Part 13 (2/2)

The prosaic exclamation drove the heated images from his mind, and Skye settled back onto his pillows with the ghost of a laugh. Looking at her as she bent to pull the covers over him, he couldn't resist saying, ”I said I'd be on my feet today.”

”And I said I'd shoot you!” she snapped.

He didn't mind her temper, but he didn't like her to be worried about him. ”Sweetheart, I know what I'm doing. If I stayed here for a week, I'd be useless for another one. I've been through this before, and-” He broke off, sorry that he'd said that.

She sank down on the edge of the bed, staring at him. Her bottom lip quivered suddenly. ”You don't have any scars,” she whispered.

He took her hand and carried it to his lips briefly. ”No. I don't scar. In a few months you won't be able to find any sign of this wound either.” Trying to get her mind off past injuries, he went on. ”I won't do too much, I promise. I'll get plenty of rest. But I have to get up and move around some.”

Katrina could feel her resolve weakening. Half angrily she said, ”I'm going to call Dr. Randall and see what he says.”

”Fine,” Skye returned promptly.

She was a little suspicious of his quick agreement, but when the doctor examined Skye a couple of hours later, he confirmed what Skye had said.

”Well, you're healing faster than I expected,” he told Skye dryly. ”If you feel well enough to be up and about, go ahead. Just take it slow.”

.Katrina stared at him reproachfully, and Skye held one hand over his bound ribs while he laughed at her.

Later in the day Dane told her that he'd expected it. ”Once he's conscious,” he told her, ”Skye heals fast. And he'd too impatient to stay in bed. If he broke every bone in his body and they put him in a cast head to toe, he'd probably wear roller skates to get around.”

Skye, who was sitting on the couch in the den wearing only a pair of sweat pants, grinned at her. Katrina mentally threw up her hands in surrender, but irritably told Dane, ”You're a lot of help!”

”Sorry.” He smiled at her. Without his mustache, and dressed in the casual dark clothing Skye usually wore, he was the image of his brother. He had even imperceptibly altered his way of moving, and his normally lazy drawl held the more clipped and rapid cadence of Skye's speech.

Katrina had observed those last traits when she had earlier gone to give Gigi a progress report on Skye. Dane had been there with Hagen, and Katrina had made a plausible excuse to draw her friend out of the office. She couldn't have very well told Gigi about Skye's recovery when Hagen had believed the man to be standing right beside him.

”You'll probably be having other visitors today,” Dane told his brother now, not without a certain enjoyment. ”Everybody wants to come and swear at you. I told them you were up to it.”

”Thanks,” Skye said dryly.

Others did come, all of them at some time or other during the day. And if they didn't swear at Skye, they nonetheless made it clear that the next time he was involved in a team effort and decided to play the Lone Ranger, there would be an abundance of people standing in line to express their displeasure.

Meekness was hardly one of Skye's character traits, but by the end of the day he was a bit subdued. Not because of what he'd done, of course, but by the reactions to it. He had never been much of a team player; his professional partners.h.i.+p with Dane stretched back over ten years, but that was far more a blood bond than one of collaboration. He was unaccustomed to people worrying about him, and more than a little surprised by it.

”I hope you aren't going to yell at me,” he told Katrina with some feeling that night.

”They didn't yell.” She was standing by the dresser brus.h.i.+ng her hair, and sent him an amused look over her shoulder. ”But whether you like it or not, they care about you. All of them. And they were right.”

Skye had spent the day very determinedly gaining strength, and as he watched her now he felt familiar stirrings. He forgot about people yelling at him. ”Trina,” he said.

She looked at him again, this time with instant awareness and a certain amount of helplessness. Her knees felt weak all of a sudden, and she was hardly aware of putting the brush down and turning toward the bed. ”You need to rest,” she protested.

”I need you,” he said, and the stark truth of that made his voice ragged.

Katrina came to the bed slowly, her heart pounding. She felt hot and weak, and already conscious of the throbbing emptiness only he could fill. Skye threw the covers back as she reached him, then pulled her down on the bed beside him.

She gasped. ”Your ribs.”

”To h.e.l.l with my ribs.” He was unb.u.t.toning her sleep s.h.i.+rt with the fingers of one hand, but it wasn't quick enough for him, and he pulled his left arm from the sling so he could use that hand as well. Katrtna moaned a wordless protest, but when she met his eyes and saw the fiery hunger there, she stopped trying to make him remember his injuries. That look told her plainly that he didn't give a d.a.m.n whether he hurt himself, because he wanted her right that minute and he wasn't going to wait. She had seen enough of his relentless will by now to know when to stop fighting it.

She helped him get rid of the sleep s.h.i.+rt, and when his hot, hard hands surrounded her b.r.e.a.s.t.s she almost cried out with pleasure. Her body was so attuned to him, so responsive to his urgency, she was Instantly out of control. But some final shred of reason made her try to keep him from moving any more than necessary. And it was a new pleasure to love him as he had so often loved her, to touch and kiss his powerful body with a hunger of her own until he groaned and shuddered.

Skye endured the sweet torment of her touch for as long as he could, but his control quickly shattered, and he lifted her bodily above him, a half-wild cry tearing from his throat. She settled over him with a lithe grace, her cat's eyes gleaming down at him, and when her tight heat surrounded him, he thought he'd go out of his mind with the searing pleasure of it.

”Tell me,” he ordered in a voice that was almost gone, his hard hands on her hips guiding her slow movements.

”I love you,” she said huskily, staring into his narrowed, fiercely Intent eyes. The tension coiling inside her was an agony of suspension, and she almost moaned out the words again and again, whimpering when he quickened the pace and surged beneath her with no awareness of his injuries or any consciousness of pain except the pain of hot desire.

And, as always, there was no slow ascent for either of them, but rather a swift, relentless, shattering climb that hurled them wildly over the brink. She collapsed on his chest with a wordless cry, feeling him shudder and hold her hard as a guttural groan was wrenched from him.

Katrina couldn't move for a long time; even the awareness of his bandages beneath her cheek and a niggling worry about his injuries lacked the power to make her move.

”I love you, Trina,” he said.

She lifted her head and looked at him, and the love glowing in his eyes nearly stopped her heart. ”I love you too,” she whispered, s.h.i.+fting just far enough so she could kiss him. Then, worried, she said, ”Your ribs-”

Arms tightening around her, Skye said, ”To h.e.l.l with my ribs.”

Nine.

Raven opened the door to let Dane into the suite, then led the way into the sitting room where Josh was just hanging up the phone. Looking at their visitor. Josh said, ”Everything set for tomorrow morning?”

Dane nodded and sat down in a chair while Raven joined her husband on the couch. ”No problems, far as I can see. The governor's due to arrive just after the park opens, so the crowd won't be too large. Since all of you and the other people you've planted around the park will be near the Ferris wheel, we shouldn't attract much more than mild interest.”

Josh nodded slightly. ”Everyone's been briefed. They'll have a cover story if any visitors have questions.”

Lifting one eyebrow, Dane said, ”A cover story?”

”We're making a movie,” Raven interjected. She nodded toward a video camera lying nearby on a table. ”Just some preliminary shots, you understand.”

Dane grinned. ”Neat.”

She smiled in return, then said, ”How's Skye? I dropped by Katrina's suite a couple of days ago but didn't stay long. I got the feeling they wanted to be alone.”

Chuckling, Dane said. ”Skye's fine. He could have gone back to being himself three days ago, but when I told him to stay put, he didn't argue. Gigi says she'll have to find another manager for her hotel.” '

”Speaking of Gigi,” Raven said, ”how's she doing?”

Dane eyed her. ”Don't you mean how's your other little plot progressing?” he asked gently.

Josh smiled, but Raven looked innocent. ”Plot? Why, I don't know what you mean.”

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