by Tina Leonard
“Don’t you at least owe me an acknowledgment of your change in attitude toward me?”
He passed on the chance to answer and countered with a question of his own instead. “Don’t you owe me an acknowledgment—for the trees and the wreaths?”
“Thank you.” Her green eyes glittered impatiently. “And you didn’t answer my question.”
She wanted to know what had been haunting him? Fine! He let his gaze drift lower, to the soft, womanly swell, before returning, deliberately, to her eyes. “Your breasts are beautiful,” he said honestly.
So beautiful, he was hard even now.
Jacey thumped his sternum with the flat of her palm. “Not that kind of acknowledgment, you insensitive cowboy!”
He caught her wrist, held it over his thumping heart. “What other kind is there?”
Her fingers spread across his chest. “You really don’t know.”
He inhaled the soft, womanly fragrance of her hair and skin. “I can honestly say I haven’t a clue.”
She wrested her hand free, stepped back a pace. “Well, maybe you’ll get one if you keep thinking on it.”
“Seriously? That’s it?”
She nodded. “Seriously. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to look for those decorations.”
Rafferty had let Angelica and countless women before her be all mystifying and confusing. He wasn’t going to let Jacey pull the same old baloney. “Oh, no, you don’t.” He clamped a hand on her shoulder and spun her around to face him. “You’re not going to shut me down without explaining exactly what has you so hot under the collar. If it’s the fact that I desire you…” Now more than ever…
She looked more aggrieved than ever. “That’s it, you don’t!”
“Excuse me?” They really were talking different languages.
Resentment colored her low tone. “You’ve seen the goods. The whole goods. Above the waist. Below the waist. And everything everywhere else. And you’ve decided you’ll pass. This, after kissing me not once but twice like there’s no tomorrow!”
Rafferty blinked, so astonished he dropped his hand. “You think I’ve led you on—sexually?”
Hurt and indignation warred in her gaze. “I don’t think you’re attracted to me. And why should you be? You were married to a beautiful model!”
“Who, as it turned out, was as empty in here—” Rafferty pointed to his heart “—as a dry well.”
Jacey stared at him incredulously. “Yeah, well, she’s the only one you married and, unlike me who has stretch marks and the whole just-given-birth thing going on here, she was reputedly gorgeous beyond belief.” She released a tremulous breath. “And before that, there was a whole legion of women you dated and discarded for no apparent reason.”
Rafferty furrowed his brow. “I don’t know who you’ve been talking to—”
“A woman at the library.”
“Ah. Let me guess. One of my ex-girlfriends?”
Bingo! “She said you were a player.”
“Who hasn’t dated anyone in the last two plus years,” Rafferty said, guessing the rest of it.
“Well, no, I didn’t know that, but that only means you’re pickier than ever about women.”
Rafferty could hardly believe they were having their first fight when they hadn’t even made love yet. And, he realized suddenly, he did intend to make love to Jacey.
“It means I learned my lesson,” he corrected gently, guiding her close once again. “It doesn’t matter what a woman looks like on the outside if she doesn’t have the goods, as you’re so fond of putting it, on the inside. Heart. Soul. Compassion. The ability to get along with and appreciate others. And that’s just for starters.”
She continued to scowl at him, wanting to believe, yet not quite able to do so. “What else?” she whispered.
“She has to be smart and funny and a little sassy, not to mention unafraid to go toe-to-toe with me, as well as be a damn fine cook. It would probably also help if she knew how to manage a property or two or three.”
Jacey blew out an exasperated breath. “Now you’re patronizing me.”
Like hell he was. He looked into her eyes. “I’m telling you that you turn me on more than any other woman I have ever met.” He was being honest. It wasn’t helping one iota. Maybe, he thought, because words were cheap. Actions were what she would believe.
Seemingly near tears, she turned away and raised her hands as if to ward him off. “I can’t do this,” she confessed hoarsely.
Now who was kidding themselves?
“Yes,” Rafferty said just as resolutely, “you can.”
Chapter Seven
It would have been so easy to turn away…to not let Rafferty kiss her again. Certainly, it would have been the smart action to take. It would have protected her heart, staved off rejection, kept her own deficiencies secret. But when he took her head between his large, capable hands and tilted her face tenderly up to his, all common sense faded. She wanted to feel his lips against hers, wanted to taste the flavor that was uniquely him. She needed to experience lust in its purest, most powerful form.
He felt so good, pressing up against her. This was no drugstore cowboy, or wannabe. Rafferty was the real deal—a virile Texan who knew what he wanted and had no compunction in going after it. And what he wanted right now was her.
“I can’t believe this is happening again,” she murmured as Rafferty twirled her backward to an old-fashioned reading chaise with threadbare upholstery.
With one arm, he swept away the stack of equally threadbare linens laid on top of it.
The next thing Jacey knew, she was lifted over the mess and set back down, feet firmly on the floor. Her knees were pressed against the back of the chaise, and Rafferty wrapped his arms around her. “I can’t believe it’s taken so long. Damn, Jacey,” he whispered, kissing her cheek, her ear, her neck, “I want you. I want you so much.”
She swallowed. Closed her eyes. Buried her face in the tensile heat of his shoulder. Despite her effort, she wasn’t able to contain the conflicting emotions swirling through her. “You say that now…”
“I’ll say that for an entirety. Or as you put it—” he grinned wolfishly “—I’ve already seen the goods.”
“And walked away,” she remembered, her deepest insecurities taking center stage once again.
His gaze traveled over her face in a frank, sensual manner. Tenderly, he stroked her hair and continued to search her eyes. “Only because I was being chivalrous. If I’d had any inkling you wanted me, too…”
“That’s the problem,” Jacey informed him bluntly over the tumultuous rhythm of her heartbeat. “Wanting and being able to…” She paused, searching for the right word. “Perform…aren’t the same thing.”
He brought her closer still, flattening his hand over her spine so they were pressed together. “Yet again…you lost me.”
She tilted her face up to his. “I can’t…” even say it! “I’m not any good at…” She paused, wet her lips. “That is…I’ve never…actually…” Heavens, this was so embarrassing! Yet, better he know now than find out after the fact.
“Are you saying you’re a virgin?” He studied her, perplexed.
“No.” Which in her view somehow made it all the worse. She wasn’t inexperienced. Just ice cold when she should be white hot. She swallowed around the growing tension in her throat and forced herself to continue. “I’m not. But I might as well be for all my, um, success in the area.”
Rafferty sat down on the chaise. He pulled Jacey onto his lap, so she was seated sideways, across his thighs. He kept one arm around her waist. The other lifted her chin. He looked into her eyes, all gentle understanding. “Talk to me. What do you mean you have no success?”
Jacey trembled. She thought she had been embarrassed before. It was nothing compared to how she felt now. “I mean, I can’t reach…”
He blinked. “You’ve never…”
“Climaxed,” she informed him miserably, knowing this was part of the reason her previ
ous relationships had dwindled and failed. Her frigidity was too hard on the male ego. Hard on hers as well. Made her not even want to try again, never mind feel so inadequate when she was supercapable in every other way.
“Jacey,” he told her softly. “Anyone who can kiss the way you do is definitely able to respond.”
Her heart took a little leap at the blatant desire in his gaze. Oh, how she wanted to do what he was urging her to do, and let herself go wild with him. Determined, however, not to repeat her previous mistakes, she caught his wandering hand in both of hers. “I wish it was that simple.”
“It is.” His lips came down on hers, soft and sure, even as he wrested free of her detaining hold.
“Rafferty…”
Still kissing her, he began to unbutton her blouse, apparently seeing this as a challenge he was more than willing to take on.
“Okay, I admit that feels good, but…” she murmured as he traced the subtle curves, kissing her all the while, gently and seductively, before moving lower still. The next thing she knew, his hand had eased beneath her skirt, slid upward, over the insides of her thighs, until she was arching up off his lap. Moaning her pleasure, she gripped his shoulders, not sure whether she was pushing him away or drawing him near, just knowing she had never felt anything so hot and sensual in her life.
It felt so good to have him touching her that way, so good to be wanted…to let all her inhibitions float away as they kissed endlessly. To feel him gently exploring her there…stroking and loving…until she caught her breath. Maybe it was the postpregnancy hormones…maybe it was all the years of pent-up longing, coupled with intense frustration. All Jacey knew for sure was that she had never felt anything like it, as wave after wave of passion swept through her.
When it finally stopped, she was as weak as a kitten, clinging to him, shocked and dazed. “I know you don’t believe in celebrating Christmas anymore, but that was some present,” she told him breathlessly, trying to make light out of what had been a very monumental event.
“One question,” Rafferty said, kissing her temple as she closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his cheek. He slid a hand beneath her chin and lifted her face up to his. “Just who made you think you couldn’t enjoy sex?”
SPYING THE DECORATIONS they had been hunting for all along, Jacey adjusted her clothing and slid off his lap. “It’s just something I’ve always known.”
He ambled after her, still looking as if he wanted to make love to her then and there. “Why?”
Doing her best to quell her breathlessness, she stopped and looked into his eyes. “Because I’ve never been all that comfortable even kissing someone.” Not the way I’ve been with you….
He handed her two of the lightest plastic storage boxes and picked up the heaviest two. “Ever stop to think it might have been the fault of the person kissing you?”
“Well, yeah, now,” Jacey replied, eager to get out of the storeroom and away from the possibility of any further intimacy. She practically lost her grip on the containers, her hands were so slick with perspiration. “Because I finally know I like what we just…did,” she mumbled, embarrassed. A lot! It hadn’t felt uncomfortable, hadn’t had that underlying ick factor that had always left her feeling more used and invaded than cherished.
He stopped next to the tree in the living room and said softly, “It’s more than just my lovemaking skill, Jacey.”
Flushing, she set the decorations onto the floor. Leave it to Rafferty to try to build something out of nothing. “I don’t know about that. Granted, I’ve only had two serious relationships.”
He opened up a box containing strands of colored electric lights. “Tell me about them.”
Jacey untangled a clump of old-fashioned wooden ornaments, in the shape of Nutcracker figurines. “You sure are curious tonight.”
He shrugged, not the least bit apologetic. “I want to know everything about you, Jacey.”
Their glances held. Realizing the need to know went both ways, Jacey’s heart pounded.
“So back to your previous boyfriends,” Rafferty prompted.
“Andrew was my college boyfriend. We dated three years, and only started sleeping together at the end. It was embarrassingly awkward and we broke up—he felt he had to sow his wild oats. And I was relieved. I didn’t know what lovemaking was supposed to be like, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t that.
“The other guy came along about two years later. It took me that long to get up my nerve again, and Patrick wasn’t the type to pressure a girl into bed, which I liked. What I didn’t like was that it didn’t seem to matter to him if we didn’t sleep together.”
Rafferty quirked an eyebrow but didn’t interrupt.
“Anyway, we eventually ended up there and it wasn’t a whole lot better than my first experience. But because I had concluded I just wasn’t a really physical person—and neither was he—I was okay with it. He thought it was fine, too, and since we got along great in every other aspect of our relationship, we kept dating. Eventually, we started to think about doing something more permanent.”
She paused, remembering the shock and the heartache. “And then, one day out of the blue he told me he’d been thinking about it, and he just wasn’t sure he ever wanted to be a father. That wasn’t going to work for me, so we broke up. Then I just started thinking about how much I really did want to have a child, and I knew if I waited to find the guy to settle down and have a family with that it could be too late. So I started looking into sperm banks.”
“And that’s when Dash came along,” Rafferty guessed, still untangling lights.
Jacey crossed her arms. “His name is Cash. And yes. He heard what I was trying to do from a mutual friend and offered to help. So we went to the doctor’s office and one artificial insemination later, it was done.”
“That was quick.”
“Unusually so.” Jacey made no effort to disguise her relief that she’d only had to do that once. “Anyway, I took that as a sign that Caitlin was meant to be conceived exactly that way. And I have no regrets.”
Rafferty thought a little. “This Caleb must be some guy.”
“Cash,” she corrected yet again, pretty sure now Rafferty was mixing up the name on purpose to get under her skin. “And he really is great,” she said sincerely.
The doorbell rang.
Jacey looked at him. “You expecting anyone?”
“No. You?”
“At nine at night?” she retorted. “I don’t think so.”
Rafferty went to the door. Jacey heard him mutter something about another lost tourist. Her sympathy going out to the poor lost soul, she kept right on decorating the tree.
The front door opened on a whoosh of cold night air. Low male voices followed. Familiar male voices. Startled, Jacey nearly dropped her decoration. Still clasping the ornament, she followed the sounds of the decidedly male conversation.
Rafferty gestured expansively at the fit and handsome thirtysomething man who could have come straight out of an outdoor-clothing ad.
The interloper winked at her with affection. “Speak of the devil!”
“Cash!” Jacey cried.
“Hey, sweetheart!” Cash closed the distance between them, engulfed her in the kind of hug old friends gave each other after a long absence. “I was just apologizing to Rafferty here about the late hour. I had a heck of a time finding this place, even with GPS.”
Jacey stepped back to survey the golden beard Cash had spent the last few months growing. His hair was shoulder length, the sun-streaked strands clean but unkempt. “What are you doing here?”
He flashed her a wide grin. “Your sister tracked me down. Mindy said I had to come right away, that you were in terrible trouble.”
RAFFERTY DIDN’T KNOW whether to be relieved there truly was nothing going on between them—or concerned, given the two had conceived a child together…albeit via medical procedure.
“So what’s happening?” Cash asked casually, looking every bit the
adventurer in trendy hiking boots and clothing. “I see you had the baby.”
“Yes, I did. And she is as healthy as can be.”
Cash looked pleased for Jacey, but seemed to have no emotional reaction for himself. “That’s great,” Cash stated casually. “So what’s the emergency? When I stopped by the apartment complex in San Antonio to get my Jeep, I heard you were no longer living or working there, that you’d left rather unexpectedly.”
“I was sort of forced out.” Jacey explained the situation.
Cash exhaled. “Doesn’t surprise me. A lot of rich folks can be pretty demanding. They probably wouldn’t like a baby in the office. You know, it would mess with your ability to pay sole attention to them and their needs.”
Jacey laughed and shook her head. “You’re right. I really should have seen it coming.”
“So you’re working here now?”
“Temporarily.”
Too late, Rafferty wished he and his father had secured a long-term deal for Jacey from the beginning.
At the time, of course, it had suited him as much as it had worked for her. Now he felt differently. He wanted her to stay on.
Cash told Jacey with a friendly protectiveness Rafferty found irritating, “Look, I don’t have a lot of money in the bank right now—I spent most of what I earned and what I got from my trust for my adventures the last six months—]but I can spot you a couple thousand. Or even let you and your baby move into my place back in San Antonio for as long as you need, ’cause I’m not going to be there much…you know that.”
Jacey flushed, clearly unhappy. “We had a formal, written, legal agreement, remember?” she told Cash. “You are not responsible in any way for me or this child.”
“I know, but we’re still friends, Jacey, and friends help each other out. So if you’re in a tough spot, I’m here for you.”
As was everyone on the ranch, Rafferty thought, resisting the urge to wrap an arm around Jacey’s shoulder and bring her in close to his side.
“Thank you,” Jacey smiled at Cash. “But we’re doing okay. I’m just sorry that Mindy called you.”