The Sheriff of Heartbreak County

looked at her and said, “That was somebody you know.”

Her stomach flip-flopped and her body went cold. She didn’t know she’d set her coffee cup down until it hit the countertop with a clunk that jarred to her elbow. “Not…”

He shook his head, confusing her all the more. I thought he was angry with me. Why are his eyes so gentle?

“A sheriff’s detective from down in Florida-Scott Cavanaugh. Says he only met you once, but you know his wife real well. Her name’s Joy? I guess the two of you used to be roommates?”

“Joy?” It came from her mouth but she didn’t recognize it, that dazed and bewildered voice, like the cry of a lost child beholding a familiar face.

Then, everything inside her simply…crumbled.

In some disconnected but still-functioning part of herself she understood she was falling apart, but like a spectator watching a train wreck unfold before her eyes, she was powerless to stop it. She began to shake, then to laugh, and finally, to cry-all three happening to her at once, and while she could wrap an arm across her waist to contain the shivering and clamp a hand over her mouth to hold back the laughter, there was nothing she could do about the tears pouring from her eyes like a summer sunshine-and-rain squall after a long, long drought.

Roan started toward her and she backed away from him, putting out her hand in what he knew must be an instinctive effort to ward off the inevitable, the way someone facing a gunman throws up his hands to stop the bullets. And with about as much effect.

He folded her into his arms, though she fought him-fought desperately, folding up and barricading herself behind a wall of hands and arms and elbows. He knew to ignore all that; long years of experience dealing with a redheaded woman had led him to understand she was apt to fight hardest against what she needed-and wanted- most. And it had taught him to be patient with those kinds of contradictions.

So he corraled her with strong arms, gentle hands and soothing words, stroked her back and her hair, cradled her face against his thumping heart, smiling over her head and a little misty-eyed himself because there was a poignant familiarity about the feel of her quivering body in his arms, the little snuffling, hiccuping sounds, and even about the damp spot she was making on the front of his shirt. Erin had been prone to rain squalls like this. Some of his best memories of his life with her involved their sweet, sweet aftermath…which was possibly why, when he felt Mary’s shivering and tears subside and her body begin to relax, it seemed so natural to him to gently tilt her face up and kiss her.

Chapter 11

He kissed her eyelids first, the taste of her tears cool and briny on his lips…and so sweet it made his heart ache. He heard her breath catch and his muscles quivered with response, even as his mind was being slammed with the full realization of what it was he was doing.

It hit him like a power surge-the awareness that this wasn’t his wife’s face he held, cradled like a precious treasure between his two hands. It froze him for a moment, shorted out his circuits, so he couldn’t think about who this woman was…only that her face was damp and warm from the tears she’d shed, the ivory perfection of her skin delicately blotched with pink like the petals of some exotic hybrid flower. He couldn’t let himself think about who he was, either…only that the woman he held in his arms smelled good…felt good…tasted good…and he’d been hungry a long, long time.

He wiped away the dampness on her cheeks with his thumbs, let his lips caress that gentle curve…find the corner of her mouth and sip the drop of salt-sweet moisture pooled there. He felt her lips part…her breathing cease. And he paused…hovered there, his lips not quite touching hers, the suspense and the yearning an ache in his bones and a quivering in his muscles…a prickling behind his eyelids and a tingling in his skin. Breathing her in…lost in the forbidden wonder of it all.

He heard the faint sound she made-a whimper of impatience. And then her head moved in his hands…turned slightly…seeking. Not moving closer, not demanding, simply feeling. Waiting… breathless…the way the world at dawn seems to hold its breath in anticipation of the sunrise.

I can still turn back…I can stop this…now.

But, it seemed, he could no more stop it than he could have stopped the sun from rising.

He moved…or she did…just a little, enough so that their lips touched…breath mingled…and again he froze there, each of his heartbeats a hammer blow. He hadn’t known how painful it would be, this coming back to life after being numb…asleep…dead for so long. The blood running through his veins was like wildfire; there wasn’t any part of him that didn’t feel the burn. The roar of it in his ears drowned thought. All he knew was pain…and a need that was a thousand times greater than pain.

He felt her trembling but couldn’t let himself wonder or care why she did. He knew she could have moved away from him if she’d wanted to. But she seemed as spellbound by what was happening as he.

To test himself-and her-he let his hands fall away from her face, not holding her, still not claiming her mouth, neither moving away from her nor closer, releasing her if that was what she wanted. But she didn’t move, and pausing there with only breath between them, he let his hands come to rest on her shoulders…then move inward to caress her neck before making the return journey, taking the edges of her robe with them.

He didn’t ask, but of her own accord, and moving no other part of her body, she slowly lowered her arms to her sides. Delicately, like someone trying to mold moonlight in his hands, he eased the robe over her shoulders, over rounded flesh the velvety texture of rose petals, and heard the fabric rustle as it fell to the floor. It whispered to him like a blessing.

He didn’t know how long they stood like that, facing each other, eyes closed, lips and bodies scarcely touching, hands down at their sides. Mary’s face was tilted up to his and her hair streamed down her back, and he thought they could almost feel each other’s hearts pounding. And then, like lovers finding one another in the dark, their hands came together…fingers touched…twined…then joyfully clasped. A gasp came from her lips-and at the same instant from his-and at last, at long last, he brought them together, his mouth sinking into the sweet welcome of hers like a lost soul coming home.

The sense of profound relief and pleasure he felt lasted only a second. It hit him like a bomb blast-first the white-hot flash of awareness, the heavy thump of need in the bottom of his belly. Then desire blew through him like a shock-wind.

He felt powerless against it…didn’t know when he let go of her hands. He was aware that they touched him, though only on the edges of consciousness. He had already lost himself in her…the taste of her mouth, the texture of her skin, the sweet moist warmth of her body. It had been so long since he’d held a woman’s body in his arms.

He gathered her in, his hands roaming hungrily, sweeping across the valleys, swells and plains of her body that was at once strange to him, yet seemed achingly familiar. His hands were marauders, roving where they pleased… pillaging her lush curves…taking…wanting more. Wanting his clothes and her nightgown gone, wanting her skin touching his skin and her long sleek body under his and the rich, dark mystery of her female body folding close around him…embracing him…inviting him in. It had been so long since he’d lost himself in a woman’s body.

Thoughtlessly, heedlessly, he gathered the nightgown’s silky fabric in greedy handfuls, gathered it until he’d uncovered what he wanted. He heard her gasp when he cupped her nakedness with his hands, and she clutched at the back of his neck as if the earth had dropped out from under her feet. He took advantage of the moment to plunge his tongue deep into her mouth and felt her fingers tangle in his hair and her soft breasts pillow against his thumping heart.

It shocked him to realize how close he was to taking her then and there, how much he wanted to make love to her in her frilly pink kitchen with sunshine streaming through the windows and the smell of fresh-brewed coffee in the air. Shocked him…but not enough to make him stop.

Stop him? Mary could have, but she was as lost as he.

And then, suddenly, they did stop. Both of them. Stopped, looked down and stared like dazed crash survivors at the moth-eaten yellow-orange tomcat doing drunken figure eights around their ankles.

For a few moments, except for those sinuous movements and the sound of raspy purring, everything seemed to