She pushed through the cards. “Ten of hearts.”
“Mine’s the seven of spades.”
Her spirits lifting, she began to gather up the cards. “Too bad,” she said. “You lose.”
He clamped a hand over hers. “The game’s not over yet.”
She looked up at him surprise. “Sure it is. You just lost.”
“No,” he argued. “You’ve still got your panties. If I win the next hand, I can choose to put an article of clothing back on or ask you to take off your panties.”
Her eyes bugged wide. “That’s not how I play the game!”
“You’ve played strip poker before?”
“No, but I’m familiar with the game and I’ve never heard of that rule before.”
He lifted his shoulder in a shrug and began to shuffle the cards. “Probably because most folks never get this far.” He shot her a wink. “By now they’re usually rolling around on the floor all hot and sweaty.”
She snatched up the cards he’d dealt her. “They’ll be licking popsicles in hell before you’ll find me rolling on the floor with you.”
He reached for the waist of his underwear. “I think I hear them chipping away at that ice now.”
Though she didn’t want to look, Deanna couldn’t seem to keep her gaze from veering to watch as he stripped his underwear down his hips and legs. With him sitting cross-legged on the sofa opposite her, she had a perfect view of the semierect staff that rose from between his legs.
Gulping, she jerked up her hand, blocking the sight with her cards.
“How many do you want?” he asked.
She lowered the cards a fraction to blink at him dully. “What?”
“How many cards?”
“Oh.” She dropped her gaze to study her hand, but the suits and numbers all blurred together.
“Deanna,” he prodded.
“Would you give me a minute?” she complained.
“What’s wrong?” he teased, and unfolded his legs to nudge her knee with a bare toe. “Having trouble concentrating?”
She didn’t mean to. Really she didn’t. But when she lowered her cards to scowl at him, she found herself looking at his sex instead. It had grown since she’d last glimpsed it and now stood erect and proud, juxtaposed against a washboard-rippled stomach. Heat burned behind her eyes, seared her throat. She blinked. Gulped. But the heat only spread, setting fire to her cheeks and churning like an erupting volcano low in her belly.
Gulping again, she thrust her cards up in front of her face. “T-two,” she stammered, though she didn’t have a clue what cards she held.
He peeled two off the top of the deck, but took none for himself.
“What have you got?” he asked, as he stroked his toe along her leg.
That he didn’t seem to have a problem speaking irritated the heck out of her, as she was having difficulty pushing a single word past the lump in her throat.
“A pair,” she finally managed to choke out.
He drew his leg back to fold in front of him again and spread out his cards. “Me, too. Mine’s jacks. What’s yours?”
She dropped her cards. “Sexes. I mean, sixes,” she amended quickly.
Biting back a smile, he scraped up the cards. “I’ll take those panties, please.”
She hugged her folded legs closer to her body. “I concede. You win. Game’s over.”
“Deanna,” he scolded, giving her a disappointed look. “I would’ve never taken you for a quitter.”
She jutted her chin. “I’m not quitting. I’m conceding. There’s a difference.”
Shaking his head, he gathered up the cards, then unfolded his legs and swung them over the edge of the sofa, stood.
Unfortunately for Deanna, that only provided her with a clear view of his backside…and she’d always found his backside as tempting, if not more so, as his front. He had that infamous cowboy butt—rounded, muscled cheeks that just cried for a woman’s hands—and a narrow waist that sliced upward in a V to a broad, muscular back and coat-hanger-straight shoulders. It was all she could do to keep from reaching out and splaying her hands over the tempting expanse, dragging them down to squeeze her fingers into the muscled flesh of his cheeks.
“Okay!” she cried in frustration, as she struggled to shimmy her panties over her hips. “You can have my dang panties.”
He angled his head around to peer at her…and she froze as their gazes met, her panties tangled at her ankles. His eyes were dark and filled with a heat that burned right through her. She gulped, staring, as he turned slowly back around. With his gaze on hers, he reached down and unwound her panties from her ankles and tossed them aside. Then he was leaning into her, easing her back.
“You ready to play now, Deanna?” he asked.
The huskiness in his voice, the sensual invitation in it rolled through her in waves, leaving her weak, needy.
Braced up by her elbows, her mouth only inches from his, she could manage only a breathy, “Yes.”
His mouth struck hers with an urgency that threw her to her back. Trapped beneath him, she lifted her arms and wound them around his neck, offering herself up to him, accepting what he offered her in return. And he had a lot to give. Within seconds, her chest was heaving like a bellows beneath his, her skin on fire from his touch. She clawed at his back, at his shoulders, knotted her fingers in his hair, desperate to taste him, have him inside her.
The game of poker, though initiated to ease the boredom, had served as foreplay of the headiest kind, leaving her hot and hungry for his taste, his touch. For him. She wanted him more than she’d ever wanted him before, was sure she’d die if he didn’t take her, fill her.
Moaning her need, she opened her legs for him, inviting him in. She felt the prod of his erection at her moist center, the heat that had forged it into steel and nearly wept with joy as he pushed inside.
She gasped, throwing her head back, tearing her mouth from his, as he pushed deeper…then deeper still. Her hips rose to meet him, her back arching high. Her hands, slick with perspiration, clutched the cheeks of his butt, holding him against her. A trembling started inside her, building in intensity and strength until she exploded around him, clinging to him, crying out his name. He held her, his own breathing ragged, his heart thundering against hers, then set his jaw and thrust one last time. She soared higher, anchored to the sofa only by his weight, as he pumped his warm seed deep inside her.
With his gaze on hers, his sex still buried inside her, he curved a hand over her cheek and stroked a thumb beneath her eye.
“I love you, Deanna,” he whispered. “More than you’ll ever know.”
She stared, her heart swelling in her chest at the sincerity in the words, at the obvious love she saw in his eyes. “I—” Her throat closed around the words that burned there, refusing to let them past.
Silence screamed between them, as Cope waited, his breath burning his lungs, for the words he’d traveled halfway across the country and endured nearly two weeks of her stubbornness to hear. When they didn’t come, with a disappointed sigh, he rolled to his side and drew her against him to hold.
When Cope awakened the next morning, he was alone. He knew it instantly. Sensed it before he even opened his eyes. She was gone.
Vaulting from the sofa, he charged for the deck. Naked, he faced Beach Road, focusing his gaze on the spot where they had parked their vehicles the night before. The Hummer was there, just as he’d left it, and seemingly unharmed by the storm.
But the Lamborghini was gone.
Swearing, he spun back inside the house, slamming the door hard behind him.
“Damn you, Deanna!” he swore angrily, then bent at the waist and dropped his forehead against his fisted hands. “Damn you,” he moaned. Gulping, he lifted his head to stare at the ceiling and blinked the moisture from his eyes.
“Damn you.”
Later that same morning, Grammer poked at Deanna’s shoulder. “The phone’s for you, dear. It’s Cope.”
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nbsp; Deanna burrowed her face deeper into the mattress and pulled the pillow down tighter over her ears. “Tell him I’m not here.”
“I won’t lie for you,” Grammer informed her, in a voice that brooked no argument. “If you don’t want to talk to him, you can tell him so yourself.”
Snarling, Deanna rolled to her back and snatched the phone from her grandmother’s hand. “I’m not here,” she snapped into the receiver, then tossed the phone to the end of the bed. Flopping over onto her stomach, she pulled the pillow back over her head.
With a weary sigh, Grammer retrieved the phone from the tangle of covers. “Really, Deanna,” she fussed. “How long do you intend to keep this up? You’ve been hiding under that pillow all morning.”
“I like it under here,” came her muffled reply.
Frowning, Grammer jerked the pillow away. “No, you don’t. You’re unhappy. Any fool can see that. Now why don’t you sit up and tell me what it is that has you so upset?”
Groaning, Deanna pushed herself up to her knees, then turned and sat, dropping her back against the headboard. “I hate him,” she muttered.
Grammer sank down on the edge of the bed. “Oh, now,” she scolded gently. “Hate is an awfully strong word.”
Deanna shot a finger beneath her nose. “Well, it’s true. I do hate him.”
Grammer reached to push back the wild strands of curly hair that had fallen across Deanna’s cheek. “Is it hate you really feel? Or is it fear?”
Deanna tossed up her hands. “What is it with everyone?” she cried. “First Lacey and now you. I’m not afraid of Cope.”
“I can’t imagine why you would be. But I do think you’re afraid of how he makes you feel.”
Right now she felt like a bug under a microscope. Not liking the feeling, she folded her arms across her chest and looked away. “So he gets under my skin. Big deal.”
“Yes, it is a big deal. But not one I would think a woman with your fire and spirit would run from.”
When Deanna kept her face turned away, Grammer placed a finger beneath her chin and forced her to meet her gaze. Seeing the sheen of tears in her granddaughter’s eyes, she smiled tenderly. “Oh, Deanna,” she murmured. “You’ve fallen in love.”
Crumpling, Deanna dropped her head onto her grandmother’s shoulder. “But I don’t want to be in love,” she wailed miserably.
Grammer patted her on the back. “There, there, dear,” she soothed. “There’s no need to cry. Falling in love isn’t supposed to make you sad.”
“It does me,” Deanna sobbed. “I don’t want to love Cope.”
Surprised, Grammer pushed Deanna back to look at her. “Why not? From what you’ve told me, he sounds like such a nice young man, and he obviously cares a great deal for you.”
“He wants to get married.”
“Well, yes,” Grammer said in confusion. “Marriage usually is the next logical step when a couple falls in love.”
“But I don’t want to get married!”
“Oh, dear,” Grammer said, unsure how to respond to that strong of an objection. “That does present a problem.”
Deanna hiccuped a sob. “That’s why I’m hiding from him. He won’t take no for an answer.” Mad at herself for crying, she dashed her fingers across her cheeks, wiping away the tears. “Do you know why he bought Sam’s house?” she asked furiously. “He bought it so I would have a place to stay when I came home to Colman key to visit you.”
“Oh, how sweet,” Grammer murmured, touched by the gesture.
“It’s not sweet! The man’s deranged. No matter how many times I tell him I’m not going to marry him, it’s like he doesn’t hear me. He keeps right on acting as if our wedding date is right around the corner. For example,” she said, desperate to prove her point, “he told Mrs. Wallace at the grocery store that we were engaged.”
“Yes. I heard about that.”
“Another time, I couldn’t decide where to put his sofa, in front of the window or in front of the fireplace. He says to leave it in front of the window, then says we can move it in front of the fireplace this winter. I told him I wouldn’t be here to move it, I’d be in Hawaii. And he comes back with, ‘or we might be on our honeymoon.’” She tossed up her hands. “Who can reason with a man like that?”
Grammer stroked a hand over her hair. “He loves you, dear. That’s why he doesn’t want to accept your refusal.”
Deanna slid down onto the bed and dragged the pillow over her face. “Well, I’m not leaving this room until he’s packed up his things and headed back to Texas.”
“So you’re just going to hide your head in the sand like an ostrich?”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” came Deanna’s muffled reply.
“Do you girls remember this?”
Deanna glanced up from the stew she was stirring aimlessly around her bowl to see what her grandmother was displaying for her and her sisters to see.
She scowled when she saw that her grandmother was holding THE letter, the one Cope had sent to her the first morning after her arrival on Colman Key. “Who could forget that,” she said bitterly.
Grammer smiled. “Yes, it did create quite a stir. Each of you girls was sure it was meant for you.”
Too bad Marti and Lacey were wrong, Deanna thought bitterly.
“Big John sent it.”
Deanna gave herself a shake, sure that she’d heard her grandmother wrong. “What did you say?”
“Big John sent it. To me,” Grammer added.
Big John had sent the letter and not Cope? Deanna couldn’t quite get her mind to wrap around the idea.
“We’re getting married.”
“You’re what?” Deanna cried.
“Big John and I are getting married,” Grammer repeated, then looked around the dinner table at her other granddaughters, her expression turning uncertain. “That’s all right with you girls, isn’t it?”
Lacey exploded from her chair. “Well, of course it is!” she cried, as she ran to throw her arms around her grandmother. “I’m so happy for you, Grammer,” she said tearfully, hugging her close.
Marti sank down to her knees on Grammer’s opposite side. “Me, too, Grammer,” she said, sniffing back tears. “I think this is great. Now you won’t have to sell the house and move into that crummy old nursing home.”
“Oh, no, dear,” Grammer said, shaking her head. “I’m still selling the house.” Smiling, she gave Marti’s cheek an affectionate pat. “But don’t you worry. I won’t be moving into that crummy, old nursing home. After we marry, I’ll be moving into Big John’s cottage with him.”
Grammer lifted her head to look at Deanna. “Deanna? Sweetheart? Are you okay?”
Deanna gulped, trying to swallow back the tears that choked her. “Yeah,” she said, forcing a smile for her grandmother’s benefit. “I’m okay. Just surprised. But I’m happy for you, too, Grammer. Really I am.” To prove it, she rose and rounded the table to hug her arms around her grandmother from behind. Squeezing tight, she gulped back the emotion that stubbornly remained in her throat. “I just want you to be happy, Grammer,” she whispered. “That’s all that counts.”
Blinking back tears, Grammer tipped her head back to look at Deanna. “That’s what I want for you, too.” Looking down at Marti and Lacey, she smiled. “I want all of my girls to be happy.”
Deanna prowled her room like a caged lion, twisting her hands. She wasn’t sure how much more of this lovey-dovey stuff she could take. First, Grammer dropped her bomb, announcing that she and Big John were getting married. Now, a person couldn’t enter the kitchen without catching the two of them playing kissy-face by the back door.
She’d barely had time to catch her breath from Grammer’s announcement, when Lacey piped up, all-starry-eyed and lovesick-looking, and broke the news that she and Matt, who had suffered a rift in their relationship a few days before the hurricane, had resolved their differences and were getting married. Which meant that Deanna was not only gaining a new brother-in-
law, but twin nephews, too!
If that wasn’t a big enough pill to swallow, Marti, who had adamantly denied feeling anything for Devlin Faulkner—a journalist with a job that Marti would’ve traded her right arm for—finally ’fessed up and admitted that she and Devlin were in love and she was planning on going with him when he returned to his overseas assignment.
She was happy for her grandmother and sisters, she told herself. It was just that—
She stopped and frowned. It was just that, what? Why did she have this awful knot in her stomach? And why did she feel weepy all the time? And why in the dickens couldn’t she shake this awful feeling that something terrible was about to happen? And if she didn’t do something quick, the world was going to come to an abrupt and brutal end?
Was it because she missed Cope?
Groaning, she turned to press her nose against the window. It was so dark outside, she could barely make out the border of Grammer’s herb bed in the garden below. She looked up to search the sky. But the moon and stars were gone. Dark clouds had moved in, covering them all.
One last flick of the nose from Hurricane Leslie? she wondered, as she pushed up the sash and leaned her head out the window. She inhaled deeply, drawing in the fragrance of the mint still growing in Grammer’s garden. Beneath the mint, she caught a hint of the Gulf’s scent and that of the approaching rain.
She was going to miss this, she thought sadly. Granted, Hawaii had flowers and salty air, but it wouldn’t be the same. The air in Colman Key was unique, special. And tomorrow she would breathe it for the last time.
She gave herself a mental slap. Come on, Deanna, she lectured firmly. Snap out of it. You’re getting positively maudlin. Besides, it wasn’t as if she’d never return to the island. Lacey and Matt had decided to buy Grammer’s house, so Deanna knew she would be visiting often.
Determined to shake the mood, she turned back to her suitcase. She picked up a sundress from the stack of clothes on her bed, carefully folded it, then slipped it inside. She froze, frowning, sure that she heard something. She strained, listening, but didn’t hear the sound again. With a shrug, she plucked up a tiger-print bikini, rolled it in a ball and stuffed it into a gap among the clothes she’d already packed.
To the One I Love: That Old Familiar FeelingAn Older ManCaught by a Cowboy Page 29