Until You

by Janis Reams Hudson

  His smile came slowly, curving his mouth first, then lighting his eyes to brilliant blue. Stealing her breath. “Yeah?”

  With a sigh, she smiled and laid her head back on his shoulder, tilted it to look up at him. “Yeah.”

  “Good.” The temptation was too great. Her lips were too near. The invitation in her eyes irresistible. He kissed her again, taking her mouth with his, invading her, mating his tongue with hers. She made a low sound of pleasure in her throat that went straight to his head.

  God, she felt so good pressed against him. So good, so right. He didn’t question the sense of it, because sense didn’t matter. Only kissing her mattered, tasting her, holding her. Touching her.

  Anna reveled in his touch. When his hands slid down her back to cup her hips she nearly groaned in pleasure at the heated sensations engulfing her. Her mind went numb, and she didn’t care. Refused to care. Nothing mattered but this. This intense pleasure.

  She wasn’t sure how her shirttail came to be free, but the feel of his hot, hard hands on her flesh left no room to worry about it. Everywhere he touched, she tingled. His hands devoured her, as did his mouth. And then one of those hands cupped her breast and the feeling was so exquisite that her knees turned to jelly. She threaded her fingers through his hair and held on, with no will to do anything other than go on kissing him, be kissed by him, forever.

  Gavin treasured the weight of her breast. He barely stopped short of pushing her bra aside to feel that soft, warm flesh against his palm.

  Realizing how close he was to losing control, he forced his hand to release her and slip from beneath her blouse. Forced himself to release her lips, those soft, generous lips that tasted sweeter than any wine.

  They stood together, held each other, until hearts calmed, pulses leveled. Then, as if by mutual agreement, they stepped apart.

  Gavin wanted, very much, to kiss her again. Her lips were still red and puffy from the pressure of his. Her eyes, as wide and gray as a misty mountain lake, mesmerized him, drew him. So trusting, those eyes, but he didn’t feel at all trustworthy just then. “I think,” he said slowly, regretfully, his hands trailing up and down her arms, “I’m going to turn in now before I get us both in trouble here.”

  She wanted to protest. She wanted to ask him to kiss her again. Better yet, she yearned for the courage to stretch up and kiss him herself. But she’d never had a lot of courage, and what little she’d had a few minutes ago seeped away. Unable to hold his gaze, she stepped back and looked away. “All right,” she told him softly. “Good night, then.”

  His hands trailed down her arms one last time, his fingers lingering on hers as though he didn’t want to let go. A sweet, sweet ache bloomed in her chest. And as he turned to go, she knew that her earlier determination to keep her growing feelings for him to herself had been a wise one. Now there was real cause for terror. She’d done the unthinkable. She’d fallen in love with him.

  Who would have thought that kissing Anna Lee Collins would be such a powerful experience?

  Gavin stared toward the ceiling in the darkness of his room and laughed silently at himself. He must have thought it would be great or he wouldn’t have been so intrigued by her all these days.

  No, that wasn’t right. It was her, all of her, the woman, who had intrigued him, not just the thought of kissing her. So rigid and uptight, so straitlaced and unbending. So loyal toward that idiot brother of hers. Yes, she had intrigued him from the beginning. From before he’d ever met her, before he’d barged his way into her home. He’d been fascinated by the stories Ben had told of how she had managed to pull the two of them out of the hole their parents had left them in, how she had challenged him to finish school, forced him to learn to play the piano.

  Gavin knew Ben Collins. Getting the kid to do anything that was good for him was damn near impossible. Gavin had known from the beginning that Anna Collins must be some kind of miracle worker. She’d sure worked a miracle or two on him since he’d hit Oklahoma. He’d been there, what, a week and a half? And just now realized he hadn’t been to a single party. Hadn’t missed going. At home he would have been to half a dozen in that amount of time.

  He hadn’t had a single beer, and hadn’t missed it, either. He’d have gone through a case by now at home.

  He hadn’t made love to a woman. But hell, it’d been a damn sight longer than a week and a half since he’d done that, and now, tonight, he really missed it. But not just sex. Sex was fine. Sex was wonderful. But it was Anna he wanted, and he wanted more than sex. With her he wanted to make love.

  The very idea of everything he wanted from Anna scared him. He wasn’t ready for all these deep feelings trying to take hold. Didn’t want them. Wouldn’t allow them, by damn. If he and Anna happened to share a night or two together before he left, well, that would be great. He didn’t want more than that. Didn’t need more.

  Or so he told himself.

  Anna thought she could handle it, this being in love. She thought she could cope. But by the time she got to work the next morning she was more miserable than she’d ever been in her life.

  Donna, who had pretty much left Anna to her own devices during the three years they’d worked together, must have decided that Anna had been left on her own long enough. The payroll clerk took one look at her Tuesday morning and let out a disgusted snort.

  “Tell me it’s not a man, will you.”

  Anna decided her misery over Gavin must show on her face.

  “If there’s one thing I know about other than my job, it’s men,” Donna said stoutly. “Whatever he did to you, throw the bum out. He’s not worth it.”

  Anna had never had a confidante, someone to tell her troubles to. She didn’t know that she was ready to have one now. Better to keep her troubles to herself and avoid the embarrassment of looking like a fool. She sat at her desk and put her purse away in the back of the bottom drawer. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I’m talking about your pale cheeks, red-rimmed eyes with dark circles underneath, and the way you’ve got your blouse buttoned wrong.”

  Baffled, Anna looked down at her blouse, turned away from Donna and redid the buttons just above her waist.

  “I know you,” Donna said firmly. “You would never come to work with a less than perfect appearance. You never have, until now. You know if you don’t talk about it you’re going to burst. If you don’t want to talk to me, okay. We’ve never been bosom buddies. I can live with that.” Her voice softened. “But, Anna, you need to talk to somebody. You’re hurting.”

  Yes. Oh, yes, Anna thought. She was hurting. But it wasn’t Gavin’s fault.

  Suddenly she needed to talk. Desperately. She got up and closed the door to their office.

  Donna slowly uncrossed her arms. “Anna?”

  Anna returned to her seat and took a moment to gather her nerve. “I...I have this friend,” she began, chickening out at the last minute.

  “A friend?”

  “That’s right.” Anna moistened her lips. “A friend. She’s met someone.”

  “A man.”

  “Yes, a man. He’s...he’s very special.” Anna caught herself starting to smile. “But he’s temporary. Only in town long enough to conduct a little business, then he’ll go home to California.”

  “Uh-huh. And this, uh, friend of yours,” Donna said in a tone that said she saw right through the pathetic ploy but was willing to play along. “She’s maybe getting a little too attached, shall we say?”

  Anna did smile this time, poignantly, as she gazed off into middle space. “She’s in love with him.”

  “Damn.”

  “For the first time in her life, she’s totally, completely in love. And he’ll be gone soon, probably in a couple of days.”

  Donna was quiet for a moment. Through the paper-thin walls the sound of the copy machine firing up sounded loud.

  “How does he feel about...her?” Donna asked.

  Anna blinked, sighed. “He likes her wel
l enough, I suppose.”

  “But he’s not in love with her?”

  “Of course not Why would he be?”

  Donna shrugged. “Why wouldn’t he be? Has she told him how she feels? Asked him how he feels?”

  “To what point? He’s leaving.”

  “Does he talk about leaving?”

  Anna frowned. “No, but...”

  “Forget the but. He doesn’t talk about leaving. Maybe he won’t.”

  “He will. He has a life to go back to, a successful career. And I—my friend, well, she’s nothing special.”

  “That’s crap.”

  Startled, Anna blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

  “If that’s what she thinks of herself, that she’s nothing special, she might as well hang it up and send him on his way. If she hasn’t got any more faith in herself than that, it’s for sure he probably doesn’t love her.”

  Anna’s stomach tied itself in a knot. “She’s never had much self-confidence.”

  “What are you doing with a friend like that?” Donna cried, throwing a hand in the air in disgust. “She sure doesn’t sound anything like you.”

  “What do you mean? I...”

  “I mean, Anna, dear, that you always know exactly what you want and you’ve never let anything stand in the way of getting it. You’re so damn confident on the job, it’s intimidating to the rest of us mortals.”

  Anna was shaking her head before Donna finished. “You’ve got it all wrong.”

  “I don’t. And I’ll tell you something else. If you’re—I mean, if your friend is really in love with this guy, then it’s already too late to avoid a kick in the teeth, if that’s what’s going to happen. If it was me, or you, I’d say you ought to enjoy the ride while you can.”

  “No.” Anna shook her head. “When he leaves, I—she’ll be devastated.”

  “So what? Looks to me like she’s already devastated. Better to have loved and lost, and all that.”

  “That,” Anna told her steadily, “is a cliché.”

  “Clichés get to be clichés because over and over again, people find that they’re true. Your friend should hold on to this guy for all she’s worth, if she really loves him. Who knows? Maybe she’ll find out that he’s just as crazy about her.”

  “What good would that do?” Anna asked quietly. “He still has to go home.”

  “I’m thinking of another cliché here. True love always finds a way?”

  Anna chuckled sadly and shook her head. “I don’t think so, but thanks for the advice. And the ear.”

  “You’re welcome. And tell your friend that she’s out of her mind if she gives up on love one minute sooner than she has to. She should enjoy him while she has him. And I mean that in every way possible, if you get my drift.”

  It sounded lovely to Anna, lovely and sad. But she knew she didn’t have the courage it would take to bury her fear and simply enjoy being with Gavin. Surely he would see right through her and know how she felt about him. Then he would feel sorry for her, and that she could not bear.

  No, she thought. Better to distance herself now. There was no point in anything other than polite friendliness between them. No point at all. Ben would be home soon.

  Chapter Ten

  By the time Anna pulled into her driveway that evening her nerves were stretched taut and her stomach was churning. She’d worried all day about how to act around Gavin, what, if anything to say to him. How did a woman behave around a man when she didn’t want him to know she’d done the unthinkable and fallen in love with him?

  She couldn’t let him find out. A man like him, the kind of life he surely led in California... The rock-and-roll songwriter and the mousy bookkeeper from Oklahoma. It was laughable. Pathetic. He would, at best, feel sorry for her. At worst, he would laugh at her. Maybe secretly, behind her back.

  No, that wasn’t right. It didn’t fit the Gavin she knew. The man she knew wouldn’t deliberately hurt her, wouldn’t be cruel.

  Neither, she believed with all her aching heart, would he be willing, or able, to return her feelings. He had an entire other life in California, one he would be returning to soon.

  Oh, damn, why did she have to go and mess everything up by falling in love? They’d been having such fun. He’d opened her mind and her eyes to so many things she’d been missing in her life. Things like laughter, Phantom of the Opera, kites.

  And that, she thought, was one reason she’d fallen for him. He’d taught her how to have fun. Taught her that having fun was important.

  She wondered if she would even know how to have fun, much less be capable of it, after he left.

  A car pulled up across the street at the Robertses’ and revved its engine, making her aware that she’d been sitting in her driveway for several minutes staring at her garage door.

  She should never, ever, have gotten close to Gavin Marshall.

  She got out of her car and raised the garage door. Gavin stood on the other side, as though reaching to raise the door himself.

  “There you are,” he said. “You sat out here so long I...” Deep furrows appeared on his brow. Placing his hands gently on her arms, he studied her face. She could swear she felt his gaze like a warm, caring caress. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “Nothing.” She tried for a smile, but failed miserably. “I...”

  “Anna.” He jiggled her arms slightly. “Something’s wrong. What is it? Is it Ben? Did he call you at work? Did he show up?”

  “No,” she said quickly. “No. I haven’t heard from him.”

  Gavin read the truth of that in her eyes. She would always protect her brother the best she could, but she was a lousy liar. She hadn’t heard from Ben. But something was wrong. The anguish in her eyes, which she was trying unsuccessfully to hide, hurt him. “Then what is it?” he asked again.

  She glanced away. “Nothing.” Slipping from his loose grasp, she turned away. “I better get the car put up and dinner started. I don’t know about you, but I’m hungry.”

  He had thought he was, but at her blatant evasion, he found himself rapidly losing his appetite. Except for her. His hunger for her had been gnawing at him all day. All week, if he was being honest. Right now the hunger raged not so much in his loins as in his heart.

  This time when the alarm bells went off in his head at the thought of how much Anna was coming to mean to him, he ignored them. He was tired of worrying about what he should want, tired of denying what he did want.

  She was hurting, and he was very much afraid it was because of him.

  With a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, Anna changed clothes, then left her bedroom and went to the kitchen. She wasn’t the least hungry, but she would eat because Gavin would notice if she didn’t and might ask why. She needed to keep everything normal. Normal and calm. It was the only way she was going to survive the rest of Gavin’s stay without breaking in two.

  She was at the sink scrubbing two baking potatoes for the microwave when Gavin joined her. “I thought I’d keep it simple tonight,” she offered politely. “Salmon patties, baked potatoes and tossed salad.”

  “Anna—”

  “Oh, and com-on-the-cob. How does that sound?”

  “Talk to me,” he said.

  “All right.” She turned off the water and took a fork from the cutlery drawer, then started poking holes in the potatoes. “What would you like to talk about?”

  “About why,” he said quietly yet firmly, “you’re suddenly treating me like a stranger.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Gavin reached across her and covered her hands with his, stilling them, feeling, she was sure, the way they trembled. “Last night you said an apology would insult you. What do I do, then, Anna? How do we get back to where we were yesterday before I kissed you?”

  Anna stared at his large, dark hands covering her much smaller, paler ones on the sink divider. “Is that what you want?” she asked, her throat aching. “To go back to before you kissed me? To
pretend it never happened?”

  “If that’s what will make you smile at me again.”

  She swallowed hard. If he moved his fingers less than an inch he would feel how her pulse raced. “Smile?”

  “Look at me,” he said softly.

  She didn’t want to. She’d been avoiding looking him in the eye for fear he would be able to read exactly how she felt about him. But at his soft plea she could do nothing but comply.

  “What happened, Anna?” With his free hand he touched her cheek. “What’s wrong? What did I do to make you push me away?”

  “Nothing.” She shook her head. “You didn’t do anything. I’m not pushing you away.”

  “It sure feels like it to me.”

  She couldn’t take his nearness anymore without doing something completely foolish, such as laying her head on his shoulder and weeping for all they could not have.

  “I’m sorry.” She turned away and placed the potatoes in the microwave. “I guess I’ve just had a lot on my mind today, worrying about Ben, about when he’s going to get here.”

  “Are you in a hurry for him to get here? For me to leave? Is that it?”

  “No,” she protested quickly. Too quickly, she feared. “I mean, no, I’m not in a hurry for you to leave. But we both know you can’t stay here forever. How much longer will you give him? What if he doesn’t come at all? If he finds out you’re here he’s likely to stay away on purpose just to avoid you.” She took a deep breath around the knot in her throat. “Maybe I should—”

  “No.”

  At the harsh word, she turned toward him. “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

  “Don’t I?” The muscle along his jaw flexed. “You were going to offer to pay me the cash he owes me. I told you before, it’s not your debt. I won’t take your money. I thought we were past that, dammit.”

  “How can we be,” she asked quietly, trying to keep the emotions from invading her voice, “when that’s the only reason you’re here?”