by Paula Roe
The thought was liberating, as if she’d been wearing too-tight shoes that dug and pinched and now she was wiggling her bare toes in the sand.
Finn was still absorbing the shock, a dozen emotions racing over his features. She put her hand on his arm, a soft touch on unyielding stone. He shook it off.
“Why did you agree to help me?” he snarled, green eyes dark and stormy. “After what I did, how could you—”
“How could I not?” she countered. “I could’ve said no but I didn’t. We’ve been—we are—man and wife. We’ve shared everything.”
A breath hissed out from between his teeth as if she’d insulted him. “What happened after you lost the baby?”
“We argued but always ended up in bed. The last time I told you I was leaving. You offered me money, but I wouldn’t take it.” She saw him stiffen. “Your father tried to talk me out of leaving, but when he realized I was serious, he drove me to the airport. I came back home to Sydney, found out I was pregnant. So I decided it was best if I just stayed out of your life.”
She closed her eyes against the destructive past, the overwhelming abandonment that she’d sworn she’d never go through again, and pushed it from her mind. It was over. She had dealt with it and moved on.
When she opened her eyes, Finn was staring at her, a tense figure of anger and self-loathing.
Her heart ached. “Don’t, Finn. Don’t do this to yourself. You can’t change what happened between us.”
“Were you ever planning to tell me this?”
“No.”
His features tightened into hard, sharp planes. “Don’t you think I deserved to know?”
“And do you feel better knowing?” she asked calmly.
“For Satan, Ally! I had a right to know!”
“And now you do.” Finally, unable to watch him struggle with this any longer, she went to him. He grabbed her hands, shoved her away.
She tried again.
“Ally. I’m warning you,” he growled, imprisoning her wrists.
She twisted free, wrapped her arms around his neck and clung on for dear life. “Just let that anger and regret go. It won’t change a thing.”
He struggled but determinedly she tightened her grip, pressing herself closer.
Almost immediately heat flared up, scorching through her shirt and into him, reminding her of the intimate connection they still had. His warm breath stuttered, dashing over her neck.
For an eternity they stayed like that, Ally with her arms around him, Finn straining from her touch, while their bodies were doing something else entirely.
Finally, with a deep, gut-wrenching groan he wrapped his arms tightly around her and gave in.
Ally rested her cheek on his chest, the steady thrum-thrum of his heartbeat a comforting echo of hers. And she could swear it kicked up in tempo while she stood there, absorbing his heat and willing forgiveness into his bones.
“I was a complete fool,” Finn muttered against her hair, tentatively stroking the curls. “More than a fool. How on earth you put up with me, I will never know. I wish I could remember.”
The sigh she gave ruffled the very edges of his control. He’d wanted so desperately to find fault, something, anything, that would justify leaving Ally after he regained his memory. But now, knowing the full story, he couldn’t.
Damn—he couldn’t even blame her for walking out on him, for keeping this baby a secret. He’d been a first-class jerk and deserved every inch of her contempt.
She shifted, brought her body more completely up against his. He looked down to see the remnants of an emotional storm settling behind her eyes.
“And I’m sorry,” she whispered. “But it’s better you can’t remember it all. I like this Finn much better.” Then she kissed him.
Nineteen
“This is dangerous,” Finn muttered against her mouth. “I can’t…We shouldn’t…”
“I know. But I can’t help myself.”
His breath hitched.
The desperate desire to blow away the shadows of the man he had been engulfed him. No wonder she didn’t want to take anything from him. He’d hurt her so deeply, then had emotionally blackmailed her into helping him.
Yet here she was, her arms wrapped around his neck, forgiving him.
He took his redemption as eagerly as the glorious indulgence of her lips. The softness, the texture was unlike anything he could remember. Her intimate breath on his mouth, the warmth of her hands over his skin.
A thick pounding started in his belly, quickly spreading to his groin. It was like kissing her for the first time all over again. His heart skittered merrily along, caught in the urgency of the moment.
And when he filled himself with her scent his head reeled. It felt like coming home after an eternity in limbo. It was so good. So right.
“Do you want me to keep kissing you, elskat?” he murmured, the warm question teasing against her lips.
“Yes.”
His mouth trailed molten fire over her jaw and found a sensitive place on her neck, provoking tiny shivers along her skin. He tunneled his fingers into her hair, dragging through the strands with a deep feeling of utmost pleasure.
Something in his chest pinged when she brought passion-darkened gray eyes up to meet his. His skin felt as though someone had set him alight from the inside out, her touch scorching a trail over sensitive flesh while his heart pumped in double-time.
Memories danced and teased just out of his reach and futilely he tried to imprint them before they fled.
Yet even without those memories, this woman who filled his arms so perfectly felt familiar, comfortable. Instinctively he knew what would turn her on. How she liked to be kissed. How her body would shudder and moan and how her spontaneous response would push all his buttons.
When he kissed her again, tenderly, lovingly, then breathed in her musky arousal, he was doomed.
Burning with the need to touch, he bunched her shirt up, then drew his tongue slowly across the tops of swelling creamy breasts cupped by scraps of pink lace.
“So beautiful, elskat,” he murmured against the satiny skin, the glorious smell of hot, sweaty woman. Dipping his fingers under the lace, he freed one nipple. Her deep sound of pleasure sent a shot of pure male satisfaction to his groin and in the next instant he took that puckered bud in his mouth, rolling his tongue around it, rasping his teeth against the sensitive flesh.
He gathered her in his arms and took a step backward, until he hit the couch and sat, dragging her across his lap, across his straining erection. Sweat broke out on his brow.
“Ally.”
With her name like a groan on his lips, his questing fingers undid her pants, dragged them over her hips and sought the warmth between her legs.
Ally thought she might burst from pleasure. If she pretended really hard, she could imagine his touch possessed the same emotion and intensity like when they were first in love. He caressed, he stroked, he kissed as though the past months and a million regrets had never been.
He brought her to the brink of release with his sinful fingers, a languid, deep stroking rhythm inside her moistened heat so exquisite she almost lost it right then and there.
“Finn…” she pleaded. “Please. I want you inside me.”
He paused in his torture, smiling up at her flushed face with a glorious look of wonder. Then slowly, as he kept on with that delicious stroking, she heard the rasp of a zipper.
For one brief second he withdrew, somehow managed to lift her onto his lap and yank down her panties. Then, in one long, slow tease, he slid her down onto his throbbing arousal.
She clenched her teeth and gave a sharp hiss.
Finn stilled. “Does that hurt?”
She shook her head, curls spilling over her shoulders. “It’s wonderful.” Then she sighed, an erotic sound full of lusty contentment that turned Finn on in a thousand different ways.
He cupped her bottom and set out slowly, rocking her back and forth. Trying to defy the
hot explosive need that bubbled in his veins. But when her eyes gazed into his, glazed with passion, it touched something so incredibly pure, so desperate in him that it left his control in the dust.
Her head tipped forward, enveloping them in a fragrant cocoon, the silky hair like feathers teasing his shoulders, his face. Her breath came out in tiny gasps against his cheek. As she bent to capture his lips again and again she moved and rocked above him. He wanted to hold back, wanted her to take pleasure first, to see the glorious satisfaction register in her eyes, but he wasn’t sure he could make it. He was just one raw nerve and she was scraping heat over it, taking her with him into the inferno.
A slice of memory speared behind his eyes. Ally, moaning and damp with passion, smelling of blossoms and sex, lying on an unfamiliar bed with her hair spread over the pillow. Him, stripping off her clothes like a man possessed before burying himself in her welcoming core.
A deep and thorough sense of belonging dragged a cry from his lips then sucked away his breath to leave him gasping.
She paused, gently touched his cheek. “What’s wrong?” Her voice was threaded with concern.
He shook his head, took her face in his hands and kissed her. “Nothing. Everything is right.”
His breath, out of control, blasted across Ally’s tender skin, and as he began to move slowly inside her again, his fingers sought and found the tiny bud of arousal that he’d used to reduce her to a quivering heap many times before.
Her mind went blank as her brain shorted out.
She wriggled, strained to escape the sensual torture. “Stop, stop, stop.”
“No, elskat,” he murmured, throwing her off balance by pulling her forward, then conveniently capturing a nipple with his lips. “You can’t stop it.”
Could someone actually die from pleasure? she thought deliriously as Finn flicked, stroked and kissed her into a frenzy. He was outside and inside, working magic on her body. Her sanity. Her soul.
She felt her release start to build up, sweeping closer like the beginnings of a tidal wave, the pressure swelling inside—hot, wet and furious. She tried to twist, to pull away again, but he evaded her.
“Let me do this. Please.” His eyes burned into hers, desire and need and fire alight in the depths.
With a final groan, she lost all control and peaked in a crashing, tumultuous release.
Finn squeezed his eyes shut, desperately clawing for the thin threads of restraint. She was slick and hot, shuddering around him, great aching shudders that pierced his self-control and tugged mercilessly.
He couldn’t hold on anymore.
Ally watched the release flood his face, emotion shoot across every feature and tighten the muscles. A low groan, almost primal in its depths, feathered across her neck.
With Finn buried deep inside her, she ran her hands down his sweat-soaked arms, feeling every dip and bulge of his body, tempered steel beneath hot, satin-smooth skin. When he reached for her, she let him draw her down into his embrace.
Don’t fool yourself. Remember this isn’t forever.
Twenty
The sun slowly set, defiantly shining through the heavy bedroom curtains.
Ally stirred next to him, her hair trapped under his arm, one silky leg thrown over his. He swept his gaze over her face—the freckles he’d lazily kissed again and again, those long sooty lashes that had fluttered closed with an earthy sigh then flown open when his tongue had teased her back to the brink of climax. That wonderful mouth that had laughed and sighed and done its fair share of teasing his flesh.
Flesh that suddenly hardened at that thought.
Gently, so as not to wake her, Finn placed his palm against her belly, slowly testing the slight swell beneath.
His baby.
Emotion ripped at his chest, winding him.
He had hurt Ally so much, the selfish demanding man he’d been. Yet miraculously, he’d been given a chance to put it right.
And now he was here. Ally was in his bed. And they were still married.
“Can you feel that?” she murmured.
Her sleepy gray eyes were open as her hand tentatively covered his, still on her naked belly. A tiny fluttering erupted under his palm. Wonderingly, he stroked her skin.
“It’s the first time I felt him move,” she whispered, her face reflecting the awe he felt.
He swooped down for her mouth, wanting her fierce response to match his and assuage the tainted memories of his past that he’d branded her with. But Ally wouldn’t let him. Instead she melted into him, into the kiss, with such aching tenderness that he groaned in frustration. Damn her for understanding. Damn her for forgiving me.
And damn me for loving her.
It was almost as if it were their first time all over again, Ally thought dreamily as he moved to cover her body with kisses. His mouth, so harsh and demanding, had softened into a kind of divinity that made her want to sink right into his skin and stay there forever. He stroked her hair, gently arranging it over her shoulders so her nipples poked though the strands. He paid loving tribute to them, sucking, rolling and nipping, sending glorious warmth pounding through her skin. Her groin began to throb in anticipation, her fingers searching for his silken heat that pressed urgently against her thigh. This time he let her take him, let her guide him into her hot wetness. And when he slid inside, she gave a blissful cry of triumph, her head thrown back.
“Look, elskat. Look at us.”
She followed his gaze to the full-length mirror across the room, to her eyes wide and shocked. The bed sheets lay tangled and forgotten on the floor, displaying their entwined limbs to stark perfection. Her legs wrapped around his waist and locked at the ankles. His dark-brown arms cradled her body; long, elegant fingers splayed over her breasts.
As she stared, his gaze met hers in their reflection and his mouth dipped, took one erect nipple in his mouth and sucked.
She made a mewling sound that sounded like a plea.
“Watch us, Ally,” he commanded as her eyes began to close.
So she did. She remained transfixed as his hand slipped between their sweaty bodies and found the very core of her hot, slick heat. With confident authority his fingers massaged her and through the glorious burst of exploding pleasure she thought she heard his breath falter, felt his arms tremble.
With green eyes locked on nearly-black in the mirror, he began to whip her up into such a passion that she thought she’d go over the brink. His lips went back to hers, tasting, teasing, arousing. His hands cupped one breast while the other weaved magic on her most sensitive spot. And his hot breath feathered across her skin, scorched her to the point of combustion.
When she cried out and began to shudder, Finn threw her leg over his shoulder and thrust deep into her welcoming body.
Jeg elsker dig.
I love you.
Finn knew better than to say those words aloud. Knew better than to tell her what she didn’t want to hear. So he showed her instead, with every deep kiss, with every tender touch. With every strong stroke he rocked into her damp enfolding heat, Finn loved her.
And if he couldn’t change the past then he would make damn sure their future began right.
Which meant telling her the truth.
Half an hour later, Finn said quietly, “I have something to tell you.”
“Hmm?”
She was lying in his arms, a hand gently stroking his chest.
“There’s more to—” He ended on a curse as the sharp trill of his cell phone on the dresser interrupted his admission.
When he hesitated, Ally sat up. “Answer it,” She released the sheet and reached for her robe, easing her arms into the sleeves. “It could be important.”
Finn stared at her, at the profile of soft cheek and stubborn jawline, at the tumble of curls sweeping over her shoulders. The elegant, erotic dip and curve of her naked back and the remembered memory of touching and stroking every inch of that velvety skin.
Without looking back, she said quiet
ly again, “It could be important,” before slipping out the door.
Unable to refute her statement, Finn picked up the phone. “What?”
“Finn?”
He rubbed his temple, recognizing the voice of his cousin, Louisa. “Ja?”
“Check your e-mails. I’ve got something you’ll want to see.”
He walked out of the bedroom and into cavernous silence.
“Ally?”
As his heart began to pick up tempo, he strode into the kitchen. On the table sat a note in her familiar loopy handwriting.
“Gone to get breakfast. Back soon. A. X”
With a sigh he turned back to the lounge, to his laptop on the coffee table.
Seconds dragged as he watched it boot up then go through the motions of receiving e-mail, time recorded with every sharp tick on the hallway clock.
Then it was there.
The final answer.
The end to his quest. The end to him and Ally.
No.
He took a gulp of air and began to read.
Louisa had had the foresight to scan the letter—dated the day of the accident—and e-mail it to him. He read it once, then again, disbelieving.
Dear Finn,
This letter and hand-written codicil is serving as a stopgap just in case something happens. And if you’re reading this, it means something has and I didn’t have a chance to formalize it and talk to you.
As you know, I’m a man of action, not words. But please accept my apology if you felt that you’d missed out on me being there for you. That is my one biggest regret but, of course, being my son, you never let on.
I did the best I knew how, and that meant providing a stable home after your mother died, keeping you fed, in clothes and giving you a top-notch education. I even thought that by marrying Marlene I could somehow give you another mother figure, even though at seven you were such a grown-up little man already.
Still, we know how that turned out and I’m sorry.
Which brings me to this letter. The doctors are going to give me a good going over and I don’t expect anything unforeseen, but you know I’ve always planned for any eventuality. I will be amending my will anyway but this codicil will now serve my final wishes.”