Captive Kisses (Sweetly Contemporary Collection) (19 page)

Once she met Charles’s gaze across the width of the table,
puzzlement in the depths of her eyes. The smile he gave her was warm with
reassurance. There was also a caressing quality about it, as if he enjoyed the
picture she presented with her scooped-neck tank top over her jeans, her cheeks
flushed from the heat of cooking, and the soft waves of her freshly shampooed
hair drawn back from her face with a blue ribbon.

She lowered her lashes, staring at the food on her plate,
pushing it this way and that. Swallowing hard on the tightness in her throat,
she looked up again. “Charles —”

“Not now, Kelly. Someday I will answer anything you care to
ask, but not now.”

The quiet tone of his voice sent a flutter of alarm along
her nerves. The muscles of her stomach tightened, and she knew a prickling
sensation at the base of her neck, as though she were being watched. The
stillness in the dark regard of the man across the table seemed to form a pact
between them, one completed as she nodded in acceptance of his terms. And yet,
his concession did nothing to ease the edginess that held her in its grip.

Kelly got up from the table at last, and taking her plate and
utensils, carried them to the sink. She rinsed them under running water, then
put the stopper in the sink to catch hot water for the dishes. Charles crossed
the room behind her, bringing his own plate and glass, as well as the bowl of
rice.

Kelly gave him a quick glance, “I can manage alone. You don’t
have to help.”

“If you do it by yourself, that means it will be twice as
long before you can join me.” As she started to protest, he added, “And I
prefer to have you with me as much as possible.”

There was something different about him tonight. He was
controlled as always, but still there was a suppressed recklessness in his
eyes, as if he chafed under the bonds of civilized behavior. As he stood close
to her, she could sense the emanation of vibrant life electrifying in its
strength. She had the feeling that if she made the slightest move toward him,
or even if she stood still so near him, he would take her in his arms without
regard for the consequences. It was with a great effort that she forced her
stiff body to turn away, to reach for the dishwashing liquid and turn off the
still-running water.

The moment passed, but it could not quite be put behind
them. When they had finished in the kitchen and retired to the living room, he
poured glasses of white wine for them both, then put a stack of records on the
stereo, most of them Mrs. Kavanaugh’s instrumentals from the forties. Smiling
blandly, though with a devilish glint in his eyes, he drew her to her feet and
out into the clear center of the floor. They danced to the slow and sentimental
music as in a trance, moving in perfect unison. His hold was light and yet
firm, his lead without hesitation. As one, they let the music guide them,
relinquishing cerebral control for the ancient pleasure and grace of body rhythm.

His arms were a haven, immensely comforting, affecting her
with a feeling of belonging that disturbed her. She drew back once to stare at
him, a half-smile without coquetry curving the pure lines of her mouth. On a
harsh, indrawn breath, he drew her back against him.

Still, even in their self-absorption, they were neither of
them quite oblivious of the still darkness of the night beyond the uncovered
windows.

The record changed. The soft melodies to which they had been
moving were replaced by the faster tempo of a disco album, one Mary must have
left behind. The sound was louder and more frantic. It seemed to vibrate
through the house with a self-perpetuating tension. Keeping up with it, and
with Charles, was an exciting challenge. It was also tiring and thirsty work.
Kelly was glad when the last pulsing beat died away and she could catch her
breath while they sipped their wine.

Charles drained his glass, then stood turning it in his
hand. “Kelly,” he began.

She flicked a quick glance from the windows to the hallway
that led to the back bedrooms. Suddenly, she could not stand to be where she
was another minute. She set her wine glass down with a sharp click. “Shall we
go outside for a little air?” she interrupted.

“I don’t think —” he began, but she had already surged to
her feet. Moving to the door, she pulled it open and stepped out into the
deep-shadowed stillness of the veranda.

The moon was rising, a sickle moon that seemed to have its
lower horn caught on the trees. It shed its pale radiance over the water,
turning it into a silver mirror framed by the spiky black forms of the trees.
She turned her footsteps in the direction of the porch swing. By the time she
had reached it, Charles had closed the front door she had left standing open
and moved to where she was, standing ready to take a seat beside her.

Kelly moved over to give him room. He stopped her with a
touch on her shoulder, dropping down close beside her. In an effort to dispel
her tenseness, she inhaled, filling her lungs before she let the air out
slowly. There seemed to be a freshness in the night breeze that had been
missing before, an intimation of fall.

“Does it seem cooler to you tonight?” she asked.

“A little,” he agreed. He stretched his long legs out,
setting the swing into motion, while at the same time he extended one arm along
the seat at her back.

“In less than two weeks the summer will be officially over.”

“So it will.”

“Four more days, and I am supposed to be back at work.”

“You would like to know if there is any chance you will be
there?” he queried, his voice coming low beside her.

“Something like that.” She kept her tone quiet and
reasonable with an effort.

“You can leave here tomorrow, if you like.”

She turned to look at him in the dimness lit only by the
glow from the windows. “Do you mean it?”

“I’m not in the habit of saying things I don’t mean.”

The payoff must have come then, or else he was expecting
George to bring it with him when he returned. “I suppose you will be leaving
too?”

“Yes.”

It was over. She wanted to feel relief, the relaxing of her
tightly guarded defenses. She could not. She was aware of the slow seep of
tiredness through her muscles, along with a niggling feeling that it was too
easy, there was something more involved, something she had overlooked.

“Before you go, I would like to tell you once more how much
I regret what happened here.”

“It doesn’t matter.” The conventional words rose to her
tongue of their own accord. Once spoken, she found they were true.

“It does matter,” he said, swinging toward her. “It matters
because what happened affects the way you feel. It matters because everything
started out wrong, because I want desperately to set things right and there is
no other way I can convince you to let me try. Dear God —”

There was the raw note of a prayer in his last words, and
then he reached to pull her to him. His lips burned on hers with the fever of
his longing. They tasted of wine and remorse and the sweetness of leashed
desire. His arms around her were steely in their strength. Kelly felt the leap
of the blood in her veins, felt her senses reel. She knew herself to be
slipping into a sensuous lassitude where time and place and purpose ceased to
exist, and did nothing to stop it. There was no resistance in her hands as she
lifted them to his shoulders. As his loss deepened, her soft lips parted. She
felt his hands smoothing over her back, drawing her closer. His fingers touched
the nape of her neck, tangling in the soft mass of her hair before they trailed
along the angle of her jaw and downward over her shoulder to the curve of her
breast. His mouth brushed fire over the gentle plane of her cheek to the
sensitive lobes of her ears. He explored the tender and vulnerable curve of her
neck, descending with searing suddenness to the pulse that throbbed in the
hollow of her throat. His fingers slid beneath the narrow strap of her tank
top, slipping it from her shoulder.

“Charles,” she breathed, a soft sound not of protest, but of
wonder. She pressed closer to him and was still not close enough.

“Kelly, chérie, I love you. Je t’aime,” he whispered, his
breath warm against the honeyed sweetness of her lips. “Tell me you feel the
same.”

Love. The word sent a shaft of cold horror through her,
banishing her languor. She couldn’t love a man like Charles Duralde. She couldn’t.
And even if she did, he must not know.

“Charles, no!”

“It may be too much to ask, so soon, but if you will see me
later, when we leave here, I will make you care.”

There was such agony in his voice it brought an ache to her
chest. “I can’t,” she said wildly. “I — I hate you.”

“You don’t mean that. Sometimes when you look at me, when I
hold you, I think you care more than you know.”

He was a criminal, without ethics or morals, one who had no
concept of the rights of others, but who could imprison them, speak of their
deaths without the least sign of compunction. He had said once that he had
plans for her. Were they any different now that he claimed to love her, would
they change since she had resisted him?

“No, you’re wrong!” she cried, breathless with the pain the
words gave her.

His hands moved to her arms and he gave her a small shake. “Then
why do you smile at me so, why do you come close to me?”

“Because I had to,” she cried. “I was pretending, hoping you
wouldn’t watch me so closely, or at least that you would let me live, set me
free when you leave here!”

He flinched as if he had been struck. “I suspected, once,
but I couldn’t, wouldn’t believe it!”

“You had better believe it because it’s the truth!”

“You win, Kelly,” he said, his tone strained. “Tomorrow you’ll
be free, but there’s still tonight.”

He crushed her to him, his mouth coming down on hers with
bruising force. Her lips burned. Dread and anguish beat up into her mind. She
spread her hands against his chest, pushing with all her strength, but could
not break his merciless grasp. A shudder ran over her, and hard upon it another
and then another until she was trembling uncontrollably. A low sob caught in
her throat, and on her lips was the taste of salt tears.

Abruptly he released her, lifting his head, removing his
hands as if the touch of her seared him. In the quiet, their ragged breathing
was the only sound.

Kelly surged to her feet, flinging away from him toward the
screen door. It flew open under her hand to crash against the wire of the
veranda, setting it to humming.

“No! Kelly, don’t go out there!”

She paid no heed to his shout, but stumbled down the steps
and ran headlong into the waiting darkness. She turned toward the lake with its
encircling trees, her eyes blinded by the night and her tears. Behind her, she
heard Charles’s soft curse, and his swift steps as he came after her.

She reached up to clear her vision, wiping her eyes with the
palm of her hand. Ahead of her she saw a movement, and she slowed with a gasp
of pent-up breath that made her lungs ache. Then she saw him, the shape of a
man silhouetted by the moon-silvered brightness of the lake. He was in a
crouch, with a rifle slung from the fingers of one hand. As he realized she had
stopped, he came an erect, tall, thin figure nestling the scoped rifle against
his cheek, pointing it not at her but at the man on the walk behind her.

“No!” she screamed, spinning around. “Charles, go back! Go
back!”

She careened into him and they went down as the lake echoed
to a cracking explosion of sound. Clamped tightly together, they rolled down
the slope and into the deep shade of the live oaks. Suddenly the world was
filled with the bright glare of lights and the strident whine of sirens. Bull
horns roared, followed by the bursting crackle of shots and the sound of gunned
motors as cars raced from around the house.

“This is the police! We have you surrounded. Lay down your
weapons and come out with your hands up!”

Kelly heard the words in despair. With her eyes tightly
shut, she lay in Charles’s arms, feeling the firm and steady beat of his heart
where her cheek rested against his chest. Her clothing was damp with dew from
the wet grass. There was a small branch from one of the oaks overhead gouging
into her side. Still, the warm shadows enclosed them, an ally hiding them in
they comforting darkness. For this brief space of time they were safe. And then
she heard the sound of running footsteps, coming toward them.

“Mr. Duralde? Are you all right?”

A flashlight played over them. Charles raised himself to one
elbow. The voice, tight with anxiety, belonged to George.

“Yes, I’m fine. I think we both are.”

“Lord, but you gave us a scare. That dude nearly plugged
you. I don’t know what the idea was, you two running out like that, but I’ll
have to hand this to you. When you create a diversion, you do a bang-up job!”

Without looking at the man who held her, Kelly pulled away
from him, coming to her knees. The scene before her had changed with
unbelievable swiftness. State troopers, men of the Louisiana State Police, were
everywhere. Police cars with their lights flashing, headlights bright, and
two-way radios issuing staccato announcements were parked at odd angles all
around the house. One man, the tall, thin gunman she had seen, lay writhing on the
ground while a trooper worked over him. Two others were being relieved of their
rifles and taken into custody. On the veranda the senator had appeared, looking
a little dazed as if awakened from sleep. No one was paying the least attention
to him, or to Charles.

Still, it was a moment before it struck her. There was a
good reason why they were not interested in Charles Duralde. She did not know
what he was, nor why he was at the lake house with the senator, but of one
thing she was certain. He was not, nor had he ever been, a criminal.