But he knew that it was his angel. Comforting him as she'd done that icy Vermont Christmas Day.
He shut his eyes hard and realized that until now, he'd never known that it was possible to feel both joy and sorrow at the same time.
THE FOLLOWING SUNDAY dawned bright and gloriously sunny.
Shade was out in the yard, planting a tree beside his deck. An oak, in memory of Rachel, the only woman he'd ever loved. The only woman he would ever love. The woman, as irrationally as it might sound to others, he knew he would someday be with again.
He was tapping the earth around the roots, when he looked up and saw her. Running toward him, wearing a somber dark dress so like the one she'd been wearing when they'd first met.
"Rachel?"
At first he believed she was a dream. Born of his aching need.
"Oh, Shade!"
As Rachel flung herself into his arms, he realized, with a burst of pure joy, that she was unbelievably, wonderfully real.
"How? Why? What are you doing here?" he asked between kisses.
"There's so much to tell, I don't know where to begin."
"I want to hear everything. Later."
Crying and laughing at the same time, Rachel citing to him as he carried her into the house. "Later," she agreed breathlessly.
Afraid she would be taken away from him again at any instant, he took her directly to the bedroom and laid her atop the patchwork quilt with reverent care. The room was washed with warm, buttery spring sunshine.
Rachel drew him down beside her and wrapped her arms around him, seeking the solid feel of him, the warmth, the lightness of his body against hers. She laughed breathlessly, then kissed him deeply, revealing a boldness, a confidence that allowed her to come to him freely with her own needs and demands.
Because it seemed an eternity since they'd been together, because their mutual, desperate need was so strong, they undressed each other hurriedly. Shade whisked away Rachel's dress, tearing first it, and then her underwear, before she could catch her breath. Just as quickly, she stripped him of his jeans and shirt and cotton briefs.
Her lips raced over his throat. Her breasts pressed against his chest. Her need was incendiary. His was equally hot and every bit as urgent. In one strong move, Shade lifted her as if she were weightless, which indeed at this moment she felt she was, then brought her swiftly back down, plunging into her.
Rachel cried out in rapturous pleasure. His long fingers dug into her waist, holding her tightly. Her knees pressed against his body as she moved with him, harder and faster, pushing each other to a place they'd never gone before. A place beyond the normal realms of time and space, where love and desire ruled.
Through the thunder in his head, Shade heard Rachel call his name. They'd reached the pinnacle and were hovering on the razor's edge between reason and madness.
Holding her tightly, gasping her name, Shade closed his mouth over hers, let himself go and welcomed the madness.
Afterward, he lay with her atop the rumpled quilt and prayed that if this was just another of the erotic dreams he'd been having lately, he'd never, ever wake up.
"That was," she murmured, "beautiful." She pressed her lips against his damp chest. "Almost as beautiful as that tree you just planted."
"Beautiful," he agreed. Tearing his eyes away from her lush, warm body, he followed her gaze out the window, toward the leaves of the newly planted tree—bright green leaves signifying promise. He ran his hand down her hair, playing with the thick blond strands that were still moist from their frantic lovemaking.
"Tell me you're not a dream. Or a mirage."
"I'm most definitely real." She wiggled teasingly against him and slanted him a dangerously seductive smile. "Can't you tell?"
"It's hard to believe. When I brought you in here, for a moment, I was almost afraid to touch you. I was afraid my hand would go right through you."
She lifted his hand to her lips and kissed each fingertip. "But it didn't."
"No."
"Surely my coming back can't be harder to believe than everything else you've had to accept lately?"
That was, Shade decided, the understatement of the millennium. "I went to Salem."
"I know." She'd hoped he would and had cried when he had.
"It's true, isn't it?" He lifted a few more strands of hair, arranging them over her bare shoulders, her breasts. "Everything you tried to tell me. About Salem. The trials. Joshua. All of it."
"Yes."
"God." He shook his head. "I thought I'd lost you forever."
The pain in his voice tore at Rachel's tender heart. She sat up and wrapped her arms around her bent legs.
"That was a terrible mistake." She looked into his eyes. Dark green eyes that revealed the deep wounds her death had inflicted. "I was only supposed to be wounded."
"But you died, dammit. I was holding you in my arms. I felt your breath slip away."
"I know. And I'm so horribly sorry you were hurt, but you see, although it was totally against policy, Joshua responded with pure emotion, rather than logic, and plucked my spirit out of my body to prevent me from suffering."
"Dammit, if it was all a mistake, if you were supposed to stay here with me, where the hell have you been all these weeks?"
His gritty tone didn't disturb her. Rachel much preferred Shade's irritation to his earlier pain. "I wanted to return sooner, but Joshua and I were brought before a judicial review board for having broken so many celestial rules."
"You had to go through another trial?" he asked unbelievingly. "After everything you went through the first time?"
"It wasn't at all the same," she hastened to assure him. "In fact, as soon as the board decreed that Joshua wouldn't lose his angelic ranking, I was given permission to return to you."
His fingers slid into her hair as he framed her face, holding her gaze to his. "For how long?" he asked cautiously, trying to tell himself that he'd be grateful for any brief time they'd been given, but wanting an eternity.
Reading the concern etched onto his ruggedly handsome face, Rachel's heart went out to him. "I was thinking," she said, her silver eyes laughing, "of seventy or eighty years. If you think you can put up with a stubborn, headstrong wife for that long."
Shade began laughing, as well. He'd never felt so good. So free. "I'll give it my best shot."
She pressed her hand against her chest. "Such a romantic proposal." She sighed dramatically. "It makes my heart go all pitter-pat."
"Give me a few more minutes to get my strength up again and I'll see to it your entire body goes pitter-pat," Shade promised.
Rachel knew from experience that he could and it would. She glanced down at her clothing, scattered across the floor, knowing that her dress was ripped beyond repair. Not that she cared. If the truth be told, she hated the ugly dark dress Joshua had sent her back to earth in.
"I don't have anything to wear," she murmured.
"We'll go shopping," Shade promised. "In a few days."
She arched a brow. "That long?"
"We have a lot of catching up to do," he reminded her. "And it's ten miles to the nearest town."
She smiled. "You just want to keep me naked."
"That, too," he said agreeably.
Rachel laughed, as she was supposed to. "You know," she said, suddenly serious, "I probably should have warned you that I'll only agree to marry you on the condition that you promise to stay out of trouble. No more running off to all the world's hot spots and leaving your wife and children at home."
Children
. After Rachel's death, Shade had thought he was destined to go through life without ever knowing what it would be like to be a father. Because there'd only been one woman he'd ever wanted to have children with.
"You've got yourself a deal. As it happens, Caine O'Bannion is opening up a New England branch of his security company. And you're looking at the new regional vice president."
"I hadn't known." Incredibly, the deal must have come through while she'd been arguing Joshua's case before the judicial board.
"It isn't dangerous work," Shade assured her. "It's strictly white-collar, business-oriented stuff. I won't have to travel, the hours are routine, and the vacation benefits are more than generous.
"Which will give me," Shade promised as he kissed Rachel, "plenty of time to spend with my angelic wife and all the children we're going to have together."
"Oh, I do like the idea of a large family," Rachel agreed happily as the kisses grew longer. And deeper.
"Speaking of progeny—" his lips plucked at hers as his hands moved between them"—what would you say to spending the rest of the day making a baby?"
His clever, wicked touch was making her melt all over again. To think she'd been granted a lifetime of such glorious lovemaking! Twining her arms around his neck, Rachel surrendered to the pleasure. To Shade.
"I'd say yes," she agreed breathlessly.
As he pulled her down beside him and began to make love to her again, a thought occurred to Rachel. A wonderful, brilliant, thrilling idea.
"Shade, darling?"
"Mmm?" He ran his thumb over the rosy tip of her breast and felt her breath quicken.
"May I ask you a question?"
She was so soft. So sweet. He lifted his head, looked straight into her laughing, loving eyes and knew that he'd just discovered paradise on earth.
"One question. But you'd better make it quick." Although he'd vowed to make things last this time, explosions were already bombarding his system, from his brain to his loins.
"Quick," Rachel agreed on a gasp as his teeth captured a sensitive nipple and she felt herself rapidly slipping back into that smoky world she'd only ever known with Shade.
"How does one go about getting a midwife's license in Vermont?"
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