by Lisa Childs
She nodded, the red hair moving around her face like a silken curtain blowing in a gentle breeze. “I know that, Royce.”
“I have so much going on. I need to find Bart’s killer.” His voice cracked, frustration clawing at him. “It’s one of them. But which one? And who helped him? Your deputy or someone else?”
She dropped to the bed next to him, her hip resting against his. Tingling spread, tensing his muscles.
“He’s not my deputy, Royce.” His foolish heart lifted at the conviction in her voice.
“Then who? Someone had a corporate credit card, albeit an old one. I checked employee records. A couple of the guards were on vacation. Lionel Patterson and Ronald Weber. I’m going to talk to them tomorrow. I would have today…”
“But Jeremy kept you occupied. And me.”
She’d kept him very occupied with thoughts of the way she’d looked in that stateroom yesterday…naked to the waist. He swallowed hard.
“There was the reading, too.” He shrugged a shoulder, shaking off the desire for a woman he could never have. “It has to be one of them, but I don’t understand it.”
A sigh tore free of his throat. “How could someone close to Bart harm him? He was so caring, so generous…”
“So he was a good man?” Something trembled in her voice. A sob?
“I’m sorry, Sarah. He was your grandfather.”
“But I didn’t know him. Not like you knew him. You loved him.”
He flopped back on the bed, his gaze rising to the rafters. “More than my old man. Jeez, Sarah, could my father have done this? No, I can’t even think it.”
She leaned over him, brushing those silky fingers across his cheek. “But you are thinking it, Royce, and it’s tearing you apart.”
“You don’t know about the woman.” The motive for revenge. But why wait so long? Because he’d bought the company and didn’t have to worry about losing it to Bart’s heirs after his partner’s death?
“Bart’s wife. My grandmother. Your father loved her, too.”
Surprise drew some of the tension from his clenched jaw. “How did you know?”
“The way he looked at me when we walked into the hospital yesterday. The way he said her name. How did he keep his friendship with my grandfather, feeling the way he did about his wife?”
Royce sighed. “Bart explained it to me, but I wonder if he really knew everything. He thought the old man had made his peace with it, that Maggie had soothed Donald’s hurt feelings with her usual grace and charm.”
Sarah had inherited that as well as her grandmother’s looks. If a friend of his stole Sarah away from him, would anything mollify his desire for vengeance? What was he thinking? She wasn’t his to steal.
“But he didn’t marry for a long time, not until after Maggie died.”
“So she died before my…father?” The catch in her voice revealed the feelings she tried so hard to hide. She’d known where her adoption record was but had never opened it. He did not doubt her surprise when she’d learned her relationship to Bart McCarthy. But despite her fierce allegiance to her adoptive parents, her blood relatives mattered to her.
He caught her fingers and gently squeezed. “Yes. Bart said it was a good thing, that a child shouldn’t die before a parent.”
Sarah’s fingers trembled in his, and fear clouded her smoky eyes. “No, a child shouldn’t.”
He wanted to make assurances, but he had no way of predicting the future despite the press’s allegations that he was psychic. “Sarah…”
“I know. I know. I don’t want to talk about that now. The last thing you need is the added concern of protecting Jeremy.”
He cupped her chin, sliding his thumb over her lips and pressing them closed. “But what if Jeremy’s in danger because of me? What if it is my fault?”
She leaned over farther, her breasts pressing against his chest. Her fingers slid into his hair. “Royce…it’s not your fault. You can’t take the blame for everything.”
The breath expelled with her words whispered across the pad of his thumb. He suppressed a shiver. Had to be the chill still in his bones from his icy plunge yesterday.
“Sarah…you’re an amazing woman. I don’t know why I’m telling you all this stuff. I never—”
“You trust me, Royce.”
Fear knotted his guts. She had to be wrong. He trusted no one. He shook his head, her fingers slipping through his hair to settle on his shoulders, kneading the tight muscles. “Sarah…you’re so beautiful.”
“Royce…”
With his hand on her jaw, he urged her closer while rising up to brush his lips across hers. Her breath sighed out with the freshness of mint, dispelling the musty odor of his maudlin thoughts and his past. His tongue slipped between her lips, the mint biting in and streaking through his blood. Tingling arousal chased the lethargy from his muscles.
“Sarah, I want you.” And it was so dangerous to want this woman, as dangerous as it was to trust her.
“Then take me, Royce.” She pressed against him, her lips sliding along his jaw.
“Sarah…” He groaned, aching with his desire for her. “I don’t feel right about…”
She nibbled at the pulse pounding in his neck. For her. He wanted her as he had wanted no other.
“I thought you quit feeling, Royce.”
“I never said—” Her lips stopped him, and her tongue danced into his mouth, sliding along the edge of his teeth and retreating.
“You taste so good,” she murmured against his lips. “So sweet.”
He groaned. “Hmmm…isn’t that supposed to be my line?”
“I’m not sweet.”
But wasn’t that her biggest secret? She took care of those she cared about. Did she care about him? His heart lurched because despite his better judgment, he cared about her. Too much.
He surged up and rolled over, pinning her beneath him with his thigh pressed between hers, rocking against her heat. “I’m going to prove you wrong.”
She squirmed, shoving her breasts into his chest as he made love to her mouth. His tongue stroked in and out, over the line of her teeth, along the length of her minty tongue. She moaned.
On a journey of discovery, he kissed along her delicate but stubborn jaw to the graceful curve of her slender neck. She shivered in his arms.
“Royce…”
He nipped at her earlobe, catching the diamond stud between his teeth before whispering in her ear. “Oh, you are sweet, Sarah. So sweet.”
With shaking fingers he struggled with the tiny pearl buttons of her silk blouse until the fine fabric parted to bare her lacy bra. He ran one fingertip from the jumping pulse in her throat along the crevice between her breasts, which rose and fell with her agitated breaths. He continued over the clasp of her bra, the pressure of his touch releasing it. Then he swirled a fingertip in her navel.
“Royce…” His name edged into a sob.
He kissed her sweet lips again, soft, slow kisses while he fumbled with the fastening of her slacks. How long had it been since he’d undressed a woman? The memory fled while Sarah filled his mind. Sarah and all her secrets, but tonight he didn’t care. Tonight he needed her as much as her moans indicated she needed him. Probably more.
She lifted her hips as he yanked the fabric from her. She offered no protest when he tossed the slacks onto the floor. She was too busy struggling with the snap of his jeans with one hand while the nails of her other raked across his chest.
A smile teased his mouth over her anxiousness. After their first meeting, he would never have imagined Sarah Mars-Hutchins tossing aside his clothes with eager abandon while she writhed on his bed wearing only her silk underwear, her bra straps sliding down her arms.
The smile fled as desire swamped him. The room darkened and faded away. His focus had narrowed to the vision before him. Red hair sifted across creamy shoulders, the contrast as vivid as a Caribbean sunset. His gut clenched, but he ignored the warning. What danger could exist in those s
ilken arms, arms that held her son with such love?
Love needled him, but he ignored it in favor of desire. Careful of his rough palms, he glided his fingers along her shoulders and over the rise of her breasts. Pushing aside the lacy cups, he circled her breasts with his fingertips.
“Royce, I want more.”
“What? I don’t want to hurt your skin with my rough hands…”
Her hands cradled his and slid them over her breasts. With a moan she arched into his palms, her hardened nipples nudging him. “Oh, yes…I love your hands.”
He chuckled then groaned. “Sarah, I have to taste how sweet you are.” He kissed over the rise of each breast before swirling his tongue around one turgid nipple, then the other. Closing his lips, he suckled, glancing up at the desire raging through Sarah’s smoky eyes.
Her nails raked over his shoulders. “Royce, I can’t…”
Through her panties, he cupped her heat, stroking over the silk until dampness penetrated to his palm. Then he pushed aside the silk of fabric for the silk of the red curls hiding her intimate secrets.
She rose to meet his touch, arching her pelvis into his hand and her breast into his mouth as if starved for a man’s passionate caress. But how could that be for such a gorgeous woman?
He slipped a finger into her heat. A few gentle strokes had her murmuring his name and shuddering against him. He dropped from the edge of the bed, eased her panties down and replaced his fingers with his mouth. Heat and sweetness engulfed him as she arched against him.
Whimpers and moans spilled from her lips.
“Royce, now! I need you now!” She urged him onto the bed, delving her fingers into his hair and pulling him up.
Restraint snapped. But old habits died hard, even after years of disuse, and he retrieved his wallet and a foil-wrapped packet from inside it. Before he could tear it open, her fingers shoved down his briefs and closed around him. He bit his lip to hold on to his control, and said with an agonized groan, “Sarah, wait.”
With shaking fingers he donned protection then surged into the wet heat between her legs. Tight. She enclosed him, holding him close with her intimate muscles and the length of her silky legs wrapped around his waist.
“Sarah…” How could she be so tight? She’d borne a child. She’d been married. How long had it been for her?
Too long for him, he couldn’t control his desire.
He drove in and out, and she rose to meet him, flexing and cradling until she exploded around him. Her cries rent the still air of the cavernous room. Then his guttural cry joined hers as he found fulfillment such as he’d never experienced. He’d found it with a woman he might never really know if she managed to keep all her secrets.
HER BODY pulsed as Sarah lay across his black comforter. Cool air rushed over her heated flesh but had no hope of cooling it. She’d never been so hot or so satiated.
Then the bathroom door opened, and he sauntered across the painted pine floor, magnificent in his nakedness. Had she once thought him not her type? Long limbs, sleek muscles, and that dark-golden hair teasing past the nape of his neck, just brushing his naked, broad shoulders. What was there not to desire?
She throbbed again, between her legs, where her body bore the brand of his. She’d never been loved like that, but then she’d had only a girl’s memories to compare to the devastating reality of a man.
He rubbed his knuckles over his washboard stomach, the six-pack of muscles ripping beneath his hand. She’d seen him do that before…when his infamous instincts kicked in. For a moment she tensed, but no real concern passed through his eyes. So she relaxed and languidly stretched under his rapt stare.
“Sarah…” She’d never heard her name as a warning, nor uttered in a sexual purr.
Her gaze skimmed again over his honed body, over the muscles rippling beneath his flesh as he dropped to the bed on all fours. And stalked her like a wild animal as he moved toward her.
She shivered, enjoying the delicious sensation of quivering nerves. She’d never quivered like that. “Royce…” The warning was lost in the sappiness of her voice.
Her smile widened, stretching the muscles of her cheeks, as he’d stretched her other muscles. She wanted them stretched again, so she reached for him, skimming her fingers across his washboard belly where dark-golden curls teased her hand.
“Sarah…” His warning died in a groan as her fingers closed over him and stroked his hot flesh. “I can’t…”
“Oh, I think you can.” But she wanted more this time. She shoved him to his back and proceeded to show him how much she appreciated his desire. How much she appreciated him…
He submitted to the torture with groans of protest, stroking his hands along her derriere, across her breasts until she moaned. And it wasn’t enough. She wanted it all. All of him. And she wanted more than one night.
After donning protection, he lay back on the bed and lifted her hips until she straddled him. Then he gave her the reins, the control she’d always found so lacking but so essential in her life. He understood her as no one else ever had.
Tears burned behind her closed eyes as she stretched and arched and drove them both crazy. His hands at her hips and breasts guided and urged but didn’t master. The thrill shot through her, and stars danced with the tears, chasing away all her concerns until she dropped against his slick chest.
His shaking hand stroked through her hair and across her sweat-streaked back. “Sarah…tonight was just the beginning. I want to learn all your secrets.”
Her heart resumed a frantic pace as his real warning echoed in her head. This hadn’t been about desire, about wanting her as a woman. She was a puzzle to him, nothing more. And he excelled at tracking down the solutions to puzzles.
“What secrets?” she scoffed. “You know everything about me now.” And if he did, she hoped he’d explain some things to her. What the heck had compelled her into his arms tonight? She’d thrown herself at him, desperate for a closeness she’d never wanted with another.
In her past relationships, she’d been the giver. And here, initially, she’d wanted to give. She had wanted to console Royce over the loss of a man who had been important to him. She had wanted to soothe his pain over the past that haunted him.
But in his arms, she’d taken more than she’d given. She’d been greedy and selfish, and if she could feel her bones yet, she’d jump his again.
But under the hunger, something else burned for him. And in the end maybe she’d given more than she had ever before. Her heart.
His rough fingertips drew patterns on her skin. Goose bumps rose at his touch, and she shivered.
“You’re cold.” He yanked the comforter from the foot of the bed and wrapped it around them like a cocoon.
But she wasn’t cold.
“See, told you,” she said. “Without me saying a thing you knew I was cold.”
“And without you saying a thing I know it’s been a long time since you’ve been this close to a man, Sarah.” His fingers skimmed up her back and around her shoulder, then traced the line of her neck to lift her chin. He stared into her eyes for a long moment. “Why?”
She wanted to run, but after what she’d done with Royce and what she’d been through, she had no strength left. No strength to run, no strength to summon that ever-elusive control she needed to keep her secrets hidden.
“Why what?” She tugged her chin free of his light grasp and snuggled her face against the soft hair covering the hard muscles of his chest.
“Sarah.”
Her sigh stirred his golden hairs, which tickled her nose. “It’s been a while. So what?”
“How long?”
She couldn’t lie. “Do you know how old Jeremy is?”
“Sarah?”
“Do you?”
“Yes, twelve.”
“Twelve, but it’s probably been almost thirteen years. Guess it’s true what they say, you know. It is just like riding a bike.”
“Thirteen years. So you and Robe
rt Hutchins never…”
She shook her head. “No, even without his heart problems, I was more like his daughter than I ever was his wife.” She would tell Royce that much. The rest…well, she was just too tired. Her eyes fought to drift closed.
“So why did you marry him?”
“He insisted. For my protection. For Jeremy’s.” It was the only way he’d take her money, the only way she had to keep him from losing everything he’d worked so hard to build. For a while she’d managed to save someone she cared about.
But when the heart attack had claimed him, there’d been nothing she could do. A tear trembled on her lashes, but she brushed it away before it could fall against Royce’s skin.
“There’re so many things I want to know about you.” A yawn stretched the muscles in his neck and lifted his chest, jostling her.
She giggled. “I can see that you’re completely fascinated.”
“Oh, Sarah, I am. And when I’m not so worn out, I’m going to ask the rest of my questions.”
And maybe she’d answer them then. Fear filled the hollow pit of her stomach. And when he discovered it all, he’d have no reason to want her again. But her greatest fear was that she would never stop wanting Royce. Would never stop loving him.
A STABBING PAIN in his gut produced beads of sweat on his upper lip. Royce brushed at them with one hand, his fingers tangling in silk tresses.
Sarah shifted against him and moaned. His heart contracted at the rightness of waking with her in his arms. He opened his gritty eyes, squinting against the glare of the track lighting overhead. They hadn’t even turned off the lights. They’d fallen asleep wrapped tight in each other’s arms.
The pounding in his head resumed, matching the tempo of the clenching of his stomach muscles. He needed more aspirin. Leaning over the bed, he scrounged around on the floor for his discarded jean jacket. Brass buttons scraped across the pine planks as he snagged it by an arm and pulled it closer.
He patted the denim pockets, finding the bottle of aspirin and his phone. He should check with the men posted around the grounds, make sure everything was fine.