The Heartbreaker

by Vicki Lewis Thompson

  Mike leaned his head back next to hers and turned to look into her eyes. “So that’s why you seemed all flustered when you came back from the phone call. You knew my dad had found out we’d done more than shake hands since I got home.”

  “He doesn’t miss much, you know.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “Once he’s not so doped up, he’ll know exactly how things stand between us. All our talk about nobody knowing if we became involved didn’t take Ernie into account.”

  Mike reached up and ran a finger down the bridge of her nose. “According to you, I’m so scared of getting involved with you that nothing’s going to happen, so we have nothing to worry about.”

  She gazed into his eyes. “I could be wrong.”

  An image of loving her shimmered in his mind. “Indeed you could.”

  “Mike? Bern?”

  They both leaped to their feet at the sound of the doctor’s voice. Mike held tight to Beth’s hand, while he searched the doctor’s face for good news. This guy wasn’t big on showing his emotions, but Mike thought he looked cautiously optimistic. Mike held his breath and prayed.

  “Everything’s looking much better now,” the doctor said, clasping his hands in front of him. “We’ve decided to take him off the IV and put him on oral medication. Pretty soon we should be able to return him to his room. The worst is over.”

  Mike turned to Beth and swept her into a bear hug, burying his face in her hair to hide the grateful tears that ran down his cheeks. When he finally felt in control of himself enough to release her, he noticed her face was pretty damp, too.

  “We’ll continue to keep a close watch on him,” the doctor said, “but I think it’s time for you two to go home and get some sleep. You won’t do him any good if you put too much stress on yourselves.”

  Mike swiped a hand across his face. “Can we both go in now?”

  “Sure. Then I strongly recommend you get some rest.”

  “We’ll go see him, and then we’ll decide about that,” Mike said. Still holding Beth’s hand firmly in his, he started toward the doors leading into ICU.

  HOLDING FAST TO MIKE, Beth approached the narrow bed where Ernie lay looking pale and exhausted. Beth concentrated on the movement of his chest to reassure herself that he was still alive. His eyes fluttered open. He glanced from Mike to Beth, and even in his drugged state, approval registered in his gaze.

  Mike reached for his dad’s hand. “You sure raised a ruckus. I’d like it if you wouldn’t do that anymore,” he said, his voice shaking.

  “That goes for me, too,” Beth added.

  Ernie seemed to be trying to say something.

  “Don’t try to talk, Dad,” Mike said. “I just wanted you to know that Beth hasn’t bitten me in two days, now.”

  “Mike!” Beth cried.

  “I appreciate you telling her not to, though,” Mike continued. “I guess she still listens to you once in awhile, even if I’m the one who has to bribe her with ice cream instead of you.”

  “He’s making all of this up,” Beth said, her cheeks warm. But despite her embarrassment, she could see that the teasing had brought a faint sparkle to Ernie’s eyes that hadn’t been there when he’d first opened them.

  “Anyway, we’ll be back to see you soon,” Mike said. “I love you, Dad. Now get some rest, okay?”

  Ernie gave an almost imperceptible nod of his head.

  Beth released Mike’s hand and moved around him to brush a quick kiss on Ernie’s leathery cheek. “I love you, too,” she murmured. “Get better.”

  Mike recaptured her hand and squeezed it. “We’d better take off. Don’t want to overdo it.”

  “Right.” With one last blown kiss to Ernie, she walked with Mike out of the unit.

  For a long moment they stared at each other.

  Finally Mike reached for her other hand, holding onto both of them as he faced her. “Look, I can’t go back to Bisbee. You go. Take the car. I know I’ll lose a day at the shop, but I just can’t—”

  “As if I care about losing a day. I don’t want to go back yet, either.”

  He looked grateful. “You’re sure?”

  “Hey, he’s like a father to me. I could no more drive back to Bisbee right now than fly. But the doctor was right. We probably should get some sleep.” She glanced toward the waiting room couches. “Somehow.”

  His gaze penetrated deep into hers. “There’s a hotel a block away. If we leave that phone number the doctor can call us if anything changes. We could be back here almost immediately.”

  “You’re right.” Her heartbeat quickened.

  He hesitated. “But that’s not the only reason I want that hotel room, Beth.”

  “I know.” She gripped his hands very tightly as the need to comfort and take comfort swamped her with powerful force. She loved this man, had always loved him. If he needed her now, she would be there for him.

  “Maybe it’s wrong to want you right now, but, God help me, I do.”

  “It’s not wrong. It’s very human to want to hold someone at a time like this.”

  His tone roughened. “I don’t want to hold just someone. I want to hold you. There’s a difference, and I want you to know it”

  “I don’t really care why you need me, Mike. I just know that you do, and that’s enough for me right now. I need to hold you, too.”

  “But—”

  “I don’t expect promises. So don’t try to think it out. You’re the one who said this was about feeling, not thinking.”

  His sigh was one of surrender. “All right” He released her hands. “I’ll go find a telephone and see what they can do for us.”

  As he walked away, Beth’s heart squeezed. He looked more vulnerable than she’d ever known him to be in her life. He was an only kid facing the loss of his only parent. At least she’d always had Alana to cling to. And perhaps, because of Alana, she should feel guilty about the decision she’d just made. But no guilt marred the warm certainty that she was doing what she needed to do at this moment, for herself and for Mike. They’d survived this ordeal together, and nothing seemed more right than taking solace from each other now that it was over.

  As ERNIE DRIFTED OFF to sleep, he heard Pete’s voice as plain as day.

  What a showoff. You didn’t have to pull a stunt like this to get them together, for crying out loud!

  Ernie tried to rouse himself enough to answer, but he just didn’t have the strength.

  Okay, so Mike and Beth are holding hands and depending on each other, but cut out the drama, will you? You’re scaring everybody, including me!

  Ernie couldn’t tell him that the drama was unintentional, but the news that Mike and Beth were holding hands was good. Real good. He smiled.

  HAD SHE HAD A CHOICE, Beth would have preferred something other than the impersonal atmosphere of a hotel room when she made love to Mike. But she had no choice. He needed her now, with a ferocity that wouldn’t be denied. And she would give him this. Although it could be dangerous to speak words of love, at least she could show him the depth of her feelings.

  As he twisted the lock on the door, she pulled the drapes, blocking out the pale beginnings of a new day. The only sound was the soft whisper of an air conditioner and his muted footsteps as he walked toward her.

  “I’ve imagined this hundreds of times,” he said gently, “but I always pictured it with you wearing that red dress.”

  “Let’s not talk about that night,” she murmured, her heart full of tenderness. “In fact, let’s not talk at all.”

  He reached for her and she snuggled into his arms, into his warmth.

  “We have to talk about it,” he said, his lips against her forehead.

  She hugged him tighter. “No. Not now, Mike.”

  “Now. Because that was the moment everything began, the moment everything changed.”

  She grew very still, remembering what he’d said on the street that night in Bisbee. When we finally do come together, we’ll probably h
ave to scratch, and claw, and bite each other just to work everything out between us.

  “That’s why you made that circle of glass, isn’t it?” he said. “Because that moment changed your life forever, too.”

  “Mike—”

  “Isn’t it?” He shoved his fingers through her hair and tipped her head back. “The whole world shifted for you, too. Admit it, Beth.”

  She gripped his arms so hard her nails imprinted on his skin. “I don’t want to talk about that night. I just want to love you, Mike.”

  “And why don’t you want to talk about it?” he persisted as his thumb stroked the line of her jaw.

  “You know why.”

  “Tell me.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut. He seemed determined to drag them through this swampland. “All right! Because after you kissed me, you tried to make love to her!”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  Her eyes flew open. “How dare you deny it” She tried to push him away.

  He held her fast and his dark eyes glowed with intensity. “Because I was falsely accused. I didn’t try to make love to Alana. She begged me, but I couldn’t make love to her after what I’d just found out, that you were the one, you were always the one—”

  “No!” She pushed against his chest, her palm coming into contact with the jaguar tooth necklace tucked beneath his shirt. “She told me you did. She told me!”

  He wrapped both arms around her and held her tight. “She lied to you, Beth.”

  She shook her head violently. “She wouldn’t do that.”

  “Not unless she was desperate, and she was. She sensed things were different between us, and she was trying to hang on. I don’t blame her for making up that story. I hurt her, and she had to strike out.”

  No, Beth thought, searching his face for any hint of deception and finding none. Surely Alana wouldn’t lie to her, wouldn’t deliberately tarnish her image of Mike. “I don’t believe you.”

  “Yes, you do, deep down. I couldn’t make love to you without telling you the truth. I don’t want Alana’s lie between us, poisoning what should be pure and beautiful.”

  Her voice quivered as she battled with what he was telling her. Believing him meant doubting Alana. But doubting him now would rip her to shreds. “Let me go.”

  “No.” He lowered his head.

  “Damn you, let me go!”

  “No.” His lips hovered over hers. “And I warn you that if you bite me, I’ll bite you back.”

  “I hate you.”

  “No, you don’t. And I’m going to prove it to you.” He closed in, taking possession of her mouth, daring to thrust his tongue deep.

  She writhed in his arms, trying to get away, but she didn’t bite him. She pushed at his chest with both hands, but he only deepened the kiss, probing for the wellspring of desire and love that lay waiting for him, waiting for this moment.

  After all the years she’d fought her longing, her capitulation was swift. She’d come to this room to love him. It was, after all, the only thing she wanted. And she knew, in the honesty of his passion for her, that he was telling her the truth about that night. With a moan she tunneled her fingers through his hair and pressed her body against his.

  As she abandoned herself to his kiss, she threw away all doubt about his integrity and his permanent place in her heart. There would never be another man in the world for her. From that first tender embrace long ago to the fiery wonder of Mike in her arms today, there had been a sense of recognition, a sense of coming home each time he held her, as if she’d always known the way he’d taste, the way he’d feel, the way he’d move.

  And so it was as they tumbled to the bed. After impatiently ridding himself of his clothes, all except the jaguar tooth necklace, he undressed her with trembling hands. When he faltered she helped, until at last there were no barriers between them.

  She touched the smooth jaguar tooth that dangled close to her breasts as he leaned over her.

  “Do you want that off, too?”

  “No.” She used the necklace to pull him closer. “It reminds me of that wild streak in you.”

  His lips hovered over hers. “Which you’ve always hated.”

  “I don’t hate it,” she whispered, flicking her tongue against his mouth. “I envy it. Show me your wildness, Mike.”

  “As if I could stop myself, with you here beneath me at last.” He closed the tiny gap between them with a searing kiss that was only the beginning of his relentless assault on her senses.

  Yet his heated touch on her skin was remembered, somehow. When his mouth captured an aching nipple he generated a liquid warmth that she already knew, and when his breathing quickened, it was a pattern she recognized...her own.

  She felt no hesitation, no awkwardness. He knew her, knew the sensual secrets that would arouse her to a greater pitch of excitement. And he, breathing as she breathed, was carried along in the tide of passion. As he knelt between her thighs, she lay before him, unashamed, and his supplicant hands knew the way—his fingers how to knead and lift her breasts to his waiting mouth, his palms how to glide over the curve of her waist as he tasted her.

  His mouth traced a path down the valley between her ribs as he slid his hands beneath her. Her breathing changed again, becoming more ragged, for she knew the gift he intended to give her before he plunged deep inside.

  She gasped when his tongue probed her sensitive cleft and laved the tender nub awaiting his touch. He raised the stakes, using his tongue to drive her deeper into madness, and a red haze of need swirled through her brain, blotting out everything but her increasingly desperate cries and the pounding urgency at her core.

  The mounting tension shivered through her body, setting off responding shudders within him. She clutched his shoulders and quivered, until at last she arched upward in an abandoned, glorious climax, crying out his name again and again.

  All boundaries disappeared as she slid both hands down his back to grasp his hips. “I want to feel you deep inside me,” she murmured.

  “I’ve always been there.”

  And so he had. And so he would always be. For she loved only him. “Then come back to me once more,” she said.

  He sheathed himself. Then, keeping his gaze locked with hers, he entered her, moving smoothly forward, going deep, going for her soul...

  She needed to know she’d touched his, as well. “Tell me...it’s never been like this.”

  “Never.” He eased back and moved forward again. “And it’s never been like this for you.”

  “That’s not a question.”

  “No.” He moved within her, slowly at first, then with increasing speed. “It’s not a question.”

  Her voice became breathy. “You always were a know-it-all, Mike Tremayne.”

  “I know you.” The sweet tension was gradually driving her out of her mind. He shifted his angle slightly, bringing more pressure on that special point he’d awakened not long ago.

  “You think...so.” Her breath hitched as he made contact with the exact spot. “Well, you’re...right.” She closed her eyes. “Oh...so...right.”

  “Open your eyes, Beth. This time I want to watch your eyes while I drive you crazy.”

  Her eyes drifted open and she looked into his fiery gaze as her body moved in concert with his. Her lips parted and she began to gasp and cry out soft, indistinct words that sounded almost like a plea.

  As the moment neared, she began to tremble.

  “Yes, my love,” he whispered hoarsely. “Explode for me. Shatter into a million pieces. I’ll be right here.”

  “Oh, Mike,” she whispered, panting. “Mike... Mike...Mike!” She lifted beneath him.

  With an agonized cry of release he plunged with her into the abyss. As he quivered in the aftershock, Beth wrapped her arms around him and drew him down, cradling his head against her shoulder as he lay helpless and dazed.

  “I need you so much,” he whispered.

  She tightened her hold, her eyes damp. She could fe
el the imprint of the jaguar tooth against her skin, and for now, she’d captured the wildness within him and made it her own. He might never need her like this again, but at least she had this moment when he was completely, utterly hers. No matter what happened, no matter what this moment cost her, it would have to be enough.

  9

  WAKING UP in unfamiliar surroundings confused Beth at first. She wasn’t used to sleeping anywhere except in her apartment above the studio. She turned her head and glanced at the digital bedside clock. Two-ten in the afternoon. She never slept at this time of day. Then she brushed against the man lying next to her, and everything came flooding back. Oh God. She closed her eyes in dismay at the realization that she’d done the one thing she’d sworn never to do. She’d made love to Mike Tremayne.

  “Regrets?” murmured a husky voice next to her.

  She didn’t open her eyes. “How will I ever face Alana?”

  “I don’t know, seeing as how you can’t even face me.”

  Cautiously she opened her eyes and turned her head on the pillow.

  Mike lay watching her, his expression unreadable.

  “What have we done?” she whispered.

  “You tell me.”

  “I’ve betrayed my sister. I’ve made love to the man she loved. I don’t know if she’ll ever forgive me.”

  “In the first place, being true to yourself isn’t betraying anyone. And in the second place, whatever Alana’s reaction, I was hoping what happened between us would be worth it.”

  His reminder brought back the delicious memories of touching and being touched by Mike. She remembered the tender moments they’d shared at the hospital and her decision to make love to this vulnerable man. When he’d stirred her anger, he’d obliterated it again in a blaze of passion. Desire began to push aside her guilt about Alana, as it had a few hours ago.

  Mike’s expression softened. “That’s better. When you get that look in your eyes I know everything will be okay.” He raised up so he could see the dock. “I’m going to call the hospital.” He swung his legs out of bed. “Just as soon as I find my wallet with the phone number in it, that is.”