A Dad At Last (11 page)

“Ten.”

At ten, he could picture her with pigtails, a wall-to-wall grin and eyes that rivaled Fourth of July sparklers. “Ten hardly seems old, unless you're a house pet.”

Connor paused, knowing this was the perfect opportunity to walk away from her. Lacy was feeling vulnerable and for once was protecting her territory
instead of invading his. But, perfect or not, he found he couldn't get himself to do it—precisely because she was so vulnerable. He felt very protective, even though deep down he knew he should probably get his head examined.

“So, what else were you not allowed to do besides trick-or-treating?”

Finished unloading, she closed the dishwasher door. “I didn't mean to make it sound that way. I wasn't deprived, I just—hey.” Light dawning, she swung around abruptly to face him. “Wait a minute, we were discussing you, not me.”

Catching her against the wall, he leaned his hand against it just above her head. All this banter had him feeling like some kid in high school. “I'd rather do you.”

She knew he didn't mean it the way it sounded, but she couldn't resist teasing. “Really?”

Something serious slipped into his eyes and his expression. “Really.”

Excitement rippled through her. She banked it down, knowing that she was fooling herself. There was nothing going on between them.

“That's twice you've lied in the last ten minutes,” she accused him. “One more time, and your nose is going to start to grow.” She ran the tip of her finger over the bridge of his nose. Even such a little action warmed her. She was hopeless, she told herself.
“You're just trying to make me forget that I just had a major victory here.”

He didn't even bother to contest her words. Something felt as if it had opened up inside him tonight, and he knew he owed it all to her and her stubborn pigheadedness. But he wasn't about to tell her so. She would become unbearable to live with.

“Don't let it go to your head.”

Lacy heard what she wanted to hear. “So, you admit it.”

“I admit nothing.” He couldn't quite carry off his neutral expression. She made him feel like singing. Like standing out in the rain and tilting his head back like some damned stupid turkey.

“C'mon, admit it.” She laughed, doubling her fists and pretending to beat on his side—as if she could make a dent. “Admit that I did a good thing getting you and your mother together and talking. Admit that you wanted this.”

“You're getting carried away.”

“That's because I'm right.”

“Okay, you're right. And for such a little thing, you've also got a hell of a right fist.” He caught both fists in his hands, holding them still. “How long do you intend on pounding me?”

She looked at her immobilized hands. “I guess I'm about done now.”

He opened his hands, releasing her. “I see this really is a red-letter day.”

She was surprised to hear him admit it. He'd made even more progress than she'd thought. “Why, because you and your mother finally connected?”

“No,” he said, deadpan, “because you backed off and gave up.”

She pretended to sniff. “The day I do it over something important, that'll be your red-letter day, not before then.”

The woman struck him as a tireless crusader. And one royal pain in his butt. “You like bashing your head against a wall?”

He made her sound far more obstinate than she saw herself. “Only when the wall finally caves in.”

“And if it doesn't?”

He was talking about them, she thought. About him. “I make sure I have a giant supply of aspirin on hand.”

In an incredibly magnanimous mood, he laughed, shaking his head. “She was right.”

“Who?”

“My mother.” He realized, pleased, that he hadn't hesitated this time when uttering the precious word. Mother. Megan Maitland was his mother. Maybe it was time he acted as if he was damn grateful to Lacy for what she'd done. “She said you were something else.”

“I bet you were quick to jump in and tell her just what that something was—or were the words that
came to your mind a bit too spicy for mixed company?”

“The only thing in this house that's spicy is you,” he told her.

Maybe it was the evening, or the breakthrough he'd just experienced. Whatever it was, there was an exhilarating feeling racing through him, infusing every part of his being until he was certain he really could have lit up the sky.

His eyes on hers, he combed his fingers through Lacy's hair, framing her face. Bringing it closer to him.

“And I've suddenly got this overwhelming craving for spicy.”

“By all means,” she murmured against his lips, excitement filtering through every pore, “indulge your craving.”

T
INGLING
sensations ran along her body, growing stronger as his kiss deepened. Her body heated as she felt his hands glide, every so lightly, along her arms.

Please, let him want me. Just for a little while, let him want me.

She dug her fingers into his arms as if for leverage, as if to keep from being swallowed up whole, leaving slight impressions in the muscles. Her head swam with hope, with excitement.

Each kiss flowered into a cluster that robbed her of her senses. Someone else would have said she was crazy, leaving herself open this way to a man she knew didn't love her. A man who could only break her heart in the end.

But it wasn't the end she was thinking about. It was the moment. And the way he could make her blood churn and ignite.

Connor tugged at the ends of her blouse, pulling them out of the waistband of her skirt. Very slowly, his lips still on hers, he slipped his hands beneath her shirt, touching her waist. He felt her bare skin
quicken. Tremble. Something within him quickened, as well, responding. Glorying.

This wasn't right, he upbraided himself. If he had a shred of decency in him, he'd stop now, before he let this go too far.

It had already gone too far.

His hunger for her had gone too far. And his desire for her had gone too far. As for decency, it found itself outnumbered by demands of the flesh that were far stronger. It might have been possible to do the right thing if she hadn't melted like cotton candy on his tongue when he'd brought his mouth to hers. If her lips hadn't been so willing, her body so soft, her kisses so eager. He'd taken a young, virginal girl the first time. This time it was a woman who returned his ardor, and she was too much for him to resist.

With every pass of his lips against hers, every sigh that echoed in his brain, every ache that throbbed within his body, Connor sped further and further from the right thing and streaked like a bullet toward the only thing.

In his feverish brain, he kept hearing a fragment of refrain from an old song, something about if loving her was wrong, then he didn't want to be right. More than anything else in the world, he wanted to make love with Lacy tonight.

Over and over again, Lacy relived the first night he'd taken her. That night she'd found him, sitting in his room, lost and alone. Her heart had broken to
see him like that, and when he'd turned to her for solace, she'd given it and herself freely. The single night was almost two years in the past. She'd clung to it all this time. Even when she'd had amnesia, somewhere deep in the night, silvery pieces of the memory would come back to her. Haunting her. Making her long to return to the life she'd lost, if only to find the man who had made her feel this way.

And now he was here. Wanting her. Making her head spin as he stood with her in the living room, stealing her breath. Claiming her heart.

With hands not quite steady, she unbuttoned his shirt and splayed her fingertips along his bare chest. She could hear his sudden intake of breath. Could feel his desire flaring. Triumph thundered in her veins, sending her to the next level.

A single salvo of guilt pierced him, and he struggled to rally around it. Decency was making a last, enfeebled stand. He drew his head back, trying to focus on her face. It swam before him, beautiful, still as innocent as the morning dew.

“Lacy, maybe we shouldn't—”

Unlike the first time, when she could only follow where he led her, this time she was his equal. She knew exactly what she wanted and exactly what it would cost her.

On her toes, she brought her lips to his. “Maybe we should,” she whispered against them.

It was all he needed. Any aspirations he had to
ward sainthood crashed and burned with those three words. With all his heart, he wished he were stronger or that there would be no regrets for her, but wishing was for children, and he had long ceased to be one. There would be regrets, a host of them. But they were for morning.

And the night was here now.

Slipping his hands higher on her waist, he cupped her breasts, surrendering his very soul in exchange for the look he saw in her eyes as he touched her.

She took him prisoner with her innocence, an innocence that had somehow survived despite everything. He was captivated and captured by the woman he knew, ultimately, he was wronging.

If she was his, then he was hers. For the night.

He kissed Lacy in a way he had never kissed anyone, not even her, before.

Picking her up in his arms, he carried her up the stairs to his room, his mouth sealed to hers. Instinct and familiarity brought him to his door.

Once inside the room, an eagerness sprang up within him. He freed her of her blouse, her skirt, then curbed himself as he peeled away her undergarments. He caught his breath. The last time he'd seen her like this, his mind had been hazed with grief and alcohol. Now there was nothing fogging his brain except desire. She was magnificent. And his.

The battle of right and wrong raged within his
brain, giving him no peace, even as he lost himself in the pleasures of her eager mouth, her willing body.

If her innocence captured him, her prowess closed the prison door.

Moving with instincts she had no idea she'd had, Lacy not only was made love to, but made love on her own. She matched every pass of his hands with one of her own, divesting him of his clothing just as he did her. Divesting him of any barriers that existed within his soul. His shirt fell on top of hers, his pants sank against her skirt and their undergarments, hers flimsy, his practical, were relegated to a place of their own.

Cloaked in only the moonlight streaming into the room, Lacy made herself irresistible to him.

Her fingers, so nimble, reduced a towering man to a supplicating teenager. Bringing to life responses, emotions that had long since faded from his life. She made him catch fire. It wasn't merely the stripping away of her clothes and seeing her young, supple body that transformed him from a confident male to a man who would have willingly dropped to his knees before her if she merely gave the sign. It was the confidence that radiated from her very being.

She felt so right in his arms. So right in his bed. The more he kissed her, the more he touched her, the more he wanted her until he felt as if he was on fire. And with each move he made, the bars around him closed in a little more.

Even the sound of her breathing excited him. And her eyes—her eyes seemed to look right into him. Humbling him. Igniting him.

He couldn't have turned his back on her and walked away if the ransom of the entire earth depended on it.

It was hard to keep her wits about her, to focus and not give herself up completely to the pleasures of his caress, to the fire he so skillfully stoked. But she wanted him to remember this. To lie awake in his bed and relive this night over and over again in his mind until his body was a mass of pulsing desires and needs. Until he found he wanted only her in his life.

She was determined.

But it was difficult to stay focused and determined when his lips traveled the length of her, outlining every pulse point with deep, openmouthed kisses that reduced her to a throbbing mass. When he made her body twist and turn against him, desperate for that final moment of extreme gratification.

Desperate to feel him within her.

He couldn't hold back. Not a second longer. He took what precautions he could, then, braced over her, he joined his hands to Lacy's, his eyes on hers as he slowly moved into her. He saw the flare of desire mingled with something akin to triumph. He felt the beating of her heart within his chest. Sealing his lips to hers, he began the dance that would bring
the two of them to the mutual pleasure they sought at the summit's crest.

The tempo increased. He tasted his name on her lips as the muffled cry melted against his flesh. He whispered her name in his mind, softly, like a prayer.

And when it was over, there were no regrets. There was only softness and peace as, spent, Connor held her in his arms.

 

F
LUSHED
from her visit to Connor's house, Megan breezed into her kitchen through the garage. It didn't surprise her to see Harold looking as if he was waiting for her to make her entrance. The butler always seemed to materialize when he was needed. When she was a little girl, Abby used to think the man was magical. At times, Megan was inclined to believe that.

“I won't be needing anything tonight, Harold, I had a marvelous dinner at Connor's house.”

“Yes, ma'am.” The older man inclined his head. “But I fear there might be something Mr. Blake might need.”

“Hugh?” Without thinking, she glanced at the telephone on the wall. Why was the lawyer calling? “What would he be needing?”

“Your presence, ma'am. He's waiting for you in the study. Been here since eight.” Anticipating her next steps, Harold moved out of Megan's way with
out bothering to look. It was as if he knew what she would do next.

“Thank you, Harold.” Leaving her purse for Harold to put away, Megan hurried from the room.

Had she forgotten a meeting she'd scheduled with Hugh, or was this something unexpected? Although their business association extended beyond the usual client-lawyer relations, and although over the years they had become friends, Hugh didn't usually make a habit of dropping by.

Megan pushed open the study doors. “Hugh, what are you doing here?”

Hugh Blake set down the empty glass he'd been debating filling and rose to his feet. He knew the gesture had fallen on hard times of late, chivalry being mostly out of fashion, but Megan Maitland deserved a little chivalry in his opinion, and he was more than happy to supply it.

The smile on his face was genial. “Waiting for you.”

Megan crossed to the fireplace. “That much is obvious, but why?”

He didn't give her the real reason, afraid that it might shred the fabric of the friendship that had taken years to weave. Instead, he nodded at the large manila envelope on the coffee table beside his empty glass and the cut-glass decanter Harold had left with him.

“I had some contracts for your signature. A few
securities maturing, needing a turnover, things like that. Your place was on my way home, so I thought I'd drop them off instead of asking you to come down to the office. Harold decided to ply me with Scotch. Damn near melted my bones, forcing me to stick around until the effects wore off.” He frowned, raising a brow as he looked at the decanter instead of at the woman who did more than merely melt his bones. “Need to be stone-cold sober on the roads. With my luck, some overzealous motorcycle jockey one third my age will be hiding behind a sign, itching to get me in his radar beam. I thought it was safer to just wait it out.”

Enchanted, he watched her for a moment as she straightened a photograph on the mantel. “All right, I've told you what I'm doing here, now it's your turn.”

Her smile illuminated her eyes, the way it always did, he thought. “I live here, remember?”

“I meant what you were doing with your evening. You walked in with cheeks that were flushed like a young girl's.”

She moved her hand vaguely around. “The night air's still a bit sultry.”

His brow rose a little higher. Was she seeing someone? he wondered. She'd been alone for so long. “You parked the car inside the garage, and unless the last hurricane has disengaged it from the
house, you entered via the side door—which is completely enclosed.”

Amusement deepened her smile. “I wasn't aware that Sherlock Holmes was seeking a successor.” She'd known Hugh Blake most of her adult life, known him when his hair was the color of sun-kissed gold instead of silver. He'd been William's lawyer when she'd met him. Over the years, he'd become her confidant as well as her lawyer. She felt she didn't have a truer friend in the world. “I had dinner with Connor and Lacy.”

Unconsciously, Hugh squared his broad shoulders. She'd trusted him with her secret long before she'd made her announcement. It had been a shock, though he hadn't said anything. It had struck him at the time as amazing that he could know someone for so long and yet not truly know them at all. He'd struggled to picture the young girl, pregnant and abandoned by the man she loved, and had difficulty reconciling that to the woman he saw before him. What had intervened was a strong, steely band of jealousy he hadn't realized he was capable of. Jealousy that there had been someone who had swept her off her feet so completely that she had surrendered herself to him without a qualm.

But he had gotten his reaction under control swiftly, showing nothing but dependable understanding. It wasn't his place to be anything else. He'd advised her to pick her time carefully before drop
ping her bombshell. The Maitland children were a good, decent lot, but they would need time to adjust. It surprised him how quickly they had all come to terms with this part of their mother's past.

Far better than he had, he mused. “What restaurant did you go to? The new one I suggested?” He'd made the suggestion, hoping to take her there himself, but at the last minute had changed his mind, not wanting to change the status quo between them.

She shook her head. “The new ranch.”

Feeling suddenly tired, Megan crossed to the sofa and sat down, patting the spot beside her as she turned her eyes to Hugh. He joined her.

“You should see what Lacy's done with the place. The girl is an absolute marvel. The sooner Connor comes around and realizes that, the happier they'll both be.”

She was matchmaking, he realized. It didn't surprise him. He knew that Megan believed that she took a hands-off approach to her children's lives whenever possible, but quite the opposite was true.

He wasn't in the mood to talk about Connor. His attention was focused elsewhere. On the years that had gone by, wasted. “And you?”

She didn't see the connection. “And me what?”