It took him a good ten minutes to wiggle, push, grunt and shove free. Finally, the heaviest timber tumbled off his back. Jack got a knee, then a boot, under him. Sliding his arms under Sabrina, he scooped her from her dusty cradle.
Blinding light engulfed them the instant they stepped outside the cabin. Not about to risk a fall, Jack waited until his eyes had adjusted to the blazing light before starting for the truck. Sabrina blew upward to clear the dust from her face.
“I...I can walk.”
“Maybe.” Jack tightened his hold. “But I can’t let you go.”
Her eyes widened at that, but she didn’t argue. Her arm curled around his neck. Her breath fanned his ear, as erratic and uneven as his. Jack could feel her heart punching against her ribs. His own was doing exactly the same.
By the time he spotted the truck, his blood thundered in his ears almost as loudly as the falling timbers had. Sabrina’s rounded bottom nudged his stomach with every step. The hot wash of her breath was driving fear, relief, even fury at his own stupidity for putting her in danger right out of his head.
Wrenching open the passenger door, Jack eased her onto the passenger seat. His stomach kicked again at her dusty pallor.
“Hang tight. There’s some bottled water in the back.”
Water and a first aid kit. He retrieved both and set to work. Worried about possible scratches and puncture wounds from the rusty pipe or roofing nails, he cleaned her face, her hands, her arms, then checked her stretchy knit shirt front and back for rips and tears.
Aside from a nasty scrape on one elbow and a rising lump on her collarbone, Sabrina had come through the near disaster remarkably unscathed. She winced when Jack smoothed a stinging antiseptic ointment on her scrape, then took the tube out of his hands.
“You took more of the avalanche than I did. Your shirt’s torn at the shoulders. You’d better take it off and let me put some ointment on your cuts and scrapes.”
When he shrugged out of the once pristine white shirt and turned, Sabrina had to bite back a gasp. Angry red welts scored his skin. An evil bruise had already started forming along his ribs. Spreading her legs to cradle his hips, she squeezed a big dollop of ointment into either palm.
If she’d thought about it at that moment, Sabrina would have sworn that few experiences in life could match the heart-stopping impact of having a building fall in on her.
Then her flesh connected with Jack’s.
Her touch was slow, soft, light on the sore spots. Her fingertips trailed lightly across muscled shoulders. Down a well-defined spine. Along a jagged scar that traced the curve of a rib. He was, she decided, magnificent.
The greasy ointment made her movements a slow glide of discovery, a stroke, a caress. His skin was warm and supple under her fingers. With each stroke, each joining of her flesh to his, the need that had been building since the moment she’d opened her eyes and found Jack smiling down at her ripened, blossomed, opened like a flower unfolding its petals to the sun. Sabrina couldn’t speak for wanting him. Could barely breathe.
Suddenly, his skin rippled under her palms, and she heard a low, raw sound. To her surprise, Sabrina realized it came from her.
Jack caught the small groan and whipped around. He was so big he blocked the rest of the world from view, so close she could see the dust in the brows that slashed into a tight, worried frown.
“Are you sure you’re all right?”
“No.” She bit her lip, dragged in an unsteady breath. “I think I’m in shock.”
Cursing, he bent to scoop up his shirt. “I’d better get you into town.”
“Jack, it’s not that kind of—”
“I must have been out of my mind to bring you out here.”
Shoving one arm into his shirt, he fought behind his back for the other sleeve.
“Jack...”
“Don’t try to talk! Just put your head back. Stay still while I—”
She cut off his whip of instructions by the simple expedient of wrapping both arms around his neck, hauling him down, and crushing her mouth to his.
He stumbled into her, off balance, his arms still tangled in the sleeves behind his back. She took his weight on her breasts, her spread thighs. The sudden, erotic press against the seam of her jeans sent a lightning bolt of pure sensation straight to her brain.
She pulled her head back, smiling at the stunned look in his eyes.
“It’s not that kind of shock.” She brushed her mouth against his once more. “It’s this kind.” Her tongue slid along his lower lip. “And this kind.”
“Sabrina! Dammit...”
“And this kind, Jack.”
Her arms tightened. She raised half off the seat, molded her mouth to his once more, gloried in his dark, seductive taste.
He froze. For what seemed like a small eternity, he didn’t answer the urgent demand of Sabrina’s mouth and hands and body. Then, suddenly, his muscles bunched. Swearing, straining, smothering her with the heat that rose in waves from his body, he finally wrenched one arm free of his shirt. A heartbeat later, he buried his hands in her hair and tugged her head back.
“Sabrina, listen to me. I want you. I’ve wanted you since the first moment I saw you lazing like a cat behind the diner. If you kiss me like that again, I swear I’ll have your clothes off before you draw another breath.”
It was a threat. A promise. A low, savage vow.
Back bent, neck arched, scalp tingling where his grip tugged at her hair, she flashed him a grin.
“So, what’s the problem?”
He groaned. A vein popped out on his forehead. Barely able to breathe for the heat curling through her body, Sabrina stared up at him.
“The problem is what we talked about last night. We were worried about getting in too fast and too deep. I’m not worried anymore, but you...?”
“I’m still nervous,” she admitted with bruising honesty. “We’re from different worlds. We have different needs, different dreams. But if you don’t make love to me in the next sixty seconds, I think...no, I’m pretty sure...I’ll die.”
Jack groaned again. Or maybe he snarled. Since his hands and his mouth were all over her, Sabrina couldn’t tell which. Her stretchy knit top ripped over her head. The waistband of her jeans popped open. He lifted her up, then dropped her back on the vinyl truck seat a few seconds later minus jeans, minus panties, minus breath.
As before, her thighs spread to accommodate him. As before, the hard, driving pressure against her mound sent streaks of pure sensation straight to her brain. She almost sobbed with pleasure when Jack shaped her breast.
His hands both rough and gentle, he worried the aching nipple. It went rigid at his touch, his taste, his tender-sharp kisses. Sabrina arched back, her hands flat on the seat behind her, glorying in his need. Her own hunger soon fired too hot to let her take and not give. The fingers that had skimmed so lightly over his back dug into his shoulders. She explored his contours, his strength, his slick, hot skin with the same urgency, the same racing delight as he’d explored hers.
She was spinning on a spiral of white-hot sensation when he stepped back.
“Jack...”
“I don’t want to run over my sixty seconds, sweetheart, but I need to—”
“I’ll help,” Sabrina panted, fumbling with the snap on his jeans.
A moment later, he was jutting, magnificent. Sliding an arm around Sabrina’s waist, he dragged her forward, half off the seat and hard against him. His fingers parted her folds, probed her slick center. With a deliberation that drove her half out of her mind, he primed her, pumped her, soon had her sobbing.
Through it all, her mouth and her hands and her heart gloried in the feel of his.
At last he entered her. He stretched her, filled her, and soon built a wild rhythm. Up, down, up, down, like a well-lubricated oil rig lifting, plunging, pulling treasures from the hidden depths.
Jack felt the jagged, saw-toothed edge of his release long before he was ready. He gritted his t
eeth, determined to hold back, to push Sabrina to her peak before he blew. The effort beaded sweat on his arms and chest, already slick from the friction of her body against his.
Wedging his back against the door frame, he dug his hands into her waist, anchored her, and thrust upward. Her back arched, and he thrust again.
“Jack! I can’t...! I don’t...!”
“You don’t have to, Sabrina. Just let go.”
She flung her head back. A long, ragged groan tore from her throat. He felt her convulse around him, tight and hot and long.
Jack held himself rigid while she climaxed, his every muscle on fire with the strain. He’d never seen anything so beautiful, he thought savagely. So wild. So damned incredible. Then he began his own swift, searing climb to the sun.
It took some time for Sabrina to realize that the buzzing in her ears came not from her explosive climax, but from the pesky little gnats that had flitted into the truck. She opened her eyes, lifted a boneless arm, and swatted them away. In the process, she drew a rueful smile from Jack.
“I fantasized about this moment.” His voice was rough and achingly tender.
“Me, too.”
He used his hold on her waist to lift her more comfortably onto the truck seat. If Sabrina hadn’t been totally boneless and drained of every ounce of energy, she might have marveled that her nakedness didn’t embarrass her. As it was, she could only sigh in pleasure while he traced a line along her cheek with his knuckles.
“I know I talked about a couple of hours of hot, mindless sex, but I didn’t intend...” he glanced around the overgrown, sun-dappled road “...this.”
“Do you hear me complaining?”
He brushed back her hair. “I had planned soft lights, cool sheets and a slow, sweet seduction. I wanted the best for you, sweetheart.”
She saw that he was serious, that he thought she needed more. He didn’t realize how magnificent he was. How just the sight of his dust-coated brown hair and sweat-sheened shoulders glinting in the hot sun was making her crazy all over again. Smiling, she turned her head and planted a kiss on his knuckles.
“Much as I hate to pander to your ego, Mr. Wentworth, I think...no, I’m almost sure—I just had the best.”
One dusty brow hitched. “Almost, huh?”
“Well, I might need another sample or two or three to make sure.”
“That, Ms. Jensen, can be arranged.”
Suddenly, disconcertingly brisk, he scooped up their scattered clothing.
“Here, you get dressed while I see if your poster survived the crash.”
“No!” She grabbed at his arm as he stepped into his jeans. “Don’t go back in there. I couldn’t take another roof falling in on you in one day.”
“I’ll be careful.” He dropped a quick kiss on her nose. “Just get dressed, then we’ll head back to your place. It’s closer. You can use the phone in the truck to call Hank and let him know you won’t be back to work today.”
He strode off, and Sabrina’s rosy glow dimmed a bit around the edges. Obviously Jack was used to taking charge and making decisions.
So was she.
She couldn’t think of anything she’d rather do at this moment than tumble out of a shower onto cool sheets with this fascinating, irresistibly sexy man. But she couldn’t go weak at the knees and fall into his arms every time he smiled at her, or walk away from her job on a whim. She might not chair a multinational corporation, but she, too, had certain responsibilities.
By the time Jack returned with the poster, Sabrina had pulled on her top and jeans. He stowed the salvaged items in the truck bed, then slid behind the wheel.
“Jean Harlow took a few hits, but a good restorer should be able to get her back in star condition.”
“That’s okay. I’m just glad all three of us survived.”
“Ready?”
Nodding, she propped one sneaker on the seat to tie the laces.
He keyed the ignition and wrapped his hand around the gearshift. “Did you get hold of Hank?”
“I didn’t try.”
He shot her a quick look. Calmly, Sabrina hiked up her other foot.
“I can’t take the rest of the day off.” She softened the blunt statement with a swift, sideways smile. “I wish I could. Believe me, I wish I could. But Peg has to take her daughter to the dentist at four-thirty and the part-timer doesn’t come on until five.”
Her foot dropped to the floorboard.
Jack couldn’t miss the message in that solid whump. Or in those clear green eyes. Obviously, he’d run smack up against Sabrina’s stubborn independence and pride again. He admired both. Nor could he fault the sense of responsibility that pushed her back to work, even if the prospect of a wait raised a clamoring protest. His nerves sang with the need to taste her again, to fill her again, and again. Swallowing an impatience so sharp, so alive, it ate at him, he shoved the truck into gear.
“Okay. We’ll go back to your place. We’ll clean up, and we’ll take you back to work. After work, we’ll see about giving you that sample or two or three.”
Sabrina didn’t get back to work that afternoon.
She started feeling drowsy on the way home. It could have been the hum of the tires that lulled her. Or the fact that she’d hit the ground running before five this morning. Or the fact that a roof had fallen in on her twice today, once in the old motor court, once in Jack’s arms.
At any rate, she was content to listen to the soothing resonance of his voice on the drive home and watch the mesmerizing wink of sunshine through the trees. She was half asleep when the truck turned into her driveway and she led the way inside the house, offering Jack first dibs on the bathroom.
She was sound asleep when he stepped out of her tiny shower fifteen minutes later.
Jack hooked his hands on the towel slung around his neck, his mouth curving. She was curled in a loose ball in the middle of the bed. She’d shucked her sneakers and dirty jeans, but little else. Sighing, he considered his options.
He’d cleared his calendar for the rest of the day.
Sabrina hadn’t.
He could wake her and drive her back to work.
Or let her sleep.
With a last, regretful glance at her tucked-up legs and curved bottom, he returned the towel to the tiny bathroom and buttoned his borrowed shirt.
Chapter 10
Sabrina came out of a dreamless sleep to a room filled with warm, summer sun. Stretching, she let her gaze drift with sleepy curiosity to the alarm clock beside the bed.
Her eyes widened. No way! It couldn’t possibly be six-forty! She blinked, shot a look at the window, and gasped at the slanting rays that cut at a sharp angle across the room.
Disbelief rattled into dismay. She rolled upright in the bed, frowning at the pull of a sore muscle. Her hand went to the small of her back as the sharp ache pierced her lingering grogginess. Like a kaleidoscope, fractured images clicked into place in her mind. The motor court. The falling roof. The man who’d pulled her from under the debris and made fierce, wicked love with her.
Her stomach hollowed as the images rolled on. The hot sun. The endless blue sky. Jack’s sweat-slicked body locked with hers.
Jack!
Her heart thumping, Sabrina listened for some sounds of his presence. All she heard was a faint drip from the shower.
“Jack?”
Flustered by the late hour and the silence, she pushed off the bed. It took only a moment or two to ascertain that he had left. Sabrina stood m the living room, staring at the salvaged light fixtures, the shabby dressing table, and the dented poster of Jean Harlowe that Jack had stacked just inside her front door. Clenching her fists, she fought bitter waves of disappointment.
“Don’t be stupid,” she muttered fiercely, spinning around to head back to the bedroom. “The man has a corporation to run. A home to go back to.”
And a busy, jet-set life that didn’t include her.
Still, a goodbye would have been nice, or so she info
rmed the dust-streaked face that frowned back at her from the bathroom mirror.
A goodbye and an indication, however casual, that he wanted to see her again.
More hurt than she was willing to admit, Sabrina set about removing all traces of the afternoon’s tumultuous events. Ten minutes later, she rushed through the kitchen and slammed the door shut behind her. The few miles to the diner sped by while Sabrina reminded herself that neither she nor Jack had made any promises, that what happened was as much her doing as his. She’d practically attacked the man this afternoon.
Sighing, she whipped into the diner’s still-crowded parking lot. Guilt at having left Hank and Peg in a lurch during the supper rush had her skimming her Mazda into a convenient space between two eighteen-wheelers instead of weaving around to her usual spot in the rear lot.
She hurried up the steps and through the front door. With a smile to a few of her regulars, she wove through the noisy crowd. She spotted her boss peering through the backlog of orders stacked up on the pass-through from the kitchen.
“Hi, Hank. I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to be gone this long.”
He gummed his cigar from one corner of his mouth to the other. “We managed, although I’m sure glad that sub who came in to cover for you doesn’t have to make a living waiting tables.”
Thinking he referred to the high schooler who worked part-time, Sabrina winced. “She couldn’t handle the crowd, huh?”
“Oh, the crowd’s not the problem. It’s...”
The sound of a plate smashing onto the tile floor had them both flinching.
“It’s that,” Hank finished dryly.
“I’m sorry,” she said again. Stashing her purse under the counter, she grabbed a broom and dustpan from behind the kitchen door. “I’ll help get that cleaned up and start working those backed-up orders. Just give me...”
Sabrina took only a step, then stopped in her tracks. Her jaw sagging, she gaped at the apron-clad figure hunkered down beside one of the booths. Under the apron he wore one of her father’s old denim work shirts that she had appropriated to study and sleep in. He must have filched it from her bedroom, she thought dazedly.
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