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Moonlight pearled the darkness. If she’d had company, it might have been romantic. As it was, though, she felt sad and tired and frustrated all at once.
“If he doesn’t care, why is he working so hard to shut me out?” she asked the empty room and her voice sounded overly loud in the quiet. Hugging the pillow a little tighter to her middle, she told herself that if he didn’t care about her or their baby, he wouldn’t have so much trouble being around her.
“And if that doesn’t sound backward I don’t know what does.” But it made an odd kind of sense, too. He was throwing himself on a proverbial sword by avoiding her. Making sacrifices she didn’t want for a reason he wouldn’t share.
So how was she supposed to fight it?
The week she’d spent with him now seemed like a dream. Even that last morning in her hotel room had taken on the soft edges of a fantasy rather than the warm, loving reality she remembered.
“I should go,” Jack said, bending his head to take her mouth in a kiss that was filled with a hunger that never seemed to ebb.
“Not yet.” Rita cupped his cheek in her palm and looked into those amazing blue eyes, trying to etch everything she read there into her memory. “Stay. Just for a while.”
He smiled and threaded his fingers through her hair. Rita closed her eyes briefly to completely savor the sensation of his hands on her. She’d never known a week to fly by so quickly. She’d thought only to take a week at the beach. A little vacation to clear her head after the Christmas holiday rush at the bakery back home.
But she’d found so much more than she’d ever expected. A man who made her laugh, made her sigh and made her body sing in a way she’d never known before. They’d spent every waking moment together in the last few days and even asleep, they were locked together as if somehow afraid of being separated.
And now, they would be.
Her heart was breaking at goodbye. But her flight home was that night and Jack would be leaving himself first thing in the morning. Their time was up. But what did that mean for the future?
“My enlistment’s nearly up,” he was saying and she told herself to concentrate on the low rumble of his voice. “This time, I’m not going to re-up. I’m getting out.”
She ran her hand over his chest, loving the feel of those sharply defined muscles beneath soft, golden-brown skin. “What’s that mean for us?”
He slid one hand up the length of her body to cup her breast, his thumb and forefinger tugging on her hardened nipple. Electricity zipped through her entire body and set up a humming expectation at the very core of her. One touch from this man and she was a puddle of goo at his feet.
“It means I can come up to Utah as soon as I get home.”
“Good,” she said on a sigh. “That’s very good.”
“And we’ll pick this up,” he said, “right where we left off.”
“Even better,” she said and got a smile from him. “Please be careful, Jack.”
She could have bitten her own tongue off. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t cry. Wouldn’t worry him. Wouldn’t put her own worries onto his shoulders.
“I will be,” he promised. “Always am. But this time, I’ve got even more reason for making it home in one piece.”
He was smiling as he said it, but fear nearly choked her. Rita reached up, wrapped her arms around his neck and held on, as if somehow if she held him tightly enough, she could keep him safe. Keep him from going. From leaving her. Tears stung the backs of her eyes, but she blinked like a crazy person, to keep them at bay.
She didn’t want to let him see her cry.
“Hey,” he soothed, rubbing his hand up and down her arm for comfort. “I’ll be okay. I swear it.”
She nodded into his chest, but kept her face buried against him so he wouldn’t read her fear on her face.
“Rita,” he said, and gently moved her head back so he could look down into her eyes. “I swear to you. I’ll be back. And I’ll come to you.”
“You’d better,” she quipped, trying to take the pain out of goodbye. “I have two older brothers who will beat you up if I ask them to.”
“Well, now I’m scared.” He grinned, kissed her again, running his tongue over her lips until she parted them, sighing at the invasion of her mouth. When he had her completely stirred up, he pulled back again. “I never thought to find someone like you, Rita. Trust me when I say I don’t want to lose you.”
“I’m glad. I don’t want to lose you, either, Jack.”
“You won’t.”
Late-afternoon sunlight spilled into the room and bathed the two of them in a golden haze. A soft, cool breeze ruffled the curtains hanging at the partially opened window.
Letting his gaze sweep up and down her body, he finally met her eyes again and whispered, “You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me, Rita. Never forget that.”
Oh, God. That sounded too final and she couldn’t accept that. He had to come home. To her. So she smiled and fought for courage.
“Don’t you forget it, either,” she said.
“Not a chance.”
He kissed her again and she knew it was goodbye. He had to leave. See his family before shipping out in the morning. And she had a flight to Utah to catch.
When he slid off the bed and grabbed his jeans, she sat up, dragging the coverlet up to cover her breasts. Pushing her hair back out of her eyes, she watched him dress and her mouth went dry.
“You’ll write to me,” she said, not a question.
“I will.” He patted the pocket of his shirt. “I’ve got your address and you’ll have mine as soon as you get a letter from me. I’d give it to you now, but I can’t be sure it won’t change. Hell, I’m not even sure my email address will be the same.”
“Doesn’t matter.” She shook her head, went up on her knees and reached for him. He held her close and she locked her arms around his waist, resting her head on his chest. She heard the steady beat of his heart and prayed it would remain safe and steady until she was with him again. “Just write to me, Jack. And let me know you’re safe.”
He tipped her chin up with the tips of his fingers. “And when I’m coming home.”
“That, too.” He kissed her again, looked long and deep into her eyes, then turned for the door. At the threshold, he paused, turned back and sighed. “You take my breath away.”
She covered her mouth with one hand and knew she would soon lose the battle with her tears. “Be safe, Jack. And come home to me.”
He gave her a sharp nod, then turned and left, the door closing quietly behind him. Alone, Rita walked to the window, the coverlet a toga of sorts, around her naked body. She pulled the edges of the curtains back, looked down into the parking lot and saw him, taking long, sure strides toward his black Jeep.
As if he could sense her watching him, he turned, looked up at her and simply held her gaze for several long seconds. Then he got in the car and drove away.
But he never wrote. He never came to her. If she hadn’t moved to Long Beach to feel closer to a memory, she might never have known he was even alive. Was that Fate blessing them? Or cursing them?
“Down! Get down!”
Startled at the muffled shout, Rita jumped to her feet and whipped her head around to stare at the darkened hall leading to Jack’s bedroom. Starting down the hall, the wood floor was cold against her bare feet. With every step she took, his voice came louder, more desperate.
She ran, following his shouts, his pain.
Her heart.
Seven
Jack shouted himself awake, jolted upright in bed and struggled to breathe. The dream—nightmare—still held him in a tightfisted grip and he had to force himself to look around the moonlit room to orient himself. He was home, yet his heart still raced and his mouth and throat were dry. A black duvet pooled in his lap, his bare chest was covered in sweat and his gaze was wild. He scrubbed one hand across his face, rubbing his eyes as if he could wipe away the fear raised by the images still stamped in his mind.
“Jack? Jack, are you okay?” Rita hurried into the room.
“I’m fine,” he muttered thickly, jumping out of bed. Perfect. Just perfect. He’d woken her up and now she’d stare at him with either pity or fear and he didn’t think he could take either.
He wore loosely tied cotton pants that dipped low on his hips and he was grateful he’d decided not to sleep naked since she’d moved in. Damn it. Jack needed a little time to get a grip. To shove those memories back into the dark corner of his mind where they were usually locked away. He needed to be clearheaded when he talked to Rita. Jack just didn’t see that happening anytime soon.
He pushed one hand through his hair and looked at her as if she were a mirage. Jack had pulled himself out of a hot, dusty dream where the sound of explosions and gunfire still echoed in the stillness around him. Seeing her here, in the dark moon-washed confines of his bedroom, a world away from the scene that still haunted him, was almost too much to compute. “Sorry I woke you. Just...go back to sleep.”
He turned his back on her, hoping to hell she’d leave, and walked out onto the terrace, welcoming the brisk slap of wind. Sea spray scented the air that he dragged into his lungs, to replace the dry dustiness that felt as though it was coating him in more than memories.
“Jack?”
Damn.
She’d followed him onto the terrace and the touch of her hand against his bare back had him flinching. Every nerve in his body was firing, on alert.
“What is it?” She stood right behind him, her voice soft, low, soothing. “Talk to me.”
He whipped his head around to glare at her. “I don’t want to talk. That should be clear. Just leave me alone, Rita. You don’t want to be with me right now.”
“Yeah,” she insisted and didn’t look the least bit cowed. “I do. Or I wouldn’t be here.”
Gritting his teeth, Jack ground out tightly, “I’m on the ragged edge here, Rita. I need some space.”
“No, you don’t.”
He choked out a harsh laugh. “Is that right? And you’re an expert on me, is that it?”
“Enough to know that you’ve had enough space,” she countered, stepping in closer. “Too much, maybe. Everyone backs off when you tell them to, but I won’t. I’m here, Jack, and I’m not going anywhere. You can’t use a nasty tone and a miserable attitude to shake me off. Talk to me.”
His skin was buzzing, his mind racing and his heartbeat was still at a fast gallop. Jack had come out of that damn dream ready to fight, but there was no enemy to face. He needed to move. To fight. To do something, to expel the ghosts gathered around him, shrieking for his attention.
“Damn it, Jack,” Rita said, tugging at his forearm until he turned to face her again. Her whiskey eyes were hot, burning with passion and fury and he wasn’t sure which had top billing.
“I’m not deaf or blind,” she said. “I heard you shouting. I stepped into your room in time to see you bolt up in bed as if the hounds of hell were after you.”
She’d hit that one on the head. Scraping one hand over his face, he muttered, “They were.”
“Then tell me.” She held on to him, the heat of her touch sliding into his arm, moving through his bloodstream. “Let me in, damn it. What does it cost you to open the door just a crack?”
He speared her with a hard look. There was no pity, no fear in her eyes. Only concern and curiosity and maybe that was worse in some ways.
“You think it’s me I’m worried about?” He grabbed her shoulders, giving her a little shake for emphasis. “It’s you I’m thinking about here. I’m trying to save you, don’t you get it?”
“Save me? From what?”
“God, you won’t let this go,” he muttered thickly.
“Not a chance.”
He stared into her eyes. “Fine. I’m trying to save you from me. Okay? I don’t even trust myself around you right now.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
There was a response he hadn’t expected.
“You’re not trying to injure me in some way, Jack,” she pointed out, her voice a little louder, her eyes a little more fiery. “You’ve done your best to simply avoid me at all costs.”
“There’s a reason—”
“Did I ask you to save me?” she interrupted, breaking free of his grip. The cold ocean air lifted her hair into a cloud of dark curls around her head and with the flash in her eyes, she looked like a pagan goddess. Even the nightgown she wore that was hot-pink with the image of a cupcake on it and the words SWEET THING scrawled across the top couldn’t diminish her. No, not a goddess, he corrected. Instead, she looked like a short, Italian Valkyrie. She was furious and her eyes were shot with sparks.
She poked her index finger into the center of his chest. “I’m a big girl. I save myself when I need it. I don’t need a knight in shining armor, Jack.” She shoved her hair out of her eyes impatiently. “What I need is for my husband to tell me what’s tearing at him.”
“You would have made a great warrior, Rita,” he said softly, gaze raking her up and down, from her bare toes with their purple-polished nails up to the eyes that were so incensed he was surprised she wasn’t actually shooting flames from them. “You are a Fury, aren’t you? Not afraid of anything.”
“Not afraid of you, anyway,” she said, whipping her head back to shake her hair free of her eyes.
How the hell was a man supposed to win an argument with a woman like this? How was he supposed to ignore her, ignore what she made him feel?
“Maybe you should be,” he said, pulling her in close with one quick move. “And if I were a better man, I’d tell you to leave. Now. But I’m not—so if you want to run, now’s your chance.”
She reached up, cupped his face in her palms and demanded, “Does it look like I’m going anywhere?”
“No. Thank God.” He bent his head, and took her mouth in a kiss that was filled with the hunger and desperation he’d felt since she reentered his life.
With the dregs of the nightmare still clinging to him, Jack held her tighter, his hands running up and down her back and down to her bottom. He pulled her against his rock-hard body and she wriggled closer in appreciation. Expectation. His blood ran hot and fast, his heartbeat raced and his mind was fogged by the want choking him. Need was alive and shouting inside him.
The cold ocean wind wrapped itself around them, but he didn’t feel it. Nothing could vanquish the internal heat. One hand cupped the back of her head and held her still so he could completely claim her mouth. His tongue tangled with hers and her eager response fed the flames licking at his soul.
There was no time for romance, seduction. He needed to be with her. In her. Over her. Tearing his mouth from hers, he looked down into her now-glassy eyes and fought to breathe.
“What’re you doing?” she managed to ask breathlessly. “Why are you stopping?”
“Not stopping. Changing location.” He bent down, scooped her up and carried her back through the French doors and into his bedroom. Moonlight followed them, the wind rushed in behind them and none of that mattered. He laid her down on the mattress and, in one deft move, stripped her nightgown off, leaving her naked—just as he wanted her. She scooted back farther on the mattress and reached for him. Jack didn’t keep her waiting. He yanked off the sleep pants he was wearing and joined her on the bed an instant later. His hands moved over her, exploring every curve. Every line.
He remembered this so well. Had tormented himself over the last few months, by recalling the feel of her skin, the lush fullness of her breasts and the taut, dark nipples that he loved to suckle.
And now, because of the baby, she was so much more than she had been. She was ripe, delectable and more alluring than ever. Even as he thought it, though, both of her hands went to the mound of her belly as if to hide it from him. He drew her hands away and said, “Don’t. You’re beautiful.”
She laughed. “I’m huge.”
He shook his head. “No. Curvy. Delicious. Amazing.”
She sighed a little. “Wow. When you try, you really know the right things to say.”
He grinned, bent his head and indulged himself in what he’d wanted to do for weeks now. He took one nipple into his mouth and savored the taste of her. Her scent invaded him, the soft sighs and moans sliding from her throat enflamed him. He ran his tongue and teeth across the tip of her nipple and then suckled, drawing her very essence into himself.
She planted her feet on the mattress and lifted her hips. “Touch me, Jack. Touch me.”
He did. Sweeping one hand down the length of her body, he cupped her center and used his thumb to brush across her most sensitive spot. She jerked beneath him and he smiled against her breast, relishing her reaction. He suckled harder, and then lifted his head to switch to her other breast and she went crazy in his arms. As if the need that had been building between them for weeks had finally reached a breaking point for both of them, she rocked her hips into his hand.
He pushed two fingers into her heat and groaned himself at the slick, tight feel of her. It had been too long. His body was ready to explode and so was hers. He couldn’t wait another minute to be inside her, to feel her body surrounding his.
Lifting his head, he looked down at her then kissed her briefly. “At least we don’t need a condom now.”
“Points for us,” she said, swallowing hard, breath coming in short, hard gasps. “Damn it, Jack, don’t drag this out. I need you inside me.”
“Just what I need, too,” he said, and shifted position to kneel between her thighs. He spread her legs wide and looked down at her. She was wanton, wild and everything he’d ever wanted in a woman. And for this one moment at least, she was his again—as she was always meant to be.
His mind whispered that this was temporary. That this marriage wasn’t real and he was nobody’s idea of husband material anyway. But he shut that nagging voice down and surrendered to the mating call trumpeting through his body.
He ran his hands over her hot, slick center, watching her twist and writhe in her own desperate need.
Her response pushed his own desires beyond what he could bear. Body throbbing, heart galloping, he leaned over her and pushed himself inside her. That first, glorious slide filled him with the kind of ease he hadn’t known in months. This was what had been missing in his life. This sense of rightness that claimed him when their bodies were joined.
She hooked her legs at his hips and pulled him in tighter, deeper. Tipping her head back into the mattress, she bit her lip and moved with him. Their bodies meshed, linked in the most intimate way possible, he felt the pounding of her heart. Saw the flash in her eyes, heard her gasping breaths and experienced her body quaking, quivering as he pushed her higher, faster than they’d ever gone before.
Her nails scored his back as he rocked in and out of her body, setting a rhythm she raced to meet. “Jack! Jack!”
“Come on, Rita,” He urged, barely able to frame the words as his breath sawed in and out of his lungs. “Go over. Go over so I can follow.”
She clung to him and shouted his name when the first tremors took her. He felt her body tighten around his in spasms of delight and when she’d reached her peak, Jack let go and found the peace that had been denied him for months.
* * *
Rita took some deep breaths and tried to ease the frantic beat of her heart at the same time. It had been six long months since he’d touched her like that. Time in which she’d almost convinced herself that her memory was making what they shared much better than it actually had been. Well, she told herself, that theory was just shot out of the sky.
Her whole body was so alight with sensation she thought she should glow in the dark. And even while she tried to regain control, she was thinking about doing it all again. She turned her head to look at Jack, lying beside her. One arm flung across his eyes, his chest heaved with every breath and she smiled, knowing that he was just as shaken as she. Had she finally broken through the wall he’d built around himself? Was her Jack finally back?
“You owe me twenty bucks,” he said softly.
She blinked at him, then laughed. “Seriously? You want a tip?”
He lowered his arm and turned his gaze on her. “Nope. A bet we made. Not only did you marry me when you said you wouldn’t, you just—”
She held up one hand. “I know what I just—” then she slapped both hands to her hips as if checking for a wallet “—I don’t seem to have any pockets at the moment so I’ll have to owe you.”
One corner of his mouth quirked. “I suppose I can live with that.”
Rolling to one side, he propped himself up on one elbow and looked down at her. “Rita—”
She stopped him by laying her fingers on his mouth. Disappointment welled in her chest. Looking into his eyes, she could see that her Jack was still buried behind a shutter of ice. Maybe there were a few cracks in that cold stillness, but it was a seductive stranger staring at her through Jack’s eyes. Her heart hurt for it, but she wouldn’t give up. Now more than ever, it was important to find a way to completely reach him.
“Don’t you dare apologize for this,” she said firmly. “Or tell me that it’ll never happen again—”
He tried to speak, but she hurried on. “We both wanted this, Jack. And I want it again right now.”
“Want isn’t the point,” he ground out as he laid one arm across her middle.
“Then what is?” She reached up and smoothed his hair back from his forehead, just because she wanted her fingers in that thick, wavy mass. Rita needed to touch him, to ground herself and hopefully him. To remind them both that the threads binding them were still there. They hadn’t been broken, only strained. She had to believe they could strengthen them again.
“Talk to me,” she said, locking her gaze on his so that he could see how much she wanted this. That when he told his story, whatever it was, he would still be safe with her. “Tell me what you were dreaming. Why were you shouting? What made you grab hold of me and hang on like I was a lifeboat in a tsunami?”
He scowled, but she was so used to that expression now, it didn’t even affect her. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Just dream about it then?” she countered, refusing to give up on him. Them. “Don’t you see that if you do tell me, maybe it will make the dreams fade?”
“Nothing can.”
Then the baby kicked and his features went blank with surprise. He glanced down to where his arm rested across her belly and then he sucked in a gulp of air when the baby kicked again, as if reminding its parents that they weren’t alone. His astonished gaze snapped to hers. “That was—”
“A good kick,” she finished for him. She knew what he was feeling, because she’d felt exactly the same the first time the baby’d moved. It was magic, she knew. Staggering. That tiny life making itself known. Taking his hand, she held it tightly to the mound of their child.
On cue, another kick came and Jack’s eyes went wide even as an unexpected grin lit his face. “Strong baby.”
That wide smile of his tugged at her heart. “Like its father.”
Just like that, his smile faded into memory. Pulling away from her grasp, he asked, “What is it? The baby, I mean. Do you know?”
If he hadn’t pulled away from her, Rita would have thought that she was making more progress with him. He hadn’t once asked about the baby before, so normally, she would have celebrated internally that he was feeling...linked. But the look in his eyes was cool, not warm, and so she had to admit that nothing had changed.
“No,” she said sadly, sorry that he was withdrawing again. “I didn’t want to know ahead of time. I wanted to be surprised. There aren’t many real surprises left in the world.”
“You always surprised me,” he said. “Still do.” Just for a second, she saw another crack in the wall around him. Then it was gone and as if to prove it to her, he turned and pushed off the bed.
He walked naked to the open French doors and out onto the terrace. On the twenty-fifth floor, facing the ocean, there was no one to see them. No nosy neighbors.