Judd caressed her neck with his lips. As he nibbled gently at the tender skin, she groaned, the sigh soft and raspy, full of all the yearning she felt for him.
Judd made an answering growl deep in his throat. “Oh, Karen, you make my head swim.” His exploring mouth moved to her collarbone, and the proximity of his lips awoke a tingling in her ribs. She could feel her breasts swell, reminding her intensely that she was a female, fashioned to complement his maleness in every respect, and soon he would show her the deepest meaning of what it was to be a woman.
She willed him to go on, gripping his shoulders and arching into him, feeling her nipples rub his fully clothed chest through the gauzy nightgown. The sensation was wanton, and at the same time primally fulfilling. In response, Judd reached down, bunched a handful of her gown and lifted the hem. She raised her arms, wiggling a bit to help him as he slipped the garment over her head.
Judd inhaled sharply. It sounded like a compliment, but she was unsure. Feeling cherished and abandoned had been easy fully clothed, but nude, her self-consciousness about her body returned, and she remembered how she had always been too big-boned, too ample to be attractive.
“Karen, you’re lovely,” Judd whispered.
She opened her eyes. Pearly moonlight filtered over them through the sheer curtains, and Judd was drinking her in with appreciative eyes.
Lovingly he took hold of her hands. “You are beautiful,” he breathed, “like a painting.” He shook his head in gentle wonder. “One of the old masters might have conceived you as the perfect woman.”
With newborn trust, and from a desire to please him, she timidly squeezed his fingers. He returned the pressure, his steady, admiring gaze as much a balm to her femininity as his physical caresses had been.
“This is selfish of me,” he said finally, “I could look at you all night, but you must be cold. Get under the covers, and I’ll join you in a minute.”
Karen obeyed, lying quietly against the pillows as Judd undressed. As he removed each garment, he threw it over the back of her tapestry-covered slipper chair. The last to go were his briefs, then he paused, perhaps allowing her a turn to look at him.
It was the first time she’d seen a completely naked man. She didn’t want to stare, but he really was magnificent. He himself would have made a model for an artist—a Greek sculpting the long-ago champion of the first Olympic Games. Though her gaze skimmed it only briefly, it was impossible to overlook his considerable arousal.
As he drew back the covers and slid in beside her, he smiled, white teeth flashing in the moonlight. He nuzzled her forehead playfully with his beard, and she reached up.
“It is soft,” Karen said, stroking his jaw with her fingertips, then trying her cheek against it. “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to touch your face.”
Unable to resist her curiosity, she let her fingers move downward to the firm, warm flesh of his chest. Fascinated, she probed her hand below the sheet to his stomach. Through his slightly coarse dusting of hair, she squeezed his upper abdominals; they were dense with muscle.
“If you go much farther, sweetheart, it will be a short evening,” he said.
“I’m sorry.” She jerked her hand back, but he caught it and kissed it. “Don’t be embarrassed, I was only teasing. I love it when you touch me.”
He started to reach for her, then unexpectedly rolled onto his back and put his forearm over his eyes.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
He muffled a curse. “I can’t believe I forgot about this until now, but—” he uncovered his eyes to look at her “—we really shouldn’t be doing this without…” His voice trailed off in regret.
Karen’s eyes widened as she caught his meaning. “You’re right. But…” She fished in her nightstand and pressed a few gold foil coins into his hand. “One of my associates works with young, unmarried mothers,” she explained, “and she insisted on giving me these.”
He regarded her solemnly. “I guessed this was your first time. It is, isn’t it?”
Uneasily she replied, “Does it matter?”
“Yes, because it makes this incredibly special.” He rolled toward her and propped himself on his elbow. “And, I have to confess, it makes me both very glad…and rather nervous.”
“You’ve done this before,” she said, feeling both more at ease because of it, and a little jealous of the other women he’d known.
“I can’t remember another time,” he said, his hand cradling her cheek. “To tell you the truth, sweetheart, I hope I never do.”
Karen kissed his palm, then held his gaze for a pregnant second before closing her lids as a signal for him to begin.
He didn’t hurry, embroidering her collarbone with little kisses. He eased the sheet back, began lightly circling her breasts with the pads of his thumbs, then slowly deepening the pressure into a delectable massage, sending tendrils of erotic sensation downward to her abdomen. To reciprocate, Karen kneaded the dense tissue of his shoulders. His neck was as corded as an oak, but the shaved hair at the back of his head felt like velvet when she stroked it.
Judd’s heated mouth came down, and he licked the contour of her right breast, each heady stroke of his tongue filling her with fire. When he took the nipple between his lips and gently worried it, the pleasure grew indescribable.
His long fingers circled her waist, the thumbs splaying over her tummy, exacerbating a ravishing hunger deep in her womanly parts.
“Judd, darling.” She whispered the words like a prayer. Then, as he raised his head, she urged, “Don’t stop, please.”
“I won’t, I promise.”
He continued to pleasure her breast with his tongue as his broad hands smoothed languorously over her belly, trailing promise and fire over her pubic mound, then reached wickedly between her legs.
Karen gasped, her hands fisting in the bedsheet.
“Karen, you’re breathtaking,” Judd said, his fingers searching her moist folds. “If I’m not careful, you’ll drive me wild.”
“Fair is fair,” she managed to gasp.
The bed rocked like a boat as he positioned himself; Karen’s heart beat an erratic tattoo.
He lowered his heavy body over her, blocking out the moonlight, and braced himself on one elbow as his other hand continued to stroke her with incredible tenderness. “This may be a little uncomfortable at first,” he whispered.
She didn’t care; she felt ready to burst.
A moment that divided time later, he asked anxiously, “Am I hurting you?”
She wanted to laugh, she loved him so much. “No, for a second perhaps, but not now. Quite the contrary, darling.” She wrapped her arms about him, holding him close as she soaked in the wondrously satisfying sensation of being one with him. An involuntary spasm rolled through her.
The movement seemed to excite him, and the intense feelings were soon doubled by the ravishing friction Judd created inside her. He moved rhythmically, consistently, rocking like the waves of the ocean. Karen could feel an erotic pressure begin to build and build within her.
As a rapturous storm swelled between them, she wrapped her arms around Judd’s sweating back, her breathing marking time with his fervid thrusts.
Karen clung desperately to her lover, the pilot of her soul, trusting him to bring them home through the turbulent sea of passion. When the ecstatic pressure grew too much to bear, she called out his name, and with a flurry of masterful strokes he brought them both in, exhausted but safe, beached on the shores of Paradise.
They lay entwined, lungs heaving, minds insensible to all emotions but joy. Momentarily drained of strength, Judd used the last ounce he had to draw Karen tightly to his chest. Her arms still encircled him like a golden band, and he found himself saying a heartfelt prayer of thanks for her.
His lady had given him indescribable gifts tonight, first helping him to see himself through her eyes, not as a man deranged but as someone worthy of a good woman’s faith. And now, she had made her
self completely vulnerable to him, given him the greatest, most precious gift of love and trust that a woman could bestow.
Judd buried his face in his precious love’s hair and drew a deep breath of her unique scent. Karen Thomas was everything wise and womanly and wonderful in this world. Even as he had released himself into her, he had felt her miraculous essence flowing into him—saving him, healing him, renewing him. He still did not know who he had been in the past, but Judd was very sure that this night had changed who he would be forever.
THEY SLEPT IN the next morning. Judd awoke close to nine, rolled over instinctively in search of Karen’s soft form and teetered at the edge of the sofa.
Where was he? He pushed the hair from his forehead, afraid for a disoriented second. Had it all been a dream? Had last night been only a thrilling flight of his imagination? He was on Karen’s couch. No, he must have sleepwalked again. Last night had been real, thank God. The most real night of his life!
He walked naked to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee, the total awareness that he was in love with Karen Thomas, and she, with him, zinging in his veins. The sky outside the kitchen window was overcast, but the memory of their intense lovemaking warmed his blood, for he felt no chill.
On the way to the shower, he checked on her. His heart stirred as he watched Karen from the bedroom doorway, her cheek buried in the pillow, her foxcolored hair fanning over one round, delicious shoulder. The sheet, unfortunately, was pinned primly between her arm and body. He had an impulse to enter the room and awake her in the sweetest way possible. But compassion bade him let her sleep; she was probably exhausted after staying up so late, and there would be time for love after breakfast.
It wasn’t until he was midway through a hot shower that the full memory of yesterday’s arrest and interrogation suddenly returned to Judd. As the weight of his trouble settled on him again, he could only wonder that being with Karen had so completely pushed it from his mind. From the minute he picked her up to carry her to the bedroom, his every sense, every thought—even every dream as he slept—had been filled with her. Though in a way it troubled him that he’d temporarily put aside such a pressing matter, on the other hand, he was glad the tragedy of Marlene hadn’t interfered with his lovemaking with Karen.
As he dressed in jeans and a polo shirt, Judd decided to delay thinking about the case just a little bit longer. Right after breakfast, he must go to Marlene’s house—the newspapers described it as a cottage in the woods—and take a look at the crime scene. If it wasn’t too early, he’d stop at Ed Thomas’s office on the way and sign that release letter for his college records.
He realized it might be foolish to delay his investigation, but for now, he wanted just one more hour, to fix breakfast for himself and Karen, to wake her and eat with her, before returning to the chaos that was the rest of his life.
He turned the little radio on in the kitchen while he cooked. The classical-music station was too heavy for the buoyant mood he wanted to sustain, so he dialed through the channels. An agitated male voice piqued his curiosity and made him listen:
“…don’t have a good feeling about this at all, folks, I’m sorry to say. In fact, I was alone in the studio this morning, I’d just started the broadcast at five, when I heard a kind of pop. This booth is basically soundproof, and I thought at the time it must be an awfully loud backfire from a car. That was approximately four hours ago. Our engineer has gone downstairs where the police cars and unmarked vehicles have gathered and he should be reporting back in just—here he is!
“Rusty, can you tell us what is going on outside the radio station here in downtown Silver Creek?”
“Yes. Apparently it’s worse than we feared, Mike. One of the suites in our small office complex here is rented by a gentleman, an older man who works as a private investigator. Apparently he has been shot to death.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Rusty,” the announcer said, “we have to break for a quick commercial. We’ll be right back, folks.”
Judd stared at the radio in shock. When Ed Thomas had given him directions to his office the day before, he had mentioned the tiny radio station upstairs. There could be no mistake—Karen’s uncle was dead. She would be crushed. She had never talked much about her relationship with Thomas, but it had been clear to Judd that her affection for him ran deep…
The man had been murdered. It had to be—the PI had shown no signs of being suicidal when they spoke with him. It was too much of a coincidence.
A jolt went through Judd as he made the connection: he’d been sleepwalking last night, awaking in the living room…But surely he couldn’t have left the house and murdered a man in his sleep! Even if he’d been in a trance, some crazy altered state, he would have to be utterly mad to carry off a killing and not remember it. Besides that, he didn’t have a gun.
Judd dismissed the notion of his own guilt. Yesterday, perhaps, he would have entertained the possibility, taken more time to consider it, but he was less ready to believe himself a murderer today, after Karen had proved so completely what utter faith she had in him.
However, the police would have no trouble believing he was responsible! Thomas had been talking to the crew at the Creekside Diner about the murder, probably asking questions about his niece’s suspicious client all over town. A desire to silence the investigator, who might have learned too much, would be motive enough for the police. They were probably on their way to arrest him now.
Judd pictured himself being led away in handcuffs, a judge setting bail, and a tearful Karen struggling to post a bond for him. Or worse, since this was a conservative, rural community, his bail request might be denied entirely. He might be trapped in jail and never get a chance to look into his own past and his connection with Marlene Hall, and meanwhile, the detectives would stop looking for the real killer, convinced they had the perpetrator behind bars. No, he couldn’t let them take him in, not until he had answers to some of his own questions.
He started to the bedroom to wake Karen, then stopped, his mind racing. It would take several minutes to rouse her, and she was sure to be griefstricken and in shock when she heard about her uncle. There wasn’t time to break the news gently and explain his plans. Judd chewed savagely on his lip. He hated like hell to leave Karen this way, but an explanatory note would have to suffice.
As he grabbed a pencil beside the kitchen phone, his hypersensitive ears picked up the sound of automobiles approaching on the street There were three, maybe more, large engines.
He threw down the pencil. The house would be completely surrounded in a matter of seconds. He’d scoped out Karen’s backyard his first day here. There was a vine-covered gate at the back that led to a dirt lane behind the house.
He paused at the sunporch door just long enough to scan the landscape, then sprinted to the fence. As he ran, he could hear car doors slamming out front. The gate was stuck fast at its foot by years of accumulated leaf debris. He stepped back, took two running steps and vaulted. As he cleared the top, a voice behind shouted, “There he is—going over the back fence. Get him!”
KAREN WAS AWAKENED by the simultaneous sounds of the bell ringing and someone thumping on the front door. She’d been deep asleep and peered hazily at the clock: 9:40. Where was Judd, and why wasn’t he answering the door? Perhaps he’d gone jogging. It wouldn’t surprise her. That man had energy to burn, that was for sure. She gave a satisfied grin.
But her amusement turned to alarm as the pounding continued and shouts came from her backyard. She threw aside the covers and peeked out the curtained window. Men, in uniform she thought, were milling around at the back of the yard. The intervening shrubbery made it impossible to tell what they were doing, but the sight of them turned her blood to ice.
She shoved her most concealing terry-cloth robe over her nightdress, gave up on finding her slippers and hurried to the door barefoot.
“Ms. Thomas, would you step aside please, ma’am.”
Detective Talmadge and
a cop in blue swept past her. They were here for Judd. Her head swam. Through the sunporch, she watched more police run across the yard. Lieutenant Rossini appeared in their wake, barking orders.
Something told her Judd wasn’t here; she hadn’t seen him on her way to the door, and the house felt empty. She drifted into the living room and stood by the cockatiel’s cage. Judd had forgotten to cover it last night, and Trouble was clinging to his perch, his body slim and rigid with fright at the sudden invasion of these agitated strangers.
The cops made a thorough search of the house. Just as they finished and regrouped in the living room, Lieutenant Rossini came in. Talmadge raised his brows; his partner just barely shook his head and said nothing.
“You men,” Rossini addressed the uniformed officers, “join the sergeant outside.”
Karen found her tongue. “I take it you’ve gotten your warrant for Judd’s arrest.” She knew there was no point in being testy, but she couldn’t keep the caustic combination of anger and fear from her voice.
The senior detective searched her face for a moment, then gestured toward the sofa. “Deputy Talmadge and I need to talk to you, if you don’t mind.”
The lieutenant’s voice had softened incredibly to a tone she’d never heard; an instinctive reaction made her stomach turn over. She wrapped the robe tightly about her legs and sat down. The partners took seats across from her.
“I have some bad news for you, Ms. Thomas,” Rossini began. He started to remove a notebook from his breast pocket, then stopped and forced his eyes back to Karen. “I’m sorry to have to break it to you like this, but your uncle, Edward Thomas, was found dead in his office this morning.”
Karen’s heart stopped. She’d heard him correctly, as clear as day, but was he lying? Was this some tactic to get her to tell them where Judd was? She searched their faces: Rossini’s mouth drooped in a grimace, and his fist was clenched so tight the knuckles were white; young Talmadge stared at the carpet as he sniffed and ran a finger under his nose. Altogether their body language seemed genuine and unrehearsed.
Only A Memory Away Page 16