" I"m sorry. "
He shrugged. "" S"okay. I was about to turn in myself. "
For along while, then, she didn"t say anything, while her eyes seemed to search every inch of his face-seemed, because they were only dark smudges in the dim light and he couldn"t read their expression. In a way, he was glad. Finally she looked away distractedly, jamming her hand through her hair in a gesture he was beginning to recognize as a sure sign of self-consciousness.
"So," she said, with a small and careful throat-clearing, " " how did it, uh. go? Is everything all right? "
"Yeah," said Doug. Then amended with a quick shrug, "Well-in a manner of speaking. You know."
"Oh. Right. Sorry." She touched his hair, suddenly and impulsively, catching her breath as she said, "You"re wet."
"Yeah." He smiled, but it felt awkward. "It"s really coming down out there."
"You must be cold," she whispered, staring at his naked chest as if she could see that his heart was beating a mile a minute inside it. Her mouth seemed blurred. impossibly lush.
"No... not that cold: Hot. On fire. Burning up inside. He suddenly felt parched, as if he were dying of thint and her mouth was a sweet-water oasis.
And then, once again, there was silence, a silence as tense and fraught with inevitability as a launch pad the last few seconds before blast-off.
He felt Joy"s hand on his chest, a touch as cool and healing as a blessing. His hand lay on the gentle join of her neck and shoulder, but it seemed a tremendous weight, too heavy for him to move. From somewhere, though, came the strength to bring his other hand to bear on her roving fingers , to corral them, hold them prisoner right over his rampaging heart, and to croak her name in feeble protest.
But perhaps it wasn"t strength, after all, but only the gravest folly. Because it felt so good to him to have her touch him like that. So incredibly, unbelievably good. The pleasure of it pierced him like a bullet, shattering his resolve all to smithereens. Instead of confining her hand, he found himself caressing it, making love to it the way he wanted to make love to all of her, stroking the delicate fan of tendons with his fingertips, then dipping into the sensitive valleys between her fingers. using his thumb to probe the warm, moist hollow of her palm in slow, sensual circles.
There was a moment when he heard her swallow, felt her tremble. just the tiniest spark, the barest flickering of reason. But it was too late-the rocket was leaving the launching pad, and the shock-wave generated by its lift-off snuffed out what was left of his convictions. He wasn"t even aware of closing the distance between them at last. like a thirst-crazed wanderer plunging face-first into a life-giving spring, he was aware only of the sweet, blessed taste of her mouth.
His lips were rain-cooled and smooth, the kiss so light, so very gentle. Before, when he"d kissed her, Mary had thought her biggest fear was that he might never kiss her again. Now she knew she"d been wrong. This was a miracle-this man, the way he made her feel. She" dthought such a thing could never happen to her. To lose such a miracle-to have it and then lose it-that would be agony too terrible to bear. But oh, how tenuous, how fragile, how achingly lovely it was. like a bubble balanced on the tip of a finger, shimmering with all the colors of the rainbow. A breath, a blink. and it would be gone.
Afraid of risking more, afraid of bursting the bubble, she caught just a tiny sip of air, holding herself motionless except for the trembling she couldn"t control. Her throat ached so; she felt as if her chest might burst. Her eyelids came down on warm pools of tears; thus displaced, they ran in cooling trails down her cheeks to mingle their salt with the sweetness of the kiss.
She knew he must taste her tears. Oh, G.o.d, what would he think?
But he made only a small, interrogative sound, less a question, really, than an acceptance. Hmm. so that"s the way it is with this woman.
His acceptance seemed to her like a gift; she felt encouraged by it, emboldened. She moved her lips, tasting his. Neither guided nor impeded by the fact that he was holding it, her hand crept over his chest, fingers weaving upward through the thicket of his chest hair. When it reached the smooth, warm ridge of his shoulder, he pressed it briefly against him, then left it to explore farther where it would.
And yes, oh, yes. it would. Released and validated, her hand was free at last to touch and explore as it had wanted to do for so long. What exquisite pleasure it was, just to touch him. Every nerve ending was super-sensitized; her fingers seemed to burn. Up, up they rode along the taut cords of his neck, not hurrying, pausing to measure his pulse, thrilling to the power and urgency in it, tracing the hard line of his jaw, rasping over the day"s growth of beard and coming finally to the place where their lips met. Her fingers trembled; she uttered a tiny wordless whimper of purest joy It was as if he"d been waiting for such a signal. He made a sound of his own, born of similar needs but wholly masculine in timbre, and slipped his hand around the back of her neck. The kiss grew warm, liquid. It poured into her like honey, like melted sunshine, filling up that brand-new emptiness inside her.
So this is it, she thought. This is what it feels like. This is what Belle felt like. And she shuddered, because it was so much more precious than she"d ever dreamed, and she was so desperately afraid that, like Belle, she was going to lose it.
"Joy..." Her name was a groan that seemed torn from the deepest part of him; breathed into her open mouth it went straight to the deepest part of her.
She"d been so caught up in her own sensations, her own emotions, she hadn"t felt the heat and tension in him, the quivering restraint in his hands. Poor MacDougal, she thought, aching for him now, for the struggle she knew she must be putting him through. In a way she even wished she had the strength of character to stop it, but she knew she didn"t. She was too selfish, too hungry, and she wanted this too much.
"I"m sorry," she whispered against his lips. "I"m sorry...."
"What for?" He pulled her face from his as if it cost him a tremendous effort and held it cradled between his two hands, brushing away the residue of her tears with his thumbs.
She could only look at him. iVhatfor? For wanting you For loving you. But most of all. "Joy? What is it? If you don"t-"
With a sharp sound of frustration and longing she reached for him, took his face in her hands and pulled it toward her and kissed him. I don"t care, she thought-though it was more like a prayer. I want this. Even if it"s all I ever have of love. Please, G.o.d. I want this.
In an instant the melting warmth became molten, a cauldron , a volcano. He made a sound low in his throat, a guttural cry that was response at the most fundamental level, primitive male, raw and unreasoning. And though it was a sound she"d never heard before, something in the depths of Mary"s being thrilled to it, like a she-wolf rising to her mate"s call echoing across a cold, moonlit plain. She opened to him with a fierce, primal joy, plunged into the cauldron with total trust and complete abandon. Her body arched toward him, taut and trembling. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, her nipples, every nerve felt charged, electrified. waiting for his touch.
And then his hands-those big, strong hands she loved were pushing impatiently under the long tails of her shirt, fitting themselves first to her waist, but only briefly, as if to establish coordinates before venturing upward again. On they skimmed, lightly, shivering her skin to roughness, to find her aching b.r.e.a.s.t.s at last. His palms cradled and measured them, warmly nested them, oh, so gently kneading. And-it felt so good. so good.
She tore her mouth free, laughing with relief and the most exquisite delight she"d ever known. She kissed his jaw, his ear, the side of his neck, the cove above his collarbone, then joyously threw back her head to give his mouth access to her arched throat and the deep-plunging V of her shirt.
MacDougal wasn"t content with such limits, not for long. But being MacDougal, he didn"t tear the shirt open or thrust it roughly up under her chin, but instead dealt with the but tons one by one in heart-stopping suspense, then oh so gently, and with an expression of profound wonder, drew the two sides apart and pushed them up and over the tops of her shoulders. and down her arms. Even then he didn"t take what lay open in wholehearted offering to him, but slowly raised his eyes to her face, almost as if he were asking Her heart seemed to burst, flooding her with tenderness. Laughing and dizzy, she pulled his head to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and cradled it there, kissing his hair, burying her face in it, measuring its length on the back of his neck with stroking fingers. With a great sigh he put his arms around her and drew her close against him, wrapping her in the incredible heat and power of his body. And she thought, this is all I"ve ever wanted. Please. let me have this man forever.
Slowly, he laid her down, supporting her weight with his arms while he kissed her throat, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, each nipple . nursing them to softness in the liquid warmth of his mouth, teasing them hard again with his tongue. She floated on waves of sensation, breathing in quick, shallow breaths as his mouth skimmed downward, lingering to kiss a healing scratch, probe the shallow cup of her navel, gauge the nerve-flutters in her taut belly.
Those infinitesimal betrayals of the tension in her seemed to give him pause. She sensed that there was. not a cooling of the fire inside him, exactly; it was as if the coals had been carefully banked, so as to burn even hotter and last alonger time. His kisses grew languid, his stroking sensual and slow. She began to feel it deep inside her and to move to its sultry rhythms, to the pulses that throbbed in every part of her, like primitive drums. They filled her mind completely; she couldn"t think at all, only feel She hadn"t thought it possible to feel-for any human body to feel-such sensations. And at the same time she wondered how on earth she had endured living so long without them. Without him. This man-this MacDougal. It was as if she had no consciousness at all, as if nothing in the world mattered except him, except now, this moment. Nothing that had happened in her life before this moment was of any consequence; beyond this she had no existence at all. His body, his mouth, his hands, were her universe. He was . everything.
Dimly, she felt him ease her underpants over her hips, felt the heat of his mouth on the mound at the juncture of her thighs. She gasped, electricity curling through her from the soles of her feet to the roots of her hair. but her legs parted of their own accord.
His thumbs gently opened her; his tongue pushed between her protective folds and found the sensitive place they guarded. A shaft of pure sensation, silvery and bright as a sword, pierced her to the very core of her being, and she writhed away from him with a low, frightened cry.
Instantly he slid up over her body, holding his weight away from her while he kissed her. "It"s all right," he whispered against her mouth. "Shh-it"s okay. I won"t if you don"t want"
She shook her head rapidly, urgently. "It"s not that. It"s too much. I can"t-"
He kissed her again so she could feel his rueful smile. "Honey, I know. But I"m not sure how long I can hold on. I just wanted you to"
Again she shook her head, almost panic-stricken. She understood what he meant, what he wanted to give her, but there was something more important, something she wanted more. Something she desperately needed. She didn"t even fully understand it, but she felt so terribly empty. incomplete. as if the most vital part of her entire being was missing. The pain of her incompleteness was sharp and raw, as if the wound was new.
"It doesn"t matter," she gasped. "I don"t care-I just want you Please..." She m.u.f.fled the plea in his mouth. Her hands sought his belt buckle.
"Joy" He broke from her like a drowning man gasping for air. His voice sounded husky and pained. "Just a minute-I have to-I just remembered something. Be right back."
And just like that, he left her.
In the bathroom, Doug yanked open the medicine cabinet and scanned the contents with an avid ness born of utter futility. Then he closed it again carefully, gripped the edge of the sink and leaned on his hands, closing his eyes against the unforgiving brightness of the light.
Nothing. He had nothing. Why would he? He"d never had a woman here. Never in his life had he felt such frustration and disappointment. It hurt. It actually hurt physically And it was still nothing compared to what he was going to have to do next, which was go back in there and tell Joy "It"s not going to happen, is it? Between us..."
She was there in the doorway, leaning against the frame. She"d pulled the shirt around her but hadn"t b.u.t.toned it, yust held it together more or less in place with her folded arms. Doug swiveled his head enough to look at her, but didn"t straighten up or turn around; he felt stiff and achy in every muscle and joint and sinew.
"Not tonight: He didn"t bother to clear the ton of gravel from his throat. " I don"t have a thing. I"m sorry. " He could see the protest forming in her eyes and silenced it with a single upraised finger before she could open her mouth. " Look I"m a cop. n.o.body knows better than I do what the risks are: He turned back to the mirror and growled, "I won"t. I can"t. I"m sorry."
There was . a little silence, one that seemed to scream with unvoiced anguish and frustration. Then Joy cleared her throat and in a very low voice said, "You probably won"t believe me, but for what it"s worth, I haven"t been with anybody since high school. And I"ve never done drugs , so.. "
He jerked himself around, vibrating like an out-of balance wheel. She wasn"t looking at him, she was staring down at the floor, and her face, except for the blossoms of embana.s.sment in her cheeks, was deathly pale.
"Joy," he said, and was amazed at how much it hurt his throat to speak. He tried it again, whispering, and that was better. "Joy, I do believe you: But she still wouldn"t look at him, and he wanted her to. He wanted her to know, to see in his face and his eyes what he couldn"t allow himself to tell her until after this whole b.l.o.o.d.y mess was over. " "Hey..." he demanded harshly, "look at me."
Then all at once she did, and he wasn"t sure he was going to be able to survive it. Her chin came up and her eyes were glowing like old brandy, but her mouth looked soft and bruised, like ovenipe fruit. That combination of fight and vulnerability-it got to him every time. "Joy," he said huskily, in a voice that shook with entreaty, "of course I believe you. Dammit, don"t you understand? It"s you I"m trying to protect."
Her face lost all remaining color. "You don"t mean you"
He shook his head and drove a distracted hand through his hair. " " For Pete"s sake, Joy, a long time before there was AIDS there was another good reason for using condoms. "
"Oh: It was a soft little intake of breath. The expression on her face was indecipherable and to Doug, utterly mystifying. She looked at him for along time, and although he could almost see the wheels turning inside her head, he couldn"t for the life of him interpret what she was trying to say to him with her eyes. He watched, helplessly in suspense, while she struggled with it, and then, just when he thought she wasn"t going to take a shot at telling him at all, she cleared her throat and said, " "But what if"
"Cops! Hide the stuff! It"s a raid!"
"Jeez-Maurice." Nerves jangling, Doug began to swear vehemently. The bird did have the worst possible timing.
Then all at once he froze. Joy had uttered a squeak of nervous laughter; he held up a hand and put his finger to his lips to silence her, then dove past her and hit the light switch. He listened, ears straining, but all he could hear was the rain. " " Raid! Raid! Hide the stuff! "
"What-"
"Hush-someone"s out there." Doug had already s.n.a.t.c.hed his gun and belt off the towel rack. Now he grabbed Joy"s arm and shoved her bodily through the door.
"Let"s go-keep down, away from the windows. Move, move. "
On the way through his darkened bedroom he s.n.a.t.c.hed an armful of clothing from the pile on the chair, hoping and praying it was the jacket and shirt he"d just taken off, or at least something like it. Thank G.o.d, he thought, that things hadn"t gone any further than they had-at least he still had his pants and shoes on.
In the hallway he felt Joy"s hesitation. " " Forget the d.a.m.n cat," he growled. " I. et"s go-and for G.o.d"s sake, keep down. " He stopped dead in the living room doorway and threw out an arm like a barricade. " "Listen. Look there... : "
Even in the darkness Maurice"s cage was plainly visible, silhouetted against the lighter rectangle of the window. So was Maurice. And even in silhouette it was plain to see that he was staring intently at the front door.
Doug could see it, too, now, gleaming dully in the reflected light from the window. The doork.n.o.b was slowly turning.
Chapter 12.
From the way Joy"s arm had suddenly tensed in his grasp he knew she"d seen it, too, and silently blessed the instincts that kept her silent. Although the fact was, with the racket Maurice was making, it was unlikely anybody would have heard even if she"d screamed b.l.o.o.d.y murder. So while he was sending up thank-you-G.o.ds, he adcqed an especially heartfelt one for the providence-or preoccupation-that had made him forget to cover Maurice"s cage tonight.
After that, there wasn"t much time for any kind of thinking "Kitchen," he hissed, and gave Joy"s arm a yank, aiming her in the right direction.
Since he expected in the next instant to have his front door bang open and then to die in a burst of machine-gun fire, he knew it must be pure adrenaline that carried him, with Joy in tow, through the house and out the kitchen door. And it was gratifying to discover that he could move so quickly, even pushing forty.
But while he was running headlong down the backstairs he felt a surge of something that was much more than just adrenaline rush. It was part exhilaration, part rage, and a primitive, purely instinctive call to battle. What was he doing , dammit? He was a cop, he wasn"t supposed to run away from the bad guys!
But of course that was crazy thinking. First, there was Joy. He was responsible for keeping her alive-that was his number-one priority-and he still had a vivid memory of that arch of bullet holes across the front of her house in San Diego, and the sound of the machine-gun barrage that had almost killed her. And while he"d have given just about anything to know who was on the other side of his front door right now, he also knew that this was no time to be playing cops and robbers without any backup. No doubt about it, these guys meant business. And why not? he thought grimly. If what he suspected was true, somebody had an awful lot to lose.
Going through the laundry room, Joy pulled loose from his grasp. "Clothes," she gasped. "I don"t... have anything "
He grabbed his raincoat and tossed it to her. " " Here-put this around you: While she was doing that, he took the moment to buckle on his gun belt. Then, thinking of her jeans, he s.n.a.t.c.hed them out of the dryer, rolled them up and added them to the bundle of clothing already tucked under his arm. "Come on," he rasped, taking a good grip on her elbow, "" let"s get out of here. You can put "em on in the car "
The garage was damp and cold; the rain seemed closer, louder, wetter. Doug heard Joy"s sharp hiss as her feet touched the bare concrete floor and remembered belatedly that she wasn"t wearing shoes, either.
Ah, well, it couldn"t be helped. And it wasn"t all that important , considering the fact that in a very few minutes, depending on what was waiting for them outside that garage door, they would very likely be dead, anyway.
He opened the car"s back door and half helped, half shoved Joy inside. "Don"t shut it," he growled at her. "Wait until the last minute."
His keys were already in his hand. He slid in behind the wheel, stuck the key in the ignition and turned it, then counted the longest eight seconds of his life until the coil heater light went out. He turned the key farther and the engine fired. " " Old Faithful, " he muttered to himself in grat.i.tude, thinking about what Joy had said about naming the old car. Why not? Old and faithful she truly was, even if a little slow and creaky on the hills.
"Get down," he snapped at Joy, who had hitched herself up to look over the back of his seat. "Shut your door and stay down. Don"t get up for anything, understand?" She nodded and dropped out of sight.
"Okay ... here goes nothin"," he muttered grimly, and hit the garage-door-opener b.u.t.ton.
" "What do you suppose he"s been doing up there so long?" asked Daisy, scowling through the rain-washed windshield of Mary"s Bronco.
Preacher ducked down so he could see better. "He"s picking the lock, that"s what he"s doing."
"No!" Daisy turned to look at him in disbelief.
"Preacher, you know you can"t see nothing from this far , away, in this blinkin" ram. How you know that"s what he"s doin" ?"
Preacher reared back, looking gravely affronted. " " And who, I ask you, should know better than I? The cop"s got a deadbolt lock, that"s why it"s taking so long. But he"s picking it, no doubt about that. "
"I thought you said the guy was some kinda friend."
"So it appeared, Mrs. Pepper, so it appeared.... Although I must say-oops, there he goes. He"s done it, he"s in. "
"Look there," said JoJo suddenly, reaching over the back ; seat to point. " " Here he comes. "
Two heads jerked around to see what he was talking about. Then all three watched in silence as the garage door rose slowly to emit a feathery tail of diesel smoke.
"Uh-oh, here comes trouble," said Daisy. All three heads swiveled, like spectators at a tennis match, in time to see the figure in the dark raincoat burst from the door at the top of the stairs and start down them in a big hurry. An unwise move, as it turned out.
"Ouch," said Preacher, "that looked painful."
"Told you them steps was slippery," sniffed Daisy. "Where do you s"pose he"s goin" in such a hurry?"
"To get his car, I should imagine," said Preacher. "He does seem to be wanting that cop, for whatever-"
"Look!" cried JoJo, pointing again. Back came the heads, as if they were on springs.
The white Mercedes had backed into the street and was now headed downhill away from them, picking up speed. They barely had time to catch a glimpse of the pale face looking back at them through the rear window.
Preacher and Daisy looked at each other. JoJo was bouncing excitedly on the back seat. Then all at once they shouted in a joyful chorus, " " It "s Mary ! "
"Mrs. Pepper," said Preacher in some alarm, grabbing for a good handhold in the vicinity of the dash, "what do you think you"re doing?" Daisy had already started up the Bronco and was putting it in gear. "We can"t chase them down in this-you said yourself, we"re almost out of gas!"
"Shoot," said Daisy through gritted teeth as the Bronco bucked over the roots of a eucalyptus tree, "you can"t tell nothing from a gas gauge, anyhow. Sometimes you can go for miles on eqpty. Way I see it.. : There was a pause, and two simultaneous gasps, while the Bronco"s muddy rear tires fishtailed on wet pavement. Daisy down-shifted like a trucker, then continued, " Is that he"s takin" our Mary someplace, and the only way we got a chance in h.e.l.l of findin" out where, is if we tail him. We got no choice. Got to give it a shot. Go as far as we can. If we run dry, well. then that"s that: "
"Somebody"s followin" us," JoJo announced. "Comin" fast. "
Daisy and Preacher looked at each other; in the excitement of finding Mary, they"d both forgotten about the guy in the dark raincoat.
It didn"t take long for everything to click into place.