MARRIAGE MATERIAL Page 14

  Was he just grieving, was that what this weird loneliness was about? Was he realizing nothing lasted forever, that sooner or later it came down to the ties you made in your life? It was certainly one of the reasons he'd come back to Red Creek. He'd grown tired of being the alien, had wanted to come back to his own place, to the place where he knew things, knew the sky and the trees and the bugs and the smells.

  Maybe his wish for Tamara was just another part of that. She was a hometown girl, the kind of girl a wild boy didn't notice, but got to wanting as he got older and realized he wasn't going to be young forever.

  Abruptly, her porch light went off. It spurred Lance to action. He found himself moving up the walk, and almost rang the bell before he remembered Cody was sleeping, and knocked instead. There was an urgency in the sound of his hand against her screen door, and he stepped back, appalled. What was he doing?

  Then she opened the door, and he knew. Her face was bare of makeup, and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she wore only a flannel shirt and jeans and socks. Ordinary things. And just looking at her took his breath away. It took him long moments to gather enough air to speak. Tamara simply looked at him with wariness and hunger in her big green eyes, a wistfulness on her mouth.

  At last he found his voice, though it was a roughened version. "Can I come in?"

  * * *

  Tamara stared at him with a mingling of terror and joy. His hair was damp with melted snow, and in his eyelashes, some of the thick flakes had stuck, giving his eyes a starry look. There was no smile on his mouth, no gleam in his eye. She might have been able to resist that.

  Instead, he wore tonight the same expression that had torn away her defenses the night of his father's funeral. Lost. Lonely. Adrift. In desperate need of comfort and unable to ask it.

  She pushed open the screen door and let him in.

  He didn't even close the door—just flowed to her and gathered her close, so very close, and kissed her. His mouth was cold and his nose nudged her cheek with an icy touch and his down jacket still held the winter night, but it didn't matter. His kiss was hot, and his arms were enveloping and she sensed he would inhale her like oxygen if he could.

  No one had ever wanted her in her whole life the way Lance wanted her right then. And she'd never wanted so much to give anyone like she wanted to give him herself.

  Gently she moved away from him long enough to close the door. When she threw the dead bolt, he made a small, pained sound, and reached for her again. And again, she felt a sense of being wrapped, enfolded, truly embraced as he pulled her against his big, long body. He buried his face in her hair. "Oh, Tamara, I want you," he whispered. "So much. Don't send me away again. Let me love you."

  She lifted her head and put her hands on his cold face, and pulled his head down to kiss him. "I won't," she promised. "I couldn't."

  With a rough groan, he kissed her. And it was an almost violent kiss—bruising teeth and fierce thrusts and a drawing, hungriness that set her blood aflame. She tilted her head to meet him with the same unfettered passion, pushing his coat from his shoulders. He let her tug it off his arms and let it fall to the floor without breaking the kiss. He touched her body, his hands roaming her back and her buttocks and her thighs and her waist, up to her head and down again, as if he would touch her everywhere simultaneously if he could.

  Tamara let everything go. Everything. For this one night, she was free of past or future, of hopes or wishes or dreams. There was only Lance, so beautiful and wounded and lost, needing her like she had never been needed, nor expected she ever would be again. Here was a man who asked nothing but her pleasure, who promised nothing but a full enjoyment of her passion.

  And passion she had. Oh, yes. It rushed through her limbs and into her throat and mouth. It swelled in her breasts and between her legs. It made her hands tingle with the need to feel his supple skin.

  She let her inhibitions fall away. Let herself feel him, all of him. His muscular back and the broad shoulders and his upper arms, so thick with his work. She kissed his clean-shaven, hard-cut chin and his neck that smelled of pine and snow and night, and the light furring of hair on his chest.

  With a sudden, swift move, he picked her up. "I want you in a bed, where it's warm and comfortable. Tell me where."

  Tamara pointed. "I can walk."

  "Not tonight," he said, and carried her through the living room and down the hall to her room. It was dark. He put her on the bed, and Tamara felt a strange, pulsing anticipation as he reached for the small bedside lamp.

  She had no time to protest. He tumbled her backward and straddled her thighs. The aggressive gesture thrilled her, and her breath caught high in her throat as she reached for him.

  He caught her hands. "No, let me touch you." His hair fell forward around his face as he reached for the buttons on her shirt. Tamara, sensing his need, dug her fingers into the comforter, grabbing fistfuls so she could remain still.

  He took his time. One button at time, with no hurry, until they were all open, and she felt a slice of air touch her stomach and chest. With a single gesture of both hands, he pushed the fabric away.

  She watched him as he touched her stomach lightly, putting his palm against her belly. The expression on his face made her remember the night he'd kissed her outside the bar, as if he was truly seeing her, making himself slow down enough to be truly present in that very moment.

  But it was not easy to simply lie there, her hands to her sides, as he knelt above her looking windblown and glorious with his tousled hair and broad shoulders and thick, powerful thighs holding her own immobile.

  It was not easy to remain still when he reached for the front clasp of her bra and unhooked it, and then let the fabric lie there, as if he prepared himself for some greatly anticipated wish. She closed her eyes in a torrent of pleasure when he slid his hands under that scrap of fabric, brushing her aching nipples lightly, and pushed the bra away.

  For long moments, only air and his gaze touched her, both swirling over flesh unused to such attention. She clutched huge handfuls of the comforter in her fists, and opened her eyes, afraid of what she would see.

  "I wanted to see you like this, in the light," he said raggedly. "And touch you." To illustrate, he stroked each risen nipple with the tips of his index fingers. "I wanted to see your face when I did it," he said.

  She met his gaze with effort, that blue, burning, hungry gaze. And all at once, she was fiercely glad to be with him like this, to see him shredded with desire for her. She reached for his thighs and curled her hands around them. "Lance," she whispered, "please—"

  He bent over and kissed her, and his open shirt billowed out, letting his chest meet hers in an erotic brush of hair and masculine heat against soft female skin. He moved down her neck, to her breasts. "You're all I've thought about," he said. "For days. I can't sleep."

  She clasped him to her, so overwhelmed with desire she wanted the clothes out of their way. "Please, Lance, I want to be naked with you. Take off these clothes."

  He lifted himself up, still straddling her, and took off his shirt. Tamara touched his smooth, hard stomach. "You are the beautiful one," she whispered. And wickedly, she smiled and let her hands fall lower, to stroke his rigid member through his jeans. He made a low sound, and his eyes closed, and she drank in the way his face looked now, sensually hazed and extraordinarily beautiful.

  He caught her hands and bent forward, pinning her completely, her hands on either side of her head, his legs firmly trapping hers, and kissed her. His chest rubbed her breasts, and she arched a little against him, needed more. He kissed her chin, and her throat, her collarbone and her chest.

  And at last he opened his mouth on her breast, hot and wet and wild. The sensation was so fierce, Tamara cried out softly. She freed her arms and he cupped her breasts, lifting them to his tantalizing tongue and lips, to the swirl and suckle and gentle nip of his mouth. His blond hair fell around his face and touched her flesh, and Tamara thought she could gl
adly die, right then and there.

  The urgency in her grew, and she could not bear to go so slowly. She reached for the button of his jeans. "Let's take off the rest of our clothes," she said.

  "Oh, yeah." With a quick movement, he stood up and stripped off his jeans so fast, Tamara had barely shed her shirt and tangled bra before he was finished.

  And then she couldn't move because she forgot what she was doing when he stood in front of her, splendidly nude. She could only stare.

  "Oh, my," she whispered. He looked like a painting. Yellow lamplight caught on his exquisitely carved shoulders, and flowed down his torso, glinting against the golden hair scattered in an artful dusting on his chest. He was as golden as a god, made of sunlight and an exotic grace that seemed born of mountain winds. Even the sight of his arousal, full and slightly foolish and erotic all at once, only added to the almost painful impact of his beauty.

  Her heart ached with it, and she felt she could not breathe, unless it was to breathe in Lance. The ache grew when she saw he stood there a little shyly, not proud and cocky as she might have expected. He waited, limbs loose, for her reaction, as if he were not sure she would be pleased.

  She raised her eyes to his face, and let her wicked thoughts show on her face. "I don't suppose you'd consider just standing there so I could admire you awhile, would you?"

  He smiled, his eyes lighting with that sweet brightness that was boyish and freeing and so alive. He dived toward her, tumbling her backward in his naked embrace, covering her with his long, warm body. "I bet we can think of something better to do than that."

  Tamara wanted to burst then, burst with the feeling of him all around her, his hair against her cheek, his lips skating over her jaw and her neck, his hands restless, stroking her arms and her back and her stomach. She clasped him close to her, inhaling the scent of his warm skin, touching his hair and his strong back and the erotic round of his forearm, hot and threaded with a thick, pulsing vein.

  "I need you, Tamara," he said in a rough voice, his fingers on the waistband of her jeans. "I want to see you, feel all of you."

  "Oh, yes," she whispered.

  Deftly, he stripped her of her jeans and panties. When she was as bare as he, Lance paused, moving his hand up her bare thigh, over her hipbone and waist. He lowered his sun-gilded head and kissed her breasts. "You're so beautiful," he said quietly, and lifted his head to look at her. There was a great solemnity in his gaze. "I wish I knew some poetry right now."

  Tamara's heart caught. She opened her hand on his hard cheek. "You're poetry enough."

  He kissed her, deeply, passionately, with that same hungry need that had inflamed her earlier. He caught her body close to his, tangling his legs and hers, wrapping her in his arms. Any play that there had been between them fell away, leaving only raw need, pure and intimate and overwhelming. Tamara let herself flow toward him, let her heart and mind and soul become enmeshed in the fierceness of his need, of her need.

  When he moved over her, sliding his legs between her thighs, there came a quiet between them. Bracing himself on his elbows, he kissed her very gently, and plucked a condom from the pillow where he'd put it. "Will you do the honors?"

  "Yes." There was a fine trembling in his limbs. She took the condom from his hands. He sat up to allow her to adorn him, and for one devastating moment, Tamara was overcome with him—with the feeling of him so close, and the expanse of his heated chest so close to her face, and the vulnerable trembling she felt all through him. She swayed forward and kissed his ribs, right over his heart. "Come home, Lance," she whispered, and drew him down with her, opening herself to him.

  And she realized then that she was shaking, too, as if she were afraid. She trembled with such violence and aching want, that for a moment, she wanted to weep with it. Then Lance was around her, over her, in her. He moved with exquisite control, sheathing himself to the hilt. And stopped.

  He lifted his head and pressed an achingly gentle kiss against her lips. His blue irises were unstable, rolling with a thousand things Tamara could not read, and she had the sense that he wanted to speak, to say something, but instead he closed his eyes, supped again of her lips and began to move within her, his hands clasped with fierce gentleness around her head.

  Tamara could not think, could not breathe. She only moved with him, marveling at the fit of him to her, as his lips had fit hers, as his hands had fit her breasts. It was the most perfect moment she could imagine, embracing him deeply. Her precious, gilded, lost Lance.

  And as they moved, deeper and closer, yearning for wholeness, Tamara realized with an almost piercing sorrow that she loved him. As she tumbled into completion, feeling him come apart within her, she bit her lip to keep from crying out the words, and only clasped him tightly to her, his head against her neck.

  Because she could not love him. She could not.

  * * *

  Lance did not go home. He stayed in Tamara's bed all night, holding her, loving her, until both of them fell into a sated sleep.

  Near morning, something awakened him, and he jolted awake into the stillness of the dawn. Cold, snow-tinted light pushed at the curtains over her windows, but he was warm next to Tamara. She slept on her side, her back to him, nestled close, and he had his arms around her. It was incredibly satisfying to simply wake up here, cozy under a heavy quilt, with Tamara in his arms.

  He closed his eyes with a sigh, pressing his forehead against the flesh between her shoulder blades. Her skin smelled faintly of their mingled scents, and it was soft against his brow. He simply reveled in the feeling, the sweet, deep sense of relief he felt, and hoped he could go back to sleep.

  But he couldn't. He was too aware of her alluring nakedness, her soft skin just under his palms, the warm weight of a breast pushing against his forearm. He eased away, trying to resist the temptation to kiss her awake, and propped himself up on one elbow to watch her sleep.

  Pale light caught on her dark hair and made pearlescent tracks over her flesh. He let his gaze wash over the curve of her neck and the vulnerable place just below her ear. The lines of her back, the long curve of her spine and the exquisite arch of her shoulder blades, seemed at once to be almost unbearably graceful, and it was those simple lines that proved his undoing. At first he only touched her spine with his finger, very lightly, and traced the shoulder blades.

  But then he wanted to put his mouth against them, and he moved close to do it, just putting his mouth gently against each tiny rise, tracing her spine to the back of her neck. In sleep, she moved a little, nudging her bottom closer to him, bumping his arousal. Drawn by almost narcotic longing, he moved his mouth to her shoulder, then to the vulnerable place on her neck. She made a soft sigh and he ceased, waiting to see if she was awakening, but she was not. She only moved restlessly, and her foot moved against his shin.

  But her movements had put one rosy-crowned breast within reach. He bent his head to that crown and tasted it slowly, closing his eyes so only his mouth and her nipple existed. She shifted, and her hand fell in his hair, pulling him closer. He loved the taste of her, and let her know it, not hurrying, just tasting and nudging and rolling her flesh in his mouth, loving the low sounds of pleasure she made.

  She turned toward him, sleepily awake now. "Lance," she whispered. "Cody will be awake any minute. We have to stop."

  He pressed his face to the soft, fragrant valley between her breasts. "Okay," he whispered, kissing her lightly. He moved his hand down her belly, down to the soft curls there, and slid his fingers between her legs, careful to be gentle. "One more time, to remember tonight," he said, and it was a much more ragged sound than he would have liked. One more time for her? Or for him?

  He found her moist and ready, and he felt a jolt of almost dizzying need. She was the most responsive woman he'd ever known—deeply, genuinely passionate. And she didn't take it all too seriously. All night she laughed and teased with him.

  As she did now. She moved closer, touching his chest. "Well, if you insi
st," she said. Her hand closed around him.

  "I don't have any more condoms," he said, aching with the need to be in her one more time. Just one more time this morning—to see him through until tonight.

  She gasped softly as he captured a nipple that strayed close to his mouth, too close and tempting to resist. He grazed it with his teeth and she arched against him, her hand closing alluringly around him, making him groan.

  "We'll just have to make do, then, won't we?"

  And they did.

  And this time, laying sated in her arms, Lance finally realized he was in trouble. Big trouble. Tamara Flynn was intelligent and strong and sexy. She had a sense of humor and a bawdy spirit that he doubted would ever tire him.

  She was exactly the kind of woman he always avoided. The kind of woman he didn't want to hurt with his wandering ways. The kind of woman who deserved a lot better than Lance could give.

  And he'd taken her anyway, had given implicit promises he could never keep. A woman like this didn't sleep with a man for fun. She didn't just take a lover for the heck of it. Women like Tamara saved themselves for a good man, a man who would care for her and love her and her children for the rest of his life.

  With a crushing sense of despair, he realized she was already a single mother. Some other man had done this to her in the past. Someone had loved her and left her, leaving her to bear the consequences of that passion alone.

  Some other man. The thought of it gave him a sick feeling. He felt murderous and jealous and trapped all in the same moment.

  What a dog he was! Like a greedy rake, Lance had been unable to resist seducing her. Instead of simply allowing himself to enjoy her goodness, accept her friendship, he'd had to take it all.

  Guilt washed through him with a doomed clang.

  "Lance?" she said next to him, smoothing a lock of hair from his forehead. There was bewilderment in the word.