As Jerrod, Johnna, Mark, April, Luke and Abby all gathered around Lilly to learn about Clara’s condition, Matthew stepped outside into the late-afternoon sunshine.
He walked over to a stone bench beneath a shade tree and sat down, his thoughts whirling.
The absence of any negative feelings for Clara surprised him. He’d wanted to make her a villain in his past, had needed somebody to blame for all the misery, all the pain they had endured. Aunt Clara had been an easy scapegoat, but she’d had no more power than the Delaney siblings had had.
She’d been a woman alone with no power or resources to help. If she’d attempted to step in the way of Adam, he would have crushed her beneath his heels.
He leaned forward and placed his head in his hands, hoping…praying that Clara would come through the surgery all right. She had to be all right, not so much for his sake, but for Lilly’s, who loved her so.
“She’s all I’ve ever had.” Those were the words Lilly had said to him, her eyes filled with unshed tears. They were words that confused him.
According to what his father had told him, Lilly had had a family until she was sixteen, when they had been killed in a tragic car accident. So how could Lilly believe that Clara was all she’d ever had. She’d had a family until she’d been sixteen.
“Matthew.”
He looked up to see her approaching. She sat next to him, her gaze warm as she looked at him. “What are you doing out here?”
“Getting some air…thinking.”
“I want to thank you,” she said softly.
He frowned. “For what?”
“For being kind to Aunt Clara. For kissing her and letting her know you care.”
He drew a deep breath. “I’ve blamed her for years for not rescuing us from my father.”
“I have a feeling she underplayed the trauma of her childhood with your father.”
Matthew nodded, knowing she was probably right. He looked at Lilly curiously. “You mentioned earlier that Clara was all you had…all you’ve ever had. But weren’t you sixteen when your parents died?”
This time it was her turn to look surprised. “Don’t you know how I met your aunt?”
“I have no idea. My father told me your parents had been killed in a car accident when you were sixteen and Clara took you in.”
Lilly shook her head. “Aunt Clara was probably afraid to tell your father the truth.”
“And what is the truth?”
“The truth is I met your aunt when I’d just turned sixteen and I tried to snatch her purse on the street outside her house.”
She smiled at Matthew’s stunned expression. “It’s true. It’s not something I’m particularly proud of, but I tried to grab her purse off her shoulder and run. Instead she grabbed hold of me and didn’t let go.”
“Why were you trying to steal her purse?” he asked incredulously.
She leaned back and gazed off into the distance, her smile fading. “Because I’d been living on the streets for three weeks and I was hungrier than I’d ever been in my life.”
Matthew gazed at her in confusion. “I don’t understand. Why were you living on the streets? Was this after your parents died in the accident?”
“No. That was just a story we made up,” she replied. When she turned to look at him again her eyes were dark…haunted. “You aren’t the only one who didn’t have such a terrific childhood. My parents were drug addicts, and my early childhood was nothing but chaos and uncertainty.”
Matthew was stunned by her disclosure.
“We moved around a lot because they often couldn’t pay the rent,” she continued. “We spent the summer that I was six living in our car.” She tucked her hair behind her ear and leaned back against the trunk of the tree behind them. “My father was a carpenter. He’d try to stay clean, get work, but those periods never lasted very long.”
“So what happened to them?” Matthew asked.
“I don’t know. When I was eight years old we were living in a small apartment, and for the first time in a while life seemed sort of normal. I went to school one morning and when I came home that afternoon they were gone. They’d packed up and moved what little we owned and disappeared. A social worker was waiting for me.”
She closed her eyes, and Matthew knew she was remembering that day. He reached out and took her hand in his, wanting to comfort the little girl she had been—a little girl thrown away by her parents.
Her fingers curled around his, and when she opened her eyes tears glistened there. “I was sure they’d be back, that it was all some sort of a horrible mistake. I insisted the social worker sit with me on the stoop of the apartment building and wait for my parents to return. We sat there all night long. When morning came I knew they weren’t coming back for me.”
Matthew placed an arm around her shoulder and drew her close against his side as she continued to speak. “I went into foster care after that. From the age of eight to sixteen I was in fourteen foster homes, then when I was sixteen I ran away.”
“Where did you go?”
She shrugged and leaned her head against his shoulder. “The mean streets of Dallas. I found an abandoned building and stayed in it for three weeks. I’ve never been so dirty…so hungry and so scared in my life. The best thing I ever did was try to steal Aunt Clara’s purse. She grabbed me by the arms, took me into her house and scrubbed and fed and loved me like I’d never been loved before.”
For a long moment neither of them spoke. Matthew silently tried to digest all that she had told him, imagining the pain of being abandoned and the fear of being alone. “Why didn’t you tell me all this years ago?” he finally asked.
She sat up and looked him in the eyes. “Probably for the same reasons you didn’t tell me about your father. There are some things too painful to share at the time you are living them. That first summer that Aunt Clara brought me here, I was so afraid that I’d somehow do something to mess things up, I wasn’t about to say anything to anyone about my past.”
It amazed him, how much he’d thought they had shared with each other on those summer days so long ago, and yet in reality how little they had shared. The integral parts of themselves, the essence of experiences that had made them the people they were they had jealously guarded, afraid to share.
“She has to be all right, Matthew,” she said softly.
He squeezed her shoulder. “She will be. She’s tough.”
“I hope you’re right. I need to get back inside,” she said, although she didn’t move from his side.
“I think I’ll just sit out here for a little bit longer,” he said. He wanted to digest what she’d told him about herself.
She pushed away from him and stood. “I’ll see you inside?”
He nodded, then watched her as she walked back to the building and disappeared into the hospital doors. She positively amazed him. Now that he knew her background and the pain she had endured, her ability to love and her cheerful optimism awed him.
She seemed to carry no scars from her experience and he envied her that. But that didn’t change the fact that the scars he carried were too deep to be healed, too toxic to be ignored.
He could love Lilly, if he allowed himself. But he’d promised himself a long time ago that he’d never, ever love a woman. And one thing Matthew never did…he never broke his promises.
It was just after ten when Lilly parked in front of the house. Matthew had left the hospital two hours earlier, when the doctor had told them that the surgery had gone fine and there had been no complications.
Lilly had stayed, and when Clara had been brought back into her room, she had sat next to her bedside, content to simply watch the old woman sleep peacefully.
The nurse had finally chased her out of the room, telling her to go home, get some sleep and come back in the morning. Realizing she was tired, Lilly had finally heeded the nurse’s advice.
The front door was unlocked and she found Matthew sitting in the family room, a glass of brandy
in his hand. “Ah, that looks wonderful,” she said, and sank down in one of the wing chairs.
He stood and went over to the bar and poured her a glass of the dark-amber liquid. “Here you are,” he said.
“Thank you.” She took a sip, then leaned her head back and swallowed.
“Everything okay?”
“Fine.” She opened her eyes and took another sip. “The nurse finally kicked me out of Aunt Clara’s room and told me to come home.”
“Smart nurse,” he observed as he sat on the edge of the sofa. “You look tired.”
“It’s been an incredibly long day.” She kicked off her sandals and buried her toes in the thick carpeting, then took another sip of the smooth brandy. “Everything okay here?”
“Fine. Several of the workers have come by for news about Clara.”
“That’s nice. She’s a special woman, Matthew. If you just give her a chance, she’ll enrich your life.”
He nodded, his features inscrutable. He finished his brandy, then carried the empty glass to the bar sink. “Did anyone say when Clara will be released from the hospital?”
“Day after tomorrow,” Lilly replied. She took the last sip of her drink, then stood and carried her glass to the sink. “It’s amazing, isn’t it,” she said as he took the glass from her. “That they did heart surgery today and she’ll be released so quickly.”
“Amazing,” he agreed. His gaze lingered on her for a long moment. “Well, I guess I’ll head to bed.”
“Me, too,” Lilly said, her pulse racing slightly. There had been something in his eyes when he’d looked at her that had shot adrenaline through her.
Matthew turned out the light in the family room and together they left and paused at the foot of the stairs where they would part ways to go to their separate bedrooms. A pale light drifted out of his bedroom providing just enough illumination for her to see his features.
“Matthew, thank you for being there for me today,” she said. “I always feared that something would happen to Aunt Clara and I’d have to face it all alone. It was nice to have you and your family there with me.”
“I’m glad I could be there for you.” He reached out and touched a strand of her hair. Hunger. That’s what she saw radiating from his eyes. A hunger for her.
Her throat went dry and her heartbeat accelerated. How she wanted to be held in his arms again. How she wanted to feel his touch burning her, setting her on fire. “Matthew?” His name whispered out of her.
“I want you, Lilly,” he said, eyes blazing. “I want you in my bed, in my arms.”
“I want that, too.”
He pulled her to him and captured her lips with his, his hands tangling in her hair as his body pressed tightly against hers.
Lilly welcomed him, opening her mouth to him, arching against him in overwhelming need. He tasted of brandy and simmering passion, and she wanted to lose herself in him.
He broke the kiss only long enough to scoop her up in his arms, then he carried her into the bedroom and gently laid her on his bed.
As he undressed, she did the same, kicking off her shorts and taking off her blouse. There was no sense of shyness, no hesitancy inside her. Never had she felt so right about making love to a man.
When they were both naked, he rejoined her on the bed. He placed his hands on either side of her face and for a long moment gazed at her, his eyes filled with both a hunger and a sweet gentleness that stole her breath away.
“We’re quite a pair, you and I,” he said, his voice deeper, huskier than usual. “You’ve spent much of your life without a family and feeling all alone. I’ve spent much of my life with a family and feeling all alone.” He kissed her lips softly, tenderly. “But at least for tonight, neither of us has to feel alone.”
His words sought out and found a cold place she hadn’t realized existed in her heart and warmed it with evocative heat.
Yes, she had spent most of her life feeling alone, but at the moment, with Matthew’s arms wrapped tightly around her, the innate loneliness disappeared.
Then there was no time for further thought as he kissed her again and stroked down the length of her body with his slightly callused hands. His kiss was explosive, yet retained an underlying tenderness that wove its way straight to her heart.
The love she felt for Matthew, a love she’d fought against and tried to ignore, now expanded and rippled through her entire body and soul.
His touch was different this time from the first time they had made love. Gone was the frantic first-time frenzy, replaced by what seemed to be a languid savoring of her skin.
She moaned as his hands found her breasts, his thumbs raking over the turgid nipples and shooting sensation throughout her body.
“Oh, Lilly,” he murmured softly. “You have made me half-insane over the past couple of days. All I’ve been able to think about is kissing you…making love to you.”
“And I’ve wanted you,” she replied breathlessly.
“The most difficult thing I’ve ever done in my life was take you back to your bedroom after you’d come in to thank me for that rose.” He leaned his head down and captured the tip of one of her breasts in his mouth.
Any reply Lilly had been about to make was lost, just as she was lost to his touch, to his kiss, to him.
She splayed her fingers over the expanse of his broad back, enjoying the feel of his smooth skin and the play of muscles beneath. As his mouth moved from one breast to the other, she tangled her fingers in his thick hair, another moan escaping from her.
His touch ignited every nerve ending in her body, and it didn’t take long for her to be enflamed with need. Still he took his time, languidly stroking her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, teasingly avoiding the place where she needed him most.
She didn’t remain an uninvolved participant. She ran her hands across his chest, down his flat abdomen, then on to his muscled thighs, enjoying his quick catch of breath and the fire in his eyes as she teased him in return.
It didn’t take long before the mutual teasing reached fever pitch and Lilly felt that if he didn’t take complete possession of her immediately, she might die.
Apparently he was at the same place, for with a groan he rolled between her parted legs and entered her. As he moved his hips against hers, she cried out and shuddered as a climax swept through her.
He waited a moment, allowing her to catch her breath, then began to move again, beckoning her back up…up…to heights of pleasure she didn’t even know existed.
As passion swallowed her whole, she had one final thought. How on earth was she going to walk away from this man? And yet she knew that’s exactly what she had to do.
No!
He stood outside the bedroom window, the lamp on the nightstand illuminating the couple on the bed. He wanted to run away from the sight, and yet his feet walked him closer to the window. He wanted to close his eyes and banish the image of the two making love, and yet his eyes refused to look away.
Tremors shook his body…tremors of rage. How dare he? How dare he touch her so intimately. By all rights Matthew Delaney should be dead. Matthew should never have left that creek, should have fallen into the water, his blood spilling out of him from a rifle shot.
The watcher at the window balled his hands into fists. He should have taken the time to get off one final shot. Perhaps it would have been the one that hit his target. But he’d been aware that the sound of the two blasts he’d fired might draw attention, and so he had taken off, angered by his lack of success.
He didn’t blame Lilly for this betrayal, knew she was an innocent who had been taken advantage of by the smooth, handsome cowboy. What he was watching take place in the bedroom was nothing short of rape, and hatred for Matthew Delaney coursed through him.
He had to get Lilly away from here. He had to get her away from Matthew. Once he had her alone, he could make her understand that they belonged together. He could make her understand that she was his.
Chapter 11
> He felt as if he’d been starving for years and Lilly was a piece of life-sustaining bread. He felt as if he’d been thirsty for a lifetime and Lilly was a swallow of sweet, clean water.
Matthew knew in his heart that making love to her again was a mistake, but as he took possession of her, felt her surrounding him in heat, saw the glazed passion in her eyes, he also knew he couldn’t not make love to her one last time.
After tonight he would stay away from her. After tonight he would never kiss her, never hold her, never make love to her again. But he had to have her tonight.
All afternoon he’d thought about what she’d shared with him, the pieces of her childhood that he hadn’t known before. And for the first time in years he’d ached with somebody else’s pain…he’d hurt with her pain.
He’d thought of the little girl she had been, sitting on a porch, waiting for her parents to return for her. He imagined her pain when the night had passed and they hadn’t come back. He’d ached with the need to wrap her up in his arms and never let her go. He’d yearned to sweep away her past and rewrite it with happiness and love.
Once again he’d been awed by the fact that not only had she survived but she’d thrived, despite her past. And as he’d waited for her to return home from the hospital, a crazy need to hold her in his arms had filled him. The need had grown to fever pitch by the time she’d walked through the door.
She now moaned his name and he increased his rhythm, moving in and out of her warmth with the ancient tempo of lovers. Each and every movement shot overwhelming sensation through him.
He wanted this moment to last forever, yet felt himself building to fever pitch far too quickly. He slowed his pace in an effort to cool his fervor.
Each sweet little gasp, every precious deep moan she released, further stoked the flames of his desire. Her fingers raked across his back with each thrust he made and once again he increased his pace, unable to ignore the pounding pleasure of loving her.
He took possession of her mouth once again, their tongues battling in passionate warfare. He vaguely wondered if he would ever get the taste of her out of his mouth, the scent of her out of his nose, the memory of her out of his brain.
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