Kat Attalla Special Edition (61 page)

"Jake, please." she begged, unable to stand the waiting another second.

Jake caught sight of her shining eyes begging for him to continue, and he could no longer wait himself. He had a burning need to feel her beneath him. Nothing before came close to what he felt with her.

Some last-minute flash of reality brought him back long enough to fumble for his jeans and extract his wallet. Desire and urgency conspired to make him a complete fool. He struggled with the foil packet until Kate let out a frustrated giggle.

"Let me," she said, deftly tearing it along the perforated line and handing it back to him.

"You're pretty good at that," he said, half-accusing, half-teasing.

"Only because chocolate comes in the same kind of foil pouch. If you ever suffered from PMS, you'd know what a talent that can be."

"Oh, Kate. You're priceless." Only she could turn an awkward situation into a cherishing memory.

In seconds he was back, lowering his body over her. Her body tensed slightly, but he was so attuned to her that he noticed it immediately. He paused just long enough to allow her to adjust her position.

"Are you all right now?"

Kate pushed her hips against his and murmured, "Perfect."

She wrapped her arms and legs tightly around his. As their bodies moved together, it was impossible to tell where one ended and the other began. They were one, joined in a white-hot passion that consumed them. She matched his every move as if they were made for each other.

On some basic level she had to trust him. It wasn't possible to lose herself in him so totally if she had any doubts. She gave him everything, with no holding back.

The air seemed to explode around them. Her body gave in to the release and she grabbed on to him while she was rocked with delightful spasms.

Jake closed his eyes. As her muscles closed repeatedly around him, it snapped the last thread of his control. He entered deeply one last time, filling her completely, and gave in to his own long-awaited release.

Perched above her on his elbows, Jake stared deeply into her eyes as both fought to get their breathing under control. He started to lower himself onto the bed, but Kate wrapped her arms around his waist to stop him from moving.

"Not yet."

He flipped over onto his back, pulling Kate on top of him. Long strands of her silky hair fell around his shoulders. She kissed him, then folded her arms on his chest\and laid her head down. "Are you hungry?"

He groaned. "Give me a minute to catch my breath, Kate."

* * * *

She laughed and rolled off of him. Muscles she didn't even know she had, ached. She inhaled deeply, wanting to make a memory of the smells around her.

A peculiar odor tickled her nostrils. "Oh no. The quiche!" she cried out, jumping from the bed.

She grabbed the first thing she could find in the heap of clothes and tossed Jake's shirt around her on her way to the kitchen.

So much for impressing the man with her culinary skills. The quiche Lorraine was harder than Jake's stubborn head. Another two minutes and she might have set off a smoke detector.

"How does peanut butter and jelly sound for breakfast?" she called out. She dumped the quiche, pan and all, into the sink.

Jake had pulled on his jeans and joined her in the kitchen. "Sounds fine."

She reached up to the top shelf of the cabinet for the jelly jar. As the shirt rode up along her thigh and rested on her hip, he saw the mark. He pushed back a fold of the flannel fabric and traced his finger along her long, jagged scar.  "How did you get this?"

She covered his hand and moved it away. "I don't like to talk about it."

"Why?"

"I just don't like discussing it with anybody."

"I'm just anybody, Kate?"

"Of course not," she denied. He had twisted her words until he could hang her with them. If she didn't explain, it would look as if she were only amusing herself with him. She didn't know how to tell him that she considered the subject off limits.

"Then tell me about it." His strong hands spanned her entire waist as he lifted her up to the counter. She squirmed around trying to cover her exposed thighs. After their morning of lovemaking, the gesture seemed childish, so she gave up and wrapped her legs around his hips.

"Now, what were we discussing?" she whispered in his ear, nipping playfully at the lobe to divert his attention.

"The scar, Kate. We were discussing why you don't want to tell me about the scar."

She blew a puff of air at the wisps of hair on her forehead. "Would you believe it's a spy initiation ritual?"

"Give me a straight answer or tell me to mind my own business. If all you want is a sexual relationship, I can deal with that."

She stiffened. "That's not fair."

"Yes, it is. I answer any questions you ask me."

He had been up front from the beginning about his colorful family history. Only she couldn't share things easily. Years of living two separate lives had made her afraid to trust. If she was going to have a normal life, she had to start somewhere. "I was standing too close to a guy with a switchblade."

His eyes narrowed to angry slits. “You mean someone did it on purpose?"

“I'm told I was lucky. He was aiming for my face, but someone pushed me backwards in time." That someone being her bodyguard. She had been warned repeatedly not to mingle in the large crowds following concerts, but she had foolishly believed that nothing would happen to her.

"Did you know the guy?"

"No."

"Out of the clear blue, some guy just stabbed you. Why?"

"He didn't like my music?" Her overly rehearsed line didn't play to an audience of one. At least not this one. "I don't know why. I didn't get a chance to ask him. I woke up in a hospital, and the police had already arrested him."

"No trial?"

Kate shrugged. "Plea-bargained to assault." That didn't stop the gossip magazines from speculating on the true facts of the case. The incident wouldn't have raised an eyebrow if it had happened to Kate Costello. Unfortunately, it happened one evening after a concert in full view of the press and hundreds of fans seeking autographs.

"And that didn't bother you?"

"Hell yes, it bothered me. But they didn't ask me first. That sort of stuff goes on every day in
New York
." She hated discussing the incident because she got upset all over again.

Like most people, Jake had a morbid curiosity, and he had it fixated on this unknown assailant. "How can you live in a place like that?"

"I don't live there any longer. Do I?"

"But you're going back soon."

Kate pulled a jelly jar from the cabinet and slipped off the counter to the floor. "You keep telling me I am. Are you marking the days off on a calendar?"

"What about your work?"

"It doesn't require that I live in
New York
. Like most musicians, I travel when I'm working. Hand me the bread." And get off this subject, she silently added.

"How much time are you talking here?"

"A lot, I guess. I never stopped to figure it out. About six months a year, on and off."

He handed her the bread absently, lost in thought. "Am I missing something, Kate? Why don't I recognize your name? You obviously make a lot of money, so you must be well known."

"You sure are full of questions today."

"So were you earlier, but I didn't avoid them."

She laid the knife on the counter and turned to face him. "Jake. Do you know who Art Tatum or Itzhak Perlman are? Or Sheila Armstrong? Tops in their field, but if you're not into classical, blues, or opera, you wouldn't recognize their names. When you and Chloe start talking about Merle Haggard or Waylon Jennings, I'm completely lost."

"I guess you're right."

His halfhearted concession gave her a temporary reprieve. She knew they would have this conversation again, but perhaps the next time she might be ready to explain more. She didn't know if Jake would be able to separate who she was from what she did. Her mother hadn't been able to.

"Just for the record, Kate. I know who Perlman is. He's the fiddle player who did the credit card commercials."

Kate burst into laughter. "Fiddle player?"

"Violinist. Fiddle player. There's no difference except the money they get paid."

If Jake ever would be ready for the truth, it wouldn't be any time soon. "You really are hung up on the money, Jake. I'm sorry that I get paid well for what I do."

"It doesn't bother me anymore."

"Don't lie. You've mentioned it twice in this conversation alone."

He flashed her that innocent grin of a child who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "I'm conscious of it, I suppose."

"You suppose?" She poked her finger into his shoulder and added, "You think about it whenever we're in the same room."

"I didn't think about it in the bedroom," he denied.

"Well, thank goodness for that."

He folded her hands in his own and pressed them to his lips. "Could we go back there before we have another argument?"

"What about your sandwich?"

"It'll wait." Jake reverted to the same diversionary tactics that he wouldn't let her get away with earlier. And because she wanted to be diverted, she followed him.

Chapter Nine

Jake waited in the parking lot, watching the students file out of the main doors. He must be getting old. He never remembered the girls looking like that when he went to high school. Some of them looked older than Kate, and they made Chloe seem downright babyish. Fifteen going on thirty. Would he ever be ready for this?

He was worried about Chloe, and he figured that since he had to come into town, he would pick her up and spare her the hour-long bus ride. Although she babbled on continuously around Kate, the last few evenings, she'd been quiet and irritable. He hadn't found an opportunity to speak with his daughter about his relationship with Kate, and he wondered if she might be feeling jealous. It seemed unlikely, since she pushed them together at every turn, but she was a female, and, therefore, prone to illogical behavior.

He slouched down in the seat and grinned. If Kate knew he had thought like that, she'd let him have it right between the eyes. He wouldn't consider her a feminist, but she could get on a soapbox when he started in on the differences between the sexes. Sometimes he started up just to get a rise out of her.

A tap on his window gave him a start.  He straightened and pushed the brim of his hat back. He recognized the rusty-haired boy as Tommy Johansson and rolled down the window.

"Chloe ain't here," he said to Jake.

"What?"

"She left early."

Alarm bells exploded in his brain. It wouldn't be the first time her grandmother had removed her from school without his permission in the hope of having her taken away from him. He had left specific instructions with the principal, denying Ruth and Joe permission to take her.

"Was she sick?"

The boy shrugged. "Don't know. Miss Kate picked her up a few hours ago."

Kate! Why would Kate pick her up from school early? His heart pounded against his rib cage. There must have been an accident. Before he jumped to conclusions, he decided he'd better go back to the house and see what happened.

However, when he returned to the house, they weren't there. He tore the desk apart looking for his phone book of emergency numbers. It took him several nervous attempts to dial the correct numbers for the doctor and the hospital, but neither one could give him any information.

By the time they returned to the house a half hour later, reason had deserted him. He watched in a fit of fury while the two girls chatted outside.

Chloe entered the living room, where he'd been hovering over the phone in a state of panic. When she saw him, she froze.

"Where were you today?"

"School," Chloe said nervously, clutching a paper bag in her hands.

He recognized the name of the store printed on the bag as one from the mall. "And after that?"

"Out."

"What's in the bag, Chloe?"

"Stuff."

He held his hand out. "Let me see it."

"No." She ran into the bathroom and locked the door behind her.

His jaw dropped in shock. His daughter had never disobeyed a direct order. He paced around the room, waiting for her to come back out. After five minutes, she still refused to answer his knock, and she turned on the shower to drown out his words.

Jake was livid. If Kate exerted this kind of influence over Chloe, then he would put a stop to it. He stormed across the yard with all the rage of a twister. What did Kate think she was doing? Didn't she understand anything? Only three days earlier he told her not to give Chloe her hand-me-downs, so she went out buying new things instead. He didn't care if she had more money than God, he didn't need charity.