she seemed to gain comfort in his arms, so he tightened them and realized that what they’d just shared had been heartbreakingly perfect.
For a long few moments, they remained still.
Then she spoke in a soft husky whisper. “Did what we just did help make you-feel better? About your brother and your family?”
“It made a dent, yeah.” He gave her a warm smile. “A big one.”
“I’m glad.” She burrowed closer and swallowed hard. “I just don’t want…
“To…a one-night stand. Or a mistake.”
“Never.” He didn’t let her go. “It was too intense.”
“And good?” As soon as the words escaped her, she moaned, immediately covering his mouth with her hand. “No! Don’t say anything, I can’t believe I asked. Aaah, just forget it! Forget everything.”
Pulling her hand away from his mouth, he laughed and gave her a hard possessive kiss. “If it’d been any better, you’d have killed me. No way am I ever going to forget what just happened, and you won’t convince me you could, either.”
She sagged against him, throwing her arms around his neck, squeezing him tight, as if she didn’t want to ever let go. Fine with him, he didn’t want to let her go, either.
He felt her tremble. “You okay?” He ran a hand down her back.
“I’m fine, just…”
She didn’t finish, but held on as if her life depended on it. Stone realized she was gripping him as if she expected to be turned away.
It struck him how little he really knew about her and how much more he wanted to. He wanted this woman in his life. “I’ve got you,” he assured her. Cradling her in his arms, he gently smoothed back her hair from her face, then swore softly because he couldn’t see a damn thing. “I’ve got you,” he promised. “And I’m not letting go, okay?”
She nodded, but he wasn’t satisfied. Couldn’t be until he told her how he felt.
“The light,” he decided. “We’ll have it on now.” He shifted to reach for the switch, but she made a sound of refusal. Cupping her face, he stroked her lower lip with his thumb. “I want to see you, Cindy.” He gave her a soft kiss. “I’m not used to this. I don’t like letting you hide from me.”
“It’s just that…” She gulped in a breath, then let it out loudly. “Look, I know it was strange that I insisted on the dark, and I really wanted to explain that first, before we… But then you kissed me, and…and I hadn’t kissed like that in so long,” she confessed. “And you can really, really kiss. I sort of got lost in it all and how you felt and, oh, how you looked without your shirt…”
He’d struggled to follow every halting word, then started to smile at what he thought she might be trying to say, but she groaned theatrically. “Could you just kiss me, kiss me quick and shut me up?”
“Mmm.” Finally something that made perfect sense. “Gladly, sweetheart.” And tipping up her face with his hand, he did, and it was as emotionally wrenching as their lovemaking had been.
When they were both breathless, he rose with her still in his arms, walked to the door and flipped on the light.
Quickly, almost ridiculously shy given what they’d just shared, Cindy jerked down her skirt to cover her hips, but she wasn’t quite quick enough to tug her open blouse closed.
“I want you again.”
She bit her lip, adorably flushed. “You do?”
“Yeah.” He let her slide slowly down his body, enjoying the way her breath quickened when she felt him get hard again. “But not here, not like this. Next time-” he paused to kiss her until she was clinging again “-next time it’s with soft sheets and moonlight and music.”
“Next time?”
Staring down into her eyes, he traced her jaw. “There is going to be one. You know that, Cindy.” He bent, kissing her soft lips, but she’d gone rigid at the sound of her name on his lips.
“No,” she whispered. “Oh, no.”
“What is it?”
Mute, Jenna stared up at him.
“Hey,” Stone said softly, touching her hot face with his cool hands. “What could you possibly be thinking about?”
She’d blown it. She’d come back to town to right all her wrongs, to fix her life. To be good, to herself and others.
And she’d destroyed any hope of that because she still couldn’t control her hormones when it came to Stone.
“Nothing,” she managed, withdrawing from him. She struggled with the buttons on her blouse; suddenly her fingers wouldn’t work. She could feel the awkward bunch of her bra, which she hadn’t fastened first. “Dammit,” she whispered, nearly choking on the humiliation she would certainly feel when she finally told him who she was. Much as she wanted to cry out the truth now, she couldn’t. Not after this. He’d think she’d planned it to soften him up for the news.
“Here.” Stone gently pushed her ineffective fingers aside and turned her away from him. His hands encircled her neck, then slid beneath the material of her blouse to flirt with her collarbone. Slowly he slid the blouse down off her shoulders until her arms were trapped at her sides, the blouse at her elbows.
“Stone,” she breathed, clasping the material to her exposed breasts. “I-”
His mouth settled on one shoulder, halting her words as heat spiraled through her again. She felt his hands slip down to her waist, where they lingered for a minute, spreading wide to brush against the sides of her breasts. Swaying, Jenna closed her eyes, unable to speak, much less think.
Then those wonderful talented hands traveled leisurely up her spine, where they easily gathered her bra, straightened it out and then fastened it.
With one last wet openmouthed kiss on her tingling skin, halfway between her shoulder and her neck, Stone lifted his head, drew a sharp breath and let out a heartfelt oath.
She knew just how he felt.
He turned her around to face him, his eyes hot with the knowledge he’d again reduced her to a boneless mass of jelly. He buttoned up her blouse, his fingers sure and strong.
“Th-thanks,” she stuttered. “I’ve… I’ve got to…” What? What did she have to do? She couldn’t possibly remember now. “I’ve got to go. Bye.”
Cringing at how ridiculously juvenile she sounded, she whirled and ran out of his office, through his workshop and out into the bright of day.
“Good heavens,” she muttered, rubbing her chest in an effort to still her pounding heart. That man could seduce the dead.
And Jenna was many things, but she wasn’t dead.
Chapter 7
The next morning Sara practically inhaled her oatmeal as Stone watched, both alarmed and amused at his daughter’s ability to chug down food.
Had he taught her to do that? They were going to have to work harder on manners, not something that had been particularly high on the list of their survival tactics.
“Mmm,” she said, dripping milk out a corner of her mouth, which she promptly chased away with her sleeve. The food continued to disappear at a shocking rate. “The cereal is good this time, Daddy. No lumps.”
“Thanks,” he said dryly. “I think.” He wasn’t much of a cook, never had been. For the most part they’d done okay, especially on the one night a week Mrs. Potts left dinner to heat.
And on the other nights, pizza usually worked. Thank God he could afford the luxuries of a cleaning lady and takeout. The memories of earlier years, when he hadn’t been able to, were now just a distant nightmare, one that
