by Vella Munn
“No. He doesn’t.”
“You didn’t bat an eye. There’s no way anyone would have guessed we’d ever met.”
Mara’s sigh was so low Reed almost didn’t hear it. “Clint helped,” she whispered. “I told myself that if I wasn’t careful I might put you in danger. That was possible, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
Reed’s voice was so matter-of-fact. Danger acknowledged and then dismissed. Yet Mara didn’t expect anything different from him. She’d felt the heat of his reaction to their embrace, their kiss, her hand on him. She shared that same heat. But then she’d felt him draw back, and she wasn’t going to let him know how much the loss hurt. “Where’s your car?”
“At the hotel. I didn’t want anyone to know I was coming out here.”
“Didn’t you?”
“I think you know why.”
“Yes,” Mara made herself say. “I think I do. You’re sure you weren’t seen? That you’ll be all right?”
“There’s no way I can be sure of that. But I took precautions.”
Mara didn’t want to hear about precautions. Or danger. She didn’t want anything except the unsettling challenge of touching him. “I hope so, Reed. When I think…”
She couldn’t stop with that. Somehow she would match Reed’s raw courage and, maybe, absorb from him what she needed to deal with her own life. Reed dealt daily with violent men. She’d spent hours feeling raw and wounded because someone had left an ice-cream cone on her car.
“Zack.” She forced out the name. “Before, I had no image, no way of knowing. Why can’t he be five foot five with skinny shoulders and a paunch?”
“The Zacks of the world don’t come that way.”
“No. I don’t guess they do.” Mara rocked to her feet. She tried to turn away, but remembered Reed had noticed her talc. He knew she’d worn it because it reminded her of something they’d shared. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “Even if you can only stay a few minutes, I’m glad you came.”
“Are you?”
“Did you think I wouldn’t be?”
“I don’t know what I thought, Mara. When I saw you at the show, I realized I had no business drawing you into what I’m doing. Endangering you.”
“No.” Mara swayed, caught herself. He couldn’t be saying goodbye. He couldn’t! “Reed?” She struggled for the right words. “You aren’t drawing me into anything. What happened was coincidence. It isn’t going to happen again.”
“Isn’t it?”
Mara’s throat contracted. She pictured him walking out her door, closing it behind him. Driving away. Fear and an incredible sense of loss nearly engulfed her. Mindless of what she might expose, Mara reached out and drew his hand to her throat, her breast. “You can’t protect me from life,” she whispered. “I don’t want to be protected. I never have.”
“But deliberately…”
Mara shook her head. It pounded from the effort of not crying. “Reed? Don’t block me out. Please.”
“Block you out?” Reed’s hand over her heart stiffened. “Is that what you think I’m doing?”
“I—I don’t know what you’re doing.” She dropped her eyes and shut them, squeezing tightly against her tears. “I don’t know anything about you.” Anything except that I’m lost without you.
Reed drew her into him, inch by precious inch, taking away the cold and stopping her tears. Her eyes remained closed, but she could feel his breath on her temple, his strong arm around her shoulders. Mara felt safe and protected. Whether she wanted to feel that way wasn’t important. She was in his arms. He hadn’t walked out the door.
“You said you don’t know anything about me,” he whispered. “You really believe that?”
Mara nodded.
“I’m sorry. Oh, Mara. I’m sorry.”
Had she touched something deep inside him? Did she have that kind of power? “I don’t want it to be like that,” she whispered back.
“You don’t?”
“No, Reed. Oh God, no. Last weekend was wonderful. You knew that I needed to get away. That I needed…other things.”
“What things?” Reed asked. He stroked her hair, his fingers gliding along her temple, around her ear, down the nape of her neck. “Tell me about those things.”
“Things,” Mara repeated. How she wanted to lay herself open to him, to put an end to reserve!
“Say it, please. I have to know. Before anything else, I have to know.”
With her head buried against Reed’s chest, and the beating of his heart soothing away her headache, Mara listened to her own heart. For them, there was only tonight. “What I said when we were at the coast? About not knowing you well enough? It isn’t like that anymore.”
“Are you sure?”
Mara sighed. It came out sounding too much like a moan. “I’m not sure of anything.” Oh Lord, should she say this? Could she not? “I watched you with Zack. I didn’t know the man you’d become. I didn’t like that person. Who are you, Reed? I want to know the real you. I want to feel you against me and know that the man with me isn’t the one Zack called Lane.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“Nothing. This isn’t about words.”
“Then—” his hand feathered down her cheek and throat, “—what is it about?”
“You want me to say it?” That wasn’t enough. She had to give him an honest answer. Give herself one. “Reed, I want you here. With me.”
“Making love?”
“Yes.” Yes.
“Yes?” Reed’s hand stopped in mid-caress. “You’re telling me yes? Oh, Mara.”
Mara. He made her name a song, a promise. Then, with his hand once again tracing the outline of her cheek, her jaw, he whispered, “Don’t you think you should let Lobo out?”
“Lobo? If you think so.”
“I’m not sure what I think, Mara. When I’m around you, I don’t know myself at all.”
Shaken by what he’d just revealed, Mara slipped free and walked to the door. She stood as Lobo pushed past her. It was a beautiful night, warm, cloudless. The air on her arms and legs was part of the spell. When Reed remained silent and still, Mara gathered her courage and turned around.
He was beautiful. This man, whose eyes had been all but dead on Saturday, was beautiful. There was strength in his arms and questions in his eyes and promises in his smile and, for a moment, something of a boy in the man. Who are you? Why are you here?
The answer wouldn’t be found in words. There was another way, the only way that mattered. It called for closing the door and walking back to him. Looking up and into his eyes. Asking questions. Being afraid. Wanting as she’d never wanted before. For a moment Reed waited with his hands by his sides, frightening her.
Maybe this wasn’t what he wanted after all.
Without knowing she was going to do it, Mara reached out and touched. He touched in return. His hands found her shoulders, and she came to him. The sleek velvet of his throat when she brushed her lips over him took her beyond doubt and questions, into a world lit by emotion. Her question died unspoken.
“Mara?” Once again his whispering of her name flowed through her. “You understand, don’t you? Tonight. Until I’ve done what I promised, that’s all we have. Tonight.”
Mara forced herself not to shudder. “Don’t. I won’t talk about that.”
“Not talking won’t change things.”
“I know,” Mara said in a voice both strong and weak. “But we can pretend.”
Reed ran his hands down her thighs, caught the hem of her nightshirt and brought it slowly up. “This isn’t pretend, Mara. Tell me. Tell me this is what you want,” he whispered with his hands brushing against her hips. “I have to know. You have to tell me what’s right.”
“This—” She pressed her hands against his, flattening his fingers against her naked flesh. “This is what I want.”
A moment later the lightweight gown dropped to the carpet. “You are so incredibly beautiful
.”
Beautiful. Mara had been told she was committed and intelligent and gutsy and half-crazy, but never beautiful. She’d never needed to be told that, but the word came from Reed, and it was precious.
Mara felt no shame about standing naked before him. He touched her with warm and roughened fingertips, every touch erasing fear and questions, replacing those emotions with wonder. With feeling. She had, she could believe, been created for him.
A touch? A single night? No. It was much more than that.
Mara remembered placing her hand in Reed’s, but not the effort of making her legs work. She didn’t know when he’d turned off the light or how he’d guided her into the bedroom, or whether, maybe, she’d been the one to lead him there. An hour ago she’d had nothing except this house and her dog and a thousand self-doubts. But now Reed had pulled back the covers on her bed and was looking at her, saying nothing, waiting for her.
Yes. Oh yes.
“No doubts? I won’t push—”
“Reed? Please.”
Mara’s quiet plea echoed, fading, evaporating. Then Reed touched the swell of her breast, dispelling all but her need for him. It seemed unbelievable that this was the first time she’d trusted Reed with her body this way. After the impact he’d had on her life, her senses, her thoughts, her every emotion, they should be more to each other.
But they had to begin somewhere. Here. Tonight.
“I don’t know what you want,” Reed told her when the last of his clothes had been discarded. “Tell me what’s right for you.”
“You,” Mara managed. “The rest—”
Reed covered her mouth with his and shut off the words she couldn’t finish anyway. Although she trembled and gripped his back with fingers that dug into his flesh, he treated her as if she was a work of art. His fingers and palms moved over her, touching lightly where she needed a whisper, pressing to reach below the surface when she needed that.
They were still standing. Mara felt she could have stood forever with his body moving so lightly, so wonderfully against hers. But her body longed for more. Feeling for the bed, she sank onto it and brought Reed down with her. He settled with her. He was here. Here.
She touched him tongue to tongue, quick pressure, quick surrender. He tried to slide off her, but she gripped his shoulders and held him close, wondering at her brazen courage. Once again he brushed her breasts, igniting her passions until her nipples puckered and hardened. She shifted restlessly under his touch as waves of wanting rocked her.
But tapping into herself wasn’t enough. Tonight, the only night they might have, was for both of them. With that commitment guiding her, Mara roamed with her hands and toes and legs and tongue over him, wondering at planes and valleys, flesh and muscle. Life.
Her thumb found a small lump near his right hipbone. She explored the tiny mass, her fingers tracing its contours, trying to imagine what it was.
“War wound,” Reed whispered.
“An injury?” She rested her palm over it. His stomach tightened. “Who did this to you?”
“I did, Mara.” He shuddered and drew her hand away. He settled her hand over his ribs and shuddered again. “When I wrecked my bike. I’m not like you, perfect. I have flaws.”
“Oh, Reed. I have flaws, too,” she whispered, sliding her hand downward again to settle it over his scar.
“I can’t find any,” he said, his hands moving, moving. “Your waist. It feels so sleek, so smooth.” His fingers dipped lower. “The way your stomach disappears when you draw in a breath. The way—” he touched her breasts again, “—the way your body tells me what you’re feeling. That’s what makes you perfect.”
Perfect. Mara wanted to embrace the word, to believe she could be that for Reed. But he held her nipple between thumb and forefinger, held it so he could draw his moistened tongue over it, and she couldn’t think.
She felt the strange roughness of her sheet, air sliding over her breasts and belly, the slow glide of Reed’s leg as he covered hers with his own. Feeling as if she might explode from the symphony of sensations, Mara reached out blindly and found Reed’s shoulders. Reed’s powerful, competent shoulders. She felt as if she’d grabbed hold of a waterfall-slickened boulder, but this rock had life pulsing through it. And she’d tapped into that life.
Using Reed as her guide, Mara touched her tongue first to the small hollow of his throat and then worked downward past lazily curling hairs, over the hard ridge of his breast. She found his nipple and took it gently into her mouth. Her teeth closed over him, a captor with a willing prisoner.
“Mara…Mara!”
She could wrest that emotion from him? Mara opened her eyes. In the dark she met his eyes. Then, unnerved by what he’d exposed in that gaze, Mara closed her own eyes again and let touch, taste, smell take over.
Reed took her into the waves, introduced her to powerful currents. Mara gave herself up to him, feeling a reckless freedom she’d never known herself capable of. She drew him into her, and renewed herself in him. Her body jumped, filled, exploding almost with him. She felt his sweat-slickened body, felt his movement, felt her response. Yes! He was there, matching her stride for stride, wave for wave.
Yes!
Reed had satisfied her; hadn’t he heard her abandoned cry, felt her shivers of release? For minutes, hours maybe, there’d been nothing but him and her. Them. It wasn’t just his sweat after all. His hard and urgent breathing. His release. They’d done that together. They.
That wonderful knowledge would take Mara into the morning.
Only, what she’d experienced during those moments when they clung together had been more than lovemaking. It might simply be that she’d broken loose from everything she’d ever believed about herself.
It might be no more complicated than the act of falling in love.
“I didn’t know,” Mara whispered, “When I heard the car driving up, I had no way of knowing.”
“This wasn’t why I came. Not the only reason,” he whispered back. “I had to see you. Just see you.”
“Yes. Yes. And then—” Mara touched her tongue to Reed’s chest, tasting salt, “—then this happened.”
“You’re not sorry? There aren’t any regrets?”
Maybe in the morning. “Oh no, Reed.” Then because morning stalked her, she had to ask, “You can’t stay?”
“No. I wish…”
“I know,” Mara finished. She should let him go. Putting off that moment would only make the leaving harder. But not yet. Not until she had something more to take her through days and nights when she wouldn’t know where he was, if he was alive. She touched her tongue to his flesh one more time. She ran her toes over his calf, feeling hair and skin, muscle and bone. Then she began to cry, silent, secret tears.
There was nothing planned or calculated about her sigh. “Go. Now. Please,” she begged.
“I’m sorry. I can’t give you any promises. I don’t know when I’ll see you again.”
“I know that. Reed, please just go now.”
Hating his job, hating the bonds that tied him to Jack, most of all hating her fears for his safety, Mara watched Reed dress and start for the door. She wouldn’t get out of bed to watch him go. It was the only way she could let him leave her tonight. But she couldn’t remain silent. “Be careful. Please.”
Reed turned around. He was backlit by a living room lamp. His eyes were even darker than they’d been when need for her had ruled him. He gripped the doorjamb, and his knuckles were white. He said nothing.
Mara heard the door close behind him. She slipped back under the sheets and pulled them tight around her. The heat Reed had stirred in her veins cooled, and she shivered. She didn’t know if he’d seen her tears. She had no way of knowing whether he understood that a woman falling in love would cry at the loss of her lover.
That her need for him was that strong.
Reed didn’t call the next day, and Mara felt herself slipping. She told herself it was just concern for Reed that made h
er jumpy. Some of that was the truth. How could it be otherwise when her sheets smelled of him, when his memory remained silhouetted in the doorway, when her heart cried out for his return.
But it was more than that. The police were warning women not to shop alone at night. A local TV station had called to ask if she would be part of a program on serial rapists. She had declined.
The program, which Mara tried not to watch, but did, aired on the evening news. The focus was on the supermarket rapist, a man the police claimed to believe was driven by a need for control.
Clint called as soon as the piece was over. Was she all right? he asked. If she wanted him to come over he would. Mara did want him to come, but told him no. Instead she spent the next hour loading and unloading the pistol, feeling its weight, gaining strength from having it at hand. Remembering everything of what had been said and left unsaid the evening Reed had taught her how to use it.
The next night she cooked dinner for Clint and his parents, and they stayed until bedtime. Mara changed from her morning radio news station and avoided reading anything more serious in the paper than the advice column. She threw herself into her work by planning an ad she would place next to the weekend car sales information.
And then Reed called. At first she couldn’t concentrate on anything as unimportant as what he was saying. She could do nothing except breathe and fight tears of relief.
Suddenly his words came into focus. “I wish I didn’t have to say this, but Jack was right,” he told her, his voice stripped of emotion by the poor connection. “This case isn’t going to be easy. I met Zack’s partner. The man wouldn’t trust his own mother.”
No. “You have their names, don’t you? Can’t the police arrest them?”
Reed explained that a good lawyer, which the ring members could afford, would find loopholes in the case he’d built. “The case has to be airtight. I have to be able to document what everyone’s role in the ring is. I’m sorry. It’s going to take time. I wanted you to know that.”
Time. “Will I… You can’t get away?”
“That’s why I called, Mara. Zack and his partner are going to Reno in a couple of days. Some kind of meeting. They don’t want me along.”