Passion's Mistral (4 page)

what it would feel like to discover your child had fallen into a profession upon which most people would

look down. Her own parents thought her chosen work was unseemly as well as sordid. Would they have

disowned her if she had fallen into the squalid world of prostitution?

“Damned right they would have,” Silkie murmured.

She had to admire Mrs. Lynden for wanting to find her son no matter what he did for money. She only

wondered if finding him would be in the woman’s best interest.

Fay Lynden turned over in bed and threw off the covers. A thin film of perspiration dotted her upper lip

and had settled in the creases beneath her breasts. The wash of cool air wafting over her body helped to

ease the heat of passion’s afterglow.

“You’re going to be the death of me, darling,” Fay’s husband muttered as he reached out to stroke her

arm.

A lilting laugh escaped Fay’s arched throat as she threw her head back. “Not until your insurance is paid

up,” she joked.

Bradford Lynden nudged her with his knee. “Wicked woman. Don’t I give you everything you desire as

it is?”

Fay looked over at him. “And don’t I give you everything you desire, you old fart?”

“Old?” Bradford gasped. “I’ll show you who’s old, woman!”

Her eyes wide, Fay tried to shimmy off the bed but her husband caught her around the middle and

launched himself atop her, his straining member stabbing possessively between her legs.

“Help! Rape!” Fay yelled as her husband began tickling her ribs.

“Say it,” Bradford demanded, digging playfully into her sides as she squirmed helplessly beneath him.

“You can’t make me,” she managed to say in between uncontrollable giggling.

“Say it or I’ll keep it up until you get the hiccups again,” Bradford warned.

Fay flung this way and that in the bed but her husband kept her pinioned, his fingers playing up and down

her rib cage.

“Brad, don’t!” she begged but her pleading turned into laughter.

“Say it, woman, and I’ll stop.”

Managing to get her hands on his arms, she shoved with what fading strength she had but Bradford did

not budge. He continued his delicious torment until she shrieked one last time and shouted, “I give! I

give!”

Before his wife could relax from the cessation of his tickling, Bradford Lynden thrust his erect cock into

her and held it there, in as deep as the root would go. He stared down into her lightly lined face and

grinned.

“And?” he questioned, one brow cocked in anticipation.

Fay sighed heavily. “And you can have your way with me.”

And he did, putting both of them through a heated session of passionate love that would have exhausted

a younger couple. Nor did he stop until he was sure he had satisfied his lady.

Long into the night as the plane carrying the Heartland private investigator to the exclusive resort began

its descent to Mistral Cay, Fay lay beside her sleeping husband and thanked the gods she had a man

such as Bradford Lynden.

Now all she needed was her son to make life complete once more.

A single hitch of breath came from her as she thought of the little boy who had been torn from her arms

that day over thirty years before. Her wild cries, her struggles, had not moved the government officials

who had come to take her child away. Her last sight of the son she had named Patrick was his little

face—scrunched up in a horrific howl—as the social worker buckled him in the car seat. She would

never forget his little outstretched arms, his tiny fists beating against the glass as he was driven out of her

life.

Prison had been only a minor circle of hell for Fay O’Reilly. Her true punishment had been the absence

of her little boy and the torture of not knowing if he was alive or dead, of wondering if he was being

cared for and loved, if he was being abused. The most terrible day of her life had been the day she

learned her precious child had been adopted by some nameless family and would never know her as the

woman who had given him birth and who loved him still more than life itself.

“It’s the best thing for him,” the social worker sniffed, “and I’m sure you want the best for the boy.”

As the years passed, her son’s memory remained bright and clear in her mind and the determination to

find him once she had served her time never wavered. She wrote him everyday even though she knew

her letters would never be forwarded to the family who had adopted him. In those letters she poured out

her soul, explained how and why she had wound up in the nightmarish prison that kept her from him,

begged his forgiveness for what she had been forced to do.

On the day she was allowed to go free, she had stood outside the prison gates in the pouring rain, her

face to the heavens, tears mingling with the raindrops and vowed that no matter what it took nor how

long, she would find her son, now a grown man.

Trudging down the interstate highway, cheap suitcase containing all her worldly possessions clutched in

her cold hand, she had passed the sign warning motorists not to pick up hitchhikers. Resolved to walk all

the way to the next town, she had been surprised when the expensive white Lincoln town car’s brake

lights came on and it pulled off the slab just ahead of her. Cautiously approaching the idling car, she had

flinched as the front passenger door swung open as she drew near.

He was leaning down in the seat so he could see her beneath the barrier of the door opening. “Hop in,”

he said. “You’ll catch your death of cold out there!”

There was something very warm and non-threatening in his open face. He was smiling at her in a way no

man had in a long, long time.

“Can’t you read, Mister?” she had asked, nudging her chin toward the sign warning motorists not to pick

up hitchhikers.

“Yes, I can,” he replied. “And I can do math, too. Been able to since I was knee high to a possum’s

belly.”

Watching his infectious grin widen, she had thrown any reservations she might have had to the blowing

rain and had accepted the ride, never once regretting her decision.

“Where you headed?” he inquired as he pulled the car onto the interstate.

“You can drop me wherever is convenient for you. I got nowhere to go and no time to get there.”

“Done your time and don’t have to worry about a parole officer, huh?” he asked.

Fay O’Reilly had stared at the middle-aged man behind the wheel. “How’d you know I—”

“The Correctional Institute for Women is back there,” the man interrupted, jerking his thumb over his

shoulder. “I imagine that’s where you were.”

“Do you make it a habit to pick up ex-cons?” she snapped.

“Only ones who look like cute little wet puppies,” he responded, glancing over at her. “You give new

meaning to having a bad hair day, little lady.”

Fay turned her attention to the front of the car, staring out the windshield at the rain lashing against the

glass. Eastward, lightning flared in the sky. As grateful as she was to be inside the warm car, she was

suspicious of her companion.

“My name is Bradford Lynden,” the driver said. “I live in Altoona but I’m on my way to Davenport for a

meeting.”

“Fay O’Reilly,” she supplied. “Davenport sounds good.”

Her companion was quiet for a moment then cleared his throat. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him

gripping the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles had bled of color.

“Look here,” he said, clearing his throat before he continued. “If you need some money to help you—”

“That’s what I figured!” Fay hissed. “Just pull over and let me out right now!”

She saw his head swivel toward her. “Ma’am, I think you misunderstood me,” he said quickly.

“Stop the damned car and let me out!” she shouted.

Lynden put on his turn signal and slid cautiously onto the breakdown lane. He glanced in the rearview

mirror as he braked then put on his emergency blinkers. Even before the car stopped moving, Fay was

fumbling at the door handle.

“Now, wait just a minute!” Lynden growled, reaching for Fay’s arm. Her response to his touch stunned

them both—the crack of her palm meeting his face echoed through the car.

The fiery red handprint on her companion’s left cheek could be seen clearly even in the dismal light cast

from the storm. As rivulets of water cascaded down the windshield, thunder rumbled overhead and

lightning flared around them, the wind buffeted the idling car, rocking it as traffic skirled by on the

superhighway. It seemed the bottom had fallen out of the sky for the volume of the rain suddenly

increased.

“You know I believe we’re on the edge of a wall cloud,” Lynden said in an uneasy voice.

Fay blinked. “A tornado?”

“Just listen,” he said.

Off in the distance, there was a low droning sound that might well be coming from the train tracks running

parallel to the interstate. Driver and passenger looked at one another.

“We’re not that far from an overpass,” Lynden said. “I believe we’d better make for it.”

Nodding her acceptance, Fay kept her fingers wrapped around the door handle as her companion eased

the town car back onto the highway. She realized he hadn’t turned off the emergency blinkers and that

his face was strained in the glow from the dashboard lights.

“I don’t like bad weather,” Fay commented.

“It’s all right as long as you’re inside a sturdy building,” Lynden stated, “but I don’t care for it at all when

I’m out driving in it.”

The rhythmic slap of the windshield wipers was so fast their movement was giving Fay a queasy feeling as

she tried to peer out the glass. There was limited visibility and the flare of lightning pulses further obscured

the highway.

“The overpass should be just up ahead. Let’s hope nobody else is parked under it,” Lynden said.

The droning sound was getting louder, the rumble of a runaway train coming at them from the south side

of the interstate.

“Hurry,” Fay said.

Barely able to see the lane in which he was driving, Lynden hunched over the steering wheel and reached

up to wipe away the condensation that was forming on the windshield. He glanced at his passenger when

she slid toward him and used the sleeve of her blouse to help clear the fogged area.

Fay could feel the car shuddering beneath her rump. The wind was shrieking so loudly she couldn’t hear

her companion’s words but she realized he was pointing toward a dark shape just up ahead. She

nodded.

One moment they were rolling to a stop beneath the overpass, the next Bradford Lynden was shoving

her out the passenger door, scurrying after her then pulling her with him up the concrete incline and under

the soaring rafters. Wind and flying debris were pummeling them, stinging their flesh and blinding them as

they climbed as high as the concrete slope would allow. A deafening roar drowned out any other sound

as Lynden pulled her head against his chest, arched his upper body over hers and wrapped his legs

around her hips. Wedged tightly into the triangular section of concrete between the bridge overhead and

the incline, she held onto his waist with all her might while he wrapped his arms around the steel girder

above them.

For what seemed like an eternity, the train engine sound of the tornado—the shrill flute of its

movement—traveled the length of the overpass. The girders hummed, the concrete sang and the

accompanying music of flying debris chimed in harmony with the plaintive voice of the fierce, deadly

wind. Fay kept her eyes tightly closed, her arms squeezing the breath from Bradford Lynden, her cheek

pressed to his chest where she could hear the wild beat of his heart as he strained to keep them attached

to the girder.

Bradford’s legs were trembling as he anchored the slim woman to him. He felt as though he was being

drawn and quartered—the wind pulling at him, straining his arms, trying to suck the two of them away

from their hiding place. Something had struck the back of his head and he could feel the warmth of his

blood oozing down his neck. By the time the howl of the wind had died down to a fading rumble to the

north of them, Bradford was unconscious, the loss of blood having taken its toll, but his legs were locked

around Fay O’Reilly’s hips, keeping her safe.

As he had kept her safe for four years now, she thought as she wedged herself against his sleeping body.

Even in sleep, he reached out to put an arm around her, anchoring her securely to him.

“We’ll find your boy, darlin’,” Bradford had promised and over the years had done everything he could

to keep that vow.

Rich beyond Fay’s wildest dreams, powerful as any state politician could ever be, her transplanted

Alabama boy had provided her with wealth and position, a stunning home and happiness that knew no

boundaries.

If now and again her pretty face turned sad and quietness settled over her normally buoyant personality,

Bradford understood and held his arms out to her. And if she turned morose and introspective,

concerned her past would somehow harm this wonderful, supportive man would get down and dirty with

tickling fingers and pounding cock that would take his lady’s mind from her troubles.

At least for a little while.

“I love you, Bradford Lynden,” Fay whispered against her husband’s throat.

“I love you, too,” Bradford mumbled.

“They’re gonna find him, Brad.”

“Yes, they are.”

“What if he won’t…?”

“Don’t borrow trouble, Fay-Fay,” her husband said.