Zach's Law

by Kay Hooper

  Teddy couldn’t help him really, except to listen. And when she realized that the restlessness in his eyes wasn’t due entirely to his worry over elusive things, she could hardly help but be encouraged by it. She’d lain awake for hours the previous night, trying to think of some way of reaching him. And her eyes still ached with her tears of despair.

  But if—even now, in the midst of serious concern—he could look at her and want her, then there was still a chance, despite the threat of time running out. Because she was still determined. She loved him, and no matter what Zach thought, that love was very, very real.

  He was visibly restless by the time breakfast was finished. The tape recorders had remained inactive, and he rose after a glance at them to help her clear the table. The area near the sink was cramped, and Teddy was all too conscious of his nearness. She could feel the storm hovering, sending warning gusts of wind toward her, and her fragile control began to splinter.

  She heard her own voice, calm but husky, speak to him. “Is it dangerous, this off-center thing you’re sensing?”

  “Everything’s dangerous in a situation like this.” Zach was standing beside her, her shoulder almost brushing his arm, and he felt oddly winded, as if something were tightening around his chest, squeezing the breath out of him. He tried in vain to shake off the feeling. “Especially,” he added, “something you can’t put your finger on.”

  He reached to put the bread back on the shelf, and before his arm could fall to his side again, he felt her fingers on his forearm below the rolled-up sleeve of his flannel shirt.

  “Sometimes,” she said, “what you can touch is even more dangerous.”

  He looked at her hand, creamy pale against the smooth bronze skin of his arm. The hand that was so small and slender and trembled a little. Clearing his throat of some mysterious obstruction, he said, “You should always avoid danger—”

  “If you can,” she finished. “I can’t, Zach.”

  He looked, finally, at her face. “I can,” he told her, the sudden hoarseness of his voice giving the lie to his promise. “I can for both of us.”

  “You?” She almost laughed, a soft sound that was part humor and part vast understanding. “You were born for danger. Shaped for it.” She stepped closer as he automatically turned to face her, and her free hand came to rest on his chest. “You could no more avoid it than another man could willfully stop breathing.”

  “Teddy—”

  “Don’t tell me that what I’m feeling is wrong, that it isn’t real.” Her eyes held the amber fire of a cat’s. “Don’t tell me I’ll get over it. I don’t believe that, Zach, I won’t.” She drew a deep breath. “But I won’t make demands on you, I promise. If—if you don’t want to see me when this is over, then I’ll understand.”

  “It’ll be you,” he muttered, “who won’t want to see me.”

  “Don’t count on it.” But her voice was half smiling, because he had, with the statement, implied that there would be a time after this. She hoped. Her hands slid up his chest as his found the curve of her hips, and she tried desperately to rein the wild hunger rising in her, half afraid that what was inside her was too abandoned, too violent.

  Zach’s eyes were half closed, his lashes hiding the darkening gray as he looked broodingly down on her. His hands remained at her hips, and though they held her tautly, it wasn’t to draw her closer but to hold her firmly away from him. “No,” he said finally, a guttural sound. Before she could react, he stepped away from her abruptly.

  “Zach—”

  “No, dammit!”

  A part of Teddy’s emotions took wing then, and she allowed them their fierce, angry flight. “I’m twenty-six years old,” she told him furiously. “Why won’t you believe I know what I’m doing?”

  “Because you don’t know.”

  “Well, then, give me a chance to find out, dammit,” she retorted a little wildly. “It’s my body, and if I want to give it to you, then that’s my own business!” She realized the absurdity of what she was saying but somehow couldn’t stop the words.

  Zach laughed curtly and turned away. “If all you want is a stud, Teddy, you’ll have to wait until you get to Boston.” He stopped as though he’d run into a wall, closing his eyes briefly as he realized what he had said to her. Behind him was utter and complete silence. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that.”

  She said nothing.

  He braced himself and turned back to face her. The only life in her white face was blazing in amber eyes, and he couldn’t read the emotion burning there. “Teddy … I’m sorry.”

  She looked at him as though he were a stranger just met, her head tilted a little, the expression on her pale face vaguely curious. “You can be cruel, can’t you, Zach.” It wasn’t a question, just a peculiarly detached observation. “As you said, if I had a brain worthy of the name, I’d be afraid of you too.”

  It hurt, and Zach knew he deserved it. He nodded a little, accepting it, then went over to his equipment silently and began labeling tapes, storing them neatly. Packing away unnecessary things. Getting ready, she realized, to leave this place.

  Teddy finished cleaning up, moving by rote, then forced herself to do other things, to keep busy so that she couldn’t think. It didn’t work, but at least she wasn’t feeling very much. Those wild feelings, she thought, had been shocked into stillness by this rejection, leaving only the dim echoes of what had been.

  It was late in the day, and Zach had silently left the cabin several times, when Teddy ran out of things to do. She had made a stab at organizing her purse, she had straightened the tumbled clothing in her suitcases, and she had cleaned up the cabin. After preparing a supper that neither of them did justice to—and in silence—she finally shut herself in the bathroom and took a bath of sorts.

  It wasn’t easy, but the creativity demanded for the task at least occupied her mind. The sink was small, the water cold, the room cramped. But she managed to wash by standing naked in a battered tin washtub she’d found, soaping and rinsing methodically. She even managed to wash her hair.

  She emerged finally, wearing a definitely overlarge flannel shirt as sleepwear, her hair wrapped turbanlike in a towel. Ignoring the uncommunicative expanse of Zach’s broad back, she crawled into bed with her comb and brush and sat toweling her hair until most of the water was out. Then she combed the tangles from the unruly mass before brushing it steadily while it dried.

  The automatic motions were soothing, and Teddy blanked her mind as much as she could. By the time her hair was dry, though, her mind wasn’t the problem. Since that first burst of passion between them she had been walking an emotional high-wire, surprising herself again and again by saying and doing things she hadn’t anticipated. The wild mood swings from temper to depression to a kind of aching apathy seemed unmanageable and beyond her understanding.

  She wavered between hope and despair, passion and anger, determination and anguish. And now she was aware of all those feelings rising in her throat, choking her, clawing to get out after the dazed stillness of hours. She set the brush and comb on the floor and slid down under the covers, turning her face to the wall. And she realized she was chewing on a knuckle only when she felt the pain and, feeling it, bit harder, because at least she knew then why she hurt.

  Zach had been aware of her every movement. He had sat and kept himself busy with packing away instruments, with listening to uninformative conversations from the house and going out to check the area, with requesting and studying data from Interpol and other data banks—all of it mindless, barely scratching the surface of his thoughts.

  He kept reminding himself, over and over, of why he had turned away from Teddy. Of why he had to. But as the hours passed, that reasonable voice grew weary and fainter. He stopped listening to it altogether when he heard the quiet sounds of her bathing.

  He was under control again when she came out, but didn’t dare turn and watch her. Still, he knew she was in bed and brushing her hair. He knew when she put the brush asi
de and when she lay down in the bed.

  Zach did turn then, gazing toward the bed. She was a mass of red hair and blankets, facing the wall. She wasn’t crying, he knew. It was something worse than tears, something that reached out in a way he didn’t understand and wrenched at him. She didn’t move or make a sound, but he felt his willpower vanish, his control splinter. For just a moment he sat there, unable to move for the sheer power of the feelings battering him. His? Hers? He didn’t know.

  He didn’t care.

  Zach didn’t remember crossing the room but he must have, because he found himself sitting on the edge of the bed. He touched her shoulder, finding it tense, spoke her name softly. She didn’t move, and he turned her gently onto her back. She was looking up at him with huge eyes that were dry but feverish.

  His large hand closed around her wrist and pulled her knuckles away from her mouth. Her creamy skin was reddened and bore the marks of her teeth, and he knew she would be bruised there tomorrow. He lifted her hand to his own mouth, rubbing his lips softly across her knuckles. His free hand cupped her cheek, the thumb gently drawing her bottom lip from between her teeth.

  “Don’t be kind,” she told him in a voice that almost wasn’t there.

  His mouth twisted, and Zach bent toward her, murmuring, “I haven’t got a kind bone in my body.” He fitted his mouth to hers, firmly and with utter possession, his tongue diving deeply to twine with hers.

  Instantly, Teddy responded, her arms going around his neck, a faint whimper escaping the molten joining of their lips. She could feel his hand slide around to the nape of her neck, drawing her up against him, and his other hand was at the small of her back. Her breasts were pressed into the hardness of his chest, and the pleasure of that alone tightened an already quivering coil of desire deep inside her. They were locked together for long moments, and her body strained instinctively to be closer, to be a part of him.

  He eased her back a little so that he could unbutton her shirt, his fingers quick and sure, and she lowered her arms long enough to let the flannel slide away. She would have reached out for him again—did, in fact—but he was straightening, and Teddy felt a quick flare of pure panic.

  She gasped. “If you leave me now …”

  Darkened gray eyes were sweeping her body that the discarded shirt and tumble of blankets left bared to the waist, and he smiled just a little as he swiftly unbuttoned his shirt. “No, honey,” he said in a voice like rough velvet, “I’m not leaving you.”

  Reassured as much by the expression in his eyes as by the words, Teddy allowed her body to relax and lay still, watching him. Completely unselfconscious and utterly fascinated, she watched the golden light play over his rippling muscles, and when he bent to discard the light moccasins he always wore, she reached out to gently touch one of the several faint scars on his back. His muscles moved like a living animal under her fingers, and he turned his head to look at her with a hint of that untamed intensity in his eyes.

  “So much hurt,” she murmured, thinking of mangled cougars and wounded warriors. Her fingers traced the puckered scar that had to have been left by a bullet, then trailed downward to follow the curving ridge of scar tissue high on his rib cage; God only knew what had made that awful wound.

  Her hand fell away when he stood up to finish undressing, and she caught her breath. The raw male beauty of him made her ache, heart and soul, and the vital force he exuded ignited her senses instantly. His big body was tanned flesh covering corded muscle; the smooth expanse of bronze was broken only by the jet-black hair lightly furring his long legs, covering his powerful chest, and arrowing down his flat stomach to the thicket over his loins.

  Clothed, he was an imposing man, the size and obvious strength of him intimidating, his grace of movement riveting; naked, he was all that and more. He was a male animal in the prime of his power and virility, and he was beautiful.

  Teddy reached out to him when he swept the covers away and lowered his weight beside her, but he caught her wrists gently in one big hand and anchored them to the pillow above her head. “I want to look at you.” His voice was a deep, soft rumble. He gazed down at her slender body, which seemed curiously insubstantial because it was half hidden in his own shadow.

  Her breasts rose and fell quickly with her shallow breathing, the position of her arms lifting and rounding them so that they begged mutely to be touched, kissed. She seemed incredibly fragile, her body delicate, her creamy flesh the kind that would be easily bruised; but she was unmarked, utterly perfect, and beautifully feminine.

  Zach swallowed hard, but it didn’t ease the ache in his throat. He felt a dizzying, savage wave of desire surge through his body, a driving need to possess, to feel her body sheathing his.

  “Zach?” Her voice was a whisper, her eyes not frightened but wide and feverish.

  He bent his head and kissed her, exploring the dark sweetness of her mouth, and he felt the heat of her response increase instantly when his free hand surrounded the thrusting curve of her breast. He could feel the hard arousal of her nipple against his palm, and when his fingers tugged gently at the coral bud, her body arched instinctively and a kittenlike sound tangled in her throat.

  His lips trailed down her neck and across her breastbone, hot and shaking, until they closed over a nipple and drew it strongly into his mouth.

  Teddy bit her lip, her eyes half closed, the storm descending on her for a second time. But now there was not even minimal control, and she had no idea of what the crescendo of this violence would do to her. It seemed she’d be torn apart, waves of pleasure battering her, and she found the breath somewhere to voice the single doubt in her mind.

  “I feel—I can’t control it, what you make me feel. It frightens me—”

  He raised his head for a moment, gray eyes shimmering hotly, then kissed her lips with a hunger only just tempered with gentleness. “Don’t be afraid,” he murmured huskily. “Don’t ever be afraid of this.”

  As his head lifted again, Teddy felt his hand slide down over her quivering belly, and even as the muscles of her thighs relaxed and responded to his insistent touch, she was aware of another tension, deeper inside her, tautly coiled and waiting for something. Something …

  She cried out in surprise and pleasure, her body arching again, when his knowing fingers combed among the red curls and found the slick heat awaiting him there. Shock waves of delight swept over her, and she didn’t worry about control anymore, didn’t worry that there was something unnatural in the wildness of what she felt.

  He held her trapped, her arms above her head, one of his legs between hers; she felt helpless and yet safe, safe if he’d only hold on to her, because she couldn’t hold on to herself anymore.

  “Don’t let go of me,” she whispered wildly, feeling that she’d float away somewhere if he didn’t hold her down, anchor her somehow.

  “I won’t,” he promised thickly. And he didn’t let go until he rose above, slipping between her legs and bracing himself over her. She caught at his shoulders then, feeling the smooth hardness of his hips against her inner thighs and a gentle probing of the aching flesh between.

  Her remaining breath caught in her throat and she stared up at his face, in that instant imprinting his features deep in her soul for all time. She felt her flesh stretching to admit him, and a tiny pain brought instinctive tension.

  Zach made a rough sound and lowered his head to give her a kiss that was both gentle and fierce. “I’ll hurt you,” he warned in a hoarse, raw tone. “Just for a moment.”

  Aware suddenly of the rigid tension of his muscles, Teddy knew then what it was costing him to hold back for her sake, and tension dissolved in a warm flood of trust. Her arms coiled around his neck, and she lifted her head to kiss him, murmuring wordlessly.

  He groaned, a shudder rippling through his big body. His breathing seemed tortured, ripped from his chest with harsh sounds, and she could see the pulse hammering in his throat. He moved with shattering care, hesitating when she gasped
, catching her faint cry with his savagely tender kiss.

  The pain had been sharp but brief, and Teddy forgot it instantly. Wonderingly, she absorbed the incredible sensations of joining, the stark power of him, the alien fullness her body welcomed with its own heat. His flesh sank deeply into hers in a merging so complete and utterly perfect that she felt a part of him and gloried in the feeling.

  “Teddy … ?”

  She opened her eyes, realizing only then that they had closed, and looked up at him. Her arms tightened around the strong column of his neck and she moved against him, drawing another groan from him.

  The velvety clasp of her body sent a wild shiver of pleasure up his spine, and the soft, unconscious sounds she made drove him crazy with need. He moved slowly at first, but soon her body was lifting to meet his thrusts and the heat of her scalded him, drove him still wilder. The innate fire of her passion increased his own, building it higher and higher until his hunger for her was a living thing consuming him alive.

  Teddy was writhing beneath him, and he lost all control over his own body. Some distant part of his mind told him he was being too rough, but he heard nothing except for the howling of intolerable need. He couldn’t get enough of her, couldn’t sate his starving senses or satisfy the terrible craving.

  And even as the hot explosion of her ecstasy caught him in its violent shock waves, even as their mindless cries were strangled in a fierce kiss of devastating completion, there was another explosion deep inside Zach.

  Buried somewhere near the core of his being, the iron bars of a cage burst outward with the wild force of the emotions swirling around it. And he knew dimly and with utter certainty that he was vulnerable now to her, knew that all the strength he could command would never be able to stand against her.

  He had fallen into another trap, and this one promised to tear the heart out of him.

  FIVE

  THE TURBULENT STORM had passed, leaving exhausted peace in its wake, and this time Teddy didn’t fear the return of it. It would return, she knew, in all its wild power every time Zach touched her.