Shadows of Yesterday
Page 27

“What choice did I have?” she said on a light laugh.
“Many,” he said seriously. “Sharon had a choice not to take that bottle of sleeping pills, to face whatever had happened to me with fortitude. She chose not to.”
Leigh felt the arsenal of defense she had built up crumbling slowly under the onslaught of his arguments. Sharon’s suicide must have caused Chad much pain and guilt, especially since he had wanted to protect her from the rest of the world. Leigh felt a surge of compassion and tenderness for him as she saw his pain-racked face. Leigh knew that, prudent though it might be, she couldn’t just abruptly stop seeing Chad now. She knew the risks involved, knew the heartache she would suffer the first time he had to leave her to fight an oil-well fire, but that nightmare seemed remote now at this intimate moment. She would face it when she had to. Not now.
She touched his hair. “Chad, I’m sorry about Sharon.”
“Thank you, Leigh. I know I should have told you earlier, but I couldn’t risk losing you.” He laid his head in her lap as his arms went around her waist. Nuzzling her seductively, he said, “Leigh, I need you. Don’t deny me. Please.”
What he was doing, even through her clothing, set her heart racing. She could feel herself melting against his mouth like warm butter. “Chad, we haven’t known each other long. We could count on one hand the times we’ve been together.”
“I’ve felt like this since I left you in the hospital. I wanted to install you and Sarah in my life then.”
“Why didn’t you stay? Or come back?”
“The timing was off and I knew it. I thought you might still be grieving over Greg. It had been less than a year since he was killed. You had just had his baby, the last link with him. I would have felt like an intruder. I had to give you time to recover physically and mentally from what you’d been through. And it seemed like every oil well in the world started having problems. I was hopping all over the globe. Besides, I thought you might be embarrassed to see me again. Often when tragedy or near-tragedy brings people together, they find it hard to face each other in normal circumstances.”
She combed her fingers through his hair as his head lay against her midriff. “I guess I should have been embarrassed, but I wasn’t. You were so… so sensitive to me and what I needed at the time.” For a moment she paused, then admitted, “I cried after you left me that night in the hospital.”
He raised his head and searched her storm-blue eyes. Then he lifted himself onto the sofa, lay back, and brought her with him to recline upon his chest. He smoothed back the rich-brown hair that draped either side of her face.
“I hung around until your parents arrived. I couldn’t just walk out and leave you alone without anyone looking after your interests. I wanted to introduce myself to them, but I looked so raunchy, I was afraid they’d be terrified to know such a man had delivered your baby.”
She laughed as she traced the outline of his lips with her fingertip. “That’s probably one of the wisest decisions you’ve ever made.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s exactly how they would have felt if they’d seen you that day. They’re not as warm and affectionate, as tolerant and accepting, as your parents.”
He fingered the buttons of her blouse. “What did you think of me that day?”
“I was terrified until you took off your sunglasses and I saw your eyes,” she said honestly.
“My eyes are very sensitive to sunlight. I wear dark sunglasses year-round.”
“You kept calling me ma’am. That was out of character with your desperado appearance.”
“My mother would be proud that her strict etiquette lessons paid off,” he said, grinning.
“And despite how dirty you were, I thought you were handsome, especially with the bandanna tied around your forehead.”
He laughed. “That wasn’t cosmetic. I did that to keep from drowning you and the baby with sweat. I was so damned scared I’d do something to injure both of you.”
“You were more gentle than any nurse or doctor could have been,” she whispered.
Placing a hand on the back of her neck, he drew her down to his waiting lips and kissed her tenderly. Again and again his lips tripped lightly over hers, stopping periodically to press more insistently before drawing away.
Then he couldn’t pull away any longer. His mouth stayed pressed against hers until their lips parted at the same moment and the ribbons of desire that had been tightly bound for the past few hours began to unfurl.
Holding her tightly, he rolled her against the back cushions, positioning himself precariously close to the edge of the sofa. Their thighs interlocked. He lifted her arm and placed it over his shoulder, giving him better access to the breast that his hand stroked through the silk blouse.
They kissed with such heat that at last they were forced to separate, breathless, hearts knocking together, laughing slightly in sheer delight of each other. Chad rained small, rapid kisses on Leigh’s cheeks, her neck, down her chest, chasing the fingers that hurriedly divested her of blouse and undergarments.
Burying his face between the deep cleavage made more pronounced by her position, he murmured, “Leigh, do you want me?”
She nodded, sighing as he planted a hot, wet kiss on the inside curve of her breast, “Yes, Chad. Yes.”
He rolled off the narrow sofa and picked her up as he had out of the back of his pickup. “Then I’m going to love you,” he said against her hair.
Plagued by a sudden rush of modesty, she buried her head against his shoulder and nodded again. He carried her down the short hallway to her bedroom. His knee made a long, deep dent in the mattress as he leaned upon it and laid her down crosswise.
He straightened and Leigh watched in fascination as he peeled off his clothes. The buttons were almost torn from his shirt as he pulled impatiently at them. Bare-chested, he danced on one foot and then the other as he tugged off his boots and socks. His jeans were lowered before Leigh could prepare herself for seeing him wearing only the brief, dark blue underwear. She caught her breath.
The small lamp beside her bed cast into sharp relief the hollows of his body and highlighted the planes. The body hair that matted his chest and dusted the rest of him glinted against the dark skin. Muscles rippled in legs and arms as he lowered himself beside her. Shirtless, his shoulders seemed broader and his chest more massive. The evidence of his sex beneath the tight briefs was awesome, and Leigh knew a moment of panic.