Fire And Ice (13 page)

“You see how good it can be?” he whispered. His lips brushed hers, his teeth ardently catching and pulling the lower lip. “Here, darling,” he murmured, drawing her hand to the buttons of his shirt. “Open it.”

With a deftness she was unaware of, her fingers coaxed the buttons open and slid the silky fabric away from his broad, tanned shoulders, feeling the warmth and power in them with awe. She liked the way his skin felt under her fingers, the hardness of muscle, the sensuous maleness of the thick carpet of hair that made a wedge across his broad chest. She stroked it, tugging gently at the tangle of it, and smiled when she elicited a harsh groan from the mouth that was ardently crushing her own.

“You little witch,” he ground out, raising himself up to look at her smiling face, at the green eyes shimmering with raw excitement. “That was deliberate.”

“Accidental,” she murmured. Her hands slid onto his shoulders, his neck. “Larry never liked me to touch him,” she recalled, and her smile faded with the memory. “He didn’t like to touch me either, or look at me….”

“Stop looking back,” he said softly, holding her gaze while his fingers moved expertly down her body and made it go taut with desire. “You’re with me now, and I want to touch every inch of you.”

“I may disappoint you….”

“Never,” he said quietly. “You make me feel whole. You’re everything I’ve ever wanted in a woman, all the secret dreams a man hoards of his ideal. In no way could you ever be a disappointment.”

Tears blurred his image. She reached up to touch the long, masculine curve of his mouth. “Oh, I love you so!”

He moved, so that their bodies were touching at every point, her soft breasts crushed against the mat of hair on his chest, her legs brushing his, mingling with them as they strained together.

“It’s going to happen,” he whispered shakily as they kissed more intimately, the hunger they felt for each other overpowering. “I can’t stop.”

“I don’t want you to stop,” she moaned, arching. “Love me. Love me, make it stop aching!”

“Oh, God, what a sweet ache,” he breathed. His mouth was careful with hers, so tender that she could have cried. His hands gentled her, tracing slow patterns, preparing her for him.

“I’ve never wanted…anyone before,” she confessed as he pressed her back into the pillows. “I never loved…until now.”

“Be quiet, darling,” he whispered. “Lie still, and do what I tell you….”

“How wicked,” she said, trembling, waiting to be overwhelmed, possessed, taken….

“Not half as wicked as what I’m going to do to you now,” he promised with a triumphant smile when his hands moved and she cried out. “Yes,” he said breathlessly, watch-ing her. “Oh yes, that’s it, darling, welcome me….”

His hand went to his belt a wild minute later, then froze as the sudden sharp buzz of the doorbell burst into the silence like a bomb blast, shattering the silver intimacy into a thousand ragged shards, bringing back ice-cold sanity. And Cannon cursed like a drunken sailor, his face terrible.

“I hope whoever’s at that damned door has his life insurance paid up,” he said under his breath as he sat up and fought to calm his rapid pulse and ragged breathing.

“Oh, God…!” he groaned. His shoulders shuddered as he buried his face in his hands for a minute, his body rigid.

“I never would have stopped you,” she whispered. “I’m sorry.”

He drew in a harsh breath and eased his shoulders back. He glanced down at her with lingering regret as she pulled up the covers to her chin.

“What a shame,” he said softly, “to cover up such beauty.”

She managed a strained smile for him. “I’ve only just realized where I am, and why,” she confessed with a mischievous gleam in her eyes. “You heartless seducer…”

“Me?” he burst out in mock outrage, standing up to find his shirt and tug it back on. “Like hell. You dragged me in here and tried to seduce me!”

“I never!” she retorted. She sat up, tossing back her dark, disheveled hair. “A gentleman…” she began, stressing the word.

“I’m not a gentleman,” he reminded her, glaring toward the hall where the doorbell was being repeatedly jabbed. “And you damned sure wouldn’t love me if I were, would you?” he added with a grin.

She peeked up at him through her lashes. “I’ll let you know when I’ve had several hours to think about it. You’d better see who it is. Maybe somebody called the police when they saw you bring a sweet young thing like me into your evil lair.”

“You’re sweet, all right,” he murmured, going toward the door. “If you’ll stay just as you are until I get rid of our company, I’ll express that a little more physically.”

“Oh, I’ve had my excitement for tonight, thanks,” she said. “I think…I’d like to do a little more thinking.”

He looked back at her, but he wasn’t angry—or even impatient. He smiled. “We’ll go at your pace, honey. I want you, but I’m not going to force you. See you in the morning.”

She nodded. “’Night.”

He winked as he went out.

* * *

The intruder was a business associate of Cannon’s who wanted to discuss the contractual agreement he’d been working on all day. Margie was secretly grateful for the opportunity to steal away to her own bedroom and lock herself in. The wine had banished her inhibitions momentarily, but the interruption had brought them back with fresh intensity. Not only had she been willing to lay aside all her principles, she’d even admitted to him that she loved him!

She put on her gown and climbed into bed, her mind still on the feel of his hands, his warm, powerful body against her own bareness, the sweet aching crush of his mouth. She did love him—that was no lie. She ached for him in ways she couldn’t have imagined before.

And while he hadn’t admitted to sharing those feelings, he’d admitted to her that she was everything he wanted in a woman.

Of course, she reminded herself brutally, men were likely to say anything when they wanted a woman, regardless of whether or not it was true. And Cannon very definitely wanted her, she remembered, blushing.

She turned out the light and pulled the covers over her. In the morning, with a clear head, she’d think about it again. But right now, her fuzzy mind was only fit for sleep, not for untangling emotional puzzles.

* * *

The following morning she awoke with a start, sitting straight up in the wide bed. She bit her lower lip as she began to remember, her eyes closing when bits and pieces of what had happened came back to her.

Her long legs swung off the bed and she went to her suitcase, dragging out a pair of navy slacks and a white blouse. She hurried into the bathroom and showered quickly, grateful for the blow dryer that restored some order to her hair. She used more makeup than usual to camouflage the shadows under her eyes, the faintly bruised mouth. Reality seemed harsher by the morning’s light than it had the night before. She was glad now that the interruption had prevented her from making love to Cannon.

“Idiot!” she berated herself. “Oh, you idiot!”

She didn’t know how she was going to face him. If only she hadn’t had all that wine. If only she’d pulled away….

She packed her suitcase methodically and gathered it and her purse, slinging her navy blazer around her shoulders. She opened the door and walked slowly down the hall.

Cannon was in the sitting room, uncovering dishes apparently left by room service. There were eggs, sausages, toast and coffee, all laid out on the small table.

He looked up as she came into the room, his hard arms shown to their best advantage in a short-sleeved yellow knit shirt. His eyes were as bloodshot as her own, and the dark shadows under them had no camouflage of makeup as hers did.

“Good morning,” she managed in a tight, husky voice, avoiding his dark eyes.

“Good morning,” he replied with equal reserve. “Sit down and we’ll have a quick breakfast before we head back to Florida.”

She sat, placing a napkin in her lap before she picked up her coffee and sipped it.

He seated himself across from her, and neither of them spoke while they ate small amounts of the food. Cannon’s dark, troubled eyes watched her the whole time.

“Margie,” he said softly.

She looked up, her fork poised over the delicious scrambled eggs that she’d hardly touched. She saw her own regrets mirrored in his hard face.

“Nothing happened,” he reminded her.

She smiled wistfully. “By the skin of our teeth,” she observed.

“And if it had, would the world have ended?” he asked. He got up, kneeling beside her chair with one arm across her knees, one hand curving around her waist. “Answer me. If I’d had you last night, would it have been so terrible?”

“You said it yourself,” she sighed. “I have a very Victorian outlook on life, a legacy from Grandmother McPherson who thought that a girl should fling herself out a window if she let herself be seduced.”

“Doesn’t it depend on who does the seducing?” he asked dryly.

“Not to her, it didn’t.” She looked into his dark, smiling eyes and relaxed for the first time that morning. “It was the wine, you know,” she told him softly.

“I’m afraid I don’t believe that,” he replied. He touched her thigh, and her leg tautened involuntarily at the sensuous caress. “We wanted each other, Margie. There’s no shame in that. It’s the most human thing in the world.”

Her lower lip thrust gently forward. “It’s cheap.”

Both eyebrows went up over laughing eyes. “Not in my income bracket, it isn’t.” He chuckled.

She hit his shoulder with the palm of her hand. “Stop that,” she chided. “You know what I mean. People can…make love to each other without strings these days. Except that I can’t be casual about it.”

He drew in a slow breath, studying her averted face quietly for a long time. “I didn’t tell you what I felt, did I?” he asked. His fingers moved up to her chin, turning her eyes back to his. “Did you think it was all physical with me? That you were just going to be another notch on the bedpost?”

“It’s nothing against you,” she replied matter-of-factly. “You’re a man.”

“And you’re a woman. Very much a woman. The first woman,” he added with a level look, “that I’ve touched in several months. I work hard and I play hard, but I don’t have affairs. Not even brief ones.”

“Just the occasional one-night stand?”

“That’s about the size of it,” he admitted. “And even then I’m damned particular about the woman. Since my divorce, I haven’t cared all that much for commitment.”

She studied his hard face intently.

“Looking for scars? They don’t show,” he told her.

She shook her head. “I’m trying to imagine what kind of woman would attract you enough to get you to the altar.”

His sensuous mouth curved. “She was a voluptuous redhead and I literally lost my head over her. I was twenty-five, fresh out of college with a vice-presidency under my belt and visions of love everlasting in my mind. She cured me in two years, and I divorced her the night I found her latest lover in my bed.”

“Did you know him?” she asked.

He laughed. “He was her interior decorator.”

“She went from you…?” Her tone was incredulous.

He studied her. “You say that as if you couldn’t imagine a woman going from me to another man.”

“I can’t,” she confessed, and turned her face away. “We’d better finish our breakfast.”

“What would you say,” he said softly, catching her fingers to lock them into his, “if I were to tell you that I couldn’t go from you to another woman?”

She felt her eyes dilating, her lips parting as she met his quiet, unblinking gaze. “Are you…telling me that?”

He brought her fingers to his mouth and kissed them softly. “Yes, I am.” He turned her hand, and touched his mouth to her palm. His breath sounded uneven and his fingers crushed hers. “Margie, if you want the moon, I’ll get it for you,” he whispered half in jest. “Just promise me you won’t ever try to walk away from me.”

Tears misted her green eyes as she watched him get to his feet and pull her up against him. His arms swallowed her against his large, powerful body, and he cradled her gently. What could she say? In just a few hours, she was going to be back in Panama City, and she was going to have to tell him the truth. She saw now that there was no future for them as long as any pretense lay between them. She was going to have to trust him enough to level with him, and it might be the end of everything.

“I won’t go unless you send me away,” she compromised, and pressed close to him, drinking in the scent of him.

“Send you away?” He laughed mirthlessly. “My God, ask me to do something simple, like cutting off an arm; it would be less painful.” His arms tightened. “Margie, I…want you.”

It sounded as if he was saying one thing, but meaning something very different. Her breath caught and she looked up at him. “Cannon, when we get back, I’ve got something to confess; something that I…have to tell you. And you may not like it, or me.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “You’re not on the pill—is that it?” he murmured wickedly.

She smothered a grin. “Actually, I’m not, but that isn’t what I have to tell you.”

“Then what is it?”

He looked so concerned, so genuinely concerned, that she almost told him right then. But the words stuck in her throat.

“Not today,” she said.

“All right. Not today.” He took her by the waist and lifted her up against his body so that her lips were level with his. “I dreamed about you,” he murmured as he tugged her closer. “I dreamed…that we made love….” His mouth nudged her lips apart, bit at them, teased them. “It was so real that I woke up in a cold sweat and reached for you.”

Her arms went around his neck and she nuzzled her nose against his, smiling lazily, lovingly. “Was I there?” she murmured.

He chuckled. “It felt like you,” he murmured back, “but when I opened my eyes, I was squeezing the hell out of a feather pillow.”

“I didn’t realize I was that flabby,” she whispered as he kissed her.

“That soft,” he corrected. “And only in certain places. Here…for instance,” he added, lifting her higher so that his mouth could reach the soft swell of her breasts. Even through the fabric the kiss was shatteringly intimate, and she caught her breath with an audible gasp.