Warrior's Embrace (9 page)

“My libido’s never been tuned up, Mother, so
I really wouldn’t know about things like that.”

“Well, thank goodness for that.”

For the first time since the fiasco at the
Bullpen, they smiled at each other. With their mutual affection and
their sense of humor, they could get through anything.

Candace got off the bed and hugged
Virginia.

“I’m sorry, Mother. This took me by surprise,
that’s all. Over the last twenty years I got used to having you all
to myself, and I guess I never thought of having to share you. Does
that make me selfish?”

“No, it makes you human.” Virginia held her
daughter close. “You’ve nothing to worry about, Candace. This week
has been a lovely interlude in my life, and I don’t regret a minute
of it.”

“Not even that scene at the Bullpen.”

“Not even that. It proves we’re strong. We’re
capable of showing honest emotion without letting our feelings
damage our relationship.”

“I don’t want to lose you, Mother. You’re all
I’ve got.”

All Candace had known of her father over the
years was that he sent expensive gifts at Christmas. Sometimes when
Virginia thought of the way Roger had ignored his own daughter, she
wanted to fly out to California and smash a six hundred-page
bestseller over his head.

It was bad enough that he left her; he didn’t
have to leave his daughter as well.

“Don’t worry, Candace. You’re never going to
lose me... no matter what.”

“Two against the world, Mother?”

“Two against the world.”

o0o

When Virginia had something important on her
mind, she couldn’t sleep. If it happened to be a chapter in a book
that needed fixing, or a character who needed shaping up, she could
just get out of bed, go to her office down the hall, and turn on
the computer. Sometimes the screen was still glowing at two o’clock
in the morning, but that didn’t matter because she was the only
person losing sleep.

She tossed and turned, wadding the sheets in
a tangle around her legs. Disgusted, she got up and walked to the
window. Was that a pinpoint of light she saw in the guest cottage?
Would it be horribly rude to disturb Bolton at one o’clock in the
morning?

She climbed back in bed, determined to wait
until morning, but fifteen minutes later she knew she couldn’t.
She’d never been a patient woman, and she despised loose ends.

She threw on her pink robe, grabbed her
flashlight, and tiptoed down the stairs.

o0o

Bolton saw her coming.

He stood at the window watching, and he knew
by the way she walked that she was geared for battle. One of the
things he loved most about her was her stubborn independence. She
challenged him in a way no woman had, in the same way his mother
challenged his father.

Bolton smiled. He and his twin sister had
heard the story of their parents’ courtship over and over, and
neither of them ever tired of it. Jo Beth McGill had led Colter
Gray Wolf on a merry chase... and still did from time to time. The
thing that was so wonderful about their love was that it allowed
for disagreements. He and Callie used to climb the tree behind
their house and make bets on the outcome of their parents’ friendly
wars.

Callie always sided with Jo Beth. “Mom’s sure
to win this one. When she tosses her head and sticks out her chin,
Dad had better watch out.”

“Yes, but you know Dad,” Bolton would say,
sticking up for his father. “You can’t tell by his face whether
he’s going to be a summer rain or a thunderstorm.”

Though Bolton had inherited his mother’s blue
eyes and her love for photography, he was like his father in other
ways, as unreadable and endurable as the mountains and generally as
benign. But anybody who had ever tried to scale a mountain in the
midst of a storm knew that mountains can be dangerous.

Bolton was still smiling when he opened the
door. Virginia didn’t yet know him well enough to be warned.

“You need not be so pleased to see me,” she
said. “The purpose of this visit is not unbridled sex.”

“Is that what you call it?”

“Among other things.”

“What other things?”

He guided her to the chair with a hand on the
back of her neck. That small touch sent shivers all over Virginia,
that and merely being in the same room with him. The cottage was
small and cozy, the kind of place that invites intimacy. Bolton had
lit the gas logs and pulled the two overstuffed chairs close. His
notebook was open on the table beside one of the chairs, and his
boots were under the table.

She glanced down at his feet. They were big
and substantial, a tall man’s feet, with a light sprinkling of dark
hair across the toes. Until she met him, she’d never known how sexy
a man’s feet could be. The sight of them made her want to drop to
her knees and take him in her mouth.

This wouldn’t do. It wouldn’t do at all. She
shoved her hair back from her face and glared at him.

“Don’t try to sidetrack me,” she snapped.

“Would I do that?”

“Yes. You’d do anything it takes to have your
way with me.”

“And what way is that, Virginia?” Laughing,
he sat in the chair opposite her.

“See. You’re doing it again. It’s a
deliberate ploy on your part.”

“You read me too well. I’m going to have to
practice implacability.”

“If you get any more implacable, you’ll have
to hand out maps and instruction books.” Though he was still
laughing, his face told her nothing. It was his eyes that gave her
pause. Such mysteries were hidden in them that she felt as if she
were drowning.

“I don’t think I can trust you, Bolton Gray
Wolf.”

“You delight me, Virginia.”

“Oh, hush up. This is hard enough as it is,
without you looking like that.”

“Like what?”

“Don’t you ever look in the mirror? Your eyes
alone are enough to make saints turn in their crowns. And that
smile... don’t even get me started on your smile.”

“I take it you like those things?”

“Yes... I like them.”

“That’s a great start. You like me and I like
you. We’re going to have a wonderful marriage, Virginia.”

“See. There you go again.” She jumped up from
her chair and stalked around the room. She was in such a fizz, she
didn’t even notice that her belt had come loose and her robe was
flapping open.

Bolton caught the edges of her robe and
maneuvered her to the front of his chair. Then he held her there,
robe parted, devouring her with his eyes.

She didn’t struggle against him. She’d never
win in a contest of strength against a man the size of Bolton.
Furthermore, she didn’t want to win. She wanted to stand exactly
where she was, with her body and every one of her secrets
exposed.

His eyes held hers, and she felt the quick,
hot rush of desire.

“This is not fair,” she said.

“All’s fair in love and war.”

“Is this love or war?”

“Both, I think...” He thoroughly kissed her.
“In that order,” he murmured.

She wouldn’t argue with that,
couldn’t
argue with that. If her easy acquiescence made
her weak and selfish, she didn’t care. She had come to the cottage
to end the affair. There was no future for the two of them, but
they had the moment, and it was too precious to be thrown away.

“Love me... please... tonight I don’t want to
think, I don’t want to talk.” She wove her fingers in his hair and
pulled him closer. “Tonight, just love me.”

He eased her robe off her shoulders, and it
pooled at their feet. Pulling her close, he tipped up her chin.

“You’re the most exciting woman I’ve ever
known.” He ravished her with a kiss, and as he lowered her to the
rug, he whispered, “It will always be this way with us, Virginia,
love and war.”

“Shhh, don’t talk, not yet.” She pulled him
fiercely to her.

They loved as if they’d waited a lifetime for
each other, loved until their bodies were slick with sweat and
glistened in the glow from the fire. They loved until the first
faint fingers of dawn turned the windows soft shades of rose and
gold.

Bolton wrapped Virginia’s robe around her
shoulders and pulled her onto his lap.

Suddenly she was too full to speak. He rocked
her, smoothing her damp hair and murmuring love words to her in
Athabascan.

“I never did learn that language.”

“You will.”

She didn’t deny him yet. She wasn’t strong
enough. She would close her eyes for a moment, gathering strength
in a catnap, and then she’d tell him good-bye.

Bolton watched her sleep. He knew why she had
come, knew it with a certainty that required no words. The
interview was finished. Now there was only one reason to stay in
Mississippi—Virginia.

He’d always been supremely confident that
whatever he wanted, he could have, either by hard work or patience,
or sometimes merely by the sheer force of his will. But he’d never
met anyone like Virginia. For the first time in his life he
couldn’t predict the outcome.

Her face was damp and dewy from their
lovemaking and the glow of the fire. Tenderly he touched her cheek,
then he licked her scent off the tips of his fingers. She stirred,
smiling in her sleep and snuggling closer to him. He joined their
hands, and her fingers automatically curled around his. Conscious,
she might deny her feelings, but unconscious, she melted into him
as naturally as the snows of spring melted into Mother Earth.

Suddenly he knew the outcome, he could
predict the future. Virginia would be his no matter how long it
took to win her.

She woke with a start.

“What time is it?”

“Just after dawn.”

“I didn’t mean to sleep so long.”

“I’ll escort you back if you want to go now.
Candace is probably not awake yet.”

“It doesn’t matter. Candace knows.”

Virginia went into the bathroom and splashed
water on her face. She didn’t dare look in the mirror. Every night
took its toll for the years would not be denied. They extracted
their due no matter how much she paid for products with names such
as line preventer and repair complex. Why didn’t the cosmetic
companies just get realistic and call the night cream damage
control?

Bolton was still sitting on the rug with the
fire burnishing his light copper-colored skin. She leaned against
the bathroom door and drank in the sight of him. Even after a
marathon session of sex, she still wanted him, wanted him with such
hungry desperation that she had to bite the inside of her lip.

“Would you like something to eat?” he asked.
“I’ll make scrambled eggs and toast.”

“No, thank you. I want to suffer.”

Bolton stood up and propped his elbow on the
fireplace, towering over her, gloriously naked.

“Would you please put on some clothes?”

“Do I distract you, Virginia?”

“You know you do.”

“You said you wanted to suffer.” His smile
was without mirth.

“Not that much.”

They locked eyes, and she was the first to
look away. “You could join me,” he said. “Slip your robe off,
Virginia. I want to see you naked once more in the morning
sun.”

“You don’t give up easily, do you?”

“I don’t give up at all. Did you think I
would?”

She really hadn’t known what to expect. In
spite of her vast experience with men in the fantasy world, she’d
had very little in the real world. Roger had been her first man,
and after he had left she’d been too busy raising Candace and
carving out a career to develop another relationship, even if she’d
wanted to. It took years to get the bitter taste of her first
disastrous marriage out of her mouth, and when she thought she had
recovered, good old Harry had led her down another boulevard of
broken dreams.

“Scared, Virginia?”

“How did you know what I was thinking?”

“Your face told me.”

She put her hands on her cheeks. “I’m not
scared of you, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“You have no reason to be afraid of me. Not
now, not ever.”

“There you go again. Assuming a future for
us.”

“It was no assumption. It’s fact. There
is
a future for us, Virginia.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Fate never makes mistakes.”

“I’ve met at least a dozen men who would have
made my life a constant catastrophe. And I probably would have
given my share of grief back to them. How do you know fate didn’t
send them my way?”

“What did your heart tell you?”

She batted at the air as if she were swatting
flies.

“I’d be in a pretty pickle if I’d listened to
my heart. It was so broken when Roger left that all I wanted to do
was crawl into bed and stay there. But I didn’t.” She balled her
hands into fists and thrust out her chin. “I don’t listen to my
heart, Bolton. I listen to my head.”

Bolton wanted to pick her up and ride off on
one of her white Arabians. His gut instinct told him that the only
way he could ever make Virginia listen to her heart was to take her
captive, to get her away from computers and cars and microwave
ovens and all the other machines that cluttered up her life. He
always went back to nature when he needed to understand the message
of his heart.

If he had spent a few days in the mountains
thinking, he’d never have bought Janice a ring. Fortunately, he’d
corrected that mistake before it was too late.

Was it too late to keep Virginia from making
a mistake that would cost them the future?

“Come with me, Virginia.”

“Where?”

“Back to Arizona, back to the mountains and
the rivers and the forests, back to a place where man can
understand the messages of the heart.”

Almost, his vision seduced her. Almost she
could believe that what he said was true.

“It’s tempting.”

“Come, Virginia.”