Long-Lost Mom

Sara and her precious childhood threatened because he hadn’t provided properly for her future.

So much-his mind couldn’t take it all in. And then there was this warm, caring woman looking at him as if he were her entire world. As if she could make him forget everything bad. As if she alone could make his life perfect.

How to resist that?

“You’re so strong all the time.” Her dark solemn eyes blinked at him. Cupping his face, she met his gaze. “talking care of everyone but yourself.”

“I’m okay.” But he’d started to shake with the effort to remain in control.

She continued to touch him, softly, tenderly-and it was so damn irresistible. “Let me do it for once,” she whispered. “Let me be the strong one for you. You deserve that, Stone. Just let go.”

His heart beat so hard and fast that it almost hurt. His throat was tight, but he managed a strangled “I’m okay.”

It was a lie, a damn lie, and she saw right through it.

“No,” she murmured. “You’re hurting, and I can’t bear to see it.” She met his gaze, hers strong and sure and confident in a way he’d never seen before. “Let me give you this.” She ran her hands over his chest, a light tentative touch that inflamed him so his hurt turned into something else. “Let me…”

She could have no idea how just the thought of making love to her, here, now, had his blood humming. Yet it wasn’t his usual style, using sex to forget the harsh reality of his world. And he refused to use her that way. “I don’t-”

Her fingers brushed his mouth, holding his words in as she shook her head slightly. “Let me.”

And there, in his daze of grief and hunger, he saw it, the flicker of hesitation, the brief flash of emotion that told him she wasn’t nearly as sure and brave as she’d like to be, but was trying her damnedest to hide it from him.

Slipping his hands beneath her short curtain of hair, he cupped her jaw and drew her mouth to his, needing the contact, desperate for the compassion and sensitivity and hope he knew he would find in her arms.

He felt her slide her hand beneath one of his, so that it was between his skin and hers. He wondered, then realized… she was protecting the webbed line of scar tissue from his touch.

“Does it hurt?” he asked huskily, tenderness flooding him.

She dipped her head. “No.”

He could feel the heat in her skin and knew she felt humiliated “You’re lovely, Cindy. Don’t hide from me.”

“It’s ugly to the touch.”

“No.” Gently he pulled her hand away and kissed the hot skin, inching little love bites along the nearly undetectable web of scars, intending nothing but to ease her discomfort. Just holding her eased so much for him. Reality faded a bit, all hurt faded, as he held this wonderful, giving woman.

At first she remained rigid in his arms. But he didn’t give up; he simply pulled her onto his lap and rained a shower of kisses over her jaw and neck, gradually coaxing the tension loose from both of them as he continued to taste her skin before shifting back to her mouth.

Her parted lips responded warmly, eagerly seeking his. With a low sound of consent and need, she pressed close, arching her body against him, fueling the urgency.

Her fingers curled in his shirt, digging into the muscles of his chest, as though she needed to touch him as desperately as he needed to touch her. That need suddenly swallowed them both, making them moan with it as it exploded around them. There was no going back. They couldn’t, not when he couldn’t imagine taking his next breath without her.

He rose off the stool, claiming her mouth with a frantic, almost violent hunger. With a soft little moan, she melted to him, chest to chest, hips to hips, her arms locked around his neck.

“I need you,” he whispered, feeling battered and bruised. “So much-”

“I need you, too,” she whispered, yanking at his shirt. He helped her, pulling it impatiently over his head. “I always have-Oh, my goodness!” Abruptly that fog of need and hunger disappeared from her eyes. “Your stomach.”

“You always have?” he repeated, wondering at her words. “What do you mean, you’ve always wanted me?”

Stricken, she stared at him, and whether she purposely avoided the question or was just horrified at his injuries, he didn’t know. “I-Nothing. Stone, look at you!”

He knew what it looked like-a huge, swirling, black and green and yellow and purple bruise that the span of her two hands, which she gently plastered against him, barely covered. “Oh, Stone.” Her fingers were so soft and enticing on his bare skin that he could hardly stand it. “From the saw yesterday?”

“Yeah.” Sucking in his breath did nothing to ease the tension that had gripped him from just having her hands on him. It’d been a long time for him, he decided, but still, he couldn’t remember ever getting so hot so fast. What was it about her that so destroyed his carefully placed defenses? Was she real? Would she be his, stay his?

“It must be painful.”

What was painful was how much he wanted her. His arousal pressed against the fastenings of his pants, threatening to cut off vital circulation. “It’ll heal,” he rasped, nearly swallowing his tongue when her hands slid down a bit, running over his hips.

“Stone?” she whispered, bold and incredibly shy at the same time, which was a sharp turn-on for reasons Stone didn’t want to examine.

He was a man who, ever since Jenna left, only liked sophisticated women, preferably ones looking for no more or less than what he was willing to give. But he knew that this, with her, was different, and if they continued, nothing would ever be quite the same between them again.

Maybe a better man could have resisted, but Stone felt overwhelmed, uncharacteristically out of control, and he couldn’t have turned from her to save his life.

“The door,” he murmured, pulling away long enough to walk through his office to the outer shop, where he locked the front door.

Bolting the office door, as well, he reached for her again, then was surprised when she flipped off the lights and plunged them into complete blackness.

“No one can come in now,” he assured her, bringing her back into the circle of his arms, loving the feel of having her there. Slender and willowy, yet with wonderful curves in all the places that mattered, she was a dream come true.

His dream, and not only did he want to see her, he wanted her to be just as certain as he was. “No one will bother us. We’re safe in here.”

“I know. I just…” Burying her face in his neck, she went mute and hugged him tight, apparently embarrassed.

He had no idea why she would want the anonymity of the dark. Maybe she was shy. Maybe she had something she wanted to keep covered, like a tattoo.

Which brought back, quite vividly, visions of another woman, a lifetime ago. Jenna, and her own discomfort in the dark, for she’d gotten a small rose tattooed on her hip, and she’d hated it. It had embarrassed her, but she’d been stuck with it.

Stone had never been able to convince her that he didn’t care about a damn tattoo, he just cared about her.

But Jenna had no place here, no place at all.

Cindy did, and she wanted the dark, which was a small request. It shouldn’t matter, but somehow it did. It’d been so long for him, too long, and even then, he couldn’t remember it being like this. He wanted it to be real. Honest. And he wanted to be able to look at her.

“Do… do you hate the dark?” she questioned softly.

It was the scars, he realized suddenly, hoping for her sake that there weren’t more than he’d already seen. She was trembling now, and he held her close. “It’s all right,” he murmured. “It’s all right. We’ll just-”

“No,” she said quickly, urgently, pulling him closer. “Please, I want this. I want you. It’s just that-it’s been so long.”

His chest tightened because he found her admission unbearably moving. “It’s been a long time for me, too.”

And there in the dark, amidst his grief and fear and incredible hunger and need, they came together.