“He might be strict, and he can be an opinionated pain sometimes, but Judy and their children are the center of my brother’s life. He’d never hurt them. If anything, he goes too far the other way.”
“What do you mean?”
“It probably comes from being the oldest. He’s always tended to be overprotective. Jimmy doesn’t want to be treated like a child anymore.”
“Some kids mature early.”
“Jimmy might be big for his age, and he might think he’s fifteen going on twenty, but inside he’s still just a boy.” She curled more tightly into the corner of the couch. “He must be so scared by now.”
Sam slid off the arm of the couch to sit beside her. “Why weren’t he and his father getting along?”
“It’s an old argument. Jimmy has always wanted to become an artist. Norm and Judy thought it was just one of those childhood fancies, and that he’d grow out of it, but lately he’s been letting his schoolwork slide so he can spend all his time with his painting. The more Norm got after him, the more rebellious Jimmy got.”
“From the artwork I saw on the side of Norm’s van, the kid’s good.”
“Yes, he is. He did those two paintings beside the window.”
Sam studied them for a few minutes, then pursed his lips in a low whistle. “He is good.”
“The problem is that Norm has always hoped that his son would join the family business.” She sighed. “I can understand how that would frustrate Jimmy. His parents mean well, but he doesn’t want to have his life controlled by everyone else’s good intentions. He loves them, but he wants his independence.”
“Sounds a bit like you.”
“In a way, I suppose we both find the family overbearing at times. That’s probably why I have such a soft spot for Jimmy.”
He stretched his arm along the back of the couch and brushed his fingertips across her shoulder. “Somehow I can’t picture you as a rebellious teenager.”
She tilted her head to meet his gaze. “Oh, my rebellion was delayed a decade. When I was younger, I did everything that was expected of me. I never argued. My life was all mapped out for me and I never thought twice when I went straight from the protection of my parents to my fiancé.”
“You couldn’t have been much more than twenty when you got engaged.”
“Ryan and I met the day I started kindergarten and were going steady by the time we were in high school.” She turned Sam’s ring around on her finger. “He proposed on my twenty-first birthday.”
“Your family must have liked him.”
“They adored him. He was in and out of the house so much when we were younger, they treated him like one of my brothers. They weren’t surprised in the least when we told them we were going to get married. I had always assumed we would end up together.”
“It sounds as if you were suited to each other.”
“We were. We’d made so many plans. A bunch of kids, the house with the tire swing in the yard and a dog in front of the fireplace. But then he had his accident...” She paused. “I had to change my plans.”
He cupped her shoulder, his fingers warm and reassuring. “I’m sorry, Audra.”
“He didn’t want me to stay with him. I told you that, didn’t I?”
“Yes, you did.”
“At first I thought it was because he wanted to be noble, that he loved me too much to have me see him in that wheelchair.”
“That’s understandable. No man would want to be pitied.”
“I didn’t pity him. I loved him. But he hated having me take care of him because it turned around his entire perception of who I was. He was like my father, always assuming that it was his duty to be the one to take care of me. I hadn’t realized just how helpless he considered me to be.”
“You’re far from helpless, Audra. I have a lot of respect for your competence.”
She sighed, leaning her cheek against his knuckles. It was so easy to talk to Sam. He was so direct and matter-of-fact; he listened willingly to things her family was still careful to tiptoe around. “Sometimes I wonder whether things would have turned out differently if I hadn’t stayed.”
“Why?”
“Maybe someone else would have noticed the warning signs. I was so busy trying to pay the bills and arrange his nursing care that I didn’t see them. I honestly didn’t realize what was happening.”
The couch dipped as he shifted closer. “Audra, what are you talking about?”
“At first we argued all the time. He didn’t want to be dependent, but I couldn’t imagine simply deserting him when he needed me. I believed I knew what was best for him. Love meant forever, so I stuck by him and didn’t let myself see how it was killing him inside.” She tried to swallow past the lump in her throat. This was the point where she usually stopped talking. For five years she’d kept this inside because no one wanted to hear the rest.
Sam tugged aside the pillow she’d been clutching and covered her hand with his. “Go on.”
She felt the prick of tears behind her eyes. It wasn’t from pain—that had grown dull long ago. It was from Sam’s offer of sympathy. She inhaled unsteadily. “Before Ryan’s accident, he’d always taken pride in his athletic abilities. He’d thrived on competition, on being the best. So he never adjusted to life without the use of his legs.”
“It would be hard for anyone.”
“I tried to get him into therapy, but he wouldn’t go. I tried to get counsellors and psychologists out to the house, but he refused to talk to them and only got more agitated. His doctor finally put him on tranquilizers, to ease him through the transition, he said, and for a while it seemed to work. Ryan’s moods settled down and his outlook improved.”
He squeezed her fingers, an invitation, a silent gesture of support.
“Ryan hadn’t been taking his tranquilizers, he’d been hoarding them,” she continued. “He was always very meticulous. He found out how much he’d need for a lethal dose, then waited until he’d accumulated four times that amount. He chose a time when I was at work and no one was due to visit. He filled the bathtub to the rim, pulled himself into it and swallowed his pills. He slipped beneath the surface of the water as soon as he lost consciousness, so he drowned before the pills could actually kill him.”
Sam swore under his breath, a short, rough expletive, yet his touch was achingly gentle as he reached out and lifted her onto his lap. His warmth surrounded her as he cradled her head against his shoulder. “I had no idea. I’d assumed he died because of his injuries.”
“His mother swears it was an accidental overdose, but there’s no doubt in my mind it was suicide. I found his note before I found him. And I’ve always wondered whether I could have saved him if I’d come home earlier. Or whether he wouldn’t have done it at all if I hadn’t stayed with him in the first place.”
“It wasn’t your fault, Audra.”
“But I hadn’t realized how much he hated being dependent on me, or how stifling our love was to him.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” he repeated firmly. “It was Ryan’s decision, not yours.”
She pressed her face to his collar, taking comfort in the solid strength of his embrace. “I went for counselling after the funeral, and I realize how complex suicide is. In my head, I know I’m not to blame, but in my heart I still have doubts.”
“That’s understandable. It’s never easy to come to terms with a tragedy like that. Death is hard enough to accept, but when the death is by choice, it’s many times worse.”
“My family still won’t accept it. They’re like Ryan’s mother, they insist his death was accidental. They’re stuck in denial and just can’t handle the truth. So they keep pushing me to try again, as if marriage is some kind of horse that threw me and I’m supposed to climb back up on it for my own good.”
“They care about you. I saw that at the party.”
“And I care about them, but I’ll never get married,” she said. “I know how destructive love can be, and the lengths Rya
n was driven to because he couldn’t endure being dependent.”
“That’s why you want to be on your own, isn’t it? It’s because of the consequences of Ryan’s dependence, not yours.”
God, he understood, she thought. He really understood. Within the space of the few weeks they’d known each other, he’d grasped what her family never could. It wasn’t only her own pain that made her vow never to commit to a man again, it was Ryan’s pain. Deep down, she was afraid of ending up as vulnerable and desperate to escape as he’d been.
Sam moved his hand over her back in slow, soothing circles, then caught her chin and angled her face toward his. “It must be hell for you to pretend you’re engaged to me. When I came up with the idea, I didn’t know what I was asking.”
There was such honest sympathy in his gaze, she felt the knot of old guilt inside her start to loosen. “It’s okay, Sam. You couldn’t possibly have known.”
“If there’s anything I can do to make it easier...”
“You just have,” she whispered.
He stroked her hair back from her face, tucking it behind her ears. Silence stretched out between them as he continued to hold her gaze. Then as if it were the most natural thing in the world, he leaned toward her and settled his lips over hers.
The kiss was sweet, his mouth soft and giving. Audra sighed and relaxed in his arms, her hands sliding up his chest until she could feel the steady beat of his heart beneath her palm. Compared to the situations they’d already been in, this kiss could almost be called chaste.
Yet somehow it was more intimate than anything they’d done before.
Too soon, he lifted his head. But he didn’t pull away. Instead, he cupped her cheeks in his palms and came back for more.
It was only a kiss, she reassured herself. Not love, not commitment or any of those things she was afraid of, just a kiss. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Audra knew there were reasons she shouldn’t do even this much with Sam. Yet it felt too good, too...right to stop. Parting her lips on a sigh, she melted against him.
Sam deepened the kiss slowly, accepting her invitation with a gentle increase in pressure. The tip of his tongue played over her lower lip in a smooth caress, back and forth, almost in, hovering on the edge until he made a low sound of pleasure and eased inside.
She felt his heartbeat accelerate at the same time she felt her own pulse speed up. The comfortable glow that suffused her body warmed to awareness. He slid one hand into her hair, holding her more firmly as he angled his head to press closer. His other hand dropped to her shoulder, coaxing her forward until she slipped her arms around his neck and leaned with him as he reclined against the corner of the couch.
How different this was from that time in her kitchen, when playfulness had led so swiftly to passion. Or that time in the conference room, when he’d been so fast, charging ahead with no preliminaries, giving her no time to think. She’d had no idea that he could be so...tender. So caring. As if they had all the time in the world, as if all his attention, all his energy, were focused on the urge to give her...what? Comfort? Pleasure?
She didn’t want to think about what he was giving her any more than she wanted to think about why they shouldn’t be doing this. It still felt right. So right, she made no protest when his hand smoothed down her side and closed gently over her breast. The soft moan that rose in her throat surprised her almost as much as the certainty of her response. She arched her back in a wordless request, smiling against Sam’s lips when he moved his hand to the middle of her blouse and one by one, unfastened the buttons.
A tremor went through her at the first touch of his fingers on her bare skin. He traced the edge of lace, skimming his thumb over the slope of her breast while his palm rubbed across the center. She felt herself swell into his hand, every nerve tingling. When he pulled her blouse from her skirt and slid his other hand up her back to unfasten her bra, reason and logic shut down completely. All she could do was feel.
He took her breasts with the same focused tenderness he put into his kiss. As his tongue teased and savored her lips, his fingers explored her shape and texture, lifting, rubbing, squeezing in sweet persuasion. She pressed against him, her breath catching on a wave of delight.
“Sam,” she whispered. She didn’t say anything more. Just his name. But he took it as another invitation. He moved his lips to her ear, grazing his teeth over the lobe in a caress that made her tremble. Shifting her beside him on the cushions, he slid his hand beneath her skirt.
The touch of his fingers on her thigh was electric. Slow heat unfurled inside her. Wants she’d never before suspected, desires she’d never dreamed of, blossomed in delicate pulses of sensation. She threaded her fingers into Sam’s hair and pulled his face back to hers. This time she kissed him. She didn’t care that she might be awkward or that her experience was no match for his. All she could think about was getting closer.
The eagerness of Audra’s response jolted Sam back to full awareness. Her lips sealed over his, her tongue swept into his mouth and the pleasant haze he’d been lost in transformed to urgency. No, it was more than urgency. It was raw need. His blood pounded and his body tightened so insistently his hands shook. His hands. Inside her blouse. Under her skirt.
What the hell was he thinking? He was doing it again, letting his libido overrule his reason. She was merely a means to an end. A civilian. A respectable woman.
He was getting in deeper all the time. He knew he shouldn’t have involved himself in her family’s problems. And he sure as hell shouldn’t have listened as she’d opened up her past to him. The physical thing that he felt for her was hard enough to handle, but now he had let her get close to him in an entirely different way.
There was no excuse this time, none at all. He couldn’t claim he was only playing a role. He couldn’t pretend there was anything fake about the emotions she’d revealed to him. There was no one else to put on a performance for.
This wasn’t part of the plan.
All those thoughts whirled through his brain, demanding his attention, but they faded to insignificance at the impulse to finish what he and Audra had started here. What if he eased the blouse off her shoulders and leaned down to close his lips over that hardened nipple, and moved his hand farther up her thigh and used his thumb and his fingers to make her moan for him, and brought her delicate hand to the front of his jeans and showed her—
Fighting to keep hold of the last shreds of his control, he lifted his head.
Audra’s cheeks were flushed, her lips moist. From beneath half-closed lids, her gaze gleamed with arousal. He’d fantasized about her like this. For weeks he’d wondered what it would be like to really hold her, to taste her and touch her as if he had the right...
But he didn’t have the right, did he? And he never would.
Gritting his teeth, Sam withdrew his hands from beneath her clothing. “Listen, Audra...”
The flush on her cheeks deepened. She touched her tongue to her swollen lower lip, her gaze steadying on his. A mixture of regret and embarrassment flashed across her face as she pushed away from him and dropped her arms to her sides. “Don’t say it.”
“What?”
“Don’t say you were only pretending, that this was only part of your role.”
“I wasn’t. I can’t deny I’m attracted to you, Audra. You’re a desirable woman and I’m a normal man, but this was a mistake.”
She tugged the front of her blouse closed, her hands unsteady. “A mistake,” she repeated.
“I shouldn’t have kissed you. It’s late, we’re both tired and you were upset. I took advantage—”
“No. You didn’t take advantage of me, Sam. I...kissed you, too.”
He rubbed his face roughly. She wasn’t making this easy. “I apologize. It won’t happen again.”
She dipped her head without replying and started to refasten her buttons. Her hair swung forward, hiding her expression.
“With the Fitzpatrick wedding coming up in less than a
week, we can’t let ourselves get confused about the reason for our association—”
“Yes, you’ve made that abundantly clear. Several times. We definitely don’t want to get confused.”
He heard the thread of hurt in her voice, and he wanted nothing more than to reach out and take her back into his arms. Pushing himself to his feet abruptly, he walked to the other side of the room. “We can’t get involved as long as we’re working together. Distractions can be dangerous.”
“Distractions,” she repeated, her fingers fumbling. She’d misaligned the buttons.
He itched to help her with those buttons. He shoved his hands safely into the back pockets of his jeans. “I didn’t mean for things to go so far.”
“It was no big deal, Sam. After all, it was just a kiss. I’m twenty-eight years old. It’s not as if I haven’t done that before.”
Just a kiss? If she could get his blood pumping with only a kiss, what would it be like if they did more?
The thought was there, in the back of his mind. What if they didn’t stop next time? What real harm would it do? Maybe it would be better to relieve the tension between them so they could concentrate on the job—
But this was Audra, the woman who baked bread and bounced babies on her knee. She wasn’t the kind of woman who would go for a quick, meaningless tumble on the sofa.
Or would she?
No. He couldn’t start thinking that way. He still had another week to get through. He knew what his priorities were here, right?
She raised her head, shaking her hair back from her face as she met his gaze. With her blouse misbuttoned and her cheeks still flushed, she was a tempting mixture of innocence and sensuality. He wavered, taking a step toward her. “Audra, I...”
The telephone on the table beside the lamp shrilled suddenly, drowning out whatever he was going to say.
It was a timely interruption. It was just what he needed to yank him back to reality.
But the hell of it was, Sam didn’t know whether or not he was grateful for it.
Smoothing her skirt down awkwardly, Audra reached for the phone. “Hello?” She paused, her hand tightening on the receiver. “Jimmy? My God, Jimmy! Where are you?”
Engaging Sam Page 13
