"French toast?" he echoed absently, intent on watching Casie tug on the sash.
Liz suddenly became aware of what was going on. Shifting the slipping Casie higher on her hip, she almost lost her dignity completely. Casie gurgled as she yanked the sash off. Liz grabbed for the two sides of the robe, which had parted company now that the sash lay on the floor at her bare feet.
She saw desire flash in Griff's eyes.
She bent down awkwardly, still holding Casie. Snatching up the sash, she managed to work it back around her waist. "Now keep those busy little hands off," she reprimanded Casie affectionately. Then she turned to look at Griff who was watching her with an amused expression. "As for you, you could have averted your eyes, officer Foster." She tried to suppress the warm, pleased feeling she had, even as it warred with her embarrassment.
"Yeah, I could have." He gave no indication that he would have done anything of the kind.
Elaborately, she took hold of the two ends of the sash and twisted them around tightly in her hand so that Casie could no longer play with them. "So, you're human after all."
Only too human as far as you seem to be concerned, he thought with a touch of annoyance as well as interest. "Human enough to want that French toast you just offered."
The way his eyes appraised her, she knew he didn't have French toast on his mind.
Neither did she, but this wasn't the time or the place to explore what was silently going on between them. Maybe later, she thought with a touch of sadness, wishing she were a little more reckless or that Casie had slept just a little bit longer.
"Right. French toast coming up." She marched off, her hips unintentionally swaying provocatively beneath the terry-cloth robe.
Griff watched the easy rhythm of the sway. Damn, he wanted her. Though it was wrong and would never work, he wanted her in the worst way. But he knew he couldn't handle the added complications. He was having enough trouble just dealing with having Casie pop up unexpectedly in his life. He'd seen what had happened to policemen with emotional problems at home. They lost their edge. He couldn't allow that to happen—not for any reason—not even in a town with as little crime as Bedford.
"Don't hurry, I have to take a shower first." A cold one, he added mentally.
He heard Liz laugh softly to herself and wondered if she could read his thoughts. It certainly wouldn't have been hard at the moment.
When he had finished with his shower and had gotten dressed, Griff felt as if he was once more in control of himself.
Walking into the kitchen, he realized that he was living in a fool's paradise. Or maybe that was where he wanted to live. To fool himself for a little while and pretend that everything wasn't the way it was.
She was standing there, barefoot up to the neck, he mused longingly, with his bathrobe covering her long, tan legs and sleek athletic body. The fact that he had worn that bathrobe against his own body just yesterday morning heightened the degree of intimacy between them to a point he didn't think possible.
Her hair was piled up high on her head in a haphazard ponytail, with tendrils tumbling down every which way. She looked absolutely delectable. A witch in total control of the situation and an imp partially at his mercy at the same time. He didn't know which he wanted more, he only knew that he wanted her.
"I missed my bathrobe," he murmured as he crossed the room to her. Off to the left, Casie sat making a mess in her new high chair. It was a domestic scene straight out of a Norman Rockwell portrait, he thought.
And yet there was this current of electricity running through it so strongly that he felt he could touch it if he tried.
He wanted to touch her. She was making him crazy.
For a moment, from the tone of his voice, she thought that he was going to demand that she return his robe right then and there. "You should have more than one," she answered, trying to ignore the way her heart was pounding at his nearness. He was right behind her and she could have sworn that she felt the heat of his body.
"There's never been a need to before last night."
She turned around, her body brushing against his, feeding the flame between them. "Don't you, um—" she ran her tongue against her dry lips "—entertain?"
"Is that what they call it, now?" With very little encouragement, he could easily separate her from the bathrobe. He was strongly debating the possibility. "You're probing again."
"Yes," she said softly, "I am." She searched his eyes for an answer.
"No," he told her needlessly. She already knew his answer, yet hearing it from him made her glad.
"I'm surprised."
"I didn't think you could be surprised."
"Yes,'' she said, rising on her toes, her breath touching his lips. "Every once in a while. Surprise me."
"Okay."
He turned and began to walk away.
She stared, stunned, wanting to throw the frying pan at him. How could he lead her on this way, knowing, unless he was totally blind, how she felt about him? How vulnerable she was right now?
Griff swung around on his heel and took her into his arms so fast her breath whooshed out of her.
"Surprise," he murmured against her mouth just before he kissed her.
Drunk. There was no other way to describe it. He made her feel drunk and dizzy and created a thousand different contradictory sensations within her. It was too wonderful to put into words. And he wanted her, she knew it. It was only when he kissed her that she felt she was getting to the true man, the man beneath the scowl and solemn words. The man who spoke to her soul.
Griff slipped his hands beneath the robe. She wasn't wearing anything under it, just as he had fantasized. The feel of her soft skin made him ache so badly that he didn't think he could withstand the temptation to make love to her right here, right now.
He only allowed his hands to span her waist. But his long fingers dipped low on her back, skimming the sensitive area of her buttocks. Without thinking, only feeling, he pressed her against him. He heard her gasp again, then moan his name against his mouth just as her passion rose to entwine with his.
It was all going too fast for him. He needed time, time to sort things out, time to think. And he couldn't think, not with her in his arms.
This was madness and any second he was going to be washed away with it.
Somehow, she had snuck past all his safeguards and struck at the very core of his being. He had vowed never to want again, never to love again. Never to offer his heart again. He had suffered his affections being rejected time and again as he and Sally were passed around from one family to another like so much loose change. He had hardened his heart, sworn that he needed no one. And he hadn't.
Not until now.
He didn't like having feelings. He didn't trust them. Feelings led you astray. Feelings complicated things, left you vulnerable, got in the way of functioning. Feelings involved you in a way that he didn't want to be involved.
But he didn't seem to have any choice.
His mouth drained her of everything she had to give and yet there was more, always more. She had no idea where it was coming from. She just knew that she wanted to give it all to him. Maybe it had been stored up, just waiting to be set free. Just waiting for someone like him. Someone strong, someone dependable.
Just waiting for him.
She entangled her fingers in his hair, pulling him closer to her, uttering a small, animal-like cry when he began to kiss her cheek, her ear, then the sensitive part of her throat. In another moment, she knew she was going to slip past the point of no return.
She didn't care. She wanted him, wanted to be wanted by him. Nothing else mattered.
She yelped, pushing against Griff. This time driven by pain rather than passion.
"What the—?"
She turned and looked back at the stove. The oil had heated and was now angrily dancing high off the pan. She had forgotten to turn the flame down, forgotten everything but the man who so effectively blotted out the rest of the world for her.
Seeing the potential danger, Griff quickly elbowed her aside, pulling the pan off the flame and onto a cold burner. He threw a cover over the pan. The oil sizzled beneath it, pinging a symphony of anger. "We almost burned the house down."
She leaned against the counter, as much for support as anything. She pulled together her disarrayed robe. "Among other things."
He forced back his hunger. He had no business losing control like that. "If this is an example of how you cook, maybe I'll just have some juice."
The moment was gone, but the memory was going to live on a long time. They were both on the threshold of something, something wondrous and very frightening at the same time, and she had a feeling that he knew it, too.
"Coward," she scoffed softly.
He held up his hands and there was a smile on his lips, but his eyes told her that he understood what she was talking about. And it wasn't about her culinary skills.
"Guilty as charged." He passed Casie and picked up the spoon she had thrown on the floor.
Casie reached for it as he stood up, and wrapped her fist around it. Metal met high chair and she used the spoon to produce her own brand of music.
He wanted it, wanted all of this; Casie, her, commitment. She could sense it. Why did he fight it so hard? "Courage is proceeding on even when you're afraid of what lies ahead."
He met Liz's eyes only briefly. "Sounds good." With studied nonchalance, Griff opened the refrigerator and took out a container of orange juice. "I'll try to remember that."
He turned and saw that she was scrutinizing him intently. There was no hiding his thoughts from her, he realized in annoyance as he raised the glass to his lips.
"See that you do," Liz said and then began to make a fresh serving of French toast.
After breakfast Liz sent Griff off to the drugstore with a list of things intended to see Casie through another siege of tooth-cutting pain. On the whole, the little girl seemed to settle down.
But Griff couldn't. He could handle Casie keeping him awake, he thought to himself as he drove off, a lot better than he could handle having Liz walking about wearing his bathrobe, unconsciously tempting him until he thought he would lose all reason .
When he returned from the drugstore Liz was wearing her rose dress again. He was relieved.
And just the least bit regretful.
As soon as he had given her the bag from the drugstore, Liz sat him down and began to go over what to check for if Casie were to act up again. He sat there, dutifully trying to absorb all the details she was throwing at him. He was also trying very hard not to notice the way the morning sunlight streaming in through the kitchen window seemed to get itself caught in her hair.
"What are you staring at?" she finally asked.
He attempted to gloss over it by sounding matter-of- fact. "Do you know that there are red streaks in your hair when the sun hits it?"
"Those are called highlights."
And what do you call the streaks running through me every time I'm near you? he asked silently. He had the answer for that himself: insanity.
Liz showed him how to get the better part of a jar of baby food into Casie's mouth, not into her clothes or her hair. She showed him how to change Casie without using half the towels in his linen closet to clean up the mess that seemed to be a by-product of this process when he tackled it. She showed him a great many things, predominantly what it was that he had been missing all his life.
And what it was that he knew he could never have.
It was useless to even contemplate a commitment between them. He could never overcome the enclosure that held his emotions hostage. He might have momentary breakthroughs, but he wasn't the kind who could show feelings. And Liz, he could tell, was the type who needed to feel surrounded by love. He couldn't give that to her. There was no point in his even dwelling on it.
"Well, thanks a lot," he mumbled awkwardly as Liz began to take her leave.
"Sounds like you're thanking the plumber for coming over to fix a leak," she noted philosophically, "but it's a start."
And so is the way you kissed me in the kitchen, Liz added silently. The sparks in the frying pan weren't the only ones that flew. "See you two tomorrow."
"Yeah."
She wanted him to say something further, or do something, but he merely stood there, waiting for her to leave. So she did.
Rome wasn't built in a day, she told herself, and she had made progress. If that errant spark of oil hadn't smacked her in the posterior just when it had, she had a feeling that Officer Griffin Foster would have taken quite a quantum jump forward in personal relations this morning. Those emotions he held back so fiercely had nearly escaped then. She knew that with him it wouldn't be just a matter of two bodies joining. If it were, he had had ample opportunity to make some sort of a move before now. And if that had been the case, he wouldn't have attracted her the way he did. No, with Griff the act of lovemaking was tied in with feelings, with caring. She would have staked her life on it.
Liz gripped the handle on her car door and pulled. Nothing happened. She tried again, then realized that the car was locked. And her keys were in her purse. She remembered that as she looked down at her evening bag. It was innocently nestled on the front seat next to her shoes. Behind the locked door.
Liz sighed and leaned her head against the door for a moment. Done in once again by the fact that she was always hurrying. This time, at least, there had been a legitimate reason for haste.
That didn't help her now.
Griff, she thought suddenly. Griff was a policeman, right? He could easily get the door open for her. She turned around and marched back up the walk.