“There are times when a man should be both.”
She straightened from the rail and hugged her stomach. “I’m too tired for riddles, Joe. Why are you here? What do you want?”
“You.”
Her heartbeat stumbled, then broke into a wild gallop.
“Come here.”
Her own words thrown back in her face.
He stood there, tall and strapping with the breeze ruffling his thick dark hair, so entirely what a man should be that it hurt to look at him. Her anger flared hot and righteous.
“Is this some kind of game to you? Because I’m not playing just to prove you can make me.”
“Does he love you, Catherine? Does he take away your pain and make you
feel?
When you kissed him in the car, did he make you
burn?
”
“You were watching us?”
“Answer the question.”
“You were watching us?”
“Yes, I was watching!” he roared. “I saw you staring into his eyes. I saw you lean over and kiss him. If you hadn’t kept it quick I would’ve ripped his friggin’ head off. Now answer the question, dammit. Did he make you burn?” His eyes glittered with a kind of savage anguish.
“No, he didn’t make me burn!” she yelled back, close to tears. “He’s never made me burn, or my heart pound, or my body ache—not like you have. Is that what you wanted to hear, Joe? Is your macho pride happy to know that I love you and not him?”
Her eyelashes fluttered. She sucked in a horrified breath. Grabbing her purse, she pulled out the key and whirled around to the door. Her hands shook so badly she fumbled inserting the grooved metal properly. The landing vibrated as feet pounded up the stairs.
“C’mon,” she breathed. The key slipped in and she reached for the knob.
Large hands spanned her waist and pulled her against an iron body. Heat seared her bare back. A stubbled cheek pressed against her neck.
“You drop a bomb like that and expect to run away?” he rumbled in her ear. “I don’t think so.”
An agonizing, wonderful, miserable terror filled her heart. “Nothing’s changed.”
“Like hell,” he muttered, turning her in his hands and pressing her spine against the door. His mouth
came down hard and hungry on hers, and she was lost.
He kissed her deeply, possessively, as if he needed the taste of her more than he needed air. The hot succulent mating of tongues took her from embarrassed to burning in seconds flat. She threw her arms up and spread her fingers wide, thrilling to the hard strength beneath fine cotton, the thick hair cushioning his skull. His own hands seemed fascinated with her bare back, returning again and again to the point just above her rhinestone bow and teasing the edges of fabric. He suddenly pressed her tight to his loins and tore his lips from hers.
“Say it again,” he demanded, his voice gruff with passion.
She lifted heavy eyelids and stared up with unfocused tenderness. “I love you, Joe.”
He made an unintelligible sound low in his throat and captured her mouth again, his tongue delving deep and hard. His palms rose to bracket the sides of her breasts, his thumbs finding the sensitive centers with unerring accuracy. As always with him, and only him, she lost her inhibitions and matched his ardor, loving the wet heat of his mouth, the tumescence pressing into her stomach. Wanting more. So much more.
When at last he lifted his mouth, they were both breathing like bellows.
His dark turbulent gaze bore into hers. “You can’t marry Pretty Boy, Catherine.”
A perverse stab of irritation jerked up her chin. “Why not?”
“Because you’re going to marry me.”
She wilted like a pricked helium balloon while he watched her closely, his expression growing more grim with every passing second of her silence.
“I can see you’re overwhelmed with joy.”
Overwhelmed, yes. She couldn’t speak for the confusion storming her senses.
“I know I don’t have a job yet and I can’t finance the fancy practice you’ve always wanted, but I’ll work hard, Catherine. There’ll always be food on the table and a roof over our heads. And Allie is crazy about you. She’d be thrilled to have you for a mother.”
“And you? Would you be thrilled to have the burden of a wife?” Hating the threat of tears in her voice, she twisted her head and swallowed.
A strong hand spanned her chin and turned her face to his. The tender light in his eyes captivated her. She couldn’t look away.
“How can my best friend be a burden? I love you, Catherine, didn’t you know? It was me calling you my lady and my love earlier—for myself, not Romeo. Good God, I parked the Bronco a block away and spied on you like a damn kid when you got home. You’re making me crazy, and there’s only one thing I know that will cure me, Counselor.”
He lowered his head and brushed her lips gently. “Marry me.” His tongue traced the corners of her mouth and dipped inside for a quick taste. “Marry me.” He trailed his mouth along her jaw and nibbled her earlobe. “Marry me, Catherine. Maybe one day I’ll be in a position to give you the things Carl can now, but don’t make me wait to give you my love. We’re good together, you know we are. We’ll laugh a lot and fight a lot and make up like rabbits if I have
anything to do with it. Say you’ll many me.” His voice was soft, cajoling, seductive.
Her eyes drifted shut as the sincerity of his love sank in. And still she said nothing, for to be wooed like this after a lifetime of emotional deprivation was rainfall to a parched field.
“We’ll go to Colorado for our honeymoon. There are some cabins I know of right in the heart of an aspen forest. During the day we’ll watch the leaves shiver in the wind. At night we’ll make love by a fire, maybe make a little brother or sister for Allie while we’re at it. I’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
Her heart was too full to contain.
“Ah, sweetheart, honey…don’t cry.” His tongue caught the tear welling at the corner of one lid before it spilled free. “You can take your time deciding.”
She wrapped her arms around his waist and held him close, vowing to make her rugged gentleman happy until her dying breath. Pulling back, she opened her eyes and offered a wobbly smile.
“I never had any intention of marrying Carl after our night together. I just didn’t want you to feel obligated to do your gentlemanly duty.” She hugged him more tightly. “I want a houseful of kids, Joe Tucker. And Allie for a junior bridesmaid. And a regular game with Earl at The Pig’s Gut to keep my aim sharp. Oh…and about that honeymoon?”
His mouth showed signs of breaking into the devilish grin she loved. “Yes, ma’am?”
“I really don’t see any point in waiting to start it, do you, Joe?”
And there it came, spreading white and wicked and delicious across his face. “No, ma’am!”
Opening the door and dropping the key in her purse, he handed her the bag and gave her a look that melted her bones. In one powerful swoop he lifted her high against his chest and crossed the threshold.
“Guess who’s got his touch Juliet?” he crowed before kicking the door shut with his heel.
eISBN: 978-14592-7805-9
MY FAIR GENTLEMAN
Copyright © 1996 by Jan Freed.
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