And Babies Make Four (7 page)

“She’s here,” Jean whispered.

Finally, he thought, turning back around. Now we can get this charade over wi—

He caught sight of her, and froze.

They’d changed her clothes for the traditional multicolored wedding dress of the island—he’d expected that. But he hadn’t expected the way she’d look in it, like a delicate, beautiful angelfish swimming through the night reef of the crowd. Her stiffness was gone, replaced by the subtle, mesmerizing grace he’d seen earlier that day in the bedroom when she’d thought she was alone. Unable to stop himself, his gaze slid down the slim, glove-snug material of her dress, over her barely concealed curves, to the dancing slimness of her bare feet. Dammit, she could have worn her shoes at least. A Ph.D should wear shoes.…

Like a swimmer dragged down by a strong current he stepped down off the altar and reached for her hand. She turned at his touch, and looked up at him with eyes deep enough to drown in. The brittle frost was gone, revealing an honesty and strength of spirit so pure it robbed him of his breath. Her trust shattered him. Her beauty intoxicated him. He fell into her gaze, feeling an ache inside him for something more than passion, more than sex. She was fascinating. She was irresistible.

She swayed against him, and gave a small, discreetly refined hiccup.

She was drunk.

“Lord,” he groaned, steadying her arm. “How much did you have to drink?”

She blinked, clearly having some trouble focusing. “A few cups. Was only sugar water.”

“Yeah, well that
water
could fuel a space shuttle. Just follow my lead, okay?” He grasped her elbow and drew her to his side, and tried to guide her toward the stairs. No luck. She swayed again in his arms, tumbling against him in a way that sent an electric jolt slamming through his already overcharged system.
I can’t do this. I can’t marry a woman who hates me so much she had to get drunk to do it. Even I’m not that low.

“Look,” he whispered rawly against her ear, “you don’t have to do this. I’ll take you back to the car.”

“But my research …”

“We’ll find another way.”

He stepped down and started to steer her away from the altar. Unexpectedly, she dug her heels into the dirt floor.

“I’m not going,” she stated, her delicate jaw set in a stubbornness a mule would have envied. “There
is
no other way. Said so y’self. I’ve got to do this. Einstein and PINK’re depending on me. Can’t let them down. Can’t be like
him
 …”

Sam didn’t know who
him
was, and now sure wasn’t the time and place to ask. Jean was peering at them suspiciously, and even Papa Guinea had looked up from his audience with a member of the crowd. In another minute the shaman would smell a rat and call
the wedding off, regardless of what either of them wanted.

And what exactly do you want, Donovan?

He shoved the question away. He could deal with only one crisis at a time, and right now he had all the trouble he needed looking at him with wide, uncertain, and hopelessly innocent emerald eyes. He was a hard man who’d lived a hard life, but her gaze ripped through his tough hide like a rhino bullet through body armor. Christ, the kid didn’t have a clue what she did to him with that trusting, almost worshipful look. Or how little he deserved it …

Think about the money.
He dragged his gaze from hers, forcing his mind onto the job and the money he’d make doing it. That was what mattered. That was real, not some crazy emotion that he had no more business feeling than a pig did sprouting wings. He grimaced, pulling his jaw into a tight, hard line. “Okay, it’s your call,” he growled as he gripped her elbow and steered her up the steps. “But this is your idea, not mine.”

In the candlelight he caught the edge of her green glance, full of gratitude and heartfelt relief. He jerked his gaze away, knowing he didn’t deserve that, either.

I’m getting married.

The words buzzed through her head like persistent flies as she knelt in front of the altar rail. She tried to concentrate on the fact that this wasn’t a real marriage, and that the feather-garbed shaman performing
the ceremony had no more authority to pronounce her someone’s wife than the local dogcatcher, but her mind wouldn’t cooperate. Her thoughts kept straying to the man who knelt beside her at the rail, a man she barely knew. And what she did know didn’t make her feel very safe.

She glanced over at him. Candlelight shifted over the rugged planes of his face and illuminated the sheen of sweat on his tanned skin. He was still as the stone steps they knelt on, yet she could sense the cold fire burning inside him, the violence that both frightened and fascinated her. She swallowed, her gaze riveted on his remote expression, feeling a strange hunger build inside her. No,
safe
wasn’t a word anyone would use to describe Sam Donovan. But there were other words that came to mind, words that would send her proper New England ancestors spinning in their graves—

She yanked her gaze away, trying to collect her scattered thoughts. No luck. The soft, sacred cadence of Papa Guinea’s indecipherable words, the staring interest of the hundred people and the thousand gods, and the strange, seductive energy she’d felt since she’d landed on the island wrapped themselves around her like a second skin. Unable to resist, her gaze crept back to the man beside her.

Okay, I’m human, she admitted silently as she stared at his heartbreakingly handsome face. Her gaze drifted down the strong column of his throat, fastening on a glistening bead of sweat sliding down his
skin. She bit her lip, fighting an urge to press her mouth to that throat and lose herself in the hot, heady taste of his flesh. She’d always repressed her fantasies, seeing them as part of the bad blood that ran through her very proper veins. But for once she didn’t feel guilty. After all, what was the harm in it? He wasn’t interested in her physically—he’d made that more than clear with that “old maid” crack. So why not let her imagination live a little? Why not pretend, just a minute or two, that this was a real marriage?

So she pretended. She imagined that she was madly in love with him, and that he was madly in love with her. She visualized him taking her in his arms and kissing her—not the predictable, measured kiss that Hayward gave her, but a kiss as wild and unpredictable as the waves that thundered against the island shore. She closed her eyes, drowning in the lush, forbidden fantasy. But there’s no harm in it. No harm at a—

“Oh hell,” he muttered.

Noel froze. Had he read her mind? It was impossible, but the impossible seemed an everyday event in this weird, magical place. She cleared her throat, making a titanic effort to keep her voice steady. “What’s a matter?”

“Something I forgot, something about the ceremony. I have to kiss you.”

“What?”

“Pipe down,” he growled, gripping her wrist. “We’ve come this far. Don’t blow it now.”

“But a kiss!” Her mind reeled from a harmless
fantasy that had suddenly become dangerously real. If he kissed her he might realize what she’d been fantasizing about. And she’d die if he found out, she’d just die.

He said nothing, but his expression hardened, growing still and deadly. Papa Guinea and the crowd faded to nothing, leaving only the reality of his strong fingers gripping her wrist, his muscular form towering over her like a dark mountain, and his eyes searching hers with a stabbing, subtle violence. His gaze absorbed her, stripped her bare, leaving her vulnerable and exposed, spiritually naked. Too late, she realized that kissing him could cost her more than her pride. It could cost her her soul.

Sobered, she turned away, her prim Boston accent creeping back into her whispered words. “I’m sorry, I simply can’t kiss you. You’ll have to explain to Papa Guinea that—”

He tightened his iron grip to something just short of pain. “It’s not a choice. You can’t trash these people’s customs just because you think you’re better than they are.”

“I don’t! I—”

“Save it,” he hissed. He dropped her wrist and gripped her jaw, turning her face up toward his. “It’s showtime, sweetheart. Don’t worry, I’ll make it quick. I’d rather swim in a shark-infested cove than kiss you.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but she never got the chance. With masterful but passionless skill he
tilted her head to the side, and lowered his mouth to cover hers.

And all hell broke loose.

Sam knew she was expecting a swift, unremarkable kiss. That was exactly what he intended to give her—until she tried to wriggle out of the slight request like a trout off a fisherman’s line. Okay, so maybe he wasn’t like the well-mannered, well-heeled suits she was probably used to kissing, but he wasn’t garbage either. And he’d bet the entire profits from this assignment that he knew a hell of a lot more about kissing than any of her yuppie boyfriends.

In two weeks she probably wouldn’t even remember his name—others hadn’t. Noel Revere was cut from the same cloth. She’d forget him before the film was developed from her high-resolution, diamond-focus, cost-a-small-fortune camera. But she’s not going to forget this kiss, he pledged silently as he lowered his lips to hers. At least, not easily.

He covered her mouth in a consuming embrace, swallowing her small gasp of protest. Her eyes widened
in shock. Good. She balled her hands into fists and tried to push away. Better. He stationed an arm strategically against the small of her back, locking her against him.
You can’t wriggle out of this one, little fish.

She glared at him, her icy gaze speeding through surprise, through shock, and ending in burning fury. He grinned against her lips, enjoying the hell out of her anger. He liked her mad, liked the way it took the starch out of her oh-so-proper manner. He deepened his kiss, realizing he was beginning to like a lot of things about her.

She wasn’t what he expected. She tasted like wine—warm, bloodred wine that pounded through every part of his body. Her lips may have been pursed in a prim expression, but that was the only thing proper about them. They were a man’s worst temptation—hot and erotic, and innocent enough to make a man believe she meant it. He thrust deeper, exploring the secrets of her mouth, taking her with the passion that had been burning in his gut since she stepped out wearing the rainbow dress … hell, since she’d stepped off the plane.

His senses blurred, seduced by the fire beneath her ice. She made a small, guttural moan and sank against him, her yielding body melding to his from shoulder to thigh. Her woman’s scent mingled with the smell of incense and passion, intoxicating him, driving him full-throttle toward desire. He forgot about the church, Papa Guinea, the money, the farcical wedding—nothing mattered except the fact that she was warm and real and in his arms. It didn’t matter
why he’d started kissing her. He only knew that kissing her filled up an empty place inside him, a place that hadn’t been touched in a long, long time.…

I’ll kill him! she thought, her face burning with embarrassment as his mouth erotically plundered hers. When this wedding was over she was going to make him pay for this—for pulling her against the length of his rock-hard body, for making her aware of his strength, his heat, his musky masculine scent, and for turning her blood to pure fire with every slow, deliberate stroke of his intimate invasion.

Her forbidden fantasy was a joke compared with reality. Violent emotions ripped through her, creating an ache in deep and secret places. His power roared into her like a tidal wave, crashing through her brittle reserve, shattering her barriers in a single pounding heartbeat. She couldn’t breathe. She raised her fists to push him away, but instead found herself twining her arms around his neck. Just another second, then I’ll kill him, she promised as she wove her fingers through the thick hair at the base of his neck, pulling him closer. Her rock-solid Puritan morality dissolved like gritty smoke in the hurricane of his passion, making her feel aching and vulnerable, and wildly, shamelessly alive.
It’s the sugar water. It’s got to be the sugar water.

But the reason didn’t matter. She parted her lips, starving for his caress, aching for a deeper, more wicked embrace. She felt as if another woman had stepped into her skin—the secret sinner she’d kept locked deep inside her since her childhood. All her
life she’d walked the straight and narrow. She’d lived her life by rigid standards, afraid that one slip would bring out the reckless, devil side of her nature. Well, she’d slipped all right—big time. Now, wrapped in a virtual stranger’s fiery embrace, the woman who’d always done the “right” thing found herself wanting to do the wrong thing. She wanted to be bad—wonderfully, hedonistically, unforgivably bad with Sam Donovan. And she wanted to do it over and over again.…

In slow motion Donovan lifted his head and looked down at her with an intensity that left her weak. He stared at her in a kind of confused wonder, like a small boy who’s just been presented with an incredible toy that he can’t quite figure out how to use. The look cherished her beyond words, and shattered her more completely than his kiss. She stared up at him, every bit as confused as he was. For the first time in her life she felt as if someone was looking at her—at
her
, not a Revere descendant, not her father’s daughter. For the first time she felt as if she mattered to someone because of who she was, not what she—