When a Man Loves a Woman (Indigo) (6 page)

Slowly lifting her head, she nodded.

He kissed the right corner of her mouth. “That’s Taylor’s thanks.” He repeated the gesture on the left side. “And that’s from Tyler.” He ran his tongue along the wet seam of her parted lips, probing, searching for entrance inside the warmth of her mouth. “And mine is…”

With agonizing precision and exquisite slowness, his tongue mated with hers, causing her to shiver from an onslaught of buried passion. She desperately tried not to press her body against his. He teased and tantalized until she opened fully. She nearly exploded when his hand closed over her breast, kneading the soft flesh, his thumb circling her nipple until it was taut.

“What are we doing?” Vic breathed faintly, her chin almost touching her chest.

“What we should’ve been doing months ago instead of fighting.” He released one button on her blouse, then another. “Baby, tell me something.”

She stared at his hands for what seemed like a lifetime. This was crazy, she was insane, and he was nuts. From the time of the accident, she’d promised to stay with him and do whatever needed to be done—no matter how long it took—until he recuperated. Nothing more. Their eyes met, hers dilated with desire and need, his narrow and burning. It was her undoing. Like always, his kiss, his touch opened a floodgate of longing, and before she knew it, she’d placed her hand atop his, imploring him to continue.

Unbuttoning the blouse all the way, he released the front clasp of her bra, burying his face in the space between her lush breasts, inhaling. “God, you smell good.” Nuzzling his mouth across one breast, he drew a swollen nipple inside and sucked hard.

“Baptiste,” she moaned in ecstasy.

“Yes,
mon amour
,” he whispered roughly. He loved the thin, pleading way her husky voice called out to him, something she only did in the throes of passion.

She whimpered softly into his mouth. “We can’t. The girls might—”

“You want more?” he rasped, the words coming from deep in his throat. He took her hand and moved it between them to where his erection strained against his pajama bottom.

She softly moaned, stunned at how passion always managed to detonate whenever they where together. “More…”

He pleasured the other nipple with the same adoration.

Her body quivered, and a second later she tried desperately to control the pounding inside her chest. Her hand explored the length of his arousal. It was useless to try and resist this man any longer. The need to be released from an eight-year-long hiatus had her body bubbling with anticipation. Large, strong hands palmed her face, and her mouth was devoured once more with a kiss that produced sheer delirium.

He caught his breath and groaned. No words could ever describe how he loved his woman. He needed to show her. “Go lock the door.”

“Honey, where you?” Tyler called out from her bedroom down the hall.

Vic quickly pulled back and stared at A.J. before her eyes went to the door.

“Oh, Jesus.” Vic scooted away from A.J. “Uh…T-Two, wait right there, baby.” She turned her back to Baptiste, nervously fumbling to right her clothes.

“Gotta feed Harry and Sally, Honey,” Tyler advised.

“Okay, sweetheart. Honey’s coming.”

“Turn around, woman,” A.J. said, chuckling as he scooted toward her. He made a tsking sound, brushing her hands away to take over the task at which she was failing miserably. “You’re doing it wrong, anyway. Didn’t Louise teach you how to dress yourself?”

“Hush, Baptiste.”

His brows bunched together as he wondered why the girls were still up. It was well past eight, and they were usually asleep by seven-thirty. “Who are Harry and Sally?”

“The newest members of the family. I brought them two goldfish this afternoon.”

“Honey?” Taylor called out this time.

A.J. sighed. “T-One, is it an emergency?”

Taylor shouted back. “What’s ’mergency, Daddy?” When she didn’t get an immediate response, she hollered, “That Honey’s new name?”

“Honey will be right there,” he broke off and chuckled before adding, “and you, young lady, should be asleep. You too, T-Two.”

“Honey gotta help feed ’em, Daddy,” Taylor countered.

“I’m coming, pumpkin,” Vic said tensely over her shoulder and swatted Baptiste’s hand away as it inched upward to button her blouse.

“Wait.” He pulled her back to him and swiped her mouth with a kiss. “This discussion isn’t over.”

She nodded and hurried out.

* * *

Thirty minutes later, A.J. stood at the threshold of Taylor and Tyler’s bedroom watching Vic softly sing a lullaby to them as they finally drifted off to sleep. He turned and eased down the hallway, angry with himself. His plan to win Vic’s heart had veered off course earlier. Now wasn’t the time for lust to overrule love. He’d waited too long, had come too far for passion to win out over patience. Yes, he wanted her body, but more than anything, he craved her unconditional love. He’d seriously considered abandoning Zach’s advice about telling Vic he’d offered a reward, but couldn’t take the chance his brother-in-law would inadvertently tell his sister, Moni and…There was no way he’d risk losing her trust. He threw his head back, sighing softly. How was he going to tell her? Vic was a woman who didn’t mince words, and the best way to tell her something was to just come right out and say it.

“Baptiste, what’s wrong?” Vic walked into the dining room ten minutes later and stood behind Baptiste, placing her hands on top of his shoulders.

Looking solemn, A.J. reached to cover her left hand with his. “Sit down, Honey.”

Vic felt his muscles knot beneath her fingers. Concerned, she pulled a chair next to him. “Is everything okay?”

“Honey, I told Zach to offer a reward. Hopefully, if someone knows any information about the person who caused the two accidents, they’ll come forth.”

“A reward?” Vic stared baffled for a moment. “How much did you offer?”

A.J. shook his head. “That’s not important.”

“How much did you offer, Baptiste?”

“Two hundred and fifty.”

It took a moment for her comprehension to kick into gear and suddenly her eyes flared. “You don’t mean thousand, do you, Baptiste?”

He nodded.

“No,” she cried out and shot to her feet. “The accident was my fault. You shouldn’t have to put up that kind of money.”

“Wrong. You didn’t cause the other car to broadside someone else and then rear-end you.”

“I-I need to at least chip in something—”

“No,” he said emphatically.

“Baptiste—”

“Honey, I said no. End of discussion. There’s nothing you can say to make me change my mind.”

“But—”

He stood and walked toward her. With her face cupped between his hands, he gently voiced his refusal again. “No.”

With a warm smile, she wrapped her arms carefully around his waist. “Why not?”

“Three reasons.”

She stared into his eyes, confused. “Three?”

He nodded. “First, somebody hurt you, and whether intentional or not, they didn’t stop to help. Two, Nicole is fighting to stay alive. And three…”

She swallowed hard because she couldn’t fathom what the third reason could be. “And?”

“
Je t’aime
,” he confessed without hesitation.

She turned her head away to hide the tears forming in her eyes and thought she would scream. God, she wanted to find the courage to tell him her greatest fear, but the words simply wouldn’t come. “Please don’t say you love me.”

“
Je t’aime
,” he repeated slowly, nudging her face back around with his mouth.

She quivered when he bent his head, his mouth lowering to hers, lightly touching her lips. When he pulled back, her heart pounded, despite the reasons her mind offered to keep their relationship from going any further. “Baptiste…”

He looked at her, his gaze assessing. “Victoria Louise Bennett, will you let me love you?”

Chapter 6

The moment Baptiste led Vic into his bedroom, she conceded a bitter truth. Her libido had overruled what little logic she had. A shudder raced down her spine, and a chill swept over her despite the seventy-degree heat outside. Goose bumps surfaced on her arms the moment the door closed and the lock clicked.

“This room is our space, Honey,” he said quietly, braced against the door. “Whenever we come in here, the past doesn’t matter.”

Running away from a challenge was something she’d never done in her life—until she met Baptiste. For six days, she’d been in and out of his room so much she could walk through it blindfolded. Now she was ready to bolt, knowing her vulnerability. The defenses she’d erected long ago to protect her heart from another man’s betrayal were in jeopardy of being stripped away one by one.

She didn’t want to fall in love again, yet it was too nerve-wracking to teeter back and forth with the physical attraction that had crackled between them for months. Why not enjoy the moment? When things were over, he could move on, and her heart would remain unscathed. Without saying a word, she turned and looped her arms around his neck. “What’s right is you and me…tonight.”

He placed his hands atop hers. “I beg to differ.”

She whispered in his mouth, “Baptiste, enjoy this moment with me and what we feel for each other without any commitments, okay?”

“I can’t do that, Honey.” He lifted her hands and placed them at her side.

She stepped away, confused. “I-I don’t understand.”

“For the first time since I’ve known you, I’m going to love you. And just so you’ll know, I’m not going to simply enjoy the moment. Never.”

She shook her head. “What are you saying here, Baptiste?”

He moved closer, but didn’t touch her. “I told you before, Honey, I’m not going to settle for a casual affair with you and then go our separate ways afterward.”

“B-But you just said a moment ago you were in love with me, right?”

Smiling, he nodded.

“Well, if a person loves someone, they usually show it physically, right?”

“Usually,” he concurred, lightly stroking his finger along her cheek. “The only problem is that it doesn’t hold true in our case.”

Frustrated, her hands landed on her hips. “And just why not?”

“Because you don’t love me. If I simply wanted a booty call, I could get that anywhere. You’re too precious to me to settle for anything less than your complete love.”

Vic was more baffled now than she was earlier. “B-But you asked if you could love me, right?”

He nodded. “Precisely. I asked if I could love you, not make love. There’s a world of difference.”

“Difference,” she cried out in bewilderment. “How?”

His hand fused with the back of her head. “Let me show you.”

Before she knew what hit her, he wrapped her in his embrace, his mouth swooping down on hers. The feel of his lips was strong, yet ever so gentle. A voice inside her head screamed this was another one of his ploys to make her fall in love with him. The whisper from her heart confirmed he might succeed before all was said and done. The tiny flicks of his tongue against the corners of her mouth caused her arms to inch their way back around his neck. His fingers toyed with her skull, causing her lips to part, and he probed further, sucking away her senses and resistance until she released a moan of pure, unadulterated pleasure.

He stepped back, kicked his slippers off, and tugged at the tail of his tank top.

Vic swallowed hard. “W-What are you doing?”

“Getting ready to go to bed.” He walked over and sat on the edge of the mattress and removed all his clothes except his underwear, then stood again.

Vic’s eyes widened. She blinked once, twice, and a third time before it finally registered.
Oh, Jesus. Black silk bikini briefs?
She didn’t even know such a design existed; she’d been out of circulation too long.

“Are you coming?”

“C-Coming where?” she stuttered in a strangled voice.

Didn’t he just tell her two seconds ago they weren’t going to have sex? She continued to stare, but this time, with appreciation. Muscular, toned, and powerful, his massive physique towered over her. She closed her eyes and held the image. Lord, the man looked good.

“To bed,” he answered softly.

She shook her head to try and clear the confusion and looked down at her clothes before glancing back at him. “Take them off?”

“You can leave them on or off. It doesn’t matter.”

She sucked in a deep breath and tried to steady the trembling of her hands while she undressed down to her underwear. His gaze never left hers.

Their eyes met, and with slow, deliberate steps, he closed the gap between them.

“You’re about to experience what it feels like to be loved by a man. Do you understand?”

Did she understand?
He couldn’t be serious? She hadn’t been able to grasp the meaning of anything they’d done or said the last ten minutes, let alone comprehend the two of them together in his bedroom half-dressed. From the moment they’d laid eyes on each other, they’d fought worst than foes on a battlefield. Yet a bond existed between them that went far beyond the physical. She’d been sucked into a vortex of emotions she hadn’t felt for any man, not even Ron, and would fight to the bitter end not to feel for Baptiste, if it meant protecting her heart.

When he held his hand out to her, she accepted it and followed him around to the right side of the bed. With her mouth ajar, she watched him push back the covers.

“Go on, get in.”

“Whoa, back up here a minute, Baptiste. You just said you didn’t want us to have sex.”

He cleared his throat. “I’m going to set the record straight for you, Honey. We’ll never have sex. And to clarify what I said, earlier, we won’t make love—not tonight, at least.”

Vic simply stared. Did he really expect for them to get in bed together, half-naked, and not wake up in the morning in tangled sheets?

She released a nervous chuckle. “You’re not going to even try to…you know—”

“Nope. I told you what I was going to do. Remember?”

“L-Love me?” she finally managed to say, taking in a deep, shuddering breath, forcing her voice to remain calm.

“Yes. Now go on, woman, climb in.”

A.J. went to the opposite side of the bed and got in. Once he settled his back against a pillow, he held his arms open, and waited.

After a few moments, she cuddled snugly against his right side. “Baptiste, what you said a few moments ago about loving me. W-What did you mean by that?”

“This…”

He devoured her mouth again with a kiss more urgent and scalding than the one they’d just shared. Once she caught her breath, she gazed into his eyes, which smoldered with desire. And he expected her not to go stone-cold crazy after this? No way.

“Now maybe you can relax and go to sleep,” he whispered against her mouth.

Vic started to say something, but suddenly her throat tightened, and her words lodged somewhere in the middle.

Even though she hadn’t uttered a word, he saw the play of emotions skirting across her face and tilted her head back a fraction. “Don’t ever be afraid to share anything with me. What’s discussed between us stays between us. Understand?”

She nodded, blinking back tears. Settling next to him, she thought about the irony of this whole situation. Here she was lying next to the man she’d tried for months to elude in an effort not to fall in love with him. And right now he was the one person in the entire universe who fiercely guarded her worst misery. Anguished emotions seeped down into the marrow in her bones, destroying her vow to never let anyone witness her pain.

She cried long and hard. Years of trying to remain strong and not crack under the pressure, of suffering in silence, of clinging to a painful memory, of trying to heal a broken heart alone, washed down her face in moments.

“B-Baptiste, it was the most painful experience in my life,” she faintly whimpered in a hoarse voice an hour later.

He pulled her closer to the warmth of his body and felt her heart thud wildly against his chest. The tormented anguish in her voice pierced his very soul. “I can’t imagine it would be anything less.” He hesitated for a moment. “Listen, you don’t have to tell me anything else. I realize what you’ve already shared was difficult enough.”

Her head rested next to his heart and she shook it because she’d held the hurt inside long enough, simply too embarrassed to tell anyone.

“Ron and I met right after he’d finished up his residency. I’d wrapped up my nursing clinicals, and we ended up working at the same hospital.” She released a half chuckle. “We actually hit it off from the beginning, and about a year later we got married.”

“Did you ever suspect anything?” he whispered softly, reaching down and lacing their fingers together.

“Nothing that would make me think he was…” After all these years, Vic still couldn’t say the word aloud, and blew out a hard breath. “We’d even talked about starting a family and buying a home. But right after our first anniversary, things started to change.”

“How?”

“He became distant. I-I figured he was stressed because of our financial situation.”

“Your financial situation? I don’t understand.”

Vic shifted to an upright position and faced him. “Ron was trying to get his practice off the ground, so we’d taken out loans for that. Plus, we both had student loans from school, and money was tight. I tried to work as much overtime as I could. I figured it would take some of the pressure off him,” she choked out between sobs.

A.J. reached for her hand again and softly squeezed it. “It’s okay. Settle down,
mon amour,
and take your time.”

“One day,” she managed to say as fine tremors shook her body, “I came home from work and found him in our bed with…” Even after eight years, it was still difficult for her to say out loud that she’d found her husband in bed with another man. “At first, I was so stunned, I didn’t feel anything. Baptiste, I-I just stood there.” Tears appeared again, and this time, she didn’t bother to wipe them away. “I didn’t even go inside. I didn’t yell, I didn’t scream, I didn’t curse. I just turned and ran.” Bowing her head, she gasped for air. “I-I was so hurt…and humiliated.” Scooting backwards, she settled on her haunches. “You know, as close as my mother and I are, I couldn’t even bring myself to tell her.”

“So no one knows the real reason for your divorce?”

She shook her head. “Not even Caitlyn. You’re the only person I’ve ever told. At first, I was too ashamed to tell anybody. Then after some time passed, I didn’t know
what
to tell ’em.”

He shook his head. “I’m not following you,
mon amour
.”

She accepted the tissue A.J. handed her and wiped her face. “What was I supposed to say, Baptiste? That Ron turned to a man because I was working a lot and wasn’t around?”

“What?” A.J.’s voice was perplexed.

“At first, I-I thought it was because I wasn’t there to satisfy him.” Wearily, she shook her head. “To be perfectly honest, I’m still not sure what the real reason was, and that’s what hurts the most. You know, you can accept things better if you understand them.”

He nodded. “Did you ever sit down and talk to Ron after what you saw?”

“Why?” she shouted, focusing on the wall in front of her. “Everything I needed to say to Ron, I said through my divorce attorney.”

“And since then?”

She released a contemptuous chuckle, and pure hate replaced her pain. “As a matter of fact, he called about six months ago. Ain’t that a bitch?” She tore the tissue into shreds. “The no-good son-of-a-bitch. There’s not a whole lot he can say to me at this point.” She lowered her head, embarrassed because she’d never known Baptiste to use profanity. Even in the most stressful situations, she’d never heard him raise his voice or lose his temper. “I’m sorry. I-I didn’t mean to say that.”

“Listen, under the circumstances, I think you have the right to say that and more.”

She sucked in a long breath, and then slowly released it. “Even though we’d always used protection, I was worried sick. For two years,” she emphasized, holding up two fingers, “I got an AIDS test every three months. I didn’t want to take any chances.” Fury burst inside her again. “Nobody should have to go through that. Nobody.” Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes and she screamed, “I should be a mother by now, but instead I got screwed, Baptiste. You hear me? Screwed!”

He shifted to an upright position and held her until her trembling ceased. “I understand that, and you’re right.” He leaned back, cupping her chin until she slowly lifted her head. “Let me ask you something.”

“What?”

“Do you think I’d do what Ron did to you?”

“Baptiste—”

“Yes or no, Honey. Do you?”

“No,” she whispered honestly.

He pulled her to his chest. “Good answer, because that’s one thing you’d never have to worry about.”

“I believe you, Baptiste. I’m just not willing to take the chance of having another man break my heart again for any reason,” she admitted truthfully.

“And that’s why you won’t let yourself fall in love with me?”

She sighed with frustration and pulled away from his embrace. He just wasn’t getting it. She simply couldn’t gamble on believing whispered words of love a second time, the possibility of going through more heartache. This was the closest she’d been to a man’s bed in eight years. Whenever she got desperate, she could always count on a well-made electrical device and six strong Duracells to take the edge off. Even now, she was struggling with releasing the raging pent-up sexual desire inside her while trying to hang on to her heart. And he wanted more? It would never happen.

“Listen, Baptiste—”

“Honey, the answer is simple. Yes or no?”

Vic lowered her head.

He smiled tenderly. “Well?”

“I-I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m scared, Baptiste. I’m scared!”

His smile was shadowed by the darkness of the room. This was more than progress. It was absolute victory. Whether she knew it or not, she’d just let him slip past her safety zone, the invisible boundary she’d established to guard her from hurt, pain, and disappointment. She’d just let down the defenses around her heart and allowed him to touch it. “Look at me and tell me what it is you see.”