Always Mine (7 page)

But she did want him, and here he was, just inches away, his gentle touch sparking blazes along her nerve endings, like those signal fires that ancient peoples used to spread news.

Of good tidings?

Of danger ahead?

“Just a little human contact,” he whispered again, and her heart squeezed, ridding itself of the last of her objections.

It was the thing she needed, too—and often. Human contact, human comfort—the loving touch of a parent, even the playful shove of a sibling—would have been welcome during those lonely childhood years. Books were magic, and they had taken her away and given her hundreds of new worlds and new characters to be—but they couldn't provide the warmth of a body. They were not a substitute for the strength and heat of a man to whom she wanted to offer her matching softness and need.

So here was a temptation she wasn't willing to pass up. An opportunity to share the long night with someone who made her insides tremble with just the briefest of kisses. But
brief
was the operative word. They'd been briefly in the same orbit, they were
going to be briefly married and this interlude of contact and comfort would be brief, too.

Brief, lightweight, not meaningless, but not full of heavy implications, either. It would be a pleasurable way for two people to fill a long, dark night.

He traced her upper lip with two fingers and she tilted her chin to catch the pads between her teeth. She felt him tense, and when she licked across his skin, he groaned an answer to her caressing tongue. His other hand left the inside of her thigh and traveled to her far hip so that he could roll her toward him. In a smooth jerk, their bodies were flush.

She sucked on his fingers and he groaned again, pulling them free of her mouth so he could use the damp tips to paint her lips. “This was the first thing I noticed when I met you. Soft and full and the color of summer plums.”

“I was wearing a bikini, and you were looking at my
face?
” she teased. Teasing, smiling, flirtatious. That was just the way she wanted this interlude to go.

“The second time you were wearing a bikini,” he reminded her, “and I promise I was suitably impressed.” The back of his hand skimmed her throat and then followed the center of her body to subtly loosen the belt around her waist. “But the first occasion we met was over drinks, and I think we were both a little put out that our two friends had dragged us to meet a total stranger.”

“Oh, not me. Emily always connects me with the
cutest hunks. I can't tell you how many pickups she's found for me at these librarian conventions.”

He punished her sass by leaning in and biting her lower lip. She squealed a fake protest as a hot arrow shot from her mouth to her womb. “Hey, don't damage the kisser.”

His hands paused in the middle of stripping the robe off her shoulders. “‘Don't damage the kisser'? Is that librarian-speak?”

“It's…it's…” She had no idea what it was, because the pathway from the thinking part of her brain to its speech center was suddenly experiencing gridlock. Owen had slid the flannel free of her skin and now the only thing covering her was the filmy fabric of her shortie nightgown and matching panties—and the heat of Owen's gaze.

He cupped one breast and rolled his thumb across the already hard tip. The flesh tightened and she felt herself swelling, become even more sensitive with each light pass of his thumb. “Owen…” she breathed.

“The second thing I noticed about you,” he said, “was that you have a strong reaction to cold.”

“What?” She wanted to laugh, or maybe she wanted to hit him. “That was the second thing you noticed? Do men really pay attention to…to…stuff like that?”

One corner of his mouth kicked up. “My brothers-in-slavedom-to-our-sex-drives might not appreciate me admitting this, but, yes, we really pay attention
to ‘stuff' like that. Right next to
dog
in your library's fat fancy dictionary, you're likely to find a photo of a guy who looks just like me.”

He'd not stopped stroking her nipple during the confession, so she had a difficult time being as appalled or offended as she supposed she should be. Instead, she found herself leaning toward him, silently begging for more than that subtle touch.

“What can you tell me about women?” he whispered, his mouth tracing her eyebrow, the rise of her cheekbone, the line of her jaw. “Is there some confession you'd like to share?”

She tried to come up with something funny or teasing or fun, but all she could think about was the tingling tip of her breast and the maddening way he was really not even touching it. Yes, not really touching it at all, she realized, as her focus centered on the movements of his maddening thumb. His flesh wasn't making contact with hers. His palm barely cradled her breast, and his thumb was merely moving the gauzy fabric of her nightwear across her hard nipple.

“Isabella? A confession?”

Enough of fun, funny, teasing. “If you don't really touch me, Owen, I'm going to scream.”

Instead of obeying, he let out a low, sexy laugh, then rolled again, landing flat on his back, with her on top of him. “So at least I know a little more about Isabella. She's demanding, impatient, single-minded…”

He was the one teasing now. But she was miffed
at him anyway for being so in control when she was so obviously losing her grasp on her dignity. She rose up, a knee on either side of his hips, determined to put a little distance between them.

Owen stole that determination away as he instantly scooted down on the mattress and took her nipple in his mouth. Surprise short-circuited her brain. Her body arched, her shoulders jerking back and her bottom shooting up. He groaned against her flesh, sucking harder as his casted arm lay across the small of her back and his other palm cupped the raised curve of her behind.

He took his mouth from her and she moaned. “We're not done, sweetheart,” he said. “I promise. But you're going to have to help me out again, Isabella. As much as I'd like to strip you myself, my cast will just get in the way.”

She hesitated, a little shy, a little nervous. He palmed her bottom again. “Isabella, get naked and then I'll take you in my mouth again.”

Desire burned through her veins. Her hands shook as she undressed under his watchful gaze. Her stomach fluttered, because naked suddenly didn't seem lightweight or fun or funny. It seemed personal and intimate and maybe more than she could handle if the other human on the end of “contact” was Owen Marston, who had thrilled her from the first moment their eyes had met across the crowded casino.

His hand slid along her ribcage, encouraging her
back into position. “Oh, sweetheart. Everything about you is so pretty,” he said. She was trembling, but shyness and nerves evaporated the moment he took her breast into his mouth.

Her body bowed again, heat flashed across her skin and Owen groaned as his other hand lifted to toy with her other nipple. Her belly sank lower, brushing against the hard erection she could feel beneath his cotton boxers. She put one hand to the waistband and wiggled her fingers under to find the silky tip.

His hips shifted upward at her touch and his mouth tightened on her nipple. They both groaned.

His mouth moved between her breasts as she continued to caress him. “Sweetheart,” he said suddenly, his voice low and tight. “No more. No more or this will all be over.”

But she liked the fact that he was begging her this time, and she rolled off him against his protests, just so she could strip him as naked as she. Then she crawled up the mattress, finding her inner tease again, licking his hair-dusted shin, taking a nip at his knee cap, pressing kisses against his muscled thighs.

His hand found her hair as she pressed baby kisses all around his groin. His fingers bit into her scalp when she wrote a message with her tongue on his hard length. When she reached the tip, he yanked upward on her hair, bringing their bodies flush, their mouths within kissing distance.

Owen Marston had not lost his talent for kissing.
He laid them on her, one after one, feeding the sweet drug of intimacy to her, until she was hot and wiggly and so wet and swollen between her legs that when he touched her there with one long finger it slid inside so easily he immediately added another.

They were groaning against each other's mouths, needing no words to share confessions, telling secrets with their bodies and it was all so good, so right, so simple. It was like a “Dui” version of how sex should be, and when he whispered instructions to her, telling her where to find a condom and then telling her to lift up and slide down on him, she didn't feel embarrassed or exposed, or any of the dozens of emotions that moments like this between a man and a woman could sometimes bring.

She only felt pleasure.

O
wen sat on the edge of the made-up bed to pull on his clothes after his shower. He'd woken alone, but there was the smell of coffee rising up the stairs and a note left on the pillow where Izzy had lain.

It was composed of a single word—a Dui-esque
THNX
.

It made him smile to look at it, and to think of what had passed between them, when together they'd transformed the cold darkness of his nightmare into the velvet cocoon of shared sexual pleasure. First thing this morning, he needed to convey a “THNX” of his own. She'd been what he'd needed the night before, and this morning he could revel in a sense of
well-being he hadn't experienced since before the night of the fire.

He felt like himself again, the laid-back, calm-in-a-crisis, impervious-to-pressure Owen Marston who'd headed out with his head on straight the night of that last call. He wanted to keep a firm grasp on that—and on that man.

From the bedside table, his cell phone rang. He didn't bother checking the screen; he just put the phone to his ear and then swallowed his groan when he heard the raspy voice coming through the speaker. “Have you cooled down yet?” his grandfather demanded.

Owen recalled that the last time he'd spoken with the old man, he'd hung up on him. It was a minor miracle that Philip Marston had let this long pass without another call. Owen probably owed Bryce a beer or two or twelve for running interference for him.

“I'm good, Granddad,” Owen said, swiping Izzy's note from the bedside table and stuffing it into his pocket. She'd apparently made the bed while he was showering, and he was glad she hadn't tossed the scrap of paper. It was tangible proof that he was a man on the mend. “How are you?”

“Annoyed, impatient, concerned.”

Owen grinned. “And so self-aware, too. What's got your dander up?”

“Well, you, of course! I promised your mother I wouldn't pester you….”

So it was his mother Owen had to thank for his grandfather's uncharacteristic—though obviously now over—period of radio silence. Unfortunately, she didn't go for the easy beer payoff, which made him more than a little uneasy.

“…but hell,” his grandfather continued. “You're my eldest grandson, and it's not like I don't read the newspapers!”

The non sequitur clearly stated the old man was agitated. Usually he was extremely, and sometimes obnoxiously, direct. “Granddad,” Owen said, “I'm having a little trouble following you.”

“Did you hit your head when you fell?”

“No.” He frowned. “I just don't see how me being your eldest grandson and you reading the business pages have anything in common.”

“They have everything in common. And it's not the
Wall Street Journal
that I'm talking about. It's the
Paxton Record.
”

Tiny carpenters had invaded Owen's brain and were tapping on his skull with their tiny hammers. He pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, trying to force the pain away and remember that last night he'd had the best sex of his life. Izzy on top, her warm flank in the palm of his hand, her incredible molten center sliding down on him. The carpenters faded away and he took in a slow breath.

“Did you hear me, son? The
Paxton Record.
”

“You're irritated by the score of the high school football team? I don't think they've been the same since Bryce graduated—”

“This isn't about your brother, who did the right thing and joined the family business. This is about you!”

It's what Owen had been afraid of, ever since the last phone call he'd had from his grandfather, the one during which he brought up the old argument about Owen's career choice. The carpenters set to work again. “Granddad—”

“Did you or did you not go to college intending to join the business?”

“I did. You know I did.” Maybe if he let the old man get it out of his system, they could drop this familiar quarrel for good—or at least for now. “And I interned every summer and listened to you talk about the company at every family dinner. But it just wasn't for me.”

“How do you know?”

“I know because when I worked there it drained my enthusiasm and my energy. And I know because after the first hour at the fire academy I had found it again.” Not only energy and enthusiasm, but purpose and pride. There was nothing wrong with what his father and Bryce and Caro had chosen to do—involve themselves in and expand the business Philip Marston had started. It just wasn't Owen's choice.

“You were good at it,” the old man grumbled.

“And Bryce was a damn good quarterback, but you're not all over his case for not trying out for the NFL.”

“I told you, this is not about your brother. And damn it, I would have been all over his case if he had set his sights on the NFL. Do you know how many of those players limp off the field with debilitating injuries that affect them for the rest of their lives?”

Owen slid his fingers in his pocket to touch Izzy's note.
Remember last night. Remember that smile on your face this morning.
“Granddad, what does this all have to do with me?”

“I'm coming by to see you today.”

“No.”

“Nonsense. Would you prevent an old man from assuring himself his favorite grandson is recovering?”

“Bryce is your favorite grandson.”

“Today it's you.”

Owen rolled his eyes. “I need my rest.”

“You're getting plenty of rest. And your mother told me you have a nice health worker living there with you, making sure you don't overtax yourself.”

Well, he might have overtaxed himself a little last night…“Wait. What? Health worker?”

“Some young woman. Misty? Betsy?”

“Izzy,” Owen corrected, wondering what he was going to owe his mother now. He should have known
she'd kept quiet about his marriage or else his grandfather would have been on his doorstep immediately, eager to meet the mother of his great-grandsons. “Her name is Isabella.”

“Well, I assume she's taking good care of you.”

He touched the note again, sniffed the coffee in the air and swore that he smelled French toast and maple syrup. “The best.”

“So I'll see you in a few minutes.”

“What? You're more than an hour away.”

“I'm talking to you from the limo. I'm in Paxton right now.”

Between the little carpenters and the old man, Owen's good mood was taking a serious beating. “Tell me you're joking.”

“Not at all. I want us to have a serious, face-to-face discussion.”

Oh, God. “About…?”

“Now that you know the potential consequences of this career of yours, I'm going to persuade you to see reason and quit.”

Here they went again. “No.”

“A man died, Owen.”

“Don't you think I know that?” he burst out. His own loud voice obliterated the last of his well-being. “Don't you realize I can't stop thinking of that?”

Fine. That was the damn truth of it. That Jerry was gone had been hovering over him like a black cloud since he'd come to in the hospital.

That Jerry was gone
and
that Owen hadn't been able to prevent Jerry's death. All his training, all their equipment and experience, none of it had been able to stop the outcome. It was just like that damn nightmare, when even aware of what was about to happen, Owen hadn't been able to stop Jerry from going down.

“And son, I read in the paper…” Philip Marston cleared his throat. “I read in the Paxton newspaper that your colleague, he was younger than you.”

“A couple of years.”

“And that he was married.”

“I went to their wedding,” he heard himself say. “The bride's name is Ellie.” He thought of her apple cheeks and her sparkling blue eyes. Even in a wedding dress and veil, she'd looked hardly older than a teenager. She and Jerry had been high school sweethearts and he'd worn that same jaunty grin at the altar that Owen had seen on his face in the nightmare.

His grandfather's voice lowered to a gruffer note. “The young widow is eight months pregnant.”

The carpenters synchronized their hammers, assaulting Owen's skull with a single joint blow. He squeezed his eyes against the pain. “Yes.” Eight months pregnant. Oh, damn it all, yes.

It was that fact he'd been avoiding facing since he'd learned of Jerry's death. It's why he hadn't moved hell and high water to make it to the funeral. It was why he'd not called Ellie, or sent a separate floral arrangement besides the one the station had
added his name to and the other that his mother had sent from the entire Marston clan.

He hadn't wanted to think about it.

Jerry had been so psyched to be a dad. He swore he was going to be the kind who read to his toddler every night. He'd coach if the child was into sports, he'd applaud if the kid was into dance recitals, he'd listen to squeaky violin lessons and make a hundred kites catch wind.

Jerry said he'd had that kind of father himself and wanted to give his son or daughter every wonderful childhood moment that he'd experienced. Jerry's dad had passed away five years before. Jerry two weeks ago.

Leaving no one to do all those things for Jerry and Ellie's child because Jerry had died.

And Owen survived.

Why?

He hadn't wanted to ask himself that question because he knew there was no good answer.

Why?

Why?

He forced the question from his mind. “Look, Granddad—”

“I'm walking up your front steps, Owen,” the old man said. “You better tell your young woman to let me in.”

And remind her not to give away that she was Owen's wife, he thought, hobbling toward the bed
room door. Great. His positive mood was gone for good. He touched the note in his pocket. And now he'd found the perfect way to extinguish hers, too.

 

Izzy hauled in a deep breath before opening Owen's front door. She knew who was on the other side. Philip Marston. His grandson, the man she'd slept with the night before, had just called her up the stairs in an urgent voice and explained that his grandfather was moments away and that she'd been identified as the “health worker” by his mother. For reasons of their privacy, Owen supposed, or their sanity, he'd added.

He'd looked tense and tired, the exact opposite of how she'd felt upon waking up. She hoped it was the unexpected arrival of his grandfather that was affecting his mood, but…well, she just wasn't going to worry about it. Her state of mind was buoyant, and she planned on keeping it that way.

Why not? She'd been wondering for weeks about what she'd missed out on with Owen, and now she knew. Yes, as he'd suspected, they danced on the mattress as well as they did in the clubs in Las Vegas. Satisfying one's curiosity could be a positive experience.

On her next breath, she pulled open the door. The impression of a tall, gray-haired man flashed through her brain before she found herself flat on her back on the floor, a yellow monster hanging over her.

“Nugget,” the man scolded. “Is that any way for a Marston to act?”

The big dog swiped her chin with a wet tongue, then pranced backward to stare at her with big brown eyes. Izzy cautiously sat up.

“Granddad? You brought the dog?”

Izzy glanced back to see Owen on the upper landing. Then she returned her gaze to the canine standing at attention, close enough that she could feel his breath wash over her face.

“It's okay, Izzy,” Owen said.

Mr. Marston frowned down at her. “Not afraid of dogs, are you?”

“Um…I don't know any dogs. Not, um, this close and personal, anyway.” The elderly ladies she'd most often stayed with had been cat people. She slowly climbed to her feet, and, one eye on the dog, held her hand out to the older man. “I'm Isabella Cavaletti, Mr. Marston.”

His shake was brief and businesslike. “Good to meet you. And this champion yellow Labrador is none other than Marston's Golden Nugget.”

“Or, as we find more appropriate, the Nug,” Owen added.

“Okay,” Izzy said. The dog looked more like a “Nug” than a champion. He was still watching her with his doggy eyes and his tongue hanging out. “Would everybody, um, like some breakfast?”

“You're not here to wait on us,” Owen started.

His grandfather spoke over him. “Just coffee for me, please. Black. Owen, your mother said you're headquartered upstairs during your recovery. Can I help you back to bed?”

“I don't need to lie down,” his grandson grumbled. “But come on up, Granddad.”

To her dismay, the dog hung around in the kitchen while she put together a tray. Did he somehow think she was suspect? Could he tell she was a counterfeit “health worker”?