“How can moving out be the right thing?” Jason exploded in frustration. “Isn’t that just running away? Or are you filing for divorce? Have things gone that far?”
“Not yet.”
It suddenly occurred to him that perhaps he’d been trying to cast blame in the wrong direction. What if his mother…? Dear Lord, it wasn’t possible that she had found someone to fill the lonely hours when her husband was at work. “Mom, is it…you haven’t…there’s not…”
No matter how he tried to phrase it, he couldn’t get the words out. It was clear, though, that his mother understood. Suddenly she was reaching into her purse. “I really have to go.”
Jason spotted the tears welling up in her eyes and felt more helpless than he’d ever felt in his entire life. “Mom?”
She brushed a kiss against his cheek, then hurried from the restaurant. She hadn’t even told him how he could get in touch with her.
He spent the afternoon closeted in his office with the door shut, trying to make sense of what had happened. It took everything in him to keep from going down the hall and slugging his father. Unfortunately he couldn’t seem to make up his mind whether or not he deserved it. His mother had never once said that his father was to blame for anything. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t imagine his mother walking away from the family that had always meant everything to her, unless his father had committed some terrible sin.
He barely looked up at the tap on the door. He didn’t bother responding. Harriet would send whoever it was away. He’d told her he didn’t want to be disturbed.
The door opened a crack. “Jason?” Dana said softly, then added more anxiously, “What are you doing sitting in here in the dark?”
He glanced around and realized the room was filled with shadows. He hadn’t even noticed. “What time is it?” he asked wearily.
“Past six. Are you okay?”
“No,” he said. “I am definitely not okay.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I had lunch with my mother today. She’s moved out of the house.” He looked at Dana and astonishment filled his voice. “She’s actually left my father.”
The startled expression on Dana’s face reflected his own feelings exactly.
“I don’t understand,” she said.
“Neither do I. She didn’t see fit to explain it.” He shook his head. “No. That’s not fair. I think she was too upset to talk about it.”
“What does your father say?”
“I haven’t talked to him. I was afraid I’d hit first and talk later.”
“Maybe it’s not his fault.”
“It has to be somebody’s fault,” he said, itching to cast blame and unwilling still to pin it on his gentle, sensitive mother. The fact that she hadn’t denied the suggestion that she was having an affair nagged at him like a hangnail. He toyed with the idea until the pain was nearly unbearable.
“Maybe it really is no one’s fault,” Dana said, coming up behind his chair and beginning to massage away the tension in his shoulders.
The brush of her fingers against his neck had his pulse bucking. Though he was certain she meant to relax him with the kneading strokes, the effect was anything but soothing. Every nerve in his body craved the magic of her touch.
When he could stand the tantalizing, innocent caresses no longer, he swiveled his chair around and pulled her down onto his lap. Before it even registered what he intended, his mouth was covering hers with a desperation that might have frightened him if he’d recognized it. Instead he was just acting on his feelings, hungry for the taste of her.
The kiss was bruising, needy and it wasn’t nearly enough. He shoved her sweater up until he unhooked her bra. Her breasts spilled into his hands. He took the rosy tip of one into his mouth, urging it into a hard bud, then did the same with the other. The silk of her skin burned hot beneath his touch.
As if she sensed his need, Dana unbuttoned his shirt with matching urgency, her hands stroking and teasing with renewed purpose, this time to inflame. Her mouth found his masculine nipples and teased with the same desperate intensity. Jason had never before been aroused so fast. He felt as if he were going to explode if he couldn’t bury himself inside her.
He gathered her into his arms and carried her to the sofa. With hands that shook with emotion, he stripped away her jeans, then his own slacks, until he was able to enter her with a quick, powerful thrust.
With each desperate stroke some of his anger and confusion began to fade. With each caress he thought less and less about his parents’ failure and more about his own future, here in Dana’s arms. How could emotions this powerful ever die? Surely this kind of intensity couldn’t be lost.
With one last shred of sanity, he slowed, only to have Dana quicken the pace again, luring him over the edge with an instinctive understanding of his need.
When they were both spent, tangled in rumpled clothes and slick with perspiration, he cradled her in his arms. The peace he’d craved hadn’t come. If anything, he felt worse than before because he’d used a woman he loved without regard for her feelings.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, distraught by the uncaring way he’d treated her. He tried to find the words to explain, settling finally for the simple, raw truth. “I needed you so much.”
“I know,” she said gently.
“That’s no excuse for being so thoughtless, so rough.”
“You weren’t rough. Just demanding.” She gave a little half smile, the kind which Mona Lisa had been enchanting people with for years. “You always are, you know. I think that’s what I love about you. You don’t hold anything back. I always know how much you want me.”
“I gotta tell you, Dana, right now that scares the hell out of me.”
“Because of what’s going on with your parents.”
“Exactly.
