Kissing Under The Mistletoe: The Sullivans (Contemporary Romance) (18 page)

“There’s nothing wrong with you.” He tugged
her onto his lap and said, “You make me happy. Happier than I’ve
ever been.”

His sweet acceptance of her just the way she
was made her heartbeat settle and the knot in her stomach uncoil.
Framing his face in her hands, she told him the one thing she knew
for sure.

“You make me happy, too.”

The next few days followed in a blur of
meetings and promotional activities, while the nights were a
dazzling rush of sweet and sinful lovemaking. Somehow, Jack managed
to keep his promise to Mary, not only about keeping their
relationship a secret but by holding back the one small but very
meaningful word that was burning a hole inside of him.

Love,
his mother had
once told him, might not always be easy, but whatever struggles or
pain that might come with it, true love was always worth it.

Jack had seen the truth of that in his
parents’ marriage. Now he understood that for all these years he’d
been waiting for Mary. She was his destiny. And whether or not she
was ready to accept it yet, he was hers.

But just because they were meant to be
together, he knew better than to think he could simply sit back and
let things take their natural course. He wanted to give her
everything—not just pleasure but romance, too. Apart from that
first evening in the diner, he’d never taken her out on a date. And
though they’d been extremely busy working on the campaign, that was
a poor excuse.

Tonight, no matter what, he’d give her not
only flowers but memories of more than passion and heat, too.

When Mary let him in that evening, she was so
beautiful and she tasted so good that he nearly forgot his plans
for the evening. Her eyes widened at the red poinsettia plant in
the green-painted pot that he was holding out to her.

“You bought me flowers,” she said, slightly
stunned.

They’d shared the ultimate intimacy, yet he
found he was nervous as he held out the flowers. “I was going to
get you roses, but when I saw this, I immediately thought of
you.”

She took the pot from him and admired the
large flowers. “When I was a little girl, there were hundreds of
these plants all over town at Christmastime.” She lifted her gaze
to his again, wonder in them as she asked, “How do you always know
me so well?”

He prayed that she already knew the
answer…even if he’d promised not to speak those words of love aloud
until she was ready to hear them.

“I should find a good spot for this,” she
said. But instead of moving into the living room, she simply put
the pot down on the floor, then pulled him toward her and pushed
the door closed behind him. Her lips found his, and then she was
raining kisses from his mouth to his jaw, before nipping
seductively at his earlobe. “I missed you today,” she told him
between kisses. “So much.”

He’d made plans to give her romance, and Jack
Sullivan always followed through on his plans…but how could he
possibly keep his hands from roving down her curves?

“I don’t just want you for your body,” he
told her as he tried to keep hold of the reins long enough to take
her out for some long-overdue wooing. “I want to give you a
romantic evening tonight.”

Her eyes flared with surprise and obvious
pleasure at his intention, but when she lifted one leg and wrapped
it around his thighs and kissed him again, Jack realized that for
the next few minutes he had no choice but to completely give up the
tenuous control he had over himself.

His hands dove into her hair as he crushed
her mouth beneath his. Together they moved just far enough inside
to sink down onto the soft rug in front of her Christmas tree. She
pulled off his sweater and he untied the sash around the waist of
her dress. His belt buckle opened at the same time silk slid from
her shoulders. He got the clasp of her bra to come free just as she
gave up on the final buttons of his shirt and yanked it open.

They rolled together on the rug with Mary on
top, straddling his hips as she pressed hot kisses all across his
chest. But moments later he was the one moving over her, his hands
stroking her body so that she was crying out with pleasure. There
was no rhythm to their lovemaking tonight, no plan, no goal as both
of them followed their wild—and loving—instincts.

* * *

They were lying side by side on the rug, her
hand in his, when he told her again, “I had plans for us tonight.”
He was still trying to catch the breath she’d stolen from him.

Post-climax, her eyes were hazy but still
filled with wickedness as she informed him, “So did I.”

He grinned back at her. “Clearly.” But when
he was helping her back onto her feet, he couldn’t stop his
eyebrows from going up in shock. “Ruining your dress wasn’t in my
plans. Forgive me?”

She seemed stunned when she looked down at
the state of her outfit. The bodice of her elegant silk dress was
down around her waist, and the delicate fabric was badly wrinkled
from where he’d grabbed it in his fist to drag it up by the hem as
he’d moved between her legs to take her. One stocking was still in
place around her thigh, but the other was a couple of feet away,
tossed onto a corner of the rug in the midst of their passion. But
Mary seemed most stunned by what she’d done to his button-down
shirt—one sleeve ripped, half of the buttons strewn across the
rug.

“I did that?” Alongside the surprise on her
face was a hint of sensual pride that heated him up all over
again.

“I’ll bet that’s how you open Christmas
presents, isn’t it?” he teased.

“I would if I ever had a Christmas present as
good as you,” she teased back.

They were already behind schedule, but if he
couldn’t tell her he loved her, he needed to say it with a kiss
instead. Her lips were still heated from his earlier kisses and
sensitive now from their wild lovemaking. Quickly, the kiss began
to spiral into something more, but Jack carefully drew back from
her.

His voice gruff with emotion—and desire that
grew from moment to moment—he said, “Go put some new clothes on so
I can take you out for a special date.”

“Jack, it’s really sweet that you want to do
something romantic for me tonight, but don’t you know you’ve been
wooing and romancing me every single second since I’ve known
you?”

“Pie and ice cream isn’t wooing. Dinner with
my family isn’t romance.”

Her blue eyes were clear and full of emotion
as she told him, “It is when I’m with you.”

My God, he loved her. So damned much the word
was right there on the tip of his tongue.

“Hurry, or we’re going to be too late.”

He thought he saw disappointment in her eyes
before she turned away and moved down the hall to her bedroom to
change. It was almost as if she’d secretly hoped he’d break his
promise and confess his love for her.

* * *

Mary didn’t recognize the address Jack gave
the taxi driver, but she knew his romantic surprise would be
amazing. Just as she’d told him earlier, he really did know
her.

And yet, instead of being able to completely
enjoy it, she felt twisted up inside.

She’d never had a secret relationship before.
As a teenager she’d been a good girl, too focused on her dreams to
waste time on the local boys at school. She knew some people found
having a secret affair exciting, but Mary hated not being able to
put her hand in Jack’s in the back of the taxi without worrying
that the driver would see them, then recognize her and end up
telling someone.

Why, she asked herself for the millionth
time, was she still being so careful, so wary? What would it hurt
if people knew that she and Jack were falling for each other? Heck,
if being careful was her main goal in life, she’d still be in her
childhood town, with babies and children playing at her feet while
she helped her mother sew wedding dresses for the other women.

But Mary knew that worrying about other
people’s reactions wasn’t the main reason she wasn’t ready to give
up the secrecy. The real reason was much more complicated.

Jack was wonderful…so wonderful that a part
of her was absolutely terrified.

What if he realized one day soon that he’d
had his fill of her and decided to move on?

Or what if the product launch ended up going
badly and he couldn’t separate the success of his business from her
role in it?

Or what if she screwed up and made a rash
decision that he couldn’t forgive her for…just as her mother once
had?

The happier Mary was every moment they were
together, the more she worried when they were apart, simply because
Jack mattered to her—more than any other man ever had.

As the secrecy continued to eat away at her,
she had to wonder if never publicly acknowledging their
relationship would make losing him any easier.

The taxi pulled up to the curb, and when she
looked out the window, she realized they were in front of a
beautiful old movie theater. The words in lights on the marquee
made her heart skip a beat.

“They’re playing
Singin’ in
the Rain?
” She turned to Jack in surprise. “How did you find
this?”

“Some things,” Jack said softly, “are meant
to be.”

He extended his hand to help her out of the
cab, holding it a few moments longer than a friend would have but
not long enough that strangers would wonder…unless they happened to
notice the way the two of them were looking at each other and
noticed the flush of heat spreading across Mary’s cheeks.

The fog off the Bay was thick tonight, and
she pulled her coat closer around her as she looked at the long
line of couples waiting to get their tickets. But just as people
began turning to take a second glance to see if she was who they
thought she was, Jack gently propelled her toward the entrance and
handed their tickets to the young man at the door.

“Follow the stairs to the left all the way up
and you’ll find your seats.”

Instead of heading for the stairs, Jack led
her over to the concession counter. “I hope you like your popcorn
dripping with butter.”

“Only if it’s doused with salt, too,” she
told him with a smile she couldn’t possibly contain. Mary hadn’t
been on many movie-and-popcorn dates in the past thirteen years.
She felt, for a moment, like any girl out on a long-awaited date
with the boy she couldn’t stop daydreaming about.

A few minutes later, when their arms were
laden with candy and soda and an absolutely enormous tub of
popcorn, they climbed up the narrow stairs to the balcony. Mary
stopped at the top of the stairs in surprise.

“There are only two seats up here.”

Jack looked incredibly pleased with himself.
“I know.”

She hadn’t needed romance or wooing to fall
for Jack Sullivan. But now that he was giving them to her on a
silver platter filled with popcorn and malted milk balls and
ice-cold Coke, Mary wasn’t sure how she could ever have thought
she’d be able to resist him.

In their private seats high above the rest of
the theater, as the lights went down and her favorite old film
began to play, Mary not only didn’t have to worry about secrecy,
but she realized she could stop worrying entirely for two
hours.

Snuggling into Jack, loving the feel of his
arm over her shoulder, she reached into the tub of popcorn and knew
she was the luckiest girl in the world.

* * *

A little less than two hours later, Mary was
startled when the house lights came up. She’d been utterly lost in
the fantasy of being Jack’s girl and in the incredible sensuality
of his fingers brushing over her shoulder, his thigh pressed
against hers, his breath warm as he whispered into her ear during
his favorite parts of the movie.

She hadn’t dated much as a teenager, and as
an adult the men who asked her out wouldn’t have dreamed of taking
her to see an old movie while munching on popcorn and candy. Just
as none of them would have bought her pie and ice cream in a
diner.

Jack had been careful to buy tickets ahead of
time so that they could walk inside the theater quickly and had
also thought ahead about reserving the private balcony to make sure
their relationship stayed under wraps the way she’d insisted. Which
also meant that they would have to wait until the seats below
emptied so that they could sneak back out unnoticed.

Mary thought about the end of
Singin’ in the Rain
, when Debbie Reynolds’s character,
Kathy, had stood hidden behind a curtain as she sang…and how wrong
it had been for her to hide herself away like that.

Wasn’t that exactly what Mary was making the
two of them do by forcing them to keep their true feelings hidden,
not just from strangers in a movie theater but also from the people
with whom they were working?

Her stomach twisted as she forced herself to
face the truth.

No!
She didn’t want
to let go of Jack’s hand when they went back downstairs. And she
definitely didn’t want to pretend that he hadn’t come to mean
everything to her.

It was time to come clean, not just with the
rest of the world, but with Jack…and with herself, too.

To hell with caution. Mary wanted everyone to
know she was his.

“I was wrong, Jack.”

She had felt the warmth of his gaze on her as
soon as the lights went up. Now, he took her hands in his and
gently asked, “
Singin’ in the Rain
isn’t
one of your favorite movies, after all?”

She’d been focusing so hard on her guilt and
trying to be brave. Only Jack could have made her smile at a moment
like this.

“Not about the movie—I still love it, and
seeing it with you has made it even more special. What I meant was
that I was wrong about hiding our relationship.”