“I suppose he’s been romancing you,” Lizette said, splashing water on her face in an unconcerned way.
Erica blew out a long breath. “You could say that,” she said. At the same time she knew she didn’t want to discuss anything about her relationship with Hank with this woman.
“He’s good at it,” Lizette went on. “He’s also good at some other things, like what goes on in bed.”
Erica wanted to get up and leave, but Hank was due here any moment, and she wasn’t about to abdicate her position and leave him to the unclothed Lizette. Still, Lizette made her uncomfortable. Very uncomfortable.
“I suppose you already know how good he is in bed?” Lizette inquired sweetly, her tone goading.
Erica was still trying to figure out if she should respond to this when Hank walked out of the swirling mist. He was wearing bathing trunks and a T-shirt. “So what if she does?” he said angrily. “It’s no business of yours, Lizette.”
“Henry! I’ve been wanting to talk to you!”
“We’ve talked all we need to. You’d better leave, Lizette.” Hank shrugged out of his shirt and folded himself down into the pool beside Erica. He rested a hand on her thigh, claiming her.
“I’m a paying guest,” Lizette said. “I have a right to go wherever I want.”
Hank turned to Erica. “Would you like to leave?”
Her response was immediate. “No.” She wouldn’t give Lizette the satisfaction.
A few more seconds passed, and Erica could tell that Lizette was wavering.
“Henry, I think I’ll book you for a private riding lesson,” Lizette said. “I could teach you a few things.”
“I could teach you some things not connected with riding. Like class, for instance. And respect. And how to give up gracefully when it’s over.”
“In my Life Experiences class, we’ve discussed what to do about men who are afraid to commit. We—”
“Men are usually not afraid to commit. When it seems as if that’s the case, it means that they don’t want to commit. To you. But—” Erica thought she felt his fingers squeeze her thigh slightly “—a man might be perfectly ready and willing to commit to someone else.” His voice was firm, his manner brusque.
For the first time Lizette looked panicky. “After all we’ve meant to each other?”
The pool bubbled into the silence, and Erica held her breath.
She supposed that Lizette was taking the only avenue open to her at this point when she stood up, exposing her body to view before she grabbed her robe off a nearby rock. Her hands were shaking as she wrapped it around herself.
“Fine, Henry, but don’t come running to me when you’ve had enough of your little cowgirl there.” After treating them to one last view of her breasts, she yanked the robe closed and haughtily flounced off through the mist.
“Well,” said Hank, “that’s that. And that’s enough.” He removed his hand from Erica’s thigh and slid it around her shoulders.
She scooted over on the stone ledge where they sat, out of arm’s reach. “She told me that the two of you are thinking about living together.”
Hank rolled his eyes. “I told her I wasn’t going to do that, and besides, I don’t like the way she talks about Kaylie. She called her a brat.”
“She did?”
“She did. And she’s never even seen Kaylie.”
He moved closer, reached under the water and took her hand. People walked past on the path, their voices low. When the voices faded, Hank entwined his fingers with hers. “I haven’t been able to think about much but you since this morning,” he said. “It’s like I’ve been enchanted or something.”
“Rancho Encantado,” Erica said unevenly. “Where dreams come true.”
“Where you can meet the woman you’ve always dreamed about.” His face was close now, and it was all she could do not to move hers a fraction of an inch so that her lips would meet his.
Her mouth was dry, and she’d begun to feel giddy. She swallowed and tried to move away, but he slid his free hand to the nape of her neck and held her there. “Kiss me, Erica. Kiss me the way you did last night and this morning.”
His breath was warm on her cheek, and she closed her eyes to shut him from her view. The image of his face was still on the back of her eyelids, as if engraved there. Her lips parted, and his moved slowly, agonizingly slowly, toward hers. Her eyes drifted closed again. And then she was kissing him. Kissing him as every cell in her body yearned for him, called to him, begged for more. Lips, tongue, teeth, creating such delectable sensations, such unparalleled pleasure. And then his arms came around her, pulled her close to his wet chest, his lips still working their magic as they feathered down her throat, kissed the hollow above her breasts and lingered there as his hands slid under her bikini top.
The water in the pool was hot, but her skin was beginning to feel hotter. She was burning from the inside out. She was consumed with wanting him, wanting to feel him close enough to guide him into her. With Hank kissing her and taking his time about it, she could anticipate all that was to happen between them tonight. His lips were skilled and they were sexy, and so was she. She blossomed under his touch, her nipples rose to meet his caressing fingertips, and he responded to her soft moan with a hot surge of need.
His hands went around to unhook her top so that her breasts were crushed against his chest, their skin slick and full of sensation. “These are the only breasts I cared to see tonight,” he said, and he dipped his head to kiss one rosy peak and then the other. “Yours is the only body in the world that means anything to me.”
She arched her back as he drew one nipple into his mouth and sucked gently, then greedily. Her head fell back, her eyes half-closed, and their surroundings—the palm trees and the rocks and the mist unfurling above the pool—seemed surreal.
Without knowing quite how it happened, she found herself facing him on the ledge, felt his hands move under her bikini bottom to cup her against him. Then he untied the side fastening and it floated away. She gasped, reached for it, but he only smiled at her. It may have been his fingers that undid her swimsuit, but it was that smile that undid her emotions. In that moment, the moment in which his eyes took on a gleam of amusement overlaid by passion, she knew she didn’t care who or what was watching. She wanted him now, not later, not in a bed or behind closed doors. This was the stuff of dreams, but her dreams had never before reached a level in which she actually cared about the man so much that she would throw all caution to the wind.
Now her emotions were not merely a mind game that she played with herself for amusement and escape. They were the driving force behind all she wanted, all she did. And what she did was reach for him so that he groaned and settled her closer. “If you’re going to touch me like that, lady, you’d better mean business,” he said close to her ear.
“Now,” she urged. “Now. Before anyone walks by.”
His fingers found her center, slid upward and in. Her skin shivered, and her back arched, waiting. She felt herself open to him even as he positioned himself, and then finally, when an instant seemed like an eternity, he drove into her in one long, shuddering stroke.
She gripped his hair, clamped her legs around him and rode. She was prepared for a quick climax, wanted it, but he seemed determined to draw it out, to make it last.
“Hurry!” she whispered.
He threaded his hands through her hair and pulled back her head to expose her throat. “Not a chance,” he said between kisses. “Not when I’ve been waiting for you all day long.”
Then, moving excruciatingly slowly, he teased her into delirium, into ecstasy, until she cried out for mercy.
“For someone who doesn’t want anyone to know we’re here, you sure are making a lot of noise,” he said.
“Hank, please,” she said, her voice muffled against his shoulder.
“I’ll please you, darlin’, have no fear,” he said. Then, in a ripple of movement, he turned her so that she was lying back on the le
dge, the smooth surface firm against her back. He rose above her, almost like a phantom in the mist, and then before she could pull him to her, he plunged into her so that she cried out in surprise.
And then she wondered how she could have lived all of her life without knowing what sex, real sex, was like. It had never been like this. It had never been so passionate, never engaged her body, mind and soul, and it had never been with a rugged cowboy who knew how to bring her to these heights. The planes of his face were pressed to hers, the angles of his body complemented the curves of hers, and their hearts throbbed to the same rhythm.
As they raced together toward the moon, she spun away on the ripples of the pool, was drawn into the ribbons of moonlight, became one with the silvery mist. She became satin, she became silk, she became the moon mirrored in his eyes. She inhaled his breath, rose on its life force to spiral into a place she had never gone before, and she was going there with him, Hank, her perfect cowboy.
She thought she might have cried his name, didn’t care if anyone heard, and in that moment she knew she was one with the universe and that Hank was the universe for her now, in this moment.
And then, before she could drift down from that wonderful place, she felt her muscles clamp and convulse, felt his shudder at the core of her being and closed her eyes against the tears that threatened to overflow.
Tears of happiness. And tears of sadness that it had taken her so long to find this man.
ERICA OPENED her laptop. Time to write to her sister.
Hi Char
Did I ever tell you about my fantasies of the perfect cowboy? Well, I’ve found him.
Love,
Erica
Erica,
A man who already has a baby isn’t perfect by any means. A baby takes a lot of time and work. A baby gets in the way of a developing relationship. A baby is, well, a baby. You don’t do babies, remember?
It sounds like you’ve taken leave of your senses. Isn’t it time for you to fly back to New York?
Your devoted sister who is beginning to wish that she’d never mentioned Rancho Encantado, Charmaine
To my devoted sister,
Char, I really like this baby. Also, Kaylie has not stood in the way of our developing relationship. If anything, she has enhanced it by making me notice what a fine person Hank is.
Besides, I’ve really got the hots for this guy.
But enough talk. I’m going to sleep. It’s late, and I’m going to his place to cook breakfast for him early tomorrow morning. I think I can manage fried eggs. Can seven-month-old babies eat fried eggs, do you know?
Love from your grateful sister, who can’t imagine never having visited Rancho Encantado,
Erica
Erica
YOU MUST HAVE LOST YOUR ALLEGED MIND! YOU DON’T LIKE BABIES AND YOU HATE TO COOK. FIXING BREAKFAST EARLY IN THE MORNING? SHEESH! I KNOW YOU WENT THERE TO GET A MAKEOVER, BUT THEY WERE SUPPOSED TO LEAVE YOUR BRAIN ALONE.
CALL ME, ERICA. CALL ME RIGHT NOW. I MEAN IT.
Charmaine
Chapter Twelve
Hank woke up the next morning and lay in bed, eyes closed. He could still see, in his mind’s eye, moonlight dancing over the smooth curves of Erica’s body, casting her breasts in sharp relief. Her face in that magical light had appeared carved in silver and was more memorable than any daydream he’d ever had.
He stepped back into that memory, felt her body so close to his that he longed to touch her, and he shut out the place, which was his own bed, and the present, which would soon get very busy. He kissed her, long and hard and deep, and he slipped his hand between her legs. She was moist and ready for him, and she urged him closer, sighed when he released her lips, floated up and over him to settle in exactly the right place so that his—
A dog started barking. At first he thought it was far away and part of his dream, but as the dream burst like a bubble, he realized that the barking was right outside the kitchen door. He sternly requested his anatomy to calm down and threw off the covers.
He pulled on jeans and hurried to the back door. There was Murphy, wagging his whole body and begging to be let in.
“You old nuisance,” he said, happy to see Murphy despite the dog’s disappearance last night when he set off in pursuit of the cat.
Murphy pattered around the kitchen, looking for his food dish. He found the food Paloma had left on the floor for Mrs. Gray and gobbled down all of it before Hank could stop him.
“Well, I guess that solves the problem of what to feed you,” Hank said as Kaylie began warming up for an early-morning complaint. He went to the refrigerator and took out a baby bottle full of milk.
Kaylie cheered up when she saw Hank with the bottle, and she gave it her best effort while he changed her diaper. Then he lifted her into his arms and took her into the kitchen, where he settled her into her high chair and proceeded to heat up her cereal.
Murphy watched every move. “I wonder if Justine came back last night,” Hank said to him, but Murphy looked blank. Hank dialed the number of the Big House, but Justine didn’t answer. He’d try again later.
“So, Murphy,” he said conversationally as he started to feed Kaylie, “what happened last night? Did Mrs. Gray lead you on a merry chase?”
Murphy looked noncommittal and quite raffish.
“Oh, so you found a lady friend?”
Murphy flopped his tail up and down enthusiastically.
“Well, so did I. And we…Uh-oh, here she is.”
Erica spotted him through the window on the door and smiled. She let herself in, wearing a brightly patterned pullover against the early-morning chill; her rosy cheeks made her gray eyes sparkle. He didn’t have time to register the fact that her eyes weren’t the color they’d been last night, and besides, she looked fantastic. He got up and took her in his arms.
“Mmm,” she said, inhaling deeply. “You smell like sleep.”
“Mmm,” he echoed. “You smell like soap. So will I after I take a shower. I thought maybe you’d like to join me, but you’re way ahead of me.”
“I woke up early. Couldn’t sleep.” She opened the refrigerator and took out the eggs and bacon.
He sat back down and started to feed Kaylie again. “Anything wrong?”
Erica looked abashed. “I kept thinking of things I want to know. For instance, does Kaylie eat fried eggs?”
“No, she’s not into fried. She’ll eat poached and soft-cooked. This is her breakfast this morning.”
Erica bent over and sniffed the cereal. “Good heavens,” she said under her breath. “Do we all start out eating that stuff?”
“Pretty much.”
The phone rang, and Hank got up to answer it. He handed Erica the spoon. “Here, would you mind taking over the feeding duties?” He disappeared into the living room.
Erica looked uncertainly from the spoon to the cereal and then to Kaylie, who was gazing up at her with equal uncertainty. “Well,” Erica said with false bravado, “let’s proceed as though I know what I’m doing.”
For an answer, Kaylie banged the flat of her hand on the high-chair tray. Erica sat down on the chair vacated by Hank and scooped up cereal with the spoon. Tentatively she held it out toward Kaylie, who opened her mouth like a baby bird. Erica had no idea if she was offering too much or not enough, but she held her breath and dumped the contents of the spoon into Kaylie’s open mouth. Kaylie promptly spit half of it down her chin.
“Too much,” Erica muttered as she wiped Kaylie off with a napkin. “I’ll see if I can do better this time.”
The next spoonful held only about half the cereal that the last one did, and this time Erica knew to angle the spoon so that Kaylie swallowed most of the contents. What she didn’t swallow dribbled down the baby’s chin again, only now Erica had a napkin at the ready.
“Tests? What kind of tests?” Hank was saying into the phone in the other room. A silence, and then Hank spoke again. “You should stay as long as you need to. No, I’ll take care of Murph
y. Don’t worry about it.” Another pause. “Sure, I have to teach. Right. Why don’t I ask Erica if she can help out?”
Erica, distracted by this conversation, heard a little clink! on the spoon. At the same time, Kaylie squinched up her face so that Erica looked at her sharply, and when Kaylie opened her mouth for another spoonful of cereal, Erica noticed a speck of white in the middle of Kaylie’s bottom gum. She looked closer. A tooth! A tooth was erupting there!
“Hank?” she said unsteadily. “Hank!”
Her tone of voice must have alarmed him because he rushed into the kitchen, phone in hand. “Is something wrong?”
“I think Kaylie has her first tooth!”
He bent quickly to look. “Why, it is!” He raised the phone to his ear again. “Justine, Kaylie has her first tooth. No, Paloma didn’t discover it. Erica did.”
Erica wiped Kaylie’s face, raising her eyebrows at Hank. Now their secret was out. Now Justine would guess what was going on.
Hank rolled his eyes. “Erica is here, yes.” A pause while Justine talked. “She was feeding Kaylie her cereal. Yes, I know she’s a guest, but you know the policy of Rancho Encantado—if it feels good, do it.” Another silence, while Erica shook her head violently, willing Hank to be quiet.
“Of course I know that’s not the policy here, Justine, but did you ever consider that it should be? Sure, you can talk to her. Just a minute.” He appropriated the spoon from Erica, motioned for her to get up and sat down to feed Kaylie himself.
Erica took the phone from him and went into the living room.
“You wanted to feed Kaylie?” Justine said with a large helping of skepticism.
“I, well, yes.” Erica decided to let it go at that.
“I see,” Justine said, though she still sounded puzzled. She cleared her throat. “I have a few favors to ask of you. Tony’s staying here for tests this morning, and I’ve decided I’d better stick around. If you wouldn’t mind going over to the Big House and dealing with my phone calls for a while, I’d appreciate it more than I can say.”
Cowboy Enchantment Page 17