Christmas Diamond, a Novella: Inspired by The Jewel series and the Virtues and Valor series (14 page)

Her ring?

Maxine's eyes flew open as memories of the night before flooded her mind. She whipped her head around. The bed next to her was empty, the pillow indented from where her husband's head had recently lain.

Her husband!

Alone in the bedroom, she lifted her left hand and stared. There sat the ridiculously enormous, preposterously expensive platinum ring, encrusted with emeralds and diamonds, that the man with whom she had been engaged for less than two hours before their wedding ceremony had picked out for her. When he slipped it onto her finger, he'd said something about the color of her eyes. Seconds later, he'd kissed her.

After a cursory glance around the room to be certain she was actually alone and the bedroom door was shut, she threw the covers off and rushed to the closet, looking for anything to wear. She grabbed a pair of jeans and a sweater and dashed to the bathroom, shutting and locking the door behind her. She leaned against the closed door for a moment while her heart raced and her mind reeled.

What in the name of all things holy had they done? Rather, what had she done?

With a few flicks of her wrist, she turned the water on for a shower and stopped to look at herself in the mirror. She lifted her fingers to her mouth and traced lips swollen from his kisses. Her green eyes sparkled like the emeralds on her finger. Normally, her olive complexion needed the help of cosmetics to bring out any kind of rosy flush. This morning, however, her cheeks looked rosy, flushed. She felt warm inside despite the morning chill.

In her entire adult life, no other man had ever even so much as kissed her. Not once. Many men had tried to taste her mouth, but whenever they'd gotten close enough, panic would rise up and make her push them away. That typically ended the relationship. The ones who suffered that humiliation soon learned that it wasn't a onetime thing and very quickly gave up trying. As she stepped under the warm spray of water, she thought back to the night before and to her complete lack of fear.

Her husband of less than twelve hours – her husband didn't frighten her at all. When he kissed her, it occurred to her that she felt absolutely none of her normal panic. Instead what she felt was warmth, excitement, attraction. He made her feel safe. He made her feel … loved.

"Husband and wife," the Elvis impersonator had proclaimed with a shimmy and a shake. Then her husband had slowly leaned in close and taken her lips with his strong, masculine mouth as if they were the most delicate rose petals. Her knees had vanished and she felt his arm around her waist holding her up, lifting her, supporting her as she kissed his heavenly mouth.

Then, here, in this hotel suite last night on the very top floor of the Las Vegas casino, her husband had let her lead the way. It was as if he sensed that she needed to be able to control all of the activity. She never had to say anything to him or explain her fear. He just accepted her hesitations or kissed her through them. He slowly coaxed and guided and offered until she accepted. It had been so wonderful, so beautiful, that he had held her to him with her head cradled against his broad, thick chest and his strong arms around her while she wept at the beauty of it.

Her sister was going to kill her.

Reflecting on that for a moment, Maxine realized she didn't much care. She was excited, thrilled. Married!

She quickly finished showering and got dressed. After brushing her teeth and running a comb through her long straight black hair, compliments of her Native American father, she left the bathroom, again comforted by the solitude. Little nervous butterflies woke up in her stomach while she slipped into her shoes, the sight of the enormous ring on her finger distracting her with every motion of her hand.

Stalling, she straightened the bed. As she pulled the coverlet up, her ring caught the light. Running her hand over his pillow she smiled and felt a warm rush of love flow through her heart, quelling the nervous butterflies.

When she could think of nothing else to do, she opened the bedroom door and stepped out into the living room. Seeing him standing there staring out into the sunrise brought back visions of every time she had seen his face in the last three years. She thought of every time she had sketched his face. She could not believe how much had happened in the last three weeks.

The thought stopped her. Three weeks? Had it only been that long since they put her brand new husband's first wife in the ground?

Without turning to look at her, his smooth, baritone voice reached her ears. "Obviously, we need to talk."

Topaz Heat
was a 2012 RONE Award
Nominee
for
Inspirational Novel of the Year
. If you missed
Topaz Heat
, part 3 of
The Jewel Series
, buy it now in Paperback or eBook wherever fine books are sold.

Enjoy this special excerpt from the critically acclaimed full length novel
Topaz Heat
.

SARAH
heard another clang. She quietly set her purse down but held onto the umbrella, holding it just above the handle like a baseball bat. Running lightly on her toes, she crossed the room quickly and stood by the door of the dining room. There were a few more sounds, then the sound of a man whistling that got louder as he got closer.

Taking a deep breath, she raised the umbrella over her head and waited, focused on the door. She let it swing open, watched the figure of the man come out of the dining room, and brought the umbrella down. Hard.

He must have sensed the movement because he ducked and the umbrella hit him across the back of his shoulders. "Ow! Hey!"

In the next second, and utterly without warning, he rolled to the floor and used one of his legs to sweep hers out from under her. She flailed her arms as she landed on her backside, finding herself under his weight. She started struggling, but he threw one of his legs over hers and grabbed her arms in a bone-lock, pinning them up by her head.

"Sarah?"

She realized her eyes were closed. At the sound of his voice they flew open. Immediate recognition prefaced the heat that rushed her face from total embarrassment. "Derrick? What are you doing here?"

"I was about to ask you the same question."

She hadn't seen him in at least five years. No, it was six. He left town right after his mother's funeral. He'd not been back. She got updates from Maxine or Robin each time they'd seen him in New York. She hadn't been to New York and hadn't seen him at all in that space of time. He'd filled out, she thought. His face looked more mature, almost tougher, his shoulders wider.

Derrick was thinking that Sarah hadn't changed at all. She still looked like a teenager. Her hair had come out of its clip and lay spread out around her head on the carpet, the red highlights caught in the curls, catching the light. She still had the spray of freckles across her nose, and her eyes, behind their glasses, still looked exactly like the color of the richest topaz.

Realizing he was staring, he released her instantly, pushed away, and sat next to her. "What in the world did you hit me with?" He reached behind him and gingerly touched the back of his shoulders, wincing when his hand came away smeared in blood.

The only thing he had on was a pair of sweat pants. "My, um, umbrella."

He saw it next to her and grabbed it. It was snapped in half. Irritated anger burned through him. "This? You think there's an intruder and this is what you use to defend yourself?"

She ripped it out of his hands and stood. "It was all I had."

"It never occurred to you to call security?"

Her cheeks flushed bright red. No, it had not occurred to her. She waved her hand as if to dismiss his last statement. "Let me see," she said, moving behind him.

He jerked to his feet. "No, thank you. Don't touch it."

"I promise I won't hurt you, Derrick. I won't even touch it." She put her hands on her hips. "I am a nurse, you know."

She almost withdrew the offer. Then he glared at her before moving to one of the oversized chairs, sitting sideways so she could see his back. The skin across his shoulders was already starting to purple with a bruise, and it looked like something had caught the skin and ripped it. He had a gash about three inches long diagonally across his right shoulder. "Ouch, Derrick. Sorry about that."

Over his left shoulder, just shy of the bruise, was a tattoo of a dragon, done in brilliant colors – turquoise, fuchsia, purple, bright green. She was surprised that it was there, intrigued. He had done everything to get rid of his past, and she wondered why he still had the tattoo. Before she realized it, her fingers were hovering over it, about to touch it.

He looked at her over his shoulder and glared. She bit her lip and gingerly touched the bruise. "You'll want to put some ice on it, and you should let me clean and dress the cut."

She turned to leave. "What are you doing?" he asked.

She was halfway down the hallway before she answered him. "I'll be right back." Moving quickly, she went to the master bathroom and pulled open the medicine cabinet, finding the supplies she needed. She slipped the roll of tape and the package of bandages into her scrubs pocket, then pulled a washcloth out of the linen closet and wet it.

When she returned to the front room, he stared at the brown bottle in her hand suspiciously. "What's that?"

"Hydrogen peroxide."

"Uh huh. And what do you think you're going to do with it?"

With a sigh, she poured some on the cloth and stepped closer. "I'm going to clean the cut."

He hissed the breath between his teeth and cringed away as the cloth came in contact with his skin. "Ouch. That hurts."

"Good Lord, Derrick, quit being such a baby."

He clenched his teeth and swallowed a retort. Then he felt her warm breath blowing on the wound. He imagined her lips puckered as she blew against his fevered skin.

"There, is that better?"

"It's great. Kind of like a carnival ride but without the cotton candy. Thank you."

He heard her moving behind him, heard the sound of the cap going back on the bottle. He felt her fingers graze his skin as she placed a bandage over the cut and taped it to his skin. He tried desperately not to react to her touch in any way, to pretend she was some platonic stranger tending his wound. "You need to ice it. I'll go get some."