“Tomorrow.”
She stared at him, frustrated. “But we’re so close.”
He offered her the bread across the table. “Lara, I’ve been gone for seven years. We’ve been searching less than two days. Another night won’t make any difference.”
Reluctantly, she reached for the bread. He pul ed it back, holding it teasingly away from her mouth until she leaned forward to eat from his hand. As her lips closed around the bread, he added softly, with intent, “Especial y if it means I get to spend that night with you.”
Her gaze met his.
She almost choked, bathed in golden heat.
Oh, but it could. How long could she be with him, how many times could she lie with him, and stil survive a separation?
And yet how could she resist this chance to know him better? To make love with him one more time?
Deliberately, she picked up her wineglass. “So,” she said.
“Tel me how you learned about wine.”
He narrowed his eyes at her obvious change of subject, but he played along, tel ing her about the yachts he’d crewed, the jobs he’d handled, the places he’d been.
Their lives could hardly have been more different, she reflected, listening to his stories about a delivery to Bahia, a race in Key West. In thirteen years, she’d rarely left the wal s of Rockhaven. Yet he seemed genuinely interested in her life there, encouraging her to talk about her job in the school office.
24 2
V i r g i n i a K a n t r a
“It might seem like busywork to some,” she said. “But I like the routine. I like being organized.”
His eyes gleamed. “I noticed.”
Under his subtle prodding, she told him things that should have bored him sil y, details about living in the dorms, minor infractions after lights out, stories about Bria.
“You must miss her,” he said quietly, and tipsy with wine and attention, Lara blurted out a truth she had barely admitted to herself.
“I hated her. She was the person I was closest to in the whole world, and she left me. She didn’t care enough to try to talk to me, she didn’t tel me she was going. And then I wondered if she left because of me. Because she knew I resented her for having the courage to do al the things I wasn’t brave enough to try.”
“Bul shit,” Iestyn said.
Lara blinked. “Excuse me?”
“First, you’re one of the bravest people I know.” He reached across and took her hand, holding it in his warm, strong clasp. “Second, your friend didn’t leave because of you.
She left because she had to, because of something inside her that couldn’t be there anymore. Maybe she real y cared about you.” He looked down at their fingers, joined on the table; up into her eyes. “Maybe she was afraid if she told you, you’d talk her out of it.”
*
*
*
They were among the last customers to leave the restaurant. They walked back to the inn along roads without streetlamps under stars pulsing raw and real overhead. So many stars, undimmed by human light, Lara could almost imagine herself in Heaven. In the near darkness of their room, he undressed her, F o r g o t t e n s e a 243
revealing her pale body in the silver light that slipped through the window. He laid her back on the soft white bed, spreading her legs wide, easing inside her.
Her sore muscles tensed against his blunt intrusion.
“Sorry,” she whispered.
He kissed her, stroking her hair back from her face. “It’s al right. You’re al right. You’re perfect.”
“I guess I’m not used to . . .
“I’l go slow,” he whispered wickedly, and he did, teasing her with his hands and his body, making her tremble, making her moan and clutch at him with anxious hands.
He pressed deep inside her, holding himself stil inside her, until she shimmered with impatience, until she twined her legs around him, pushing her hips against him, nudging in restless rhythm,
She came so hard she saw stars. With a groan, he plunged once, twice, again, before he final y let himself go and fol owed her into oblivion.
Afterward they lay in silence, her head on his shoulder, his hand in her hair.
Lara closed her eyes, holding thought at bay.
Iestyn kissed her forehead and got up and went into the bathroom. The light shone under the door, dimming the glow from beyond the curtains.
He was gone a long time. She lay motionless, listening to the sounds of running water, a muffled thump, almost glad for the respite. Not for her body, but for her heart. She could handle a little soreness from their lovemaking. She was unprepared to deal with these extremes of emotion, the delight and the pain of loving him so
