The Great Escape (17 page)

want to knock your head.' She kept down while he negotiated the

turn, then she eased away from him to look around her with blurred

eyes.

'Are we there yet?' she asked, voice fuzzed by sleep.

She heard his low chuckle and glanced at him in time to catch the

fleeting whiteness of his smile in the semi- darkness. 'Dear, sweet,

patient thing—you don't even know where "there" is, do you? No, we

aren't there, I just can't drive any more without the fear that I might

nod off as I stare at those lovely white lines on the road that flash on

and on.'

'I could drive,' she mumbled, and sank against the car door to close

her eyes.

'We're not that desperate,' he replied dryly, his exhaustion running

through his amusement. 'We're going to get a room and sleep until we

wake on our own. You've had it and so have I.'

They pulled into the parking lot of a roadside motel that was still

open, and Dee stumbled out along with him. He stopped and stared at

her. 'Go back and stay in the warm car until I call for you,' he urged,

shooting out a hand as she staggered.

She doggedly shook her head. 'I want to come with you.' She blinked

as she looked around. She didn't want to stay in the car by herself.

Silly, probably, but there it was. She followed him and didn't even

notice his tired grin at her appearance. She was totally unaware that

she still had the blanket around her and that she was peering from it

like a small street urchin wrapped in rags, reeking of smoke. His arm

went around her shoulders bracingly, and she leaned against him as if

it was the most natural thing in the world to do.

Later, after they had carried in their luggage, Mike locked the door

and he turned to one of the two beds, stripping off his clothes with the

simple economy of movement that bespoke overwhelming

exhaustion, and an overriding desire to get in between the sheets

despite clothes flung on the floor and chair. Clad in only his briefs

and unaware of Dee's riveted and fascinated gaze at the sleek animal

beauty of his long body, he slipped between the covers and settled

with a sigh on the pillows. Greatly tired herself, in spite of her sleep

snatched in the car, she also stripped right there, uncaring if Mike's

attention was on her or not. It just didn't seem to matter. She slid a

clean nightshirt over her head, yawning so widely that her jaw

cracked, and started at the unexpected sound of Mike's voice, sleepy

and amused, 'You look about twelve years old in that thing.'

She grinned as he stretched luxuriously, hugely, and she padded over

to turn out the light with a careless flick of her wrist. Then, suddenly

paralysed by the thought and the totally unexpected emotional need

that struck at her, she stood motionless in the middle of the dark

room. A spasm of shaking swept through her as she stood, chilled and

alone.

A rustle of sheets. 'Dee?' he asked her quietly, the deep timbre of his

voice luring her more than he could know. 'Why are you just standing

there like that? Is something wrong?'

Slowly, very slowly, she advanced until her leg brushed the side of

his bed. She trembled, wondering what he would think if she just

slipped into his bed. Dared she? A hesitant, trembling hand went

questing out and found a corner of sheet. Just to slip in beside him and

to be held, so wonderfully close and warm and safe. What if he

rejected her? What if he turned away?

His voice came again, puzzled, patient and very, very tired. 'Dee?

Where are you? I can't see in this infernal darkness. Are you all right,

love?'

And at that she suddenly knew. She pulled back the coves with a

sureness as solid as a rock, and slid right in, encountering long, warm,

hard legs with her own slighter, cold ones. She pulled the covers over

herself as she felt-' the quiver of shock run through him. The warmth

of his body was like an electric heater and yet so much more enticing

and comforting, for it was living and breathing and able to give her

what she needed.

'God——' he muttered, as if it were jerked out of him, '—Dee, what

are you doing?'

'Trying to get warm,' she whispered, and another spasm of chills

shuddered through her. 'I'm being selfish, you see. I want to be held,

and warmed, and I want to go to sleep knowing that when I wake up I

won't be alone. I don't want to be alone, Mike.' Her voice trailed away

to a mere thread of sound.

Utter stillness and then, convulsively, his arms slid around her,

drawing her close to his long, warm, vibrant body. She snuggled and

cuddled and drew as close as she could, and there wasn't anything

sexual at all between them—and yet curiously enough there was. Just

to know that Mike was so definitely, exquisitely, alienly male made

the warmth very interesting indeed. He groped and searched for her

hands and found them carefully tucked away from him, as cold as ice.

He pulled them close, in spite of her tentative tugs, and laid them

right against the heat of his chest without so much as a flinch. It felt so

wonderful and so incredibly good to her, like the rest of his body, that

she sighed, relaxing, and she felt him relax too. He drew her head on

to his shoulder and she found that it fit just exactly right in the hollow

of his neck and shoulder muscles. A quick, slight movement had her

pressing her soft lips against the side of his neck and then relaxing

again.

'Thank you, Mike.'

'You're very welcome, Dee.'

They slept.

Delicious warmth and the total relaxation of tired, sore muscles. Dee

turned her head, murmured in her sleep, and roused a bit at the light

that peeped through the thin slots of curtain across the room. She

stretched her legs lazily and collided with longer, harder, smoothly

muscled legs. Freezing in surprise, she remembered and relaxed

again. She slid close to Mike's warmth and started to drift off to sleep

again, after briefly and uninterestedly wondering what time of

morning it was. A large, questing hand roused her as it touched her

bare thigh, and she murmured, 'It's just me.'

A low, husky voice vibrated through her back as he slid closer.

'Hmm, so I've found. How could I have forgotten? Good morning.'

'Mm, g'morning.' Dee froze again as that roving hand crept slowly

along her rib cage, over her slim shoulder to the hair that lay on her

neck. The hair was brushed gently aside and warm lips pressed to her

nape. The pure physical delight that quivered through her at this was

totally new and unexpected, and she melted right to the bone at his

touch, sighing.

The hand quested down again, found the edge of her nightshirt,

slipped in. 'Dee,' it was said very, very softly, and yet she still caught

the quiver of something ragged running through it. The hand stilled a

moment, fingers tightening, lying heavily and yet gently against her

ribs. 'You'd better get out of this bed right now. Please, get out.'

He was saying two different things, she thought hazily. He was

asking her to stay with his hands and telling her to go with his words.

And she found that she wanted to stay so very much, and with a

rightness and a completeness, she realised why she wanted to stay.

Of course she loved him. She had known yesterday, underneath,

when she'd been overwhelmed with desolation at the thought of him

dead. She had known at the bursting of joy when she had heard him

calling her name over the sound of the fire. She had known when

Mike had pulled her close yesterday, and held her.

She turned in his arms and looked at him clearly, letting him see the

emotion and the desire in her eyes, without prevarication, and the

smile that she gave to him jvas like the morning sun rising and

spilling its brilliance over a darkened countryside. She heard him

catch his breath and felt him come up on one elbow to stare down at

her. 'Can you look me in the eyes and tell me straight to my face that

you want me to leave?' she asked him softly, feeling somehow much

more controlled than he at the moment. 'Because if you can, I'll go,

but not before then.'

His eyes dropped to her moving lips, then he closed them and

swallowed. 'No matter what happens?' he muttered, his hand

clenching convulsively.

She touched him and felt the reverberations of her touch shudder

through his entire length. 'Especially for what would happen,' she

whispered.

His eyes opened and he stared deeply into her eyes, the green vivid,

violent, leaping, fringed with lovely long lashes under a dark and

heavy brow, cleanly moulded. His head gradually lowered to her, his

eyes never leaving hers, and her heart started a slow, hard pounding

that threatened to stop her ears with its roar. He was leaning over her

and his lips hovered over hers. She saw his eyes flutter shut. Just

before he kissed her, he whispered, 'I can't.'

DEE woke again and smiled involuntarily. To be held and to be warm

and to be loved—what more could one want out of life? A heavy

weight lay on her legs and on her waist, and she had her right hand

curled in Mike's hair at the back of his head. She turned to look at him

and he was so close that all she had to do was reach out just a little

with her lips. She did, and at her light, feathery touch he awoke too,

kissing her back, eyes closed and a low, deep, husky groan of

satisfaction purring in his throat. The heavy weight on her legs moved

as he shifted his, and the weight at her waist tightened deliciously, but

he was rolling away to lie on his back.

'Good morning again. You're a wonderful sight to wake up to,' he

murmured, head turned on the pillow, smiling lazily at her. Dee

stretched and moaned as she felt the creak of sore, abused muscles.

Memory flooded her, and she raised a self-conscious hand to her face.

'Beautifully black and blue, no doubt,' she said wryly, laughing at him

laughing at her. 'I was having the most wonderful dream.'

'Oh?' he murmured, coming up on one elbow and running a long

finger down her nose. 'And what were you dreaming about?'

'About this warm and sensitive man I met a few days ago,' she replied

softly, reaching up to his face. He turned his head and kissed her

fingers. 'We were running around and around, and he was chasing

me. He finally caught me, too, and when we looked back at where

we'd been running, we found we'd been going in crazy circles, and not

only had he been after me, but I'd been after him. Then there was this

huge, roaring monster that chased us all over the place and it started

to rain. The rain melted all our clothes off. . .'

'Dee?' he questioned softly, a white smile touching his firm lips. She

stopped to look up at him, eyes wide and innocent. 'Are you making

this up as you go along?'

She nodded, mischief in her eyes, and he started to laugh. *But,' she

hastened to tell him, 'I did meet a warm and sensitive man a few days

ago.'

'Oh, you did?' He bent his head and began to trail a line of tiny kisses

from her neck to her shoulder, up to her mouth for a long, long while,

and then back again. 'Do I happen to know this person? I'm not sure if

I entirely approve of you making friends that easily with a total

stranger . ..'

'Of course you know him,' she whispered into his ear, pressing a kiss

to his jaw and feeling the roughness of his unshaven face. He nuzzled

her, then stopped still as she continued blithely, 'You remember

Chuck, the trucker, don't you?'

And she shrieked with devilment and laughter as he tightened two

warning hands on her with a mock- serious growl of anger. After a

few more minutes of this kind of play, Mike slapped her hip and said

with a sigh, 'I'll bet it's some ungodly time of day and we should have

been up hours ago. It's time you and I were out of bed, my girl.' He

slid out of the covers and stood, a quick, fluid movement, and as she

stared at the smooth strength of his muscular body, she went warm

with remembrance. He was turning to look at her, though, and she

ducked under the covers again, giggling. One seeking hand came

under the covers in search of her, and she slapped at it. 'No, I won't!

The bed's too warm—ow! All right—all right! I'll get out, for

heaven's sake, just stop tickling me! You wombat, I'll bite if you don't

let go of me—oof!' That last was as he scooped her up high into his

arms, swung her around in a dizzying circle, and deposited her in a

heap on the crumpled bed. Her hair went flying and her legs were all

tangled up in a heap, and her eyes were such a vivid, brilliant,