For the Love of His Life (25 page)

* * * *

Veronica walked back up the wilderness trail to her campsite. The fish she’d caught was in a small cooler on dry ice, waiting for her to get a chance to prepare it for her next meal. It was a hot day, so she was once again wearing only running shorts and an exercise bra. She pushed aside an errant tendril of hair that had broken loose from her pony tail as she walked through the brush surrounding the small clearing. She smelled the smoke and realized she wasn’t alone anymore.

Not giving any thought as to who else it might be intruding on her privacy, she stomped angrily forward to confront her nemesis. Raul was leaning against a big rock looking in the opposite direction. Her heart skipped a beat at how good he looked, how much she still wanted to touch him. Her body reacted to his instinctively and she used her anger to force it under control.

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Raul quickly turned to look at her, his face reflecting a myriad of emotions.

“We need to talk,” he said simply.

“About what?”

“About what you think happened. About what Jared told you. He was wrong.”

“Yeah…
right
.” She strode over to the campfire remnants and put her cooler down before turning to face him with her hands on her hips, defiantly.

“Jared jumped to conclusions without asking anyone. He thought he was protecting you…”

Veronica scoffed, “I don’t need anyone’s protection. I just needed a kick in the ass to remind me that people don’t change. They just try to make you think they have, until they get what they want.”

Raul shook his head. “That’s not true at all. I
have
changed. I changed because coming up here helped me slow down enough to listen to the voices in my head that I’ve always ignored before.”

“Don’t try to bullshit me.”

“Nica, listen to me, please. I’ve never lied to you…ever.”

“No, you just forgot to mention that you were dealing me sloppy seconds by banging your leading lady too. No big deal, huh?”

Raul flinched before moving forward, his arms outstretched and Veronica stepped backwards.

“Don’t touch me!” she hissed in alarm.

“I swear the only time I touched Kelly was when we were filming the love scenes on Wednesday, with the whole crew watching and Jared directing the action.”

“Then how did you know about the tattoo on her hip? That slip of the tongue was enough for Jared to realize what was really going on.” She turned to walk away from him. “This conversation is over. There’s nothing more to say.”

Raul walked up behind her but kept his arms at his side. He could feel the heat from her body radiating at him, but the torture of not touching her was nothing compared to the pain in his heart.

He spoke in a low, pleading voice. “Please, Nica. The only time I saw her ink before shooting the scene was when she broke into my trailer and I found her naked in my bed. She’d heard I was so emotionally-stunted that the only way to get me to be able to act as if I was in love, was to be having sex with me. At least that way my sexual interest would show, even if I had no idea how to look like I knew how to love.”

Veronica shook her head, turning on him and spitting out her words.

“That’s it? You expect me to believe that? And what happened? You turned her down? A sexy young actress that half the men in the world whack off thinking about and
you
turned her down? Why? Because all you could think about was chubby, plain old me? How stupid do you think I am?”

His arms reached forward and his hands dug into her shoulders as he shook her slightly. “Don’t you dare talk that way about the woman I love.
¡Dios Mio!
Nica, don’t you realize how beautiful you are to me? I’ve had women all around the world…any women I wanted, for so many years I’ve lost count. And you know what? I don’t remember
any
of them! No names…no faces…not even the memory of their intimate places. Most of the time I was so high I had no idea what my own name was, let alone any interest in learning anyone else’s. But you? The memories of what we have shared are burned into every cell in my body. All I have to do is
think
of you and I’m hard. I want you all of the time, whether you’re near me or not. I won’t ever cheat on you because I don’t have to! I have no unsatisfied desires, and no interest in returning to a life of anonymous, forgettable sex with strangers. Been there, done that…not going back. The only woman I want is you! I wish I knew how to make you believe me…”

Veronica stared into his face. “You’re an actor. You lie for a living…”

Raul exhaled in exasperation. “Then don’t you think if I was lying I’d have thought up a more believable story?”

Veronica’s eyebrows rose as she studied his face. Raul met her gaze, trying to project all of the love in his soul into his eyes. He could feel tears beginning to form and tried unsuccessfully to will them away.

He spoke in a soft, pleading voice. “Is there anything I can say or do to convince you just how much you mean to me? How much I need you in my life? How alone I am without you? How much I…” his voice broke. He swallowed hard. “How much I love only you?”

She held out for a heartbeat, then reached up to pull him closer to her. He dipped his head and his lips found hers. They ground them together, bruising each other with passionate kisses, opening their mouths to lick at each other’s faces. Raul’s hands were moving all over her body, fondling favorite places, each area of skin responding to him with more heat, as their body temperatures rose together.

Raul pushed her gently and Veronica moved backward onto the blanket. He fell to his knees, still holding her, his lips caressing her abdomen, his hands massaging the rounded globes of her ass and the sensitive area between them and the tops of her thighs. She moaned, holding the back of his head with one hand, the other clutching at his shoulder.

Raul pulled her shorts down and buried his face between her legs. Veronica gasped as his tongue lapped at her folds, then the point of it sought and found her clit. The tiny bud hardened as he used his lips to push back the hood and relentlessly attacked the center of her pleasure. It only took a few minutes before she threw her head back and moaned her pleasure.

He looked up at her, smiling with satisfaction. “See? You’re
my
woman. I’ll never want anyone else again. I want to spend the rest of my life making love to you. Tell me you want that too! Tell me what you feel…”

As she looked down at him, his hand was busy. His thumb flicked at her clit, his fingers stroked her inner walls insistently. Her body was flushed, a dark pink color spreading up from her belly to cover her neck and face. She began to rock with the strength of her building pleasure.

“Yes! Oh my God…yes! Raul!” She gasped as she came again, fluttering against his fingers, her pelvis twitching in a rhythmic motion.

He pulled her down to lie on the blanket and unzipped his jeans. She reached over to grasp his rampant rod, her hand moving up and down as he frantically pushed his pants down to finally kick them off along with his boots.

“Mine?” She panted at him, her hand still busy stroking him, her other hand fondling his nipple, tweaking it and pulling at his chest hair.

“Yes,” he groaned as he rolled on top of her and buried himself in her wetness, his size making him have to force his way into her, despite her obvious arousal.

They bucked against each other like wild animals. Raul gripped her hips so tightly there would be bruises for weeks. Veronica wrapped her legs around his hips and pulled him down onto her. She bit his shoulder as she came, repeating the gnawing each time she rode a wave of orgasms higher and higher. Raul reared up and howled as he came, a primal scream torn from his soul as the hot fluid burned its way out of his body into hers. She opened her eyes to watch in wonder at the look on his face before another orgasm slammed into her and she had to squeeze her eyes shut to watch the explosions of stars on her eyelids.

Raul collapsed onto her, expelling her breath with a
whoosh
. They lay unmoving except for the heaving of their chests, as each body tried to relearn how to breathe in a regular rhythm. Gradually their heartbeats slowed down, and Raul rolled off to one side, pulling Veronica closer, wrapping his arms around her possessively, one hand holding and massaging a butt cheek.

“Wow!” Raul panted. “Just…wow!”

Veronica pushed herself up to smile at him, one hand tenderly caressing the side of his face, gliding down his neck, to rest on his shoulder.

“Did you really mean what you said?”

He nodded gravely. “Every word.”

“You love me?”

He used the hand not already busy to gently stroke the side of her face, tracing along to her ear, then traveling down her neck to pull her down for a long, satisfying kiss. He spoke against her lips, a reverent breathy word, “Yes.”

She pulled her head back slightly to look into his eyes. They stared at each other for a long time. Finally, as if satisfied with what she saw there, she laid her head back on his shoulder and her hand busied itself stroking through his silky black chest hair.

“I think I just saw your soul in your eyes,” she began in wonder.

“I hope so. I was trying to let you see it.”

Veronica sighed happily.

“Isn’t there something you want to tell me?” Raul tried to keep anxiety out of his voice, but knew he wasn’t successful when she pulled back to look at him again, a crooked smile on her lips.

“Like what?”

“How you feel about me?”

Her lips twitched in amusement. “Do you really have to ask?”

He nodded. “No one besides my mother has ever said those words to me. That never bothered me before. Until now…”

She smiled at him, with infinite tenderness, her emotions plain to see, her eyes tearing up as much as his were.

“I love you, Raul. I’ve been falling in love with you since you first told me your real name. I’ve never felt so much for anyone before. It scares me, how much I love you. I never wanted to give any man that much power to hurt me. When I thought you didn’t care about me, the pain felt like part of me was dying.”

Raul took a deep breath, feeling the relief flood his body with a warmth that filled all of the cold, lonely places he was so afraid to acknowledge.

“I’ll never hurt you, Nica. Doing that would hurt me more.”

Suddenly her face changed. “Uh…Raul? We didn’t use a condom that time, did we?”

“No. I didn’t have time to think of it. I wanted you so bad…”

“Me too.”

He gently stroked her hair out of her eyes. “
Lo siento, mi cariña
. I have some with me. We’ll use them from now on.”

She looked troubled. “But what if…”

“We’ll face it together. I want to marry you and have children with you when you’re ready. I don’t really need an excuse, but that would make things a bit more urgent. As long as you love me, I can face anything.”

She nodded, gazing into his eyes again. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Let’s just hope for the best. Things are complicated enough right now. We don’t need to add more to worry about just quite yet.”

“But soon?”

She slapped gently at his shoulder. “Don’t rush me, man! I’ll let you know when I’m ready.”

His lips were the ones to twitch in amusement now, “From what I’ve heard, there’s no such thing as a good time. I’ll wait as long as I have to, because you are worth waiting for…”

Suddenly his stomach growled. Veronica giggled. “Speaking of waiting, when was the last time you ate,
señor
?”

“Um…I’m not sure. I couldn’t eat any dinner last night because I was too upset. I tried to choke down some food this morning, but that didn’t work out so well. I guess I’m kind of hungry…really, really hungry.”

He inclined his head in the direction of her cooler. “How big is that fish you caught?”

She smiled. “Big enough, I think. I’ve got some noodles and dehydrated veggies too. I think it’ll be enough to get some strength back into you.”

His eyebrows rose. “Enough for what I have in mind for the rest of the day?”

She giggled. “We’ll see.”

“Tell me what to do so I can help.”

They didn’t even bother to get dressed, since the island was so remote. Both of them enjoyed spending the next twenty-four hours naked.

Chapter Nineteen

On Monday, routine established itself again. Jared and Raul seemed to have come to an agreement, and Kelly was sparkling with excitement, seeing as how she was
entertaining
her cowboy trainer at night. The filming resumed with a vengeance. Jared was a perfectionist known for shooting scenes over and over again until they reflected what he was seeing in his mind’s eye. Many days led to long nights of work, but at least there was always Sunday to relax.

Many of the crew members would head into Grand Marais for their Saturday night partying, and Raul was glad to recommend The Crossroads, where his good buddy Tom was the owner and bartender. Once in a while he and Veronica would make an appearance. They’d have a drink or two, shoot some pool and somehow the pictures would make it into the celebrity gossip mills quickly. But while the crew members often closed the bar, Raul and Veronica would leave early, heading back to the privacy of her house, where they could jump naked into the lake from the dock behind her place and spend the night exhausting each other with their passionate love-making.