. She cataloged everything about him—the texture of his skin, so smooth and thick and tanned, the color of his hair, a tasty shade of oatmeal cookie dough, the fragrance of his pores, a meaty, masculine smell that made her want to lick him. She noticed how the very quality of the air in the room seemed different because they were breathing in tandem.

  She’d learned so much about him in such a short amount of time. He’s gifted me with grace, she thought.

  Her eyes misted and an odd airiness inflated her heart. She was overcome with sadness so overwhelming she feared she could die from the loneliness of it.

  Her natural instinct was to joke, to dance, to giggle. Anything to elevate her frame of mind and jam the gloominess. But this time, Cass sought none of her usual defenses against melancholia. Instead she experienced the emotions, knotted her hands into fists and let it come. The sorrow rolled over her, through her, past her and she came out on the other side reborn.

  She was not destroyed by experiencing the uncomfortable sensations as she always feared she’d be if she wallowed too much in her feelings. Rather she was liberated, recognizing that emotions were nothing more than transient states of being she could chose to face and accept or run away from and deny.

  She’d been running for too long.

  All these years what she thought passed for happiness—high fashion and hanging with the “in” crowd and dating men who looked good standing next to her—was alien to this sudden imperturbable sense of conviction. Her understanding of honest happiness had been forever altered.

  She had changed.

  And she realized something startling. Without commitment she would never learn to care for another person more than she cared for herself.

  In that iridescent moment resplendent in the glow of their lovemaking, Cass knew what she must do. She had to quit running from pain. She had to embrace it and then renounce it. What she had been fleeing had occurred and she’d survived.

  Last night, Sam had told her that he loved her. She hadn’t said it back to him, because words weren’t going to be enough. Not for him and not for her. She needed a concrete symbol, something that would prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was changed.

  But what?

  And how?

  Was she truly ready for this step?

  She’d spent a lifetime living for herself and now there was someone else to consider, someone whose happiness meant more to her than her own.

  In order to move ahead, she had to make a sacrifice. She had to let go of her past, of her fears. She’d been an inmate of her own emotional prison for far too long. It was time to let go.

  And thanks to Sam, she finally understood how.

  WHEN THE DAWN SUNLIGHT slanting through his bedroom window awakened Sam, he rolled over, reaching for Cass, only to find her gone. He sprang upright in bed, not knowing what to think, cocking his head, listening for sounds of her.

  “Cass?”

  No answer.

  He threw off the covers, slipped on his underwear and padded through the house, knowing he would not find her hiding in the closet or giggling behind the curtains, but he looked anyway. Hoping against hope she was playing a game and hadn’t run away from him.

  Dammit. He’d screwed everything up.

  Why had he told her he loved her? He’d known she wasn’t ready to hear those monumental words and yet he’d stupidly let the words fall from his lips in the throes of happy lovemaking.

  He sank down on his couch, not knowing what to do and that’s when he noticed the shoe box he’d given her the night before was missing. No doubt about it. She’d taken her shoes and walked out.

  Should he leave her be? Obviously, she hadn’t been able to handle his declaration of love.

  Part of him whispered, “Don’t rock the boat.” It was a piece of his personality that had dominated too much of his life. He thought of the times he’d checked out and put his own life on hold. The times when he hadn’t rocked the boat that needed a good rocking, how he’d missed out on a lot of good things because he hadn’t wanted to risk the discomfort of instability. He’d been on an even keel far too long.

  He wasn’t going to leave this alone. He was going to find Cass and tell her exactly how he felt. And if she rejected him, well he would deal with it. But at least he would have taken a stand, expressed his wants and desires for once instead of putting someone else’s needs above his own simply for the sake of keeping the peace.

  Sam took a deep breath. He was not only ready to go out on a limb for Cass, but to saw it off if that’s what it took.

  Galvanized into action, he reached for the telephone. He called Cass’s house but had no luck. Not satisfied with leaving a message on her machine, he then called the precinct and asked the desk clerk to look up Cass’s file and give him her sister’s phone number. Five minutes later, he was on the phone with Morgan Shaw.

  “Have you heard from Cass?” he asked after he’d introduced himself.

  “Yes,” Morgan said. “And I’m worried about her. She didn’t sound like her usual self.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She sounded…well, this may seem strange to you, but she sounded grounded.”

  “Is that a bad thing?”

  “I don’t know.”

  They lapsed into a short silence, both considering the implications of a grounded Cass.

  “Do you know where she might be?” Sam asked. “I called her apartment but she’s not answering the phone.”

  “She said there were things she had to do. She said she was going to call in to work and take the rest of the week off.”

  “Did she tell you where she was going?”

  “No.”

  “Thanks for your help,” he said.

  “Sam?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I think Cass sounding grounded is a very good thing and I think it’s all due to you.”

  “You give me too much credit,” he said but her words warmed his heart.

  “No,” Morgan said. “I don’t think you’re giving yourself enough credit. She’s changed a lot since she met you.”

  “Really?”

  “Do you love her, Sam?”

/>   “You have no idea how much.”

  “Then find her, Sam, tell her how much you love her and no matter what she does to push you away, don’t let her go.”

  Thanking Morgan for her advice, Sam hung up.

  He took the subway to Cass’s apartment, praying she was there, his mind flashing between the wonderful memories of last night and his conversation with Morgan. His gut churned with equal amounts of excitement and fear. What was Cass doing? Where was she going? And why had she taken time off from work?

  Holding his breath, he pushed through the door into her building.

  And saw a cleaning lady organizing her supplies, Cass’s Hermès scarf wrapped gaily around her neck.

  “Excuse me,” he said, approaching the woman. “Where did you get that scarf?”

  She stopped what she was doing, looked up at him and fingered the scarf with a happy smile on her face. “A lady who lives in the building gave it to me to wear to a job interview. I think it’ll bring me good luck. I sure need some.”

  “I’m sure it will,” Sam said.

  “Cass Richards—that’s her name—she’s the kindest person.”

  “That she is. Do you know if she’s home?” He pointed at the staircase.

  The woman shook her head, grinning. “She just left the building.”

  “Thanks,” Sam said and then got the hell out of there before tears came to his eyes.

  To think that Cass, a woman who not two weeks earlier had risked her very life to hold on to that expensive designer scarf, had just freely and generously given it away to a woman who needed it more than she. In that moment, he loved Cass more than he ever thought possible.

  “HERE’S THE DEAL, NIKKI.” Cass knelt at her old friend’s grave, their high school photograph and the Doc Marten shoe box with her Manolos inside clutched to her chest. “I’m going to ask you to forgive me for being a wimp. I’m sorry I couldn’t handle our friendship when you needed it most.”

  She reached out and trailed her fingertips over Nikki’s headstone, tracing the etched dates. “But I’m stronger now. I’ve become a better person and if I could do it all over again, I’d stick by you every step of the way.”

  Rocking back on her heels, Cass placed the picture in the shoe box and put the shoe box on Nikki’s grave. She took a shaky breath and brushed tears from the corners of her eyes before she could continue. It would be so easy to stop talking, to take back her shoes and return to her life the way it had been before Sam. But she could not. Cass was done with taking the easy way out.

  “I found out—” she swallowed “—that if I want to experience real happiness then I have to give up pursuing it and just be happy. And if I want love, then I’m going to have to open up and let myself feel love.”

  In that present moment, at Nikki’s grave, Cass at long last gave herself permission to grieve. All these years she’d been avoiding expressing her sorrow over what she had lost. But in her avoidance of pain, she had also avoided true and lasting joy.

  With tears streaming down her cheeks, she stood up, dusted off her knees, then slowly turned and walked away. Leaving behind her Manolo Blahniks, leaving the photograph, letting go of the guilt and forgiving herself for being flawed.

  “I CAN’T FIND HER, Beth, and I’m going insane.” Sam paced Beth’s sunny yellow kitchen. “I’m worried. Marcos Rebisi said someone knocked him on the head and took the White Star. What if whoever took the amulet is after Cass?”

  “Calm down, big brother. Why would the White Star thief be after Cass?”

  “I don’t know. I’m just…frustrated.” He shoved a hand through his hair. “And worried about her.”

  “And in love,” Beth finished.

  “Yeah.” Sam flung himself down in a chair. “I’m stone cold in love with her.”

  Beth patted his hand. “It’s going to work out.”

  “I don’t see how. She ran away from me and I don’t know why. She’s not answering her cell phone. I’ve been by her apartment three times already. I should never have told her I loved her. I knew she had trouble with commitment. I was moving too fast. Damn, damn, damn.” He pounded his palm against his forehead.

  Beth chuckled.

  He raised his head and glared at her. “What’s so damned funny?”

  “Seeing you so twisted up.” She shook her head.

  “My suffering amuses you?”

  “No, no.” She got up and came over to massage his tense shoulders. “I love seeing you so passionate about someone. You always tried so hard not to care too much. Probably because of what happened to Janie. You never wanted to feel that kind of hurt again. Look how disconnected you were from Keeley. It took you months to figure out what she was up to. But this woman, she’s lit a spark in you that I haven’t seen since before Janie’s accident. She’s truly something special.”

  “Okay, but how do I hold on to her without chasing her away?”

  “From what you’ve told me about Cass, I don’t think it’s commitment that really scares her. I think it’s a fear of being out of control. What you need is a grand gesture to prove to her that you don’t want to change her or turn her into something she’s not. You’ve got to let her know you accept her exactly as she is, and if that means you have to let go of the idea of an official commitment like an engagement or marriage, then you have to let it go.”

  Beth had hit upon the truth. The minute she said it, Sam knew. “How’d you get so smart, baby sister?”

  “I had a wonderful big brother who taught me a lot.”

  Sam got up, hugged Beth. “Thanks for your advice.”

  “Where are you going?” she asked as he headed for the door.

  He grinned. “I’ve got a grand gesture to plan.”

  CASS WENT BACK TO WORK with her head clear and her heart lighter than it had ever been. She’d tried to call Sam upon her return, but he hadn’t answered his phone. She’d told herself it was okay. That even if nothing more happened between them, he’d given her what she needed most and she would never ever forget him for that. Part of her couldn’t help hoping for a happy ending, but she wouldn’t push, she wouldn’t pursue happiness at full throttle, she’d just experience life and let things happen the way they were supposed to happen.

  “Cass, Cass.” Mystique came running into her office.

  Cass looked up from the PR campaign she was working on, revolving around star-crossed lovers inspired by the French book she’d found in Morgan’s antique shop, and she felt it was the most creative work she’d ever done.

  “What is it, Mystique?”

  Mystique pushed her way to the window. “Come look down.”

  Cass frowned. “I’m sort of busy right now.”

  “It can wait. Come look down.”

  “All right.” Cass sighed and pushed back from her desk.

  Giggling, Mystique opened the window. Traffic noises blew in. “Come look down.”

  Grumbling, Cass crossed the room to join Mystique at the window. “What’s so important that you’ve got to interrupt me right in the middle of—” She broke off at what she saw directly below the eight-floor window.

  Oh. My. God.

  There in the middle of Broadway traffic was parked a shiny red fire truck with a very long ladder propped against the side of the brownstone. And three quarters of the way up the ladder climbed a man with a cake in his hand.

  But not just any man and not just any cake.

  It was Sam.

  Her brave, handsome, scared-of-heights-but-not-going-to-let-it-stop-me Sam.

  Balancing in one arm a three-tiered chocolate Barbie cake with M&M’s and sprinkles.

  Cass began trembling all over. Two more rungs and his face appeared in her window. He placed the cake on the window ledge and grinned at her.

  “Sam Mason,” she cried. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “Grand gesture,” he said.

  “But you’re afraid of heights.”

  “Not half as afraid as I am of losing you.
But don’t worry. I’m not here to ask you for a commitment,” he said.

  “You’re not?”

  “Nope. We haven’t known each other long enough for you to feel secure about my feelings for you.”

  “We haven’t?”

  “When you’re ready for more, you’ll let me know.”

  “What if it takes me a long time?”

  “I’m a patient guy. I’ll wait.”

  “What if something’s broken inside me, Sam? What if I can’t ever commit?”

  “You’re not broken, Cass, you’re just scared. You think you can’t commit, when the truth is you were already committed.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You were already committed to your footloose way of life. The way I see it you’re a shoe-in to do fifty or sixty years of marriage, just as soon as you realize it.”

  “Get in here,” she said, picking up the cake and handing it to Mystique. “Before you hurt your silly self.”

  She held out her hand and he took it as he climbed through the window and into her office. Applause sounded behind them and they looked around to find the employees of Isaac Vincent standing in her doorway.

  But she didn’t care. She only had eyes for Sam. A man who loved her enough to face his greatest fear. A man who wanted her badly enough to accept her exactly as she was, with no strings or commitments.

  Her heart was giddy.

  Sam. Sam’s the man.

  She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. “Actually, I came to the same conclusion you did.”

  Cass looked into Sam’s eyes and saw her best self the way he saw her.

  When she was with him she felt transcended. She had it now. She understood. She’d learned to stop glossing over the surface of life, to assimilate her experiences in depth. She’d learned to appreciate, be grateful and enthralled by the wonders all around her. Through Sam she’d developed a sense of the boundless goodness of life. She’d taken that leap of faith and learned true love had been waiting to catch her when she faltered.

  She told him all this and so much more.

  “So what are you saying, Cass?”