“Noah?”
Her voice roused his senses. It pricked his memory. “Lucy?”
“Yes, it’s me. Thank God, you’re okay.”
Okay? He was anything but okay. She was bending over him, stroking his face, and he could feel the feathery curls of her pubis tickling his skin with every move.
“Lucy,” he whispered, “get me out of these jeans. I need to breathe. I need to breathe with you.”
She seemed to hesitate, but he had no idea why. The flickering candles made it difficult to see anything. “Lucy, did you hear me?”
She didn’t answer, and he fell back, exhausted, his mind swirling.
“Shhhh,” Lucy whispered, trying to calm him. She’d heard him, but she didn’t know quite what to make of his request. She was so crazy, out-of-her-mind thrilled to have him back—to have him alive—that she would have done anything. If he wanted out of his jeans, she would get him out of them. Maybe they’d twisted up and were cutting off his circulation.
“Just a minute,” she told him, crawling backward down his body.
His anguished moan startled her. “Did I hurt you?” she asked.
“Wait!” He gripped her by the arms with surprising strength and drew her back to him. “I can’t let you go. Don’t leave me yet.”
“I’m not leaving.” She hushed him, trying to soothe his fears. “You’re all right. You’re going to be fine.”
“No, I’m not, Lucy. Not without you.”
He caressed her face and lifted on one elbow to whisper something to her, but all she could hear was the rush of his breath as his mouth came perilously close to hers.
It felt as if they were kissing, the way their lips parted and their eyes drifted shut, kissing yet not kissing, playing with fire. God, how she wanted that. The kiss. The fire. She’d just had her mouth all over him, but that was different. This felt thick with promise, hot and sexual, and it gave her uncontrollable shivers. They darted like fireflies in the pit of her stomach.
She tried to pull back, but he wouldn’t let her go. “Lucy, no, I need you.”
He was making her flushed and dizzy. She needed some space. “Let me undo your jeans,” she said.
He drew her against his mouth, moaning, and she wanted to fall into his arms and never fall out. Their lips touched, and she heard a tiny cry form in her throat. It nearly undid her, that utterance. She’d never made a sound like that in her life.
“Let me go,” she said, dragging herself up.
He released her and she moved off him with an awkward lunge, thinking that she could help him with his jeans and be gone. Move away, out of the force field they’d created, run from the storm.
She had no idea that she would find him fully aroused. An enormous bulge had stretched his jeans tight. You could see detail through the material. “Noah, you’re—I can’t.”
He pulled her into his arms, and they rolled over from the force of it. She landed on her back, with him looming above her. “I need you,” he said, breathing the words. “I need to be inside you.”
Her stomach clutched, and the fireflies swarmed, going wild. They were too bright to bear. Too sharp. That sound again. It quavered in her throat, and he heard it.
“Jesus, Lucy.”
She reached up to touch his mouth, and air, warm from his lungs, flowed through her fingers. In that split second, she must have made a decision without even realizing she’d done it. She could run from the storm or let herself be taken by it. His kiss represented everything she feared. It was inviting disaster, a flirtation with death, and the only way she could come back to life. The alternative was limbo, and that’s where she’d been since her father left.
She must have known that because when Noah tugged her to a sitting position, she met his gaze unflinchingly, and then she put her hands in the air. She raised them high, letting him strip her of all clothing, all protection.
A moment later, she sat naked in the candle flame, blushing under his gaze. She could feel the gooseflesh pricking her skin—and he could see it. Yes, he made her shiver. Yes, she wanted that feeling. But God, it was fierce. This was more than just pleasure. It verged on pain—and she felt completely alive.
Now the air was pouring in and out of him. He could have been breathing fire.
She fell back, throwing her arms above her head, and he moved over her like a gathering storm.
She was prepared for force and fury, prepared to be flung into the void, but he was astonishingly gentle. There was plenty of fury contained in his touch, but it was tempered with a reverence that brought a mist to her eyes.
“Now this is beauty,” he told her, taking in her figure.
Stretched out in the firelight, she was a long, flickering flame. Her breasts gleamed like honey. “And these are sweetness,” he said as he bent to taste them. His lips were like bees, drinking up the nectar. She wanted them to sting her and make her gasp. But he stopped too quickly, leaving her nipples wet and taut, aching for more. Still, it was good. This was what she had missed in her life, the lovely agony of needing.
She did nothing more than lie there, gazing up at him as he used his fingers to trace the golden contours of her breasts, one at a time, purling along the voluptuous outer curves. Odd that she felt it even more intensely when he stopped. Her flesh reached for him, yearning.
He left her long enough to slip out of his shirt and jeans. She glanced at his body in the firelight, but it was more than she could handle at the moment. Her own nakedness still shocked her a little. Her heart couldn’t stand the impact of his, too. He was strikingly built, but she’d known he would be. She’d never seen longer, stronger legs. And his butt could have been sculpted from marble.
Noah noticed her looking at him, or rather, trying hard not to look, and once he had the clothes off he dropped down beside her to save her any more discomfort. She would become familiar with his body soon enough. He didn’t want to frighten her, at least not in that way. Would he love to terrify her with the raw passion of their coupling? Would he love to terrify the hell out of both of them? Yes. And the way his heart was pounding and his muscles throbbing, it shouldn’t be too difficult.
He captured her mouth with his and lowered his weight onto her. Her hands were already above her head, but he covered them, which gave the illusion of rendering her helpless. The way her eyes glittered told him she was excited. But the scent she gave off was tinged with fear and trepidation, all of it mingling to create an intoxicating female musk.
Her body was a mystery to him. She had secret places he’d never touched, never seen. He wanted to search out every one of them and shower her with pleasure, but the drive to be a part of her was too powerful. Especially when she dug her fingers into his flesh and urged him to enter her. Her legs surrounded him, gripping him tightly, and he was so hard, so ready, he ached.
If he didn’t slow this down, he was going to be inside her, all the way inside, where everything was mindless bliss. At this rate it would all be out of his control.
He took the control back, lifting himself above her and extending his arms to their full length.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I don’t want to lose my mind, not yet.”
She reached up and raked his face with her nails. “We’ve both lost our minds. Maybe we’re supposed to.”
Her hand dropped to his shaft, stroking it and guiding it into her.
Noah groaned at the beauty of her touch, at the fire that blazed through his veins. His body was a live, hot wire. His penis throbbed. Nestled in her moist, sweet nest, it inched toward heaven with a will of its own.
He dropped to his elbows and thrust deep, deeper.
Lucy fell back, taking him, loving it. He kissed her mouth as he entered her body, and their breath mingled like wind and water. She choked back a sob. She couldn’t have waited. She was too terrified that something might happen, she might change her mind. She’d been known to do that.
“God, I’m inside,” he whi
spered.
“You’re inside,” she echoed. Joy coursed through her, deepening as he began to thrust. He was the storm. He was life, dangerous and sweet.
LUCY woke up to the realization that her ankles were freezing. She was lying on the floor on her side, her arm draped over her head, and her bare feet sticking out from under the covers. She didn’t remember there being any covers when she fell asleep. She didn’t remember falling asleep. Unfortunately, she did remember how she got on the floor.
“Oh, Luce,” she whispered, her voice cracking, “what have you done?”
Probably no coincidence that she’d used her mother’s term of endearment. She was in trouble. She wasn’t clearheaded enough to grasp exactly how much trouble, but her thoughts were making her dizzy, so she pulled her feet back under the blanket and took a moment to get her bearings before doing anything else. She honestly had no idea what awaited her out there, and she’d had a tendency lately to cross without looking both ways, so she was taking it slow this morning. She didn’t even know whether or not she had an overnight guest.
The house seemed unusually quiet, but maybe he was asleep on the floor behind her. She had an image of him sprawled naked in all his magnificence—and he had some of that going for him, magnificence. More than his share, actually. He’d taken her to places she’d never even dreamed of, the grand tour, and she hadn’t wanted to come back. He’d be the perfect man to run away with . . . if only she were a woman who could run away.
She rolled to her back and looked around.
He wasn’t lying next to her, behind her, or anywhere in the room that she could see. She was alone, but there was plenty of evidence that he’d been there. The overturned hassock, her discarded T-shirt, the array of candles, now dark. She hadn’t dreamed about the laundry room experience or his near electrocution or any of the rest of it. The house still smelled of smoking wires and dripping wax.
She sat up slowly, drawing the blanket around her and wondering where it had come from. The soft claret-red material could have been cashmere. She spotted a label and took a quick look. It was cashmere—pashmina. The entire thing was bordered with a graceful red silk fringe that was extraordinarily long and dense. It wasn’t a blanket, she realized. It was a very large shawl.
Wrapping herself in the deliciously soft cape, she went to get her T-shirt, then glanced around to make sure she was alone before she made the exchange. She slipped on the shirt and as an afterthought, tied the shawl around her waist, for modesty as well as warmth. Her ankles were still icy.
Not a fashion statement, she admitted. But at least she felt slightly more equal to dealing with the aftermath of . . . what? What did she call last night? An accident? A blackout in every possible sense of the word? Fate? She just didn’t know, and his disappearance didn’t help. They couldn’t even talk about what it had meant.
Where had he gone?
She made a quick search of the house, but didn’t find him. She didn’t know how to feel as she walked back to the living room, but she found it damn hard to breathe. Only as she entered the room did she see the package that sat on the couch.
It was gift-wrapped, but looked as if it had been opened. The card lying next to it had her name inscribed on the envelope.
A thrill shot through her as she rushed to pick it up. She slid her finger inside the envelope flap and ripped it open. It had to be from him.
She read the note aloud, her voice unsteady.
A warm shawl and a decanter of French fire to help with those goose bumps.
Love, Noah
He’d handwritten a P.S. at the bottom: I had an early call, but don’t worry, your wiring’s good.
Love? He’d signed it love.
Now she knew how to feel. Giddy. Stupid. Happy.
Oh, jeez, she was happy. That was terrible. It required justifying and explaining. Tortuous soul-searching. How could she be happy under these circumstances? It was like trying to be happy about your toothache because you didn’t want to go to the dentist.
Was that how she viewed her marriage, as a trip to the dentist?
She touched the cashmere wrapped around her waist. Noah must have opened the package before he left so that he could cover her with the shawl. A pretty sweet thing to do, she had to admit. The man was beginning to show some list potential. If she recalled correctly, “sweet and attentive” was number six.
She glanced at his note, curious about the second gift, French fire. A search through the popcorn-filled box turned up a bottle of aged cognac in a beautiful Limoges decanter.
“This is too much,” she whispered.
When had he bought these gifts? Why had he bought them? She really didn’t understand his motives, but maybe that wasn’t the point. She needed to be questioning her own motives. Why was she making such crazy choices?
Clearly she’d given in to another impulse, but why had that seemed like a good thing last night and a bad thing this morning? Probably because it wasn’t her. Lucy Sexton didn’t do things like that. She didn’t make reckless choices. She always knew exactly what she was doing and why. She’d planned her life exactly the way she’d planned her wedding, with nothing left to chance.
She could have explained everything she’d done since the age of eleven to the satisfaction of anyone who cared to listen. She had reasons for what she did. But she couldn’t explain this at all. It was a blackout. It negated everything that was normal and familiar to her. Was she trying to sabotage her relationship with Frederick? Did she want out of the wedding? If she was looking for an excuse, this was a doozy.
“What time is it?” She hugged the cognac bottle. “Too early for a drink?”
She heard a phone ringing faintly in the distance and wondered if she was imagining it. Why would anyone be calling her so early? It was the cell phone in her bedroom, and she dashed to answer it, but by the time she got there, she’d begun to suspect that it wasn’t early. Her clocks were running, but they were hours late from having been off all night. Her cell—which was lying on the floor where she’d left it—said it was nearly ten-thirty. Cells didn’t require electricity, so it was probably right, which made her all the more reluctant to answer the phone. The number in the display said it was her office calling, possibly even her mother.
Lucy was relieved to hear her assistant’s voice.
“What’s going on?” Valerie asked. “Why aren’t you answering your phones? You have new clients due here in fifteen minutes!”
“I lost the cell last night, and the other phones haven’t rung.” Lucy checked to make sure her land line was on the hook. “I had a power outage. It probably knocked the land line out of commission. I’ll have to reset the phones.”
“Are you okay?” Valerie asked. “Can you get over here? I can stall your clients for awhile.”
Lucy had poured her life into Sexton Mediation. She hadn’t missed an important meeting since they started the company. Racked with guilt and remorse, she said, “I can’t do it, Valerie. I’m not . . . well.”
“You’re sick? Lucy, you’re never sick. What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” She sighed. It was the truth. “Would you ask my paralegal to take my place at the meeting? It’s a standard intake so there shouldn’t be a problem. Anna’s smarter than I am anyway. If she’s not available, get Mom, but don’t tell her I’m sick. I don’t want her to worry.”
“What shall I tell her?”
“You can come up with something, Valerie, please. Be creative.”
Valerie reluctantly agreed, but as Lucy hung up the phone she felt like an escaped convict. She’d bought herself some time, but what was she going to do with it? Rethink her entire life? Frederick was coming back today, and she would have to face him sooner or later.
She pulled the shawl from her waist and wrapped it around her shoulders, then went back to the living room. Drawn to the place where she and Noah had been, she sat nearby on the rug, wrapped in her shawl and holding on to the bottle of cognac.
For the longest time she wasn’t able to do anything, even think, but the fact that she had surrounded herself with Noah and his gifts to her told her something. Maybe she couldn’t figure it all out. Maybe she would never be able to understand, but she couldn’t dismiss what happened. There had been extenuating circumstances. She’d thought Noah was dead, and she’d been overjoyed when he took that first breath, but that wasn’t the only reason they’d ended up in each other’s arms. Something in her had wanted it, needed it, and allowed it. This wasn’t really about Noah. It wasn’t even about her relationship with Frederick. It was about Lucy Sexton. That’s where everything began and ended. And that’s where she had to look for the answers.
Some time later, it all began to come together for her. Still immersed in thought, she sat cross-legged on the floor, nodding her head at the idea that had taken hold. As much as it frightened her, she knew she’d hit on something significant.
And suddenly it was clear what she should do to resolve at least part of this nightmare. She just didn’t know whether or not she could.
A sharp series of raps at the door brought Lucy out of her thoughts. She considered ignoring the insistent noise the way she’d been ignoring the cell phone all morning. She hadn’t taken the time to fix the land line, either. She didn’t want to talk to the office, her mother, or Frederick. Nor did she want to get another electrical shock. But mostly she was afraid it might be Noah, and she didn’t know what to say to him. She was also a little worried about what he might have to say to her, maybe because she had no clue what that would be.
This could be him at the door. But she couldn’t hide forever.
She was gathering herself to get up when she heard a key turn in the lock. She froze, staring at the door. Who had a key to her house? That could only be her mother or—
“Frederick?”
The door swung open, and her fiancé barged in, coming to a halt when he saw her. “Are you all right, Lucy? I’ve been trying to call you since I got back.”
Man of My Dreams Page 23