Authors: Maralee Lowder
When she felt him begin to pull away
,
her arms tightened, but then she let go.
Whatever they had together must always come from their mutual desires, she resolved, never from just her own need.
“We’ve got to talk.”
She recognized the resignation in his voice.
It wasn’t what he wanted either, she realized.
Of course
,
he was right.
They did need to talk.
And they would.
Soon.
But couldn’t talking wait just a bit longer, she asked herself as the corners of her mouth lifted in a seductive smile.
“Yes, we need to talk,” she whispered as she nipped playfully at his ear.
“And we will,” she said as she slid her hands over his body, touching places she knew would send him over the edge of desire.
“Soon,” was the last word she spoke before she found a use for her mouth that far surpassed any words she might have
spoken.
Before, when they had made love, they had been filled with
a wildness
, hot and passionate.
But now the loving was warm, and sweet, and oh, so delicious.
The rest of the world ceased to exist.
Time was meaningless.
There was only now.
And in
all the
univers
e, there were
only the two of them.
He kissed and caressed her body until she wanted to beg him to take her, to bring her to the highest plateau of their passion.
But she said
nothing, sensing that he wanted - no needed -
to bring her even higher.
And then it was her turn to tease him with her lips, her tongue, to t
ouch and caress with her finger
tips.
She watched his face, gauging his reactions.
She wanted to bring him to the same heights he had brought her.
She wanted him to want her beyond all reason, to ache with desire.
At last, not daring to wait another moment, Mac buried himself de
ep within her, until they
became one.
He gloried in
the feel of her as he took slow, deliberate strokes, prolonging the exquisite torture.
Cassie’s breath caught as she felt the tension mounting deep within her body.
Clinging to him, she gloried in the wild, wonderful sensations as together their world exploded into a million brilliant stars.
Mac sat at the table in Cassie’s kitchen watching her as she prepared their breakfast.
Though her hair was still tousled from the bed
,
and her terrycloth robe had seen better days, to his eyes she was the ultimate expression of womanhood.
He couldn’t remember ever seeing anything lovelier than his little Cassie.
The silence was companionable, the sort of thing that happens with people who are totally comfortable with one another.
Every now and then Mac picked up snatches of a tune she hummed under her breath.
He thought it was ‘Here Comes the Sun’
, but he couldn’t hear enough of it to be sure.
It would be appropriate
,
though
, he thought as he glanced out the window.
Rays of early morning light streamed through the trees, promising a beautiful day.
He caught himself silently praying that it really would be a good day.
They were all in desperate need of at least one good day after all that had happened in the past week.
Cassie set Mac’s coffee before him.
She lifted her eyes to his, the corners of her mouth curved in a shy, tentative smile.
His response was to place a sweet, chaste kiss upon her lips.
Their gaze held as she pulled away, the expression in their eyes saying more than words ever could.
Mac would never be sure if it was that soft, loving expression in her eyes, the taste of her lips that still lingered on his
,
or the afterglow of the loving they had just shared, but it was at that very moment that he came to realize that he was totally and forever in love with Cassie Adams.
He hadn’t a clue how it would
affect the rest of their lives;
all he knew for certain was that for the first time in his life he had given his heart wholly and with no reservations.
It was both a liberating and a terrifying realization.
How can I love him so much?
Cassie wondered as she gazed into his smiling eyes.
She wanted to lose herself forever in their velvety chocolate depths.
For a few brief moments she opened herself to t
he new emotions he awoke in her,
to receive the love she saw reflected in his eyes,
willing the moment to never end, knowing that it would be all too brief.
Soon he will go away
, she told herself, already feeling the pain of his leaving.
But she pushed the thought aside, telling herself to take what she could of him, to absorb his very essence so she would always have him with her, no matter how far apart they might be physically.
Still not speaking, she sank to her knees beside him, circling his waist with her arms and cradling her head in the curve of his shoulder.
“I can’t believe how much I love you,” Mac whispered, his breath stirring the hair just above her forehead.
She raised her face to his, unshed tears of
happiness sparking in her eyes.
“Do you mean it?” she asked, pleasure and amazement obvious in her airy voice.
“Oh, I mean it.
I only wish I had the words to tell you how much I mean it.”
“You don’t need words,” she smiled.
“Not with me, anyway.”
“I wouldn’t have thought I’d ever want anyone to be able to read my mind.
But since it’s you, I like it just fine.
It means
you will always know me better than anyone else ever could.”
“It’s not so much that I can read your mind, it’s more that I feel what you feel.
It’s as if we have a unique psychic connection.
I feel a stronger connection with you than anyone I’ve ever known.”
His arms tightened around her as he bent to kiss the top of her head.
“I think I like that,” he murmured.
“Yes, I think I like that very much.”
She turned her face up to his, making it easier for him to drop a kiss on her waiting lips, then pulled away.
She rose to her feet, stepped over to the window and turned
her face into the warmth of the morning sunlight.
She paused there for a moment before turning bac
k
to face him.
“I owe you an apology for the way I acted yesterday.”
She raised her hand to stop the protest that rose to his lips.
“No, I do.
If you wrote that story, you must have had a good reason.
I believe in you.
I know you would never do anything that would hurt me.”
“But I didn’t write it.”
“What?”
“You heard me.
I didn’t write the story.”
“But who
...?
Why
...?
I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I, but I intend to find out.”
Then he told her how he had called his editor but had only ended up more confused than ever.
“It’s a mystery.
Somebody faxed in that story under my by-
line, but I can’t for the
life o
f me figure
out who or why.
I don’t know, maybe someone thought they were doing me a favor.
But that’s pretty hard to buy.
As far as I know, there’s no one in town who would care one way or the other if I fell flat on my face at
The Inquisitor
.
And I can’t think of any other reason why anyone would submit a story under my name.
It’s so damn unprofessional!”
“Unprofessional and weird.
Wh
y
would someone
do it, I wonder.
”
She stood there for
a moment
thinking, and then her eyes widened as she said, “You don’t think somebody did it to turn us against one another?
I mean, if one of the other reporters happened to notice all the time we’ve been spending together, they might not have liked the idea that you’re closer to the story than they are.
Maybe one of them did it.”
Mac nodded sagely.
Cassie might very well have hit on the answer.
Such antics were not entirely unheard of among his
cohorts
.
Hell, given the circumstances, he might h
ave done the same thing himself.
“But we’re not going to let them win, are we?” Cassie grinned as she closed the gap between them once again.
“Nothing could ever convince me that you would deliberately hurt me.”
Mac felt a tightening deep within him, though he tried to hide it from Cassie.
No one had ever had such faith in him before.
He wasn’t all that sure that he could be worthy of such trust.
“After I’d fumed and fussed about the story for a few minutes, I came to my senses and realized that it all had to have been a mistake.
I wanted to apologize to you then, to at least get your side of it, but I didn’t know where you’d gone.
I had actually thought I’d go looking for you, but a bunch of Samuel Hicks’ groupies got in the way.”
“What do you mean ‘
got
in the way’?”
Mac’s dark eyebrows came together in a scowl.
“Oh, it wasn’t anything
really.
Luckily, Father Sullivan had stopped by the shop
,
and when he saw what was going on
,
he called the Sheriff’s office.
Even though there’s no love lost
between the priest and Sheriff Whitaker, the sheriff came by and made them go away.”
“I think you’d better tell me everything that happened and let me decide.
I may just have to have a talk with that Hicks character.”
Mac’s dark scowl almost made Cassie laugh.
She had never had a man who wanted to protect her before and she discovered that she liked it very much.
However, she thought it best to diffuse the bomb before it did any irreparable damage.
“Really, it wasn’t anything.
Some of Revere
nd Hicks’ people were hanging around outside the store with their stupid placards.
I wasn’t even sure Samuel was aware of what they were doing until one of the women mentioned that they were expecting him to join them soon.
But he never did show up.”
“But the Sheriff did, right?”
“Yes, along with a couple of his deputies.
They said that they had received
some
calls.
I guess some of the local businessmen were afraid there was going to be a riot.
They probably weren’t too thrilled with all the yelling going on.
It can’t be good for their businesses either.
In fact, that’s pretty
much the gist of what Walt told Shelly and me after he cleared everyone away.
As far as he’s concerned, she and I would be doing everyone a favor if we’d just lock
ed
the shop up and quietly fade
d
into the woodwork.”
“He said that?” Mac asked incredulously.
“Well, not in so many words, but that was his meaning.
Believe
me,
he didn’t leave a lot of room for doubt.”
“I can’t believe the guy.
First he tells you
you
can’t leave town, then he tells yo
u to make it look as if you had.
What the hell does he want from you?”
“I suppose what he wants is for all of this to simply disappear.
He’d like nothing more than to have his own little town back to where it was before.
In fact, I think he’d rather have it back to what it was before we came, high crime rate and all, just so he wouldn’t have to deal with the coven anymore.”
“You’ll let me know if he starts harassing you, won’t you?
He strikes me as the kind of guy who gets his kicks pushing people around and I’ll be damned if I let him start in on you.”
“Say, I think I like the idea of having my very own knight in shining armor,” Cassie said, smiling broadly.
“It’s pretty nice.
It’s ki
nd of like how Alan is with Mom. O
nly I like my knight
best.”
Mac wasn’t so sure he liked being compared to Alan in this
con
text.
As far as he was concerned Alan’s armor was decidedly tarnished.
“At least
,
Alan used to be Mom’s champion.
I’m not so sure now.”
The laughter left her eyes as she was drawn back to the ugliness of reality.
“I just can’t figure him out anymore.”