Part 7 (2/2)

”Where?”

”You'll see,” he said mysteriously. ”But you might want to grab your bathing suit and if you don't have one, you could try skinny-dipping.”

Her eyes widened and she a.s.sured him, ”I have one.”

Chuckling, he took his plate from her and followed her around the side of the adobe. A few minutes later they were sitting in the truck, b.u.mping over a gravel access road. Soon, even the gravel disappeared and they traveled on the packed earth. Slowing as stands of cedar grew thicker, he finally stopped beside a live oak. ”We're here. We don't have to walk far.”

He came around to Mallory's side of the truck and opened the door for her. When he offered her his hand, her gaze met his. The electricity between them practically buzzed, but she took his hand and used it for leverage as she stepped down to the ground. They walked side by side through the range gra.s.s until they broke through a line of oaks.

When she stopped, so did he. ”How lovely,” she murmured as if entering a holy place.

He felt that way about this spot. The descending sun was a fiery red ball reflected in the calm, cool water of the lake where a willow dropped its branches. Tall gra.s.s grew along the north and west borders. Sparkles of sunlight danced to the south and east as the bare earth embraced the water.

”It's spring fed,” Reed explained, ”so it's cold.”

”Right now I could use a little cold,” she said with a smile.

He handed her one of the towels he'd brought, laid his on the ground and pulled off his boots and socks. When his hands went to the snap on his jeans, Mallory asked, ”What are you doing?”

”I'm going swimming.”

Unfastening his fly, he let his jeans drop to the ground.

Mallory backed up, but her eyes dropped below his waist. He was wearing black briefs, not a bathing suit.

”I didn't bring a suit with me.” He shrugged.

She quickly spun around and peered at the lake.

”Mallory.” He kept his voice gentle. ”You've seen me naked. I've seen you.”

”Not when I was fully conscious of what I was doing,” she retorted, glancing over her shoulder and keeping her eyes steadily on his.

Instead of being a bond, the night they'd spent together in that motel room was a barricade. ”I'm going in,” he said gruffly.

Mallory watched as Reed strode into the water and dove under and swam out to the middle. Her hands were trembling and she realized her attachment to this man scared her. All he had to do was smile at her, let alone bare his chest or more, and her insides quivered with a longing she didn't recognize. She'd been brought up to be a proper lady, and she didn't understand what had happened that night in Reno...why simple rebellion had turned into marriage to a man she didn't know.

The temperature hadn't eased much and standing here watching Reed wasn't going to help her cool off. Choosing a compact clump of cedars for a changing screen, she slipped behind them and quickly removed her clothes. The little devil who'd prompted her to sit at Reed's table at the Golden Spur made her wonder, What if he saw you like this, and you were fully conscious?

The excited tingles that danced through her body made her grab her pink bikini bottom and slip it on quickly. When she fastened the top, she suddenly realized that this bathing suit wasn't a whole lot better than being naked around Reed. But it would have to do. Leaving her clothes, she s.n.a.t.c.hed her towel and carried it to the spot where Reed had waded in.

She stepped into the water slowly. It was cold but felt delicious against her hot skin. Gradually she went in farther, then splashed water on her neck and arms. Finally she ducked under the water and swam across the lake. They both swam for a while until Mallory floated into more shallow water and stood, appreciating the beautiful sunset, the orange, purple and pink streaks shooting through what was left of the blue sky. She heard a splash of water and sensed Reed swimming up beside her. When he stood, she could feel the immense masculine power of him, as awe inspiring in some ways as the sunset.

Clasping her shoulder, he nudged her around to face him. His hair was wet and he must have brushed it from his forehead when he came out of the water. Droplets glittered on his shoulders and in his chest hair under the last rays of the sun. ”Are you glad you came?” he asked.

She nodded, her voice sticking in her throat. She couldn't take her eyes from his, and caution warned her to move away. But she couldn't. Not when antic.i.p.atory excitement was making her heart race and her breaths shallow.

”I shouldn't have lost my temper with you yesterday,” he admitted.

It seemed hard for him to make the apology, and she guessed that it didn't come easy for him.

”Does that happen often?” she teased lightly, so he'd know she'd accepted it.

But he didn't smile. ”Only when I care about something a great deal.”

The power in his blue gaze seemed to pull her closer, and she recognized it as desire. She felt her body leaning slightly toward his. His hand on her shoulder slipped to the small of her back, and she knew she could still pull away. She should be cautious. She should run....

His head bent to hers and she raised her mouth for his kiss.

His hand was large and gentle on her back, and soon it was joined by his other one in a sense-stirring duet caressing her spine. When he reached her b.u.t.tocks, he raised her to him and his tongue invaded her mouth. She gasped at the erotic contact and wrapped her legs around him. He was hot and hard, and she'd never known a sensation so pleasurable, so fulfilling, yet not quite fulfilling enough. His briefs, her suit, both wet, were little less than a film between them, making the contact even more tantalizing. His groan echoed through her and she responded to his tongue by stroking against it, wrapping her arms around his neck and holding on for dear life.

Reed finally broke the kiss and when her gaze found his, she saw controlled desire there. ”I want my hands over every part of you,” he said. ”I want to sink into you until the sun comes up. Is that what you want?”

Still dazed by a pa.s.sion she didn't understand and a desire that was as new as her marriage, she could hardly comprehend what he was saying. She knew he was talking about pleasure and satisfaction and s.e.x. Isn't that what had gotten them into this mess? Because his fiancee had dumped him? How could she have forgotten that even for a moment?

”No,” she said breathlessly, and then louder, ”No!”

His expression changed. The desire faded from his eyes and became a blue wall. ”Once is enough, Mallory. There's nothing wrong with my hearing.”

She remembered Winston trying to kidnap her and how many times she'd said no. Her wishes hadn't mattered to him and she wondered if it would have been any different in the bedroom. But Reed- Suddenly she remembered too well what her mother had confided in her when she was a teenager. She'd come into her mother's room and found her sitting at her vanity, a stack of letters in her hand.

”What are they?” Mallory had asked.

Her mother had said, ”I was cleaning out the closet and found them with your father's things. They're letters from his first wife, Dawson's mother.” And then she told Mallory something Mallory had never forgotten. ”He wouldn't have kept them unless they meant something to him, Mallory. I've always suspected he came to me because of a midlife crisis and once the damage was done to his marriage, he couldn't go back. There's a lesson here, honey. They had that 'always' kind of love, and that kind lasts forever. Your father is my true love, but I'm not his. If I hadn't been blinded by my love for him, I would have realized it before we married. Don't ever marry a man who still has ties to another woman.”

Reed still had ties to another woman.

His voice was a husky rasp when he said, ”Just drop your legs and I'll put you down.”

She'd wrapped her legs around him to fit to him...to give them both a taste of fulfillment. But a taste wasn't nearly enough, and she wasn't about to give any more when he still had feelings for his fiancee. She suspected Reed wasn't the type of man who could love a woman one minute and forget about her the next.

Even though she unwound her legs, she felt his arousal as he lowered her. Still, embarra.s.sment didn't keep her from asking, ”Reed?”

His hands slipped from her and he stepped back. ”What?” His voice was gritty with a desire she could still feel, too.

”Were you involved with anyone before Stephanie?”

”Involved? You mean, in a serious relations.h.i.+p?”

”Yes.”

”No. Stephanie was the first.”

Her heart sinking, Mallory turned away from him and made her way to the bank.

”Mallory, it's over with Stephanie,” he called to her.

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