Addie groaned softly in her sleep, twisting against the clinging sheet, floating in a netherworld of dreams… or was it memories?… watching herself in familiar scenes. She saw her own face, the same and yet so terribly different. The voice, the body, even the hair…it was all hers, but the shading, the resonation, the texture of the picture was different… twisted…off-key. Why were her eyes so cold? Why was her face so empty?
She and Jeff sat on the porch swing, talking in conspiratorial whispers, touching discreetly, absorbed in each other. The evening sky threw concealing shadows over them, and they sat close to each other, comfortable in the darkness. They had been there for a long time, drawn deeper and deeper into a secretive communion, until they broke past the barrier of forbidden subjects. And they discussed what should never have been planned.
'It's got to be done soon,' Adeline whispered. She curled up closer to him, her eyes dark and feline as she concentrated on him. 'He's waiting for his lawyer to get here from the East.'
'You won't have to do anything. I'll take care of it. I just need a name from you. '
'I'll have to think about it,' she said, silently calculating. She would have to pick the right man, someone smart, someone without a conscience.
'Adeline, if you're worried about the rest of your family-'
'We'll all be better off this way.' A hard smile curved her lips.
'But about how you're gonna feel after it's done-'
'I won't care. Why should I? If he cared about me, he wouldn't want to change his will. After it's changed, it'll be in trust for years, and I won't get anything till I'm an old woman.' Adeline noticed the amazement in his expression, perhaps even a touch of fear at her callousness. She sought to soothe him. 'He only cares about Ben Hunter. He doesn't want me to be happy. I never have been. But it'll be different with you, won't it, Jeff?' She stroked her finger down the front of his shirt, hooking it into the waist of his pants. Slowly she rubbed the back of her knuckle against his tightening abdomen. 'We'll be happy together,' she said, and Jeff sighed hungrily.
'Oh, yes. Yes. Just help me with the name. Someone from here. It's the best way. I'll do the rest.'
She looked up at him narrow-eyed, considering, and then she leaned over to him. And whispered in his ear.
Oh, God, what was the name?
What had she told him?
Addie's eyes flew open, and she passed a hand over her damp forehead. She had broken out in a cold sweat. She lay there stiffly, trying not to think, closing her eyes, and feeling her eyelids trembling. For a long time she was still, covered with a chilling film of perspiration.
She knew now.
Much later she heard the door open and close softly, but the sound was vaguely unreal. She kept her eyes closed, afraid to find out if it was another dream or not. Quiet footsteps. A movement in the darkness. The rustle of cotton. The slither of jeans. Then all was still except for the abraded sound of her breath. The mattress gave way beneath the weight of a man's body, the sliding of muscled legs along hers, the heat of his flesh as he lowered himself to her. A sob caught in her throat, and Addie lifted her arms, pulling him down to her. Welcoming the plundering of his mouth, she responded frantically to his kiss, needing him, craving him.
The warm fragrance of him surrounded her, and she breathed it in voraciously, tangling her hands in his hair, urging him to kiss her harder. His hands moved over her breasts, teasing her nipples, squeezing until she moaned. Biting her lip, she molded against him, her breasts flattening into his chest.
Ben shuddered and rolled over, taking her with him. Everywhere, everywhere her hair trailed and streamed in long strands of silk, lashing his neck and face and shoulders. Their lips blended in endless kisses, tenderly aggressive. As Ben gently hunted for the deepest taste of her, Addie thought she would die of pleasure.
Drawing her palms down his body, she marveled at the flexing breadth of his shoulders, the lean sides of his waist, the powerful muscles of his thighs. Her fingertips crossed the soft, taut skin of his hips, and she heard the quality of his breathing change, becoming raspy, stopping in that instant when she filled her palm and fingers with the throbbing hardness of him. She stroked him in the ways she remembered from the night before, her touch gentle but firm, and he gasped. His hands plowed into her hair as he held her head to his, capturing her mouth with a fervent kiss.
Clasping her buttocks in his hands, he urged her upward, dragging her along the length of his body. His lips found the peak of her breast and claimed it, drawing her into the recess of his mouth. Each tiny nerve was probed by the fine-grained surface of his tongue. Sliding her arms underneath his neck, she ducked her head and rubbed her cheek against his hair.
His whisper scalded her ears as he took hold of her hips and pulled her up until she was straddling him. 'Take me inside you.”
Unfamiliar with taking the lead, she hesitated before helping to guide him home, closing her eyes as he slid into her. The merging of their bodies was a slow drawing-together, a blending of softness and strength, sensitive and precise. Addie braced her hands on his chest, her hair hanging in a silken curtain as she bent her head. His fingers dug into her hips as he moved her back and forth, and his pelvis arched rhythmically up to hers. It was some wild, improbable fantasy, the pleasure so sweet it was almost like pain. Oh, she had heard about the things men and women sometimes dared to do together, but she had never imagined herself loving a man so wantonly.
She was caught in a fire too hot to bear, a storm that beat within and without, until she crumpled from the intensity and held on to Ben with a desperate grip. Her legs were trembling and tired. Sensitive to her every movement and rhythm, he understood immediately. Without a word he turned her over, smothering her whimper with his lips, driving into her again and again, and her body thrilled with an agonizing chord of ecstasy that pierced through every nerve. When it was over she continued to cling to him, aware of his eruption of pleasure.
The descent from such dizzying heights was slow. They relaxed together degree by degree, washed in the scent and taste of each other. Addie lay still as he massaged her back, his fingers pressing the base of her spine and working upward. He whispered as he caressed her, words of intimate praise that made her blush, and the moment was so blissful that she stretched like a contented cat. The darkness was no longer cold, but warm and alive, vibrant with sensations that rippled outward from their sated flesh. There were no nightmares hovering in this darkness, nothing but peace.
Try as she might to get used to it, the contrast between the nights and the days was startling to Addie. It was brought home to her each time she met Ben's eyes, for she couldn't exchange the most casual of greetings with him at breakfast without remembering what the two of them had been doing only a few hours before. As the family left the table and scattered, each one of them concentrating on his or her plans for the day, Addie accompanied Ben out of the house and managed to have a few private words with him.
'Ben, w-wait,' she stammered, touching his arm, and he stopped at the bottom of the steps, looking up at her as she stood a step above him. 'There's something I have to talk to you about.'
'Now?' He'd been wearing a mask all during breakfast, of courtesy so perfect it was almost a mockery, an attitude of endless politeness. Now he was looking at her as he had last night, his smile full of masculine arrogance.
'No, not now,' she said, glancing around to see if they were being observed. 'And don't look at me like that '
