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Authors: Barbara Delinsky

BOOK: Home Fires
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But again, from deep within the fantasy, came a
demand for more than submission. It wasn't enough to be kissed. Kissing back was just as critical. Under the gentle caress of his hands on the rustling silk that covered her back, Deanna opened her lips more fully to welcome Mark's tongue and then, timidly at first, meet it with her own. Gradually she experienced the sensation and soon found herself swept up in it. It was a whirlpool of desire, ever widening to draw her deeper and deeper into its heart With growing abandon she let herself know its dizzying force as she met Mark's heat with her own.
He was right, she realized. The more she gave, the more impassioned she grew. It was an endless circle, as endless as the rings whirling about them, tightening bit by bit to bind them together.
For a fleeting moment Deanna wondered whether other women knew this extreme sensual joy, whether she was the oddity for having been ignorant of its bliss for so many, many years. She had always found satisfaction in other realms. Now, at this moment, there was only Mark.
As though hearing his name in her thoughts, he drew back to look at her. The familiarity of his expression was nearly more than she could bear. It spoke so clearly of his desperate need of her. But Deanna had just begun to recognize her own needs. This freedom he had given her was just taking root.
Moving on pure instinct, she leaned lower and put her lips against his chest His skin seemed to throb beneath her mouth and she closed her eyes to better savor his scent and the wild heat he exuded.
He moaned, pressing her closer. She was aware of the full length of him, of the thighs that supported hers and the hands that molded her lower body to his. Her heart hammered loudly as she understood the rising thrust of his need. It, in turn, inflamed her.
Once again he held her back, this time with a hand on
her either arm. “I need you,” he whispered. “It seems as if I've waited forever.”
“I know,” she answered falteringly, and she did. Fantasy had its own needs and they were demanding after their long years of denial. Breathing in short, uneven gasps, she gently nudged his shirt over his shoulders and let it drop behind him. But when she reached to touch the masculine wealth suddenly opened to her, he reached as well. She was unprepared for the sudden rush of air on her back, needing a minute to realize that he'd lowered the zipper of her dress.
Startled, she recoiled. There had been an unreality to the situation when he had undressed before her and her mind had been caught up in the passion of it all. But now it was her turn. Her clothing was the property of Mrs. Lawrence Hunt. Stripped of it, she was in many ways a stranger to herself.
“Please, let me love you,” Mark said softly. “I won't hurt you. You know that, don't you?”
She nodded slowly. She did know it, though she wasn't sure how. When it came down to facts, she knew practically nothing about this man other than his name, his profession, his home base. He could be any number of horrible things … but she somehow knew he wasn't. As bizarre as it was, she trusted him. And she wanted him. Even in the throes of unsureness, she was aware of the fever that raged within her own body. There was only one antidote.
Forcing herself to relax, she smiled. “I'm all right This is just so … new …”
“I know,” he murmured, leaning forward to kiss her with the gentleness of that understanding. As he straightened he drew the dress from her shoulders and eased it down her body.
Deanna focused on the auburn vibrancy of his hair
while he knelt to help her from her black silk slip, her shoes, her stockings. With each went a bit of the past, replaced by the fantasy of a new woman. If the mild unsteadiness of Mark's hands was a sign of his own dubious control, Deanna's pulse was racing too fast for her to notice. Finally he straightened and looked down at her.
His eyes touched her everywhere, caressing her throat and the swells of her breasts, moving over her stomach to the lace-edged silk of her panties. She felt the heat rise to paint her cheeks a delicate pink as she tried to discern his thoughts. Was he disappointed?
Groaning softly, he gathered her into his arms. “How did I ever find you?” he rasped into her hair and she felt the beginnings of a reassurance that was enhanced by his hoarse-whispered, “So lovely.” Working his way around her ear, he tasted the lemon freshness of her neck, then sought her throat in a sequence of warm, moist kisses. Deanna closed her eyes and let her head fall back as she felt resurging delight at every touch point She arched her back unknowingly, innocently offering herself to him. The whisper of a sigh escaped her lips when his moved across her chest. Behind her, the muscles of his arms tensed with wanting.
In one dizzying moment she was lifted and gently laid on the bed. When she opened her eyes in the stillness, he was smiling just above her.
“Are you okay?” he asked. The arms he propped on either side of her trembled slightly.
“I think so.” Reaching up, she threaded her slender fingers into the thickness of his hair and drew his face down. When she arched off the sheets to kiss him, he slid his hands behind her and deftly released the catch of her bra. It was gone in an instant and she gasped.
But the gasp caught in her throat, silenced by the worshipfulness of his expression. In its wake she felt like a
goddess, a woman of flesh and curves with the awesome power to please this man. It was what she wanted more than anything to do. And she sensed a renewed urgency in him.
Her hands went to his shoulders, then around his neck, as she pulled herself into his embrace. His back was warm with muscles that flexed when she touched them, which she did with growing courage. But Mark touched as well, and was soon dissatisfied with the slender span of her ivory-sheened back. Easing her down he placed both hands on her neck, then began an erotic descent toward her breasts. When he reached their fullness at last, she strained toward him. Her nipples had long since grown taut, yet now they responded even more fully to him. His fingers massaged the pebbled tips until she bit her lip to keep from crying out at the torment.
“Don't do that,” he commanded softly against her lips as his freed them from her teeth. “Yell, scream if you want to. I don't want you to hold anything back.”
Deanna looked up. “I've never felt anything like this.”
“I know.” He grinned with a pleasure that was remarkably calm in light of the fire that licked at them both.
In that instant time sped back. Deanna recalled that fantasy of girlhood innocence when she'd first anticipated a man's possession. Blushing as she might have done then, she asked, “You do?”
“Uh-huh,” he hummed smoothly, invitingly.
“How?” Without realizing it, she flexed her fingers around the solid strength of his arms.
“Your reaction. It's almost … virginal.”
Embarrassed, she looked away. But Mark captured her chin and turned it back. He was sober and intense, silently speaking of that ultimate need. With a soft cry, the first she had allowed, she threw herself into his arms and moved restlessly against him.
It was as though she had given the sign; suddenly his
seduction began in earnest. He touched her everywhere, finding sensitive niches all over her body, kissing some, tonguing others, stroking them until she writhed beneath him. He paused only long enough to remove her panties, then his own briefs, before settling sensuously against her and letting her know the height of his desire.
Patience was exhausted on both of their parts. For Mark, the physical demand had overcome all other thought. For Deanna, all other thought was actively chased away. Her total concentration was on her body and his, on his hands that caressed her and hers that mirrored the motion. With each sound she made he gave her encouragement, and she felt freer than she had ever felt before.
There ceased to exist any other world, any other woman. The Deanna Hunt who lay on the bed, naked beside him, bore no resemblance to the Deanna Hunt who had existed for the past twenty-nine years. This Deanna was beyond all recollection of that other, more subdued woman. This Deanna was alive with love.
In a moment of passion that she would always remember, Mark moved above her, hesitated for a bare moment, then joined their bodies with a fluid grace that shimmered from one to the other and back.
“Ahhhh …” Deanna cried, unaware of the vocal sigh until it was repeated when he began to move in gentle rhythm. She clung to him as he held her closer and arched her hips to meet his thrusts, answering his need with the force of her intuitive femininity.
Later she would recall the soft words he said, the growing breathlessness, the coaxing sounds and cries. Now she was embroiled in the pleasure as it built slowly toward an apex she had never, ever known.
Mark was the consummate lover, never quite lost enough in his own passion to totally forget her greater vulnerability. With infinite care he led her upward, teasing
and withholding, speeding and slowing until he felt her at the peak of her endurance. Only then did he offer her the release she blindly sought. At that mind-shattering instant she exploded with the fire of a thousand brilliant starbursts of the kind she had so secretly dreamed of long ago. Mark heard her triumphant cry and let it trigger his own as he gave in at last to that same supreme pleasure. It was a shared moment, a moment of ecstasy. Gasping raggedly, he crushed her against him until the last of the spasms subsided.
Deanna was enraptured. Her body seemed to float, held to earth only by the arms she coiled tightly around Mark's neck. She hadn't imagined that anything could be so perfect, so natural, so naked in its glory. For those few fleeting moments she had captured the fantasy of loving and being loved back to mindless distraction. She had discovered a primal luxury and its vivid force stunned her.
Needing to feel the reality of this man who had pleasured her so exquisitely, she stroked the dampness of his back until her fingers dropped to splay over the meeting of their hips.
“Deanna … Deanna …” Unknowingly Mark cried her name. His tone was hushed, his head buried against her neck as the beauty of passion lingered. But reason returned with a jolt when he realized that she lay suddenly still beneath him, her body incongruously tense.
 
 
“D
eanna?” Mark raised his dark head to look at her with concern. “What is it?”
The fury of passion had left her looking windblown. Having escaped its bounds, her thick auburn hair lay in billowing sprays, dark against the white of the pillow. Her skin was damp. Even the glow of lovemaking couldn't hide its sudden pallor. She stared at him fixedly, blinking only when he repeated his demand more urgently.
“Tell me, honey. What's wrong?”
It seemed forever before she was able to speak. Even her shock had not overcome that lingering breathlessness. “You know who I am,” she said faintly. He had called her by name.
“Of course I know who you are.”
“I didn't … expect that.”
“Why not? You know who I am, don't you?” he chided her softly.
Deanna sank her teeth into her lower lip. Had she actually cried out his name too, without knowing it? She tried to think back to those last cataclysmic moments, but could hardly assimilate the overall magnificence of the fire that had consumed her so totally.
Mark nodded silently in answer to her inner question. “You spoke my name as unconsciously as I just spoke yours.” He smiled. “It was very natural.” Bending his head, he kissed tiny beads of moisture from her nose, then carefully slid to her side. Deanna seized the opportunity to turn her back and try to rise, but Mark caught her. His arm curved around her waist and gently drew her back, flattening her on the bed beside him.
“Oh, no, you don't! Now that I've found you, you can't up and leave me just like that”
Deanna avoided his gaze. “I've got to go.”
“Do you?” he asked, arching a brow in doubt “Is there someone expecting you? Someone waiting for you at this hour?”
Her eyes sent a message of mild rebuke as she looked toward him. “You should know the answer to that”
Undaunted, he reached to smooth a lock of damp hair from her cheek. “I know that you're Deanna Hunt”
She eyed him fearfully. Would he destroy the entire fantasy? “What else do you know about me?”
He grinned. “You live upstairs,” he offered. As his smile continued to toy with his lips, Deanna felt herself melting all over again. In self-defense she focused on his chest, only to find it as unnerving as his smile had been.
His fingers fell from her cheek to curve lightly around her shoulder in a caress that was enough to remind Deanna of her nudity. Looking down, she groped for the sheet, but Mark caught her hand and stilled her. “Don't …” he gasped quickly, without thinking, then forced himself to relax. “Wait … it's all right”
She was suddenly overwhelmed by where she was and what she'd done. “It's not!” she cried. “This shouldn't have happened. I've got to leave.”
“We've got to talk,” he contradicted her.
“I can't.” Pulling roughly away, she reached the far side of the bed, but a strange languor prevented her from standing up. As her confusion grew she wrapped her arms around her middle and swayed slightly back and forth. Before she could react to the dip of the mattress immediately behind her, a second pair of arms appeared to cover hers and she was drawn back into a virile cradle.
“I won't let you go until we've talked.” Deanna hung her head and slowly shook it in dismay. “Please talk to me,” he repeated, near pleading.
But her thoughts remained her own.
What had she done?
How had she come to find herself here? How could she have allowed herself this lapse of judgment? After all, she was Mrs.—
“Then you'll
listen
to me.” Mark cut firmly into her self-reproach, holding her unyieldingly yet softly enough to give whatever comfort he could impart. “I know that you're Deanna Hunt and that you live here at the hotel. My waiter was kind enough to tell me that. The rest I figured out for myself.”
“The rest?” she asked hesitantly.
He sighed and tightened his arms a fraction. “You're Lawrence Hunt's widow.” She drew in her breath and tried to escape, but he refused to release her. “This hotel is yours, as is that shiny limousine outside, not to mention the corporation your husband founded.”
The voice that had been so close by her ear grew silent until Deanna could hear nothing but the guilty thud of her heart. When he spoke again she caught a touch of humor. “Did you really hope to remain anonymous?” He paused, then gently squeezed her. “Hmmm?”
“I don't know,” she whispered at last.
With a pained moan Mark shifted her until she sat sideways in his embrace. “Would you like to know what else I've learned about you?” he asked in that deep tone she found so soothing.
Was there more? Were there to be no secrets from this man? But then, he had the ability to read her soul and she seemed either unable or unwilling to do anything about it “If you're going to tell me that I'm a very wealthy widow, please don't.”
“I wasn't”
She glanced up skeptically. “No?”
His eyes gleamed. “No.”
Deanna waited for him to elaborate. When he didn't, she grew impatient. “What
have
you learned about me?”
“You're curious?” His lips twitched at their corners, but having looked back down, she missed the move.
Contrary to her better judgment, Deanna found a demure smile emerging. “I'm a woman. Isn't that one of my prerogatives?”
“
That's
what I've learned.”
“What?” She frowned, puzzled.
Mark grew even more tender, if that were possible, and lifted a hand to press her ear to his heart. “I've learned that you're a woman. Through and through. For every bit of the poise and composure that shields Mrs. Lawrence Hunt from the world, deep down Deanna is a very passionate woman.”
She blushed, but he couldn't see that. There was an advantage to sitting this way, she reflected. At least he couldn't see
everything!
“Well … ?” he prodded.
“Well what?”
“Haven't you got anything to say?” She remained silent, feeling almost childish and absurd in light of the very mature experience she and this man had shared. “Nothing?”
“I'm sorry,” she finally murmured. “I'm not much of a talker.”
Mark was unfazed. “So I gather. And
that
's what I intend to change.”
Tilting her head away from his chest, Deanna looked up in good-humored skepticism. “Really?”
“Really.” His smile was smug.
“That's very interesting. I've spent nearly thirty years as my own best friend. What makes you think you can change me now?”
He touched her lips with the tip of his finger. “You've been a virgin all that time … .” At her cutting glance, he amended his words. “Well … almost. Let's say that, for all practical purposes, you were innocent in the ways of passion … and I've changed that.”
Deanna felt the urge to squirm, but couldn't turn from his riveting warmth. “Was it … that obvious?” she asked haltingly.
“Only because I wanted to see it. It was in your eyes and on your lips. When you cried out to me there was an element of … I guess you'd call it astonishment”
This time she couldn't hide her blush. “I didn't realize,” she breathed self-consciously.
But Mark wasn't finished. His eyes caressed her and she began to tingle with renewed awareness of the hard strength of his body against hers. “You haven't any idea what it meant to me to see that kind of wonder on your face and to know that I'd been able to put it there.”
“You're very sure of yourself.” She sighed, wishing she possessed even a modicum of that same self-confidence in this very new situation.
“Am I wrong? Have you felt those things before?”
“Please, Mark!” she cried on impulse, desperately needing to put a halt to his prodding. It was getting far too intimate. And despite what they'd just shared, what they continued to share sitting there naked together, she had
no desire to discuss her married life. With Larry gone, there was something sacred about those years they'd had together. She wouldn't spoil their memory by discussing very private moments with Mark.
“See, you've said it again. My name.” He chuckled at the uncomprehending expression that flitted across her features for a moment
Deanna took a deep breath. Her eyes broached the subject that her arms and legs weren't quite up to. “I've really got to be going. I do have someone upstairs—a housekeeper. When I left for dinner I told her that I'd be back to do some reading. She's apt to get worried. I don't want her to start making any calls.”
“Would she do that?”
“I don't know. I've never given her cause for worry, so she's never been put to the test”
“But she keeps a close watch on you?”
“In the sense of a chaperon … no. I'm a big girl.” She smiled up at him and was rewarded by a mischievous grin.
“That's what I've been trying to tell you,” he drawled, then put his lips to her forehead and pulled her closer for what he sensed would be the final moments of intimacy. “But this housekeeper”—he sobered—“keeps track of your comings and goings?”
“She always knows my schedule so that she can have things ready for me when I need them. It's really very helpful. And after all,” she scoffed softly, “it's not as though I run off in odd directions all the time. My life is pretty ordered.”
“Ordered … or programmed?” He kept his tone a hair above censure.
In its way, Deanna's response was just as pointed, her gaze just as sharp. “Perhaps unchanging, or predictable, would be better choices. There are things to be done on particular days and I do them. I've set a pattern over the
years and I don't stray very far. It's a very comfortable, secure way to live.”
Mark's eyes didn't leave her face, though the sight of her nudity was his for the taking. He too was preoccupied with this other, more emotional issue. “Is that how you want it?”
Deanna didn't answer for a long time. She had asked herself that same question more than once in the course of the past week. It wasn't a simple matter of “yes” or “no.”
“It has been …”
“Until now?” Having sensed her hesitancy, Mark probed its cause. But Deanna couldn't confess to him what she refused to confess to herself.
“I don't know. I Just don't know.” She shook her head, then swung around to take in the room. “This whole thing isn't what I'd planned.” Or was it? Was this at the root of the lemon-scented bath she'd taken? Was this behind the black silk and fine pearls? From beneath lowered lids she eyed her delicate bracelet and the matching ring. Those and the strand around her neck were all she wore. She put a hand to her throat
“I feel so foolish,” she whispered, not realizing she'd spoken aloud until Mark turned her around to face him. With only a hand's breadth separating them, she was all too aware of his nakedness. She forced herself to keep her eyes above his waist
“Why, Deanna? Tell me.” He spoke with soft urgency.
Deanna gazed at him achingly as she groped for the words to express her overwhelming confusion. “I … everything has always been so clear to me. It's always been so easy … .” Her voice trailed off into the silence of the room.
“Go on,” Mark coaxed her, gently stroking her arms.
Her brows drew together in a frown. “From as far back as I can remember, my role was cut out for me. I was my
parents' daughter, taken care of and protected. I was given everything I could want and more. When it was time to marry, I married. Then Larry took charge of things. The decisions were always made for me by people who knew better than I did. Everything was … so simple.”
“But there's more to life, Deanna. You've discovered that, haven't you?”
Her eyes grew glazed with a sorrow that boded ill for any future hopes he might have held. “Oh, yes. I've discovered that there's more, but …” She felt his hold momentarily slacken and took instant advantage to slide off the bed. With a quick eye to the floor she knelt, gathered her underthings and dress, and stood. Mark was on his feet before her and she gasped in alarm.
If she had thought him intimidating at his full height when dressed, he was that much more so now. In his naked glory he might have been the lean, bronzed hero of every woman's fantasy. His physique was as ideally proportioned as it was superbly conditioned. But he seemed oblivious to his nudity and his eyes refused to release hers to allow her to appreciate him fully.

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