With a sudden jerk, she freed the shirt from his jeans and peeled it upward. When she could go no further, Alec pulled it over his head and tossed it away.
Still kneeling, her hips trapped between his hard thighs, she looked at him. In an artist’s reverent awareness of his physical perfection, she ran her open palms down the corded muscles of his neck and across his shoulders, her gaze following her hands.
He was beautiful. Deep brown hair, longer at the back. A chiseled mouth, the lower lip slightly more full. Intense, nearly black eyes looking at her with a hunger that made her heart skip a beat, and then race in reaction.
She’d been wanting this, but suddenly wondered if she was really prepared.
“I guess it’s my turn,” he said with a slow smile. Efficient fingers unbuttoned the first of a dozen small buttons running down her shirt. Nearly losing her balance, Katie rested her open hands on the tops of his thighs. She could feel the heat and the power beneath them.
She wasn’t wearing a bra, so when he pushed the shirt aside, there was no more hiding. He ran the backs of his fingertips along her collarbone as his eyes studied her.
“Courageous and beautiful,” he murmured, his fingers sliding across her nipples. Instead of stopping there, they continued downward to her jeans where he undid the snap. The zipper rasped in the stillness, the sound seeming to echo somewhere deep inside her.
Picking her up, he carried her backward onto the antique sofa. He tugged off her jeans, then ran his palms upward until he reached the narrow elastic of her panties. Slowly, he pulled them down. Hot hands and cool air—a potent combination that instantly robbed her lungs of oxygen and sent the blood pooling low in her body.
She reached for him, and after shedding the rest of his clothes, he stretched out beside her.
Katie dragged his mouth to hers, opening her own for him with a hunger she’d never experienced. His tongue slid inside, delving, learning, tasting. When she could barely catch her breath, he abandoned her lips. Pushing her hair aside, he kissed the side of her neck, his teeth nibbling. Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to sink into the delicious heat that poured through her as he trailed kisses just beneath her jawline.
As his breath brushed across her breast, white-hot need went through her, and she found herself arching upward, desperate for the feel of his mouth on her. His lips closed over her nipple. Wave after wave of sensation washed through her.
Her abdominal muscles quivered when his hand stroked downward. Even as his tongue flicked across her hardened nipple, he took her intimately with one finger, then with two. Her pelvis rocked upward and he moved inside her.
Her fingers twisted into velvet as she came hard. Instead of stopping, he took her with his mouth, his tongue stroking her into another orgasm even before the first had faded.
And then, when she didn’t think she could wait another minute, he covered her body with his.
Moonlight poured over his rock-hard male body. His skin was already slick. His breath may not have been as ragged as her own was, but it wasn’t steady, either.
He held her gaze as he slowly pushed into her. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think as he filled her, her body stretching to accommodate him but quickly tightening around him at the delicious drag of flesh against flesh.
She started to close her eyes, but Alec reached out and brushed his fingertips over her mouth. “Don’t hide from me, Katie.”
He thrust into her fully for the first time, going deeper and at the same time taking her higher than she ever thought possible. Several more short thrusts had her on the precipice once more. Instead of sending her over the edge, he went suddenly still, and, lifting his hand, smoothed the hair away from her face. His fingers tenderly brushed across her eyelids, flowed across her cheekbone, caressed the line of her parted lips. She could taste them, the heady flavor of their lovemaking. She tried to move, but he held her unmoving beneath him as her feminine muscle continued to pulse around him.
The kiss started out slow and gentle and tender, but quickly turned hungry and raw. He thrust into her again and again. Her hips rocked up as another climax washed over her, this one even more intense. And then, with a ragged groan of release, he throbbed inside her.
SEVERAL HOURS LATER, with dawn only a few hours away and a heavy rain battering the glass roof, Alec pulled on his jeans. He retrieved the Glock from the second sofa. He started to pull his holster over his bare chest, but realized he no longer needed to carry a gun in his home.
After locking the weapon in his desk, he got a glass of water and wandered back into the solarium. The moon had slipped lower, so that it now filtered through the fronds of the potted palms, casting shadows onto the sleeping woman.
When he’d vowed that he wouldn’t touch her, he’d told himself that it was because he was protecting her, but the opposite was true. He’d been protecting himself.
Her dark hair lay tousled and tangled from their lovemaking and her lips were parted in sleep.
She was beautiful. But she was so much more than that, too. An amazing woman, really.
His hands curled into fists to keep him from reaching out and touching her. Alec clenched his eyes, torn between doing what he knew to be right and doing what his heart wanted him to do.
But he couldn’t hurt her. No matter how much pain it brought him to let her go, he would.
Chapter Fourteen
Katie was awakened by a strange soft and sporadic howling. It took her a moment to realize that it was just the wind catching in the metal skeleton of the solarium.
Muted light filled the space. At first, she assumed the soft dimness was due to an early hour, but then realized the day was simply overcast. It was the first sound sleep she’d had in weeks, so she’d been really out of it.
Propped on one elbow and still groggy, she scooped her dark hair out of her face. The room looked different. Still very beautiful, but not quite as magical as it had been in the moonlight.
She glanced toward the French doors and wondered where Alec was and how long he’d been gone. It was odd how she felt almost abandoned.
As she shifted, her muscles protested even minimal movements. She’d always thought of herself as being in fairly good physical condition, but last night had shown her that when done right, making love was a full contact sport that required both training and stamina.
Katie swung her legs off the side of the couch and sat there. She licked her dry lips. The light-headedness she was feeling was probably due to dehydration. Pulling the blanket with her, she stood. Her clothes were draped over the back of the opposite couch. Or at least most of them were. It took her several minutes to locate and retrieve her panties from partway up one of the palms.
She pulled on the blouse first and buttoned it. As she bent to tug on the jeans, her breasts brushed the cotton cloth, and she realized just how sensitive Alec’s lovemaking had left them.
After folding up the blanket, she glanced toward the French doors. She wasn’t quite ready to face Alec. Not because she regretted last night, but because she was afraid that he might. She feared that the only reason he’d made love to her was that, after the news, he’d needed to feel close to someone. She had been the only one there for him to turn to.
In an attempt to loosen the growing knot inside her, she took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She’d told herself that she was capable of living in the moment, but was she?
Could she just walk away after what they had shared and not look back?
Would he?
ALEC FOLDED and then threw two dress shirts into the open suitcase.
Without looking up, he sensed Katie standing in the doorway. He tossed the leather shaving kit into the opposite end of the case. He’d planned to wake her before leaving, but had been putting it off.
As if she knew she was being ignored, she stepped into the room.
With no other choice, he lifted his gaze, his features carefully schooled. She leaned just inside the door, her hands braced against the wall behind h
er, her backside resting on them.
“Sleep well?”
“Sure.”
He opened a dresser drawer, briefly fished around for some navy blue socks. As he flipped them in next to the shirts, he glanced in her direction again. This time he had difficulty looking away.
She wore the same jeans and shirt that she’d been wearing last night, and her feet were bare. She had sexy feet. Maybe it was the pale pink of her nails, or the high instep.
And then again, there wasn’t much about Katie that he didn’t find attractive. From her body to her mind. But right now, with only a queen-size bed between them, it was damned hard to think about her I.Q. Far easier to remember her tight, sleek body, which he’d buried himself in only hours ago, than the well-primed, agile mind.
His body tightened as his resolve to keep his distance slipped. Like a kid standing at a game arcade window with only a quarter in his pocket, he wanted what he shouldn’t have. He wanted to tug off the jeans and the prim white shirt, to run his hands over her warm flesh and watch her eyes go dark. To hear the catch in her breath just before she came, to feel those strong feminine muscles tighten around him…
Desperate to derail carnal thoughts, he turned and briefly pretended to scan the nearly empty dresser top. He pushed a hand through his hair. He was forgetting something. Not Katie, but something in the clothing department. He glanced back at the open suitcase, thinking of all the times over the years that he’d done what he was doing now. All the times Jill had stood in the doorway as Katie now did.
She pushed away from the wall. “What’s going on, Alec? Shouldn’t I be the one packing?”
“Philadelphia called. It looks as if David Adams is going to make it.” He grabbed boxers. “I want to be there when he’s questioned. Which should be sometime this afternoon.” He zipped the suitcase. “I should only be gone a day or two at most.” He straightened. “We’ll talk when I get back.”
The expression on her face told him those weren’t the words she’d expected after a night of lovemaking. Unfortunately, they were the only words he had for her right now.
“About last—”
“Listen, Katie. Last night was great. Special. But I don’t know where my head is right now. Even if we get a confession, there’s still a trial to go through, and after that, there will be appeals.”
His mouth tightened. She knew all that, having been down the same road. He just didn’t want her expecting anything from him. She deserved better than what he was capable of right now. He’d been a lousy husband the first time around and didn’t want to do it poorly a second time. If he ever got involved again, he wanted to be able to put the relationship first. He couldn’t do that yet.
She walked toward him, her bare feet soundless on the Persian rug, and, reaching the bed, braced a knee on the edge. “If you’re worried about me, you needn’t be. I’m a big girl. I’ll just collect my things, and…”
He looked at her, his gut twisting with a measure of self-loathing. He should never have let last night happen. “And be on your way?” He finished for her. “Look, Katie, there’s no reason for you to go anywhere. I spoke to Martinez. He’s planning to come out here to stay with you while I’m gone.” He swung the suitcase off the bed and placed it on the floor. For several seconds, their gazes connected, but he couldn’t read anything in their dark depths.
Katie backed away. “There’s really no reason for him to. Now that the killer has been caught, I’ll be fine.” She wandered over to the window and looked out. “If you don’t mind, I will stay tonight.” She turned to him, the smile on her face forced and fleeting. “It’ll give me time to make some arrangements.”
He wanted to ask her what kind of arrangements, but didn’t. It seemed easier not to. Besides, he expected Jack to come banging on the door at any second.
He picked up the suitcase. “Jack’s driving me to the airport, so I’ll leave the keys to the SUV on the kitchen counter. And you have my number.”
“I think I do,” she said, her eyes only meeting his for an instant. But the message was clear enough. She hadn’t been referring to a phone number.
In the bright morning light, the last, pale remnants of bruising from the attack were visible. And yet she managed to appear defiant, and he reminded himself that she was a survivor.
But was he? Was he strong enough to walk away from her and not look back? Not regret?
Uncertain, he picked up the suitcase. As he descended the staircase, he looked toward where she stood in his bedroom door. “See you when I get back.”
She nodded, but he knew that there was a damned good chance she wouldn’t be here.
AN HOUR AND A HALF after Alec had walked out the front door, Katie poured another cup of coffee from the nearly empty carafe, and then wandered into the solarium. She stood in front of the glass wall that overlooked the river and beyond that the preserve. Clouds hung heavy and threatening at the horizon, and the river grasses appeared almost tawny. As she watched, the wind tore across them, briefly flattening them. Shivering as if the gust had climbed her spine, she used her free hand to rub the arm holding the coffee mug.
The branches of the oaks swung around in the stiff breeze. She’d heard some people talking about how unseasonably stormy the first week of November had been this year. Of course, she had nothing to compare it to. Miami had its fair share of inclement weather, but it rarely hung on for more than a day or two.
Though she stared at the landscape, she kept seeing Alec walking away from her. As she replayed his words in her mind, she realized that he’d been trying to tell her that he still wasn’t ready to move on. That he had no room in his life for her.
Wrong time, wrong place. That seemed to be a recurring theme in her life of late.
Perhaps it wasn’t just Alec’s leaving that had her feeling so down and uncertain. Maybe the low barometric pressure and the lack of sunshine were at least partially responsible for her edginess.
She just needed to shake it off.
But she couldn’t seem to. It was almost as if some internal monitor had failed to register that she no longer had anything to fear. David Adams was in custody. And as far as what was between her and Alec—well, she’d known the score going in, hadn’t she? You couldn’t make a person fall in love with you no matter how hard you tried. Even if you were the right woman. They had to be ready. Alec wasn’t.
She returned her attention to the landscape. A line of rain showers appeared like a dark curtain in the distance. As she watched, they charged across the preserve. She felt another soft shudder run through her as the first hard drops slapped the glass ceiling.
What she needed was a hot shower. And a plan for getting on with her life. She turned away from the window.
She’d phone her parents again to let them know she’d purchased an airline ticket. By the time Alec returned, she would already be winging west.
Katie rinsed her empty mug and placed it in the top rack of the dishwasher. She’d turned the kitchen’s small television on earlier to break the dense silence in the house. When she’d walked into the kitchen, the television had been tuned to a soap opera. Now there seemed to be some type of special news bulletin filling the screen.
A dozen cop cars with emergency lights flashing sat just outside an upscale chain motel’s front entrance. As she watched, an ambulance arrived.
There was a cutaway to a reporter. “Senate hopeful Paul Darby was found dead in his Orlando hotel room this morning.”
Katie eased up the volume.
“…The police haven’t released the cause of death, but foul play is suspected. The politician was perhaps best known as one of Miami’s toughest district attorneys, putting criminals like drug czar Benito Binelli and Scott Gardner behind bars. As a strong supporter of environmental issues, Darby has been a very controversial senate contender in many parts of the state where development and growth mean a healthy local economy and a strong job market.”
Katie studied the face that flashed on
the screen. She’d been leaning against the counter, but now straightened as she finally realized why the name had struck a chord within her all those weeks ago when the first signs had appeared in neighboring yards.
Paul Darby had been the bulldog attorney who had prosecuted her sister’s case seven years ago. It had been Darby who had sent to prison the man behind the wheel of the second car that night.
She had thought about the prosecutor occasionally over the years, recalling the kind way he’d questioned her and the way he’d constantly objected during the cross-examination. He’d been trying to protect her as much as he could. But mostly his words had echoed in her head: Rick Sekorra will pay for your sister’s death.
And Sekorra was paying. Not enough, perhaps. He’d have to be six feet under before it would be truly enough. But at least he hadn’t walked free. There had been times during the trial when she had been afraid he would.
As she had recounted the events of that night, the jurors had gone still, and tears had collected in the eyes of several, but it had been Paul Darby’s closing statement that had the most impact: Rick Sekorra was a cop, his duty to save lives, and yet on a dark stretch of highway he sentenced two young girls to death. You’ve heard the evidence. While his wife was struggling with a difficult pregnancy, Rick Sekorra was having a relationship with Karen Carroll, a seventeen-year-old high school senior. And when she threatened to go public, he knew it would end his marriage and his career. So Rick Sekorra decided to take things into his own hands.
Katie hit the remote, turning off the television.
If she hadn’t been depressed enough a few minutes ago, she was now. Paul Darby had been one of the good guys. Who had murdered him and why?
Katie placed the remote on the breakfast bar and headed upstairs. As she passed the front entry table, she saw Alec’s phone there. He’d told her to call him if she needed to, and then he’d left his phone behind.
The house held only minimal furniture, but it hadn’t felt really empty until Alec had left. As always, the stairs creaked subtly as she climbed them. The cat streaked ahead of her. He’d been shadowing her for the past hour or more, almost as if he’d taken over Alec’s protective duties. Because he seemed to be forever getting in and out of everything, from boxes to empty bathtubs to kitchen cabinets, she’d taken to calling him Houdini.
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