JAKrentz - Uneasy Alliance (11 page)

"Yes, sweetheart, yes!" Torr drove himself into her again and again, filling her completely as he sought to quench the fire that flamed in both of them. He was losing himself, finding himself. The words that came to his lips were incoherent yet carried the most fundamental of meanings. The liquid velvet of her sheathed him tightly until he thought he would drown. He had known from the beginning that it would be like this. Unique. Perfect. Unbearably fulfilling.

When the ripples of completion swept through her, Torr felt them as an extension of his own pleasure; he knew a violent satisfaction at having been able to bring Abby to this level of sensation. He lifted his head with an effort, determined to witness every nuance of her expression in that moment. But he was too caught up in the final release to spend more than a few seconds enjoying her wet parted lips, tightly closed eyes and soft quick breaths. Knowing she was climaxing beneath him sent him over the edge. He didn't hear the rough exclamation that came from his own throat, but he was well aware of the fierceness of his release.

It was a long time later before Abby felt Torr reluctantly, slowly, unlock himself from her body. She opened her eyes to find him propped on his elbow, looking down at her with an infinitely disturbing expression in the depths of his amber gaze. She lay still, aware of his palm flattened possessively on her stomach and of the weight of his ankle chaining hers. The air around them was thick with the musky scent of their lovemaking and there was a dampness on both their bodies. The intimacy of the moment was overpowering.

"I've been wanting you like this for days," Torr said softly. "But even in my imagination I didn't realize how it would be." He shook his head as if a little dazed. "Nothing was ever like this."

"No," she agreed, aware that there was no point trying to hide her feelings in the rawness of the moment. "Nothing was ever like this. Oh, Torr, I've never felt…I've never known anything like this." Her eyes were wide with the brave honesty of that statement.

He lifted his fingers from her stomach and tenderly pushed back a strand of honeyed hair that lay damply on her cheek. "No woman has ever given herself to me so completely. You belong to me now, sweetheart. Do you realize that? You're mine. I think you were meant to be mine all along. But even if it wasn't ordained, it's a fact now. I'm going to take care of you, honey. I promise you that."

Abby lowered her lashes slowly, aware for the first time of the way the coolness of the room was starting to chill her perspiration-damp body. "Torr, I think I know what you're trying to say and I…I appreciate it, but…"

"Appreciate it!" he mocked gently, humor lighting his eyes for a second. "How gracious of you."

Abby looked up into his face again, her own expression not mirroring any answering amusement. This was serious for her and she had to make him understand. "I know that in the aftermath…I mean I understand that at times like this, people often say things they think are romantic. Men like to talk about women belonging to them and…and…"

"Considering the fact that I'm quite sure you haven't had a lot of experience conducting conversations at times like this, I don't see how you can set yourself up as an authority on what is and is not a common topic." The lazy amusement in him grew stronger and Abby was about to press her point when she realized what he'd just said. It sidetracked her.

"What do you mean you don't think I've got much experience in these matters?"

He leaned down and brushed her lips with vaguely arrogant assurance. "Have you?" he taunted lightly.

"Well, no, but I don't see how you can be so certain of that!" she muttered, taken off guard by his unexpected perception.

"There is something about you when you lie in my arms. Something soft and vulnerable and honest. I don't know how to describe it, but I do know that you couldn't be in the habit of doing this very frequently. If you were, you would have learned how to protect yourself emotionally. You would not be so sweet and giving. And there would not have been that moment of fear just before I took you," he added. The tightening of his fingers on her skin told her he had been aware of her emotions at that point.

The fact that he had read her so well was unnerving. It sent a flicker of apprehension down Abby's spine. Her eyebrows drew together in an intent expression as she tried to get back to the original point she wanted to make. Darned if she was going to lie here and give him the satisfaction of telling her just how little experience she'd had! The man was arrogant enough as it was.

"Torr, what I was trying to say before you diverted me is that I wish you wouldn't talk in terms of possession. It makes me nervous. I know that to you it's probably just a word, but to me it brings back reminders of how unpleasant a man can make life for a woman."

"You don't like the idea of being possessed by me? Not even now after what we've shared?" He drew his hand along the length of her thigh with a proprietary touch.

"It's sweet of you to talk of protection," she countered placatingly. "But please don't talk of possession. All right?" She brushed his mouth with a fingertip, trying to soothe the trace of rigidity that was threatening there. "Talk to me of flowers and being together and how you want me. I won't even mind if you point out just how much you can make me want you," she said with a whimsical smile.

"Not saying the words doesn't change my feelings. You belong to me now, sweetheart."

Abby shook her head once. "I belong to no one except myself, Torr. If you can't accept that, then whatever we have between us ends here now."

"Don't be afraid of me, honey. Please don't." The plea was husky and low as Torr bent to kiss her shoulder. "Just relax. If it makes you so anxious, we won't talk about it tonight."

"We won't talk of it ever," she said with quiet emphasis, aware of the stirring in her body as Torr began to trail his fingers slowly across her stomach. Where had he learned such magic, she wondered fleetingly. He only had to touch her and she seemed to burn.

"We won't talk of it until later," Torr told her firmly. "When you're ready to accept our relationship for what it is. But there is something else we do have to discuss. And I don't think it can wait any longer than morning."

"What do you mean?"

"I have to know about that weekend. I have to know why you were there with your cousin's husband in such compromising circumstances. I need to know what kind of hold the blackmailer really has on you. You can't expect me to keep working without all the facts."

Abby moved restlessly, twisting a little as though to slip out from under his caressing hand. She did not want to talk about what had happened that weekend. Not with anyone. Torr's hand somehow seemed to clamp around her waist, making it impossible for her to slide out of reach.

"Nothing happened that matters during that weekend, Torr," Abby told him very steadily. "It was a mistake. It's over and done."

"Did you spend the weekend with your cousin's husband?"

"I've already told you I didn't have an affair with Ward."

"But you did spend that one weekend with him? Does the blackmailer have something to hold against you? Why were you coming out of a hotel room with Ward Tyson? What was that weekend really all about?"

The questions came at her like the flicks of a whip, not quite violent but holding the promise of violence. Abby froze, the incipient passion fading in her body.

"Oh, honey," Torr muttered, immediately aware of the tightening of her beneath his hand. "I only want to know the truth. I have to know everything if I'm going to help you. Can't you understand that?"

"You were the one who insisted on helping me. I never asked for your assistance!"

He leaned forward, his mouth hovering just above hers. "Whether you asked for it or not, you've got it. The questions can wait until morning. Put your arms around me, Abby, and make love to me. I need you tonight."

She hesitated, unwilling to take the risk of surrender now that she knew he was going to request answers she did not want to give. But Torr allowed her no further opportunity to resist. He lowered himself along the length of her, his mouth moving hotly on hers as his hands stroked her body to readiness. In a matter of moments, she willingly pushed everything from her mind except the demands he was making on her and the equally fierce demands of her own body. The magic of their passion consumed them both.

A
bby awoke
the next morning feeling a little angry, a little defiant and very much trapped. And for the first time since the blackmail had begun, the reason for her feelings wasn't that she had been made a victim of extortion.

She awoke with the knowledge that she owed Torr Latimer some answers. Abby didn't like the idea of owing a man anything, but she felt especially strange about the obligation she now felt to tell Torr the full truth.

How had she gotten herself into this situation? Frowning furiously, Abby pushed back the quilt and eased herself out of the huge bed. Torr slept on beside her, apparently oblivious of her uncertain temper. Abby paused beside the bed, surveying the man who had freed her passions so easily during the night.

She had admitted the truth when she'd told him she'd never known anything as extravagantly exciting and enthralling as his lovemaking. She had never realized just how much pleasure her body was capable of receiving—and creating. It was true her previous experience had been extremely limited, but Abby realized with sure intuition that she would never know with any other man what she had known with Torr the night before. Not even if she lived to be a lively old lady with a hundred passionate affairs behind her.

In fact, this morning, Abby thought gloomily, she couldn't even imagine having a hundred passionate affairs. She could only visualize herself in bed with one particular man. Torr Latimer.

Her mouth twisted in wry disgust as she stalked to his closet and pushed back the door to peruse the neat interior. There on a hook hung what she needed, a short terry-cloth robe. Yanking it down she wrapped it around her, the oversize garment nearly engulfing her. Then, with one backward glance at a still-sleeping Torr, Abby hurried out the door and down the hall to the sanctuary of her own bedroom.

There she sank wearily down onto her rumpled bed and contemplated her situation. Had she really expected to be able to go to bed with Torr, she asked silently, and not wake up to find herself bound to him.

The fact was, she hadn't given the future much thought at all the previous night. She had reached out to take the yellow rose from Torr's hand and found herself chained. From the instant she had grasped the rose she had been caught. No, perhaps it had been earlier than that. Perhaps it had happened the moment she had succumbed to his offer of protection. Or had it been the night she had let him drive her home from the class in flower arranging? The first time she had spoken to him?

It was disturbing to realize that she couldn't even pinpoint the moment when she would still have been free to walk away. Looking back, it seemed as if her relationship with Torr had been inevitable from the start. And everything that had happened since that first night in class had been a continuum of events, each inseparable from the one before, culminating in last night's ultimate commitment.

Was that what it was? A commitment? Had she really taken such a step so mindlessly with a man she hardly knew? It was incredible. Impossible to believe. But Abby couldn't shake the knowledge.

Restlessly she removed Torr's terry-cloth robe, aware of the intimacy she experienced just by wearing something of his. The garment undoubtedly fit his solidly muscled body perfectly, but on her it enveloped and overwhelmed. Just like its owner.

Letting it drop to the floor, Abby padded naked to the bathroom. The intent scowl on her face reflected severely back at her from the wide mirror over the washbasin. Her hair was a honeyed tangle and her body still looked warm and rosy from sleep. Her body didn't exactly
feel
warm and rosy from sleep, however. It felt alert and aware and just a little sore in places. Abby groaned to herself as she turned on the shower and stepped beneath the pulsating spray.

The feeling of being rushed into an affair she wasn't at all certain she wanted brought on a momentary sense of panic. Last night had happened much too quickly. She had too many other problems to deal with at the moment and she couldn't risk getting so deeply involved with Torr Latimer.

The problem was, Abby thought grimly, she already was involved. She needed to put some distance between them and give herself some breathing room.

Down the hall Torr stretched widely as he heard the shower go on in Abby's bathroom. He'd been aware of her leaving the warm bed a few minutes earlier, but he'd also sensed her precarious mood. Judging it best not to confront her first thing with the intimacy of the night, he'd allowed her to escape. In her usual impulsive, undisciplined fashion she'd fled his bedroom in order to give herself a chance to think.

That was all right with him. She wasn't going any farther than her own room and he couldn't deny her a little time to herself. She needed it to adjust to the situation, he decided, feeling indulgent. Everything had happened fairly quickly and she had a lot on her mind.

Not that anything would be changed when she finally emerged to face him, he added silently as he walked naked into his own bathroom. God, he felt good. Strong and alive and determined. Abby had made him feel this way. She was everything he'd ever wanted or needed in a woman. And she was his.