by Ann Major
He followed her. “Why did you have to choose the messiest room in the house?” he whispered as she sank down in his big leather desk chair.
“Cole!” his mother snapped. “I said I’ve been waiting for over an hour!”
At his mother’s command he frowned. “There are a few magazines on the desk. I won’t be long,” he said gently to Maddie.
When he closed the door, Maddie faced his messy desk. She wasn’t happy that his mother despised her, but she refused to dwell on something she couldn’t change. This might be her only chance to search for her letters.
Knowing that she probably didn’t have much time, she leaned down and tugged at the bottom drawer. Just as she’d suspected, it was locked.
“Okay—so, I’ll look through the top drawers first!” she whispered.
While she riffled through the other drawers, which was slow going because they were stuffed with so many papers, she heard raised voices.
Not wishing to eavesdrop, but not being able to stop herself, Maddie’s ears pricked to attention even as she continued her rummaging.
“I know you’ve been lonely, dear. But this pathetic girl—Jesse Ray Gray’s daughter, of all people?”
“You don’t even know her.”
“I know she probably came back here deliberately to flaunt herself the minute she heard Lizzie died.”
Maddie gasped.
“Lizzie has been gone nearly a year.”
“Well, the whole town’s talking about Maddie skinny-dipping on our land this afternoon just to lure you.”
Maddie’s hands shook with such outrage she nearly slammed a drawer.
“You’re wrong about everything, Mother.”
When Maddie had searched all the drawers but the locked one, she angrily grabbed the keys she’d noticed earlier, lying on his desk.
“You’re too gullible,” his mother said. “This cheap girl has set her sights on you.”
Cheap…. The word stung.
“Mother, your voice is too loud. She’s my guest.” He lowered his voice and must have persuaded his mother to do the same because Maddie couldn’t hear them for a while.
Furiously, Maddie began trying different keys. Naturally, it was the last one that worked.
Suddenly the voices in the other room rose again.
“Mother, I have a question. Did Maddie try to call me six years ago before she left Yella? Did you talk to her?”
Maddie’s heart began to beat very fast.
His mother didn’t answer immediately. “Do you think I can remember every call from six years ago? I can tell you one thing, though—if she’d called, you’d remember me giving you a piece of my mind.”
“All right. Look, I need to take Maddie back to Miss Jennie’s. Maybe you and I can have lunch before I go tomorrow.”
A sob caught in Maddie’s throat. She had to find her letters. She did not want his formidable mother threatening her, or Noah, especially since Cole seemed to believe everything his mother said.
With unsteady fingers, Maddie sifted through the endless stack of deeds and contracts in the bottom drawer. When she heard footsteps approaching the office, she jumped back.
“Have you forgotten your manners completely?” his mother said. “Are you going to show me out or not?”
His heavy footsteps retreated. The front door opened and slammed shut.
If only his mother had insisted he walk her to her car. But she hadn’t. Once again, Maddie heard his brisk footsteps heading toward his office.
In a panic, Maddie nudged the bottom drawer shut with her foot, only to let out a little cry when it jammed.
Grabbing a magazine, she whirled around in his chair and pretended to read an incomprehensible article about how irrigation affected hay yield.
“Sorry about that,” he said in a world-weary tone from the doorway.
Maddie looked up. When she saw him glance at his keys, which were still dangling from the lock of his bottom drawer, her heart began to knock.
Then his concerned gaze refocused on her. “You’re white as a sheet, and shaking, too.”
Ashamed that the woman could still intimidate her, Maddie leaped up so that she could stand between him and the drawer. “I’m fine.”
“I’m sorry you had to hear all that.”
“I know she doesn’t approve of me,” Maddie said, hoping she sounded braver than she felt.
“Well, I think you’re a wonderful person,” he said.
“You do?”
“After what you told me? Of course!”
“You believed the worst of me when I left.”
“Even that didn’t stop me from caring about you.”
Too bad he’d never made that fact known to her.
As he led her out of his office toward the kitchen, she thought he was being awfully nice even if he was a little more reserved after his mother’s visit. He caught her hand in his and pressed it reassuringly in his larger palm. “Forget about her, okay?”
“She’s right. The whole town’s probably talking about me skinny-dipping to lure you by now.”
“They’re just jealous.”
“Don’t joke.”
“Forget about her…and the town.”
“Can you?”
“Look, she’s my mother. I’m used to her trying to control every second of my life. I thought I’d learned how to handle her a long time ago, but then Lizzie died, and I went through a dark patch. Guilt, grief, regrets—I was pretty messed up. Mother wanted to move in with me, to take over. Fighting her helped snap me out of my funk. I know she loves me in her way, but I can’t allow her to get too close. She’s needy and critical.”
“I’m sorry about Lizzie,” she said again. “She was sweet. Even to me. She used to sneak down to the barn and watch me take care of the horses.”
“Yes, she was sweet to everybody. But there’s something I need to tell you. I didn’t deserve her, and I’m not sure I made her happy. It’s not always easy to be married to the town saint, you know.”
Because he looked so troubled by this admission, and she thought he was going to say more, she didn’t reply.
“She’s gone,” he said simply. “It’s too late to change anything. Except there is one thing I can say for sure—she wouldn’t mind you being here. She would have wanted me to see you and sort my feelings out. She loved me—in spite of the many ways I disappointed her.”
He looked more at ease after he said that, less tense, and Maddie couldn’t help but wonder if Lizzie had known all about Cole’s desire for her and sensed his guilt. Maybe her sweet, forgiving nature had made him feel that he was a worse person than he really was.
But what did his marriage to Lizzie have to do with his feelings for Maddie now? Did he or did he not agree with his mother’s low assessment of her? Could he ever respect her?
What if he could? What if he did?
Suddenly Maddie knew she couldn’t leave; she couldn’t return to Austin and marry Greg without finding out what Cole meant to her and what she meant to him. Greg was a good man. It would be unfair to risk hurting him as Cole believed he’d hurt Lizzie. She couldn’t marry Greg until she came to terms with her feelings for Cole or purged him from her system.
“So—do you still feel like a cup of coffee?” he asked.
“I’m not much of a coffee drinker.”
When his face darkened with disappointment, her own heart brimmed with wild, illogical joy.
He wants me to stay! Despite his mother’s disapproval and the risk of more gossip!
No doubt his mother had come to warn them off each other. But Maddie was no longer a teenager who could be easily bullied. She had to know how Cole felt. His opinion mattered. Not his mother’s. It was time she stood up for herself, time she showed his mother and the gossips of Yella that she wasn’t who they’d thought she was.
“I think I’d like a glass of wine,” she said.
His brilliant smile made her tummy flip.
“White or re
d?”
She laughed, feeling warm and flushed from just looking at him. “You pick. What we drink is not my top priority tonight.”
“Then what is?” An electric current charged the air between them. Looking charmingly baffled, he stared into her sparkling eyes.
“I can see I’ll have to give you a great big hint.” Because she simply couldn’t resist, she reached up on her tiptoes and put both arms around his neck. When he made no move, she arched her body into his.
His black brows lifted quizzically, and for a few more seconds he hesitated. Then his strong hands at the back of her waist locked and pulled her closer. “You did say no touching,” he whispered huskily.
“You know what they say about women being allowed to change their minds?”
His eyes blazed as he ran his knuckles up the gentle curve of her throat, causing her to shiver. Staring at her mouth, he cupped her chin, his thumb caressing the sensual fullness of her bottom lip. “I’ve been wanting to kiss you all night—and very badly.” When she licked her lips, he groaned and snugged her against his hips more tightly. Without further invitation, his mouth came down on hers, hard. She opened her lips, sighing in soft pleasure when his tongue moved inside, probing the soft interior of her mouth so erotically he took her breath away.
Sensing her surrender, his pelvis crushed hers, communicating his blatant arousal.
“Oh, my,” she said. “Is that for me?”
When she kissed him even more hungrily than before, he swung her up in his arms. “Baby, I can’t believe you’ve finally come home…to me.”
“I didn’t intend to. But I’m kinda glad I did.”
“Just kinda?”
“Way more than kinda,” she whispered, nuzzling her cheek against his.
Still kissing her, he carried her to the kitchen where he grabbed a bottle of wine and a can of tonic water, his drink of choice ever since he’d pulled himself out of the booze hole he’d fallen into after Lizzie’s death. Holding Maddie tightly, he mounted the stairs, taking them easily. Then he strode down the darkened hall toward his vast bedroom.
Laughing, feeling like a bride, she reached out and twisted the doorknob and pushed the door ajar for him.
“If you’re going to say no again, say it now,” he whispered in a low, urgent tone.
“I want you,” she said. “And I’m weak. I’ve always been weak where you’re concerned. But then, what do you expect from the bad girl of Yella, Texas?”
“I expect wild, wanton sex,” he murmured as he kicked the bedroom door shut. “Lots of it.”
Seven
She was lying under Cole in his dark bedroom writhing against his hot, hard, naked length. She was in his arms again after six years of abstinence, and he was doing all the wickedly delicious things she’d dreamed of for years. He was skimming his fingers over her everywhere, loving her with his lips and his exploring tongue.
Then, in the next moment, the horror of the past intruded on the sweetness of their fragile present.
She was a frightened, young girl again, trapped beneath another man, a vicious man she hated, whose rough hands and foul-smelling mouth tore at her body.
Suddenly, all the dark memories she’d worked so hard to suppress overpowered her.
With her hair still damp from a final afternoon swim and her heart full of love for Cole, she’d rushed home to the trailer fresh from having made love to him on the grassy bank beside the pool. Thinking herself alone, she’d let herself in, only to find her mother’s boyfriend, Vernon, sprawled on the sofa in dirty, ripped jeans and a T-shirt. With his huge, tattooed arms, he’d seemed like a spider waiting for her in that tangled web of darkness as he’d squashed out his cigarette.
He’d come on to her before, and she was usually able to avoid being alone with him. “Why aren’t you at work?” she’d asked.
An ugly, drunken snarl had distorted his scarred face as he lunged toward her. “What’s it to you if I got fired? Bet I know who you’ve been with. The whole town knows about Prince Coleman Charming.” When she’d tried to squeeze out the door again, he’d grabbed her arm, wrenching it behind her and dragging her back inside, locking the door.
“I know where you spend your time. You won’t let me touch you because I’m not good enough. Then you chase Coleman like a bitch in heat. Who do you think you are, girl? Well, I’ll tell you! You’re Jesse Ray’s girl, that’s who! You’re nobody! Worse! You’re trailer trash, just like me! Hell, you’re lucky to get me!”
Vernon had reeked of beer and cigarettes and worse as he’d slammed her against the wall and pressed his pelvis against her as she’d fought desperately to escape. How she’d reeked of those things, too, later, when he’d finished with her.
Afterward she’d felt so dirty and scared and ashamed. Most of all she’d felt powerless. Sore and battered, she’d cried and cried, but what good had her tears been? Vernon had laughed and said nobody would believe her if she ratted on him, not even her mother. And he’d been right.
When her mother had thrown them both out, Maddie had known she couldn’t tell the authorities. If her mother hadn’t believed her, there was no way the cold-eyed sheriff would. Nor would anyone else. Hadn’t they always thought the worst of her?
Even before Vernon had hurt her, she’d always been afraid Cole thought he was too good for her. Still, she’d gathered her courage and called him. Only that was when his mother had answered. In Maddie’s broken emotional state, Mrs. Coleman’s harsh words had compounded Vernon’s injuries tenfold. She had crushed Maddie’s spirit and her sweetest hope of love and happiness.
Don’t think about the past! Don’t!
Cole shifted his weight beside her, staring at her in the dark. Gently, his hands brushed her cheeks. “Your eyes are glassy and wild, and you’re shivering and crying. Why?”
“Am I?” In shock, she traced her cheeks with her fingertips and realized they were wet. Thinking about Vernon could do this to her.
“No reason,” she lied. All the secrets that had driven her from Yella still lay like a stone on her heart.
Cole drew her closer and bent his head to nuzzle her hair. “I’ve dreamed of this,” he whispered. “All through my marriage to Lizzie, you were there between us. I wanted you even then. And I felt horrible about it.”
“I know. I’m sorry,” she said, empathizing more than was wise. His breath against her ear made her tremble.
“I felt so guilty. But I would lie in bed, with her beside me, thinking about you—about your lips, about how your nipples used to peak when I kissed them, about your silky black hair and how I loved to play with it. I think I hated you for that…more even than I hated you for Vernon.”
At the mention of Vernon, Maddie sobbed hoarsely. “You don’t know what you’re saying. Or what happened. You don’t know anything.”
“Because you ran away with Vernon without ever telling me anything. So all I had to go on was what your mother said.”
After his mother had been so cruel and Maddie had run from Yella, she hadn’t let herself think about Cole because it had been too painful. Then she’d been afraid she was pregnant with Vernon’s child. It was only when she’d realized how much Noah looked like Cole that she’d worked up the nerve to call him, but he’d hung up on her. So, she’d had to write it all down in those letters he hadn’t bothered to read.
“I don’t care about Vernon anymore,” he said.
“You don’t?”
“That was six years ago. You were young. I was your first. Maybe I was coming on too strong. Maybe you had to get away and be on your own to grow up. I only know that your coming back here is the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” he said. “I like who you seem to be now, and I don’t want to ruin our reunion by blaming you for what’s past. Don’t cry. Please. Because I can’t bear it if you do.”
He kissed her brow and then her temples with warm lips that soothed. He’d always been so nice to her when they’d been lovers. While growing up, she’d hate
d feeling that she was condemned for her mother’s sins. In his arms, she’d found an escape. Cole had made her feel as though she could change her life—before Vernon’s vicious act had nearly destroyed her.
Cole seemed as wonderful tonight as he’d been that long-ago summer. His gentle voice and kind words made her swallow her salty tears. Hadn’t Vernon ruined enough of her life? Because of him, she’d been afraid. She’d kept to herself and lived an impossibly lonely life until she’d met Greg.
“I won’t cry,” she said, rubbing her eyes with the backs of her hands. “My tears are all gone. See? So kiss me. Love me. Please, just love me again.”
She needed new memories, beautiful memories with Cole, to make the bad ones lose their power.
“All right.” He kissed her, but tenderly, sweetly, undemanding. His lips fell onto her brow, onto the pert tip of her upturned nose and then lightly onto her lips. Running his tongue over her breasts, he caressed her nipples with his hands while he held her close, slowly persuading her to put aside the past and all the pain and shame Vernon had inflicted on her for the pleasure that Cole alone could give her.
Soon his touches and kisses had her so dizzy with desire she forgot everything except her need to be with him. When he finally put on a condom and slid into her, she wrapped her arms and legs around him, moaning, clinging, so that he could sink deeper—oh, so much deeper—before he rode her. Then she clung to him and wept, but this time her tears came from joy…and the rush of new hope.
When his passion made him drive into her harder, his need to claim her primitive and demanding, she reveled in it, bracing herself for the power of his thrusts, for the pleasure of them, arching her hips to meet them, needing this forceful mating as much as he did. She circled his strong shoulders with her arms and surrendered with a completeness that stunned her, that wiped her clean of everything but her fierce desire to belong to him.
When finally he shuddered as he found his release, he cried out her name as if she were everything to him, and the sound of it made her sizzle and come in a blazingly glorious explosion of her own. For a long time after that, she held on to him, their hands locked, their damp brows touching. After six lonely years she wanted to prolong the moment of togetherness. Even when he pulled away, she murmured, clinging to him. Only in his arms and in his all-consuming passion had the dark shadow of Vernon briefly vanished.
