The madness that drove him was jealousy, pure unadulterated jealousy. And of his own brother. As he zipped along in the night, he mentally kicked himself.
He was turning into somebody he didn’t know, somebody he didn’t even like. Jealousy, kidnapping. What would he resort to next?
There was no question about it. What he was doing was tantamount to kidnapping, and kidnapping was no way to conduct a courtship. And it was certainly no way to tell the woman in his arms that she was important to him. More than important. Necessary in ways he’d never dreamed possible.
He veered left off the highway onto a gravel driveway that meandered through a hundred-year-old pecan grove. At the end of the driveway was his cottage, nestled among the magnolias and camellias and gardenias as if it had sprung up from the rich soil in the flower garden.
Crash never failed to get a rush of pleasure from the sight of his house. He searched Philadelphia’s face, anxious for her reaction.
“You live here?” she said.
It wasn’t what he expected, but he could live with the disappointment. After all, she was a big-city girl. A man couldn’t have everything.
“Yes. I live here.”
She stood on the front porch, closed her eyes, and drew a deep breath.
“It smells like a place you would live... an extravagance of wildness and freedom.” She smiled. “I like it.”
“You always surprise me, Philadelphia.”
“I’m a big-city girl by choice, but I grew up in the country. On a farm, as a matter of fact, a place very much like this. Do you have animals?”
“Yes. Listen.”
In the distance they heard the plaintive whinny of a horse, then an answering snort and the thundering of hooves across the pasture.
“It’s mating season,” he said.
She stiffened, and then she transformed before his eyes. Everything about her became liquid, her eyes, her smile, even her bones. She slithered across the porch and wrapped herself around him, then clung there like a morning-glory vine.
“So it is,” she said.
She spoke in a voice he’d never heard her use, a soft seductive whisper that sent shivers over him. Then she nuzzled his neck and actually purred. The behavior was so uncharacteristic of her that he was thrown completely off guard.
Not that he didn’t like it. On the contrary, he found this unexpectedly sensual side of Philadelphia to be extraordinarily appealing. What man could resist?
He scooped her up and carried her across his threshold, just like a hero in the late-night movie classics he loved to watch. It was an image of himself that he enjoyed.
His courtship was advancing far faster than he’d imagined.
“How about some music,” he said.
“Music?”
Moonlight laid a path from the window to the doorway, and Philadelphia’s eyes were as luminous as a cat’s. She made that little noise again, half purr, half growl, and then she began to nibble his neck.
He was so excited, he couldn’t even find the light switch. Great Caesar’s aphrodisiac. Goose bumps the size of golf balls popped up on his skin. He’d never known it was possible to have such a reaction to the touch of a woman.
He found the sofa in the dark. It was a man’s couch, big and roomy with lots of puffy pillows. He placed her among the pillows, carefully lest he break the spell that bound them. She was lush and inviting, her lips a slash of scarlet, pouty and ripe, her breasts rising above her low-slung neckline, one silken thigh completely exposed, the other a rich curve underneath the silky red dress.
“Come here,” she whispered, lifting her arms, and he fell into them, a man possessed, so hungry for what she offered that he forgot how he’d meant to court her, forgot about the candlelight and soft music, forgot the fire he’d meant to build in the grate, just enough to take the spring chill out of the air and send a pleasant cozy glow over the room.
He forgot everything except the rich pleasure of her lips and the ripe promise of her body. She murmured and writhed as he kissed her, spurring him on until he could barely keep control.
“You are delicious,” he whispered.
“Don’t talk....” She pulled him closer. “Just don’t talk.”
But even as his passion mounted, something deep inside him whispered caution; something he’d only lately discovered to be his heart yearned for the tender words, the sweet, slow buildup, the commitment.
He thrust his tongue into her mouth and engaged hers in a provocative duel. Even though desire wound him as tightly as a bowstring, he could still think about such heady stuff as commitment. Funny how’d he’d always thought the only thing he wanted was freedom. Even after he met Philadelphia he didn’t know how hard he’d fallen; he didn’t understand that freedom meant enjoying all the things life had to offer, including love.
Joe would laugh his head off if he knew Crash’s dilemma: The man who had always enjoyed the pleasures of a woman’s body without any thought beyond the moment now found himself being used in the same way, being used and wishing for the powerful, magical bonds of love and commitment.
Cupping her face, he came up for air. In the moonlight she was beautifully disheveled and incredibly desirable.
“Philadelphia...”
“Hmmm?”
She licked one finger and traced his lips.
“I thought a small fire would be nice, and maybe some slow sexy blues,” he said.
“What’s the matter, Crash?” She reached for his shirt buttons. “Getting cold feet again?”
“Again?”
“Just like in the Smokies. All bluster and no performance.”
“Is that what this is to you? A performance?”
She parted his shirt and raked her fingernails down his chest.
“Spoken just like a lawyer,” she said. “Always analyzing.”
In a neat role reversal she was skewering him with his own sword. All that aside, she was seducing him as he’d never been seduced. Only a man of iron would be immune to her sexual overtures, and he’d never laid claim to such a dubious fame.
He pushed aside the top of her dress.
“Is this what you want, Philadelphia?”
“Yes. That and more.”
“That’s an invitation too good to resist.”
“Good. I was hoping you’d say that.”
“You’re wearing too many clothes, Philadelphia.”
“Why don’t you take them off?”
Tangled together on the sofa he struggled to reach her zipper. Impatient, she shoved him aside, then stood in the path of moonlight and shed her dress with the finesse of a high-class call girl. A black lace teddy hugged her curves, and black silk stockings attached to a garter belt encased her long slim legs. She still wore her heels, sling-back pumps with a saucy satin bow, naughty shoes that begged a man to do all manner of erotic things.
“You’re incredible,” he said, meaning it.
He left a trail of clothes as he walked toward her and lowered her to the rug. And then, for a very long time, the magic took over.
Still, though he was often impulsive he was never irresponsible. As he began to pull back, she hung onto his shoulders.
“Please. Don’t stop. I want...” She bit her lower lip.
Alarm bells went off. Philadelphia had always been as elusive as the deer of the Smoky Mountains. If he had been thinking with his head instead of his heart, he might have questioned her astonishing reversal.
“What do you want, Philadelphia?”
She wet her lips with the tip of her tongue, drawing a slow, sensual circle. He almost died.
“You,” she whispered. “I want you.”
He studied her, the flushed face, the bruised, pouty looking lips, the shining eyes. She was by far the most complex woman he’d ever known. Every time he thought he had her figured out, she made him see how wrong he was. It would take the rest of his life to unravel the mystery of her, every day, every hour, every minute to decipher the exciting puzzle of her.
Hunger gnawed at him, but there was something missing, something vital.
“Why?” he whispered. “Why do you want me?”
“Oh, God... please...”
He held very still, and she arched against him, twisting and turning.
“Please... Crash... please... now.”
He was so close to letting go, so close.
“Not yet.”
Sweat slicked his back and poured down the side of his face. With a control he’d never have dreamed possible he continued their lovemaking as if he could drive the truth from her with the fury.
“Yes,” she murmured. “Yes, yes, yes. Please!”
Those darned alarm bells went off again. Crash held himself still and studied her.
He knew that look. It wasn’t the soft look of a woman fulfilled, but the squared-jaw look of a determined woman with a quest. What was she after? Surely not revenge. Surely not paying him back for what she considered a spurning in the mountains.
Philadelphia was many things, but she was not petty.
“Please what?”
She clutched him hard against her chest, her jaw set. “Do I have to beg?”
“Beg for what?”
“You know.”
“No. Tell me. You’re a lawyer, you know how to get what you want. What do you want, Philadelphia?”
“You.”
“You’ve got that. What else do you want?”
Their eyes locked; their wills clashed. The moon illuminated them... the rivers of sweat on his face and his back, her glistening skin, the black teddy twisted down around her slender waist.
She was the first to move.
She began an urgent rhythm, trying his control.
He almost lost it.
“Wait... Philadelphia... wait... let me get some protection.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
She moved again and he felt himself tumbling over the cliff, dying the slow, sweet death.
“Are you protected?” he asked, easing back to gain control.
She glared at him, panting. “Damn you... Crash. Finish it.”
Rocked to the very core of his being, he withdrew. On hands and knees he stared down at her.
“What are you trying to do?” he said.
She bit her lip, and tears sprang to her eyes.
“You wanted to get pregnant. Is that it?”
It was an age-old ploy: bait the trap, set it, and when the baby’s in the oven, slam the door shut. Many women before her had tried it.
He studied her, the strong jaw, the clear, steady gaze, the determined face. She was a brilliant woman, not at all the kind who would stoop to such a dirty trick.
“Please get off me,” she said.
“Not yet.” He held her arms pinned above her head. “Not till I learn the truth.”
She didn’t fight against him, but merely lay on the rug as expressionless and stiff as a department store mannequin.
“There’s nothing more to say,” she said.
It couldn’t be rejection she was feeling, not after the way he’d given in to unbridled passion. There was something else, something he was missing.
He thought back over all their encounters, tried to remember anything that would give him a clue to her behavior. Though she kept surprising him, she’d been consistent up until tonight: She was basically a hardworking conservative lawyer who tried to hide her soft spot behind a rapier wit.
But tonight she’d let her hair down and dressed for seduction. Why?
Tonight she’d flaunted herself before a group of Tupelo’s most conservative, most socially prominent people. Why?
Tonight she’d brazenly flirted with his brother. No, more than flirted. She’d tried to seduce him.
The truth hit Crash with the force of a falling meteor.
“You do want a baby,” he said.
Her face was a dead giveaway. For a fleeting moment she looked so wistful and dewy-eyed, he almost pulled her into his lap and cradled her like a child. Then he remembered her perfidy.
“You were using me,” he added.
“That’s right. I was using you.”
He’d hoped she would deny it, even if it were true. Hearing her admit the truth hurt more than he cared to think about.
She struggled then, struggled to free herself from his grasp and get off the rug, but he held her fast.
In spite of everything he still wanted her. In spite of his bruised and battered ego, he still loved her.
She glared at him, her eyes shooting sparks. He felt his passion stir anew, and naked, there was no way to disguise it.
She gave no sign of emotion except the slight tremor in her voice. “I wouldn’t have your baby if you were the last man on earth.”
“You wouldn’t have my baby, period. Not under these conditions.”
“Let me up.”
“I’m not done with you yet.”
“If you touch me, I’ll scream.”
“It’s a little late for that, isn’t it?”
She struggled briefly, then made herself go limp.
“Cretin.”
He laughed, but it was without mirth. “Looks like we’re back where we started, Philadelphia.”
Before she could catch herself, her face softened. A man looking with his heart can see many things, and what he saw was a combination of regret, nostalgia, and longing. And as much as he wanted a little taste of revenge for what she had done, he couldn’t bring himself to punish her further.
He brushed her dark, damp hair off her forehead tenderly, in the way of a man who loves a woman.
“When I have a baby, Philadelphia, it will be with a woman I love, a woman I treasure more than my freedom and my Harley, a woman who can skewer me with a word and melt me with a single teardrop, a woman who thinks she hates nature but who embraces a lost shaggy dog as if it were her child.... If I love a woman...”
B. J. sucked in a sharp breath, and her eyes searched his. He stood up and silently offered her his hand. She caught hold, then stood beside him, her teddy still off her shoulders, the snaps undone, her face devoid of makeup, and her hair tumbling over her naked shoulders.
He’d never wanted her more. Nor loved her more.
“Crash...”
“Get dressed, Philadelphia. I’m taking you home.”