Kittens.
Her eyes went to the barn, half submerged in the sea of liquid gold. The loft doors where Carly and Ryan had spotted movement in the straw earlier this afternoon yawned wide and dark. The water lapped just below the open loft.
Hopefully, the owners had moved their livestock as well as themselves to safety. They'd probably tried to round up the barn cats, too, but Carly knew a nursing momma would have hidden herself and her kittens in an out-of-sight corner. Well, they were safe and dry... for now.
She'd started to turn away when a shift of shadows in the backyard caught her eye. It took a moment to separate the solitary figure from the darker patches thrown by the pecans crowding the house. He was sitting on a stump near the water's edge, one ankle hooked over a knee, staring across at the barn as Carly herself had done.
She leaned a shoulder against the window frame, absorbing the play of light and dark as the breeze rustled through the pecans. Absorbing McMann's still, silent grace. Seconds slipped by, then minutes.
Carly chewed a tender spot on her bottom lip.
Common sense told her to go back to the narrow twin bed and leave him to his solitary vigil. She still hadn't forgiven him for withholding vital evidence, or for choosing to protect Billy Hopewell at the expense of Lieutenant Colonel Michael Smith. Although...
Here in the moonlit silence, she could understand Ryan's choice. Billy was already a victim twice over, once of the judicial system that should have recognized his limitations, then of Elaine Dawson-Smith. He wouldn't have stood a chance if charged with her death.
Unlike Michael Smith, whose testimony would have been weighed against that of an ex-con.
Sighing, Carly shoved a hand through her tangled hair. She could understand Ryan's choice, but she couldn't accept it. She'd tell him that much, at least.
Hoping to avoid any close encounters with critters that might have crawled or slithered out of the waters onto their small island, Carly slid her bare feet into the high topped rubber boots McMann had brought to the kitchen. The boots thumped across the linoleum, then squished on the damp grass of the backyard.
He swiveled slowly at her approach. His shirt hung open, the tails trailing his hips. With the moonlight water shimmering behind him, his face was in shadow. She couldn't tell if he welcomed the intrusion or resented it.
"I heard the kittens mewling," she said. "They woke me."
He regarded her for long moments, his eyes hooded and midnight dark.
"I didn't think anything would wake you," he said at last, his voice tipped with a mocking sting that told Carly he'd recovered from his bout with the river... or the bout with his conscience. "When I checked, you were sleeping the sleep of the pure and righteous."
The idea that he'd looked in on her while she was sunk into oblivion disturbed Carly a whole lot more than his sarcasm. She could only hope her big shirt had covered her borrowed panties, which had a tendency to slide off her butt.
"There's something to be said for pure and righteous, McMann. You should try them sometime."
He gave a little snort. "I'm way past pure, sweetheart. Oh. Sorry. I forgot. I'm not supposed to call you that."
He rolled the last few words just enough to make Carly suspicious. She stepped closer, sniffing. Sure enough, the sticky sweet odor of peach brandy hung on the air around him. She skimmed a quick glance around the stump and spotted the dull glint of moonlight on glass.
"Good Lord, did you drink the whole bottle?"
"I made a damned good try at it."
"Without puking it all up?"
He snorted again." That's still a distinct possibility."
She shook her head, torn between amusement and sympathy. She could still remember the time her brother had snitched a bottle of home-brewed sheepshower wine, a gift to the Judge from a neighbor. Of course, Dave had dared her to taste it. Of course, she'd had to do more than taste. She'd thrown up for two days after downing most of the potent, clover-based concoction. Dave, she recalled, had spent the same two days in the woodshed as penance.
She nudged McMann with a knee. "Move over." He wouldn't be nudged. Slitting his eyes, he peered up at her. "Why?"
"So I can sit down."
"Why?"
"So we can watch the water, or count the trees floating by, or talk."
His jaw jutted out. "I'm done talking."
They both knew he wasn't. He'd have to talk to a whole army of people when he left this farmhouse. Air force investigators. Prison officials. His parole officer, to name just a few. None of them would appreciate any more than Carly had the fact that he'd tried to shield Billy Hopewell by keeping his suspicions and his knowledge of the Afternoon Club to himself.
"I'm awake now, too," she pointed out unnecessarily. "But if you don't want me to share your tree stump, just say so and I'll go find my own."
"Go find your own."
"Oh, for..."
He sounded so much like Dave in one of his surly, go-away-don't-bother-me big brother moods that Carly dusted his shoulder with an irritated slap. The instant her hand made contact, she realized her mistake. He moved then, surging to his feet with that dangerous, athletic ability and a dark fire in his eyes.
"Go away," he snarled. "I swore I wouldn't touch you again, and I won't." He raked her face, her tangled hair, her legs. "But I want to. I've been sitting here thinking about just how much."
A string of warning beacons burst into flame under her skin. Do as he says, her instincts shouted. Turn around and walk away. Now!
She tried to do just that. She might even have made a dignified exit if the muddy grass hadn't sucked at one of her rubber bootheels and refused to let go. She came half out of the oversized boot, felt it knocking at her shins, pitched over.
She fell sideways into McMann, digging a shoulder into his chest with a force that staggered him. He brought his arms up to steady her and fought to keep them both from tumbling over the stump behind him. The awkward dance had Carly twisting in his hold, grabbing at his unbuttoned shirt for balance.
Arms wedged against the wall of his chest, she found her footing. Her hips, her stomach, her knees made clumsy contact with his. With a ripple of shock, she discovered he was rock hard, straining against his jeans, pressing into her belly. A sudden, vicious stab of lust hit her in exactly the same spot he did. She must have gasped, made some small sound. His arms fell away instantly.
Hers wouldn't move. The feel of him against her was like a brand, white hot, icy cold.
She hadn't planned this physical contact, hadn't intended it. But she wanted it. The realization burst inside Carly like a mortar round, ripping a hole in her pride even as her pulse jumped to a rhythm that matched his. Her head went back, and the woman in her took a shamed delight in the rigid line of his jaw Her fingers curled into his shirt.
"McMann..."
"I've told you all I knew, all I suspected. What more do you want from me?"
She couldn't be anything but brutally honest. "I want... I want the same thing you want from me."
The admission set Ryan on fire. He fought the pounding need to wrap his arms around her. He couldn't do this, couldn't let her do this. Even with the brandy blazing in his stomach and Carly hot in his blood, he'd hold to his promise not to touch her.
Carly didn't seem to appreciate his restraint. She stared up at him for endless moments, then slowly, so slowly, slid her arms around his neck. Her breasts flattened against his chest. She went up on her toes, wrapped her arms tighter and pulled him down so she could reach his mouth. Her tongue slid along the bottom lip, stealing the fiery residue left by the brandy. Her teeth scraped his, her tongue pushed inside.
Still he didn't respond. Insistent now, Carly played her mouth to his, taking, tasting, stirring more excitement in her blood, more need. She loosed one arm, let her hand roam across his shoulder, slide down his spine, drag up his shirt tail. The skin of his back was slick and damp. Even in her surging heat, she took care not to rake her nails across the we
lt scored in his flesh by the tree branch.
Short breaths later, she let him know she wanted more than just this one-sided exploration.
"McMann... Ryan." The words were ragged against his mouth, urgent. "You can touch me."
Still he didn't move.
"I want you to touch me."
"No."
Christ! Didn't she see how tight he was? How close he was to dragging her down and ripping off that oversized shirt? A sick memory rose unbidden in his mind of another night, another girl. He'd killed her. The brandy clogged his veins, fired him with the fear that he'd hurt Carly.
"Yes. Here. Touch me here." She feathered her fingertips across his chest, traced a line to his navel, slid inside the waistband of his jeans. "And here."
His stomach muscles leaped under her fingertips. On a swift, harsh breath, Ryan caught her hand. He had to stop her. Had to halt this insanity. Deliberately, he roughened his voice.
"We better get the terms and conditions straight first, Carly. Do you pay me before or after I perform to your satisfaction?"
Shock fisted into her. She stumbled back, the glorious, greedy heat snuffed out. "What did you say?"
His face was savage. "Isn't that what this is all about? You're playing the same game the others did. Taking a taste of the same forbidden fruit."
Carly swallowed both her pride and an urge to violence that startled her in its intensity. Only when she could trust herself not to howl out her frustration and her rage did she reply.
"I told you before, McMann. I don't play games. You said you wanted to touch me. For a few, insane moments, I wanted the same thing. If you think that puts either of us in the same category as Elaine Dawson-Smith and her friends, you're more twisted than she was!"
Each scathing word raised a sting of regret on Ryan's skin. She was right. She'd offered him a gift, and he'd flung it back in her face. But he didn't need her gift, and sure as hell couldn't satisfy his cancerous need for her with just a few kisses, a few touches.
"I am twisted," he snarled. "Twisted into knots so tight I hurt with them. I lied when I said I wanted to touch you. I want more than that. I want you, all of you, under me, on top of me, wrapped around me."
She backed away a step, just one step, but Ryan felt the crevasse yawning between them. Ruthlessly, he widened it into an impassable barrier.
"I want to slide inside you, watch your eyes widen with the shock of taking me, feel your breath hot and moist on my skin."
He was sure that would drive her away, fully expected her to spin around and flop back to the house in those oversized boots. He should have known she'd stand her ground and give as good as she got.
"Maybe..." She wet her lips. "Maybe I want that, too. I'll have to think about it."
Think about it! Ryan choked. Just the glide of her fingertips over his skin had fried what was left of his brain, not to mention his balls, yet she retained her capacity to process signals and thoughts.
"Yeah, well, let me know when you're done with thinking."
"I will."
She got halfway to the house before he remembered the demons that had driven him out into the night.
"Carly!"
She slowed, turned at the waist, eyed him warily. "What?"
"I wouldn't have let Smith burn."
When she didn't answer, he told himself he couldn't blame her. He hadn't exactly given her a lot of reason to believe in him.
"I didn't know for sure about Billy and Elaine Dawson-Smith. I only suspected. Then her husband was arrested. I figured he could take the heat better than the kid could, but I swear, I wouldn't have let him take the fall."
Her brow lifted. "I'm sure he'll be happy to hear that."
She trudged up the yard, leaving Ryan still hard, still hurting, and wishing like hell he hadn't dumped that last slosh of brandy into the grass. He was strung even tighter now than he'd been before and needed release... the kind that only Carly could give him.
But she had to think about it first!
Setting his jaw, Ryan reclaimed his stump and started counting the hoots of a barn owl, the bits of debris floating past, the ripples on the water, any- thing that might take his mind off the woman who'd just turned him inside out.
The damned cats finally snagged his attention. Their cries scratched at his ears, irritated him with their mewling helplessness. As if he could do anything to help them! Hell, he couldn't even get himself and Carly off this tiny atoll to safety.
He scowled at the shadowy barn, searching for the jagged board he'd decided on earlier as a reference point. When he finally found it, the kink Carly had tied in his gut became a tight, strangling noose. Since he'd last measured it, the river had climbed another foot up the wall.
Chapter Seventeen
Carly woke to the rumble of thunder, faucets that yielded only a few drops of water, and an empty house.
The first sent a jag of worry along her nervous system.
The second had her chewing on the inside of her cheek as she transferred a few careful glasses of water from the filled bathtub to the sink to scrub her face and her teeth.
The third sent her stomach plunging.
Steeling herself for her first meeting with McMann after their session by the tree stump, she walked into the kitchen. She expected to find him there, red-eyed and irritable after swilling the whole bottle of brandy. Instead, she found only the brooding quiet that comes before another storm.
Thinking McMann might have gone outside, she pushed open the screen door. She was hit by a morning far too sultry and sullen for late April and the throat-grabbing realization that their hilltop island had shrunk noticeably during the night. A single glance across the water at the barn brought her heart into her throat. The river had reached the loft doors and now snaked through the upper half of the structure as well as the lower.
The barn sat on lower ground, she reminded herself with a swallow, well below the hilltop that formed their little island. The river would have to rise another fifteen, twenty feet to reach the house. Even then, she and McMann could retreat upstairs.
Maybe he'd already retreated upstairs. She hadn't thought to check the master bedroom before she came down. Or maybe he'd passed out from all that damned brandy and still lay in a peach-flavored stupor.
The stillness of the house pressed in on her as she hurried back inside and up the stairs. A perfunctory rap on the master bedroom door and a sharp demand to know if he was in there brought no response. Frowning, Carly opened the door. The bed hadn't been slept in. Nor was there any sign that McMann had even used the room at all.
She stood rooted on the threshold, fighting a ridiculous flutter of panic as the possibilities marched through her mind. One, he could have passed out and spent the night beside his stump. Two, he could have tripped over something in the dark and hit his head. Three...
When she realized what she was doing, she choked out what should have been a laugh but sounded too close to a sob for her comfort. Damn McMann! She couldn't even marshal her thoughts anymore without feeling the weight of him in her mind. She couldn't sleep, either. She'd lain awake for hours last night, remembering the feel of his damp skin under her fingers, the heat of it, listening for his footsteps, worrying about whether he'd come into her room to check on her again. Wondering how she'd welcome him when he did.
She knew now exactly how she'd welcome him this morning, she thought grimly as she headed back downstairs. She'd tear another strip off his back for scaring her like this. Where was he?
She pulled on the rubber boots and went outside to search. The humidity wrapped around her like a wet blanket. She cut across to the side of the house, her throat tightening when she saw that the stump was gone, buried under muddy gray water. So was the well. The hungry river now licked at the base of a tall sycamore that yesterday had stood high and dry.
"McMann?"
Her shout hung on the heavy air.
"McMann, where are you?"
Prickly with nerves, she
wove through the pecans shielding the house and angled toward the water line. Debris had floated onto the slope... an old tire and what looked like a chicken coop. The tangle of drowned birds trapped inside had her backing off in a hurry.
Her heart thumping hard now, she made a full circuit, checking the trees and bushes, the sloping yard at the front of the house, the detached garage. With every step, the possibilities tumbled through her mind, each one more frightening than the last.
He'd spotted a boat or something floating past, maybe the chicken coop, tried to swim out to it. The river had sucked him in, swept him away. He'd been drunker than she thought, passed out, woke to find himself miles downriver. He'd been bitten by a water moccasin, died an agonizing death before the river claimed him. Oh, God! Not that! Please, not that.
She burst out of the garage. Fright pumped in great, painful lumps through her veins. She broke into a loping run, the boots slapping at her calves.
She'd make another circuit. He had to be here somewhere! He had to!
She took only three, panicked strides before she spotted him, rising like a swamp creature from the water, holding a burlap bag in one fist like some prize he'd found in the murky depths.
"McMann!"
Panting with accumulated fear, Carly stumbled to a halt. Her breath came in shallow, wheezing gasps as he waded through thigh-high water. His black hair was plastered to his skull. His wet shirt outlined every line, every curve of his torso.
"Where were you?" she gasped.
"I took a swim, over to the..."
"Took a swim! Took a swim!" Fear and fury shot her voice up an octave and a half. "You idiot! Don't you know the rain's washed every cottonmouth and copperhead between Birmingham and Mobile out of their nests? You could have gotten snake bit! You could have been snagged by another tree! You could have ended up swimming all the way to the Gulf!"
"I only swam over to the barn, Carly."
In contrast to her screech, his voice soothed, but she could see he was fighting a smile. Her hands balled at her sides.
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