Snowfire

by Heather Graham

  She stopped speaking as if she had just run out of steam. He was still staring at her. Staring… taut and tense, a pulse raging against his throat. She wondered if he was even breathing.

  Then he exhaled on a long breath. His eyes flicked over her.

  “I didn’t murder anyone. Is that enough for you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If that is all that I’m willing to tell you, will you trust me still?”

  Kristin frowned, but she nodded slowly. “I already told you that I trusted you. That’s not going to change.”

  She thrust his coffee mug at him. His fingers closed over it.

  Setting her hand on his bare shoulder, she pushed past him.

  Her hand seemed to burn.

  She strode over to the sink with the plates. He was beside her again. “I’ll do this,” he told her curtly.

  “No, I’ll do it,” she insisted.

  “I said—”

  “Do we always have to argue over dishes?” Kristin demanded, frustrated. At the moment, she just wanted him to keep his distance. She didn’t like to argue with him. It made her want to touch him more.

  “Let’s just leave the damned dishes for a while.”

  “Fine.”

  They both stared at each other, their hands on their hips.

  “What do you want to do?” she asked him.

  He clenched his teeth.

  There was no way to tell her what he really wanted to do. Fall on her. Right there, right now.

  No. He wanted to shake her. He wanted to discover if she really believed everything she had said about trust.

  And he desperately wanted to believe that his own overwhelming desire to trust in her was not a mistake, either.

  “Music. I’ll put on some music.”

  “That would be wonderful. You do that, and I’ll do the dishes.”

  “Great.”

  He disappeared. A few minutes later she heard a soft, pleasant show tune echoing around her. Apparently he had speakers connected into the kitchen.

  She set the last of the dishes on the drainboard and turned around and he was back in the room.

  “What now?” he demanded. He was tense, like a tiger on the prowl. She felt that way herself.

  She lifted a hand in the air. “I could go to your room. If I’m in your way.”

  “Lock yourself in?”

  “That’s not what I said!”

  “You’re not in my way.”

  “Then…”

  “There’s swimming,” he murmured.

  “I haven’t a suit. Even if I could get to my car, I didn’t expect to go swimming in winter.” He was still staring at her. “I’ve nothing to wear.”

  “You don’t—” he began, then he quickly, harshly corrected himself. “Yes, you do.”

  “Really, I—”

  “Chess? Do you play?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I’ll get the board. You bring the coffee.”

  She decided to dump out the cold coffee and start over. She carried the two cups into the huge living room and found he had set up the chessboard on the ledge in front of the massive granite fireplace. He had dragged down the big pillows from the sofa for them to lean back against.

  He didn’t offer her the first move. He was white and he took it himself, breaking out his knight.

  She was a more timid player. She started with a pawn. He followed suit. Then she realized that he was going to pull out his queen and send her into battle immediately. He’d eat her alive if she didn’t begin to find some defensive strategy.

  He was playing quickly. Too quickly, she decided. His weakness lay in his recklessness. If she played in a calm, considered fashion, she might do all right.

  Fifteen minutes later, she had his bishop and his knight, but he had one of her rooks and three of her pawns and was relentlessly pursuing her queen.

  “You don’t give a lot of thought to your moves,” she advised him primly.

  He glanced at her quickly.

  “I don’t really feel like playing,” he told her.

  She stiffened. “Well, we don’t have to play.”

  “Yes, we do. We need to do something. Anything that keeps the old hands and mind in motion. Move a piece.”

  “I can’t play if you rush me!” she snapped. Then she saw a move she could make that would seize his queen. It was crafty and subtle. She hadn’t used it in a long time because her cousin was the one who had taught it to her, and she almost never played chess except with Roger.

  She smiled complacently. And started her move.

  He watched the board at last. He was stretched out along the ledge, leaning upon one elbow. The firelight played a sensuous dance across his naked chest.

  She lifted the terry robe from her neck and bit down on her lower lip. She wanted to cry out, demanding to know just what made this man so appealing. She didn’t want to play chess, either. She didn’t care if she listened to music or not, and she didn’t give a damn about dishes. She wanted something to change the growing tension in her, something to ease the desire to reach out and touch his face.…

  And that chest.

  “It’s your turn,” he said. His gaze was on her. Sharply. On her eyes. Then upon her lips. Then lower.

  She leaned over and moved a piece, taking his queen.

  Startled, he sat up and stared at the board. She moistened her lips, her eyes downcast, and smiled.

  “Where’d you learn that?” he demanded.

  “Roger.” She looked at him. The way he stared at her made her hurry up to explain, despite the fact that she didn’t owe him any explanations. “My cousin, Roger Doria, taught me how to play. He’s very good, and we’re close.”

  The way he was looking at her made her keep talking, so nervous that she was suddenly a font of information. “I’m an only child in a huge family of cousins, so Roger rather took on the role of big brother to me. Would you please say something? Why are you staring at me like that?”

  “Roger Doria!” he exploded.

  She nodded, wondering what could create such a burst of emotion.

  “Your cousin is Roger… Doria?”

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  “Roger Doria of Warwick, Massachusetts?”

  “Yes,” Kristin said, amazed at the way he looked at her.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I did tell you! I told you from the beginning that I was on my way to see my cousin—”

  “But you didn’t tell me who!”

  “You never believed me, and you never asked,” she reminded him. She was starting to shiver. He was still so emotional, so… tense. What had Roger done to elicit such a response from this man? Roger was a nice guy, a really nice guy, and his wife, Sue, was a doll. “I—I take it that you know my cousin?”

  She thought for a minute that he was going to throw the chess game into the air. Then he started to laugh.

  “Yes, I know Roger.”

  “Did he do something to you? Is there anything wrong with Roger?” She was growing more and more confused by the minute.

  He shook his head. She’d never seen his eyes so light. Nor his features so at ease.

  “No, I like Roger. And Sue.”

  “Good.” She stared at him, certain that he had lost some of his senses. And then she understood. He finally had proof that she was not lying. She gasped in anger. “Oh, I see now.”

  “What do you see?”

  “You’re willing to believe me now, you bastard!”

  “Yes, I believe you. What’s the matter with that? You just gave me something that I could believe—”

  She shook her head, wondering herself at her sudden fury. “No one gave me any hard facts or evidence about you, Mr. Magnasun. I looked at you as a person, and I came to my own conclusions! Until this very minute, you never even thought of believing me! I was after you—for your wonderful story or scoop or whatever it is exactly that someone would risk life and limb to obtain. You
didn’t believe—”

  “Oh, come on, now! I was giving you the benefit of the doubt! I wanted to—”

  “The hell you were!”

  He laughed, amused by her anger, suddenly very at ease, and very charming. “Honest! I was giving you the benefit of the doubt. It’s just nice to know that Roger is your cousin.”

  “I was trusting you!”

  “Well,” he said softly, “maybe you just aren’t quite as world-weary as I am yet.”

  Kristin stared down at the board again, a tense knot of emotion herself.

  She moved her queen suddenly. “Check!”

  He looked down at the board. His knight—obviously situated by her queen—moved the proper spaces to sweep up her threatening piece. “I think not.”

  She moved a bishop. “Check,” she said again.

  His rook took her bishop.

  She was the one playing recklessly now, and she didn’t know why. She only knew she couldn’t continue sitting beside him calmly playing chess. He made her feel so very warm. And so very angry.

  She wanted to jump away from him.

  She wanted to move much closer to him.…

  She stared at the board, then moved a pawn.

  He moved his knight again. “Check.”

  She studied the board. “Oh, all right, you’ve won.”

  “I didn’t say checkmate. I said check.”

  “It’s a stupid game, and I surrender.”

  He looked at her and smiled. “Do you?”

  She gritted her teeth and exhaled. She saw the move that he had seen and made it. It didn’t matter. She had thrown the game away. She was far too wound up to concentrate. She couldn’t look at the board when she felt his eyes on her so.

  And she kept staring at his chest, highlighted by the fire.…

  “Now it’s checkmate,” he said smugly.

  “So it is.”

  “Do you want to play again?” he asked. His eyes were very bright in the firelight. His flesh was so very bronze… copper… glistening.

  “No,” she said.

  She could almost feel his warmth. He wasn’t touching her, but he seemed so close. And so tense again, watching her. Just watching her.

  “Do you want to watch a movie?”

  “No,” she murmured.

  And he smiled, slowly, ruefully. His eyes were a blaze of blue.

  “Do you want to make love?” he asked softly.

  She gasped, amazed that he could say something so outrageous and bold with such raw simplicity.…

  But then, it had been coming. It had been coming now for a long time.

  His smile remained rueful, but his eyes were tense. The nearby fire seemed to crack and sizzle.

  She should say no. It would be so simple. So easy. She should open her mouth and say no.

  But she did want to make love. It was exactly what she wanted to do.

  He shoved the chessboard aside and stood up. He walked around behind her, his eyes still on hers, his bare footsteps soft and silent, like the pad of a great cat.

  His hands fell upon her shoulders as he knelt down there. His face was buried in the hair at her nape, and then she felt the softest touch of his lips against the lobe of her ear.

  “It’s a question,” he told her softly. “You’re allowed to say no.”

  Say no…

  She barely knew him. He had admitted that he had been accused of murder.

  And still, it was true. She trusted him.

  Intuition.

  Desire…

  Soft, hot, wet kisses landed against her throat, teased her ear and moved along her throat once again. She sat still, pliable. And the sensations swept into her. Sweet sensations. The fire seemed to leap from the grate and enter inside her, yellow and gold, little laps and tongues of fire that entered her body where he touched her, and traveled through the length of her.

  “Kristin…?” he whispered. The sound of her name was husky. Rough. It played against her flesh.

  She turned and wound her arms around his neck. He lifted his face and she looked up into his eyes.

  “Yes! That’s exactly what I’d like to do,” she told him. “Exactly.”

  He kissed her then. Kissed her with an explosion of the tension that had ripped between them all through the morning. Kissed her hard, and deep, seizing everything from her, and giving her a myriad of crystal sensation and emotion in return.

  She’d never known anyone like him. Never felt anyone like him, this tense, this passionate. Creating sensation so strong that it seemed to touch a pinnacle that rose higher and higher.

  His kiss alone did this. Delving into her, so deep into her mouth, and with such heat that she felt the fires blazing inside her again. His lips rose from hers, then touched them again, and again, his mouth forming and molding hers, finding a fascination in the same motions once again. His tongue just touched her lips, then swept into her mouth, seized her being, and then explored so lightly once again.

  The white terry robe was falling from her shoulder. His kiss fell there. Moved along her neck. The robe fell farther and farther. She felt her bare flesh against his, and the sensation was wonderful, cool and hot all in one. She pressed her mouth against the pulse beating at his throat and teased it with her tongue.

  The white terry robe fell discarded to form a pool by her knees. He swept her into his arms.

  Her wide eyes met his.

  “We’re going upstairs,” he said. “I don’t want the first time to be on the floor.”

  She smiled, thinking that he had considered her sensibilities, and she was glad.

  “It wouldn’t matter, “she told him.

  “It would matter to me.”

  And maybe it did matter. She clung to him while he climbed the stairs, watching the blue of his eyes.

  And she trusted him still. She shouldn’t, but she did. And she knew that she was right.

  Intuition…

  She knew it was right to make love with him, too. He could be brash and rude, and he could be unerringly tender, too. She wanted him. Just as she was fascinated by him as a man, she wanted to know all of him.

  They reached his bedroom, and he laid her down on the black silk sheets. The feel of them was even more exquisite against her flesh. So good. She nearly cried out at the touch of that silk, for her flesh suddenly seemed so very much alive.

  She heard the rasp of his zipper and then his jeans were shed and he was back down beside her. He cradled her in his arms, and they rolled together in the tumbled silk. His lips touched hers again, and his kiss created all kinds of fires again, sweet little flames to leap and dance within her limbs.

  His body pressed to hers, his fingers curled around hers, and she felt that she was sinking into a never-ending pool of black silk. The rough texture of his chest teased her breasts, the pressure of his hips just met her.

  And between her thighs, she felt the decadent throb of his desire. Almost as reckless and arrogant as he could be himself, the pulse teased and elicited, no, demanded, a response.

  But he kept on kissing her. Endlessly, as if he could not get enough of the taste of her lips. And when his mouth broke free from hers at last, it moved to her throat, hovering over the rampant beat of her pulse.

  Then his eyes were fixed on hers, and he lifted his weight from her. He touched her lips with his forefinger, then drew a soft line from her mouth to her throat, and down lower, over her body. The soft draw of that single finger rounded her breast, and rounded it again. She inhaled sharply, feeling the response within her body, the hardening of her nipples. He drew a lazy circle with his finger once again, just brushed her lips … then teased the tip of her breast with just the tip of his tongue … before closing his mouth around it.

  She whispered his name, her fingers threading into his hair. The feeling was so excruciating, so sweet.…

  She didn’t know if she tried to drag him from her, or hold him closer against her. It didn’t matter. He was not leaving. Nor did he intend to hurr
y. His mouth lingered, his tongue lingered, touching, bathing, caressing that one taut peak until she thought she would scream. And while his lips played, his hands were not idle. His stroke moved down her body. Brushing her ribs, her inner arm. Cradling her hip. His fingers … drifting over her back.

  Then drawing circles. Low. Very low. Over her abdomen. Moving lower and lower until they brushed over the dark triangle at the juncture of her thighs. Teasing…

  More and more intimately. His soft, gentle probe moved against her, within her. She gasped at the sudden invasion and boldness of it, tensing, nearly blinded by the new sensation. And then he brought with it a startling rhythm while the searing white heat of his mouth continued to caress her breast.

  She no longer whispered his name. It exploded from her lips, and suddenly he was rising above her again. His eyes seemed to tear into hers, passionate, vibrant, demanding. And perhaps questing, still…

  Then they raked over the length of her. And he whispered her name. Then he groaned, and his face came against her throat and he said her name again, and again.

  She curled her arms around him, holding him close. “Please…” she murmured. Her fingers curled into his hair again. Ran down his back. His back was good. It felt so good…just to touch.

  She felt his hand on her again. Flat this time, his palm moving down the length of them, between them. Touching the soft damp petals of her sex, his fingers moving intimately again. Then his eyes were on hers, and he entered her body. Slowly. She trembled with a jolt of searing sensation just as he touched her.…

  And she trembled again as he moved, his body sinking deeper and deeper into her own. The room careened around her, and she was suddenly aware of nothing but the shaft of his body, in her, stroking within her, caressing.…

  Some soft sigh escaped her, an expulsion of breath. She felt that movement as he held himself above her, coming in, slowly withdrawing, coming in again.

  And all her senses were alive and vibrant, and concentrated upon him, upon the feel of his body against hers. The world was eclipsed.

  Outside, the snow fell and the storm raged. And inside, the fires burned. New blazes leaped to life with each moment that passed.

  Kristin cried out and threw her arms around him, pulling him down to her. Her teeth and tongue moved over the lobe of his ear, teased his neck. She bit lightly into his shoulder, then kissed the spot, clinging to him, swept within the growing fever pitch of his motion. They rolled upon the silk, their flesh so pale against the blackness of the silk.