Naked Hope (9 page)

Gleeful at besting Jill in one of their games, Liv came alive.

In the flash of a moment, Gavin saw a glimmer of her former self—confident, capable, brilliant. For the first time in fifteen months, he experienced something other than despair. After seeing Liv like this, Jill couldn’t possibly recommend against her, could she?

When the weather reports indicated the worst might be over, Jill, Gavin, and Olivia left Edith and Baines in the media room and stole into the kitchen to make popcorn and grab sodas.

Gavin stepped outside to survey the sky. Although difficult to see in the inky blackness, he spotted another funnel cloud not far to the west. He scowled and blew back through the kitchen door just as the popcorn finished. He rested his hand at the small of Jill’s back and whispered into her ear, “It’s not over. There’s another one coming fast. Let’s get Liv back, now.”

Jill nodded with a quick jut of her chin, tucking the sodas and popcorn into her arms.

Keeping one hand on Jill, Gavin captured Olivia’s hand, and called out, “To the media room!”

“To the media room,” Olivia and Jill echoed.

Jill doled out bowls of popcorn and Gavin twisted the tops off sodas. Just as everyone settled back into chairs and sofas, the power fizzled out. Jill gasped, Olivia giggled, and Gavin wished he were sitting on the sofa between the two of them. After candles were lit, Olivia begged her father to tell one of his stories.

Gavin offered up a weak protest. “You just want me to talk so there’s more popcorn for you!”

Popping a few kernels into her mouth, she giggled.

He couldn’t remember the last time she’d asked him to tell her a story. He made his voice low and rumbly the way she liked it. “Long ago, there was a girl named Olivia. She was about ten years old, and her father was always telling her not to go into the forest. But one very dark night when not even the moon was shining, little Olivia crept from the safety of her bed deep into the dark woods. The night was so dark, she couldn’t see anything. She couldn’t even see her hands when she put them in front of her face…”

Long before the story was finished, Olivia fell asleep with her head in Jill’s lap.

He offered a rueful smile. “Must’ve lost my touch.”

“Gavin darling, I haven’t heard you play in such a long time. The music would be so relaxing, and I’m sure Jillian would enjoy it, too.”

Her request startled him. Fifteen months ago, he would have been happy to play. But music wasn’t something you do just because you can. Music was something you create over and over, fresh each time, because you must. He yearned to want to play, but since Liv’s accident, he’d remained detached. Still, his mother meant well. After a moment, he asked, “Any particular request?”

“Anything your heart desires,” she replied with a proud smile.

Gavin sat at the piano for long moments flexing his fingers and waiting. Waiting. And still waiting, hoping to be inspired. When at last he played, he had no melody or particular work in mind. He played because his fingers ached to touch the keys.

He thought about the debris he’d seen strewn about outside by the storm when they’d stolen into the kitchen. People would lose their homes tonight. How do you heal lives that have been stripped to mere remnants of what they once were? Would Olivia’s life remain a mere remnant of what it once was? These images preyed on him as he played some of the most wistful strains he had ever created.

When the last chord died, his mother was weeping. Baines’ eyes were suspiciously bright. Gavin couldn’t bear to watch Jill’s reaction. He didn’t look, hoping she couldn’t tell how vulnerable he was about his music these days.

Moments after midnight, the air raid emergency siren signaled the all clear. Gavin scooped up a sleeping Olivia and carried her to her room. She awakened just long enough to smile, and then rolled over once again fast asleep.

Gavin searched the house and found Jill in the great room. “I could use some fresh air. How about you?”

When she agreed, he swept the length of her hair away from her neck and draped a nearby afghan around her like a shawl. He fought the urge to rest his hands on her shoulders. “You’ll need this.”

The rain had stopped, but drips fell from the eaves. The wind had blown itself out, and the night air fell around them, cool and strangely mysterious. Even in the dark they could see the debris was knee deep in some places, but they’d been spared. The house stood, undamaged.

With a hand at her mouth, Jill stifled a yawn.

Gavin winced. He should say good-night and let her go to bed. But he couldn’t shake the fear that in the morning the harmony and hope they’d shared during the storm would be lost. “You’re afraid of storms.”

She stiffened.

He moved closer and caught a hint of her perfume, exotic, like jasmine or perhaps orchid. “Not an accusation. Merely an observation.”

“When I was thirteen, I got caught in a tornado. Since then, they’re not on my list of favorites.”

“No,” he agreed, staring at the outline of her face. Her skin appeared luminous in the moonlight. He’d have liked to reach out and stroke the dark hair that framed her face and shoulders. “My daughter is quite taken with you.”

She smiled, lighting her blue eyes. Her full lips opened over her teeth. “She’s…”

He stepped closer, hoping for a good word. “She’s?”

“Joyful.”

His felt his jaw drop.
Joyful?

“Troubled, confused, frustrated, often suspicious, certainly angry about being separated from what she loves to do most, and yet she has an effervescence of spirit. So often TBI robs kids of their joy, but Olivia’s sense of play, of fun, of appreciating things bigger than herself, is intact. I find her…”

A playful wind brushed up against them as if apologizing for its earlier bad behavior. He saw a tendril move across her forehead and couldn’t resist smoothing it away from her eyes. His hand lingered. “Yes?”

“Remarkable.”

The stars blinked in symphonic harmony against the jet sky. Aware he hadn’t noticed such things in a very long time, he murmured, “As are you, Dr. Cole.”

****

A sumptuous bed, cool sheets, yielding pillows and yet, Jill couldn’t sleep. The image of two pianos back-to-back, barren in their silence, would not leave her. No wonder he sometimes acted as if Olivia was a stranger. They were both so lost. She’d seen brain injuries turn families into strangers more times than she could remember. She never got used to it. But rarely were they as changed as Olivia appeared to be. Without her music, neither father nor daughter knew who Olivia was.

Jill wrapped the borrowed robe around her body and made her way to the music room. She stood in the dark. The air was shrouded, heavy, as if every drop of joy had been wrung out. The thought made her shiver, and she moved over to the window. The clouds had passed. An August moon and a few summer stars provided the only light. If she were quiet enough, maybe the walls would relent and release the music that was so starkly absent. She curled up on the sofa, comforted by the afghan he’d placed around her shoulders earlier and allowed herself to think about Gavin, the man. Not Gavin the father, or her former music advisor, but Gavin the man. His dignified demeanor, his elegant grace both in the way he expressed himself and the way his body moved, and his sensual mouth. She shivered and cuddled deeper into the afghan.

She awoke to find him in the room standing over the keyboard of Olivia’s baby grand.

His body, no more than a shadow, jerked in broken spasms that tore through him like grenades. He fought it.

She couldn’t bear to watch. On silent footsteps, she moved to his side. Her touch made him whirl. She smoothed the thick hair from his face. She looked into his watery eyes and felt his ache lodge in her heart. She watched as the ravaged look he wore turned hot.

His hands rested on her hips, singeing her skin through the thin fabric of her robe. She stared into his smoldering eyes. He guided her to the sofa anchoring her back against the arm of the sofa. Her robe came lose. She made a move to cinch it closed but he caught her hands and covered her body with his. She rocked him like she would a child with his head at her breasts, providing what comfort she could. Awareness rooted in her gut. She was about to cross a line of no return—because he was anything but a child. Somehow, she knew the boy in him needed comfort, and the man needed to feel like a man.

His gaze probed hers until she was sure he could read her mind and knew how much she wanted him. He shifted her in his arms until he rocked her, one hand supporting her neck, the other the small of her back. Her heart raced and her skin blazed as her breath caught in her throat unable to remember when she’d wanted a man as much as she wanted Gavin. When she could stand it no more, she claimed his mouth. His lips were vibrant—hungry. He drank her in like a man, starved as his need for emotional release merged with his physical need. She placed both hands flat against his chest and tried to think.

He dragged his mouth away and drew back with a questioning look.

She breathed deeply reclaiming his body. Every stroke of his tongue invaded and made her burn. She matched him stroke for stroke and arched her back. His arms held her effortlessly and his mouth traced a trail of kisses to the curve of her breast. She moaned, reveling in the sweet ecstasy of his mouth on her nipple, and gave up any thought of resisting him.

He caught the laces of her nightgown in his teeth and pulled until the gown fell open, then buried his lips in the concave between her breasts, and filled it with kisses.

Some of the dampness from his tears still remained on his face. As he kissed her mouth, she could taste a trace of salt, his body hard and ready.

“Jillian,” he canted, and carried her up the stairs. They fell onto the bed but not before he’d stripped off her robe and nightgown. “My God, Jillian,” he murmured, kissing the inside of her arm.

She thrilled at the way he looked at her naked body and untied the belt of his robe, exposing the fact he wore nothing beneath. His body was perfect, with well-muscled shoulders and upper arms, a firm torso and his endowment every bit what a woman would expect from a man who looked like he did. He shrugged out of his robe and captured her lips as his palms flattened themselves against hers. They pulsated.

“Come here.” He pulled her against him, hooked his ankles around hers, and spread her legs. His hands traveled the length of her body, caressing every inch but the most sensitive areas until she moaned for him to touch her.

In answer, he kissed the back of her knees, her breasts, and caressed her belly with his tongue.

Flames erupted everywhere his hands or mouth touched, fueling her need. She waited as long as she could, and then reached for his body.

He caught her hand before she could make contact. “Me first,” he whispered and drew his fingers up the inside of her thigh. “I want to taste you.”

The sensation in her body sharpened and isolated between her legs under his attention, each touch more gratifying than the next. His fingers were neither gentle nor rough, his mouth relentless as he read the responses of her body, and gave her more of what she wanted. She gripped the headboard and hung on as the tremors overtook her body like a volcano. Jill did her best to keep quiet but when he used his mouth to coax yet another orgasm, she cried out.

“I love the way your body responds to the slightest touch,” he murmured, brushing her hair from her shoulder. “Don’t worry about the noise. No one can hear you.” He kissed her, his lips and tongue demanding a response, and left the bed. Moments later, he returned with a warm wet cloth, which he used to bathe her, until she almost came again.

When the cloth had cooled, she smiled. “Have you made me wait long enough?”

Eyes half closed, he grinned, reached into his bedside drawer, and withdrew a foil packet. “You want more?”

Elated with his playfulness, she reached for the length of him, and rolled the condom over his hard warmth. “I want this.”

“Show me.” Holding her gaze with his own, he buried himself inside her a bit at a time.

Chapter Seven

The morning brushed against her as Jill opened her eyes and found him watching her, his body still spiraled around hers as the first golden fingers of light reached into the room. She pulled away and sat up, wrapping the sheet around her body.

He rolled close and kissed the back of her shoulder. “Don’t leave yet. Come back.”

Although not more than a whisper, his voice vibrated through her. The statements sounded too much like commands. She stood, holding the sheet, searching the room for her clothes, and swept tousled hair out of her eyes. The sheet slipped.

He vaulted out of bed and caught the sheet, his long fingers holding it securely around her waist. His mouth brushed her collarbone. “I’d rather you lose this, but the decision is yours,” he whispered. “Is there anything I can do to convince you to come back to bed?”

She stared, trying to remember how things got so phenomenally off-track. She blinked remembering the recent headline
Gavin Fairfield, international globetrotter traveling intercontinentally with a bevy of women including his agent and long-time flame, Adrienne Rush, touched down in Amsterdam a few days ago for an unscheduled visit to the city of freedom and natural expression where he…
She shook her head, trying to clear it, and flattened her palms against his chest. Yet she couldn’t make herself push him away.

“You think this was casual.” His fingers played along her back. “If this had been casual, you wouldn’t be in my bed—or my home. I wouldn’t let you anywhere near my daughter—or my mother, for that matter. And, despite what you may have read or heard, I like to keep private things, private.”

Her fingers played his muscled chest and raised her gaze to his. The obvious warmth of his stare made her glance toward the bed, almost regretting her hasty decision to get up. “I’m not sure what that means.”

He kissed her again, his lips lingering on her mouth. “Just that I don’t kiss and tell.”

“They’ll be wondering where we are.” She moved away from him but only managed to step on the sheet.