Larkin stirred, moaning as tender muscles protested the movement.
“You okay?” Rafe asked.
She lifted her head and forced open a single bleary eye, blinking at him. “I think that depends on your definition of ‘okay.’ I’m alive. Does that count?”
“It counts.”
“It’s the strangest sensation.”
“What is?”
“Most of my body is screaming, ‘Don’t move.’ But there are a few regions that are saying, ‘Again. Now.’” She decided to experiment and shift a fraction of an inch. “I’d be an absolute fool to listen to the ‘Again. Now’ crowd.”
“’Kay.”
He started to roll off the bed and she shot out her hand to stop him. “Call me a fool.”
A sleepy grin spread across Rafe’s face. “Call us both fools.”
She went into his arms as though she belonged, which maybe she did, despite all that stood in their way. He’d been so careful with her, so attentive, determined to make certain she enjoyed her first sexual experience. No matter what happened from this point forward, she’d always have the memory of this night to cling to.
“Thank you,” she told him.
He lifted an eyebrow. “For what?”
“For being perfect. Or at least, perfect for me.”
It took him a moment to reply. “You’re welcome.”
She lifted her mouth for his kiss, shivering as it deepened and grew more intense. Kissing she knew about. She’d kissed a fair number of men. But those experiences paled in comparison to what she shared with Rafe. With the merest brush of his lips, Rafe seduced her. That’s all it took for her to want him. To feel the rising tide of desire crash over and through her. One single kiss and she knew she was meant to be his. One single kiss and she knew…
She loved him.
The breath caught in her throat. No. That wasn’t possible. She pushed against his shoulders and tumbled away from him, fighting to drag air into her lungs. Sex was one thing. But love? No, no, no! How could she have been so foolish?
“Larkin?” He reached for her. “Sweetheart, what’s wrong?”
She evaded his hand. It was that hand. The hand that had started all their trouble. The one that had damned her with a single touch. The touch that had infected her with The Inferno.
She snagged the sheet and wound it tightly around herself, for the first time abruptly and painfully aware of her nudity. “How are we going to get out of this?” she demanded, her voice taking on a sharp edge.
He watched her, a wary glint in his eyes. “Get out of what?”
She shook her hand at him. Sparks from the diamond ring he’d placed there sent jagged shards of fire exploding in all directions. “Get out of this. Get out of our engagement. What’s your exit strategy?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Does it matter?” He patted the mattress. “Come on back to bed. It’s not like there’s any hurry.”
She ignored the second part of his suggestion and focused on the first. For some reason, his admission filled her with panic. “What do you mean, you don’t know? You must have a plan. You always have a plan.”
He stilled, his eyes narrowing. “What’s with the sudden urgency, Larkin?”
“I need to know how this is going to end. I need to know when.”
He vaulted from the bed and padded across the room to where his trousers lay in a crumpled heap and snagged them off the floor. “You’re having regrets.”
She thrust her hand through her hair, tumbling the curls into even greater disarray. “I don’t regret making love to you, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
He grunted in disbelief. “Right.”
Kicking the sheet out from beneath her feet, she came after him. “I’m serious. I don’t have any regrets about that. None. Zero.”
“Then what?” He tossed his trousers aside and cupped her shoulders. Dragging her into his arms, he examined her upturned face, his expression hard and remote. “One minute we were kissing and the next you’re freaking out about exit strategies. What the hell happened?”
She clamped her lips shut to hold back the words. That worked for an entire twenty seconds before the truth came spilling out. “I liked it.”
He stared blankly. “Liked what?”
“Making love to you.”
His lips twitched and then he grinned. “That’s good. I liked making love to you, too.”
“No, you don’t understand.” She attempted to tear free of his hold, but he wouldn’t let her. Why in the world had she elected to have this conversation with his stark nakedness hanging out all over the place? It made rational thought beyond impossible. “I liked making love to you. A lot.”
“I’m still right there with you.”
She groaned in frustration. “Do I really have to spell it out for you?”
“Apparently you do.”
“I liked making love with you. I loved making love with you. I want to do it again, as often as possible.”
He reared back. “Well, hell, woman. No wonder you want to end our engagement. Who would want to make love as often as possible?”
“Stop it, Rafe.” To her horror, she could feel the rush of tears. “You’re supposed to be the logical one. You’re supposed to have life all figured out. Hasn’t it occurred to you that if we keep doing—” she shot a look of intense longing over her shoulder toward the bed “—what we’ve been doing, it might be sort of tough to stop?”
“Who said anything about stopping?”
Didn’t he get it? “Don’t you get it? That’s generally what happens when engagements end. The two unengaged people stop making love.” She pouted, something she hadn’t done since she was all of three. “And I don’t want to stop. So what happens when it’s time to stop and we don’t want to?”
“What usually happens is that those feelings ease up or wear off.” He said it so gently that it made the pain all the worse. “It’s just because you’ve never gotten to that stage of a relationship before. But trust me, I have it on good authority that excellent sex and mounds of bling aren’t enough to make a woman want to stick around once she walks out the bedroom door.”
That didn’t make a bit of sense. “Now I don’t understand.” She waved her hand in a dismissive gesture when he started to explain again. “I get that you think the physical end of things will gradually grow ho-hum.”
“I didn’t say ho-hum,” he retorted, stung.
“But what I don’t get is what that has to do with the rest of it. What’s bling got to do with sex, and what changes between us once we leave the bedroom? Is there a manual somewhere that explains these things? Because I have to tell you, I’m clueless.”
He gave a short, hard laugh. “Are you serious? You don’t know what bling has to do with sex?”
She shot him a knife-sharp look. “No. And if you do, then you’ve been hanging with the wrong sort of women.”
He ran a hand along the nape of his neck. “I have to admit you’ve got me there.”
“Look, I don’t give a damn about bling. If the sex gets ho-hum, bling sure as hell isn’t going to fix the problem, now, is it?” She planted her hands on her hips, only to make a frantic grab for the sheet when it started a southward migration. “What I need you to explain is what’s going to happen after we leave the bedroom that will make our relationship turn sour?”
“I believe it has something to do with my being a loner,” he explained a shade too calmly. “Too independent. Not domesticated. Emotionally distant. Intimidating.”
The rapid-fire litany worried her. It sounded as if he was quoting someone, and she could take a wild stab as to the identity of that someone. “Is that what Leigh told you?” Larkin asked, outraged.
“She wasn’t the only one.” He scrubbed at his face, the rasp of his beard as abrasive as the conversation. “How the hell did we get on this subject anyway?”
“Let me get this straight…. You think that once I’ve gotten bored with having sex with you, I’ll actually want to leave you?”
“Yes.” Humor turned his eyes a brilliant shade of jade. “Though I’ll do my best not to bore you while we’re in bed.”
“And that’s your exit strategy? One day I’ll be here and the next day I’ll be gone and you’ll tell your relatives that I got bored and left.”
His expression iced over. “I don’t explain myself to my relatives.”
She cocked an eyebrow in patent disbelief. “Something tells me that you’ll need to do a lot more than explain the situation to them if—when—I leave.” He didn’t argue, which told her that he privately agreed with her assessment. Sorrow filled her when she realized that even if he didn’t have a plan, she did. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll take care of it for you.”
He frowned. “You’ll take care of our breakup?”
“Yes.”
“And how do you intend to accomplish that?”
Stupid. Very stupid of her. She should have anticipated the question. “It’s better if you don’t know.”
He shook his head and folded his arms across his chest. Standing there, nude and intensely male, she could see how some women might find him intimidating. Not her. She swallowed. Probably not her.
“I happen to think it’s better if I do know your plan,” he insisted. “Now, spill.”
“If I explain beforehand, you won’t be in a position to react appropriately.”
“I won’t let you cheat on me.” The fierceness behind his comment had her stumbling back a step. “Nor will they believe you, if that’s what you’re going to try to tell them.”
“It isn’t,” she instantly denied. “That never even occurred to me.”
Her bewildered sincerity must have convinced him, because he nodded. “Okay, then.” He throttled back a notch or two. “Give me some sort of idea so I can decide whether or not it’ll work.”
She didn’t dare tell him, or he’d find out how well it would work right here and now. “Trust me, it’ll work. Not only will they believe it, but they’ll rally around you. You won’t have to worry about anyone trying to find another Inferno bride for you ever again.”
She looked him straight in the eye as she said it. Could he see the bleakness she felt reflected in her gaze? He must have, because he took a swift step in her direction.
“Larkin? What is it?” Concern colored his voice. “Are you ill? Is something wrong with you?”
“It’s nothing like that,” she assured him. Time to move this in another direction before he broke her down and forced the truth from her. She planted her splayed hands on his chest and maneuvered him backward toward the bed. “Why don’t we table this discussion for now and in the meantime, I suggest you get busy and bore me.”
His legs hit the edge of the mattress and he reached out to snag her around the waist as he toppled backward. She tumbled on top of him, laughing as she fell. It still hurt whenever she thought about the future. Hurt unbearably to realize that this couldn’t last. But she’d known it wouldn’t when she’d agreed to an affair. And until the moment came when he found out who she was and what she wanted from him, she’d enjoy every single second of their time together.
Would he consider it a fair bargain? Somehow she doubted it and it distressed her to think that she’d make him any more of a loner than he was already. That he’d continue to turn from people because he no longer trusted them. She’d never forgive herself if that happened. But maybe he’d understand. Maybe he’d help her and they could part on good terms.
And maybe baby pigs around the world would sprout gossamer wings and use them to fly straight to the moon.
He tunneled his fingers through her hair and thrust the wayward curls away from her face. “What are you thinking about?”
She forced out a smile. “Nothing important.”
“Whatever it was, it made you look so sad.”
“Then why don’t you give me something else to think about?”
He didn’t need any further prompting. He took her mouth in a hot, urgent kiss, one that drove every thought from her head except one. Rafe. The way his lips drove her wild with desire. The hard, knowing sweep of his hands across her skin. Those magical fingers that left her weeping with pleasure. It was an enchantment from which she never wanted to escape.
She gave herself up to pleasure, exploring him with an open curiosity that he seemed to find intensely arousing. She’d never realized how hard and uncompromising a man’s body could be in some areas and how flexible and sensitive in others. But she didn’t allow a single inch of him to go uncharted.
One minute laughter reigned as she painted her way across his shape with her fingertips and the next minute it all changed. “I can’t imagine ever becoming bored with you.” She whispered the confession.
It took him a moment to reply. “I’m not sure it’s possible for me to be bored, either. Not with you.”
What should have been a light and carefree exchange took on a darker aspect, shades within shades of meaning, filled with a bittersweet yearning. She kissed him. Lingered. Then she began to paint him into her memory again. Only this time she did it with her mouth and lips and tongue, sculpting him with nibbling bites and soothing kisses. Arms. Chest. Belly. He called to her, the cry of the wolf for its mate. But all it did was drive her onward to the very source of his desire.
He didn’t allow her to linger as long as she would have liked. Instead, he became the sculptor, shaping and molding her until they became one. He linked his hands with hers, just as he had before. She knew why, could see it in his eyes and in the emotions he didn’t dare express. Even though he would have rejected its existence with every ounce of his intellect, it throbbed between them, giving lie to his denial.
She opened herself to him, took him deep inside her until they flowed together in perfect harmony. She wrapped herself around him, surrendering to the explosion of passion, swept away like a leaf before a whirlwind. Tumbling endlessly into the most glorious sensation, a sensation made perfect because she wasn’t alone. She was there with Rafe.
The people in his life called him a lone wolf and he’d more than lived up to his reputation, to the point where he believed it himself. But there was something he’d never considered. Something he either didn’t know or had forgotten. But she knew. She understood. Because she was as much a lone wolf as he was.
Wolves mate for life.
The next week proved one of the most incredible of Larkin’s life. Making love to Rafe shouldn’t have made such a difference. But somehow it did. Whenever she bothered to analyze the situation—which wasn’t often—she realized that it wasn’t the sex itself that accounted for that difference, but the level of intimacy. It deepened, became richer, added a dimension to their relationship that hadn’t existed before.
They spent hours in conversation, discussing every topic under the sun, except the few she avoided in order to keep him from connecting her to Leigh. Art. Science. Literature. The jewelry business. It all became rich fodder for the hours they spent together.
How could anyone consider him emotionally distant? Or unavailable? Or even intimidating? It defied understanding. To her delight, he’d taken to Kiko, the two becoming firm friends. Even more amusing, she’d come across him a time or two conducting a lengthy one-way conversation with the animal.
“You will let me know if she answers, won’t you?” Larkin teased when she discovered him discussing the merits of raw versus cooked beef with Kiko.
“I don’t know what it is about that dog, but she insists on eating her food raw.”
“She likes it the way nature intended. That might not be the healthiest for us, but it works for her.”
He set Kiko’s bowl on the ground. “Have you finished packing for the lake?”
“I have. Not that there’s much to pack. Even with your mother supplementing my wardrobe, I can still fit everything into my backpack.” She winced. “I think.”
“Mamma does seem intent on filling up your closet.”
Larkin smiled, though it felt a bit forced. “Every time I go in there I find another new outfit.”
“Don’t sweat it,” he reassured her. “She’s enjoying herself.”
“I realize that.” She shifted restlessly. “But it bothers me because she doesn’t know our engagement is a sham. I don’t want her to spend all this money on me when I’m never going to be her daughter-in-law. It’s not right.”
Rafe turned to face her, leaning his hip against the counter. “We’ve had this discussion before.” He fixed her with his penetrating green gaze, his expression one that no doubt sent his employees scurrying in instant obedience. “I don’t see any point in having it again.”
It was the second time she’d caught a glimpse of the more intimidating aspect of his personality. Not that he hadn’t warned her. She’d just been foolish enough not to believe him. She should have known better. Rafe didn’t pull his punches.
“In that case, I’ll wear a few of the outfits and leave the rest,” she said lightly. “You can return them after I’m gone.”
He shoved away from the kitchen counter and approached. “Why all this talk about leaving?”
“Well…” She forced herself to hold her ground even though a siren blared in her head, urging a full-scale retreat. “It occurred to me that since everyone’s going to be at the lake, that might be a good time to stage our breakup.”
“In front of all my relatives?”
“Bad idea?”
“Very bad idea, since I’m willing to bet that the majority of them would take your side in any fight you might care to initiate.”
She cleared her throat. “I wasn’t thinking of a fight, so much as an announcement.”
“I don’t do fights or announcements. Not in public. And I sure as hell don’t do them in front of my entire family.”
He closed to within inches of her. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t keep herself from falling back a pace or two. Kiko looked on with intense curiosity and Larkin suspected that if it had been anyone other than Rafe proving his intimidation skills, the dog would have objected in no uncertain terms.
“Are you bored already, Larkin? Is that the problem?”
Her mouth parted in shock. “No! How could you even think such a thing?”
If shrugs could be sarcastic, Rafe had it nailed. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe it has something to do with your wanting to break off our engagement after one short week.”
“In case I didn’t make it clear enough last night, I’m not bored.” Images of what they’d spent the time doing flashed through her head and brought a telltale blush to her cheeks. “Not even close.”
“I’m relieved to hear it. But if it’s not boredom…” He raised an eyebrow and waited.
Naturally, she broke first. Would she ever learn to control her tongue? “I’m afraid, okay?”
It was his turn to look shocked. “Afraid?” Shock became concern. “Of me?”
“No!” She flew into his arms, impacting with a delicious thud. “How could you even think such a thing?”
He wrapped her in a tight embrace. “Hell, sweetheart.” He rested his chin on top of her head. “What else am I supposed to think?”
“Not that. Never that.”
He pulled back a few inches and snagged her chin with his index finger, forcing her to look at him. “Then what are you afraid of?”
She didn’t want to explain. Didn’t want to tell him. But she didn’t see what other choice she had. And maybe if he understood, he’d let her go before it was too late.
“It’s what we were talking about before. I’m afraid to drag out our engagement,” she admitted. “I’m afraid that it’ll hurt too much when the time comes to walk away.”
Something dark and powerful moved in his gaze. How could any woman have believed for one little minute that he was emotionally distant? It wasn’t distance, but self-control. Larkin had never known a man whose emotions ran deeper or more passionately than Rafe’s. And because they were so strong, he’d learned to exert an iron will over them to keep them in check. Intimidating? Okay, she’d give Leigh that one. But not distant. Never that.
“I won’t let you go.” The words came out whisper-soft and all the more potent because of it. “I can’t.”
He didn’t give her the opportunity to reply. Instead, he swept her into his arms. Instead of carrying her in the direction of the guest suite, he climbed the stairs to his own bedroom. They’d never made love there before and she’d understood without it ever being said that his inner sanctum was off-limits.
He lowered her to her feet once they were inside and she looked around, curious. If anything, the room confirmed her opinion of him. The furnishings were distinctly masculine, powerful and well built, with strong sweeping lines. But there was also an elegance of form and a richness of color both in the decor and the warmth of the wood accents and trim. If she’d been shown a hundred different rooms and asked which belonged to Rafe, she’d have chosen this one in an instant.
The door swung shut behind her with a loud click and she turned to discover him watching her, the intensity of his gaze eerily similar to Kiko’s. “Welcome to my den,” Rafe said.
She attempted a smile, with only limited success. “Am I your Little Red Riding Hood?”
He approached, yanking his shirt over his head as he came. There was something raw and elemental in the way he moved and in the manner in which he regarded her. “Not even close.”
Her smile faded. The wash of emotions thickening the air between them was far too potent for levity. She responded to the scent of desire, to the perfume of want, feeling it stir her blood and feed her hunger. Her body ripened in anticipation, flowering with the need to have him on her and in her. To be possessed and to be the possessor.
“Then what am I?” she whispered.
“Don’t you know?” He backed her toward the bed. “Haven’t you figured it out yet?”
In that instant she understood. Knew what he was to her and she to him.
She was his mate.
She could see it in his stance and in the possessiveness of his gaze, in the timbre of his voice and the strength of his desire. By bringing her here, he’d lowered his guard and allowed her into the most private part of his home…into the most private part of himself.
Even as she surrendered to his touch, a part of her wept. He’d finally opened himself to her, and in a few short weeks—possibly in just days—she was going to destroy not just his trust, but any hope of his ever loving her.