by Lynn Kellan
“Did Mark ever tell you what bothered him?”
“Only once. I walked into the barn and caught him with a half-empty bottle of whiskey. At that point, he was drunk enough to admit he felt guilty, but he wouldn’t say why.” She curled her palm around the back of Hale’s neck, loving the feel of his skin against hers. “I never understood how guilt could silence a person until I started feeling the emotion myself.”
Hale’s body stiffened. “What do you mean?”
“Things had gotten so bad between us, I told Mark I couldn’t live with him any more. I was packing my bags the day he fell.” She eased back and forced herself to meet Hale’s gaze. “If I’d given him one more chance, maybe he wouldn’t have gone to the bar to drink so much at lunch. Maybe he would’ve seen the rotten floorboards when he returned to the barn. Maybe he’d be alive today.”
“Don’t say that.” Hale’s arms tightened around her waist. “I’m the one who should feel guilty. Mark wrote to me a few weeks before he died. He wanted to make things right between us, but I never responded to his letter. I was still angry he turned his back after I lost my hearing. Ever since then, I’ve wondered if he would’ve turned things around had I given him the forgiveness he needed.”
She hugged him. “Thank you for telling me I’m not the only one who feels guilty.”
For a long time, they held each other while the summer night sounds twinkled through the open bedroom window. The pearly moonlight wasn’t strong enough to combat the dark shadows across the bed.
Knowing Hale had trouble reading lips in the dark, she flicked on the nightstand lamp.
Hale squinted in the harsh light. “Aren’t we going to bed?”
“I wanted to talk a little more.”
His brow arched. “About what?”
“You Cooper men keep a lot of secrets.” A spike of anxiety knifed through her. “How many do you have?”
The tendon along his jaw flexed. “Three.”
“I want to know what they are.”
The clean planes of his face hardened. “I can’t tell you.”
Her mouth went sour with the bitter taste of resentment. Hurt that Hale wouldn’t spill his guts after she’d just spilled hers, she rose from his lap and strode to the other side of the room.
“Danielle, I can hear you better if you face me.”
Abashed he had to remind her of that, she twisted the hem of her tank top in her hands. Whenever she and Mark fought, their terse barbs were delivered to each other’s backs. What better way to cloak one’s emotions? With Hale, Danielle couldn’t hide. She had to face his compelling gaze just to get across her point.
As she turned toward him, her body braced with apprehension. The intense way he watched her mouth made her feel vulnerable. “Why won’t you tell me what troubles you?”
“Because saying those things out loud won’t solve anything.” He remained seated on the bed and spread his hands open. “So, I can’t tell you three things. Ask me anything else.”
Twisting her wedding ring around her finger, Danielle frowned. “You’ll answer me? No matter what?”
“Yes.”
She knelt by Cocoa, who was half-asleep on her dog cushion. Venturing to touch one velvety brown ear, Danielle was startled when the dog thumped her tail on the floor in welcome. “Why did Cocoa follow me around the house yesterday when you were cleaning out the chicken coop?”
“Cocoa is scared of the chickens. You’re the only one they don’t chase.” A wry grin lifted the corner of Hale’s mouth. “Thanks for starting off with an easy question. Now, ask what’s really bugging you.”
Danielle sat on the floor, stroking her hand down Cocoa’s smooth back. “I’ve never seen you take a drink since you’ve been here. Is that because you promised not to get drunk?”
“I don’t drink. Booze makes me dizzy. I hate that feeling. Reminds me of when I started losing my hearing. Back then, I’d lose my balance for no reason at all.”
A distant memory made Danielle’s heart clench. “When we bailed hay the summer I came to the farm, you fell off the tractor and hit the ground hard. You acted like nothing was wrong. Why didn’t you tell me you were dizzy?”
Hale pinched the bridge of his nose, a line of tension creasing his brow. “Better to let you think I was clumsy, rather than sick.”
She remembered the obstinate jut of his jaw when his family joked about his fall. Their ribbing seemed even crueler now that she knew his unsteadiness was due to his hearing loss, but she could tell Hale didn’t want her pity. Instead, she forced herself to ask what she’d been wondering ever since he came back home. “What did you give up in Oklahoma when you married me?”
He squinted and ran a hand over his jaw. “What do you mean?”
Not sure he’d talk about this, she bit her bottom lip. “Were you dating anyone?”
Flicking a piece of grass off his jeans, he shook his head. “I didn’t leave anyone behind, if that’s what you’re wondering. There was a girl a few years ago. I told her I didn’t want to have kids because I didn’t want to pass on my hearing loss. She was okay with that, so I got a vasectomy. We were together for a while.”
Struck by the radical measures Hale took to prevent fathering a child, Danielle clasped her hands in her lap. “Are you certain your child would inherit your deafness?”
“I don’t want to take the chance. I couldn’t stomach watching my own kid go deaf, knowing I caused his suffering.” He rubbed the crown of his head and shrugged. “My girlfriend understood. We had a decent relationship, but she broke up with me a year ago.”
“Why?”
“She said I wasn’t crazy about her.” His gaze focused on a spot over her shoulder and he nodded at the memory. “She was right.”
He was being remarkably forthright. Danielle stood, deciding to press her luck. “What happened the night the barn burned down?”
“Honey, I can’t tell you that.” Across the room, his narrowed gaze burned into hers. “Thank you for never asking if I started the fire.”
“I know you didn’t. A good man like you wouldn’t do something so careless.”
He let out a gruff laugh. “You never stop, do you?”
“Stop what?” She hooked a loose tendril of hair behind her ear with an impatient swipe.
“Defending me.”
“I’m just telling the truth.”
The strained humor drained from his face, leaving behind deep grooves framing his mouth. “Six years ago, I couldn’t wait for morning so I could be with you. Didn’t matter what we were doing, whether cleaning out the chicken coop, baling hay, or driving to the mill. Being by your side was the only place I wanted to be. Now I can’t last a few hours before I need to see you again.”
Danielle took an unsteady breath. “Maybe we shouldn’t talk about this, given our arrangement.”
“I know you need to leave this place, just like I did. You deserve a chance to start over.” Hale stood, fisting his hands. “But this is getting damned complicated. Every day, not reaching for you kills me. Every night, I can’t touch you the way I want.”
She took a stumbling step backwards and bumped into the bureau, sending her hairbrush clattering to the floor.
A crease deepened on Hale’s brow. “The day we applied for our marriage license, you hated the fact I rescued you. Do you still feel the same way, Dani? Do you still hate me?”
The heartbreaking question made her eyes sting with regret. “No, of course not. When I said that, I hated myself for getting into this mess. If I had managed my life better, you wouldn’t have had to give up everything to come back to the place that caused you so much pain. The day I agreed to marry you, I lashed out because I wanted you to think twice about putting yourself in such jeopardy.” She pulled the hair away from her face, barely able to control the heavy waves with her shaking hands. “How can I hate my best friend? How can I hate you?”
He crossed the room in three strides. “I know sex isn’t part of our deal, but
I want you...even if it’s just for one night. I’ve wanted you for such a long time.”
Staring at the sensual curve of Hale’s mouth, she wondered what a real kiss would feel like with him. The last time she let a man seduce her, she ended up bruised and bankrupt. Would Hale’s secrets zap her well-being, just as Mark’s had?
Hale curled his finger into one of the belt loops of her cut-off jeans and gave a gentle tug. “Hold me like you did a few minutes ago. Grab me like you don’t ever want to leave. I’ll go back out into the barn and throw a million bales of hay if you’ll hug me like that again.”
Heart rate kicking up, she curled one hand around the heavy muscle cording his left arm, holding him at bay. “This is a bad idea, don’t you think?”
“Stopped thinking the minute you said I was a good man.” His lips parted, revealing the miniscule chip missing on his bottom toothevidence of the unsteady boy he used to be planted in the body of the reliable man he’d become.
“There’s still so much I don’t know about you.” She squeaked in surprise when he framed her waist in his hands. He looked fierce as a bull now that sexual urgency hardened his face. The concern pulsing through her bloodstream morphed into giddy disbelief when she spotted the vulnerability in his searching gaze.
“For six years, I was thirteen hundred miles away. Now, I’m living in your house and there’s still too much distance between us.” The corners of his eyes tightened and his voice grew hoarse. “Come closer. You’re too far away.”
“There’s hardly three inches between us.”
“Too damned far.” His hand slid under the hem of her tank top.
Danielle jerked when his big palm flattened along the hollow of her abdomen, branding her with heat. She’d never seen such craving in Hale’s blue eyes, and a dangerous surge of desire made her insides dissolve. Could she make love to this man when too many things were still left unsaid between them?
Secrets ruined her first marriage, she didn’t want them to poison her life again.
With a slow move, he pulled off his t-shirt and tossed it to the floor.
Danielle’s eyes widened, admiring the flex of muscle under his tawny skin. “You don’t fight fair.”
“We aren’t fighting, darlin’.” He pulled her close and nuzzled her temple. “Let me show you the difference.”
“So tempting.” The tip of her nose brushed against his warm chest. A fine layer of gold hair grew along his upper torso and narrowed to trail down his flat abdomen. Falling prey to the pulse of sexual attraction, she placed the tip of her index finger just beneath his ribcage and slid a caress to his belly button.
Hale sucked in his breath and moved his hand to her spine, lowering his palm to press her hips against his.
The jeans clinging to his lower half did little to mask his arousal. Danielle’s fingers trembled. In an effort to hide the shiver of desire, she flattened her hand against his flat belly. His warm skin felt so good.
“You’re still too far away,” he murmured.
When the bulge of his erection nestled against her zipper, the seam of her cut-offs tightened between her legs, rubbing the nerves tingling along her sex.
“Making love will complicate things.” She spoke these words aloud mostly to emphasize this unalterable fact to herself, not him.
He pressed a kiss in her hair and dragged his mouth down to her cheek. “Can’t pretend any more. I want you.”
“But I’m supposed to leave in a few months.” Her thoughts fractured when his warm, inviting lips slid over hers in a sweet, seductive kiss. Danielle got up on her toes and gripped his shoulders. “Do that again.”
“Anything you ask.” He claimed her mouth, cupping the back of her head.
Danielle buckled under the sensual assault, giving into the narcotic urge to open and let him inside.
Hale deepened the kiss and his tongue swept her mouth, proving he possessed a carnal sensuality that knocked her senseless.
She pulled away to catch her breath, leaning her forehead against his with a dazed smile. The hem of her tank top lifted, the warm night air wafting over the small of her back.
“Been wanting to do this for months,” Hale muttered and then chuckled. “Hell, years.”
“Hmm?”
The stretchy cotton fabric drifted up over her head as Hale pulled it off. He captured her wrists in his hands and gazed at the plain white bra covering her breasts.
Danielle stared through a gold hank of hair hanging over her eyes and blinked.
Lifting her wrists to his mouth, he kissed the back of each hand. “You’re stunning.”
With a head shake, she flicked the hair out of her face and pulled out of his grip so she could cross her arms over her chest. “I don’twe shouldn’t“
A muscle along his jaw flexed as he unbuttoned the waistband of his jeans. The denim fly flapped open, exposing the elastic band of blue boxers.
Danielle bit her bottom lip, thinking of all the times she washed those blue boxers over the past eight weeks. Folding them sent a forbidden thrill through her. Seeing them hang low on his lean hips made her body thump with desire.
Curling his hand into a loose fist, he slid the back of his knuckles up the column of her abdomen, stopping the caress when his blunt index finger reached the base of her bra. “Everything changed the night of the fire. I stumbled out of the barn into a group of people ready to condemn me, but you ran across the grass and hugged me. The minute your arms wrapped around me, I was yours.”
He cupped her right breast, his thumb caressing the swell of flesh above the bra’s plunging neckline.
Danielle closed her eyes, knowing Hale was asking for more than just physical release. Mentioning the blaze added a much deeper meaning to the solemn way he touched her.
Their love affair began six years ago on that fateful night. Hale was ready to consummate it, but was she?
His kiss was soft at first, but the tenderness didn’t mask the powerful surge of passion coursing beneath. Her body throbbed in response, surrendering long before Danielle’s natural caution disputed her action.
Spurred by a sudden recklessness, Danielle threaded her fingers into his short, sandy blond hair, tilting her head in invitation.
A soft grunt came out of his throat as he slid his tongue along hers. There was no mistaking the invitation in his kiss. The skillful way his mouth plied hers promised a myriad of other pleasures awaited.
If only she’d let him.
They were married, after all. Why not make it real and fall into bed with him? She slid her hands into the elastic band of his boxers and pushed the clothes off his hips.
He stepped out of his jeans with a negligent kick, his thigh muscles flexing in the lamplight.
Fascinated by how great he looked, Danielle glided her fingertips along his erection from base to tip. The simple caress sent a tremor through him, his big body stiffening.
“All yours,” he pledged, lowering her bra strap so he could kiss the round flesh of her breast.
“Oh, wow. I like that.” Her toes curled into the soft carpet when he drew the puckered tip into his hot mouth. She squeezed his solid shoulder and gasped, “Go harder.”
Ripples of sensation cascaded through her as he sucked, each pull tingling across her chest down to the throbbing parts below. She fumbled to unbutton her shorts, almost collapsing when the straight edge of Hale’s teeth grazed across her aching nipple.
He captured her hands. “Let me undress you.”
She whimpered. “Don’t stop kissing me.”
“That’s an easy promise to keep.” He flashed a sexy smile and lowered her zipper so slowly, her shorts opened click by click. His gaze flared when he slid her shorts and panties to the floor. “So beautiful.”
With just her bra hanging off her shoulder, she felt agonizingly vulnerable as her husband’s gaze raked over her. She glanced at the blanket covering the mattress and longed to hide beneath it. “Let’s get in bed.”
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�Just a minute.” His thick forefinger slid into the damp blonde curls at the vee of her legs. “D’ya want me to kiss you here?”
She wasn’t ready for that level of intimacy, but his evident willingness to kiss her anywhere made her body melt with anticipation. She unhooked her bra, tossing it out of the way so she could cup her breasts. A hard nipple jutted against her palm. “Kiss me here. I like that.”
“Will do.” He pulled her down on the bed, massaging her breasts before lowering his head.
“Oh, yes.” Danielle nearly came apart when he reclaimed the nipple he’d been working on, drawing it into his mouth in a deep kiss. A heavy sensation pooled between her legs, a narcotic throb that made her rub her thighs together as Hale worshipped her breast in his avid mouth.
“We should do the other one.” He planted a loving kiss on her lips before transferring his attention to her left nipple, which had already puckered in anticipation.
Anxious to scratch the tingling itch between her legs, she hooked a leg over his hip in invitation.
“Not yet.” He rolled Danielle onto her back and slid his heavy thigh on top of hers, trapping her legs beneath. “First, I’m gonna make my wife feel good.”
She didn’t think she could feel any better until Hale’s index finger traveled along the seam of her sex in a light caress.
A part of her rebelled at being pinned beneath him, forced to submit to his touch. He’d walked back into her life to take over the farm. Would he dominate their bed, too?
She stretched in silent protest, but having her lower half trapped beneath his solid leg intensified the throb of desire lodged in her sex. The tingling itch intensified with every seductive caress of Hale’s blunt finger.