Madigan's Wife. Linda Winstead Jones

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СКАЧАТЬ have to talk to him. She could keep her eyes and her attention on Morgan and pretend nothing was going on, here. This time after Ray turned the television off, he placed the remote on the couch beside him. It would be safe there.

      “Do you want to talk about what happened this morning?” he asked, managing to make Grace even more skittish.

      She placed luscious big brown eyes on him while she twiddled her thumbs in her lap. Her knees were clamped together, her spine straight; she looked like she’d just finished a class on how to sit like a little lady. She looked like a scared little girl.

      “Not really. I’ve told you everything already. Talking about it isn’t going to make me feel any better.”

      “Are you sure?”

      Grace gazed longingly at the remote control. “I’m sure,” she said softly. Poor girl, she was about to jump out of her lovely skin. “You know, I’d better check those potatoes,” she said, practically jumping to her feet.

      Without thinking, Ray reached out and snagged her wrist. With a gentle tug, she fell back and into his lap, landing there soft and wonderfully, arousingly heavy. She didn’t stay there long, but slid off his lap to sit beside him. As she landed on the remote, the television came back on. At least Morgan wasn’t on camera anymore.

      “The potatoes won’t be ready for at least another half hour, and you know it,” he said, refusing to release her wrist when she tugged gently.

      “But I really should…” she began weakly.

      “What are you afraid of?”

      He hovered over Grace, and she lifted her face to him. She didn’t tug against his grip again, or try to slide any farther away. He reached out and tucked that strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers brushing lightly against her face and grazing her ear as he accomplished the task.

      “I’m not afraid of anything,” she whispered, but the fear in her eyes told him she lied.

      “Not even the man who chased you this morning?”

      Her eyes widened. “Him? Of course I’m afraid of him. I’m not stupid.”

      Her short slide across his lap had caused her skirt to ride up, just a little, and when he glanced down he caught a glimpse of shapely, silk encased thigh. He placed his hand there. Grace trembled.

      No matter how hard he tried he couldn’t forget how it had been with them. He touched her and she was his. She laid her head against his chest and he forgot everything. When they came together there was power, and heat, and lightning. Like a spring storm, they lit up the sky and rocked the world.

      He lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her, soft, tender, tentative. He felt the tremble of her lips, the gentle sigh of acceptance that touched his mouth. His mouth lay over hers, fixed for a long moment. God, she tasted good. Warm and soft, sweet and real and hungry. There was something akin to relief in the kiss, like he’d had an itch in the middle of his back for six years and someone had finally scratched it. The unexpected comfort of the kiss terrified him, but he didn’t move away.

      Feeling bold, fearlessly greedy, he moved his lips against hers, ever so slightly. Grace answered with a soft, gentle draw of her own. A tender sucking, a deep and arousing reception. Everything inside him tightened and heated, as if a bolt of lightning coursed through his body.

      His hand, resting on her leg, inched higher until his fingers brushed her inner thigh. The flesh he stroked was giving, soft and warm, enticing and irresistible. This was familiar territory, even though it had been years, six long years, since he’d touched Grace this way. She trembled, but didn’t take her mouth from his.

      Ray Madigan was not a complete fool. He didn’t love Grace anymore; how could he? She’d left him, she’d hurt him in a way no one else ever had or ever would. She’d taken a world he’d thought was safe and happy and blown it apart. No, he didn’t love her, but he did want her. Yes, dammit, he did want her.

      If the response of her mouth against his was any indication, she wanted him, too. She moved her lips against his and inhaled as if gently sucking the life out of him, as if she wanted to taste deeply but was afraid. Soft and hesitant and almost innocent, she brushed her lips against his.

      He leaned over her, pressing her back into the soft cushions of the couch, and deepened the kiss. When he slipped his tongue into her mouth she gasped, and her hands went to his face, his head. She touched his cheeks and speared her fingers through his hair, and she answered the kiss, for an all-too-brief moment.

      And then she pushed his head back, forced his mouth from hers. “I can’t,” she whispered. Unshed tears made her dark eyes sparkle, the flush on her face made her look nineteen again.

      “Why not?”

      She shook her head. “I can’t sleep with you, Ray. I can’t.”

      “I wasn’t exactly thinking about sleeping, sweetheart,” he said huskily as he moved closer. Her thighs fell slightly apart; she had to feel his arousal pressing against the inside of her thigh. He could so easily take her, here and now. He needed it; she needed it.

      “You know what I mean.”

      Ah, she was serious. “What’s wrong? Have you gone back to your ten date rule?” he asked lightly, as if it didn’t make any difference one way or another if they finished what they’d started. As if he didn’t want to ask her, here and now when there was no escape for either of them, why she’d left him.

      He’d never understood the way she’d left. A damn note on the refrigerator, like a grocery list. Milk. Eggs. Goodbye.

      He would never ask. The question would sound too much like pleading, and he would not grovel in front of Grace. Not now, not ever. He wanted her as much as he ever had, right now he hurt for her, but by God he did not need her.

      “Don’t you think a ten date rule is a little excessive in this day and age?” he asked casually, holding his body against hers. He felt and savored every breath she took, the tension in the length of her bewitching body.

      He remembered how she’d explained it to him, the first time he’d tried to make love to her. Still a virgin, she’d concluded that she wouldn’t know a man well enough to sleep with him until they’d had at least ten dates. Never a patient man, he’d asked her to marry him that night, on their third date. She’d said yes and they’d been married three days later. He’d been so sure that what they had was real and deep and lasting, that Grace was the one person who would always be there. He’d been young and stupid.

      “And if that’s it, do I have to start all over?” he smiled as he delivered the joke. “Can’t I at least get credit for the dates we had before we were married? How about all those lunches at Pop’s?” Suddenly he knew why she’d never allowed him to buy her lunch. “Is that why we always go dutch these days?” he teased.

      “Be serious,” she said, as she tried to gently push him away.

      He wasn’t going anywhere. Not yet. He pressed his body to hers, hovered above her so close he could feel her intense warmth and the beat of her heart, the slight tremble of her legs. Already she was inside him, as if he’d inhaled her, as if she seeped beneath his skin when he held her tight.

      “Tell me, Gracie, when was the last time you had a tenth date?”

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