PerpetualPleasure

by Dita Parker

  “Almost there,” he said cheerfully.

  He thought she couldn’t wait to get rid of him. Or was MacCale in a hurry to get away from her?

  He parked under her portico, swiftly killing the engine and getting up to help her out of the car. Lucie took the hand he offered and let him guide her up the sweep of stairs, every step one step closer to the moment of goodbye.

  If she had any sense of self-preservation, any mercy toward MacCale, she would keep quiet. She would thank him, wish him all the best and say goodnight, not the words that burned like bile in her mouth. Pushing the thought aside, Lucie turned her back on him to face the door. She turned around a second later, hands clenched in fists at her sides as desperation surged through her.

  MacCale’s expression was tense, his lashes lowered over golden eyes. In her dreams they looked upon her with desire and devotion. She couldn’t read what she saw in them now. And she couldn’t walk through the door without knowing.

  “Stay the night.”

  “So you can throw me out again in the morning?” He breathed out roughly. “No thanks.” He crossed his arms over his chest, a decidedly forbidding gesture.

  Lucie wanted to scream. “It’s been all for you, Mac. To protect you.”

  “You can’t protect a heart, Lucie.” His voice was hard, almost condescending. “It will feel what it will feel. It’s the risk you have to take. The price you have to pay. That’s life. And that’s love. You’re afraid of ending up alone so you’ve been alone all your life. Are you the only one who doesn’t see the irony?”

  Lucie blinked, feeling the petrifying sense of loss, a pain that weighed on her chest like a log. “You’re a mean one, Mr. Moore.”

  His mouth pinched in a hard line for a second. “No. I’m just a man who would have given anything for a chance to prove it’s worth it.” He said it simply, as if she had lived forever but hadn’t learned a thing yet.

  “If you’re going to accuse me of being unfeeling again, save your breath,” she charged. “It’s self-preservation. You of all people should get that. You take all kinds of precautions to make sure no one gets hurt. Well, this is mine. And you talk about life but you forget that for me that’s all eternity. Not a flicker or a fleeting moment. Fucking forever.” She was shouting. She couldn’t remember yelling at a man in her life, but staring at MacCale looking back at her with taut eyes and tilted head, Lucie had to fight to keep herself in check and not smack him out of impotent frustration.

  “Would you sleep better if I told you I hardly sleep at all?” she asked more sedately.

  “No. It would only make me sad. Sad to think of you, alone in this house, forever.”

  “So stay the night,” she blurted. “Make it go away.”

  He swallowed hard, his throat and jaw working. “I can’t.”

  “Or won’t?” she spat.

  “It makes no difference what I want,” he shot back. “You made that pretty obvious months ago.”

  He was doing it again. Turning the tables on her, using everything she had said, every move she had made against her. “I wish I’d never told you the truth.”

  He waved his hand back at her. “It wouldn’t have changed a thing even if you hadn’t.”

  She gaped at him. “So this is my punishment.” That’s what it felt like with MacCale’s stance so rigid, his tone unrelenting.

  “I don’t want to punish you, Lucie.” His voice was gentler now, resigned. “You know what I want. Nothing’s changed.”

  It couldn’t be. Did he expect her to believe he had forgiven and forgotten? “I hurt you. I really hurt you, Mac.”

  He winced. “You did,” he said, his voice rough, his eyes reflecting her pain. “And still I can’t move on. You’re in my head, driving me to distraction. You’re a bug in my blood, spoiling me for other women. If that’s what you wanted, you succeeded, baby. Now release me,” he demanded harshly. “Tell me off again. Tell me you hate me. Can’t stand the sight of me. Because everything you’ve done since day one tells me otherwise. That makes me hope against all hope, so smash it, baby.” He stopped, almost panting, and closed the distance between them. It brought her toe to toe, nose to nose with a mountain of seething, sexy male.

  “Smash that hope, Lucie,” he gushed out. “Here’s your chance. Because all you want is to protect me.” His voice was a low snarl grating on her senses. His eyes were bright, a savage look she had seen before. Lethal, passionate. That explosive look should have terrified her. It only made her want him more.

  “Do it!”

  Lucie jumped, springing into action. She dug into her purse, jammed the key into the lock and threw the door open.

  “Inside,” she commanded.

  “Whatever you want to say, you say right here.”

  Latching on to a thick wrist, Lucie drew him inside. MacCale’s surprise worked to her advantage. He didn’t protest or resist when he could have brushed her off like a fly, he stumbled in after her. Lucie shoved the door closed and pushing at his shoulders, shoved MacCale against it.

  He shook his head, half smiling, then clucked his tongue. “You can’t seduce your way out of this, baby.”

  “I need you.”

  He raised a brow. “Me, my cock or just cock?”

  “You, Mac,” she said, not caring how mocking he sounded or how disbelieving he looked. “You want me.” Pressing closer, half expecting Mac to push her away, Lucie circled his neck with one hand.

  “That’s beside the point,” he grated. “I’m not going to fuck you.”

  She tested the corded strength beneath his skin, petted him as he had once caressed her, making her forget the resolve to keep her distance. “All right. No fucking,” she said, massaging him gently. “Make love to me then,” she whispered. She stroked her body against his, rubbed his hips with her belly, moving all over the rock-hard length of his cock. “Make love to me, Mac.”

  His expression pained, he gripped her hips, effectively stopping all motion. “Honey, the last time I tried to make love to you, you acted as if I had molested you.”

  “Forget about last time,” she bit out. “I missed you. I missed you so damn much I have trouble sleeping and eating and working.” She pulled at his neck to steal a kiss before he could pull back. “You have to set me right before I stop functioning altogether.”

  He groaned, his fingers digging into her hips as if he wanted to shake her. “You’re supposed to talk me into leaving, Lucie, not staying.”

  “I know. I don’t deserve you. It doesn’t stop me from wanting you.” She tried to pull him back down for another kiss. Unyielding, MacCale evaded the move, forcing her to let go of his neck.

  Locking eyes with him, feeling him slipping away a mile a second, Lucie made one last attempt. “I haven’t been with anyone since you left. Not even in my dreams. And we make love in my dreams all the time.”

  “Mine too, baby,” he rasped, a harrowing sadness in his eyes. “But a dream’s a dream. If that’s all this will ever be then what’s the point?”

  Chapter Ten

  Letting go of Lucie, MacCale gently pushed her away from him. Her hands dropped, her eyes flooded with hurt and maybe a hint of humiliation. All color draining from her cheeks, she slowly stepped back. Her expression, so lost, so lonely… It made his skin crawl.

  How did she bear it without going mad?

  She did what she had to do. She couldn’t die so she played dead while putting on a show, and she did it with a flair not many actresses possessed. But Lucie wasn’t an actress, or an otherworldly creature. She was human, the most heartbreaking mixture of strength and vulnerability he had ever known.

  And he was an idiot.

  He thought he could see right through her. He’d seen through her all right. Right past the truth about her life and motivation. He was too wrapped up in his own feelings and needs to understand hers. He forced his own take on her, made demands and deprived her of choices like a bona fide bully.

  Lucie had pegged him for wha
t he was, a man used to getting his way. It was all good and well on the job. But this wasn’t work. He had no script to follow. No one yelled “Cut” when he started making a mess of things. There was no way to take it from the top and do another take.

  Lucie nodded, her lips pursed tight but he could see them tremble. Was she holding back a sob? A plea?

  “Thanks for the ride, MacCale. Tell Emily I—” She stopped, one hand flying to her mouth while the other smoothed the rumpled front of her gown. “Tell Emily—” She inhaled sharply and turned her back on him. “Good night.”

  “Lucie, wait.” He flinched at the harshness in his voice, the commanding tone that had her whipping around, but what he heard in hers stirred the despair and longing he had battled with for months. Maybe he could have fought wanting her. But not the fact she still wanted him. Not her anguish, the stricken look in her eyes or her shattered voice, Lucie blinking hard not to shed the tears that glazed her eyes with moisture, Lucie trying so hard not to cry, not to beg, pleading with him with her eyes all the same.

  He thought she had hurt him. The look in her eyes nearly destroyed him. It broke through every defense, every excuse and reason he had vowed to hold on to should it come to this. He had vowed not to fall prey again. He had promised himself he wouldn’t give in to the temptress no matter what she did or said. But he hadn’t expected this. A cold shoulder, maybe. Aloofness, definitely. But coming face-to-face with the devastating sorrow she had carried and kept buried all her life, the woman she hid from everyone, maybe even from herself…never.

  He thought she felt nothing. Now he saw how much she was capable of feeling—he saw everything—raw and real and unbidden. The knowledge overwhelmed him, his grief expanding to a desperate need to soothe her pain, to protect her against the hurt, make it go away, even for one night, as she begged him to.

  “Lucie, I’m so sorry. God, baby, I—”

  “It’s okay,” she whispered. “I understand. Just go.” The distress in her eyes only grew as the tears finally fell, drenching her ashen cheeks.

  Slowly, he stalked to her, touched her face. “I would do anything to undo what happened to you.”

  “I know. But you can’t. So just go, Mac. Please.”

  MacCale closed his eyes against the heaviness in her voice. He wanted it gone. He wanted her free of it. Now. She hadn’t meant to hurt him. He believed her. She had only done what she had to do to protect them both.

  “Christ, Lucie.” He gathered her against him, rested his head against hers.

  “Don’t.” She twisted to get away from him. “Don’t you dare pity me. I do not want a pity fuck.”

  Holding on to her, MacCale let her struggle. Lucie had sensed his frustrated sorrow over the fate and the facts that would always stand between them and keep her from him.

  He dipped his head to nuzzle her neck in passing, to let her feel the warmth of his mouth against her skin. “The things you say, baby.”

  She stopped moving. “I mean it.”

  “And I said I’m not gonna fuck you. I meant it.”

  Naked disappointment shone on her face. Mac was quick to set her straight with a kiss.

  Lucie wrenched in his arms, gasped for breath. “I don’t understand. Are you staying or not?”

  Swinging her around, backing toward the door, MacCale kissed her again, fighting to keep it light for all the heat raging inside him, desperate to go slow and sensual when the separation had only made his need for her stronger.

  She whimpered, a tiny kittenish sound that made him moan in return. Squeezed against his chest, she gripped his shirt. Her hand snaked over his shoulder and up to his neck, pulling him closer.

  Mac snatched her up for a more comfortable fit. Instantly the kiss turned harder, wilder, her legs circling his hips as she settled into his arms.

  “The porch,” she panted against his lips. “The sleeping porch. Past the kitchen, at the back.”

  Torn between speeding things up and delaying the inevitable, because when the night was over so would their relationship be, he muttered, “In a minute.”

  He needed to kiss her again. He couldn’t stop. Cupping the back of her head for protection, he pressed her against the door. She touched her forehead to his, nudged his nose with the tip of hers before pressing her sweet luscious lips on his mouth, lightly, tentatively.

  He meant to soothe her. It worked the other way around, the pain in his gut dissolving as Lucie kept touching him. A fierce need to protect washed over him. He still wanted her so much it hurt, but it was a good pain, one he welcomed. With the lightest of caresses she had everything in him tight, hot and hard.

  “Mac? The porch? Put me down?”

  “Are you uncomfortable, baby?”

  “In your arms? No. In this dress? Always.”

  “Oh.” Swiftly, he set her down. “Better get you out of that thing before you hurt yourself.”

  Tears still glistened in her eyes but Lucie attempted a smile, sidestepped him and taking his hand, turned to lead him to the double doors at the opposite end of the wide center hall.

  The porch turned out to be a glass-paned room that ran along the length of the waterside facade facing the Little Ogeechee River. Comfortable and inviting, there was no gleam of silk or touch of formality in what looked like the perfect living porch. There were rocking chairs and hammocks, seagrass rugs and painted wicker furniture, dark green, maybe gray. Coupled with the heavy shutters, the deep structure was the perfect screen from the light and heat of the sun. But it wasn’t the sun that dappled the scenery, it was the moon.

  “Down on the corner,” Lucie said.

  A massive oak sheltered the sleeping porch in its turn. Had she watched the tree grow over the decades? How many times had she sat there looking over the river, the garden below and the stars above, never aging, never changing, always alone? He shook the thought away.

  “Is it too cold?” she asked, mistaking his shudder for a shiver.

  “I’m good if you are.”

  “With you, always.”

  “You have to stop saying things like that.”

  “But it’s the truth,” she said. “If only for tonight, I want this to be real.”

  “It’s been real to me from the first breath, baby.”

  “And I’ll always love you for it.”

  God, if only she would. Love him. Always. “You really need to stop saying things like that.” Everything she had done said she wanted to give in to him. Give them a chance. The thought had hounded him from the day they had last parted. He’d argued his case, said his peace, but he couldn’t force her to make that leap. He could only enjoy her and hope she took her pleasure with him as freely as he gave it.

  He would sort out his soul later. It had taken him all summer to deal with the effect she’d had and nothing felt finished. Who knew how long it would take for him to get over one last night with her. If it took a lifetime, the pain would still come to an end one day. Hers was infinite. No wonder she worked so hard not to feel a thing.

  “Lights?” He looked around for a switch.

  “Or candles?” she asked, snatching a matchbox from the table between another hammock and a wrought iron day bed.

  He couldn’t spot that many candles but to his satisfaction MacCale found there were enough as he lighted the candelabras by the door, by the bed and one massive carved wood concoction on the floor. The light was subdued, very atmospheric, and best of all, in no danger of going out without some help.

  “The panes open up?” he asked.

  “They let the breeze in, yes. I would bake in the summer if they didn’t.”

  “It’s beautiful out here,” he noted, toeing off his shoes and ridding himself of the jacket.

  “It’s my favorite place in the world.”

  “And you’re sharing it with me?” he asked, opening the tie and tugging it off.

  She nodded, watched his every move. “I’m sharing it with you. And only you. Under the skies, with nothing but the wind
and water looking on.”

  He had offered to take her that way once. God, it had turned into his favorite fantasy. Had she dreamed the same dream all summer too?

  “I’m honored,” MacCale said as he undressed slowly, letting her watch him at will. “And humbled,” he added as Lucie padded to him.

  “And horny,” she stated, placing her palms flat on his chest. She trailed down the center of his torso, her small hands cool on his feverish skin. “You’re so beautiful,” she said, her palms sliding to his hips before she could reach his dick.

  “You mean incredibly handsome.”

  “That too,” she said, her eyes following the trail her palms had forged.

  “What do I say?” she whispered, her eyes descending to his cock. “What do I do so you won’t feel used? Because that’s not what I wanted. Ever.” Her fingers kneaded his hips, her thumbs reaching for his groin where his cock bobbed impatiently. He’d waited months for her touch. Surely he could wait a few moments more, get this right on the first take? He needed her. Lucie needed him more and by God he would deliver or die trying.

  “Mac, what do I do?” She stared up at him now, her voice small, her eyes uncertain.

  He took her face in his hands. “Do you trust me, Lucie?”

  “Yes,” she said without delay or hesitation.

  “That’s all I need to know. That’s all you need to do.” Reaching for the back of her dress, he searched for the zipper hidden in the seam. The dress parted down to her thighs. MacCale knelt to help her step out and laid the gown over the hammock with his own clothes. “Shoes.” He went on one knee to remove the nude pumps she wore.

  He half expected Lucie to be naked underneath the dress again. The pale-pink underwear she wore revealed more than it covered but still offered him the pleasure of stripping her bare. “Pretty,” he murmured, fingering the sheer lace of the bra. He cupped her breasts, ran his thumbs over her nipples already hard and beading against his palm. Dipping his index fingers between fabric and skin, he carefully lowered the edge as far down as he comfortably could. “So pretty.” The plump globes pushed up and out, a sweet offering tempting him to taste, to touch.