Ideas tumbled through her head. How could she make him see that his parents’ rejection was their fault, not his? That the surface of good looks, charm and success he showed to the world was not the sum of his value, wasn’t half. How could she get through to him? How could she help him the way she’d helped others, like Barry, see the good in themselves? And why did it seem so much more important to succeed with Grady?
“How about equal time here, Leslie. You don’t talk about your parents much.”
He said it matter-of-factly, but she wondered if he regretted his revelations.
“They both died while I was in high school.” A mist in her eyes made her blink hard. “Twenty years, and it still hurts.”
He moved closer, a reassuring presence, but touched her only briefly, fingertips to her arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring up something that gives you pain—”
Pain? What about his pain?
“No, it’s okay. I guess it wouldn’t hurt so much if I hadn’t loved them so much. I had a wonderful childhood. Lots of love, lots of laughter. And I was very lucky to have Grandma Beatrice, too, after the accident.”
He looked the question. She drew a deep breath; she intended to ask more questions so it was only fair.
“Mom and Dad were coming home from dinner with another couple. The driver of an oncoming car fell asleep, it crossed the center line and hit them head-on. Mom and Mr. Reynolds were killed instantly. Mrs. Reynolds died two days later. Dad recovered enough to be home for about two months. But his heart just wasn’t strong enough. I was finishing my freshman year in high school when he died.”
“So you lived with Grandma Beatrice.”
She nodded. “From the day of the accident. My brother, Harry. was a freshman out at Stanford. He couldn’t have taken on a young teenager, and nobody wanted him to.” A slight smile lifted her lips. “Least of all me. I love him dearly now, but he was the bane of my existence growing up. Besides, he had his life, his future, to get on with. There was never any question but that I’d go to Grandma Beatrice.”
“That must have been rough on you. I can’t imagine . . .”
When he didn’t go on, she was left to wonder if he couldn’t imagine the pain, or he couldn’t imagine loving someone enough to feel the pain.
“I can’t deny I wish my parents were here, traveling out to California to see Harry’s kids, debating retirement and clucking about how times have changed. But I know they loved me.” Impulsively she put her hand to his cheek. The slight prickle sensitized her palm and fingers. “I had that love for fourteen years and nothing can take it away.”
Grady looked into her eyes and saw the strength her family’s love had given her. Enough strength to have compassion even while she was hurting.
He wanted to pull away.
Instead he covered her hand with his, binding the touch of her long slender palm and fingers to his skin. He didn’t need compassion from her; he needed passion.
Without taking his eyes from her face, he shifted her hand until his mouth found her palm. Using tongue and lips, he explored the taste and sensation of the gentle mounds beneath each finger, the delicate hollow at the center of her palm, the rise to her wrist.
And he watched her eyes change, watched the haze of desire blur the distinct colors.
Still holding her hand against his face, he bent his head to hers. He could cover her mouth in a swift raid she wasn’t anticipating. He could rely on the potent chemistry between them to carry her beyond her doubts.
But somewhere in those final two inches before his lips touched hers, he discovered he didn’t want that.
He wanted more. Yes, he wanted the chemistry, the desire he’d suspected in that first kiss by the Smithsonian rose garden, then tasted for an instant at the reception and more fully that night on the beach. But he also wanted the friendship and trust he’d had these past weeks.
So he paused, even knowing she might withdraw. She might stiffen; she might end this kiss he so desperately wanted before it even began.
From the scant distance he’d preserved, he met her eyes, then let his gaze drop to her mouth before raising it once more to her eyes. It was as blunt a declaration as he could give—he wanted to kiss her, he was going to kiss her, unless she did something to stop it.
What she did was tilt her head, slicing a fraction off those separating inches and presenting a most enticing angle. He mirrored her movement without conscious thought, and their lips brushed, lingered and separated.
Her eyes were clouded, but the wariness he’d worked so hard to erase had edged back in, though not as strongly as the desire. Not nearly as strong as the desire.
Her month softened. Slightly wet, the lips parted.
With deliberate slowness he slid his fingertips along the line of her jaw, up the sharp angle to her ear, where they traced so lightly he wasn’t sure himself if he still touched her, or only imagined the smooth, graceful curve. His fingers slid into her hair, disappearing in the soft thickness as they spread wide to cup her head.
He wanted her to see the kiss coming and accept or reject. He wouldn’t take her by surprise.
Their lips didn’t brush this time, but met fully.
When he released her mouth disappointment joined the other emotions in her eyes. He tilted her head between his two big hands in order to change the way their mouths meshed and a flash wiped the disappointment from her eyes.
She changed the angle the third time, a brief touching that fired off a chain reaction in him. The kisses blended into one another and he lost count. Though the sensations were distinct, sharp memories.
From cupping the back of her neck, his hand came around to trail down her throat, then grasp the collar of her shirt, to draw her closer. They were half lying on the couch, her leg between his, her hip brushing against his hardness. His shirt was opened, gone. He didn’t remember the mechanics of opening her blouse and bra, but he would never forget the sensation of stroking her soft breast.
She arched, filling his hand more completely, the perfect curve molded in his palm, the nipple’s sweet hardness becoming the catalyst to a chemical reaction that produced a shortage of oxygen, a tightening of muscles and a high-octane explosion in his blood.
But it produced a different reaction in her.
He felt her drawing away and heard her murmur the word “stupid,” a protest at herself not him.
He overruled her with a hard, swooping kiss, letting her body carry much of his weight, riding the reaction that always flared between them. And when she put her arms around him once more, he knew she wouldn’t pull away, so he gentled the kiss. But not right away.
The momentary desperation he’d felt before the first kiss was banked down by their marathon of kisses. Long, deep, deliberate kisses. Languid caresses that trailed off into simply touching one another. Then began again with slow-moving magic.
He knew by her breathing that she had slipped into a light sleep at one point while he held her. An unconscious movement brushed her hand against his chest. He hoped to heaven she was awake after that, because the exploration of his ribs and breastbone and collarbone that her hands embarked on just about killed him. He hated to think she could do that to him in her sleep.
But eventually the touches grew slow once more, and Leslie slept in his arms, while he pushed every thought away except how good this felt.
* * * *
Leslie jolted awake.
“What’s wrong? Something’s wrong.”
“Shh, it’s all right.” Grady’s whisper didn’t soothe her because she was aware simultaneously of the warmth of his arms around her, his legs tangled with hers and the heat gathered deep inside her from his touch, his nearness.
Dear Lord, how she wanted him.
“It’s the rain,” he said softly against her hair. “It stopped. That’s what woke you.”
She knew he was right, but she couldn’t relax. Not while he held her like this and she wanted him so desperately.
He recognized her stiffness; she could tell that in the way his hold eased, as if she might shatter if he moved the wrong way. He loosened his arms, shifted his legs.
Resisting the urge to bolt or give in to the false modesty of hurriedly adjusting her clothes, she sat up. Moving away from him, she turned her bracelet watch to see the face.
“It’s late.”
“Depends on how you look at it. Could be early. Very, very early.”
She shot him a look, then decided against fully meeting his eyes. This way she couldn’t know for sure that he wasn’t talking strictly about the hour of the day.
“But either way,” he went on, “we should get a little sleep. We have a full day of sight-seeing ahead of us.” Suddenly she was too tired to worry about that. Too tired to worry about anything except changing into her pajamas—she’d brought her most modest, least enticing night-wear—brushing her teeth and slipping into bed.
* * * *
She must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she knew, she heard rain. Lifting her eyelids, she also saw watery daylight misting into the room. It took a moment to realize the light was from the sun, but the “rain” was the sound of the shower.
Getting up; she eyed the rumpled blanket and dented pillow on the couch.
The pillow, the blanket and the indentations on the couch’s cushions gave an impression of the body that had rested there. She could almost see it; for a second she was disappointed she’d fallen asleep too soon and stayed asleep too long to see it in reality.
Foolish, Leslie. Very
,
very foolish.
Almost as foolish as she’d been last night, actually earlier this morning.
She’d come very close to making love with Grady. Much too close.
Now she had to concentrate on getting them back on track for a friendship, to reclaim the territory she’d lost—no, that she’d freely given. She couldn’t put the blame on him; she’d been an equal partner in those kisses and touches. But she could put blame on herself, because she knew she couldn’t ever be anything more than friends with Grady. She couldn’t . . .
Her head jerked up. Grady leaned against the bathroom doorjamb, wearing only jeans and watching her. She hadn’t heard the shower shut off or the door open.
His feet were bare. The snug jeans were zipped but not snapped at the top. A glimmer of water showed here and there in the narrow line of golden hair in the center of his chest. His jaw bore a glinting stubble. His mouth was solemn and his eyes bored into her with an intensity that made her dread his next words.
But all he said was a mild, “Next.”
She scooped up her clothes and toiletries bag and headed past him.
His hand on her forearm stopped her as abruptly as a brick wall would have.
"Grady—"
“No.” The single harsh word stopped her warning; they weren’t necessary anyhow because his tone clearly said he knew what she’d meant to say. And that he rejected it. “If you say it would be foolhardy to go on, I’ll just answer that it would be just as foolhardy to try to go back.”
His hand dropped from her arm, and she let out a pent-up breath.
He sounded almost normal when he added, “We’ll start with the easy stuff. You take your shower. I’ve got to check the situation in Chicago. I’ll see you downstairs.”
He was still on the phone in the guest parlor when she came down. She’d had the first cup of coffee before he joined her in the dining room.
“I have to go back, Leslie,” he said without preamble. “I’m sorry. We’ll have to head back to D.C. right after breakfast. I can catch a noon flight from Dulles if you wouldn’t mind dropping me off and taking the car back to the city for me.”
“Of course.”
“I’ll be back on the Fourth. I’m holding you to that picnic.
“If it works out, sure, but don’t worry if you can’t because—”
“I’ll be back.” He glanced out the window at the brightening sky. “Damn.”
“It’s all right. I understand.”
He studied her, from her hair to her chin, from her mouth to her eyes. “We will take this trip eventually, Leslie. Foolhardy or not, we will go on. I promise you that.”
* * * *
A promise or a threat?
Which had he intended it as? Which did she take it as?
Lord, she wished she knew the answers.
Returning to Washington after dropping Grady at the airport, Leslie found a message on her answering machine from a former co-worker who’d broken up with her husband of eight years. When she called back, the woman almost begged her to have dinner together that night. Listening to Janey's problems would keep her from thinking about her own.
That left the afternoon.
Her apartment didn’t offer enough puttering opportunities. She considered writing letters, but couldn’t dredge up anything to say that didn’t involve Grady, and that was too dangerous. Phoning would be worse, especially since the only two people she had any inclination to talk to were Grandma Beatrice and Tris, neither one shy about asking questions. Not a good idea.
Finally she changed into her coolest shorts and top and walked to the zoo. The hot, humid weather, unbroken by yesterday’s rain, kept the crowds down. Those who were there moved as slowly as the languid animals.
She bought an ice cream, found a shaded bench and stopped trying to hold off her thoughts.
Had she done him a disservice by letting their relationship go on this way? Had she given him signals he’d misinterpreted? Had she given him signals he’d interpreted correctly, but she hadn’t intended to let out?
How could she help him learn about friendship if that’s not what she was feeling for him?
She absolutely wouldn’t fall in love again, especially with someone like Grady. It could only hurt her, and it wouldn’t be fair to him, especially if he had come to truly care for her.
But maybe he’d pursued her simply because she said no. Maybe he’d confused her efforts to play mother hen to him as she had to so many friends—this time vastly complicated by physical attraction—with something else. Maybe the best thing would be to go ahead and have a fling with him so he could get past her and go on with his life as he had with every other woman.