Carrie sipped. “Stranded? I don't know if I'd put it that strongly. I bet I could find someone to take me home.”
“I dare you to let me.”
“I'm not scared of you, Truck.”
“Sure you are, but that's okay. A kiss isn't a commitment either.”
“But you'll do it again, then where will I be?”
“Soundly and thoroughly kissed, and what's so bad about that?”
Carrie didn't like where the conversation was going. “Don't you have a date with a fiddle?” she said.
“Nope. I'm going to stay right here and burn. Come on, Carrie. You're making more of this than it is.”
No, I'm not. And if I were smart, I would not walk one foot out the door with him.
I'm not smart. And uplift works.
Tom rescued her. “How about it, Carrie?”
She took his hand. “I'd love to.”
It was so much easier to follow Tom. He held her politely, nicely, and his conversation was easy and humorous. He was in fact a very nice man, young, enthusiastic and a great advocate for the quality of life that had been the draw that brought him to Paradise from Chicago.
He wondered hopefully if she had a pet.
“There are some outdoor cats hanging around, so I can't really promise you any business,” Carrie said regretfully. “Nor am I sure how long I'll be staying in town.”
“You'll stay,” Tom predicted. “You'll see. Thanks, Carrie,” he said as he brought her back to Truck.
“Thank you,” she said warmly. He was halfway across the floor when it occurred to her that he probably would have been very happy to give her a lift home.
“He would've,” Truck said, reading her mind as he sidled up to her. “But he's no fun.”
He swung her into the next dance, another slow dance, before she could protest. And then it was too late to push away, and by that time Carrie didn't want to, anyway.
Uplift was dangerous. Men could detect uplift a a mile away. She would bet Truck knew exactly what she was wearing under her thin silk shirt. And she was too aware of the softness of her body against the hardness of his as she moved against him.
This was dangerous. This was stupid. Why was her
body warring with her common sense? Why was her body winning?
She pulled away. “Truck...”
He pulled her back firmly. “Carrie,” he mimicked her tone. “Let's just do one dance at a time.”
“You don't get to choreograph everything,” Carrie muttered.
“No, but
I get
to lead.”
She wanted to bite him. For an instant, her mind was flooded with images: her lips on his shoulder, his chest, his belly...lowerâ
no!
She shook herself. She had to stop thinking like this.
She needed a healthy dose of that sexy-lady attitude, she thought. Elusive would be good. And cool. Calm. All the things she wasn't right now, with Truck's long lean body molded to hers.
Why did he still have the power to affect her like this? Carrie felt as if she was on the verge of something explosive, something that would change her forever.
No, if she had given herself to him all those years ago, that would have changed her forever. Would have changed her life forever.
She hadn't come back home to shake up her life. She didn't want complications. And she didn't want to start anything with Truck, not after all this time. And especially not after Elliott.
Well, the sexy lady should be able handle that, she thought. She'd just push it to one side and never think about it again. And she'd curl Truck McKelvey right around her little finger and keep her emotions neatly disengaged.
But that was the fantasy. The reality was that the music was too hot, Truck was too close and she was too susceptible.
Carrie became aware suddenly that the music had
stopped and he was still holding her tightly and swaying in a rhythm she felt right down to her toes.
It would be so easy, too easy to let go...
“Come on,” he murmured against her ear. “I'll take you home.”
There wasn't any graceful way out of that either. He was already at a slow simmer and halfway out the door, and she wasn't far behind.
Butâthe sexy lady could deal with that. It was all a matter of attitude. She could be detached. Not a problem, she thought resolutely. The sexy lady would know just how to handle Truck. Now, if only she could get a handle on how Truck was making her feel.
5
T
RUCK DROVE a meticulously restored thirty-year-old Mercedes sedan luxuriously appointed with burled wood, leather and ivory. An executive's car, Carrie thought, smooth, quiet, unobtrusive, elegant.
Surprising.
It occurred to Carrie that she didn't know Truck at all, and that the way he handled this car would be very much the way he would handle a woman: with a gentle touch, and with passion and control.
She shivered. She felt out of control. There wasn't anything about him that didn't remind her of the past or make her think of possibilities in the present. It was too much, too soon. And all those feelings overrode any common-sense response she might have had to the situation. Her plans didn't include this. She didn't want this.
Where
was that disdainful sexy lady who knew just how to say no? She was whispering in Carrie's ear, goading her to say
yes
. Except Truck hadn't asked her anything yet. It was just in the air, in the closeness of the car, in the jolting knowledge between them. There were some things you couldn't escape. Some things that were meant to happen Some things that endured.
“Did you ever wonder,” Truck said as he maneuvered the Mercedes down the track toward her house, “what would have happened if we'd made love?”
She'd wondered that endlessly those first years in college-
Sometimes, even after she'd gone to New York, though she'd been certain that she had made the right decision.
“No,” Carrie said.
“Liar.”
“Does it matter?”
“You tell me,” Truck said, swinging the car at an angle to the pond and cutting the engine.
“Did it matter to you?” she asked curiously.
He was silent a long moment. “It did.”
“Because you didn't make it with me and everyone thought you'd be the one who did?” Carrie said, unable to keep the caustic tone out of her voice.
“No,” he said gently. “Actually I thought we were in love. But then, you had four guys snapping at your heels those last two years of school. I just happened to be the one who got closest.”
No, you happened to be the one I really wanted...
“Why are we raking over old memories?” she asked, discomfited by his honesty. They had never ever talked about love.
Love
...
“I thought you might have some regrets.”
No. Yes. Maybe
. “I don't regret anything,” she said a bit too firmly as if she had to convince herself as much as she did Truck.
“No,” he murmured, making a move toward her. The move she feared, the move she wanted. “This is better.”
“Don't you dare kiss me.”
“Then you kiss me, Carrie.”
“I knew I should've stayed home.”
“No Carrie.” He moved closer to her. “I think... you've finally...
come
home...”
He touched her mouth gently, achingly, with his own. “Say yes, Carrie.”
“I don't,” she responded reluctantly, pulling back slowly from the pressure of his too-seductive lips, “want to...”
“Yes, you do.” He settled his mouth on hers again. He didn't probe, he didn't seek, he didn't push. He was just there, feeling the texture of her lips, tasting them, nipping them lightly. “It's only a kiss...”
Only
.
“You keep saying that,” she murmured as he took her lips again, forcefully this time, sinking himself into the deepest recesses of her mouth before she could protest.
Don't keep saying that...
Oh, but keep
doing
that...and that
â
And that
âas he took her into the heat and the storm of his mouth.
His long strong fingers dug into her thick hair to position her at just the angle he needed to plunder her.
His hands were so strong, his mouth so insistent. She wanted to run, she wanted to stay, and he had always evoked that feeling in her because the trap was those kisses, those hands, that body, and all the possibilities that existed for heartbreak.
Or love.
But love had nothing to do with it
Or this. This was...just a kiss. Only a kiss. A neverending kiss going deeper and darker and searing her soul.
“Truck...” She could barely breathe, barely speak, and his lips hovered a scant breath above hers, waiting, waiting... Had he always been waiting?
“Carrie,” he murmured in the same tone. He knew what was coming: the warrior princess in ambivalent
mode. She wanted him, didn't. Couldn't. Wouldn't. And anyway...he'd heard the whole story fifteen years before. And he'd bought it, and stupidly, he'd let her get away.
Not this time. He was so much more patient now.
“This is not
just
a kiss,” Carrie said huskily.
“What is it then?”
“I'm not going to let you do this, Truck.”
“What am I doing?”
“Trading on memories, damn you.”
“I don't remember anything like this, actually,” he murmured.
“You don't remember making out in a car?”
“Is that what we're talking about? Wasn't it the back of the truck? And anyway,” he added, usurping her line, “what's that got to do with this...?”
Truck then slowly angled his mouth on hers again and shifted his weight purposefully against her body. No matter what she said, she wanted those kisses.
She felt as if there were two of herâthe self-protective Carrie who didn't want to get entangled with men anymore who could break her heart; and the sexy lady who took everything she could get and still maintained her distance.
There was no distance between her and Truck, and his heat, his scent, his need.
And hers.
Where had that come from?
Where...? From those clever, clever hands purposefully touching her in the places her heart remembered.
Her awareness came slowly as he distracted her mouth and tongue with bone-melting kisses and slowly and lightly began stroking her all over with his fingers.
All the places he knew so well and hadn't forgotten:
the underside of her earlobe, the base of her neck, the crook of her arm, her midriff, and the most lethal place of allâthe undercurve of her breast. Her insides turned liquid as she felt his fingers slide along the underside of her breast She wanted to push him away, she wanted him to forget, to never stop, to take her there and then, because the sensations were so powerful and overwhelming, she didn't know what else to do with them.
And he knew it. This part of Carrie he had always known, and this part he could touch so easily through the light-as-air clothing she wore. But what part could he touch to make her wholly and completely his? Truck wanted to envelop her, to imprint her so that no one else would ever touch her again. Carrie was made for him, he'd known it fifteen years before, and the feeling was that much more magnified as she fought her need to melt into his arms.
A man had to have a battle plan. And a thorough, honed-in-the-crucible knowledge of his adversary.
“Come to me, Carrie,” he whispered as he nudged her onto her lap. “Come.” He pulled her gently so that she unwillingly straddled his legs.
“Just
a kiss,” she murmered as she braced herself against his shoulders.
She was on top now, she thought fuzzily, she could just open the car door and go into the house. And maybe he had done that deliberately because he knew she wouldn't want to go once she was at the mercy of his wicked magic hands.
And those kisses.
She couldn't leave those kisses. Her control, her decision. Her body liquefied as she sought his mouth avidly and claimed him.
Just a kiss...
He slipped his hands under her skirt and up her bare thighs to the outer curve of her buttocks where she most liked to be caressed.
That too...oh, especially thatâ
He released the car seat into a reclining position so that she was fully stretched out against him, and he was nestled tightly between her legs.
Now Truck had full play of her lower body, which was clothed in a next-to-nothing wisp of bikini panty, and he intended to use every weapon in his arsenal to make her comeâto him and for him.
Carrie felt his hands working on her buttocks in a delicious circular motion and she pulled abruptly out of the kiss.
“Don't stop,” he murmured.
“You stop.”
“Don't want to.”
“Because...?”
“You love this.”
“Maybe not,” she said fretfully, but her body betrayed her and she pressed closer, inviting him to explore further. Not a smart thing to do because the motion of his hands only intensified the roiling excitement in her.
She wanted to close her eyes and give in to it. Why not? They were not teenagers anymore, and yet there was an overlay of that emotion, that discovery on the edge of surrender.
But this time, she thought as she undulated against the expert manipulation of those magic fingers, this time she would know what she was getting into, she'd know how to handle it
This time, she could give in to the fantasy and not get hurt.
This time...
She wanted to. This timeâ
“Too many maybes, Carrie. How about something definitive? Yes, I love this will do.” He moved his hands and cupped her buttocks.
Her eyes closed; her body caved. His hands were so big, so knowing, so there. He knew her so intimately, and she knew him. And she was too aware of the compressed power of him lodged so tightly between her legs.
“Say yes,” he whispered.
All that thrust and motion just for her. All that explosive need focused solely in her. The thought turned her limbs to jelly.
The air grew thicker, closer. She felt him sliding his hands to forbidden places.
Yes
. She reacted tellingly, her body shuddering as she enticed him to probe still more.
Yes
.
She didn't know if she said it out loud,
yes
, but he knew, he knew.
All she had to do was surrender to his kisses, to his hands, and let him submerge her in his power and his passion.
She was drowning already. And practically naked, with her silk and gauze outfit drifting across the seat beside her. He moved subtly so as not to break the kiss, baring his soul, enshrouding his desire, and then he surged against her, hot for her and seeking her in the most elemental way.
She just wanted to lie against the pure raw power of him, to feel his length, his heat, against her body. She wanted to touch him, play with him, fit herself around him.
All of those emotions and more swirled in her as she wedged her body against the ridge of his gorgeous erection.
She remembered thisâoh, how she remembered this. He was unforgettable, as long and hard in his maleness as he was in body and souL
She wanted Truck. He had been everything she'd wanted back thenâand strong, decisive and good looking besides.
What she hadn't known then was how she could have him and everything else too. So she had said no. No, she had said to his kisses and his coaxing. No, at that one shimmering moment when he'd been primed for possession and she'd been ready, needy, wanting. No, no, and no, she had said, and for five years afterward she had lived with the pain, the remorse, the sorrow, and worse, the regret of not knowing what it would have been like to have Truck make love to her.
This time, she wouldn't say no.
This time...
This time it was he who shifted her body, guiding her surely and elegantly with those knowing hands, and giving himself into her control, her desire and her hands for the moment of penetration.
She grasped him firmly with a sure knowledge of what he still loved, what he still wanted, and what her touch would do to him. She held every last hard pulsating inch of him in her hands and inches away from heaven.
“Carrie...” His voice was strangled.
“I know.” She cradled him between her hands, sliding them up and down the shaft, feeling every nuance of him. “I know,” she whispered as she positioned him and as she took him inch by throbbing inch deep and hard into her body.
The connection was breathtaking and powerful She felt as if she were permanently joined to him as she
braced herself against his thighs. She didn't want to move. She didn't want to speak.