by Hinze, Vicki
“Who’d want to?”
“Not me,” he said, then went stone-still.
“Bryce?” He looked thunderstruck. What had happened? “What is it?”
“Tony was right.”
“What?”
“He was right. This is about pride.”
Cally pressed her face against his shoulder, then tilted her chin and looked up into his eyes. “You know, I’ve been thinking about that. I think it’s about time we got to keep a little of ours. What do you think, Counselor?”
“You’re talking in riddles again, honey.”
She gave him an apologetic smile. “Gregory married Joleen within days of divorcing me. Meriam didn’t even tell the people at work she had married you. They made us feel unlovable and our pride took a real battering.”
“I told myself those things didn’t matter. But deep down they did matter, Cally. I couldn’t admit that before, but I have to now. They mattered a lot.”
“Of course they did. They mattered to me, too.” Tension knotted the muscle at his nape. She rubbed at it. “I finally figured this out. Those things would have proven to us that we were important to them. But we didn’t get them, so we doubted we were important until we felt sure we weren’t important. The result: we feel unlovable.” She grunted. “Wickedly simple, really.”
“Hmm, but hard to face.” Bryce understood why perfectly—now. He glanced back from the carpet to Cally. She had the strangest expression on her face. Kind of awed, kind of irked. He didn’t know what to make of it. Or what to expect. “What are you thinking?”
She wheeled her gaze to his. “I’m thinking fear and doubt are horrible monsters. We let them keep us in our relationships a long time after we should have gotten out.”
He rubbed at the back of his head and debated. Bottom line, he’d promised her honesty. “I know we disagree on this, but Gregory and Meriam didn’t do anything to us that we didn’t let them do.”
“For the record, we don’t disagree anymore,” Cally said. “I always blamed Gregory and wanted back everything he had stolen from me. He did take those things, but he didn’t make me an easy victim. I did that, Bryce. I let him steal from me. Let him chisel away at the good in me until I couldn’t see any good anymore.”
“Just as I let Meriam take and take from me without once asking her to give.”
“In my humble opinion, Counselor, we screwed up.”
“I hate to have to agree, but it appears we did.”
“But”—Cally jabbed the air with a pointed finger—“by gum, we spared our pride.”
“Yeah. And paid dearly for the privilege.”
“It left us damn lonely.”
“Damn lonely,” Bryce agreed. “And unwilling to love again.”
“After our experiences? We’d be crazy.”
“Idiots.”
“And we shouldn’t feel bad about it.”
“No, we shouldn’t.” So why did he feel godawful?
“Not everyone can have that rare kind of love Collin and Cecelia, and Miss Hattie and Tony, shared.”
“If they could,” Bryce commented, “it wouldn’t be rare.”
“Right.” Cally stood up, then tugged Bryce’s hand, urging him to his feet. “I’m not agreeing to your proposal yet, but if I did, then we could care, Bryce. We do care. And caring is more honest and lasting than the kind of love we’ve known. That would fade, but us caring, that would last a lifetime.”
He smoothed his hands over her narrow shoulders, his hands warm. “So we’re smart not to love.”
She let her gaze drift to his chest. “Appears so.”
“Cally?” Standing chest to breasts, he stared down at her, the truth in his eyes. “Tell me.”
Her fingers at his waist went stiff. She dragged her gaze up to his, then sank her teeth into her lower lip. “You are lovable, Bryce. If I could choose to love any man, I’d love you. I really would.”
She would. Too moved for words, he curled his arms around her waist, then kissed her lovingly, longingly. Desire flooding his body, his heart thundering, his hands trembling, he whispered against her cheek on short rasps of breath. “I’d love you too, Cally.”
He kissed her again. Then again. And still again.
“Bryce?” She parted their fused mouths, dreamy-eyed. “Make love with me.”
Desire increased tenfold, nearly knocking him to his knees. Mentally staggering, he cupped her face in his hands and whispered the only thought he could latch onto. “I’m going to hate it.”
She went stiff in his arms. “A simple no would have sufficed, Counselor.”
God Almighty, had he lost his mind? “No.” He stroked her face. “I’m going to hate loving it, Cally. That’s what I meant.”
Primed to blister his ears, she said not a word, just stared at him. Something in his expression must have redeemed him, because her expression softened and she said, “Me, too.” Expelling a soft sigh that resembled a purr, she curled her arms around his neck. “I can’t wait.”
Determined that neither of them would have to, he grabbed her hand and headed to the stairs in a near run. At the landing, he turned to her. “Your room, or mine.”
“Mine.”
A soft rain fell against the Great White Room’s windows. Bryce clicked on the tulip lamp beside the bed. A warm rosy glow spilled over the bed, over the floor, over Cally. His heart slid up into his throat. She stood atop the braided rug, her long blond hair mussed, her striped robe gaping open at her breasts. She looked desirable. Beautiful. Lovable. She also looked self-conscious and scared stiff.
He hated knowing she was feeling those things. He wanted her at ease with him, thinking him lovable. Hell, he wanted her eager for him. As eager for him as he was for her. One day she would be, he promised himself. One day she’d look right into that damn mirror and see herself beautiful. See herself as he saw her.
But not tonight.
Tonight she stood woodenly, like a sacrificial virgin. He couldn’t make love with her knowing she felt like a sacrificial virgin. Yet if he didn’t, she’d feel ugly. She’d think he was like Gregory. That Bryce, too, found her undesirable.
Asking him to make love with her had to have been one of the hardest things the woman ever had done in her life. Knowing it, and that she’d done it anyway, touched something in him. Something precious and good and deep. The woman had more courage in her fingertips than he had in his entire body. And before they left this room, so help him, she’d know she was lovable so deep in her soul there’d be no denying it. “It’s been a long time for both of us,” he said, attempting to ease some of the tension. Hers and his own.
“Uh-huh.” She clenched and unclenched her hands at her sides.
He tried a smile. “Are you as nervous as I am?”
“If you’re terrified, Counselor, then you’ve got company.”
The smile became genuine. “Good. I’d hate to think I was going through this alone.”
“Not a chance.” She folded her arms over her chest.
Her brush lay on a silver tray, atop the heavy wood dresser. He picked it up then walked around the bench at the foot of the bed to the opposite side of it from Cally. When he motioned, she clasped the blue coverlet near the pillows, and they peeled it and the quilts back, revealing white eyelet-edged sheets that tinged pink in the soft light and smelled of sunshine.
Without a word, Cally reached for the belt of her robe. So did he. They laid them across the foot of the bed; his on the left, hers on the right. The robes looked good there, and knowing it possible he might see them like that the rest of his life started a fire deep in his gut that warmed him, body and heart. Cally would accept his proposal. She would.
He glanced up at her, and felt he’d been kicked in the chest. She looked like a barefoot princess. Her gauzy white gown clung to her breasts and to the tuck at her waist. Hiking up the hem, she crawled into bed. He slid in beside her, his heart chugging like a train. She scooted down onto the pillow then smoothed her
hem down over her ankles. A fold of it creased over his pajama-clad thigh. Navy silk and white gauze. Him and Cally. A perfect match—except for love.
He held up the brush. “I’ve watched you do this and I’d like to . . . Would you mind?” Damn, he sounded like a kid who’d just hit puberty. He’d been married for eons, for God’s sake. Why was he so nervous?
Unlovable.
“No, I don’t mind.” She sat up, then turned her back to him.
Nerves were normal. He hadn’t been married to her. Hadn’t made love with her. She didn’t like liking anything about him. And more than he wanted his next breath, he wanted her to ferociously hate liking making love with him. He wanted her to marry him, to spend all her days with him and the M and M’s, to spend all of her nights in his arms, and to hate loving being there. He wanted her content and happy, satisfied and satiated, and at peace. Wanting all that and more, how could he not be nervous?
Her back was as gorgeous as the rest of her. Pale, smooth skin, dusky with a film of scented talc that smelled soothing, like the sea. Her gown cut far below her waist, into a tempting deep vee that had him nearly drooling with wanting to kiss the skin over each vertebrae. One by one. To start at her nape and work his way down her spine. His pulse pumped hard in his throat. He lifted the length of her hair into his hands. In the mellow light, it gleamed like spun gold. “I love your hair long.”
“That’s because you don’t have to take care of it.”
“I’d like to, though. I’d like to take care of all of you, Cally.” He let the brush glide down the lengths of the strands, scalp to ends, and eased his free hand up her side to the curve of her waist, pausing just beneath the fullness of her breasts, over her ribs. “Will you keep it long for me?”
She shivered. “At the risk of ruining the moment, Counselor, I’d like to remind you that we vowed honesty. My hair being long or short can’t matter at all to you.”
Cranky, scared as hell. She was loving this. And hating loving it. He nearly smiled. “You want honesty?” She didn’t. Not really. But he’d give it to her anyway. “Everything about you matters to me, Miss Tate. Every”—he punctuated his words with kisses to her nape—“little . . . thing.”
She let out a low, sexy moan on a shiver, and he leaned closer, pressed his chest flush to her back, then buried his face in her hair and inhaled the scent. His throat went thicker still. “Mmm, peaches. Fresh, lush peaches. I like peaches, Miss Tate.” He dropped his voice to a growl and confessed. “Though your coconut shampoo does wicked things to me, too.”
“I’ll, um, remember that.”
“Good.” He nuzzled the shell of her ear, growled, low and deep. “Sexy.”
She sucked in a quick little breath and her fingers sank into his thigh. “You’re forgetting again.”
“I’m not forgetting.” He pulled the brush down slowly, rhythmically, letting himself drift into fantasies of him and Cally and them making love. Of her touching him, letting out little moans of pleasure that told him she liked what he was doing to her, liked what she was doing to him. The erotic fantasies sent him spiraling, deeper and deeper into desire’s web, and he wanted Cally there with him, free of inhibitions; free, and feeling beautiful. He paused brushing, kissed the tempting tender skin at her nape, nosed the cay of her neck, then whispered raggedly, “Cally?”
She laid her palm over his hand at her ribs, and encouraged, he kissed the soft hollow behind her ear. “One day—not today, but one day—I’m going to undress you before that mirror. And I’m going to make love with you until you look at yourself and see all I see.” He dropped the brush onto the floor. Heard it land on the rug with a thump. Cupping her breasts in his hands, he felt her chest heave, saw her nipples draw tight. He trailed kisses to her temple, her chin, her shoulder, winding his way down to them. “But for now, I’m just going to adore you.”
Through gauzy fabric and shuddered breaths, he captured her breast in his mouth. She locked her hands in his hair, drew his head to her chest, and murmured sweet sounds. When he’d paid homage to both breasts, she lifted his face to hers. Their lips met, melded, eagerly mated. He nudged her shoulder and hip, and she lifted, then straddled his thighs. The contact stunned him, innocently seductive, sensually provocative, mind-drugging. He skimmed her sloping curves, pausing to embrace, to nestle, to caress, clasping bits of her gown, craving the heat of skin. She sighed against his mouth, parted her lips, and welcomed his tongue, then raised a hesitant hand and let it hover at his chest. Darling Cally. So unsure. So fearful of doing something wrong. He held her with one arm and unbuttoned his pajama top with the other, then unsnapped his pants at the waist, his arousal pressing firmly against her thigh. “Touch me, Cally.” He looked deeply into her eyes, let her see all he was feeling. “I need your touch.”
Cally couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t fathom that the hunger in Bryce’s eyes was genuine, was for her. He hadn’t been with a woman in two years; that had to be spurring the fire in his gaze, the strain etching his face. It’d been a long time. His primal instincts had engaged and any woman would arouse him. That should bother her. Instead it set her emotions free. She just happened to be the lucky one.
With wavering hands and pounding hearts, they eagerly removed each other’s clothes, tossed them onto the floor, then hurriedly pressed bare skin to shuddering bare skin. She wanted to touch him everywhere at once, to feel all of him, now. She gazed down his broad chest to his flat stomach, followed the vee of dark springy hair to his groin and saw the evidence of his desire. Her heart skipped a full beat and she had to remind herself to breathe.
“Touch me, Cally.” He lifted her hand, pressed it flat on his heaving chest, over his heart, between his male nipples.
They were peaked and taut, and she couldn’t resist the temptation to taste them. Both tempted and aching to please him, she splayed her fingertips on his heated skin, then caressed his body, delighting in the ripple of his flesh, the quiver of his muscles reacting to her slightest touch. Thoughts of her being lacking, being ugly, or not satisfying him fled and, celebrating their departure, she let her fingertips drift down and capture his essence.
From the back of his throat quivered a grunt of pure male joy that sang to her woman’s heart, and again he claimed her mouth. Heat swirled and tippled, flowed and burned. His arms circling her, he rocked back and then tugged; clasped her hips and positioned her atop him, mouth to mouth, thigh to thigh, heart to heart. His arousal pressed hard against her belly, and the sweet pressure rippled her enchantment into riotous waves, glorious crests, and fulfilling swells. The silken hair sprinkling his chest taunted her breasts, and fingertips suddenly gone sensitive seemed tempted beyond redemption by texture, by design. His hands smoothed down her back, over her buttocks, down to her thighs. Against the back of her knee, he bunched her gown, skimmed his gentle hand to the skin beneath it, murmuring sweet, breathless words, lover’s secrets that seeped into her heart.
She broke their kiss and studied his face, his slumberous eyes, heavy-lidded and smoldering with passion, the tense line of his jaw, the straight slope of his nose with nostrils slightly flaring, the perfect arch of his thick brows. His eyes captured, entranced, enthralled. She let herself get lost in them, in the thick haze of heat and hunger swimming in their depths, and the truth arrowed through her like honey-tipped spears. This was real. Not honest with love lies between them, but real. He wasn’t thinking of Meriam or of other women with whom he might have made love. He wasn’t thinking of proving Cally lovable. He wasn’t thinking at all. He was feeling. Yearning. And so was she. But for her pride, she wanted the words. “It’s only us here, Bryce,” she said, more than asked.
“Only us,” he vowed, then reinforced his promise by praising her body with short raspy kisses, with long languorous ones, and adoring all of her with wisps of feather-light touches that seemingly dripped flame, setting her skin and soul on fire. And when they came together, a great shudder rippled through him, inciting sensations of
belonging and joy too potent to persevere, too precious to protest. She shimmered over the first crest and plunged into sensation, mindless, boneless, reckless, opening herself totally to him, body and spirit and soul.
He sensed the change in her, stilled, then looked deeply into her eyes. “I was right. I hate loving making love with you, Miss Tate.” Sweat sheening his skin, he favored her with a slow, seductive kiss that had her cresting the summit again.
Her heart hammering, taking flight, she knew at that moment her decision on his proposal had been made. “I hate loving you, too, Counselor.”
Chapter 12
Cally awakened alone.
Sometime during the night Bryce had returned to his room. In that place deep inside where secrets dwell, she knew he hadn’t wanted to leave her, but in the cold morning light she didn’t dare admit that, not even to herself. If it proved false, then allowing herself to feel she’d been desired and adored—as lovable as he’d made her feel—would be too far an emotional fall. The struggle it would take to again find some semblance of inner peace just wasn’t worth the risk.
Her breasts and thighs, even her limbs, felt heavy and sore, lethargic from a full night of lovemaking. The first time had been a tender coming together, asserting and affirming desire; solely for their hearts. The second time was pure heat. Lusty and fervent, satisfying their too-long-abstinent physical selves. The third time, just hours before dawn, had been different still. A potent sensual implosion that fused heart, body, and soul in a way Cally had never before experienced. Bryce hadn’t, either, and they both had admitted to hating loving it.
She tossed back the covers and crawled out of bed, wanting nothing more than to fall right back in and bring Bryce with her. Flushing, she crossed the cool floor, dressed quickly in jeans, a blue blouse, and her parka, then went down the stairs, gliding her hand along the slick banister that smelled faintly of lemon oil. She paused to wink at Cecelia’ s portrait, to smile at Collin’s, at the contentment in his eyes. Last night, when Bryce had been deep inside her, she’d seen that contentment in his eyes; a contentment that until then she’d only seen in them when he was with the M and M’s. That look belonging to her did more for her heart than all the sweet words and promises any man could give any woman.