by Kay Hooper
Josh found a small, wry smile. “Even a playboy can have a conscience.”
She chuckled. “I didn’t mean that, and you know it. I was mad, that’s all. And more than a little shocked to find out you really were a prince.”
“No. No prince. Just a man, Raven.” He sighed raggedly, his hand tightening around hers. “I haven’t walked on the dark side like you, but I’ve seen it. And it scares the hell out of me to think of you being there.”
“Josh—”
He reached for her, caught in the overpowering hunger to hold her in his arms, to feel her against him. But she pulled back abruptly, and he froze, searching her eyes. “If you want me to leave—” He could barely get the words out, his heart pounding sickly in his chest.
She lifted her free hand to touch his cheek, her eyes very dark and a curiously shy smile on her face. “No. But whenever I’ve been with Leon, I feel … Do you mind if I take a shower? I want to wash away Leon and that person I am when I’m with him.”
Josh held her hand to his cheek, turning briefly to press a kiss into her palm. “Go ahead,” he said gently. “But remember something, Raven. He could never make you dirty. No one could ever make you dirty.”
Too restless to be still after she’d gone into the bedroom, Josh rose and began pacing slowly. The heavy drapes were drawn, but he stayed away from the windows, knowing that if there were any watching eyes, it would be dangerous to show them a male silhouette while Raven was supposed to be alone.
He paced and tried not to think of her in the shower; she needed this time alone, he knew, and he was determined to do nothing to disturb her.
But he was disturbed. He had no doubt at all about his own feelings, but Raven, though wonderfully responsive physically, had said nothing about her own feelings for him. He told himself it was unfair of him to expect her to love him as instantly and completely as he loved her. She was, heaven knew, occupied by other and far more dangerous matters and had been since before they’d met.
That knowledge didn’t lessen his fear. She had appeared suddenly out of her shadowy life, and he knew only too well that she could choose to return there. And with all his resources, all the wealth and power at his command, Josh knew, too, that if she vanished by choice, he would never be able to find her.
He stood motionless in the center of the room, staring blindly at the wall, nothing but bleak images filling his mind. She had the ability to love, he knew, but would she make that choice? With everything she had seen and done these last years, what man could hope to keep her at his side unless she chose to be there? It would be like trying to cage the wind.
Even through his dark thoughts, Josh heard the distant sound of the shower stop, and he listened for a few moments until he heard a hair dryer begin to buzz. Even her hair, he thought somberly. Even her hair feels dirty to her when she’s left him.
And there was that. Raven knew herself, but Josh believed she had scars deep inside from the cruel cuts of the roles she had to play. It was impossible to walk on the dark side without garnering scars. And Raven felt dirty. What had that done to her feelings of self-worth, to her femininity? What kind of strength would it demand from a woman to rise above the shadowy corridors of a separate and ugly life?
Abruptly, Josh shrugged out of his jacket and threw it across the couch, moving swiftly and silently toward the bedroom. He went into the softly lighted room, barely glancing at the ultra-feminine decor. She was sitting at the dressing table in the white silk robe she’d worn earlier, a brush in one hand and the dryer in the other. Her steady, rhythmic motions with the brush stopped as she caught sight of him in the mirror, but she said nothing.
Halting behind her, Josh took the brush and dryer from her hands and began using them. He was awkward at first, but his movements became rhythmic and sure before long. The heavy mass of her wet hair lightened as it dried, and deep, warm highlights glowed in the dark brunette tresses. Each stroke of the brush caused her hair to shimmer more, the silky touch of it against his hand a feather-light caress.
Absorbed in his task, Josh watched her hair become a vital, living mass of darkness. He looked up once to meet her eyes in the mirror and his hand faltered. Her gaze was fixed on his face, eyelids heavy; her lips were parted softly and the white silk covering her breasts rose and fell quickly.
Josh swallowed, his jaw tensing as he pulled his gaze from hers and concentrated on what he was doing. His fingers were white-knuckled around the handle of the dryer, but even then he couldn’t hold it steady. His chest hurt and every muscle in his body felt rigid, while the deep, slow pulse of desire given life by their first meeting grew stronger and tauter.
He had more or less earned the outdated sobriquet of playboy, Josh knew. His sister, Serena, had often scoffed at his efforts to keep control of his life by subsisting on “a steady diet of blondes.” And Josh was a sensual man; he had found pleasure with those blondes. But he had never before felt this vital need, this pulsing of his entire body in an ache for one woman—and only one woman.
He turned off the dryer and set the brush aside, moving slowly, his eyes again fixed on hers. She turned on the low stool and rose to face him, and Josh knew there was no scrap of lace and silk beneath the robe this time.
His hand lifted to touch her cheek, the herbal scent of the soap she’d used making him dizzy again. Or maybe it wasn’t the soap. “When you came home,” he said hoarsely, “I didn’t dare kiss you. I knew I wouldn’t be able to stop.”
Her slender hands rose to lie against his chest, and then her fingers began slowly unfastening the buttons of his shirt. Her eyes were dark, as enigmatic as those of a cat. “No interruptions tonight,” she whispered. “Let the world stop for a while. Let it all stop for a while.”
If there was desperation in her words, it was muted and neither of them really heard it.
Josh shrugged out of his shirt, biting back a groan when he felt her hands slide down over his chest and stomach until his belt buckle stopped the contact of flesh on flesh. His own hands felt the cool touch of silk when he reached for her, drawing her abruptly against him, and his mouth found her parted lips hungrily.
Raven slid her hands along his ribs and then up his back, vaguely conscious of his hands holding her, one tangled in her hair and the other at her hips. She could feel his hard body burning her, imprinting itself on hers, and she rose on tiptoe until she fit him perfectly. Only the scant barrier of silk separated them, and she felt her breasts swell and begin to throb even as another ache grew deep inside her.
He possessed her mouth as if only that kept him from dying, as if he were starved and the touch of her sated his hunger. His tongue sought the tender sweetness of her mouth and Raven responded instantly, exploring as he did, caressing in the secret, hidden kiss of lovers. She felt her robe slide to the floor and her soft whimper was lost in his mouth as the sensual rasp of his hair-covered chest turned her nipples to fire.
The room seemed to move around them, and Raven half-opened her eyes as his mouth reluctantly left hers. She realized that he had picked her up effortlessly and was carrying her to the bed. Raven wasn’t a small woman, and the ease with which he carried her was a faint, almost instinctive shock. It disturbed her, but nothing could put out the fire he had ignited in her body.
Josh managed to strip the covers back toward the foot of the bed before lowering her onto its softness, then straightened and rapidly discarded his remaining clothing. His eyes, wild and glittering, raked her body with an intensity Raven could feel in every nerve, and she could barely stop looking at his face long enough to absorb the powerful strength of his body as it was revealed to her.
Her breath caught in her throat and Raven knew a single fleeting moment of panic, instantly overborne by an equally strong wave of primitive desire. Clothed, he was an impressive figure, tall and broad-shouldered, with an easy, athletic grace of movement. But when the trappings of civilization fell away, he was something else, something elementary. Raw sexuality emanated f
rom his muscled body like a primitive aura, and his desire was a vital, living force she could feel, as if electricity had been loosed in the room.
The strength of her own response to his power frightened her, and that instinctive fear quivered in her voice. “Josh …”
“Shhh.” He was with her, kissing her slowly, deeply, raised on an elbow beside her with one hand lying quietly over the sensitive flesh of her stomach. “You’re so beautiful,” he murmured, his lips feathering over her face, and his voice was unsteady. “I love you, Raven.”
She found his shoulders and held on, needing … needing. Fear ebbed, and all her senses focused on his lips, on the hand still lying unmoving just beneath her breasts. Tension began winding tightly within her, as much emotional as physical, and she could feel something else inside, something still and dark. And Josh felt it as well.
He lifted his head briefly, those hot, glittering eyes looking deeply into her own, and the rough sound he made was one of pain. “Don’t … don’t hold back, darling. Don’t hide from me.”
Was she hiding? Raven didn’t know. But she had never in her life given herself up totally just to feeling, and the guards that necessity had helped her build around her emotions and her mind weren’t easily released. She wanted to lose herself in Josh, in the way he made her feel, but years of tense, careful living had left their mark.
“I …” She tried to catch her breath, tried to combat the smothering feeling weighing her down. “I don’t want to … I can’t help it, Josh.…”
For an instant he was still, tense, and then his head lowered again and his mouth found hers with a gentleness all the more astonishing because she could feel the rigid muscles of his body demanding more, much more than a kiss. But he was careful, inexpressibly tender, as if there were no hurry. His tongue traced the sensitive inner surface of her lips softly; his teeth caught her lower lip gently; he brushed his mouth against hers lightly again and again.
The careful, insidiously seductive caresses dissolved Raven’s defenses as no demand ever could. The dark stillness within her faded away and tension grew. But this tension was sweet, shattering, and seemed to be centered deep within her. She felt his hand finally move, tracing the lower curves of her breasts, sweeping lightly down over her stomach and back again.
Raven looked at him when he lifted his head, staring at his absorbed face, quivering as his hand gently molded her breasts to fit his palm. He seemed mesmerized by her response to his touch; his gaze was fixed on her breasts and her nipples hardened achingly even as he merely looked at them. Then his mouth touched the slope of her breast, trailing toward the yearning point with agonizing slowness.
All fears and barriers forgotten, Raven thought of nothing but her body’s need for him. And when his mouth at last closed hotly on her nipple, she moaned at the instant wave of burning pleasure that swept her entire body. Her fingers locked in his hair and she tried to hold herself still for that nerve-shattering caress, even though her body needed desperately to move.
She could feel his hand moving down her hip, then skim tantalizingly up the inside of one thigh, and the hollowness within her seemed to swell achingly. She was raw nerves and empty need, and the combination nearly drove her mad. She couldn’t breathe, her heart was pounding out of control, and his hand was stroking the inner thighs parting mindlessly for his touch.
Raven gasped, her body arching in a sudden, helpless reaction when his fingers found the warm, vulnerable flesh they sought. His mouth moved from one breast to the other, tongue swirling maddeningly, while his fingers stroked gently, insistently.
“Josh!”
“Shhh.” He didn’t trust his own voice and could only draw a harsh breath when his head lifted. He couldn’t take his eyes off her tense, striving face, watching her faint, jerky movements as awakened senses took control of her body. His own body was hard and throbbing, and he thought he’d explode, but he was drunk on the touch of her, the taste of her.
He had managed to rein his desperate need because of the far more imperative need to reassure her, to ease his way past the barriers he’d felt in her mind and, perhaps, her soul. And now he held on to those restraints fiercely, all his consciousness bent on pleasing her.
He flicked a pointed nipple with his tongue again and again, then captured it hungrily. The kittenlike sounds she made drove him crazy, and his hand moved more insistently. Then he felt her explode, and she cried out softly as her body convulsed.
Blind and deaf to everything but the shattering waves of sensation racing through her body, Raven clung to him, shaking, the world revolving behind her closed eyelids. Nothing in her life had prepared her for this wild, mind-numbing pleasure, and she lost herself in the rippling waves of it.
Josh, his own need critical, gave her no time to examine these strange new feelings. His hands caressed her shaking body with undiminished hunger, and his lips trailed fire everywhere they touched.
Dazed, she stared up at his hard, intent face, and the molten heat in the pit of her belly renewed itself in an astonishing explosion that seared her nerve endings. Her desire was so intense, it was as if it were new again, surging powerfully within her, but this time she was all the more conscious of the emptiness. Where there had been shivering pleasure before was only a yearning, throbbing ache, and she knew she’d go mad if he didn’t ease that ache, fill that emptiness.
Instinctively trying to draw him closer, Raven almost sobbed with relief when he moved between her thighs and braced himself above her. His chest moved strongly with each ragged breath, and every muscle of his body was tense with strain, but still he hesitated, gazing down at her with hot eyes.
“I love you,” he said raspingly, his voice all but gone. “I’ve always loved you.…”
Raven felt a pressure against her aching flesh, and she barely caught her breath before a sharp pain tore a faint cry from her throat. Even as she saw Josh’s eyes darken in a quick reaction, she felt her body stretching, accepting him, and her own eyes widened at the primitive sensation.
His body shuddered, but Josh was still, gazing down at her with something she’d never seen before in his eyes, something very like wonder. “Raven …” he whispered.
She surged upward then, taking all of him, and her own whisper was fierce and sure. “I love you.” Her arms pulled him closer and she gloried in the hot, slick union of their bodies. “Josh …”
A wild tangle of emotions nearly ended Josh’s control, but he hung on and began moving with all the care his strained body could manage. He had wanted her willing and wild beneath him, and now that he had it, he wanted to make it last forever.
One silken thigh brushed his hip in a nerve-shattering caress, and Josh groaned, his measured movements quickening in the instinctive drive toward release, and the coiling tension within him wound so tightly it was a quivering ache.
Her fingers dug into his shoulders and those glorious long legs cradled him passionately; when she whimpered softly, he lost control. His body buried itself in her again and again, striving to have more of her, all of her.
He was wilder than he’d meant to be, but her soft little cries were driving him crazy and her body sheathed his with a caressing tightness that made savage ripples of pleasure race through him. And she was moving with him, as fierce and driven as he, as desperate.
Then she surged against him wildly, crying out, and her hot flare of pleasure caught him in its force. He buried himself in her with a hoarse sound, shuddering violently as waves of ecstasy jolted through him in a release so devastatingly complete he thought he had died.…
SIX
A COOL BREEZE from the air-conditioning system played over their damp, entwined bodies, and Josh managed to pull the covers up over them without losing his possessive hold on Raven. The lamplit room was quiet now, and his voice was hushed when he spoke. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Maybe I thought you wouldn’t believe me.” She cuddled closer to his side, her body limp and her mind floating peace
fully.
Josh was stroking her long hair, his hand still a bit unsteady. “Did you think that?”
She was quiet a moment, then sighed. “No. I can’t imagine another man who would have believed me, but I know you would have. Some women in this business … well, sex is a tool to them, to use like a smile or a certain dress or a gun. I was just never willing to use it. And until I met you—”
Josh raised himself on an elbow and gazed down at her with darkened, tender eyes. “I’m glad,” he said simply. “It wouldn’t have changed anything, but I’m glad.”
She smiled. “So am I.”
He traced the slightly swollen curve of her lower lip, still unable to stop gazing at her. “I thought I heard you tell me something else, though,” he murmured.
Her response was unhesitating. “I love you, Josh.”
With an odd, rough little sound, he lowered his head to kiss her very gently. “I was afraid to hope for that. You came into my life so suddenly, I was afraid you’d leave it the same way.” Then he stilled. “You won’t, will you?”
This time, she hesitated. “Josh, I’ve never thought much about tomorrow, even when I could. Before. And these last years … well, I’ve seen things I’ll never forget as long as I live. Ugly things. You said it yourself. I’ve walked on the dark side for a long time.”
Josh was afraid he looked grim. He felt grim. But his voice was very soft. “Do you mean you don’t want to stop your work? Or that you’re afraid that work has changed you in some way that would make leaving it behind you impossible?”
She answered slowly, carefully choosing her words. “This kind of work isn’t something you plan to make a career of; it’s too easy to burn out, lose effectiveness. I don’t want to stop helping, Josh, but I want to stop working the way I have been.”
He nodded, expecting nothing else from her. “And the second question? Are you afraid you won’t be able to leave it behind you?”
“I just don’t know.” Raven felt the sense of well-being slipping from her grasp, and a little voice inside her warned that it would always be that way. She tried to speak lightly, tried, as always, to fight back shadows with a laugh. “I’ve never fallen in love before; give me time to figure things out.”