Just a Kiss Away (33 page)

He stopped. She cried into his mouth. Then he teased her, barely grazing around her. Then he stopped; she cried; he started again, slower, building and building until she strained against him, spreading her legs and crying into his mouth for something. He stopped again, and she grabbed his shoulders as hard as she could. “Don’t stop. Please don’t stop again.”

Then his finger slipped inside her, stayed there, unmoving while his thumb touched that point again over and over.

“You’re hot inside, so, so hot inside.” He groaned onto her lips, moving his mouth to her ear while his thumb flickered against that point. Another finger slipped inside.

Her hips began to rise, striving for something hovering above her. She knew if she just moved a little closer . . .

His thumb stopped, but before she could protest he thrust another finger in until three fingers stretched her open. Her hips dropped and her breath deepened. His thumb started again circling, playing, grazing deeper, faster, then slower.

“Please, oh, Sam, please . . .”

“Don’t rush it, sweet, slow down,” he told her, laying her back on the cot and pulling her pants downward.

She moaned and moved her hips. He crawled over her, unbuttoning his clothes as he moved downward.

“Raaaaape! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-hah!” Medusa flapped through the window, lighting on her perch next to the cot.

Both of them froze for a long, silent moment.

“Son of a bitch!” Sam said under his breath, his forehead dropping to her chest. “I’m going to fry that damn bird!”

Lollie lay there, still as could be, except for her breathing, which matched his. Suddenly embarrassed, she squirmed and pulled up her pants, fumbling to try to rebutton them.

“Awk! Fry the damn son of a bitch!”

Sam looked up, glaring. “You’re dead meat.” He reached across toward Medusa.

“No, Sam!” Lollie released her pants and grabbed his wrist.

“Sam’s dead meat! Get a shovel!” Medusa weaved and bobbed along her perch. Suddenly her voice lowered to a timbre not unlike Sam’s. “You’re so, so hot inside.”

Lollie’s mouth fell open, and a slow flush flooded her face. She looked at Sam, expecting to see murder in his face. His neck was bright red, not at all what she expected, especially from a man with a black leather eye patch. She giggled. She couldn’t help it. Sam Forester was embarrassed.

He stopped gawking at Medusa and looked at Lollie, who was biting her lip in an attempt to keep from bursting into a fit of giggles.

“Just what’s so goddamn funny?” he barked, pushing himself up off the cot and giving her his one-eyed lethal stare. It didn’t work this time, because his face still showed his embarrassment.

“You’re blushing,” she said, scurrying to button her pants.

“Like hell!”

“You sure are.”

“Awk! Sam’s blushing,” Medusa lowered her voice. “So, so hot inside.”

One look at Sam, and Lollie threw her body between him and Medusa. “Don’t!”

“Move!” He stepped forward.

She stepped back.

The bird flapped its wings, squawked once, and sang, “To save a wretch like meeeeee!” Then she flew out the window.

Sam continued to glare at Lollie, then turned and left the room before she had a chance to say a thing. She stood there, staring at the closed door. He’d left. One moment they’d been intimate, and a few minutes later he was gone. It was as if he’d never kissed her at all, never touched her, almost as if she had dreamed the whole thing.

But she hadn’t dreamed it. The faint tingle of his deep touch, the unexplained need, the restlessness she felt seeping through her, and the lingering taste of him were all still there to remind her. And they stayed with her long into the dark and lonely hours of that hot, tropical night.

The ground exploded all around them, dirt and rocks spewing into the air, then showering down in a huge dirt cloud. They both coughed over and over until the air cleared and the dirt and rocks settled to the ground.

Sam lifted his chest off hers and grasped her shoulders. “Are you all right?” he asked.

She wiped the dirt from her face and eyes. “I think so.”

“Good. Now I can kill you myself.” He jerked her upright. “You idiot! What the hell were you doing walking into the artillery field?”

She turned away from his glaring eye and looked out at the clearing. “Oh. Is that what that was?”

He swore and grabbed her hand, jerking her toward the center of the camp. “I’m going to lock you in your but until that note comes. You’re trouble. You’re just too much trouble, and I’ll be damned if you’re going to get yourself killed after all the hell I’ve been through!”

“Sam!” She pulled back on her hand, but his grip only tightened.

“Shut up.”

“Please don’t lock me up. Please. I’ll just die all alone in the room.” She started to cry.

He stopped, turned, and glared at her. “Don’t start, dammit.”

“But if you lock me up I won’t be able to fix everything with the men. Please, Sam, I didn’t mean to walk into that field.”

He let go of her hand and ran his fingers through his hair. “Look, Lollie. I don’t have time to watch over you and to do my job. I’ve got to get these men trained, and you’ve got to stay out of the way.”

“Can’t you give me something to do?”

“No. I can’t play nursemaid.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her toward her bungalow.

Just as they passed the cooking but a soldier came down the steps. “Commander!”

Sam stopped yanking on her poor arm and barked, “What?”

“Cartillo’s hurt. He can’t cook the meal.”

Sam swore under his breath, then asked, “What happened?”

“He missed with the knife. Verdugo’s sewing him up right now.”

“I’ll send someone over from the field.” Sam turned to drag her back to her quarters, but she dug her heels into the ground.

“I’ll do it.”

“You’ll do what?”

“I’ll cook.”

“No, you won’t.”

“Sam, please. Let me do it. I need something to do, and it’ll give me a chance to make something really nice for the men. To make up for what I did. Please.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Remember the laundry?”

“But that was a mistake. I forgot about it, and it was partly your fault.”

“My fault?”

“Yes. You got so mad and dragged me back to the room. I never had a chance to go back to the laundry.”

“No.”

“But—”

“No.” He grabbed her hand and headed for the bungalow.

She argued over and over. She begged over and over.

She finally gave it one last try. “You’re afraid to let me cook.”

“Sure,” he said.

“You are.”

“Explain how you came to that brilliant conclusion.”

“You’re afraid if the men don’t dislike me anymore, then they’ll like me—”

“Great logic,” he interrupted. “If they don’t dislike you, they’ll like you. Brilliant, absolutely brilliant deduction.”

“You don’t have to be so nasty about it. I wasn’t finished.”

“Please.” He waved a hand in the air. “Go on.” Then he muttered, “I can’t wait to hear the rest.”

“If they like me, you’ll have to admit you like me and you can’t take that.”

He stared at her silently.

“You can’t admit that you like me.”

Silence.

“You kissed me, and . . . uh . . . all.”

He looked very uncomfortable.

“You did.”

He closed his eye, inhaled a long breath and spun around, heading for the cooking hut. A few minutes later Lollie stared at the chicken Sam had slapped into her hand. She frowned. It was dead, and headless. Nineteen more just like it sat on the large table in the cook hut. She held up the dead bird, as far away from her person as she could, and stared at it. She wouldn’t have admitted it to Sam, but she had never cooked a meal in her life.

In fact, ever since the time she’d decided to heat up some water for tea and started a little fire, the cook had forbidden her to go near the kitchen at Hickory House. Actually, it hadn’t been something she’d resented, since it had scared her silly when all those flames had leapt from the stove and up the walls. The whole thing had all happened so fast and loud, like the blast of an erupting volcano. She’d tossed the match into the wood grate, walked back to get the tea, and
whoosh!
The whole wall was on fire.

She looked at the chicken, its limp neck dangling at a horrid angle. She could do this. She knew she could. She tossed it onto the pile of dead birds and wandered around the cooking area, taking in all the things that were foreign to her.

Huge black pots were stacked in one corner near a row of sacks and barrels. The barrels were labeled, but not in English. She supposed the sacks held staples—flour and sugar and the like—but there was a whole row of canisters on a crooked shelf above the barrels. She moved to the unlabeled canisters and began opening them and examining the contents in search of something familiar. She snapped the lid off the last one and peered inside.

It looked like lard. She stuck a finger in it. It was greasy like lard. It must be lard. Tucking it under an arm she turned and crossed over to the giant black stoves. Four of them lined one wall of the cooking hut. They sat there like giant black volcanic mountains ready to erupt.

She was being silly. She’d begged for this chance and she would do it. Cooking was the perfect chance to make a great meal for the men. Men liked to have a woman cook for them. They thought it was a good job for females. It was just one she knew nothing about.

She was older now than she had been when she set the fire at home. Surely she could handle this. She eyed the stoves. Age had taught her one thing—it would be more prudent to get someone to light them for her.

She stepped outside the bungalow and looked around the camp. Sam stood near the barracks talking to the soldier who’d told him about the cook’s injury. She left the stoop and walked toward them. Sam’s voice faded and he turned around, took one irritated look at her, and bit out, “Now what?”

“Would you light the stoves for me, please?” She pointed over her shoulder at the cook bungalow.

His gaze followed her finger, and then he took a deep breath and turned to the soldier. “You go on,” he said. “I’ll be there in a minute.” He walked right past her, opened the door with an impatient jerk, and disappeared inside before Lollie could take a few steps.