Too Close To The Fire/Too Hot To Handle (Montana Men 3) (22 page)

Lacey
smiled through her tears. “It’s kind of bruised and battered, not worth much,
but if you want it, it’s yours.”

“I
want it,” he said, sounding so serious, she wondered if she loved him back
enough.

Rafe
relaxed. He didn’t think he’d ever felt so content. The constant ache that had
consumed his body for months was gone. “ I’ve always loved you, Lace.”

But
she was already asleep, her soft breath kissing his chest. He closed his eyes
content that she was at long last in his arms, exactly where she belonged, and
was going to stay. He wasn‘t giving her up. Ever.

Daylight
filtered through the window, pale, milky rays, when he woke her. He coaxed her
fully awake with long drugging kisses. He bit her throat gently, suckled the flesh,
then soothed the bruised skin with tender kisses.

Lacey
gasped, coming fully awake. Rafe suckled hard on her throat, before gingerly releasing
it. She rubbed the achy spot where his lips had just been. “Rafe,” she
whispered. “You shouldn’t have—”

“Yes, I should
have,” he said. “I don’t care. You belong to me. I don’t care who knows.
Besides, look at your breasts, sweetheart. Your belly. Your thighs. Arms. My
marks of possession are all over you. I don’t want to hide my love for you.”

He
trailed a chain of soft kisses and caresses over her breasts, stopped to suckle
her tender nipples and left more love bites in his wake. Her stomach carried
the dark reddish bruises he’d added to the ones already there. He eyed his handiwork
and grinned. “I like my marks of ownership on you. It shows you’re well loved.”
Gently, he nudged her thighs apart and grinned. “Good morning, little kitty,”
he said with a hungry growl, then buried his face between her legs.

Giggling,
Lacey quickly moaned when he licked her clit, parted her slick lips and pushed
his tongue inside her. She sighed and savored the dance of his tongue stroking
her like whips of electricity.

Rafe
grinned, eased back and guided his cock inside her. When she clasped her inner
muscles around his thick cock, she moaned her pleasure. He erupted inside her
at the same moment.

Lacey
cried his name and brought his mouth to hers. Rafe melted with the hard release
that shook his body. Reluctantly, he pulled out of her and tugged her tightly
against his chest. His arms spread around her, and he held her close. “I have
to leave soon, Lace,” he whispered. “Come to Texas with me. Don’t stay here.”

Lacey
searched his face. He saw it in her eyes. She wouldn’t do what he asked. “I
can’t just leave, Rafe. I have responsibilities. I have a son.”

“I
want you in my life, sweetheart, both of you. I don’t want to leave you behind.
For me, this is it. You’re the one I want to spend the rest of my life with. Go
to Texas with me. Marry me. Will you marry me?”

“Rafe,”
she whispered, tears filling her eyes. “Rafe…”

Chapter Eleven

I
can be changed by what happens to me, but I refuse to be reduced by it.

~Maya
Angelou

Rimrock, Montana

Backside of the Davis Property

February 7, Saturday

4:00 a.m.

“Rafe.
Rafe!”
Lacey Blackstone opened her
eyes and slowly escaped the nightmare world of smothering darkness and pain
she’d been held prisoner in for hours. Panic surrounded her, closing in, more
suffocating than the blackness crowding her mind.

Dear
God, she’d cried out the wrong man’s name. Hadn’t she?

Wrong
man?

She
frowned. Yes. Her first thoughts should have been of her husband. Danger. She
needed Danger. Where was he? Why didn’t he come? Lacey blinked, trying to
gather the splintered pieces of her memory. Everything was such a jumble. It
hurt to think, to breathe, to move.

Husband?
No. No. That wasn’t right. She
didn’t have a husband, didn’t have a home. She’d lost both to another woman. To
Karen.

Lacey
lay there in the cold, trying to solve the puzzle of what had happened to her.
She shivered. The cold bit so deep into her flesh, like all her blood had
turned to ice. Why was she this cold? Nothing made sense. She couldn’t think.
Where was she? A cold, dark place, that’s where she was, so it wasn’t hell. Was
it?

She
blinked. At last, the rubble around her began to take shape. Life was strange.
Somehow she was changed. Like a derailed train, somewhere, she’d run off the
tracks and crashed. Lacey marveled at just how much of a mangled wreck her life
had become

After
Rafe left in December, she’d tortured herself with the guilt she felt at
sleeping with him. At the time, it had seemed right, felt right, but when she
was alone, her thoughts and emotions turned into a jumbled mess. The one
thought that kept eating at her—she’d betrayed Danger. She’d broken her wedding
vows. She’d been ready to get down on her knees, confess, and beg his
forgiveness.

And
all along, he’d been sleeping with Karen.

The
truth slammed into her, scorching her soul. Danger was no longer her husband,
no longer the
right
man. His choice.
After three years of marriage, he wanted a divorce, and it had nothing to do
with the fact she’d slept with Rafe.

She’d
granted Danger what he wanted. There had been little choice. She couldn’t
revive what had died, no more than she could live with a man who didn’t love
her. She signed the divorce papers and tried not to look back on everything
they’d lost.

After
he told her he was in love with another woman, there hadn’t been much starch
left in her, certainly not enough to fight for him. She couldn’t fight for a
man who had no trust or faith in her, a man who believed lies over her truth.
He’d made it plain he detested her. He’d made it plain he didn’t give a shit
she’d slept with Rafe.

Everything
inside her curled up and died.

The
only sure thing she knew anymore was that Rafe wasn’t the wrong man. Not for
her. He loved her. Wanted her. More, he needed her. That was a whole hell of a
lot more feelings than she could say her husband felt for her. The sad thing
was, her basic yearning to be loved, her desire to be held, and her need for
Rafe had all contributed to the destruction of her marriage.

Consumed
with guilt, she couldn’t shake the feelings of responsibility for the breakup
of her marriage. The fact she’d broken her wedding vows haunted her, ripped at
her soul. She alone had failed to make Danger happy, failed to satisfy him.
Shame ate at her. It swallowed her whole. Her failure. She’d failed her husband
in every possible way a woman could fail—sexually, as a wife, as the mother of
his son.

Bleakness
settled around her. Yes. Her failures. Rafe wanted to marry her. A failure. Why
would he want to marry her when she obviously couldn’t make a marriage work,
couldn’t make a man happy, and couldn’t keep him satisfied in bed so he
wouldn’t cheat on her?

She’d
failed. There must be something lacking in her or Danger would never have
stopped loving her, never turned to another woman.

Failed.
She deserved everything Smitt Davis did to her. God had sought his punishment
for her sins. She’d die here, cold, naked, and alone. In her mind, justice was
served. A tear escaped the corner of her right eye and slid into the hair above
her ear.

Lacey
closed her eyes and shivered. The icy fingers of death crawled over her skin
and burrowed deep. They plucked at the very marrow frozen deep in her bones,
scraping and scraping until the will to live slowly drained out of her. Let
death come. Let it take her. She didn’t mind paying the ultimate price for what
she’d done. She welcomed the ethereal visitor.

Curling
into a tight fetal ball, Lacey let her tears fall unheeded. Cold. So cold. Her
blood felt as if it had turned to slush. Joseph’s sweet and trusting face swam
before her eyes. His eyes, the pewter gray of his father’s. His frightened cries
as Smitt tortured her.

The
baby, the innocent child Rafe and she had created, ripped from her womb. Her
body shook with sobs. “Mommy’s sorry, babies. I didn’t protect you, either of
you. I’m sorry.”

Her
son. Her baby. Both lost to her forever. She didn’t know how she knew it, but in
her heart, she realized Joseph was gone. Smitt Davis had beaten him mercilessly.
She hadn’t been able to lift a finger to save either of her children.

Yeah,
she deserved to die.

She
didn’t want to live.

She’d
failed her husband, failed her babies.

Lacey
clenched her fists. It slowly dawned on her that something was cutting the
flesh of her right palm. Puzzled, she opened her hand. A heart-shaped necklace.
Diamonds, rubies, and sapphires. Rafe’s Christmas gift to her. Lacey curled her
fingers around the heart. It was the only thing she had left to connect her to
the man she loved.

“Rafe,”
she whispered. “I’m sorry I let you down.”

An
icy chill seeped deeper into her skin.

Would
she ever feel warm again? No. She didn’t think so.

A
silent scream filled her heart. Let death take her, because she knew her soul
would never feel whole, warm or alive again.

Faint mewling cries
reached her ears. It reminded her of a tiny kitten, lost, alone, and forsaken.
It took her a moment to realize she was making the faint noises. Oh, God. She
hurt. Everywhere sharp pain stabbed her bruised and battered body like a
battering ram. Her breasts throbbed. So did her nipples. The two bullet wounds
burned as if someone had jabbed a red hot poker into her flesh. Her stomach felt
as if it had been ripped wide apart.

Lower
down, her feminine sheath ached. Bled.

Lacey
coughed. Her mouth filled with blood and clotted particles that coated the back
of her throat and mouth, choked her. She coughed again, spraying dark red
droplets in several directions. Pain clouded her mind. She couldn’t remember
everything Smitt did to her, but she didn’t think he’d sexually assaulted her,
not with his body. So why did she ache there as if she’d been penetrated over
and over again?

Memory
crawled back inside her head of those terrible hours Smitt tortured her. She
shuddered. He’d done things to her. Terrible things, things she never wanted to
remember. She didn’t know what he’d used, but he’d invaded her body repeatedly
with it.

Tears
slid down her face, ice cold tears that felt like a frozen river. Smitt loved
inflicting pain. He savored it. His pig-like eyes had glittered with malice
each time he ejaculated on her. His squeals of satisfaction at causing her pain
were a sound that haunted her and would disturb her for the rest of her days. Lacey
shivered and tried to turn her thoughts away from the memory of that monster
standing over her, his semen spurting onto her breasts.

She
thought of Rafe, and the way his body warmed hers, his sweet, warm kisses, his
touch, so gentle and possessive. He was her only hope. God knew Danger wouldn’t
waste his precious time searching for her. He didn’t love her anymore.

Lacey
bit her lower lip to keep from crying out with pain a simple movement caused
her. Looking back, she realized she should have told Rafe about their baby. She
should have answered his phone calls, told him they’d made a baby that night.
The opportunity to share the news with him had come and gone. Too late. Too
late to change anything, too late to pick up the phone and hear his voice, tell
him she was pregnant with his child, tell him she loved him, and she was coming
to him, if he’d still have her.

Lacey
drew her legs up tighter and shivered. The cold closed around her like an icy
crypt. She drifted in and out of consciousness, awakening each time to a world
that became more and more surreal. When she opened her eyes, the walls spun
around her. The cold, wet snow cushioned her like a warm featherbed. She
smiled. Ah-ha. She didn’t feel the cold anymore. Warmth kissed her face. Her
body floated weightlessly. Floated. Was she really drifting on a bed of Heaven’s
fleece-lined clouds?

When
she was awake, she couldn’t keep her thoughts in any kind of order. Her mind
wandered. The one thing she was certain of was that her life had irrefutably
changed. She was changed. She’d traveled a winding, up and downhill path she’d
never expected to travel. The carefree, feisty Southern woman she’d been had
died, replaced with a stranger she hardly recognized, a stranger who’d slept
with another man one night, a single night, and conceived that man’s child.

“I
want to go home,” she whispered. “I want my life back. My children. Please,
God. I want to go home.”

Why
she’d thought, believed, she might work things out with Danger when she carried
proof of her infidelity was beyond her. Still, they had a son. She couldn’t
bring herself not to try and hold their marriage together.

She
should have left the moment she discovered she was pregnant. Hell, she should
have left the moment she let Rafe touch her. She should have gone with him to
Texas. Yes, she should have packed her and Joseph’s clothes and joined Rafe on
his ranch. After Christmas, the weeks crawled by. Danger had even less to do
with Joseph, just like he had less and less to do with her.

Why
had she stayed?

What
had she been thinking? That was the problem. She hadn’t been thinking. She
hadn’t been thinking when she let Rafe make love to her. And damn, she should
have told him she wasn’t on the pill, but the thought never crossed her mind.

There
had been too many other things crashing around her. The chance of becoming
pregnant simply hadn’t been at the top of her mind as something to worry about—not
until Rafe brought it up. She’d never forget the look on his face when the
possibility of a child came up in their conversation.

* * * *

Blackstone Ranch

December 26, Friday

10:00 a.m.

Mid-morning
arrived much too fast. Rafe served her breakfast in bed, and after she ate, he
dribbled honey across her breasts and made a long, slow feast of them. He
explored and tasted every inch of her body until she quivered with need.

Rafe
spent hours the night before simply tracing his fingers over her skin. He was
always touching her. It seemed to her the minute he stroked his fingertips
along her skin, need exploded inside her. Her body jolted in response. She
didn’t know her own skin anymore, her own body.

To
say Rafe was a good lover would have greatly shortchanged him. He made certain
each time he entered her body, she was ready for him. He was just as
considerate about her pleasure before he withdrew. She marveled at his
determination to discover every single freckle she possessed by exploring her
body thoroughly.

He’d
discovered the tiny mole below her right ear and kissed it over and over. He’d
found the raspberry-colored birthmark on her forearm and licked it like it was
an ice-cream cone. He’d rooted his way between her thighs and made a meal of
her aching channel, stabbing the tender depths with his tongue until she
writhed beneath him and moaned her orgasms.

While
she showered, he cleaned the mess in the kitchen, then joked with her, telling
her he’d washed the turkey and put it back in the refrigerator.

It
was almost time for her to take him to the airport. She hadn’t given any thought
to how she’d feel the morning after or when the time came for him to leave.
Certainly she hadn’t expected this numbness crawling inside her, this sense of
loss. She had a terrible feeling that once Rafe left her sight, whatever
normalcy was left in her life would simply turn to dust, or that she might
never see him again.

How
had he suddenly become her entire world? When?

When
had her skin become so attuned to his touch, to the point she needed to feel
his fingers on her? She didn’t know when she’d become so dependent on him or so
needy. Lacey sat on the foot of the bed and watched him stuff another shirt
inside the duffle. The room smelled like sex, hot, musky sex. And why not? For
sure, Rafe hadn’t let her sleep much. He was a dynamo when it came to making
love to her.

He
turned in time to see her wince when she shifted her weight.

Rafe
hunkered down in front of her, clasped her hands, and searched her face.
“Sore?” he asked, brushing her hair aside with a tender touch.

“Mmm,
yes. You have a bit of a manly package and the will to use it numerous times.”

He
laughed, a pleased sound that came from the back of his throat. “Trust me when
I say I’ve never stayed so hard, so randy, in all my life. I didn’t think
Junior was ever going to be happy and settle down.”