Risky Business (14 page)

“You're not fighting me,” he told her. His eyes were close, searing into hers. “You're fighting yourself. You've been fighting yourself since the first time we met.”

“I want you to let me go.” She wanted her voice to be strong, but it trembled.

“Yes. You want me to let you go just as much as you want me not to. You've been making your own decisions for a long time, Liz. This time I'm making one for you.”

Her furious protest was lost against his mouth as he pressed her down to the sofa. Trapped under him, her body began to heat, her blood began to stir. Yes, she was fighting herself. She had to fight herself before she could fight him. But she was losing.

She heard her own moan as his lips trailed down her throat, and it was a moan of pleasure. She felt the hard line of his body against hers as she arched under him, but it wasn't a movement of protest. Want me, she seemed to say. Want me for what I am.

Her pulse began to thud in parts of her body that had been quiet for so many years. Life burst through her like a torrid wind through thin glass until every line of defense was shat
tered. With a desperate groan, she took his face in her hands and dragged his mouth back to hers.

She could taste the passion, the life, the promises. She wanted them all. Recklessness, so long chained within, tore free and ruled. A sound bubbled in her throat she wasn't even aware was a laugh as she wrapped herself around him. She wanted. He wanted. The hell with the rest.

He wasn't sure what had driven him—anger, need, pain. All he knew now was that he had to have her, body, soul and mind. She was wild beneath him, but no longer in resistance. Every movement was a demand that he take more, give more, and nothing seemed fast enough. She was a storm set to rage, a fire desperate to consume. Whatever he'd released inside of her had whipped out and taken him prisoner.

He pulled the shirt over her head and tossed it aside. His heartbeat thundered. She was so small, so delicate. But he had a beast inside him that had been caged too long. He took her breast in his mouth and sent them both spinning. She tasted so fresh: a cool, clear glass of water. She smelled of woman at her most unpampered and most seductive. He felt her body arch against his, taut as a bowstring, hot as a comet. The innocence that remained so integral a part of her trembled just beneath wanton passion. No man alive could have resisted it; any man alive might have wished for it. His mouth was buried at her throat when he felt the shirt rip away from his back.

She hardly knew what she was doing. Touching him sent demands to her brain that she couldn't deny. She wanted to feel him against her, flesh to flesh, to experience an intimacy she'd so long refused to allow herself. There'd been no one else. As Liz felt her skin fused to his she understood why. There was only one Jonas. She pulled his mouth back to hers to taste him again.

He drew off her slacks so that she was naked, but she didn't
feel vulnerable. She felt invulnerable. Hardly able to breathe, she struggled with his. Then she gave him no choice. Desperate for that final release, she wrapped her legs around him and drew him into her until she was filled. At the shock of that first ragged peak, her eyes flew open. Inches away, he watched her face. Her mouth trembled open, but before she could catch her breath, he was driving her higher, faster. She couldn't tell how long they balanced on the edge, trapped between pleasure and fulfillment. Then his arms came around her, hers around his. Together, they broke free.

 

She didn't speak. Her system leveled slowly, and she was helpless to hurry it. He didn't move. He'd shifted his weight, but his arms had come around her and stayed there. She needed him to speak, to say something that would put what had happened in perspective. She'd only had one other lover and had learned not to expect.

Jonas rested his forehead against her shoulder a moment. He was wrestling with his own demons. “I'm sorry, Liz.”

He could have said nothing worse. She closed her eyes and forced her emotions to drain. She nearly succeeded. Steadier, she reached for the tangle of clothes on the floor. “I don't need an apology.” With her clothes in a ball in her arm, she walked quickly to the bedroom.

On a long breath, Jonas sat up. He couldn't seem to find the right buttons on Liz Palmer. Every move he made seemed to be a move in reverse. It still stunned him that he'd been so rough with her, left her so little choice in the final outcome. He'd be better off hiring her a private bodyguard and moving himself back to the hotel. It was true he didn't want to see her hurt and felt a certain responsibility for her welfare, but he didn't seem to be able to act on it properly. When she'd stood in the
kitchen telling him what she'd been through, something had begun to boil in him. That it had taken the form of passion in the end wasn't something easily explained or justified. His apology had been inadequate, but he had little else.

Drawing on his pants, Jonas started for his room. It snouldn't have surprised him to find himself veering toward Liz's. She was just pulling on a robe. “It's late, Jonas.”

“Did I hurt you?”

She sent him a look that made guilt turn over in his stomach. “Yes. Now I want to take a shower before I go to bed.”

“Liz, there's no excuse for being so rough, and there's no making it up to you, but—”

“Your apology hurt me,” she interrupted. “Now if you've said all you have to say, I'd like to be alone.”

He stared at her a moment, then dragged a hand through his hair. How could he have convinced himself he understood her when she was now and always had been an enigma? “Damn it, Liz, I wasn't apologizing for making love to you, but for the lack of finesse. I practically tossed you on the ground and ripped your clothes off.”

She folded her hands and tried to keep calm. “I ripped yours.”

His lips twitched, then curved. “Yeah, you did.”

Humor didn't come into her eyes. “And do you want an apology?”

He came to her then and rested his hands on her shoulders. Her robe was cotton and thin and whirling with bright color. “No. I guess what I'd like is for you to say you wanted me as much as I wanted you.”

Her courage weakened, so she looked beyond him. “I'd have thought that was obvious.”

“Liz.” His hand was gentle as he turned her face back to his.

“All right. I wanted you. Now—”

“Now,” he interrupted. “Will you listen?”

“There's no need to say anything.”

“Yes, there is.” He walked with her to the bed and drew her down to sit. Moonlight played over their hands as he took hers. “I came to Cozumel for one reason. My feelings on that haven't changed but other things have. When I first met you I thought you knew something, were hiding something. I linked everything about you to Jerry. It didn't take long for me to see there was something else. I wanted to know about you, for myself.”

“Why?”

“I don't know. It's impossible not to care about you.” At her look of surprise, he smiled. “You project this image of pure self-sufficiency and still manage to look like a waif. Tonight, I purposely maneuvered you into talking about Faith and what had brought you here. When you told me I couldn't handle it.”

She drew her hand from his. “That's understandable. Most people have trouble handling unwed mothers.”

Anger bubbled as he grabbed her hand again. “Stop putting words in my mouth. You stood in the kitchen talking and I could see you, young, eager and trusting, being betrayed and hurt. I could see what it had done to you, how it had closed you off from things you wanted to do.”

“I told you I don't have any regrets.”

“I know.” He lifted her hand and kissed it. “I guess for a moment I needed to have them for you.”

“Jonas, do you think anyone's life turns out the way they plan it as children?”

He laughed a little as he slipped an arm around her and drew her against him. Liz sat still a moment, unsure how to react to the casual show of affection. Then she leaned her head
against his shoulder and closed her eyes. “Jerry and I were going to be partners.”

“In what?”

“In anything.”

She touched the coin on the end of his chain. “He had one of these.”

“Our grandparents gave them to us when we were kids. They're identical five-dollar gold pieces. Funny, I always wore mine heads up. Jerry wore his heads down.” He closed his fingers over the coin. “He stole his first car when we were sixteen.”

Her fingers crept up to his. “I'm sorry.”

“The thing was he didn't need to—we had access to any car in the garage. He told me he just wanted to see if he could get away with it.”

“He didn't make life easy for you.”

“No, he didn't make life easy. Especially for himself. But he never did anything out of meanness. There were times I hated him, but I never stopped loving him.”

Liz drew closer. “Love hurts more than hate.”

He kissed the top of her head. “Liz, I don't suppose you've ever talked to a lawyer about Faith.”

“Why should I?”

“Marcus has a responsibility, a financial responsibility at the least, to you and Faith.”

“I took money from Marcus once. Not again.”

“Child support payments could be set up very quietly. You could stop working seven days a week.”

Liz took a deep breath and pulled away until she could see his face. “Faith is my child, has been my child only since the moment Marcus handed me a check. I could have had the abortion and gone back to my life as I'd planned it. I chose not to. I chose to have the baby, to raise the baby, to support the
baby. She's never given me anything but pleasure from the moment she was born, and I have no intention of sharing her.”

“One day she's going to ask you for his name.”

Liz moistened her lips, but nodded. “Then one day I'll tell her. She'll have her own choice to make.”

He wouldn't press her now, but there was no reason he couldn't have his law clerk begin to investigate child support laws and paternity cases. “Are you going to let me meet her? I know the deal is for me to be out of the house and out of your life when she gets back. I will, but I'd like the chance to meet her.”

“If you're still in Mexico.”

“One more question.”

The smile came more easily. “One more.”

“There haven't been any other men, have there?”

The smile faded. “No.”

He felt twin surges of gratitude and guilt. “Then let me show you how it should be.”

“There's no need—”

Gently, he brushed the hair back from her face. “Yes, there is. For both of us.” He kissed her eyes closed. “I've wanted you from the first.” His mouth on hers was as sweet as spring rain and just as gentle. Slowly, he slipped the robe from her shoulders, following the trail with warm lips. “Your skin's like gold,” he murmured, then traced a finger over her breasts where the tone changed. “And so pale. I want to see all of you.”

“Jonas—”

“All of you,” he repeated, looking into her eyes until the heat kindled again. “I want to make love with all of you.”

She didn't resist. Never in her life had anyone ever touched her with such reverence, looked at her with such need. When he urged her back, Liz lay on the bed, naked and waiting.

“Lovely,” Jonas murmured. Her body was milk and honey
in the moonlight. And her eyes were dark—dark and open and uncertain. “I want you to trust me.” He began a slow journey of exploration at her ankles. “I want to know when I look at you that you're not afraid of me.”

“I'm not afraid of you.”

“You have been. Maybe I've even wanted you to be. No more.”

His tongue slid over her skin and teased the back of her knees. The jolt of power had her rising up and gasping. “Jonas.”

“Relax.” He ran a hand lightly up her hip. “I want to feel your bones melt. Lie back, Liz. Let me show you how much you can have.”

She obeyed, only because she hadn't the strength to resist. He murmured to her, stroking, nibbling, until she was too steeped in what he gave to give in return. But he wanted her that way, wanted to take her as though she hadn't been touched before. Not by him, not by anyone. Slowly, thoroughly and with great, great patience he seduced and pleasured. He thought as his mouth skimmed up her thigh that he could hear her skin hum.

She'd never known anything could be like this—so deep, so dark. There was a freedom here, she discovered, that she'd once only associated with diving down through silent fathoms. Her body could float, her limbs could be weightless, but she could feel every touch, every movement. Dreamlike, sensations drifted over her, so soft, so misty, each blended into the next. How long could it go on? Perhaps, after all, there were forevers.

She was lean, with muscles firm in her legs. Like a dancer's he thought, disciplined and trained. The scent from the bowl on her dresser spiced the air, but it was her fragrance, cool as a waterfall, that swam in his head. His mind emptied of everything but the need to delight her. Love, when unselfish, has incredible power.

His tongue plunged into the heat and his hands gripped hers as she arched, stunned at being flung from a floating world to a churning one. He drew from her, both patient and relentless, until she shuddered to climax and over. When her hands went limp in his, he brought them back to his body and pleasured himself.

She hadn't known passion could stretch so far or a body endure such a barrage of sensations. His hands, rough at the palm, showed her secrets she'd never had the chance to imagine. His lips, warmed from her own skin, opened mysteries and whispered the answers. He gentled her, he enticed her, he stroked with tenderness and he devoured. Gasping for air, she had no choice but to allow him whatever he wanted, and to strain for him to show her more.