“What are you doin’ in Indianapolis?”
She swallowed. “I think you know the answer to that.” With a boldness she couldn’t believe she possessed, she slid the palm of her hand down over the light switch by the door.
The room plunged into a darkness that was relieved only by the flickering silver light from the television screen.
“You don’t believe in messin’ around, do you, Rosebud?”
Her courage was rapidly flagging. This second time was going to be even more difficult than the first. She dropped her purse to the floor. “What’s the point? We both know where this is headed.”
With a thudding heart, she looped her fingers over the waistband of his slacks and pulled him toward her. As his hips pressed against hers, she felt him grow hard, and it was as if every cell in her body came alive.
For someone who had always been timid with the opposite sex, playing the femme fatale was a powerful experience. She sank her fingers into his buttocks and pressed her breasts to his chest. Running her hands up along his sides, she curled her body against him, moving seductively.
But her sense of power was short-lived. He pinioned her to the wall and caught her chin in a rough grasp. “Is there a Mr. Rosebud?”
“No.”
His grip tightened. “Don’t mess with me, lady. I want the truth.”
She met his eyes without flinching. In this, at least, she didn’t have to lie. “I’m not married. I swear.”
He must have believed her because he released her chin. Before he could question her further, she pushed her hands between them and released the snap on his slacks.
As she struggled with the zipper, she felt his hands on the bodice of her jacket. She opened her mouth to protest just as he pulled it apart.
“No!”She snatched at the gaping silk, ripping a seam in the process as she covered herself.
He immediately stepped away from her. “Get out of here.”
She clutched the jacket together. He looked furious, and she knew she’d made a mistake, but the only way she could keep this from becoming unbearably sordid was to preserve her modesty.
She forced herself to smile. “It’s more exciting this way. Please don’t spoil it.”
“You’re making me feel like a rapist, and I don’t like it. You’re the one who’s after me, lady.”
“It’s my fantasy. I came all the way to Indianapolis so I could feel ravaged. With my clothes on.”
“Ravaged, huh.”
She clutched the jacket tighter over her bare breasts. “With my clothes on.”
He thought for a moment. If only she could read his mind.
“You ever done it against a wall?” he asked.
The prospect excited her, and that was the last thing she wanted. This was about procreation, not lust. Besides, it might be harder to get pregnant that way. “I prefer the bed.”
“I guess the person doing the ravaging gets to decide that, doesn’t he?”
The next thing she knew, he had shoved her against the wall and pushed her skirt up far enough to catch the back of her thighs. He splayed them, lifted her off the floor, and stepped into the nakedness between.
The hard strength of his body should have frightened her, but it didn’t. Instead, she looped her arms around his shoulders and held on.
“Put your legs around me.” His voice was a low, husky command, and she instinctively obeyed.
She felt him free himself, and she expected him to enter her roughly, but he didn’t. Instead, he touched her with one gentle fingertip.
She buried her face in the side of his neck and sank her teeth into her bottom lip to keep from crying out. She concentrated on the intrusion instead of the pleasure, on the embarrassment of opening herself like this to a stranger’s touch. She had made herself his whore. That was all she meant to him, a slut to be used for a few moments of sexual pleasure and then discarded. She nurtured her humiliation so she wouldn’t experience desire.
His finger traced the entry to her body. She shuddered and focused on the strain in her splayed thighs, the uncomfortable pull of her muscles, anything except that silken stroking. But it was impossible. The sensations were too sweet, so she dug her fingernails into his back and bucked against him.
“Ravage me, damn it!”
He cursed, and the sound was so savage, she flinched. “What the hell’s wrong with you?”
“Just do it! Now!”
With a low growl, he caught her hips. “Damn you!”
She bit her lip as he thrust inside her, then gripped his shoulders tighter so she wouldn’t lose him. All she had to do was hang on.
The heat from his body burned through his shirt into her breasts. The wall bruised her spine, and he had spread her legs so far apart the muscles ached. She no longer had to worry about suppressing her pleasure. She wanted only for him to finish.
He thrust so deeply inside her that she winced. He would have made love to her if she had given him any sign at all, but she hadn’t wanted that. She had been determined to take no pleasure, and he’d granted her wish.
His shirt grew damp beneath her palms, and he used her so that he made her feel as if he were punishing them both. She barely held on to him through his orgasm. When it happened, she tried to will her body to absorb the essence of his, but her badly bruised soul wanted only to escape.
Seconds ticked by before he finally withdrew. He slowly stepped away from her and lowered her to the floor.
Her legs were so rubbery, she could barely stand. She refused to look at him. She couldn’t bear this thing she had done, not once, but twice.
“Rosebud…”
“I’m sorry.” She bent down to snatch up her purse and grabbed the doorknob. With her jacket clutched together in one hand and her thighs wet, she ran out into the hallway.
He called her name. That silly name she had taken from a beer sign. She couldn’t tolerate his coming after her and watching her fall apart, so she lifted her hand and waved without looking back. It was a jaunty wave, one that said,
The door slammed behind her.
He’d gotten the message.
Chapter Five
T he following evening Cal sat in his accustomed place toward the back of the chartered plane that was returning the Stars to Chicago from Indianapolis. The lights were out in the cabin, and most of the players either slept or listened to music through headsets. Cal brooded.
His ankle ached from an injury he’d received in the fourth quarter. Afterward, Kevin had gone in to replace him, been sacked three times, fumbled twice, and still thrown the ball fifty-three yards for the winning touchdown.
His injuries were coming faster now: a shoulder separation at training camp, a deep thigh bruise last month, and now this. The team physician had diagnosed a high ankle sprain, which meant Cal wouldn’t be able to practice this week. He was thirty-six years old, and he tried not to remember that even Montana had retired at thirty-eight. He also wasn’t dwelling on the fact that he didn’t recover as quickly as he used to. In addition to his ankle injury, his knees throbbed, a couple of his ribs hurt, and his hip felt as if it had a hot poker shoved right through it. He knew he’d spend a good part of the night in his whirlpool.
Between the ankle injury and the disastrous incident with Rosebud, he was more than glad to have this weekend behind him. He still couldn’t believe that he hadn’t used a rubber. Even when he was a teenager, he’d never been that careless. What really galled him was the fact that he hadn’t even thought about it until after she’d left. It was as if the minute he’d set eyes on her, his brain had gone into hibernation, and lust had taken over.
