Crush (25 page)

He wants to marry me,
she said to herself. The new day hadn’t erased his proposal, nor had it vanquished the discomfort she had managed to push aside the night before. Marriage was an enormous step, and certainly not one she could enter easily. If at all. Her thumb moved lightly over his lips, her nerves whistling in remembrance of what his magnificent mouth had done to her the night before. Lucas had done everything a mortal man could be expected to do to show his love for her. So why hadn’t she accepted his proposal right then and there?

Because I couldn’t,
she told herself.

There were too many things to consider before she could give him an honest answer. There was his life on the road, for one. She knew it wasn’t for her. Traveling for a story was different. That was part of her job. It had purpose. Following Lucas around the globe would make her little more than luggage with legs. Sure, she could stay home and they could exchange phone calls and e-mails as they did now, but Lucas was a young, virile man with a very healthy sexual appetite. How long would it be before he’d want to sample some of the voluptuous treats the road offered in abundance?

It had been hard enough to deal with it with Jordan, and looking back, she hadn’t cared for him nearly as deeply as she cared for Lucas.

Who am I kidding,
she asked herself.
I don’t just care for Lucas. I love him.

She sighed and she felt him in her flesh, her hair, her substance and her thoughts. She loved his tastes, his scents, his heat and his presence beside her. She couldn’t survive a betrayal from him. And infidelity was a hazard of his occupation.

Lucas deserved a wife who could trust him on the road, not one who would turn shrew the instant he didn’t answer his phone, or go insane when she saw a photo of him on the beach with other women. The realization that she wasn’t that woman stung Miranda at the center of her heart. She bit back a silent curse, suddenly furious that Lucas had ruined everything with his ill-timed and unnecessary proposal. She felt as though the battle raging between her head and her heart was poisoning her.

But as she gazed upon his sleeping form, a surge of love and tenderness replaced her wrath. She eased closer to him, rubbing his nose with hers and stroking the place where his neck met his shoulder. She pushed one of her legs between his and lightly caressed his back and hip.

Different parts of him awakened at different rates as she touched him in his sleep. That restless creature between his legs rose to greet her first, but it had help from her soft, coaxing fingers. His arms were next as they pulled her in close. His smile was third, adding its light to that of the morning. His kiss, his hands and his legs awakened at the same time, tangling themselves with her counterparts as they greeted the morning and each other.

Every part of her wanted to marry him. Her right ear, which he tickled with his hair, and her neck, which he covered with teasing kisses. Her skin wanted to marry him; she could tell by the way it warmed and responded as his hands glided over it. Her knees and elbows craved him, and her belly seemed to tumble for him. Even her brain could find no fault in marrying a man whose talent and good looks were outmatched only by his intelligence and compassion.

It was her heart that still needed convincing.

She loved him. With every cell and whisper of breath in her body, she loved him. And that love was the very thing she couldn’t bear to risk.

She gave herself to Lucas, to fully enjoy his good morning. The urgency of their reunion had been satisfied the night before, but the tempestuousness remained. Lucas’s proposal gave it deeper meaning, and it wasn’t lost on Miranda. He eased onto her, giving her a passionate and possessive kiss good morning. He moved between her thighs and made himself a part of her with the easy leisure of a man well in love.

I do,
Miranda thought.
I do love you, Lucas.
She savored his weight upon her. He laced his fingers through hers, mating their palms. His kisses covered her face and throat. With his body delving deeper and deeper into hers, his perspiration blending with hers with each kiss of their moist bellies, Miranda became greedy, desiring an even deeper union. Her pleasure was heightened by the fact that he wanted her. Forever. Truly and always.

His lips traveled from her mouth to her throat as her head arched back into her pillows. She immersed herself in the blissful friction of his hardness within her. He spoke her name, and it sounded like a blessing.

Miranda gently took the sides of his face and guided it toward hers. She used one hand to stroke the long locks of his hair from his face, and she looked into his eyes. “I love you.”

His jaw clamped shut with a tiny snap.

Her words filled him. They filled his lungs, his brain, his blood vessels, his heart. “I love you, Lucas,” she said, holding his gaze. Her soft, husky words and her open, vulnerable gaze touched him in the one place that her body couldn’t, unleashing a tide of need and emotion so strong it sent a sharp pain through him. Her words joined them more completely than any physical act ever had or could. For that moment, every breath was shared with her and his muscles moved in synchronicity with hers. In her eyes, he saw the sheer beauty of her love for him. Her image blurred, and he buried his face in her hair to hide his tears. She cradled his head, her soft breath at his ear. That tender caress sent him skyrocketing to breathless heights of love. Miranda’s breath came in deep, short hitches. Her arms moved over him as she tried to hold him as closely as possible, to join them more fully as his gaze again sought and captured hers. His muscles bunched and released with his powerful, rhythmic motion atop her, and she moaned his name, hoping it was the key to locking this moment in place forever.

“I love you,” she managed on a tearful gasp as a fat droplet escaped each of her eyes and headed south, toward her ears.

Her breathy intonation triggered a volcanic explosion within him, and he shuddered upon her. For once he broke their gaze first, when his body surrendered to the irresistible pulse of hers. He flung his head back, exposing the tense column of his neck. His veins stood out from the force of his arrival, and Miranda cried out as the heat of his fullness throbbed within her. She knew that his every breath, every taut muscle, heart and spirit belonged to her. She held her breath, willing that moment of pure oneness to last.

Miranda clung to him, and he trembled in her embrace, softly kissing her as their bodies calmed. She closeted away his proposal as she loved him again and again. The agony of awaiting her answer was blissfully eased each time Lucas entombed himself within her. Her words and her gaze had triggered the most satisfying release of his life while binding them, body and soul, more completely than marriage ever could. They each derived comfort from that fact, knowing that Miranda would soon have to give an answer.

* * *

Miranda knew that it wouldn’t be easy, but Lucas was making it ever so much harder by being so happy. He behaved like a man drunk on love as he moved about her kitchen, slapping a sort of brunch together from the contents of her under-stocked refrigerator and the leftovers from Café Brasil. Miranda sat on the sofa and sipped the coffee he had brought to her.

When he appeared before her bearing a tray of toasted garlic parmesan bread, scrambled eggs and sliced melon, Miranda’s appetite fled. She mustered a smile to answer his. He sat beside her and she took in his face as though she were looking at him for the last time. His hair was dark and damp from their recent shower. He wore a plain white T-shirt and jeans. His eyes crackled with joy, and when his sensuous mouth pulled into a tiny grin, Miranda had to look away or risk losing her nerve.

“Miranda?” He gave her bare knee, which poked from her robe, a loving squeeze. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”

She rubbed her right temple. She felt the beginnings of a blinding headache behind her right eye. “In baseball, when a pitcher is throwing a no-hitter, the guys in the dugout don’t make any reference to it at all during the course of the game,” she started. “It’s bad luck to mention a perfect game in progress, or to even acknowledge it.”

Lucas selected a sliver of cantaloupe and ate half of it in one bite. He stared straight ahead as he chewed it. Miranda watched the tiny muscle in his jaw work. “It sounds like superstitious rubbish to me,” he said at last.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s rubbish, if someone believes that it’s true.”

He turned to face her and took her shoulders, spinning her so that she faced him. “Talk to me directly, Miranda. Don’t use sports metaphors.”

She kept her eyes on the pulse point at the base of his throat as she said, “I can’t marry you.”

Her quiet words struck him like a lead mallet to the head. He grew numb, but that feeling gave way to an unpleasant hypersensitivity. He felt as though a small animal with razor claws had fastened onto his gut to gnaw at his heart with sharp, venomous teeth. “C-Can’t…or won’t?”

“Does it really make a difference?” she asked softly.

“Of course there’s a difference!” he spat, his eyes probing hers for some clue to her deliberate, methodical assassination of his heart. “If you
can’t
marry me, perhaps it’s because there’s something wrong with you. If you
won’t
marry me, then the problem likely lies with me. Is it because I spend so much time on the road? That’ll change, I—”

“It’s not the road,” she quietly cut in. “It’s what happens on the road.” Her robe was thick, and the radiant heat of the sun warmed the room, but Miranda shivered from a sudden chill. “Your lifestyle is not conducive to marital stability.”

Lucas’s irritation showed in the way he ran his hand through his hair and launched himself to his feet. “For God’s sake, Miranda, just speak!”

“This is just a fairy tale,” she blurted. “It’s not real. It’s all romantic and exciting now, and we could probably even fake a happy ending. But reality comes after that…the reality of all the temptation there is out there for you.” She forced her clenched fists into her sofa cushions. “There will come a day when you give in to it. I couldn’t survive that. Not from you.”

“I’ve been faithful to you,” he said adamantly. “If you didn’t believe in fairy tales, you wouldn’t closet yourself away with Kitty Kincaid. Even that
Slap Shot
has a bloody romantic ending! Tell me the real reason you won’t marry me.”

“Maybe you should tell
me
,” she said defensively. “You seem to have an unusually perceptive grasp of what I’m thinking.”

“You’re so certain that I’ll tire of you.” He spoke the words as though they tasted of curdled milk. “You’re afraid that you aren’t enough for me, and that I’ll cheat on you the moment I’m out of your sight.” He met her gaze directly. “Do you have so little faith in me?”

He roughly pushed the cocktail table away so he could kneel before her. “Why can’t you believe that you’re all the women I could ever want? You’re the temptress who meets me wearing only a smile and red boots with heels long enough to spear my heart. You’re the girl next door who’s just as happy playing catch in the living room as you are following a sports team all over North America. You are the exotic, intelligent succubus of my most secret dreams. I don’t deserve you and I know it, but I can’t help myself wanting you. I love you, Miranda.” He tugged her hand to his chest and splayed her fingers over his heart. “This is yours, and it has been since we met.”

She bowed her face and covered her eyes with her free hand. Her headache had worsened, and the pain was making its way down to her chest. It was so easy to love him, yet near impossible to consolidate that with what she knew was best for her in the long run. And Lucas wasn’t making it any easier by being so compassionate.

“You love me, yet you doubt my faithfulness?” he finished.

“What you’re offering me is a fairy tale,” she said. “It couldn’t possibly last, because it isn’t real.”

“What’s more real than ten thousand pounds of Conwy?” he asked. “Or that grill out there? Or me! I can abide your lying to yourself, but don’t lie to me, Miranda. You believe in fairy tales and love
and
happy endings.”

His beautiful eyes were dark with pain, a deep, soul-bruising pain that she had put there. Her only consolation was that she knew she was sparing both of them worse pain later. “I think…” She had to wait for the lump in her throat to shrink before she could move words past it. “I think we shouldn’t see each other any more. It’s not fair to you, when I know that this is as far as we can go. You want children, and—”

Lucas took both of her hands and held them tightly in her lap. “Are you seriously this short-sighted? Am I the only one of us who’s thought of marriage and children and moonlit strolls along the shore at Conwy?”

Staring into his eyes as she was, she couldn’t lie and say no. She had thought of all those things, and how behind them she constantly would be waiting for proof that happiness was an illusion.

When she didn’t answer, he stood and paced in a small circle. “Clearly some of mad Lady Emberley rubbed off on you at Conwy,” he muttered under his breath. He turned back to her, one hand loosely set upon his hip. “If you need an example of a man’s fidelity to the woman he loves, look to my side. My father has never strayed. Look at Feast! He lusted after Isabella for two years. They spent a weekend together in Cardiff and they eloped in Australia a few months later. It took Feast only seventy-two hours to know that Isabella was the one woman for him.” He took a step and stood right in front of Miranda. He bent at the waist and spoke directly into her face. “I’m smarter than Feast. It took me only two seconds to know that you were the woman for me.”

Miranda turned her head in shame.

“I don’t have to mention the obvious paternal comparison, Miranda. Nonetheless, I don’t appreciate it. I don’t deserve it.”

“You’re right,” she choked. “You deserve so much better and so much more. You want a wife and kids and…I can’t give those to you.” With her next words, she shattered her own heart. “I think you should go.”