Roan (25 page)

Roan paused a second, then reached for a berry so high that she'd missed it before. “I wonder sometimes what kind of home you came from, what kind of life.”

An unaccountable tightness constricted her throat. She had nothing to share with him, nothing to use to make a bridge of any kind between them.

“Maybe I'll never know,” she said finally. “It'll be like being reborn as a native of Turn-Coupe.”

He looked up, scanning her features as if expecting sarcasm. Then he let his gaze wander in leisurely appraisal of her tank top and shorts. “Yeah? You don't look much like it, even in that Dixie Chick getup.”

“I could fit in,” she protested in spite of the heat that flooded into her face. “I'm getting a feel for country life. Fresh vegetables, animals, the great outdoors.”

“It's a lot of work, unless there's a big family to share it.”

“Like the Benedicts?”

“Like kids. You know, curtain climbers? Cereal slingers? Miniature people wanting to slobber in your iced tea at every meal and be cuddled every time you turn around.”

“Oh, those.” His derogatory description might have fooled her a while back, but now she heard the affection in it, and the longing. He must have enjoyed Jake's childhood, in spite of everything.

“Your kids would be something to see, beautiful smooth skin and big dark eyes,” he said in a musing, half-reluctant tone. He seemed to have forgotten that he was supposed to be picking blackberries.

“Depends on the father, I'd think,” she quipped without meeting his gaze.

“It does, doesn't it?”

The words were even lower than before, and freighted with meaning. Was he reading her mind? Or only testing to see how far she'd fallen under whatever spell he was weaving with his talk of babies? Too far, she realized with sudden clarity. She was entranced by the vision, just out of reach, of living in peace and security at Dog Trot, fishing on the lake, tending the garden and belonging to his extended family. Becoming a Benedict.

It was never going to happen. Even without the wall of lies between them, she was too different. She'd never fit into his world, nor would he ever consider leaving his home and community where he was so respected for the barren, artificial existence of hers. The idea of anything of the kind was like forbidden fruit, as unreachable as the sweetly ripe blackberries she could see hiding deep among the briers, too deep ever to be reached.

She leaned far into the brier tangle, trying for an espe
cially big berry. It was just out of her grasp. She stepped closer, until a crisscrossed barrier of dried brown canes pressed against her upper arm. Still, she couldn't quite grab it, mainly because she couldn't balance that well while holding her injured arm close to her body. She inched a bit more.

Her sweat-damp rubber sandal slipped. Stinging pain bit into her arm as the briers caught her, clinging to her skin with their curving hooks. She drew breath on a quick gasp.

“Don't move!” Roan said sharply from behind her.

“I can't…” she began, but the words were never finished.

He snaked an around her from behind, then grasped the dead briers in his bare left hand and pushed them free of her skin. Before she could even breathe in relief, he swung her from the brier tangle and set her down. Then he shifted his grasp to her shoulder and bent to thrust his forearm under her knees. A moment later, she was swung high against his body.

The contact was so unexpected, and so close, that an involuntary shiver ran over her. His body was hot where it met hers, and his face was only inches away, almost against hers. She drew back slightly and put her hand against his chest, as if to put space between them. The berry juice on the tips of her fingers stained the smooth, tan fabric of his shirt. The purple spots spread as she watched. Funny, but she didn't like seeing him lose his neatness, after all.

She looked up at him with wide eyes. “Your uniform…”

“Doesn't matter,” he said. “What about your shoulder?”

“It's all right. But this berry stain may not come out in the wash.”

His lips twisted in a smile though the look in his eyes was stark. “A lot of things don't.”

It wasn't berry stains he was talking about, she knew, but acknowledging it didn't seem like a good idea. “If you'll put me down, I can walk.”

“Those damn thongs of Jake's are too big for you.” Swinging around, he started toward the house.

“The blackberries!”

He turned slightly, and she saw the bucket where he'd set it down. He took the two long strides that brought him to it, then bent his knee enough that she could grasp its bail.

“This is ridiculous,” she protested, even as she balanced the bucket on her middle.

“It's energy saving, your energy,” he said, starting toward the house once more. “You shouldn't have been out here this long, anyway. It's too soon.”

“Thank you, Dr. Benedict, but it isn't, you know. Doc Watkins says I can do anything I feel big enough to do.”

“That covers a lot of territory, doesn't it?”

It did, of course, including activities that should not have been in her mind at all. In defense, she said, “I think you just like having me under your control. You want me back at the house and under monitor watch again so you'll know where I am at all times.”

The look he gave her was straight. “Exactly.”

At least he was honest, even if he did leave her with nothing to say. Lowering her lashes, she dipped into the bucket she held and took a berry, popping it into her mouth. The sweet-tart richness of it filled her senses and ran down her throat. She took another. As long as she was eating berries, she didn't have to argue with him or make bright conversation. She could let herself absorb the hard strength of his arms around her and the heat she saw in the silver-shadowed depths of his eyes.

On impulse, she selected the biggest, juiciest berry she
could see in the bucket, then put it to Roan's mouth. He hesitated a moment before he took it. As he chewed, he slowed his stride, though his gaze never left her face. He stopped. His expression was suspended, taut with intimations of rigorously controlled impulse. She lowered her gaze while her heartbeat kicked into a higher, near-suffocating gear.

The fruit had left a small stain on his full bottom lip. She stared at it, mesmerized by that spot of moist purple. The need to taste its sweetness combined with the warm flavor of his mouth was so strong that her own lips tingled. She saw him swallow, and could not prevent herself from touching his sun-glazed throat with her fingertips.

She didn't decide to kiss him. There was no single moment when she said to herself:
This is what I want, what I'm going to do.
It felt like compulsion, as if she had no choice except to slide her hand behind the strong column of his neck and draw his mouth down toward hers.

His muscles were tense so that he lowered his head by stiff degrees, as if uncertain of the wisdom of complying yet unable to combat the gentle pressure she exerted. Then abruptly his resistance vanished.

Berries and fresh country sunlight and warm, clean maleness, he tasted of all those things and something more that was simply Roan. He tasted perfect. She felt his chest swell and his grasp tighten before he took the kiss deeper. The smooth firmness of his lips sent gratification spiraling through her. The abrasion of his tongue on hers was an enticement past bearing. Tory didn't care if they stood there mouth to mouth and oblivious, swaying in the warm Louisiana afternoon, until the final night came and the world spun to a delirious end.

Why? Why did it have to be this man who matched her needs so perfectly? Why did it have to be here, so far from
all she knew? Why did she have to find him now when everything was so wrong and might never be right again?

The questions had no answers. She pushed them from her mind while she let herself melt against him, let herself flow into him and around him until she wasn't sure where she ended and he began. And didn't care.

She felt it when he began to walk again, felt the long purposeful strides that took them swiftly back toward the house. Soon they would be surrounded by phones and all the other invasive stealers of privacy. They would be where the monitor was engaged, where she was once more a prisoner, and felt like it.

Dragging her mouth from his, she turned her face into the curve of his neck. With her lips against the salt-flavored velvet of his skin, she whispered, “Do we have to go back?”

For an answer, he swerved toward the barn they had left open. Seconds later, they were inside that big, open space, with the wide doors closed behind them.

It smelled of hay from summers past and animals that were long gone, of dust and mice, dried manure that had been ground to a powder, and a strong whiff of engine oil and rubber tires. Dirt-daubers whined like miniature concrete mixers in their mud nests among the rafters. Rays of sunlight streamed through holes in the walls to spotlight the purple paint of the Super Bird that sat glowing like some gigantic jewel in the cool gloom.

Roan set Tory on her feet before he opened the back door of the Super Bird and held it wide. He didn't urge her to climb in, made no attempt to persuade her, but only waited for her decision. She knew very well that entering the car meant acceptance of whatever might take place once they were inside. But she had vowed to make every minute count of her time left at Dog Trot, hadn't she?

She stared up at him a moment longer, then she set the berry bucket down and got into the vehicle, sliding across the seat to leave him room. The door, as he pulled it to behind him, shut with such a solid and final thud that a small shiver ran over her. Rolling down the windows for air, which he did in a few quick moves, didn't help. She shivered again as he settled back beside her.

“You can't be cold,” he said quietly as he placed his arm across the back of the seat above her.

She shook her head. “Hot, instead. It's so hot.”

“Not as hot as it may get. Do you mind?” His voice was husky, almost tentative.

“I like the heat,” she said as she settled against him, then laughed a little at her careless word choice, perhaps from nerves. To cover it, she went quickly on, “Why do I get the feeling you might have done this before? Maybe in high school?”

“Not me, though I've bumped the siren at quite a few parking teenagers in the last few years.”

“You should be ashamed,” she murmured as she eased closer. At the same time, she rested a hand against his chest, spreading her fingers until her palm was pressed over his heart. She could feel its solid thumping against his chest wall. He was, she thought, as uncertain as she was about this chance they were taking.

She felt the brush of his lips across the top of her head, then along her temple to her ear. “Actually, I am,” he said against her hair at her temple. “I might have to give them a little more time in the future.”

“See that you do.” The words were distracted. She was wrinkling his uniform by lying against him, and that wasn't good. With a marked lack of finesse, she found the buttons and slipped them from their holes, then pulled his shirt from the band of his pants while he eased away enough to help
her. As his sleeve radio dropped down his arm, she caught it. “What about this?”

“Off,” he said with the sound of satisfaction in his voice.

“And this?” She held up the pager as she unclipped it from his belt.

Roan took it from her without a word and put it together with the belt he'd unbuckled before tossing both into the front seat. Then he reached for her and dragged her across his lap, taking care not to strain her injured shoulder. At the same time, he eased back on the seat so they were half sitting, half lying on the leather upholstery, propped into the commodious corner of the boat of a car.

He brushed a hand along her arm, then caught the strap of her tank top and eased it away from the small bandage that covered her wound as protective cushioning. “Does it still hurt?”

“Only now and then, when I forget and do something I shouldn't.”

“Like today?”

She shook her head. “It doesn't hurt at all now.”

“Good,” he said softly, and his breath feathered her skin as he leaned to brush his lips over the bandage, then trail a line of small, hot kisses to the mound of her breast, peeling away the thin knit that covered it to expose the nipple. He took that sensitive, rose-tinted peak into his mouth, wetting it, laving it with his tongue.

Tory made a soft sound in her throat as pleasure spiraled through her. She arched her back to allow greater access. At the same time, she grasped his waist, smoothing her hand along it, caressing the heated skin of his rib cage.

He made a low, hungry sound in his throat and pulled her nearer, until the heated weight of his body half covered hers. Tory caught his waistband, drawing him closer against
her until she could feel the burning, pulsing evidence of his arousal, sense the hard pressure of his need.

Tory wasn't sure where all the boldness was coming from. She'd never been particularly aggressive in a sexual sense. Perhaps it was the heat and the lovely glide of her hands across his sweat-dampened skin. It could be desperation and the effect of her near-death experience, forcing her to reach out and grab for what she wanted, for the chance at life and love that she had been missing. Or possibly it was just the man himself.

Roan was everything she'd ever dreamed of in a mate. Strong, decent, honorable and caring, he attracted her on some deep, visceral level she couldn't explain, in spite of his unbending habits, or perhaps because of them. That she could have him here, in this moment, was an unexpected benefit to her captivity. A craving to capture him in her hands, to explore the rippling muscles of his back, to mold his taunt backside to her palms, to grasp the hot, silken length of him drove her. It was shocking, distressing, this reckless hunger to feel him against her skin, have him inside her, to absorb his essence deep into her body. She tugged at her own shirt, dragging it off over her head and dropping it to the floorboard.