Wildest Dreams (The Contemporary Collection) (33 page)

Then in sudden surrender, they turned, coming together.

He entered her; she received him, encompassed him with rhythmic internal welcome.

Magic, physical magic that was also in the mind.

They made it last, striving, rising, falling in tenuous rhythm, tumbling upon the sheets with trembling muscles and moist skin surfaces that glided upon each other like oiled silk. Joletta clung to his arms, hard-muscled with restraint, as he moved above her. She rose against him, taking him deep inside and deeper still with every plunge. The blood rushed through her veins, pounding in her ears. The shocks of his striving rippled through her, and she took them and gave them back again. Her senses stretched, soaring. Straining, they advanced in vital increments toward a goal neither was yet desperate enough to reach.

Then abruptly it was in their grasp.

Joletta felt her heart cease, then begin again with the sharp beat of a striking bell. She gave a low cry. The magic caught her in its vortex, spinning her out of control in a pleasure so piercing it was near unbearable, so endless it seemed to spread wider and wider until it lapped the very edges of eternity. She clung to the man who held her, feeling the shudder that shook him as he plunged into her one final time. She heard her name whispered like a benediction. They were still.

The wind off the Adriatic dried the perspiration from their bodies. Before their skin had cooled, they slept. Waking in the dawn in each other’s arms, lying like spoons under the sheet, they heard the whine of a mosquito.

They turned to each other. It was like a homecoming.

HE HADN’T MEANT TO DO IT
.

Rone let the shower spray pour over him in a hot, steady stream, chasing the sandalwood-scented lather off his body and down the drain while steam rose in a scented cloud. He should regret the hours just spent in bed with Joletta, he knew. But he didn’t. He would have this much, if no more. The regrets he’d save for later.

She was like no woman he had ever known. No surprise there; he had recognized it from the start.

She had come to him the night before as naturally as some Roman nymph, without hesitation or pretense or trying to make him realize the honor she was conferring upon him.

And because of it, he did feel honored.

He felt a lot of other things, none of which he needed to think about now, not if he was going to let her sleep a little longer this morning.

God, but she had courage. And self-control. He had expected to have to deal with a full-blown case of hysterics yesterday after the accident. No such thing. And it wasn’t that she lacked the knowledge or imagination to understand what could have happened. Her face had been pale and her eyes huge for a full five minutes; she had just refused to subject the people around her to the emotional fallout of her horror.

Earlier, before they had been run off the road, she had been well and truly irritated with him — not without reason. He would have felt better if she had screamed and called him choice names; he wondered if she knew that. But no, she had put him in purgatory and kept him there until he couldn’t stand it anymore.

Not that he thought she realized it. He hoped she didn’t. If she ever discovered how much she could hurt him, he was going to be very sorry indeed.

He had seen Venice before, but never with a woman who refused to pretend that she was blasé about it. Joletta had looked and absorbed in her quiet way, and her delight had sparkled like the sun glittering off the lagoon. Everybody around her had been enchanted, including every man in sight. Including Caesar Zilanti. Including himself.

To keep his hands and his inconvenient lust to himself had been impossible. The moment had been too right, Joletta too incredible in the Venetian moonlight.

He had been too jealous. Caesar was lucky he wasn’t at the bottom of the Grand Canal. Smooth-talking son of a—

Self-control. He was the one who needed that. He had thought he could stick close to Joletta, watch her every minute, and play it cool. Idiot. He had set his own self up.

So now what?

So now he would act the Judas goat, take Joletta to St Mark’s Square, and wait. He would pretend innocence and feel like a treacherous bastard.

He turned off the shower and reached for a towel, pressing it to his face for a long moment. He breathed deep, once, twice, before letting the air seep from his lungs in a slow sigh.

Dear God, but he hated this. He really did.

He had known he would, just not how much.

There was still a short time left, another week in Italy before the tour was over, however. Stupid and selfish it might be, but he intended to make the most of it.

Joletta, watching through slitted eyelids as Rone emerged from the bathroom, smiled a little to herself at his attempts to be quiet. She was a light sleeper — the shift of the mattress as he had eased out of bed had wakened her — but there was no need to make him feel bad by letting him know it.

She had never actually lived with a man; never wakened in the morning to find one there, never seen one easing around in the gray dawn light clad only in a towel. It was interesting.

There were drops of water between his shoulder blades where he had missed them with the towel, and also a few caught in the dark and curling hair on his thighs. She watched in lazy appreciation for the way they shone with the movement of his muscles. And she thought, with a slight flush, of drying them for him.

He had been more concerned about privacy in Switzerland, she thought; he had dressed in the bathroom, then left the room altogether while she showered and changed. That he had abandoned such maneuvers this morning was a measure of the intimacy that had been established between them. It was disturbing, that sense of intimacy, but she thought she just might be able to get used to it.

He began to whistle under his breath, a blues rendition of “St Louis Woman,” as he pulled a change of clothing and what appeared to be a small coffeepot from his suitcase. He skimmed into briefs and a pair of jeans, then moved back into the bathroom to fill the pot with water. An instant later Joletta caught the aroma of fresh coffee grounds, followed by the soft sizzle of water beginning to heat.

Rone stepped back into the room, walking noiselessly to the window, where he leaned one shoulder against the frame. He crossed his arms over his bare chest as he looked out over the rooftops. The dim light gave his features a gray cast, so that he appeared pensive and even a little sad. What could be troubling him? Some business problem? Something to do with being with her?

Joletta thought of asking him what was wrong, but she didn’t know him well enough to pry into his business. And if it concerned her, she was not sure she wanted to know.

She stretched, pushing herself up on one elbow. Her voice husky, she said, “Is that coffee I smell?”

Rone turned his head. His mouth curved in a slow smile as he gave a brief nod. “I hope it’s not too strong for you.”

“I’m from New Orleans, remember? Coffee doesn’t come too strong for me.”

He acknowledged that sally before he went on. “I’m sorry about last night.”

“Are you? That isn’t too flattering.” The light tone wasn’t too bad, if she did say so herself.

His smile faded as his face took on a serious cast. “All right, the only thing I’m sorry about is failing to protect you. I would have if I had expected — but at least it can stand as evidence that I didn’t plan what happened.”

“Oh,” she said, lowering her gaze to the sheet that covered her as she realized what he was talking about. Pregnancy and the ways to prevent it had not crossed her mind. “I didn’t either — that is, I don’t—”

“I didn’t think so,” he said, coming to her rescue with a trace of humor in his voice. “That can be fixed, if we go looking for another pharmacy?”

It was subtle, the questioning inflection in his suggestion, the intimation that he was taking nothing for granted. Hearing it, Joletta recognized that she was being handed an excuse for drawing back from the new physical relationship he had established, if that was what she wanted. What could she do except return the favor?

“We can do that, of course,” she said, “if you think we can find the time.”

“Oh,” he drawled, “I think we can manage it.”

She laughed; she couldn’t help it. A moment later she was being tumbled across the mattress as it bounced on its springs from his weight hurling down upon it. He rolled her to her back, lying across her with his weight on his elbows while he stared down at her with some dark exultation suspended in his eyes. She met his gaze for long moments, then reaching up, she slid her fingers along the strong column of his neck to the back of his head, and dragged his lips down to hers.

The pigeons had converged on St Mark’s Square, hovering in squabbling crowds around the grain sellers, fluttering and circling with the morning sunlight shining iridescent magenta and green on their heads and necks. They scattered in clouds as groups of tourists and Italian schoolchildren crisscrossed the paving stones from the quay to the Doges’ Palace and the cathedral, and they rose with a fluttering of wings like a host of earthbound angels as the two moors on the old clock tower struck the bronze bell to mark the hour.

Joletta, watching the activity as she and Rone had a cappuccino at the sidewalk café on the square, thought the birds had the same red legs and amorous dispositions as the pigeons of Jackson Square in New Orleans. It seemed comforting, somehow.

The pigeons were not the only familiar sight. Joletta’s lips tightened as she saw a tall, blond woman striding toward her, threading her way among the strolling groups and the vendors of postcards and head scarves. Natalie.

Joletta’s main reaction was irritated anger. She couldn’t be surprised that Natalie had found her, not after everything that had taken place, but it was hard to see how the other woman could dare face her.

She thought of getting up and walking away, of refusing to speak to her cousin. That didn’t seem likely to be helpful. Something had to be done, that much was clear. She might as well make a beginning now.

Natalie lifted her hand to wave while she was still several yards away. She was boldly fashionable in a Versace dress in vigorous shades of teal and magenta and hot Italian yellow, yet she looked out of place there in the square with its muted colors and timeworn elegance. As she waggled her fingers the dozens of gold and enamel bangle bracelets on her arms made such a clanking noise that the pigeons were startled into flight for a good twenty feet around her.

“Good morning, cousin,” she called in gay greeting as she came nearer. “I knew you had to show up here in the square sometime; everybody does.”

Joletta gave her an unenthusiastic hello. Natalie was undaunted. As she came to a halt beside the table she appraised Joletta in a single sweeping glance. “You’re looking well; Venice must agree with you.” She turned toward Rone, who had gotten to his feet as she approached. “Or maybe it’s the person you’re traveling with. Aren’t you going to introduce us?”

As Joletta complied Rone gave her cousin a brief nod. His features were a little stiff, as if he was less than thrilled with the interruption. They did not relax as Natalie spoke again with a sly glance at Joletta.

“Yes, I’d say a definite improvement over the types you usually have in tow, cousin, the bearded artists with nothing to say for themselves and the stuffy professors who talk too much.”

Joletta seemed to hear an undercurrent of envy in the other woman’s voice. The bright, clear light was not kind to her cousin; it exposed the sallow skin tones under her makeup caused by too many late nights and too much to drink, and etched the lines of discontent between her carefully arched brows with hard shadows.

Natalie reached for a chair to seat herself without waiting for an invitation. As Rone stepped to hold the chair for her, she gave him a brilliant smile over her shoulder. “Rone,” she said musingly, “it sounds like a name for a cowboy. Are you one?”

“Not exactly,” he answered.

“What does that mean? I’m dying to know.” Natalie, catching sight of a waiter, snapped her fingers for service.

“I have all the cowboy instincts, just no horse.”

The expression on the face of Joletta’s cousin turned arch. “Which instincts are those?”