“We can’t avoid talking about it forever,” he observed eventually.
He’d tilted his chair back on two legs and clasped his hands on top of his flat stomach in a posture that screamed of relaxed confidence. She risked a look directly into his eyes. “Talking about what?”
“The fact that we’ve gotten off to a lousy start.”
She shrugged. “We both know it. Why talk about it?”
A look of annoyance passed across his face. “So that we can resolve the problem and move on.”
Kelly’s temper flared. “How...businesslike!”
He stood up so fast, then, that his chair toppled over. Before she realized what he intended, he was leaning over her, bending down, his mouth unexpectedly plundering hers in a bruising kiss clearly meant to wipe all other thoughts out of her head. After a brief struggle of wills, it succeeded in doing just that. Her mind emptied of everything except the way Jordan made her senses swim. She abandoned the battle and gave herself up to that devastating kiss.
His lips gentled, then, coaxing, persuading, reminding her of the way they’d been together in the middle of the night—hot, slick sensuality, mind-altering pleasure, gentle sharing. They were good together, as instinctively attuned as two people who’d been married for decades. Jordan was the kind of sensitive, intuitive, giving lover women dreamed of finding. He had gauged her reactions time and again and suited his lovemaking to her needs. He was doing the same thing now.
Eventually he released his grip on her shoulders and stood back, his gaze fixed on her in a way that told her he was taking in her flushed cheeks and the kiss-swollen lips that clearly told him the effect he had on her. For once, though, he seemed more dazed than smug.
Observing him, Kelly thought how ironic it was that they were so instantly attuned physically, while all the years of straight talk had abandoned them and left them suddenly incapable of communicating in words without bickering.
She gathered her composure and drew herself up. “I think it’s time to go,” she said in a voice that shook.
For a moment she thought he might argue for staying right here, for settling their differences in bed, but he didn’t. After a bit, he just nodded curtly.
“I’ll get the bags into the car,” he said.
“I’ll clean up in here and be right with you.”
It was all so cool, so polite and civilized that she wanted to scream. Instead, the instant he was gone and she was left alone with soggy pancakes and cold coffee, she felt tears welling up in her eyes.
She’d had the wedding of her dreams the day before. She was married to the man she’d always loved. She’d discovered a passionate side to herself and to him that had filled her with ecstasy.
And she’d never been more miserable in her entire life.
Jordan would rather have faced a firing squad than Luke and Jessie’s worried, accusing looks. Their gazes darted between him and Kelly, their eyes filled with questions that only Dani’s presence had kept silent since their arrival.
“So, you’re driving back to Houston?” Jessie said with obviously feigned cheer, her gaze penetrating. “Do you have to be back in the office first thing Monday? You are supposed to be on your honeymoon, after all. Surely the incomparable Ginger could hold down the fort a few days longer.”
Jordan glanced at his wife. Kelly’s cheeks were flushed with embarrassment. She’d looked everywhere but at him since they’d arrived. He couldn’t decide whether he wanted to console her or to shake her.
Dammit all, he hadn’t wanted to head back to Houston today any more than she had. He still wasn’t quite sure how it had happened, except that she’d dug in her heels and then he’d dug in his and their disagreement had escalated from there. Somehow he’d forgotten how often that used to happen to them as kids. They were both quick to anger and stubborn as mules. It had always taken Luke or Cody to coax them out of their funks.
He glanced at his older brother and caught a grin tugging at Luke’s mouth. Obviously he was recalling the same thing. The amused reaction left Jordan feeling faintly disgruntled. Clearly he couldn’t count on much help from that direction. Luke seemed perfectly content to let him and Kelly work this fight out all on their own.
“I’m sure Jordan and Kelly have their reasons for going to Houston today,” Luke observed, confirming Jordan’s opinion of his brother’s intention to stay the hell out of this argument.
Jessie didn’t appear to have the same reticence. “What reasons?” she demanded, frowning. “Dani’s perfectly fine here with us, aren’t you, sweetie?”
Dani nodded. “I’m helping Consuela take care of Angela. She’s messy.”
The comment drew a faint smile from Jordan. “I can vouch for that,” he murmured.
“Hey, that’s my daughter you’re maligning,” Jessie said. “Dani, honey, why don’t you go check on her? She’s with Consuela.”
As soon as the child had run off to the kitchen, she turned her determined gaze back on Jordan. “Okay, explain.”
Jordan swallowed hard under the scrutiny. “I don’t think so.”
Jessie looked from him to Kelly. “Kelly?”
“Ask Jordan.”
Luke laughed out loud at that. “Maybe their reasons are none of our business,” Luke suggested.
Jessie did not seem pleased by her husband’s observation. “Of course, it’s our business. We’re talking about your brother and my friend.”
“That doesn’t give us inalienable rights to interfere,” Luke shot back.
Suddenly, to Jordan’s astonishment, Kelly chuckled. “Stop it, you two. The next thing we know, you’ll be fighting and you won’t even know why.”
Jessie regarded her intently. “Do you know why you’re fighting?”
Kelly considered the question thoughtfully. “I know,” she said. “I’m not so sure Jordan does.”
He frowned at that.
