Moonlight and Shadows (19 page)

“We’ll compromise. Seven.”

“Fine.” She sat back with a small huff,
knowing she’d never win the battle.

“We’re capable of negotiating to a
satisfactory conclusion. That makes nine.”

“Eight.”

“Okay.” He grinned. “See how easy it
is.”

She shook her head, then leveled him with
her steady gaze. “You are not shy. Seven.”

“I’m not shy with you,” he corrected her.
“But you should have seen me on my last blind date. It was a
disaster, bona fide, guaranteed.”

“Blind date?” she questioned, one silky brow
arching.

“Yeah. Smitty set me up with a friend of his
cousin’s. She was a real nice lady, but . . .” He left the word
hanging in air, his gaze suddenly turning thoughtful.

“But?” Lila prompted, curious as all get out
and not even attempting to hide it.

He remained silent for another moment, then
said softly, “But she wasn’t you, Lila. I’d met you only an hour
before I picked her up, and it was already too late. I was already
in over my head. I was already in love. I know that sounds crazy,
but I think sometimes it happens that way. One minute your life is
rolling along like it always does, and the next, someone looks at
you with moonlight in her hair and magic happens. Your heartbeat
quickens, your energy focuses, the rest of the world drops out of
sight, until there’s only the most beautiful woman you’ve ever seen
standing before you and a compulsion older than man to take her and
make her yours. I don’t claim to understand it, but I have to
believe it, because it happened to me once, last September, under
the cottonwood trees in your driveway.”

Lila listened, enraptured, her jealousy
melting away.

“Oh, Jack,” she whispered, reaching across
the table for his hand.

“I like my job,” he said, holding her
fingers in the warmth of his palm, his thumb caressing her skin. Do
you like yours?”

“Yes.”

“Nine.”

“Nine,” she said simultaneously.

The flourish of a cocktail napkin drew their
attention to the waitress.

“Fresh drinks,” she said with a bright
smile. “Is everything okay?”

Lila’s gaze dropped to her plate of
untouched food, and Jack said, “Can you wrap all of this to
go?”

“Uh . . . sure,” the waitress replied.

“Great,” Lila said, scooting away from the
table.

“Could you add something chocolate for
dessert to the order?” Jack asked while he shrugged into his
jacket. “We’ll meet you at the cashier’s desk.”

“Uh . . . sure,” the waitress repeated,
though she looked less than one hundred percent positive.

“Great,” he said with a megawatt smile.

They held hands all the way home, except
when he needed to shift gears, but his hand always came back to
her’s.

He wanted to say something like
Don’t let
me rush you into anything. Or I’ll stay up all night long and come
up with stuff to put on your list, if you like, but it won’t make
any difference. No difference at all in how I feel.

But all he did was hold her hand and try not
to smile himself right off the map.

They carried their dinner into her kitchen,
their hands full. Jack was cruising on “full speed ahead,” but Lila
had turned into all thumbs and nerves. She barely made it to the
counter before her packages slipped away from her.

“Oops.” She lunged for the paper cup full of
guacamole, inadvertently spilling it into her hand and across the
top of another package. “Darn,” she cussed under her breath, and
licked one finger off while reaching for a paper towel.

She didn’t get close to the roll. Warm
masculine hands wrapped around both of her wrists, and while he
helped himself to a long lick of guacamole, he took her other hand
and pressed it to his abdomen.

His eyes burned down into hers, and his
tongue did crazy things to the sensitive skin of her palm, making
it impossible to catch her breath.

“Spicy,” he murmured between licks, and she
could only nod. He released her other hand and pulled his shirt out
of his pants until her fingers nested in soft hair and on hot
skin.

He wasn’t shy, she thought. No shy person
could ever do what he was doing to her, a fact confirmed in her
mind when he sucked her finger into his mouth and sent a flood of
heat pouring down her body. She wanted to kiss him so badly she
ached.

“Jack.” His name whispered from her lips and
her eyes closed on a sigh.

He didn’t disappoint her. His mouth came
down on hers, gentle but insistent, and all-consuming. This was no
mere kiss, but a prelude to loving like they’d shared on Sunday.
With each stroke of his tongue he reminded her of every sweet
thrill to come, of every nuance to be anticipated and enjoyed.

Her hands explored his chest, reveling in
the feel of him, in the memories his body brought back. She moaned
into his mouth and started a chain reaction of sensual magic. His
hands dropped to her hips, and her dress slowly bunched up under
his fingers.

“I missed you,” he murmured between sultry,
drugging kisses.

“You saw me last night,” she eventually
responded, unbuttoning his shirt with unsteady hands. She stretched
up on tiptoe to savor more fully the taste and heat of his mouth,
the skill of his methods. She hadn’t known anyone could put so much
into a kiss.

“I’ve missed you since Sunday,” he broke off
long enough to say, then seared a path down to the pulse point of
her throat while his hand slipped down one thigh and then up the
other.

“Gracious,” she gasped
.

He swung her up into his arms, then carried
her out of the kitchen and down the hall.

“The food—” she started.

“Will keep,” he finished, stepping sideways
through her bedroom door.

He’d seen the room a few times on his way
back and forth from the bathroom, but he’d never lingered overlong
in the hall. It was better to be invited.

Draperies of heavy lace covered the tall
windows. Flowered wallpaper in shades of rose, mauve, and lavender
gave the room a special feminine intimacy and warmth. Jack liked
being there, in the inner sanctum where she dreamed her private
dreams. He liked the scent of her perfume in the air. He looked at
the bed and grinned. He liked knowing she’d tried on half a dozen
outfits before she’d decided on the slinky green dress.

“You’re sweet,” he whispered in her ear, and
stole a kiss, teasing her skin right where he knew he’d get the
maximum effect.

“You’re shameless,” she whispered back,
arching her neck to give him greater access.

“No. I’m in love.”

“Me too.”

His mouth stilled on her skin, and he slowly
lifted his head, a questioning look in his eyes. Lila met his gaze
steadily, knowing she’d already stepped over the line. What had she
found in this man? she wondered. He held her with care, not only in
his arms, but in his heart. He’d been gentle and kind and seductive
. . . so wonderfully seductive, slipping into her life and her
heart with barely a ripple, as if they’d been made for each other
and had only been waiting for the right time, for a harvest moon on
a crisp autumn night, to fill the air with magic. He was the good
man she needed.

“That makes ten, Lila,” he told her.

“That makes ten,” she said with a warm
smile, then pulled his mouth down to hers.

* * *

“He’s
gorgeous
!” Didi exclaimed,
grabbing Lila’s arm. “Aren’t you just full of surprises? Jack
Hudson. Who would have guessed your dyslexic Jack Hudson was the
same Jack Hudson my husband has been talking about all these
months? His diamond in the rough. His ‘some guy out on a farm east
of here doing incredible stuff with steel.’ ” Didi paused for a
rare breath, and her gaze zeroed back in on the two men talking by
the huge sculpture on display in the towering lobby. “Who would
have thought he looked like that?”

“It’s not a farm,” Lila corrected her
friend, a little unnerved by all the attention Jack was receiving
from the female part of the party. With Didi’s husband
, Kevin
, acting as his broker, Jack had
sold his phoenix sculpture to an international manufacturing firm
based in Denver. He’d had the most amazing reaction to it, too, one
Lila was still trying to figure out. “And what do you mean, looks
like that?” she asked. “He looks like everybody else, perfectly
ordinary.”

“Sure, honey.” Didi laughed. “He’s just got
ordinary down in a very sexy, extraordinary way. You should have
told me.”

“Why?” she asked absently, her gaze still
fixed on Jack.

“Because I’ve been worrying about you for
too long not to be informed of every turnabout in your love life.
You keep too much to yourself.”

Lila frowned as she watched a ravishing
redhead sidle up to Jack and actually touch his arm. “What is she
doing?”

“Jealousy. I like that.”

“I’m serious, Didi. What does she think
she’s doing?”

“Only what every woman in the room wants to
do, honey. She’s making her play.”

“And what am I supposed to do about it?” A
tightness crept into her voice, eliciting a pair of raised eyebrows
from her friend.

“Well, the Lila I used to know probably
wouldn’t have done anything except suffer in silence, but I’ve got
a feeling the new Lila is a woman of action.” Didi finished that
sentence without an audience.

Lila made a beeline for Jack, Kevin, the
sculpture, and the redhead. The white dinner jacket with black
slacks was too much. She’d known it the minute he’d slipped the
suit on. No sane woman could resist him in a white dinner
jacket.

Jack caught sight of her heading his way,
and he quickly excused himself from Kevin and the public relations
lady who’d been stalking him all night long. From the look on
Lila’s face, he figured she must have noticed the redhead too. If
she knew how little reason she had to be jealous of anyone, he’d be
putty in her hands. Which, on second thought, didn’t sound like
such a bad idea.

Lord, she looked beautiful tonight. She’d
gotten her hair
to
pile up on top of her head. He couldn’t wait to run his hands
through it and pull it all back down. Her dress should have been
outlawed. Royal blue sequins shimmered down the front, down her
arms, and across the discreet, high-necked collar. They hugged the
slender curves of her hips in unadorned simplicity. But the dress
was very much like the woman who wore it, prim and proper on the
face of it, and wonderfully uninhibited on the other side. There
was no back, not until past the curve of her waist. She wouldn’t
have lasted two minutes in that den of oversexed males called a
university. Fortunately, the older corporate crowd was more subtle,
though hardly less dangerous. He hadn’t taken his eyes off her the
whole night.

“Had enough?” he asked, reaching for her
hand.

His question brought Lila up short even as
his arm drew her near. There it was again, she thought, his amazing
reaction. Danny hadn’t exactly been a media hound, but he’d played
every bit of promotion for all it was worth. Jack, on the other
hand, was more inclined in the other direction. He gave “laid back”
a whole new meaning.

“Well, yes,” she said. “But have you?”

He gave the room a thoughtful glance before
looking back at her. “Yeah,” he said with a grin. “I think the
excitement has worn down enough for me to tear myself away.”

She had to ask. It was driving her crazy not
to know. “Isn’t all this important to you?”

“Sure. It’s great, a thrill, but the hoopla
is almost over and you made a promise to me last week, one I’m
holding you to.”

She couldn’t stop her impish smile, but she
did try for a reproachful tone. “That promise is for tomorrow
morning, and you know I’m not going to back out on you.”

“You’re not going to get a chance,” he
informed her, a sultry light in his eye. “I’ve got plans for you,
woman. Private plans.”

“You’re bad, Jack Hudson,” she whispered,
trying not to giggle. “All these people are here to pay homage to
you, and you’re thinking about—”

“The really important stuff. Are you
packed?”

“I have been for a week, as you very well
know.” They’d been living out of two houses for a month, which was
four weeks longer than Jack had liked.

“Did you remember to put in the black outfit
I bought you?”

“Outfit?” She shot him a scandalized look.
“By no stretch of the imagination is that scrap of black lace an
outfit
. It barely qualifies as a nightie.”

“Right.” He grinned. “We’re going to have
fun.”

“I’ll probably freeze to death,” she said
with a petulance he found particularly endearing on her sweet
mouth. She’d changed into an unmerciful tease over the past weeks,
revealing a playful side he doubted many people had ever seen, and
he loved it.

“Oh, no, honey,” he said softly, pulling her
into his arms and bending his head down to whisper in her ear. “I’m
not going to let you get cold, not even close. We’re probably going
to melt snow down half the Vail valley.”

“We could get arrested,” she murmured,
snuggling up closer.

“Nobody gets arrested on their honeymoon. I
think it’s against the law.”

“So is making love in corporate lobbies,”
she teased.

“We’re not making love.”

“Not yet.”

He stole a quick kiss off her cheek and
almost lingered longer. She smelled so good and felt so soft.

“Lila, honey,” he said, straightening away
from her, but still holding her close. “There is one thing I think
you ought to know before the wedding tomorrow morning.”

“Oh?” She looked up at him, waiting.

“Yeah, well, I can read.”

“Oh.” Another mischievous smile curved her
mouth. “Well, maybe there’s something I ought to tell you.”

“Like what?” he asked, his curiosity
immediately on alert.