Hope had heard something to that effect, but had never broached the subject not wanting to bring back the painful memories. “Everyone who has mentioned them always spoke of them as having a true romance until the end.”
“You’re right. I was always a little envious of them. Proud, but wondering where I went wrong.”
Sliding over to him, Hope laid her head against his shoulder and her hand on his thigh. “Don’t do that to yourself. You’re on your own timetable.”
Weaving his fingers between hers, Lyon squeezed gently. “You think?”
She could feel his melancholia as weighty as the heat. As still as it was there was barely enough air to breathe, and Hope swallowed as a droplet of perspiration trickled between her breasts like a lover’s touch, another down the small of her back—unwanted stimulus when they were this close. Her breath shuddered as she exhaled and that drew his attention.
“It’s too hot for you.”
“I’m all right.”
Clearly not convinced, Lyon drove back to the barn and parked the four-wheeler, securing it behind padlocked doors. Hope waited for him near the barn entrance. She leaned against a support beam and created an artificial breeze by fanning the hem of her gauzy blouse. A fluttering caught her attention and she looked up to see a pair of doves entering the barn and settling on the rafters to complete a mating dance they’d obviously started outside.
“You can’t wait one more minute?” she muttered.
“Guess not.” Lyon joined her, a wry smile curving his lips. He put his arm around her shoulders and led her to his truck where he opened the passenger door for her. As she climbed in and sat back against the seat, she gasped in pain and immediately leaned forward.
“What is it?” Lyon asked.
“Something stung me.”
“Turn around, let me see.”
“Ouch! It did it again.”
She did and he lifted her blouse several inches and swiped his hand along her lower back.
“An ant,” he said. “You must’ve picked it up while leaning against that beam. Hand me an ice cube from that tote bag on the floorboard. That should give you some relief and keep you from scratching and making the wound worse.”
Hope pulled off her glasses and gave him an arched look over her shoulder. “Pain or no pain, you’re not tormenting me with any ice cube!” She began to sit back in her seat, only to squirm and tug on her shirt. “Oh, blast—now my imagination is kicking into overdrive. Lyon, check and make sure there aren’t any more crawling on me.”
“Good idea. When has there been just one ant? Hold still.”
She did as he directed sitting ramrod straight as he lifted her blouse even higher than before and brushed at the inside of the material. But when he did the same to her back, the strokes grew slower, until they were undeniable caresses.
“God, you have lovely skin,” he murmured.
“Thanks. Did you—did you find any more?”
“No, although when I brushed the material I’m sure if anything was there it got knocked off. Do you want me to check your front?”
After a brief laugh, she said, “Nice try.” But when she turned back to face him, she saw there was no amusement in the eyes shadowed by the brim of his hat. There was only raw desire. Her overactive libido needed no further stimulation and Hope dropped her gaze to the snaps on his light denim shirt. “Seriously, I’m sure I’m okay now.”
“Are you?”
Two little words and yet spoken by Lyon they held a powder keg of meaning and emotion that had her trembling as though he’d just slid his hands under her blouse again.
“Hope…are you having one of those moments?”
She could have her own 1-900 number for what was happening inside her. But all she could do was nod in misery.
“Look at me.”
That was so not a good idea, and yet she lifted her gaze to his anyway.
“Come here, sweetheart.”
Bless him for understanding, she thought and with a sigh of relief, Hope wrapped her arms around him. Their initial body contact had her shuddering due to her body’s aroused state. “This is insane,” she whimpered. “I’ve loved being pregnant except for this. This is torture.”
“What did your doctor say?” he asked, his breath tickling her ear.
“Ms. Helpful, you mean. She said it wasn’t a problem, it was a gift, and to have all the sex I wanted. Hilarious, isn’t it?”
“She doesn’t know about us?” he asked stroking her from her hair to the small of her back.
“No. Lyon, that’s our business, no one else’s.”
After a few seconds, Lyon said, “I think you should consider following her advice.”
Somehow she’d known this would be his reply. “How can I? How fair is that to you?”
“It’s not as though I wouldn’t be getting something out of it.”
Hearing the smile in his voice, Hope leaned back and met his concerned, compassionate gaze. How like him—he could find the humor in something like this and still understand this wasn’t funny for her. She so wanted this. Him. If only he felt—or rather she wouldn’t feel…
“Would it be easier if I decide for myself?”
She nodded.
Lowering his gaze to her lips, he said, “Don’t end up hating me for this.”
Then he tilted his head and closed his mouth over hers. When their tongues touched, she moaned with pleasure.
What started out as a tender probing soon grew intense as layer after layer of reserve and restraint yielded to repressed hunger. Hope couldn’t hold still. Her hands had a mind of their own, at once clenching at his shirt, then wanting to explore the texture of the hair at his nape. His back muscles reminded her of her equestrian days when her highly trained mount’s muscles flexed and strained as they flew over hazardous terrain during the cross country part of the competition.
Groaning, Lyon lifted her from the seat only to lean her against the cab door, and trapped her there with his body. “Wrap your legs around me,” he said against her mouth. “I won’t let you fall.”
She had no doubt about that; she was worried about climaxing before he kissed her again. It was impossible not to be aware of how full and sensitive her breasts felt crushed by his chest, or how his arousal so perfectly fit against her core. If they’d been naked, she wouldn’t have needed further foreplay; she was that moist and ready for him. Her mind showed her how it would be behind her tightly closed lids as he moved against her again and again matching the rhythm of a kiss gone out of control. And when she climaxed, he did, too, and they absorbed each other’s whimper and moan just as they’d shared this incongruous ride.
Hope’s body continued to hum with the passion he’d stirred in her, but finally, slowly, Lyon let her lower her legs to the ground. He didn’t let her go altogether, though and they stood forehead to forehead panting as they waited for the world to stabilize beneath their feet.
“I thought that would take the edge off, but it didn’t, did it?”
His voice sounded as dry as her throat felt. All she could do was manage a single negative shake of her head.
“We could go home,” he added, his gaze holding hers. “Try again.”
Hope had to moisten her parched lips. “I need a shower first.”
“Me, too.”
With that decision almost a palpable thing between them, Lyon drove back to her farm. He handled the truck as though he was carrying a load of nitroglycerin. They made no pretense at small talk, and yet it was clear that they’d never been more aware of each other.
Back at the house, Hope exited the truck with care upon discovering that her legs were still weak; she felt as though she’d been riding for hours. If Lyon could have that potent an effect on her after just a little heavy petting, what condition would her body be in when they truly became lovers? As a new wave of heat turned her forehead damp and cheeks hot, Hope blotted at her brow with the back of her hand.
Lyon came up beside
her and slipped his hand under her hair to gently stroke the back of her neck. “Okay?”
There was a good chance that she would never be all right again. She was both excited and a bundle of nerves, but with an affirmative nod, she said, “Sure.” She was determined to win some control over herself. That’s the woman Lyon was used to seeing—calm, cool, collected Hope.
Once inside she set the canvas cooler on the kitchen bar. That could be dealt with later. “Meet you back here in a few minutes?” she asked.
“Yeah, I’d like a drink. I know you can’t have anything, but can I pour you a glass of juice or a soft drink when I get out?”
“There’s peach tea in the refrigerator. That sounds good.”
Lyon nodded then lightly stroked his thumb over her swollen lips. His Native American blood made it difficult to grow a beard, but her skin was so fine that what afternoon whiskers he did have had marked her. “I’d better shave again, too, because I’m damn well not done kissing you.”
Calm, cool and collected…calm, cool, collected.
As Hope headed for her shower, she repeated that mantra over and over in her mind. What a fraud she was.
Lyon stood with his hands braced against the marble wall, his head thrown back willing the cool spray to ease the fever in his body. Ice chips as sharp as razors could have been shooting from the shower head and he doubted he would have felt them, nor would they have changed his condition. As long as his mind was on Hope, he was going to stay aroused. So be it, since there was no one and nothing else he would rather think about.
Her response to him had at once awed and humbled him; he’d never been with a more passionate woman—and they hadn’t had intercourse yet. The way she’d clung to him with that elegant body, the way she’d whispered his name just before she’d climaxed as though in prayer had sent him over the edge, too. Heaven knew he was praying to be what she needed, all that she would ever want.
Shutting off the cold water, Lyon toweled off and eased into a fresh pair of jeans that he left unzipped for comfort as much as practicality. The white shirt he slipped into was left unbuttoned, as well. He’d already shaved so there was nothing left to do but go make that drink. His mouth was beginning to go dry in anticipation of what would follow—not that he needed any stimulant to make love with Hope. If anything he needed to slow down the flow of adrenaline in his body. He could not fail her.
He was only on his second long sip of a scotch and water when Hope emerged from the other side of the house. Already impressed with how quickly she’d achieved this transformation, her black spaghetti-strap sundress—constructed of just enough material to melt what was left of his ability to reason—had him putting down his glass to keep it from slipping out of his hand.
“Happy Birthday to me,” he murmured.
She laughed softly. “I’m glad you like it. It’s so much cooler. I should have worn this to your farm.”
Hope had never flirted with him before; back in her Will days, that wouldn’t have been right. Now, she didn’t have to, her power over him was so strong that he was captivated by her. Nevertheless, he liked that she thought she needed to seduce him—and wanted to.
“If you had worn that,” he replied, “we’d still be there.”
She crossed to him, barefoot as he was. With that crazy Mocha-whatever nail polish, her feet were as pretty as her hands, and that dainty toe ring with the heart charm on her right little toe was ridiculously sexy, the impact of it going directly to his groin.
Feeling his tongue thicken, Lyon spared himself conversation by handing her the tea she’d asked for. Thanking him with that secret smile that drove him crazy, she took a long drink.
His own drink forgotten, he admired the graceful curve of her neck and the way she filled out the bodice of the empire-waist dress. Hope was no air-brushed magazine photo and was proud of it. He was simply and utterly grateful. “Want me to check your ant bites?”
“Only if you’re prepared for what I’m not wearing underneath this.” Her gaze slid over his exposed chest and belly, lingering at the gaping V of his jeans. “I’m glad we think alike.”
He couldn’t let her keep tying him into a sensual knot or he would explode just standing there. “Then you won’t be disappointed if dinner is delayed?”
Slipping her left index finger into a belt loop on his jeans, she replied, “Come with me and you can atone.”
As a seductress, she was adorable and he would have been well on his way to falling head over heels if he hadn’t been living in that Purgatory for years. Now he just waited to show her that having freed him, his universe would forever begin and end with her—if she wanted it that way.
In the shadowy bedroom, beside the turned-down bed, she stopped and faced him again, this time slowly sliding her hands inside his shirt and inching upwards over his hard abdomen, his taut nipples, next caressing him with her breath, then her lips as she slipped the shirt off his shoulders. Sucking in a sharp breath, Lyon stroked her hair and watched with masochistic fascination as she duplicated those delicate ministrations to his right side, until he was forced to stop that sweet torture by framing her lovely face with his hands and urging her head up to receive his kiss of gratitude and ravenous hunger. He was determined to be patient and attentive, learn what else she liked and how many ways there were to bring her to the ecstasy he wanted for her. But he was only human.
“You feel so good.” He drew her closer until the silk separating her feminine curves from his hot flesh was irrelevant. Her nipples were like sharp little needles tormenting him and, as he plumbed her mouth with his tongue, he ran his hands up and down the outer swells of her breasts, then reached between them to score the hard little points with the rougher pads of his thumbs.
“Lyon,” she breathed. “Can’t we lie down so we can feel all of each other?”
“First let’s take care of this.”
He slipped one strap off her shoulder, then the other, until the black wisp of fabric drifted to the carpet and she stood before him an exquisite, honey-skinned angel of temptation. The gentle swell where her child grew made his heart pound with barely containable emotions and he sunk to one knee and brushed a tender kiss on her flawless skin. “Little mother…”
“Lyon.”
There was a hitch in her voice and his hands were a little unsteady as she stroked his hair. When Lyon rose he saw her eyes were over bright and dreamy. She’d never been more beautiful to him than at that moment.
“You, too,” she urged her hands already at the waistband of his jeans.
Lyon shoved them to the floor and stepped out of them, achingly aware of her unabashed gaze.
“I’m glad that I can see how much you want me,” she said slowly lowering herself onto the bed. “You’ve always been something of a mystery to me. So self-contained. Now I get to know at least one secret.”
Stretching out beside her, stroking her from shoulder to hip, Lyon replied, “You’d be disappointed if you knew how few there are.”
She reached down and closed her hand around him. “I don’t believe that.”
Having been flattened by three-hundred pound line-backers, kicked bloody by unruly cattle, and once even finding himself looking down the wrong end of a .12 gauge shotgun, Lyon didn’t think there was too much that would make him beg for anything including his life, but this small woman with her fantasy body and sweet soul could. He knew it in that instant as she slid her leg over his hip and brushed his feverish length against her moist softness.
“Believe this,” he said rolling her onto her back. Concerned not to crush her, he raised himself on his elbows and finished what she’d started. Thankfully, she was caught up in the same intoxicating cocktail mix of time-place-person as he was. Wet and hot as sin, when she tightened her inner muscles around him as tightly as she did her thighs, he knew this sharing was doomed to be over quickly, too. What saved his pride was recognizing that’s exactly how she wanted it.
“Look at me,” he rasped. When
she did, he began moving inside her. “I want to see your eyes when it happens for you. I want you to know it’s me.”
She stroked his forearms and biceps the way she had his more sensitive muscles and raked her nails over his chest like a kitten flexing her claws. “I know it’s you.”
His muscles beginning to twitch from the sweet hell she was inciting in him, he asked, “I’m not hurting you?” He looked down at her so much smaller than him and that fragile little swell of her tummy, barely visible as she lay on her back.
“You won’t…and the baby is well protected.”
In the end it was her emotional discomfort and physical need that allowed him to break a personal vow. All night, he had to remind himself. They had all night.
Lowering his head, Lyon promised as much to her. “All right, sweetheart, hold on.”
Chapter Seven
Waking alone in the middle of the night with the room cast in a light as though there was a full moon outside had Hope spreading her arms wide across rumpled silk sheets and striving to remember if the soreness that came with well-used muscles and the images that flashed before her were real or was she caught up in a dream? Either way her bed was empty. Lyon was gone.
As the drug-like thick weight lifted a bit and her mind started to clear, she knew with certainty that the moon was in its final cusp and couldn’t be so bright, and that she and Lyon had made love. Three times? Four if she counted that little appetizer at the farm. Because that had led to this, she most definitely would.
Shifting again to find his scent on the pillows beside her, she sighed as her body telegraphed sensations to her mind, surfacing memories of his exploration of her. Just as he was a man apart from others in his work and as a friend, he’d proven to be so as a lover. She’d learned there was much in him that was old-fashioned. Traditional, she amended, sensitive to the male ego. He was fair, poignantly generous, but even in his lovemaking reluctant to give up total control. She knew his work had forced him to see the worst sides in human nature, but who had made it difficult for him to trust a woman he took to bed? What woman had wounded his heart that he hid his vulnerability at the very instant his life’s seed was pouring into her?
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