Times Change (8 page)

As the firelight played over her face, he slipped his hands under the bulky sweater to find her. Her skin brought him images of rose petals, of heated satin. There was trembling as his hand closed over her breast. From her, from him.

With his eyes on hers, and shadows dancing between them, he lowered his mouth once more.

It was like sinking into a dream. Not a soft, misty one, but one full of sound and color. And, as he sank deeper, she wrapped herself around him. Her hands searched as his did, under his sweater, along the ridges of muscles.

As his lips began to roam over her face, she let her eyes close once again. And her heart, always so strong and valiant, was lost.

Love poured into her like a revelation. It left her gasping and clinging. It had her lips heating against his, her body liquefying. Her hands, always capable, slid helplessly down his arms.

Helplessly.

It was that which had her stiffening against him, pulling back, resisting. This couldn’t be love. It was absurd, and dangerous, to think it could be.

“Jacob, stop.”

“Stop?” He closed his teeth, none too gently, over her chin.

“Yes. Stop.”

He could feel the change, the frustrating withdrawal of her while his body was still humming. “Why?”

“Because I . . .”

In a calculated movement, he skimmed his fingers down her spine, playing them over vulnerable nerves. He watched as her eyes glazed and her head fell back, limp. “I want you, Sunny. And you want me.”

“Yes.” What was he doing to her? She lifted a hand in protest, then dropped it weakly and let it rest against his chest. “No. Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Whatever you’re doing.”

She was trembling now, shuddering. Completely vulnerable. He cursed himself. It was a shock to realize that when she was defenseless he was hampered by ethics. “Fine.” He grasped her hips and set her back on the floor.

Shaken, she hugged her knees to her chest. She felt as though she’d been plucked out of a furnace and tossed into ice. “This shouldn’t be happening. And it certainly shouldn’t be happening so fast.”

“It is happening,” he told her. “And it’s foolish to pretend otherwise.”

She glanced up as he rose to feed the fire. The heat still pumped out of the logs. A few of the candles they had left lit were guttering out. Outside the window there was a lessening of the darkness, so dawn had to be breaking beyond the storm. The wind still whooshed at the windows.

She had forgotten all that. All that and more. When she had been in his arms there had been no storm except the one raging inside her. There had been no fire but her own passions. The one promise she had made herself, never to lose control over a man, had been broken.

“It’s easy for you, isn’t it?” she said, with a bitterness that surprised her.

He looked back to study her. No, it wasn’t easy for him. It should be, but it wasn’t. And he was baffled by it. “Why should it be complicated?” The question was as much for himself as for her.

“I don’t make love with strangers.” She sprang to her feet with a fierce wish for coffee and solitude. Leaving him, she marched into the kitchen and plucked a soft drink from the refrigerator. She’d take her caffeine cold.

He waited a moment, going over what the computer had told him. The physical attraction was certainly there. And, as much as he detested the idea, his emotions were involved. It did no good to be angry. She was obviously reacting normally, given the situation. And it was he who was out of step. It was a sobering thought, but one that had to be faced.

But he still wanted her. And now he intended to pursue her. Logically, his success factor would increase if he pursued her in a manner she would expect from a typical twentieth-century man.

Jacob blew out a long breath. He didn’t know precisely what that might entail, but he thought he understood the first step. It was doubtful that much had changed in any millennium.

When he walked into the kitchen, she was staring out the window at the monotonously falling snow. “Sunny.” Oh, it went against the grain. “I apologize.”

“I don’t want your apology.”

Jacob cast his eyes at the ceiling and prayed for patience. “What do you want?”

“Nothing.” It amazed her that she was on the brink of tears. She never cried. She hated it, considered it a weak, embarrassing experience. Sunny always preferred a screaming rage to tears. But she felt tears burning behind her eyes now and stubbornly fought them back. “Just forget it.”

“Forget what happened, or forget the fact that I’m attracted to you?”

“Either or both.” She turned then. Though her eyes were dry, they were overbright, and they made him acutely uncomfortable. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Obviously it does.” It shouldn’t, but there seemed to be nothing he could do to change it. If she kept looking at him like that, he would have to touch her again. In self-defense he stuffed his hands in his pockets. “Maybe we’ve gotten our codes mixed.”

Hurt was temporarily blocked by bafflement. “I don’t—do you mean we got our signals crossed?”

“I suppose.”

Tired all over again, she dragged a hand through her hair. “I doubt it. We’ll just call it a temporary lapse.”

“And do what?”

She wished she knew. “Look, J.T., we’re both adults. All we have to do is act like it.”

“I thought we were.” He tried a smile. “I’m sorry I upset you.”

“It wasn’t completely your fault.” She managed to smile back at him. “Circumstances. We’re alone here, the power’s out. Candle and firelight.” She shrugged and felt miserable. “Anybody could get carried away.”

“If you say so.” He took a step forward. She took a step back. The pursuit, Jacob decided, was going to require strategy. “But I am attracted to you, even without candlelight.”

She started to speak, discovered she didn’t know what she wanted to say and dragged her hands through her hair again. “You should get some sleep. I’m going for more wood.”

“All right. Sunbeam?”

She turned back, shooting him a look of amusement and exasperation at his use of her full name.

“I enjoyed kissing you,” he told her. “Very much.”

Muttering under her breath, she bundled into her coat and escaped outside.

***

The day passed slowly. Sunny might have wished he would sleep longer, but it hardly mattered. Awake or asleep, he was there. As long as he was, he intruded. At times, though she tried to bury herself in her books, she was so painfully aware of him that she nearly groaned.

He read—voraciously, Sunny thought—novel after novel from the bookshelf. Activity was almost completely confined to the living room and the warmth of the fire, which they took turns feeding.

At lunchtime they fell back on cold sandwiches, though she did manage to boil water over the fire for tea. They spoke to each other only when it was impossible not to.

By evening they were both wildly restless, edgy from confinement and from the fact that both of them wondered what the day would have been like if they had spent it under a blanket, together, rather than at opposite ends of the room.

He paced to one window. She paced to another. She poked at the fire. He leafed through yet another book. She went for a bag of cookies. He went for fresh candles.

“Have you ever read this?”

Sunny glanced over. It was the first word they had spoken to each other in an hour. “What?”

“
Jane Eyre.
”

“Oh, sure.” It was a relief to have a conversation again. She handed him the bag of cookies as a peace offering.

“What did you think of it?”

“I always like reading about the mannerisms of an earlier century. They were so stringent and puritanical back then, with all that passion boiling underneath the civilized veneer.”

He had to smile. “Do you think so?”

“Sure. And of course it’s beautifully written, and wonderfully romantic.” She sat with her legs hooked over the arm of a chair, her eyes a little sleepy and her scent—damn her—everywhere. “The plain, penniless girl capturing the heart of the bold, brooding hero.”

He gave her a puzzled look. “That’s romantic?”

“Of course. Then there’s windswept moors and painful tragedy, sacrifice. They did a terrific production of it on PBS a few years ago. Did you see it?”

“No.” He set the book aside, still puzzled. “My mother has a copy at home. She loves to read novels.”

“That’s probably because she needs to relax after being in court all day.”

“Probably.”

“What does your father do?”

“This and that.” Suddenly his family seemed incredibly far away. “He likes to garden.”

“So does mine. Herbs, naturally.” She gestured toward her empty tea cup. “But he putters around with flowers, too. When we were little he grew vegetables right outside the kitchen. It’s practically all we ate, which is why I avoid them now.”

He tried to imagine it and simply couldn’t. “What was it like growing up here?”

“It seemed natural.” She rose idly to poke at the fire, then sat on the couch beside him, forgetting for a moment how restless the storm was making her. “I guess I thought everyone lived like we did, until we went to the city and I saw the lights, the crowds, the buildings. For me, it was as if someone had broken open a kaleidoscope and handed me all the colors. We would always come back here, and that was fine.” With a half yawn, she sank back into the cushions. “But I always wanted to get back to all that noise. Nothing changes much here, and that’s nice, because you can always depend on it. But there’s always something new in the city. I guess I like progress.”

“But you’re here now.”

“A self-imposed penance, in a way.”

“For what?”

She moved her shoulders. “It’s a long story. What about you? Are you a city boy yearning for the peace of the country?”

He glanced deliberately out the window. “No.”

She laughed and patted his hand. “So here we are, two city dwellers stuck in the wilds of the Northwest. Want to play cards?”

His mood brightened instantly. “Poker?”

“You’re on.”

They rose at the same time, bumped, brushed. He took her arm automatically, then held on. He tensed, as she did. It wasn’t possible to do otherwise. It was possible, barely, to prevent himself from lifting his other hand to her face. She’d done nothing to enhance it today. There was no trace of cosmetics. Her mouth, full, pouty, exciting, was naked. With an effort, he brought his eyes from it, and to hers.

“You’re very beautiful, Sunbeam.”

It hurt to breathe. She was terrified to move. “I told you not to call me that.”

“Sometimes it fits. I’ve always thought beauty was just an accident of genes or something accomplished through skill. You make me wonder.”

“You’re a very strange man, Hornblower.”

He smiled a little. “You don’t know the half of it.” He stepped back. “We’d better play cards.”

“Good idea.” She let out a quiet, relieved breath as she took the deck from a drawer. If she had a little time, alone, she might just figure out what it was about him that jolted her system. “Poker by firelight.” She dropped onto the floor. “Now that’s romance.”

He sat opposite her. “Is it?”

“Prepare to lose.”

But he won, consistently, continually, until she began to watch him through narrowed eyes. For lack of anything else, they were playing for cookies, and his pile of chocolate chips kept growing.

“You eat all those you’re going to get fat.”

He merely smiled. “No, I won’t. I have an excellent metabolism.”

“Yeah, I just bet you do.” With a body like that, he’d have to. “Two pair, queens and fours.”

“Mmm.” He set his cards down. “Full house, tens over fives.”

“Sonofa—” She broke off, scowling, as he raked in the chips. “Look, I don’t want to sound like a sore loser, but you’ve won ten out of twelve hands.”

“Must be my lucky night.” He picked up the cards and riffled them.

“Or something.”

He merely lifted a brow at her tone. “Poker is as much a science as physics.”

She snatched up a cookie. “Just deal, Hornblower.”

“Are you going to eat your ante?”

Miffed, she tossed it into the pot. “If I don’t eat several times a day I get cranky.”

“Is that what’s wrong with you?”

“I’m basically a very nice person.”

“No, you’re not.” He grinned as he dealt the cards. “But I like you anyway.”

“I am nice,” she insisted, keeping her face carefully bland when she spotted two aces in her hand. “Ask anybody—except my last two supervisors. Open for two.”

Jacob obliged her by adding his two cookies to the pot. He liked her this way—warily friendly, competitive, relaxed, but ready to pounce on any infraction. He supposed it didn’t hurt that the firelight painted interesting shadows that played over those fabulous cheekbones. He checked himself—and his hand. This seemed as good a time as any to find out more about her.

“What did you do, before you came here to decide to be a lawyer?”

She made a face, then drew three cards. “I sold underwear. Ladies’ lingerie, to be specific.” She glanced up, waiting for the disdain, and was mollified when she didn’t see it. “I have a drawerful of great stuff I got on discount.”

“Oh, really?” He thought about that for a moment, wondering just what her idea of great stuff consisted of.

“Yeah.” She was delighted to see that she’d drawn another ace, but she kept her voice even. “The problem was, this particular supervisor wanted you to take the money, box the silks and keep your mouth shut—even when the customer was making an obvious mistake.”

He tried to imagine her keeping her mouth shut. He couldn’t. “Such as?”

“Such as the pleasantly plump lady who was going to torture herself in a size eight merry widow. Bet three.”

“And raise it two. What happened?”

“Well, you open your mouth to make a gentle suggestion and before you know it you’ve got a pink slip.”

“You’d look nice in pink.”

She giggled and raised him two more. “No . . . a pink slip, the boot, the ax. Canned.” When he still looked puzzled, she elaborated. “Your services are no longer required.”

“Oh. Terminated.”