The Rebel and His Bride (15 page)

But more than anything, he wanted to know what it would take to persuade Annabelle to give them another chance. He didn’t just want an hour or a day. He wanted what his lack of understanding had cost them. He wanted the rest of her life.

She was still attracted to him. He’d have to be an idiot not to see that. And he believed her feelings went beyond the physical. Her actions spoke so much more loudly than words. She had stayed with him when he needed someone; she worried about him. He needed to know how deep her feelings went. He doubted they went as deep as his, but he could work on that.

Right now he had to get her out of there. He couldn’t work on the rest of her life until he had her undivided attention. He figured they couldn’t be the first to leave, but they’d darn well be the second.

Sebastian and Danni were the first to leave—over
Danni’s halfhearted protests—with Sebastian insisting that she was sleeping for three now. Gregory and Annabelle left a few minutes later, after a discreet good-bye to Daisy and Buddy.

“You want to tell me why you insisted we had to leave now?” Annabelle asked as Gregory helped her into his car.

“I have a surprise for you.”

“I love surprises. What is it?”

“If I told you, then it wouldn’t be a surprise, now would it?”

“I guess not. So when do I get it?”

“In a few minutes.”

“Where is it?”

“At my house.”

Annabelle had a strong feeling that this was all just a ruse to be alone with her, but couldn’t find it in herself to be upset. As a matter of fact, she really wanted to have a chance to test this new truce of theirs. She had never thought that it would actually help to tell Gregory how she felt, but it had. And it had helped even more to have Gregory acknowledge what had happened and apologize for it. Just to know that he hadn’t consciously relegated her to secondary importance made a big difference.

And now Gregory was older and wiser, certainly more focused. After all, she’d been here over two weeks and he hadn’t attended a single rally or demonstration. Maybe he just paid his membership dues and let someone else do all the work. She
could live with that. Or maybe he could stick to one or two causes at a time instead of feeling like he had to take on the problems of the whole world.

She sat on his sofa, her eyes closed as he had instructed her. She heard the music of the Magic Monkeys, a quasi-hard-rock band she’d claimed was her favorite back in college—but not for one second afterward—then Gregory told her to open her eyes. On the coffee table in front of her was a beautiful silver bowl piled high with fresh June strawberries and a saucer of powdered sugar for dipping, along with two tall glasses of what she strongly suspected was root beer.

This used to be a favorite study method for the two of them. They’d munch on strawberries or some other fruit and drink gallons of root beer while listening to the Magic Monkeys. Only now she’d outgrown the Magic Monkeys, she was allergic to strawberries, and she hated—no, loathed—root beer.

She smiled weakly. “Oh. How … nice.” He looked so pleased that she forced herself to pick up her glass and take a cautious sip. Yes, it was root beer. And yes, it tasted awful. She avoided a grimace only with an effort and a reminder that he thought he was being sweet. No, he
was
being sweet. It wasn’t his fault he’d missed the target altogether.

She wasn’t sure what she was going to do about the strawberries, though. She could try to tune out the Magic Monkeys, she could choke down the
root beer, but if she ate a strawberry, she’d swell up like a balloon. Still, a funny feeling tickled the pit of her stomach and she didn’t think it had anything to do with the root beer she’d drunk. It had to do with Gregory’s obvious effort to create a special treat for her.

“Thank you, Gregory,” she said softly. “This is lovely.”

“So have a strawberry.”

“Um, I sort of pigged out on the veggies and dip at the party. I’m really not very hungry. But this is very sweet of you.”

He started to speak, but at that moment she winced when the Magic Monkeys went into a particularly loud—and lousy—drum solo. She tried to cover it up with another smile, but wound up laughing instead. “Oh Gregory,” she gasped, “I had forgotten just how truly awful they were.”

He smiled ruefully. “They were pretty bad, weren’t they? I guess that part of the surprise fell through, didn’t it?”

She reached out and laid a hand on his. “To be brutally honest, I can’t stand root beer anymore and I’ve developed an allergy to strawberries. That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the thought that went into this.”

He sighed. “So I blew it, huh?”

She nodded. “But in a very sweet way. Gregory, you don’t need to bring up reminders of the past. Why don’t we just worry about the future instead?”

“I thought you’d never ask.” He turned off the music and blessed silence reigned as he sat next to her on the sofa, draping his arm around her shoulders. “Speaking of futures, have you given any more thought to ours?”

She cast a quick glance at him, but he was gazing across the room at a huge color poster of the Greenpeace ship,
The Rainbow Warrior
. His voice sounded as offhand as if he’d just asked her what time it was.

“I, um, thought that this hour-at-a-time thing sounded fine.”

“I want more time than an hour.” He still sounded as casual as if they were involved in nothing more than party chatter.

“How much more time?” This time Annabelle gazed at the poster.

The arm around her shoulders became less casual and more purposeful as it tugged her closer. She could feel his warm breath on her ear and the sharp, but pleasant nip of teeth on her earlobe.

“A day?” Her voice was husky.

His free hand brushed tendrils of her hair aside as his lips trailed kisses down her neck. “More,” he murmured against her skin.

She turned her face toward his, and the trail of kisses abruptly reversed direction and headed up to the corner of her mouth. He ran the tip of his tongue over her bottom lip, then sucked it gently into his mouth.

“A—a week?” Her voice had become weak,
thready, and her head seemed to be floating about twelve inches above her body. “Two weeks?”

“Longer.” She could feel his warm breath against her mouth.

“I, ah, don’t know.” She angled her whole body toward him. “You could … mm … persuade me. Maybe.”

“I love persuading,” Gregory murmured, moving closer. He nibbled all around her lips before taking her mouth in earnest. He kissed her as though it were his first time—sweetly, with a passion that was both innocent and earthy. He kissed as if it were his last time—with raw, blinding need.

He pulled back and searched her face again, only this time the question in his eyes was different from all the times before. The question was full of tender need and a yearning that was pure and perfect. “I don’t want an hour or a day or a week or even a year. I want the rest of our lives.”

Her heart pounded so loudly, she wasn’t sure she’d heard him. “Gregory?”

“I want all the time we’ve missed. I know it’s crazy. I know it’s too damn soon and I know you need time. I’ll give you time, sweetheart. I’ll give you all the time you need, but you need to know where I’m heading. I want to marry you.”

“Gregory?” This time she felt her lips form the word, but knew no sound came out. God, yes, it was crazy and too damn soon. And, yes, she needed more time. “I—I need time.”

“But you’re not saying no.”

She smiled and whispered, “I’m not saying no.”

“Annabelle, I love you.”

For a man capable of such eloquence, she thought, the words were amazingly simple. And incredibly moving.

“I love you too.”

A primitive man would have hauled her off to his cave, an impatient man would have pushed her down on the sofa to stake his claim. Gregory was both civilized and patient. He simply kissed her senseless. Slow kisses, deep kisses, wet kisses. She shivered in his arms and opened her mouth wider to his.

He didn’t think he’d ever tasted anything as wonderful as her. He was addicted to the taste, intoxicated with the feeling. He explored her ear, relished the pulse at the base of her throat, savored the curve of her shoulders. He pushed her back on the sofa and untied her sundress, then pushed the top down an inch to reveal her upper breasts. He lowered it another inch and tasted the valley between them. He tugged it down to her waist and took her tight rosy nipples into his mouth.

Annabelle gasped and sighed and moaned with pleasure, inciting him to taste more. More. If he was intoxicated with the taste and feel of her, she was high on the taste and feel of him. She felt as if she’d been empty, so empty, for nine years and only now was the emptiness being filled. She drank in the sweetness of his lips on hers, craved the feel
of his silky hair beneath her fingers, needed his clean scent filling her nostrils when she closed her eyes.

And yet, when his caresses slowed, then stilled, when his mouth left her breasts and pressed one more kiss on her lips before he pulled away, she didn’t stop him. She couldn’t honestly say she wanted him to stop, but things were moving a little too fast.

He chuckled ruefully. “I think we’d better stop before you make me forget all my good intentions. You could tempt a saint beyond redemption, sweetheart.”

Annabelle blushed as she fumbled with the top of her dress.

“Turn around and let me tie that for you.”

“I seem to be all thumbs,” she said and did as he requested.

He kissed the back of her neck before retying the straps to her sundress. “I’ll run you home.”

“Could we walk?” Annabelle asked.

“I’d love to.” The moon was just a few days past full and still shone down brightly, glinting off her hair. Gregory tucked his arm securely around her waist and looked down at her. Her hair was tousled beyond repair, most of the bobby pins having been pulled out when Gregory had tunneled his fingers through her hair. Her lips were red and slightly puffy. Her dress was hopelessly wrinkled and he’d even tied it lopsided at the back. She looked like a woman who’d been thoroughly, passionately,
loved. And the sight excited him all over again.

Gregory kissed her on her front porch and she leaned into him, sighing. “Gregory, can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“You said that, well, you believed that sex was okay outside of marriage if there was commitment.”

“Yes.”

“Then why didn’t you make love to me tonight?” Her voice was tinged with desire and frustration.

Gregory kissed her again, then leaned back to hold her gaze with his. “For one thing, even though I am committed to you, heart and soul, you haven’t committed to me yet. More important than that, though, is the way I feel about you. When I marry you, I want to be able to seal that contract in the most sacred way God intended for man and woman to seal any marriage.” He grinned. “And since I intend to marry you very soon after you say yes, I don’t intend to have to wait that long, anyway.”

He kissed her once more, then turned to leave. She stood and watched him walk away, slowly, reluctantly, as if he didn’t want to leave. He looked back several times and smiled at her. She smiled back and continued to smile until he disappeared into the night shadows.

Annabelle didn’t sleep any better that night than she had the previous nights, but it was a delicious insomnia filled with mental replays of the evening spent in Gregory’s arms, tempered with a little frustration that she wasn’t
still
in his arms. Okay, a lot of frustration.

Underlying everything was a nudge of uneasiness. Things had changed so dramatically in such a short time. When she thought of his kisses and caresses, she couldn’t believe he’d ever relegate her to second place again, but her better sense told her to put off giving him a definite answer for a while.

She didn’t hear a word he said during church the next morning. She kept looking at the man wearing a black robe and seeing, instead, the man who’d held her in his arms and driven her mad with desire. Maybe church wasn’t the right place
to be thinking such things, she thought guiltily, but the way he made her feel
was
heavenly.

After the service, she and her grandmother walked to the back of the church with everyone else. When it was her turn to shake Gregory’s hand, Annabelle leaned close and whispered, “Great sermon, Rev.”

He gave her an intimate smile that sent her blood pressure up a few points, then said politely, “See you at dinner.” His eyes, though, were not polite at all. They were wicked and wanton and blatantly said he wished
she
was dinner.

Annabelle couldn’t recall having a better Sunday dinner. She had her grandmother to thank, bless her unsubtle heart. As soon as everyone was done eating, she abruptly stood and all but pushed Danni and Sebastian out the door, saying Danni needed a nap. Then she grabbed Lute by the hand and said they were going back to Lute’s house. Another transparently obvious ploy to leave her and Gregory alone, Annabelle thought. This time she didn’t mind at all.

No sooner had Virgie and Lute headed off in Lute’s beat-up truck, than Gregory tugged Annabelle into his arms for a kiss, then another and another. He kissed her until she thought she’d melt in his arms. He kissed her until they both gasped for air, then he drew back to suck in a deep breath. “Maybe we should go take care of the dishes,” he said. “It would be safer.”

“So who wants to be safe?”

He laughed and picked her up, carrying her into the kitchen and letting her slide to her feet in front of the sink.

“Ah,” she said, “I suspected you were the sort who wanted his women in the kitchen or the bedroom.”

“In the bedroom, sweetheart. In the bedroom. Anyway, this is dangerous territory. Now hush and do the dishes. I’ll dry.”

However, as soon as Annabelle put her hands in the dishwater, Gregory took unfair advantage and lifted her hair to press kisses along the back of her neck. He skimmed his hands along her sides, resting for a moment on the curve of her hips, then slid his hands back up. “Have I told you how much I love this silky red top?” he breathed into her ear.