Tails of Love

by Lori Foster

  CHAPTER TWO

  Lisa gasped and jerked away.

  Cruz knew he’d made a serious tactical error, the kind that would’ve gotten him sent straight to the brig followed by a nice court martial if he’d been in the military. Shit. He should’ve jammed his fist in his big mouth rather than tell her how serious he was.

  On second thought . . . no, he shouldn’t have.

  Stronger than the fear that he’d ruined his relationship with Lisa before it even got off the ground was the feeling of euphoria. Relief. Triumph. Because he loved this woman. Deeply, desperately, passionately loved her. Had always and would always. And it was past time she knew it.

  Yeah, and it was past time for a few other things, too. She needed to stop working herself to the bone at the hospital and then coming home to care for Keenan to the point of exhaustion. And she needed to lose the haunted shadows under her sweet brown eyes, gain a little weight and, most of all, forgive herself.

  Looking at her now, though, none of that seemed possible. She was skittish and just needed an excuse to run and hide.

  Little did she know there was nowhere on Earth he wouldn’t pursue her and no stone he’d leave unturned to get her in bed and keep her there. Poor thing. Her hiding days were over starting right now. He—they—had waited long enough, and tonight was about new beginnings for all three of them: Lisa, Keenan, and Cruz.

  And he prayed that soon—please, Lord, soon—she would let him make love to her. The thought made him so hot, so excited, that he had to back away a little and creep up on it. Take it nice and slow.

  What would he do if he could touch Lisa like he wanted to?

  Well, first he’d filter his fingers up through those black curls . . . sift them . . . inhale them. And her neck. He’d slide his nose down that smooth brown column, find her pulse, and press his tongue to it. Wallow in the taste of her, the smell of her, the feel of her. There was a perfectly round black mole on the righthand corner of her mouth that’d always drawn his gaze—as if that berry red mouth and those plump lips needed any highlighting—and he’d kiss it. Then he’d work his way to her mouth. . . .

  God, he wanted her. He was hard with it, sweaty with it, desperate.

  But she . . . yeah, she looked like she’d been smashed with a mallet.

  “You can’t be serious,” she said, her breath ragged.

  “Yeah,” he told her. “I can.”

  “We’ve never even kissed.”

  “I’ve noticed,” he said sourly. “But we’ll make up for that real soon.”

  “I’m never getting married. I couldn’t even make my engagement work, remember?” There was a definite note of panic in her voice now. “And you’re divorced, so you shouldn’t take this so lightly either.”

  He knew what she was doing: throwing out excuse after excuse, whatever she could think of, as if she could talk him out of loving her. Like he’d say, Yeah, good point—I don’t want to marry you after all.

  She was wasting her time.

  “Here’s the thing, Lisa,” he said, unable to keep the fervency out of his voice even though, judging by her platter-sized eyes, he was scaring her more by the second. “That guy wasn’t right for you and I’d never’ve gotten married if you were available. You should’ve waited for me. You know that in your gut, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know anything—”

  She broke off and looked wildly over her shoulder down the hall, where the rubberized sound of approaching wheels on the hardwood floors was growing.

  “Oh, God, here comes Keenan again. Please, please, Cruz, I’m begging you—can we talk about this tomorrow?”

  For one beat—two, maybe—Cruz felt guilty for pressing her like this, but he kept his eyes on the prize and the momentary weakness passed. “It’s not going to be easier tomorrow, Lisita.”

  Lisa went absolutely still. “Don’t call me that—”

  “Shhh.” Temptation got the better of him, or maybe it was just that he was tired of fighting it after so many years. Aware of Keenan’s imminent arrival and knowing, but not caring, that this wasn’t the right time, Cruz leaned in, irresistibly drawn to those lips.

  Just a taste, he told himself. What could it hurt?

  She made a small peep of surprise but didn’t pull back, so he took that as permission. No, more than that—it was an invitation, especially when he saw the smoldering heat in her eyes as they slipped to half-mast.

  “Querida,” he murmured.

  By now he was almost shaking with the force of his desire and excitement. Keeping his eyes open so he didn’t miss one detail of her reaction, he licked her. Ran his tongue slowly . . . slowly . . . across her mouth and savored the faint traces of wine and the sweetness that was purely Lisa. And then he pressed one gentle, lingering kiss on her dewy-soft mouth to brand her as his for all time.

  She knew it, too. A crooning whimper rose up out of her throat and she surged closer, as desperate for him as he was for her. But then she seemed to realize what she was doing, or maybe the flaming contact between them was too much. The reason really didn’t matter.

  All that mattered was that for the second time that night she jerked away from him. Lunging to her feet, she hurried to the ar moire just as Keenan rolled back into the room.

  The interruption nearly killed Cruz. He cursed and flung himself back against the sofa cushions, his body screaming bloody murder at the loss of her. His skin felt tight, his muscles rigid, his blood boiling hot. He pressed his palms to his temples, praying for control, but God only laughed at him.

  Lisa fidgeted with the stack of CDs, looking as agitated as he felt, and that sure didn’t help him with his control issue.

  Lisa.

  He pressed his fingers to his lips to hold her kiss there and imprint it deeper into his flesh. He would make her his or happily die trying.

  “What’s going on?” said Keenan into the heavy silence.

  Judging by the suspicious note in his voice and the hard edge in his expression as he looked to Cruz for an answer, Keenan knew exactly what was going on. It could hardly be a surprise; though he’d never openly discussed his feelings for Lisa, Cruz sure hadn’t hidden them either.

  “We need to talk, man,” Cruz told him.

  Lisa rushed over, two bright patches of color on her cheeks. “No you don’t.” Flashing a quelling glare at Cruz, she smiled at Keenan and held out an arm for Atticus, who happily climbed up to her shoulder. “There’s nothing to talk about, and Atticus wants to change the music, don’t you?”

  Atticus chittered with excitement.

  “Let’s go.” Lisa turned back to the stereo, selected a CD and let Atticus put it in while Keenan studied Cruz with the open distrust he’d probably use on a bridge salesman. The new music started—Santana now, one of Lisa’s favorites—and Lisa and Atticus came back.

  “Atticus wants to open his present.” Resuming her seat on the sofa, she reached out to scratch the thick black thatch of bad-toupee hair atop the monkey’s head. “Don’t you, buddy?”

  Atticus resumed his seat on Keenan’s lap and grinned at her, revealing sharp yellow teeth.

  “Lisa,” Cruz began.

  “Not now,” she said pleasantly, not looking at him.

  Keenan was still staring at Cruz. Actually it was now a full-blown I’m going to kill you first chance I get glare, and Cruz waited for him to hurl an accusation or two, but he didn’t. Instead, Keenan handed a rainbow-striped gift bag to Atticus.

  “Here you go, buddy,” he said. “Open. Open.”

  Manic with excitement, Atticus chattered as he yanked the red tissue paper out, threw it to the floor, and withdrew a box he tried without success to open. He looked to Keenan for help, whining.

  “Uh-oh.” Keenan’s nostrils flared. He fumbled with the box, trying to get his clumsy fingers to slide under the flaps, but no dice.

  Cruz shifted uncomfortably, prepared to give Keenan a minute and see how he fared, but Lisa moved to help him. Cruz put a staying hand on
her arm just as Keenan shot her an annoyed look.

  “I can manage,” Keenan snapped, red-faced and deep into one of his flashes of frustrated anger. “I don’t need you rescuing me all the time.”

  Abashed, Lisa held her hands up and backed off. “Okay, okay.”

  At last Keenan got the box open and Atticus went wild. Screeching and delighted, as though he’d received a lifetime’s supply of marshmallows, the monkey went to work extracting his gift. It was a toddler’s tool kit, the wooden hammer, wrench, screw driver, and screws painted in bright colors to match the tool box.

  Atticus knew exactly what to do with it, too; he stuck one of the screws in its hole in the side of the tool box, turned it a time or two with the screwdriver, and looked around to make sure they’d all observed his brilliant accomplishment.

  “Eeeee-eeeee-eeeee!” Atticus screeched. “Eeeee-eeeee-eeeee!”

  The three humans, having been through this drill before, clapped and cheered. “Good job, Atticus,” Lisa said. “Good job.”

  Atticus rewarded her with another wide grin and then picked up the hammer and started banging it against the box’s handle.

  “Maybe now you two can tell me,” Keenan said, low, his color returning to normal now that his brief bout of frustration was behind him, “what the hell is going on.”

  “Happy to,” Cruz said before Lisa could get a head of steam going. Taking a deep breath, he prayed his oldest friendship could survive the night because he knew Keenan would be furious. “I just told Lisa I’m in love with her.”

  “Oh, my God,” Lisa muttered.

  Keenan gaped at Cruz, horror etched on every line of his face. He floundered for several beats, and then the shock turned into outrage. “You’re trying to get with my sister?” he said, a vein pulsing right down the center of his forehead. “I’m gonna get up outta this chair and knock your teeth down your throat.”

  Cruz didn’t doubt the sentiment or the intent. It was no more than he deserved, he supposed. If he’d been thinking, he would’ve taken Keenan aside first, told him what he had in mind, and then told Lisa, but his growing impatience hadn’t allowed him to do any of that.

  “I don’t blame you,” Cruz said. “Kick my ass if you want. I’ll still want to marry her when you’re done.”

  “Marry?” Keenan gasped. “Marry?”

  “I need your help, though, man.” Here Cruz looked to Lisa. “Because you’re the only one who can tell her it’s okay for her to rejoin the living—”

  “Stop, Cruz,” she cried.

  “—and she needs you to forgive her.”

  Lisa gasped and unraveled a little, right before his eyes. She was trembling now, a little pale, and her growing wild-eyed fear scared Cruz as much as it gave him courage. She wouldn’t be this upset if he wasn’t hitting close to home, would she? Did she need this confrontation as much as he thought she did? Was this the painful conversation that would finally set her free from her self-imposed prison?

  Cruz plowed ahead, speaking only to Keenan. “You’re better now, man, but what about Lisa? Who’s going to take care of Lisa?”

  “You son of a bitch,” Keenan snarled.

  Atticus froze, hammer cocked, wide-eyed with alarm.

  “It’s time for you to take a break from your physical therapy and your struggles and your pain and see that your sister is still a young beautiful woman who needs to have her own life now,” Cruz said. “And she needs your permission to live it.”

  Lisa got up and made a sickly laughing sound; Cruz knew her pride demanded it. Wrapping her arms around her middle as though she were freezing, she tried to pretend she was fine the way she always pretended.

  “I am living my life.” She raised her stubborn chin. “I don’t need—or want—anything other than my work and you, Keenan. Cruz isn’t very good at taking no for an answer. That’s what’s going on here.”

  But Keenan didn’t look like he believed her. He looked like he was coming out of a trance. Blinking slowly, he stared first at his sister, whose lips were now quivering with her effort not to burst into tears, then at Cruz, who met his gaze and let him see his absolute love for Lisa and his determination to make her the happiest woman on the face of the Earth, which was no less than she deserved after the hell she’d been through.

  Keenan nodded once at Cruz and seemed to come to an invisible decision. With one hand he absently stroked Atticus’s head, and the monkey lowered the hammer and looked up at him.

  “Oooo,” Atticus murmured sympathetically.

  “You’ll take good care of her?” Keenan asked Cruz.

  Cruz shifted his gaze to Lisa because the vow was for her. “Yes.”

  “Good.” Keenan nodded again, more firmly this time, and held his right hand out. “I need a minute with my sister.”

  “Great.” Lisa pivoted, turned her back to both men, and swiped at her eyes. “This is just great.”

  Cruz pressed Keenan’s hand and felt the strength that was still there in his best friend’s body, curled fingers and wheelchair or no. “Thanks, man.”

  “I’m going to hold you to that promise,” Keenan told him.

  “I know.” He dropped Keenan’s hand and half-turned to go, but Atticus stuck out his right hand, too, wanting to shake. Cruz took the monkey’s tiny fingers and had to laugh. Atticus grinned that crooked grin.

  Cruz went to Lisa, who again swiped her eyes and resolutely refused to meet his gaze. There was fear in her rigid posture and in the goose bumps running up and down her bare arms. Whether it was the past that scared her the most or the future, he couldn’t say.

  All he knew was that he loved her.

  Peeling one of her cold hands away from where she’d clamped it to her waist, he bowed his head, pressed a lingering kiss to her wrist and took reassurance from her racing pulse.

  They were getting closer, he and Lisa. Almost there.

  “Come to me, Lisita,” he told her softly, his need making his voice hoarse and the words shaky. “When you’re ready.”

  Lisa pulled her hand free and turned her stony face away, but the last thing Cruz saw before he left the house was the telltale flicker of emotion in her eyes.

  “Lisa,” Keenan said.

  She couldn’t face her brother. Cruz, damn him, had shaken her so badly she couldn’t breathe, much less speak. She felt as though she were on the edge of a bottomless crevasse with her toes hanging over and a stiff wind at her back. Why had Cruz opened all these cans of worms? Why?

  “I don’t blame you for the accident. It was a drunk driver.”

  “I know that,” Lisa snapped.

  Wheeling around, she stooped to pick up the wineglasses in her clumsy hands. Of course she knew that. This was a stupid, pointless discussion and she was tired and there were dishes to wash. Why did they have to go through this ridiculous and unnecessary forgiveness exercise?

  And why was her heart skittering? Why couldn’t she breathe? Why was her skin so tight and her flesh so clammy and hot?

  “It wasn’t your fault you were driving, Lisa.”

  “I know that,” she said again, but there was a new layer of hysteria in her voice, so strong that even she could hear it.

  “If you want Cruz—”

  “I don’t want Cruz.”

  “—then you should go to him because he’s a good guy.”

  “Great. Wonderful.” All the wineglasses now collected in her arms, she found the courage to look her brother in the face, to stare him down where he sat in his wheelchair with his ruined legs and his therapy monkey who was supposed to make everything perfect even though Keenan would never walk again. “Glad we got that cleared up. Can I go now?” She took a couple steps toward the kitchen and the only available escape.

  “I want you to be happy,” Keenan called after her.

  “I-I am happy.”

  The words were faint because no air was getting to her lungs and she just couldn’t breathe. There was a noose around her neck . . . a weight . . . a vice . . .
and it was slowly choking her to death.

  She had to get out of here right now, before she fell apart. The kitchen was her focus. If only she could get to the kitchen. Keenan wouldn’t follow her there—he hardly ever went into the kitchen—and once there she’d be able to breathe again. Hurrying to the door, she tried to block out the rush of blood in her ears and the thunder of her erratic pulse—two steps to the kitchen . . . one step . . . almost there—but then Keenan said the one thing she absolutely could not deal with: “Be free.”

  Just like that, she lost it—utterly and completely.

  The tears she’d hoarded for two years because she’d wanted to be strong for Keenan erupted from her body on a wailing moan. Desperate for Keenan not to see her fall apart, she dropped all three wineglasses—shit, shit, SHIT—and slapped her hands over her face. Weighed down with grief, weak with it, she sagged against the wall, bent at the waist, and gave herself over to ten seconds of unadulterated self-pity. Unable to do anything else, she sobbed and sobbed, aware of Keenan rolling over to rub her back and stroke her hair.

  “Shhh,” he murmured. “Don’t do this to yourself. Come here.”

  Tugging her arm, he steered her over to the sofa, where she sat, sniffling. Keenan faced her and held both her hands.

  “I-It’s my fault.” With a tremendous effort, Lisa gulped and panted her way to a full breath of air. “I-I should’ve seen him coming.”

  “It was a drunk driver.”

  “I should’ve swerved.”

  “You’re lucky you weren’t killed, Lisa.”

  “Killed?” Hysteria bubbled up out of her throat and she curled in on herself, nearly choking on her sick laughter. “You got paralyzed and I didn’t even break a nail.”

  “Stop it.” Somehow Keenan got those clumsy fingers tightened around her upper arms and gave her a rough shake, one that made her teeth clack. “Two years is enough. Let it go. If you weren’t such a control freak, you’d see that none of what happened was your fault.”

  “I am not a control freak.” Affronted, she straightened her spine and let him have it with both barrels. “And I don’t appreciate you—”