Conquer the Memories

You have no idea how fast that kind of nonsensical reaction would disappear if you, my overprotective husband, would put the whole thing out of your mind as well.

The clock edged toward ten-fifteen, and still there was only silence. Sonia took one last sip of wine and closed her eyes.

Chapter 9

Craig wandered through the dark hall and paused in the doorway to their bedroom. The dresser lamp radiated faint yellow circles that did not quite reach the bed. Sonia was sleeping, her cheek nestled against the pillow with her palm beneath it. His eyes darkened just at the look of her.

She was lying on her side, uncovered but for the green gown, one knee bent forward, her free arm thrown back, her lips slightly parted. His brows narrowed fractionally as he noticed an odd, hard, glistening object on her stomach, and he tiptoed forward.

His lips twitched as he removed the green glass jewel from her navel. What if it had cut her? Silently, he placed the stone on the bedside table, then straightened to tug off his tie, his eyes still on his wife, glancing once at the glass of wine by his side of the bed.

A blind man could have figured out what the lady had in mind. Sonia was a little blind herself if she thought she needed any tricks to make him want her.

Tugging off the rest of his clothes, he flicked off the dresser lamp and came to her in the darkness. She didn’t stir when he gently lifted her to curl back the covers and tuck her into them. He fitted her close against him, heard her groggy murmur of approval and whispered to her firmly to go back to sleep.

She did.

But he couldn’t. With her head in the cradle of his shoulder and his arm around her, he stared hard and unseeing into the darkness, and after a time he reached for the glass of wine.

Later, even after he’d forced his eyes closed, he was conscious of her warm body folded against him, of the cool satin teasing the length of his flesh. The smell of her hair and skin, the weight of her breast so heavy and supple against his chest, the softness of her cheek…

The hush of silence was all around him, dark and empty. Lonely. His whole body throbbed with wanting her. Wearily, his eyes blinked open again. Sleep-real sleep-had eluded him for weeks. Tonight was going to be no different.

***

Men were chasing her. Hundreds of them, one with pale, light eyes that shone out of the darkness like steady pinpricks. She tripped and got up again, tripped and stumbled to her feet again, sobbing. She was wearing green, something bright and soft; it was tearing, ripping from her. “Don’t you touch me!” she screamed. A hundred hands flashed in front of her eyes. Laughter. Their laughter.

She crashed into a tree; she turned around and tumbled over a bush. The laughter chased her through the fog, coming closer; the darkness was somehow green and she ached with terror, hating it, sick with it. Clawlike hands grabbed at her shoulder, twisting her, whirling her around. “No! Get away from me-”

“Honey. Wake up, love…”

She beat out with her fists, wild, smashing blows. She felt a palm on her stomach and exploded. “Leave him alone. You leave him alone…”

“Sonia.”

Green faded to darkness; her eyes blinked open, disoriented. Her whole body was violently trembling but she instantly recognized the firm arms around her as Craig’s.

“Easy, easy, love,” he whispered. “It was only a dream. You were dreaming, Sonia. You’re here and safe. Nothing will harm you. Nothing. I promise you…”

“I…” For an instant, she couldn’t seem to stop shaking; she couldn’t even talk. She buried her face in the warm flesh of his chest, wrapped her arms around his waist and just held on. So foolish. Already she knew how foolish it was to relive their attack in a dream; if she hadn’t had it on her mind before she went to sleep…

Craig’s hand stroked and soothed. His fingers brushed back her hair; his lips pressed on her forehead and cheeks, and then he just held her again. “Nothing’s going to hurt you,” he promised again, his voice so low it was almost a whisper. There was a discordant echo somewhere, something almost like anger emanating from him, but his touch could not have been more tender. “You’re right here,” he murmured. “Safe, little one. Completely safe.”

She raised her face to his. “So…stupid,” she whispered groggily. “So stupid. Craig, I haven’t been dreaming about it.” Her tongue was still thick with sleep, her mind still in that half-confusion of dreams, yet the words kept coming out in a helpless tumble. “I haven’t. It was only this once. I’ve forgotten, completely forgotten, about what happened.”

He shifted over her, his mouth pressing on hers, sealing the words back. He heard her and knew exactly what she wanted to tell him-and he believed her not at all. Sonia had forgotten nothing. Guilt lanced through him like a raging ache, the same ache that had haunted him for weeks…and his lips were rough on hers, smooth and hard and demanding. And then not. His guilt was not Sonia’s. Suddenly, the only thing in his head was the need to drive those memories from Sonia’s mind. Block them, erase them, obliterate them.

“Craig-”

He tossed back the sheets and heard her intake of breath as the cool night air trembled over her skin. His fingers pushed up the nightgown, his palms sliding up over thighs and hips and stomach far softer than satin.

“Craig. I-”

In a smooth swish, the nightgown landed on the floor. He stole the pillow from beneath her, and it landed on the floor as well. The firm surface of the mattress was all he wanted beneath her, a playground he knew well. In his head was everything he’d ever learned of Sonia, a thousand nights of touching behind them, a knowledge of everything that had ever pleased her, every special caress that had ever fired her passion.

She would forget the Chicago nightmare. His lips parted on hers, open, his tongue stealing inside like a swift thief; her warm sweetness was his treasure. He drew her arms up, holding them by the wrists, and felt her limbs twist around him, her breasts arching instinctively for the crush of his weight.

He calmed a little at her instant responsiveness. But only a little. He wanted more, much more, of her, and his lips rushed down her throat, down to her breasts. His mouth captured one honey-tipped nipple, not giving her a chance to breathe, a chance to think. He didn’t want her to think. He wanted every memory exorcised, every thought buried.

He rolled over and shifted her on top of him, his hands sweeping down the slope of her spine, fingers splaying on the smooth flesh of her bottom, rubbing her deliberately against the cradle of his thighs, forcing her awareness of his arousal between them. “Feel,” he murmured. “Feel how much I want you. I’ll take you so high you’ll never come down. Never, Sonia.”

So fierce. A delicious tremble rippled through her. A month of loneliness for the lover she knew Craig to be sent an explosion of sensual feelings to every nerve ending in her body. The dark night and stillness and hazy sleep-fog were all part of that. His rushing hands and breath and pounding heartbeat were so much more.

His lips were everywhere-on her fingertips, trailing along her arms, stealing down her sides. His tongue lapped the underside of her breasts, first one, then the other, and her fingers curled in his hair, pressing into the thick, dark mat, holding him to her. The breath hissed out of her lungs as his tongue went lower, yet that intimate touch was not his ultimate goal. His lips had miles to go, down the long slope of her thighs, then up her back. His teeth nipped at the soft flesh of her fanny, and she twisted.

Almost, a smile touched his features. She didn’t like that. It wasn’t quite…nice. He nipped again, asserting his control…a tender, gentle control. For this moment, her body belonged to him, every inch, every crevice, every