“Let me up,” she said softly but without much conviction in her voice.
Trey looked at her. He didn’t want to acknowledge this attraction he’d tried so hard to ignore, but was helpless to stop it. “No, stay.”
She was lying on top of him between his legs. It was an indecent yet perfect fit and they both realized it the same time. “Let me up, Trey,” she said lightly. “Don’t forget we have a lot of work to do before the ferry comes on Friday,” she reminded him.
For a moment Trey wondered, because of the calmness in her voice, if he was the only one on some sort of adrenaline high; the only one whose body was experiencing a mega-shock of excitement and desire. He stared up at her and took note of the deep darkening of her pupils and the faint blush tinting her cheeks. For the longest time neither of them said anything. Then Haywood broke the silence by saying. “If you’re going to kiss me then go ahead and get it over with so we can—”
Trey didn’t let her finish. Instead he tightened one hand around her and with the other gripped her hair, pulling her mouth down to meet his. He saw the moment she closed her eyes, then he closed his.
The moment their mouths touched, electricity flowed through their bodies. She opened her mouth beneath his to let him taste her like she wanted to taste him. With his hand firmly planted in her hair he held her mouth in place while his tongue took, possessed and pleasured her mouth. And she couldn’t do anything but melt under him, and let him continue to drive her over the edge with his tongue.
When she felt his hand slipping beneath her blouse she pulled back. She hadn’t meant for this to happen, then remembered that she had all but invited him to kiss her so she couldn’t play the part of an innocent now. But she could try and get control of the situation. “Okay, you’ve had your fun for today. Let’s get back to work.”
She knew her words were like ice water thrown on a blazing fire but at the moment that couldn’t be helped. They had crossed a line and she wanted to get back on the other side as soon as possible.
She let out a sigh of relief when Trey released her and gently pushed her off of him. Instead of saying anything he stood and walked out of the house.
Thirty-five
Kissing Haywood had been a mistake.
But something in him needed to know what her mouth tasted like. And now he wished he hadn’t found out. He let out a little hiss of breath when he made it to the pier. What was wrong with him and Haywood? Why were they trippin’? Why were his hormones raging to the point where she was like a craving he had to have? How had she managed to get to him so fast? He breathed deeply, wondering if the saying, “like mother, like daughter” was true. If Jenna’s allure had been anything like Haywood’s, his father hadn’t stood a chance. But still, nothing should have been that tempting to make a man turn his back on his wife and child.
Bitterness flooded his mind. He would never forget the day his mother told him why she was marrying Harry and moving to Los Angeles. She had given up hope that she and his father would get back together because she’d discovered that for the past five years he had taken back up with an old girlfriend from college, and had been secretly having an affair with her. Now the woman’s husband was out of the picture and the two wanted to marry. But the woman didn’t want a visual reminder of Randolph’s marriage to another woman, which meant there wouldn’t be a place for him in his father’s life anymore.
At first he didn’t want to believe what his mother had said. He wanted to believe she was wrong. But when his father had asked that he not be present at the wedding he had been crushed and filled with bitter resentment. It was resentment that even now he hadn’t been able to let go of.
He stood on the pier and looked out over the water. From the conversations he and Haywood had had while walking he knew she had been close to her own father. He wondered how she had handled her mother remarrying so soon after his death. Did she know her mother and his father had been having an affair while they were married to other people?
A part of him didn’t want to bring up the past but he wanted to deal with the anger he was feeling each and every time he thought about it. Taking another deep breath he decided to talk to Haywood once and for all about something that had festered inside of him over twenty years.
Haywood was sealing up the last box that she intended to pack that day. Trey had not returned and she doubted that he would. She rubbed the ache at the back of her neck admitting that she had been acting downright bitchy with him since Monday and admitted further that he hadn’t deserved it. But there was this thing between them where they could be nice to each other one minute and at each other’s throats the next. And she was sick and tired of it.
A sound behind her made her turn around. When she did so she met Trey’s gaze. He stood leaning against the door looking at her. His face and stance appeared calm but she had a feeling there was a storm brewing; a storm she was about to get caught up in. Even the air surrounding them was filled with tension.
There was something else in the air, flowing between the two of them. Temptation. They had kissed once but the need, the desire to do so again was there as he looked at her. Would kissing him again be so bad, she wondered? She studied him as she considered it. She also considered the possibility that she was stone crazy to want to do such a thing.
Her gaze moved over him and she took in what he was wearing, a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt with an expensive pair of tennis shoes on his feet. She thought he had pretty good taste. When she lifted her gaze to his face, his mouth in particular, she remembered he also tasted pretty good.
She inhaled deeply and tried to ignore the pulses of desire shooting through her body. “You weren’t supposed to come back,” she finally said, breaking the silence surrounding them.
“Did you actually believe I that wouldn’t?” he questioned huskily.
She thought of their kiss and the passion it had stroked to life inside of them and shook her head. “No, but one of us has to keep our head on straight,” she said, softly.
“Usually my head is on straight,” he replied throatily. “I’ve just never had to deal with someone like you before. You’re different.”
She didn’t know if what he said was a compliment or an insult. She decided to find out. “In what way other than bitchy?”
He couldn’t resist the urge to smile and that smile, Haywood thought, tugged at her insides some more. The tension that had surrounded them all morning began evaporating with that smile. “We’re crazy, you do know that, don’t you?” she asked quietly.
“Yeah, but maybe it’s not us, but it’s this place instead. People claimed Ma Mattie had some sort of mystical powers that were linked to her Gullah ancestry.”
Haywood nodded. She had heard that, too. She wondered if it was true and if there was a purpose to her and Trey being here on this island together other than packing up Ma Mattie’s belongings. Had Ma Mattie decided to do what she felt had to be done to end the Denison-Fuller curse, and was she using Haywood and Trey to do it?
“But what would be gained if the both of us lost our minds?” she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and her senses intact. “We have a decision to make.”
He lifted a brow. “About the island?”
She nodded, then decided to be truthful. “Yes, about the island and about us as well.”
She waited for him to say there was no “us” but he didn’t. And in not saying anything, he was acknowledging that something was going on between them. Something neither of them understood but both were willing to own up to.
She watched as he pushed away from the door and slowly walked over to her. “Ahh, Haywood, what are we going to do?” he asked when he stood directly in front of her.
She never let her gaze leave his face when she said, “Kissing again wouldn’t be such a good idea but I’m willing to chance it.”
“Yeah, I’m willing to chance it, too.” His voice was low, sensuous, and then he leaned toward her and captured her mouth with his and im
mediately began feasting on her.
Haywood rose onto her toes to get closer as he mated with her tongue so relentlessly that she felt that same urge to mate in the lower part of her body. His kiss was deep, drugging, all-consuming, If the two of them were under some sort of spell, then it was definitely an erotic one that was meant to dull their senses and stimulate their passion.
And it was working.
That thought quickly intensified when she felt his hand move up and down her backside. His hands felt good on her, like that’s where they belonged. For the first time in her life she knew how it felt to be completely absorbed by a man. Aaron’s kisses had never made her feel this way. This was the kind of kiss that could knock you flat on your butt and dare you to get up. Passion was spinning out of control all around them. One of them had to pull back; Haywood quickly concluded it wouldn’t be her. The taste of him was like an aphrodisiac, making her body hunger for things beyond a kiss.
Trey heard her moan a low, throaty sound and it triggered a desire to have more of her. For the first time in his life there was this reckless power within him. His blood was raging and his control had snapped. With this kiss she was tearing down a wall he had built, brick by brick. It was a wall that was supposed to be solid as a rock.
He pulled back as a semblance of control seeped in and he slowly let go of her mouth. But not completely. The tip of his tongue began caressing the outline of her lips, liking the way she shuddered in his arms. Moments later he rested his forehead against hers as his breathing tried to return to normal.
He took her hand in his. “Come on, let’s go for a walk so we can talk.”
“Are you seeing anyone?”
They had stopped walking for a brief moment and he turned his head to look at her. That was not what he’d meant to talk to her about. But now he wanted to know.
“No, not any longer.”
“But you had been seeing someone seriously?”
He felt her hand stiffen in his. “I thought it was serious but I don’t think Aaron did, although we’d been together a little more than a year. He owns the company I work for and is sixteen years older than me. Mom and Dad don’t like him.”
“I can understand why.”
She looked at him and smiled. “Now you sound like Zach. He doesn’t like Aaron, either. He thought he was taking advantage of me but the truth is that I was taking advantage of him. I knew he had no intention of ever marrying again but I was determined to change his mind about that.”
“I take it you didn’t change his mind.”
Haywood inhaled deeply. “No, so I decided to cut my losses and move on.”
Trey said nothing for a while then asked, “Are you still working for him?”
She nodded. “Yes, for now. But when I return to Paris I’m turning in my resignation. It will be pretty awkward for us to continue to work together.” They began walking again. “What about you? Are you dating anyone seriously?”
“No.” Now that he had appeased his curiosity about her love life he said, “Haywood, we need to talk about my relationship with your mother and why I feel the way I do.”
Haywood had wondered if he would ever bring the subject up. She concluded that he figured she didn’t know the whole story since she had only been six when her mother had married his father.
“It doesn’t bother you that they are together?” he asked her.
“Why would it bother me, Trey? Our parents have been married for almost twenty-two years. Don’t you think it’s time you let whatever way you feel about them being together go?” she responded in a gentle voice.
“What about the way they got back together and the people they hurt? Don’t you feel angry at the way they treated your father? Your mother was unfaithful to him.”
Haywood shook her head. “No, she wasn’t. My parents had a loving relationship. And although I now know my mother never truly loved him, at least not the way she’d always loved your father, I’m okay with it because of what Randolph and my mother gave up.”
Trey frowned. “And what did they give up?”
Haywood smiled. “The most beautiful and the most passionate love any two people could ever share.”
Trey stopped walking and crossed his arms over his chest and glared angrily at her. “And just where did my mother fit into the mix?”
“She didn’t. My mother and your father had already committed their lives together more than a year before he married your mother. They did it here, on this island in your father’s senior year of college during spring break. And it was done over the family Bible. In their hearts they were as married as two people could be, Trey. Maybe not legally but they were married just the same.”
Trey had heard about the family Bible and that all Denisons were to commit their lives to the person they loved over it. He also knew it had gotten lost to the family when his father had sent it to his Uncle Ross to use when he had married his Vietnamese bride. It had not been returned with Ross’s belongings when he’d died in Vietnam. “If what you say is true and they felt they were already married, then why did he marry my mother?”
“Because she was pregnant with you.”
He’d already known his parents had married after he’d been conceived. Their anniversary date in correlation to his birthdate had indicated that. “In my book that meant he was not faithful to your mother. I know my mother was originally engaged to my father’s brother. I also know about how the two of them ended up sleeping together one night when they were both mourning Uncle Ross’s death. My mother told me everything.”
“I doubt she told you everything.”
He frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means there are still things that you don’t know.”
“Your mother’s version of it?”
“No, the truth, Trey. You’re an attorney and are aware that diaries can be admissible as evidence in certain court cases. My mother’s words in her diary depicted what really happened. She doesn’t even know that I found it one day and read it. That’s how I learned the truth. It’s time that you learn the truth, too. Go to your father and listen to his version of what happened. You owe him that, Trey. He has been hurt so much by all of this.”
“He’s been hurt? What about me? I’m the one he turned his back on for you and your mother because that’s the way she wanted it. She didn’t want me around because I reminded her of his marriage to my mother.”
“That’s not true and if your mother told you that she lied. My mother is not that type of person. And no matter what you want to believe, she did not break up your parents’ marriage. My mother broke off her engagement to Randolph so that he and your mother could marry and then she moved to Paris. They didn’t see each other again until almost twelve years later. By then he was already divorced from your mother.”
“Your mother and my father began having an affair three years before my parents divorced. She’s the reason he divorced my mother, Haywood.”
Haywood frowned. “That’s not true and if you talk to your father you will find out what’s true and what’s not. If you don’t want to talk to him then talk to your grandparents, the Fullers. They both know what really happened. You owe it to yourself to find out the truth once and for all.”
Her words may as well have fallen on deaf ears, Haywood thought, as she got into bed later that night. Their talk hadn’t accomplished anything but had made them angry and frustrated with each other once again. They had ended their walk and had gone their separate ways. They had two more days of packing left and she dreaded seeing him again. He was convinced that his mother had told him the truth. Haywood wondered how he would handle it when he found out what she’d told him had been nothing but the lies of a spiteful and hateful person.
As Haywood drifted off to sleep she prayed that whatever reason Ma Mattie had had for placing them on the island together was worth all the anger, hard feelings and frustration that she was feeling right now.
Private Investigator P
atrick Sellers read the report for the second time. The information was still incomplete but at least he seemed to be headed somewhere other than a dead end.
There was reason to believe that Adrianna Fuller was not only alive but was living in San Diego, California.
He had been able to track the American church that had sponsored her to come to the United States and had paid for her schooling. According to their information, she was a doctor. The only thing he did not have was the last name she was using now.
Patrick checked his watch. It was late and time he called it a day. But he was determined to find the final piece to a thirty-four-year puzzle.
Thirty-six
He didn’t stand a chance.
Trey knew it when he arrived at the big house the next morning and Haywood opened the door with sleep-filled eyes, wearing her robe. Some things were supposed to look good early in the morning, but a woman whose face had that “just got out of bed” look was not one of them.
“I’m sorry, Trey,” she said between yawns. “But I didn’t get much sleep last night and overslept this morning. You can start packing and I’ll join you as soon as I get dressed.”
He nodded as he leaned in the doorway. “Have you had breakfast yet?”
“Breakfast? Are you kidding? I just rolled out of bed. I haven’t had a chance to even wash my face or brush my teeth.”
He quirked an amused brow at her as he straightened his stance. “All right, go do both and I’ll fix you something to eat.” He entered, closing the door behind him.
Haywood tilted her head up and looked at him. “I like your offer but I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”
“It’s no trouble at all. Eggs, toast, bacon and coffee. That’s simple enough.”
“You sure?”
Ties That Bind Page 33