In the Midnight Rain (23 page)

"You think of everything," she whispered.

"I missed you," he said, kissing her mouth, deep, then her face and her eyes. His hips pressed against hers.

"Me, too." She put her hands around his head, and pulled him to her, kissing him. Then she pushed him over and straddled the straining thrust of his member, pressing herself to it. "Let me show you," she said and wickedly, slowly, unbuttoned her blouse to reveal her breasts, unbound. He made a sound and reached for her as she shucked the shirt off her shoulders, arching her back to press her heat against him below and her breasts into his palms. She cried out when he sat up and hauled her close, trembled at the feel of his hands sliding down her naked back, pushing away the elastic of her skirt and her panties. She sobbed her need when he freed himself and urgently plunged, joining them. The tangle of her clothes, and the rasp of his jeans against her knees only added to the sensations, but nothing, nothing could compare to the taste of his mouth against hers, the restraint of his tongue flickering on her lips as he held himself there, deep inside her. He lifted a hand, groaning as he stayed there. "I love you." He moved and panted the words against her breasts. "I love you, I love you, I love you."

And when the edge of separation was spent and they lay panting and slick with heat and sweat, chests skidding together, he held her tight. "I can't stand this."

She buried her face in his neck and kept back her
weeping, and to stop herself from begging him not to go, she said the only other words she could summon. "I love you," she whispered. It didn't say nearly enough. They were easy words, tossed around for Cokes and shoes. They could never express the swell of light just thinking of him brought to her chest, the pained and joyful depth of it.

He lifted his head and put his hands on her face and kissed her softly, gently, slowly. "We'll find a way," he said.

She let him believe it, just as a thousand generations of women had before her. "Yes," she said. Because she loved him. Because he needed to hear it. Because it would break his heart to know the truth and have to make another choice.

Because she loved him, she would spare him.

12

B
lue spent lunch in a state of restless anticipation, as half-drunk and silly with infatuation as a boy. He'd forgotten how much fun it was. Next to him in the little booth, Ellie smelled of fresh shampoo and coffee. Her thigh rested against his own in perfect innocence and temptation. As she and Doc talked, Blue watched her quicksilver expressions rush over her features. He admired the smoothness of her skin. Thought about twirling a black ringlet around his finger. Mainly, he thought a lot about kissing her.

Trouble was, she was all worried about his reputation. He frowned into his glass of tea. How'd that happen, anyway? He'd have to have a talk with some of the womenfolk around here- In the meantime, he'd just show Miss Ellie Connor he wasn't a dog at all. He was proud of himself for sticking to light drinking at the blues club, and yesterday, he hadn't been tempted to find the bottle even once. So far, nothing terrible had happened.

Outside the restaurant, strolling down the sidewalk back to his truck, he said, "So, you think Binkle might be the guy?"

That faint hesitation. "I don't know. And worse, I have no idea how to find out, without asking people who might have known my mother." She looked a little green at that thought. "I really don't want to do that yet."

He paused on the sidewalk to look at her. "You know, I'm sure all of them would be happy to help you. I'm not sure I understand why you want to keep this so quiet."

She bowed her head. Scratched at a mark on the sidewalk with her toe. "I don't know." She glanced over her shoulder and stepped close to let a woman pass. "It's complicated."

He took her arm and directed her to a quiet bench set beneath a pecan that shaded the cars. "How 'bout here?"

"Maybe I don't—" Her dark brows came down. "It's a lot easier to do this stuff on-line or something. Let me just do it that way."

Blue had never seen her so uncomfortable. Her body was poised on the edge of the bench, her purse held in her lap, her face turned away. There was some deep truth about Ellie Connor in all this. And because he was infatuated, because there was no other person on the planet he'd rather have been with in that moment, he said, "I'd like to hear it from you. On-line is okay, but it's not real life, is it?"

She scowled at him. "You're a pain in the butt, Blue Reynard, you know it?"

He laughed. "Yes, ma'am."

Lacing her fingers together, she sighed and said, "Everybody else in school always had a mom and a dad. It was a little town, nobody got divorced or anything. And there I was, living with my grandparents, and everybody knew my mother had run off and come home pregnant. It was embarrassing."

"You had nothing to do with that."

She made an annoyed sound and gave him a "get real" look. "You've lived here all your life. You know better than that."

He lifted a shoulder in concession.

"It did not
help
that my legal name is Velvet, and every year somebody would find out," she said with an air of long suffering, but he also heard amusement creeping into her voice, "and there would be a few days when everybody went around calling me Velvet Condom." She didn't quite smile, but her nostrils flared.

Blue roared.

"Oh, sure. Go ahead and laugh," she said, but she was grinning.

He forced himself to stop. Put his hand on her arm. "Velvet, huh?"

"It's even worse. Velvet Sunset. How's that for the ultimate hippie name?"

He grinned. "Poor Ellie."

"Yeah, yeah. Anyway, the teasing wasn't that big of a thing. Kids do that, and I sure wasn't the only one. But some of the mothers and teachers felt sorry for me." Her eyes narrowed. "I hated it. Like there was something wrong with me because I couldn't name my father."

She didn't look at him as she talked, and Blue saw a high peach bloom on her cheeks, not a full blush, but a heat of strong emotion anyway. And he understood her self-containment was hard won, understood how threatening it would be to have to reveal too much too fast. "All right," he said. "I get it."

"Do you?"

His smile this time wasn't all that amused. "It wasn't that different for me, Ellie. My daddy shot himself, and I lived in that big old house with my aunt, and they were all just sure I was on the fast track to hell."

"Of course." Now she did look at him, her hazily green eyes deep. Connecting. The little thread of commonality wound around them, pulling them closer, and Blue was glad of that much, anyway.

He stood. "Come on. We've both got work to do today."

As they passed Connie Ewing's shop, he saw Connie, Rosemary, and Alisha eating lunch out of paper bags. He waved.

Rosemary shouted. "Blue, come in here."

He halted on the sidewalk and grinned. "You promise I won't get infected with girl cooties?"

"I don't know," Connie drawled, eyeing him from head to toe. "I might have to tie you down and uh ... give you a haircut."

"Bawdy wench." He grabbed Ellie and held her in front of him, as if to ward them off with one of their persuasion. "I've got my protection today, now. You can't hurt me."

Ellie shook her head, and he suspected she was rolling her eyes in the general direction of Alisha, who grinned.

Low in her ear, so no one else could hear, he told Ellie, "You have one fine rear end, woman."

"Quit," she said briskly, and slapped him away, sliding to safety in a beautician's chair nearby Alisha.

Connie chuckled and patted the seat nearby her with a coy wiggle of her shoulders. He grinned appreciatively when she patted his leg and gave him her most predatory smile, making her eyes tilt in blue splendor. "We've been talking about you, sugar."

"Uh-oh."

"We're going to have a potluck tonight, to put together a photo display for the Fourth of July festival," Rosemary said. "First of all, I want you to get those pictures out you've been promising me for two weeks so we can get them mounted."

He winced. "Sorry. I keep forgetting." He looked to Ellie. "You think you can remind me when we get back to the house?"

She nodded in an oddly grave fashion.

"Second," Rosemary continued, "I want you to fry a big batch of that chicken and bring it over, so you can help."

He glanced at Ellie again, and her eagerness to be included was painfully visible to him. Her eyes pleaded with him silently. "All right," he said, looking at her for a long moment, then back to Rosemary. "I can do that. What time?"

"Sevenish, I guess. Maybe it'll have cooled off by then."

"I'll be there."

"You'll come, too, won't you, Ellie?"

"Sure, if I won't be in the way."

Blue couldn't resist needling her just a tiny bit. "I thought you worked in the evenings."

She blinked slowly, making him think of a cat. "I can make exceptions sometimes."

"Oh, that reminds me," Rosemary said, putting her napkin on the table. "I'll call my sister Florence right now to see if she knows where that diary might be."

"That would be wonderful," Ellie said.

In the truck a few minutes later, Blue put the key in the ignition and paused. "You owe me big, Connor."

She inclined her head. "You're right. And my debt keeps mounting, doesn't it?"

It was his moment to say he could think of ways for her to pay him back, a moment to make some light comment. But he snagged in those big, deep eyes and thought of a little girl in a rhubarb garden, pulling weeds. "Just make sure you spell my name right in the acknowledgments."

"Would that be B-L-U-E?"

"L-A-U-R-E-N-C-E," he replied, and started the truck. A bright swing tune filled the cab, and he reached to turn it up. "I love this."

"I still say it's weird you like swing so much."

He stretched his hand along the back of the seat, preparing to back out, and looked over his shoulder. A stream of cars, diverted from the memorial construction, passed the end of the tailgate. While he waited, Blue said, "My mama loved to dance. This was her favorite, and she used to dance me all over the house."

A genuine smile of wonder bloomed on her face, and Blue thought it was one of the things he liked best about her. She loved life and everything in it. "Can you dance swing?"

"A little," he admitted, "But don't tell any guys, okay?"

She chuckled. "Cross my heart and hope to die."

His thumb lay close to the back of her neck, and a curl hung over the nape, escaped from the prison of the ponytail. He brushed her skin, lightly, musingly. Her reaction surprised him. She glanced down, a pale stain of pink on her chin and ears, and below the thin T-shirt, her nipples rose the faintest bit. Electrifying.

"Ah, Ellie, damn it." With a quick gesture, he threw the truck into gear, wrapped his hand around her neck and kissed her before she could object.

She still tried. He heard the slight, soft yelp and took it in his own throat. Thirty-six hours of thinking about touching her rushed to the nerves in his lips, and down his neck and into his buttocks as their tongues tangled. And in a split second, they were back in that place their first kisses had created, a land of their own, a place he didn't recognize but wanted to stay in. She wasn't coy with him. She opened her mouth and kissed him back with the same kind of hard, deep need he felt himself.

Breathing hard, he lifted his head. "If you really think we're gonna get out of this without falling into bed, you're not the woman I suspect you are."

She closed her eyes, which only made it worse. "I don't know what to say to that."

"Don't say anything. Maybe you should just trust me."

Her smile was soft, but maybe kind of sad. "If I did, I wouldn't be the woman I think I am."

"Touché." He let her go. Put his hands back on the steering wheel. He felt her, all through him, on his mouth and in his belly, and all the way down his spine. God, he'd forgotten how it felt to want somebody so much. "Ellie—" he began, and halted. "I'm not who they say I am."

"I'm not worried about them, Blue."

"Then what?"

She stared straight ahead. Shook her head. Finally lifted a shoulder.

He let it go.

* * *

Rosemary happened to be watching through the windows when Blue kissed Ellie in the cab of his truck. There was a sun glare right down the middle of the windshield, so she saw it happen in pieces. A conversation, then that abrupt, sudden move, and a kiss—Lord have mercy—a kiss to curl your toes.

Behind her, Connie said softly, "Like they'd eat each other up."

"What?" Alisha rushed over, peered out, and swore. "I'll kill him dead if he isn't nice to her."