McCloud's Woman

by Patricia Rice

  When he’d been nineteen, one of his greatest fears had been that his size could overwhelm the virginal sixteen-year old he’d adored too much to harm. They both had more experience now. No barrier stood in their way.

  No barrier other than his trouser fly, and TJ unfastened that without a hitch, shoving his jeans to the floor.

  Mara’s hungry whimpers escalated as he caressed moistened curls, seeking access. TJ tried to slow down enough to appreciate the tanned curves of her small waist, the bikini line at her hips. He ached so deep inside that he couldn’t slow down more than that. The day’s infuriating events and the evening’s tortured contest of wills had aroused a primitive need to win the woman who should have been his long ago.

  He slid his hands beneath Mara’s slim buttocks and lifted her hips. She tried to keep her grip on his shoulders, but he teased his fingers between her thighs, and she intuitively fell back against the mattress and wrapped her legs about his waist.

  She opened her eyes then, and stared at his seminude body in such wide-eyed amazement that TJ felt like the eighth wonder of the world. If he took time to think—

  He didn’t want to think. Leaning over to catch her mouth with his, TJ entered her and with a single shove, drove all the way inside, swallowing her scream with his kiss. Ecstasy and relief poured through him as her inner muscles stretched to sheathe him, and her scream became a seductive moan of pleasure.

  This time, it was his turn to close his eyes and absorb sensation. He registered her first shock with his body, not through his eyes. They both held still for a moment, adjusting to the newness, savoring the experience. Liquid heat caressed and aroused, and he struggled to hold the moment.

  Mara’s inner muscles tightened, and a burst of light shattered TJ’s reserve. He pulled back and drove deep again, matching his rhythm to her moans.

  It had been too long, and he wanted too much. She was slender, and he tried to be gentle, but every time he held back, his body rebelled by demanding more. At first she writhed and fought the onslaught, but then she cried out and met him in the middle, surrendering to the rhythm he set, until joy pulsed through his blood and they moved as one, with only one purpose.

  She exploded first, in small lightning movements that pumped him dry in a shattering ecstasy. Shaken by the intensity of his release, he instantly craved more. He hadn’t had enough of her—might never have enough.

  TJ lifted Mara’s hips to his, and she rubbed against him in a bid for more. He stirred inside her, growing hard again, and she whimpered in pleasure. His mind was mush, but the part of him that mattered right now possessed a spine of steel.

  Reluctantly releasing his position, TJ lifted her from the mattress and stripped back the covers. Pulling her gown over her head and tossing it, Mara eagerly slid between the sheets and watched as he ripped off his shirt. Her admiring gaze increased his driving need to painful intensity. She looked at him as if he were a man and not just a brain.

  Her blond upsweep of curls had tumbled to her shoulders, revealing the hairpiece beneath, and TJ grinned at this glimpse of the Patsy he’d known. He’d wondered how Hollywood stars managed to have more hair than real women. Reaching over, he unclipped the piece and flung it to the bedside table.

  She watched him warily.

  “I don’t make love to your hair.” He climbed in on top of her, straddling her legs, and claiming her mouth with his. Joy filled his soul as her fingers slid over his bare back, and she accepted him without question, as if they were two parts merging into one. This was how it should have been all those years ago.

  Except all those years ago, he’d had sense enough to carry condoms.

  Cursing his alcohol-deluded mind, TJ propped himself up. “Birth control?”

  She looked stunned. Her big green eyes regarded him from behind dark lashes that were longer and blacker than this morning’s set. He’d smeared her mascara into dark rings, but the raccoon effect tugged at his heart. She looked almost as vulnerable as she had at sixteen, when he’d caught her crying behind the gym during a dance.

  “No,” she whispered. “Not since I left Sid...”

  He didn’t want to hear about her ex, didn’t want to consider consequences in one of life’s rare moments of perfection.

  He leaned over the side of the bed and fished for his trousers on the floor. If he was really lucky, he might find safety in his wallet. He’d despised the uncertainty of his teenage years, but she reduced him to the status of adolescent all over again. He’d never in his life had sex with a woman without protection, and she’d inflamed him so quickly, he hadn’t given it a thought. He’d analyze that error later.

  She sighed in relief when he produced the plastic package. “You’re supposed to be the responsible one around here,” she scolded lightly.

  “Don’t wave a red flag at a raging bull next time,” he retorted, nipping her ear and filling his hand with her breast. Her perfume wafted through his head with more power than a drug, and her softness begged to be squeezed.

  “I’m a city girl. Teach me about raging bulls,” she whispered against his mouth.

  He did, claiming her as he’d wanted to long ago. Desperate for the ease of oblivion, TJ immersed both body and soul in a woman—or in the promise of the girl he’d once trusted.

  ***

  Mara hadn’t thought anyone could ease the hunger in her, hadn’t realized how starved she was until TJ filled her. Still insatiable, she clawed at his back, wrapped her legs around his waist, and bucked like a mindless animal. He tore open the scars on her psyche and flooded the open wounds, healing and soothing. Her womb ached with need, and she wept when they finally found a second release.

  She didn’t want him to leave her again, physically, emotionally, or in any other way.

  He would though, and probably not as gently as he pulled away now. The air-conditioned chill crossing her skin as he withdrew his warmth reminded her that they had nothing more between them than sweaty bodies.

  But at least she’d had that much, she thought in satisfaction as TJ rolled off and lifted her to rest on the rounded muscle of his shoulder. She—Patsy Simonetti—had driven the self-contained Tim McCloud out of control. She squirmed to a more comfortable position, and tried to believe that was enough.

  Damn the man for reducing her to the lonely child she’d once been. She refused to become that needy child ever again. He hadn’t come back to rescue her all those years ago, and she wouldn’t count on him helping her out now.

  She punched TJ’s hard abs and rolled back to the pillow to stare at the ceiling.

  “I don’t think I can talk right now,” he muttered, with eyes closed. “Can you save that thought until morning?”

  Morning. She could have him again in the morning. Crossing her leg over his so he couldn’t slip away, Mara nodded. He was probably already asleep and couldn’t see her nod. That was okay too. He meant to stay the night. The long string of lonely nights that were her past had been broken.

  The riot of emotions welling up inside terrified her.

  ***

  A large male body occupying three-quarters of Mara’s queen-size bed presented several dilemmas the next morning. The most immediate was that of a daunting obstacle between her and the supersize aspirins in her nightstand drawer.

  Bright Carolina sunshine poured in the windows—she’d not closed the shutters last night. She would definitely start drinking tonic water at those damned cocktail parties from now on.

  Rather than crawl over that wide expanse of muscled flesh, she supposed she could crawl around the bed, but at the moment, she couldn’t even open her eyes. Stupid of her, insisting on a room overlooking the harbor. She hadn’t grasped that she was on the East Coast, and the sun came up over the water—at disconcertingly early hours.

  She lifted one eyelid to admire the hurdle blocking access to relief. TJ slept on his back, and bronzed, hard shoulders covered her lace-bedecked pillows. She sighed in admiration and closed her eye again. She could endu
re a headache with all that masculinity a hairbreadth away.

  It amazed her that she could still feel the ache of desire. Once a week had been more than enough with her ex-husbands. Not once had it occurred to her to instigate their occasional couplings, but she was definitely considering running her fingers through TJ’s chest hairs right now. She didn’t know if it was possible—or even wise—to satiate a need this strong. She might be in danger of addiction.

  TJ resolved her dilemma by rolling onto his side and trapping her legs beneath a heavy thigh. His erection hardened against her hip, and Mara smiled in pleasure without opening her eyes again.

  “I’m out of condoms,” he muttered against her hair. “Shove me out of bed now.”

  The hungry desperation in his voice thrilled her to the marrow.

  “What do you think I am, a weightlifter?” She snuggled closer.

  He crushed her breast in his big hand, and her nipple rose to scrape his palm. Desire seeped directly from her breast to the place between her legs. She squirmed restlessly, thinking she’d better move now or regret the consequences later.

  Too late. She’d teased the tiger. TJ angled his body over hers, covered her mouth with a mind-bending kiss, and settled in to caress her until she demanded more. With the same urgency as she felt, he parted her thighs, and slid home.

  She wept with the startling force of the need sweeping through them. Never had she known it could be like this. She might as well have tried to tame a hurricane as to stop what was happening to her, to him, to both of them. She’d never dreamed such insanity existed, but she reveled in it, let him sweep her up in it, and became part of the maelstrom as much as a leaf driven by the wind.

  His primitive shout of triumph erupted in her ears like as they reached the heights together. Mara dug her fingernails into his powerful shoulders, arched to take all of him, and climaxed as he poured himself into her.

  This was how it should be. This was what the love stories in movies promised. Hollywood had been a disappointing illusion until now.

  Aware of his heaviness, TJ rolled back to the mattress, wrapping her in his arms to keep their connection. Mara sprawled across his torso, conscious of the heat of his skin, the perspiration sealing their flesh, the way his heart beat next to hers.

  “I wonder what our lives would have been like if we’d done this back then instead of just thinking about it?” she murmured sleepily.

  Every muscle in TJ’s body stiffened beneath her. “If we hadn’t thought about it, Brad would be alive right now.”

  He tumbled her back to the bed and climbed out, heading straight for the shower.

  Well, so much for reminiscing. Mara covered her eyes with her arm. The ugly memory of that night would haunt them for the rest of their lives. No wonder he’d never looked for her after her family moved away.

  While she was lying here vibrating with life, her beautiful, honorable older brother lay cold in the ground, never having lived to fulfill the promise of his genius.

  She’d wept those tears long ago. She wouldn’t do it any more. She might carry the guilt forever, but she couldn’t stop living just because Brad had. She’d had counseling and had chosen to live life to its fullest, rather than burying herself in grief.

  She wondered about TJ, though. Macho men didn’t “do” counseling. Had he buried himself in his work to assuage his pain? It was too much for her pounding head to analyze. She just knew he was leaving her far sooner than she liked.

  TJ emerged from the bathroom tugging his shirt over the rippling muscles of shoulders and chest, and she experienced a pang of regret wondering if she’d ever see him that way again.

  He stopped beside the bed and gazed down at her dispassionately, which meant nothing at all. TJ had dispassionate down to a science. Only she knew the chaos roaring behind the mask. She’d tapped into it last night. She didn’t know if she had the strength—or the courage—to do so again.

  “I’ll look for another assistant to speed up the job,” he said calmly. “I wish it could be easier, but once I’ve uncovered everything in the mound, I’ll move out.”

  “How long will that take?” she demanded, not bothering to draw the sheet over her breasts to hide her lack in that department. Sid had wanted her to have implants, but she’d never been brave enough or stupid enough to risk them. Padding and push-up bras worked well enough for clothes. She was tired of disguising her faults. If TJ didn’t like what he saw, screw him.

  His gaze lingered a little too long on what she left uncovered to believe he wasn’t interested. Her nipples rose to inviting peaks.

  “Two months, if I don’t come up for air,” he replied doggedly, tearing his gaze away to meet her eyes.

  “I can’t wait two months!” Mara shot up from the pillow, carrying the sheet with her. No more free rides for the monster. She needed that beach, and she needed it now.

  “Your pirates will have to sail in.” He picked up his jacket and walked out.

  Mara screamed and heaved her travel alarm after him. She followed it with a martini glass and a guidebook—none of which shattered sufficiently to match the devastation in her heart as he smashed her foolish dreams all over again.

  Choking on sobs of fury, she stumbled out of bed, determined to overcome still one more male obstacle thrown in her way. She had lots of experience in circumventing stone walls. Sometimes, that’s all that kept her going each day.

  ***

  TJ debated driving straight home, but this was Monday, and if he meant to hire an assistant, he’d have to drag out his address book and begin making inquiries. The address book was in his office.

  He’d rather think about anything than about how he’d spent last night. He didn’t want to analyze his abysmal behavior as any more than stress relief and the by-product of alcohol. He definitely did not want to know Mara’s motivation for taking him to her room. He’d just mark it up to her living in Hollywood too long.

  Maybe he should move to Hollywood. He’d never even imagined that kind of erotic experience. He would spend the rest of his life dreaming of having it again. Just what he needed, two Simonettis haunting his head, one dead and one vibrantly alive.

  Parking in the alley, TJ rounded the corner to discover Roger leaning against the storefront, waiting for him.

  “Late night?” the reporter inquired as TJ stalked up and stuck his key in the door. “Some guys have all the luck. I just found out who Mara Simon is.”

  “Tad slow, aren’t you?” Shoving the door open, TJ hit the light switch. His foot encountered a fallen chair before his brain registered the havoc strewn across the floor.

  All his meticulously labeled slides and notes and the artifacts he’d been working on for weeks lay strewn across the cheap vinyl. He’d wanted something to drive last night out of his head. This hadn’t been what he had in mind.

  Spray-painted in red across the wall was the message YANKEE, GO HOME!

  “Looks like someone doesn’t like you, old boy.” Roger pushed past a frozen TJ to examine the destruction.

  “Don’t,” TJ commanded.

  Roger halted where he was.

  “You’ll disturb the evidence.” He thought he sounded calm, but rage roared in his head so loudly that his ears rang with it.

  Roger shrugged and stepped back. “You’re the man. Want me to call the police, or you want at it first?”

  This time, TJ was glad he was he man. This was how he’d gained his reputation. No two-bit, fly-by-night vandal could escape a trained observer who’d caught war criminals with far more experience and blood on their hands than the pathetic jerk who’d trashed his office.

  “Right,” Roger said, as if TJ had actually answered his question. “I’ll get out of your way.”

  TJ was already examining the size-twelve footprint in the dust beneath the overturned table. His expertise might be forensic anthropology, but his training had taught him to look far beyond bones.

  “Do that,” TJ answered gruffly.

 
“You know I’ll be back,” Roger warned. “The colonel’s story is too big. I thought you were the one man I could count on to give me the truth. I didn’t picture you as the sort to cover up for corrupt officials.”

  “Don’t come back until you can prove Martin is anything other than the man who saved our lives and taught us how to survive out there.” Searching for anything that looked out of place, TJ turned his back on the reporter. “Until then, go far, far away.”

  “What makes you so certain he didn’t do this?” Roger responded, indicating the mayhem. “Maybe it’s a warning to tell you to go back to Africa. Maybe someone thinks you know more than you do and wants you out of here.”

  TJ turned a scathing look at him. “Rog, you’ve got a nose for news but no understanding of human nature. A sniveling coward did this. You want to call Martin a sniveling coward?”

  “You have some better explanation for this senseless destruction? Give me something, McCloud. Your pal is about to go up in flames and your office is trashed. I don’t believe in coincidences.”

  TJ slid a piece of paper underneath a gray hair snagged on a torn piece of vinyl. “I can give you at least three explanations.”

  Roger waited.

  Folding the paper and tucking it into his pocket, TJ stood up again. “Either Mara’s movie crew got tired of waiting around, someone wants to cover up a sixty-year old murder, or someone just plain doesn’t like me.”

  Or any combination of the above, but Roger could figure that out for himself.

  Checking the once-locked closet in the back room, TJ cursed at the paper evidence strewn across the floor. Good thing he’d taken the rest of the boxes to storage.

  Chapter Eleven

  “The limo can’t take me to the set?” Glynis Everett gasped in the same tones of horror that she’d used in a B film at the beginning of her career.

  Glynis might think she was the next Julia Roberts, but her star was still of second-tier star and didn’t rate maximum perks. Mara ticked off a note on her clipboard and ignored the dramatics. Once upon a time she’d been burdened with the need to make everyone happy. Scenes like this had burned out that need years ago. “If you can’t walk to the beach, you can take an ATV. Surely you’re not too old to enjoy the experience.”