Strapless (24 page)

“Peter, I
love
you.”

 

Darcie lay in the dark, alone, hating herself with the usual vehemence she reserved for the one week each month when she suffered PMS.

On her side, she burrowed deeper into her pillow but kept one ear cocked for sounds from the living room. She'd eaten dinner in sullen silence while Annie and Dylan kept each other company. Their laughter had gone through her like a corkscrew, making her even more unhappy with each delicious bite of Dylan's crispy fish 'n chips. The damper she left by her plate. What if they really hit it off—and Darcie was forced next spring to attend her sister's wedding to Dylan Rafferty?

Darcie had reached for another succulent hunk of the batter-laden seafood.

Ridiculous.

He couldn't make love to her the way (all the ways) he did then switch to Annie just because she liked his cooking.

Could he?

“I'll just close my eyes and try to sleep,” she whispered.

Then Dylan's murmur from the other room changed her mind. Alert with her next heartbeat, Darcie raised up on an elbow in bed. She could hear her pulse rushing in her ears. Was Annie out there, too? Darcie listened but heard only Dylan's voice.

Still, what if he wasn't alone, like her? Worse, what if he was seducing Annie on the sofa? And Annie was too awed by his deep voice and clever hands and talented mouth to answer him?

Darcie bounced out of bed—and fell flat on the wooden floor in a tangle of covers. “Great, now I'm doing pratfalls.”

Swearing, she struggled to her feet. Tearing the top sheet off the bed, she wrapped it around her and crept toward the living room.

If she found Dylan on top of Annie, she'd throw them both out in the street.

Where had this primitive urge come from to safeguard her territory?

Darcie didn't stop to ponder the question.

Creeping closer, she peered around the door frame into the living room.

Dylan was on the phone. To Darcie's relief Annie was nowhere to be seen.

Maybe she'd gone out.

“Charlie's doin' fine?” he said into the receiver. Darcie studied his long, lean form stretched out on the sofa and fought back a sigh of appreciation. Lord, he was good-looking. Too bad he'd grinned like that at Annie. “You're no match for that new ram,” he said with a soft laugh. “No, I'm serious. Leave that to the men. That's why I pay them. They can handle Charlie—they understand his needs.”

He listened for a moment and Darcie looked her fill. His shoulders were magnificent. Good trapezius development, too, she tried to think with objectivity. His biceps rounded out his T-shirt sleeves like ripe melons, and his flat belly, his slim hips, his long, well-muscled legs in those worn blue jeans made her pulse race faster. Too bad he could be such a Cro-Magnon man.

Despite her irritation, she was rapidly turning into a puddle of need.

Hormones? Or, something more?

“You're sure everything is all right?” Dylan said with a frown. “You're not just telling me it is and when I get home—even in the slow season—I'll find the whole place gone to hell?”

Even from across the room Darcie could hear feminine outrage at the other end of the line. It only made Dylan smile.

“Okay. All right. I understand. Yes, ma'am.”

More higher-pitched protest sounded through the receiver.

“I will remember my manners—from now on. Talk to you tomorrow. G'night, Mum. I love you.”

She heard the sputtered sign-off clearly. Darcie leaned against the door frame, wrapped in her sheet. When he hung up, still smiling, and met her gaze, she arched an eyebrow.

“Your mother?”

“She's in charge of the station while I'm gone. It's not our busy time but if I
didn't
advise her—”

“She'd do just fine on her own.”

“How do you know?” Dylan stretched out a hand to her, and Darcie peeled herself away from the door to join him on the sofa.

“I'm a woman, too.”

He grinned. “No argument there.”

She kept a small distance between them, still annoyed over the scene in the kitchen with Annie. “We're not just helpless females who can't make a decision without a man to guide us.”

Dylan shrugged. “My dad died five years ago. Until then, Mum had raised us kids and kept the house. Oh, she nursed the sick lambs like Darcie II and the orphans—with a woman's touch—but my father made the decisions. Since he's been gone, those decisions have been mine. I make them. I pay the consequences.”

“Then why leave her responsible now?”

Begrudgingly, he admitted, “Because gradually, over the last five years, she's involved herself more and more with the daily operations of the farm. Because there's no one else,” he added.

“What about your hired help?”

His smile faded. “Sure, but if one of them makes the wrong choice, it's not his station that goes under. It's mine. And my mother's.”

“Ah-ha,” Darcie said, sitting closer beside him.

“What?”

“Then you agree, it's her station, too.”

Dylan looked away. “Well, hers in the sense that she lives there. The Stud's been her home for the last forty years. I hope it will be her home until she dies. It's my job to preserve that. For my own wife and kids, too,” he said. “Someday.”

“And you call her every night to make sure she didn't mess up?”

“I have to.”

She groaned. “I'm sure she appreciates that. Not.”

“Meaning?”

“Your mother raised a wonderful son. I'm very partial to him sometimes. But how do you think she feels when you check up on her? And imply she's a breath away from bankrupting the place she obviously loves?”

Dylan remained silent for a long moment.

“You think that's why she was screaming at me?”

Darcie rolled her eyes. “It's a strong possibility.”

He sighed, then draped an arm along the back of the sofa. His hand inched closer until he touched the nape of Darcie's neck and she shivered at the contact.

“Dylan, how can you be so dense about this? You and Deidre, for instance. She's obviously an intelligent person, independent and strong. She runs her own station right next to yours—”

He looked stubborn again. “It's her dad's station.”

“You can't believe that. Red gingham curtains, and babies, as opposed to barns and sheep dip and tractors?” She snorted. “Guy stuff, women's business? Come on.”

Dylan tried a smile but his eyes stayed serious. “Do we have to talk about this? Because I'd much rather take you to bed and make up for whatever was going on tonight at dinner.”

She rubbed her cheek against his hand but wouldn't let the subject go. “I love a man who speaks his mind—even if it's to express his outdated attitudes. Is this the way you think about Deidre?”

“That's different.”

“How, Dylan?”

He set his jaw. “Deidre's an only child. She'll inherit that station only because there's no one else.”

Good grief, it's still the nineteenth century there.
“So she runs it—successfully, I assume—by default.”

“She and her father run it. For now.”

“And he gets the deciding vote.”

Dylan's fingers stopped moving on her skin.

“I wonder if it's a good idea for a woman to go to college.”

“Oh!” Darcie leaped up from the sofa.

“Every guy I know thinks the same way.”

“You see? This is why we should have ended whatever this…this is when I left Sydney. The sex was good, but—”

“The sex
is
great. In fact, we should do it again. Right now.”

“Does that usually work for you? Manipulation?” She planted her hands on her hips and stared him down. “You're really cocky tonight.”

He raised his eyebrows. “You better believe it.”

His husky tone wouldn't sway her. Her own hormones, either, or—a quick glance at his jeans—Dylan's arousal.

“I am not crawling into bed with you after an argument.”

“Why not?” His gaze darkening, Dylan caught her hand and drew it to the hard ridge of his fly. Darcie's fingers twitched on the denim. She felt her bones melt.

“I'm not in the mood,” she lied.

“Yes you are. With me, you're always in the mood.”

He was right. Darn him. The past days had been the best of her life.

But where could this lead? He was like some throwback to the 1950s. Still… “Things are changing, Dylan. Even in your country, they are. I saw that for myself in Sydney. Are you telling me your wife's income wouldn't help Rafferty Stud?”

“I don't want my wife to work. I earn my crust—enough for both of us.”

“Oh, brother.”

And she'd thought he understood about Henry Goolong, about her job. Darcie let out a breath of defeat. Like Dylan, her father pretended not to hear what he didn't want to deal with. No way could she get deeply involved—more deeply involved—with a man just like Hank Baxter. For a terrible moment, her mother's image flashed across the screen of her closed eyelids.

Then she opened them and Dylan was staring at her, serious and determined and very, very sexy. He drew her close.

“You're right. I'm a caveman.” His eyes darkened another shade.

“I didn't say—”

“I'm also horny.” His mouth covered hers before she wiped away her grin. Their teeth clicked together, then Dylan reangled his head and took her mouth again. And this time he got it right. Oh, boy, was it right, even if he wasn't right for her.

Before she realized his intention, Dylan had swung her up into his arms.

“You'll break your back,” she warned him, enjoying his strength anyway.

“You're light as a Lamington.”

“Is that good?”

“And just as sweet. Lamington is sponge cake,” he told her. “My favorite, squares with raspberry jam, chocolate frosting, coconut…”

Her mouth watered again. For cake, for him. Dylan carried her through the apartment, down the hall, into her room. Laying Darcie on the tangled sheets, he followed her down onto the bed and began to kiss her.

“Let's get basic here. Why do you think I tucked up close to Annie in the kitchen? Teased her through dinner? I wanted to prove to you—I guess just as my mother wants to prove to me how capable she is—that it's fine to feel jealous. About Annie. Or Deidre. Or any other woman.”

“That's your point?” But of course she knew.

“And this.” Dylan dipped down to her mouth for another soul-destroying kiss. His hands roamed over her body, and her skin—that most sensitive of all organs—leaped to instant life. “Matilda, you're as primitive as I am.” She tingled everywhere. Without planning to, she raised her mouth to his again, seeking his tongue with hers. And moaned.

“Point taken.”

Dylan spooned them together in her warm, cozy bed, and outside, a siren shrieked past. The garbage truck rolled down the street, stopping every few feet to grind trash loud enough to wake the dead. The smell of the river drifted
through the cracked-open window, and the complex scent that was the subway's alone, an aroma that would always remind Darcie of New York—and this night. Still, she tried once more.

“Dylan, we're totally wrong for each other.”

“You think so.”

He half covered her with one strong leg, and that touch of crisp hair and clean male skin reinvigorated her already sensitized flesh. Dylan moved down her body, inch by area, from shoulders, collarbone, breasts, to Darcie's never-small-enough-to-suit-her waist, her bloated-at-the-moment belly, her hips.

Dylan laid his cheek against her tender abdomen. “When your stomach hurts and your breasts ache and your temper's on the rise at every little thing, don't you know, Matilda? I can help.”

His hand played through the curls between her thighs until he found her very center and Darcie gasped with pleasure.

“Dylan!”

“See? We're absolutely…right.”

In the next instant he shifted—and entered her on one long, smooth, elegant stroke. And Darcie lost all thought of wrong or right. Then or now. Man or woman. Time, place—the rattle of the garbage truck fading into the distance around the corner onto Madison…even their differences ceased to exist.

Australia. New York.

City Girl. Country Boy.

Tradition. Feminism.

For now, Darcie pressed up into his embrace, into his body, and let the joining take her. No points. Just being. Together. Oh, so tightly together that they might have been one.

He annoyed her, she irritated him, but until tomorrow their differences could wait.

Perhaps, she thought, just maybe…

Dylan Rafferty might be trainable.

“I
f I were only fifty years younger…”

Her grandmother's first reaction to Dylan didn't surprise Darcie. She'd waited on purpose to introduce them until his last night in America. Having Eden put the moves on him was not Darcie's idea of fun, and after settling the matters of Deidre and Annie and her own unexpected jealousy, she still felt a bit raw about competition. Dylan had dazzled the entire office at Wunderthings the day before although she'd kept him away from Greta. Tonight Eden sported full warpaint and a diaphanous flow of sapphire hostess lounging pajamas.

“I wouldn't put it past you, Gran, to charm his pants off—literally.”

When Dylan tipped his Akubra hat, “Pleased to meet you, ma'am,” Eden pressed one hand to her chest. The other stayed clamped in Dylan's larger grasp. “Matilda— Darcie—has told me all about you.”

Eden arched a penciled brow at her granddaughter. “I'll assume the news was good.”

“Spectacular,” he said, and winked.

With a flirtatious grin, Gran finally removed her hand
from his and stepped back out of the doorway to her duplex, motioning them inside.

The smells of pot roast and just right, oven-browned potatoes greeted Darcie, who felt her toes curl. “Ahh. You made my favorite dinner.”

“Beef,” Dylan said with an appreciative sniff. “Mine, too.”

“I thought it was lamb,” Darcie said.

He winced. “I have a tough time with that. Makes me glad I run a wool operation, not a meat business.”

Glad to hear that—in all this time she hadn't wanted to ask for fear her namesake was doomed to end up in a pot— Darcie drew him into the living room with a quick glance around for Sweet Baby Jane. She didn't want Dylan attacked, especially when he was wearing his best dark pants and a white shirt that wouldn't look good with gore on it. The coast being clear, she led him to the sofa.

“Sit. Relax. What are you drinking?” Eden asked just as the doorbell rang again. “Oh, this is fun. Here's Julio.”

Dylan grinned at Darcie. He'd heard about Gran's boyfriend, too.

In no time the two men were fast friends, talking about World Cup soccer as if they'd known each other for years. Maybe their differing accents gave them a common bond or something. In any case, Darcie was grateful. She'd envisioned a long evening of awkward conversation filled only by her stiff attempts to draw everyone out. The housewarming party was still too fresh in her mind.

No longer needed, she drifted into the kitchen.

“May I help you, Gran?”

Eden bear-hugged her, rooster-print potholders like clumsy paws on both hands. She felt oddly fragile in Darcie's embrace and Darcie frowned despite Gran's chipper tone. “It's good to have you home. And that young
man…
” She lifted her eyebrows. “If you tire of him anytime soon, while I'm still ‘available,' I can take him off your hands.”

“Don't you try. What do you mean ‘available'?”

“You'll find out later. I told you, the hat's the key. But
what's under it—all the way down—is genuinely first-class, too. That man has
genes
…and I don't mean from Levi Strauss.”

“He's not a side of beef like your pot roast.”

“Don't be too sure. Even Janet couldn't disapprove.”

“Mom won't get the chance.” Darcie's smile faded. “He's leaving tomorrow.”

She couldn't quite get used to the idea.

Eden pursed her lips, shiny mauve tonight. Still, Darcie thought her cheeks looked pale. Was Gran worried about her? “Please don't tell me you intend to let him go. You'd have beautiful children, dear. While I'm young enough to enjoy them, I hope.”

“Let's not go there—or we'll end up fighting.” Darcie took the potholders from her, then removed the roast from the oven. “You serve the drinks. I'll deal with this. Do you want gravy?”

“Would it be my pot roast without?”

“No, of course not. Silly me.” She turned off the bubbling peas on the stove.

Eden bustled about, fixing Julio's Manhattan—giving him two plump maraschino cherries—then uncapping Dylan's beer. She pushed Darcie's white wine across the counter to her and set aside her own Merlot.

“I'll be right back. Then we'll talk.”

“Gran.”

But she was already gone. Darcie mixed water and flour for the gravy. She stirred it into the drippings to thicken, found Gran's best Limoges bowl and dumped the peas in, then looked for the electric knife to slice the meat.

She did anything to help—to keep herself from thinking about Dylan's departure. Would it be better to sleep apart tonight? Accustom herself to her solitary bed again? Or should she jump him as soon as they got home and make herself some memories to rival those of her trip to Sydney?

It didn't take long to make her decision.

“Here. Let me do that.” Dylan appeared, took the knife from her and skillfully cut the pot roast. Between each slab,
he leaned over to kiss her. The kisses got longer and hotter until Darcie heard herself gasping.

“Save yourself,” she managed. “I have plans for you later.”

“I hope they're the same plans I have for you.”

She was about to agree when pain shot through her ankle. Darcie yelped—and glanced down to see Sweet Baby Jane, her sharp teeth piercing Darcie's skin. Bending, Dylan gently pried the cat away and scooped her up.

“Moving to my own apartment was the best decision. The word
kill
crosses my mind,” Darcie murmured.

“This little sweetheart? She barely broke the skin.” He held Jane up at face level, and Darcie waited for the beast to take out an eye, but Jane only purred, then settled against his chest. “See?” Dylan said. “She probably bit you because she was afraid you'd step on her. You have to know how to treat her.”

Darcie remained skeptical. “Oh, sure. Was that the problem?”

Slipping Jane an end of pot roast, Dylan set her on the floor. With a devoted SBJ following, leaving Darcie speechless, he carried the platter into the dining room where Gran's table was set with her Haviland china and Waterford crystal and the heirloom Irish lace cloth she'd inherited from her own grandmother.
If I spill gravy on that,
Darcie told herself,
I'll die right here.

Maybe that would save her another attack by Sweet Baby Jane—or dying tomorrow morning when Dylan left.

To keep from falling into a depression, she ate too much. Why not? She was hungry and after tonight, she wouldn't have a man to look good for. “As if I need to define myself through Dylan, or anyone else,” Darcie reminded herself. Then another glass of Chardonnay seemed wise to wash everything down, and drown her growing misery. Thank heaven the conversation proved lively. By the time dessert rolled around, Darcie felt like a roly-poly clown from FAO Schwarz. A dizzy one.

How could she alternately enjoy an evening, and pray for it to end?

“I have the important news to announce,” Julio said in his careful English before Darcie dug into her coconut cream pie. “Attention, all of us.” He rapped his fork against his glass and the antique crystal chimed. Darcie's ears rang.

“Julio,” Gran scolded gently but he didn't seem to hear.

He cleared his throat, the Waterford still ringing. “Señora Eden is to become—”

“His fiancée,” Gran supplied, her pale cheeks suddenly flushed with color.

Dylan was the first to recover. “Beaut,” he said.

“I—I—” Darcie tried twice but nothing else came out.

Eden's expression fell. “You're not pleased, dear?”

“Well, I—” Her eighty-two-year-old grandmother, a bride again? With a groom half her age? Not that it should matter…

Dylan's arm came around her shoulders. “Matilda's just surprised. It's good news. Isn't it, darling?” He squeezed her, prompting a response.

“It's—wonderful. Yes.” Somehow, she found herself standing. On stiff legs, she moved to her grandmother's chair and leaned down to kiss her. When she clasped Eden's hands, they felt chilled. “Best wishes, Gran. I love you.”

“You're not shocked?”

“Well. Only a little. I wasn't expecting this, that's all.”

“Your mother and father will be mortified.”

“That's their problem.” Darcie turned to shake Julio's hand, then Dylan clapped him close in one of those male hugs that always looked embarrassing to both men, not to mention bone-breaking. Dylan's embrace all but smothered the smaller Julio.

“Good going, mate.” He pronounced it
might.
“So you're set on a bit of Trouble and Strife,” Dylan added with a smile. “That's Aussie slang for wife. Congratulations.”

To Darcie the last sounded like a question. Many of his statements did, but to her the uncertainty fit the occasion.

“This calls for a celebration.” Eden rose from the table.
Her cheeks had lost their brief high color, and Darcie again thought she looked ashen. Did she fear Darcie's opposition—like Janet's? It didn't seem like Eden. “Let me get the champagne.”

“No, I will. You sit down, Gran.”

Avoiding the snap of SBJ's teeth on her way past, back in the kitchen, buying herself time, Darcie hauled champagne flutes from the upper cabinet. Juggling four glasses and a cold bottle of Piper Heidsieck, she hurried to the dining room, her heart still pounding.

She and Eden had been buds—of very different ages, but still fast friends.

She would be the first of Darcie's friends to be married except for Claire. Darcie didn't count cousins. Was it jealousy she felt now? Again? On the very night before Dylan left?

“Stiff upper lip,” she ordered herself.

Because part of her wanted to feel joy for Eden. Julio, too.

The rest of her wanted to bawl.

A remaining scrap or two wanted to slap herself.

“Selfish,” she mumbled. She'd be losing a friend in some ways—but gaining a new…what? Stepgrandfather? At forty-something, small and dark, unlike her real grandfather who'd been big like Dylan, Julio didn't suit the role. He would come between her and Gran now, even if he didn't mean to. He already had.

With their rift over Julio and the apartment nearly healed, now this.

Darcie struggled with the champagne cork until Dylan covered her hand, and she gave him a blind smile of appeal.
Help me.

“You just want an excuse for another kiss,” she murmured.

“Good idea.” Picking up his cue, he bent to her mouth then kissed each of Darcie's cheeks, blotting up twin tears that had escaped. The cork popped and bubbles flowed down the bottle's side.

She swallowed. “I propose a toast.” Seeing nothing in
front of her, Darcie managed to pour the wine into four glasses.
Rise to the occasion.
“To Gran—Eden Marie Baxter—and Julio—” She didn't know his middle name and stumbled over the words.

He said, “Martin Perez.”

“—and Julio Martin Perez…long life, and happiness.”

“Thank you, dear.” Eden raised her flute to her mauve-painted lips. She pressed her free hand to her throat and her cheeks went virginal white. “With your blessing, we're going to be married.”

Then she slipped, unconscious, to the floor.

 

“Too much excitement,” Darcie told Dylan. “That's all it was.” They had just returned from the hospital where Gran was “resting comfortably,” as the saying went.

“I'm sure her other tests tomorrow will be negative, too,” Dylan agreed, “like her EKG was normal.”

“She was just too excited over her engagement to Julio. And wasn't he wonderful with her in the E.R.? I do feel better,” she said. “They're going to be happy together. I know he'll take care of her.”

Dylan pulled her close as soon as she shut her apartment door. “Since you mention excitement…” In the darkened entryway he nuzzled her neck, then kissed her, his hands snaking up under her sweater to cup her breasts.

“You didn't have to delay your trip home,” she said with a small moan. “You have the Stud to run, all those decisions…”

“My decision was to stay right here. Until Eden's home, you need someone to lean on.” When she opened her mouth, he covered her lips with one finger. “No arguments, Matilda. There's no shame in needing someone…”

Darcie blinked. She'd done a lot of that during the evening. In the hospital waiting room she'd paced and worried and shed a few tears for her grandmother's well-being. She couldn't imagine Eden being seriously ill. She was one of the strongest women Darcie had ever known. It was Janet who took to her bed with the slightest cold. Eden bull-
dozed her way through without complaint, but if her heart no longer worked right…

“She's had angina for years. I don't know what I'd do without her,” she murmured. “Without you.”

“Fortunately, you won't need to face either one tomorrow.”

He walked her into the bedroom, and Darcie didn't think of refusing him. She had promised Dylan a last night he wouldn't forget, promised herself the same. How could she renege on that promise, even if he wasn't leaving yet?

Exhausted from tension, still worried about Eden, she slipped off her shoes, then her skirt and sweater.

“You're a pretty good guy to have around. Thanks for tonight.”

Dylan came up behind her. She felt his bare chest against her spine. Bending his head, he kissed first her left shoulder then the right.

“Don't thank me yet. I haven't started.”

“I thought that's what foreplay is all about.” She shivered when his lips grazed the nape of her neck, a sensitive spot Darcie hadn't noticed until she met Dylan.

“You call this foreplay?” His smile tickled her neck. “I feel like a man on death row who just got the governor's order of clemency. Two minutes before the warden threw the switch.”