Parker And The Gypsy (19 page)

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Authors: Susan Carroll

BOOK: Parker And The Gypsy
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“Well, I...” Their eyes met, a look stealing into his that took Sara's breath away. But the candle chose that particular moment to run out of wick, leaving them in darkness.
With his face lost to the shadows, she felt Michael shift a little away from her. “Of course I don't believe in all that true love mush. I was only saying—” He rubbed one hand across his eyes in a weary gesture. “I don't know what the hell I was saying. I spout a lot of nonsense when I get tired. Would you mind if we stopped talking now and went to sleep?”
“N-no. I suppose not,” she said, swallowing her disappointment.
“Good.” He didn't exactly roll over and turn his back to her, but Sara could feel his retreat, even though all he did was close his eyes.
Settling back on her own pillow, she stifled a sigh. So what had she expected? Some impassioned declaration from the man? Some tender outpouring of emotion at last?
Even with what little light was left she could make out the stubborn outline of his jaw. It would take more than one night to convince him there was some magic left in the world.
Frustration with the man warred with tenderness as she pulled on the coverlets, dragging the light bedspread and sheet up to tuck them both in. Hovering over him, Sara carefully brushed back a strand of hair from his brow.
“I love you, Mike Parker. I do. So there. I think the heavens meant for us to find each other whether you believe in such things or not. Maybe I can believe enough for both of us.”
She whispered the words very softly, taking care not to wake him, though she realized she needn't have worried. Even in the darkness, she could tell how exhausted the man was. She had a feeling Mike Parker had been running on empty far too long.
“Sleep, Michael,” she said, pressing a soft kiss to his brow. “Because I'll be here. Catching all your bad dreams tonight.”
Nine
“G
ood morning, Mr. Parker.”
The voice was light and airy as a fairy's wings. Mike thought he must be dreaming. He was used to being awakened by the jerk in the apartment next door blasting “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” over his stereo or the trashmen rattling garbage cans in the alley below.
But the silvery voice came again, soft, but persistent. “
Good morning
, Michael.”
Groaning, he managed to force one eye open, then the other, mere slits as he squinted against the brilliant flood of light. He seemed to be floating on some soft white cloud trimmed with eyelet and lace.
And at the foot of his cloud, haloed by sunlight stood a truly celestial being, her feminine curves undulating beneath a satin robe of shimmery blue, golden hair spilling about her shoulders. And she was holding out a cup of—
Coffee! Mike sniffed the air, a tantalizing aroma wafting to his nostrils. He must've died and gone to heaven. Better grab both the mug and the angel before somebody realized they'd made a mistake. Struggling to a sitting position, he forced his eyes open. The sunlight shifted, the angel becoming Sara smiling down at him.
Sara's face. Sara's bedroom. Sara's apartment. Memories of what had happened last night came flooding back to him with a real jolt. Perhaps because for the first time in his life, he had memories too good to be true.
She bent over him, offering him the coffee with a light kiss on his cheek. “Sorry I had to wake you, but I'll have to go out and open up the shop soon.”
“That's all right,” he mumbled. He accepted the cup and took a deep swallow. Hot, black and strong. Just the way he liked it. He wondered how she could have known, but he'd given up asking Sara Holyfield questions like that.
The steaming brew seemed to clear away some of the fog from his mind. He rubbed the grogginess from his eyes.
“Did you sleep well last night?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said, surprised to find that he had for a change. Deep, dreamless, secure. “What'd you do? Sprinkle some pixie dust over me?”
“Something like that.” She perched on the edge of the bed with that look on her face, the expression of a woman waiting for a good-morning kiss.
He set the cup aside and obliged, pulling her down into his arms, his lips meeting hers. The kiss
did
taste of morning—warm, bright and sweet.
The woman never failed to astonish him. He didn't know what he had expected from her. A little awkwardness, embarrassment, some regret perhaps.
After all, she had wasted her first time at making love on an insensitive jerk like him. But she didn't look deflowered. She looked blooming, melting back into his embrace with an eagerness that stirred his desires to life, stronger than ever.
But it had been far easier to give in to temptation last night, caught between the mystical light of her candle and the darkness of the storm.
Mike eased her away from him. “Maybe we'd better take these morning greetings a little slower, angel. Before things go too far.”
“Too late for that, Mike Parker,” she said with a laugh, shaking her hair back.
And she was right. But in desperation, he tried again. “Sara, about what happened last night. I—”
But she placed her fingers over his lips, refusing to allow him to continue, her eyes still smiling into his. “I suppose this is the part where the hero goes all noble and tries to tell the girl how sorry he is for stealing her virtue.”
“No.” Mike kissed her fingertips, moving her hand away. “Because there isn't any hero here, sugar. Just me. A firstclass cynic. I was a mess last night and I took what you offered for my own selfish reasons. And I don't have the decency to be sorry about it.”
“Good, because I'm not.”
“That's because you have that misguided notion all females get, that you can take some poor slob and save him from himself, that you'll find some kind of a prince of a fellow shining underneath. Well, that won't work with me, Sara. I'm not worth the effort. You keep thinking—”
“You don't know what I'm thinking,” Sara interrupted. She ran her fingers lightly, playfully down his bare chest. Mike felt his body tense in instant, eager response.
“Damn it, Sara. I'm trying to be serious.”
“So am I.”
Her hands drifted up and down the hard ridge of his rib cage, each time tracking a little lower, taunting, teasing. A half moan, half laugh escaped him. He was trying to warn her and she wasn't paying any attention to him. The blasted woman was looking at him with stars in her eyes and he feared all he'd end up doing was extinguishing them.
“God, angel, what've I done to you?”
He didn't realize he'd spoken the words aloud until Sara responded, “You made magic for me, Michael. I want you to make it again.”
Is that what she really believed? Then maybe it was up to him to show her that wasn't the case. Prove to her that there hadn't been anything magical or special about it. Prove it to himself, as well.
He caught her and flipped her back onto the bed, his kiss hard and rough. Her response was just as fierce, her tongue meeting his in a fiery dance. The two of them grappled in a heated embrace.
He tugged at the belt that held her robe, tossing it aside. Then he parted the folds, pushing them back, baring the lovely splendors of her body, naked except for the demure white silk of her panties. He ran his hands almost feverishly over her enticing curves, cupping and stroking the soft fullness of her breasts in his hands.
Sara's breath released in a sigh, her lips seeking his as she melted closer into his arms. He was never sure at what point she infused something else into their embrace, some strain of tenderness that touched him to the quick. Beauty gentling the beast. Or maybe she was simply setting him free.
He inched his fingers inside the elastic of her panties and eased them down, slipping them off so that there were no more barriers between them. His maleness pressed against the soft apex of her thighs, seeking the union they both craved.
Sara parted for him, her arms encircling him, warm and generous. She took him deep inside herself, deep into that bright warm world that seemed to be uniquely hers.
Once more there was only Sara. Her healing fire, her gentle loving. The melding of their bodies was a joyous thing, transporting Mike far beyond the shadows of his past.
It was only later when his passion had faded into a hazy afterglow that Mike's doubts returned to haunt him. He held Sara in his arms, the question she'd asked last night turning over and over in his mind.
You don't believe in love, Michael. Do you?
No, he still didn't. Did he? He wasn't so sure anymore. After all, he'd been dead wrong about one thing.
It was morning. And the magic was still there.
 
 
Sara's shop seemed destined to open late that day. It was nearly noon by the time they made it out to her kitchen for a bite of breakfast.
A soft summer breeze ruffled the gingham curtains and Sara's golden curls, drawn up into a ponytail, still slightly damp from the shower. She bustled about the kitchen humming an off-key tune as she refilled their coffee mugs.
From his perch at the kitchen table, Mike found himself unable to keep his eyes off her, drinking in her every graceful movement. The sweet curve of her derriere in sassy white shorts. The soft flow of her top spangled with the signs of the zodiac, the bright blue fabric only bringing out the brighter blue of her eyes. Eyes still aglow from their recent lovemaking.
Mike could only watch her with a sense of amazement and growing guilt. Amazement, because he couldn't believe it had taken a woman as innocent as Sara to teach him more about passion than he'd ever known in his life. Guilt, because he'd let happen again what never should have happened in the first place. Why did it seem like more of a sin to make love to an angel in the daytime?
Maybe because it was harder to avoid certain realizations with the sun glaring in your eyes. The knowledge that bedtime magic wasn't enough to offset the kind of disagreements and disillusionment that could spring up between a man and woman when they weren't tangled between the sheets. His experience with Darcy had taught him that all too well.
And there had never been two people more opposite than himself and Sara. Despite all her exotic beliefs, Mike was fast discovering that she was a very domestic sort of gypsy. Her little apartment was smaller than his but it was filled with all those woman touches—African violets on the windowsill, cookies in the cookie jar, real napkins with a flower print, not the kind that had been swiped from McDonald's.
All those small details that made her place into that intangible something he'd never had and never would.
A home.
The thought stirred in him both a poignant longing and a sense of deep regret. Sara drifted back across the room, setting the steaming mug down in front of him.
She settled across from him at the table, the soft fresh scent of her blending with the other aromas of her kitchen—the coffee, the fresh-baked apple-cinnamon muffins.
Mike took a sip from his cup and offered her a wry smile. He touched the T-shirt that Sara had laundered for him along with his jeans, and commented, “Clean clothes, a hot meal and a beautiful sexy dame who makes a mean cup of coffee. A guy could get used to this....”
“But?” Sara prompted, smiling at him over the rim of her cup.
“I didn't say ‘but' anything.”
“It was there in your voice, Michael.”
He was distracted for a moment, noticing how her bangs grew more soft and golden as her hair slowly dried, tendrils escaping her ponytail to frame her face like some kind of halo.
“A guy could get used to this,” he repeated with a rueful face, “but a guy like me shouldn't.”
“Why not?”
“Because...” He hesitated, not wanting to hurt her, but it was far too late for him to be thinking of that now.
“Because even though what's happened between us—was something pretty spectacular, the truth is, we're two very different people, Sara.”
“I noticed that.” She slanted a wicked teasing glance down the length of his torso.
Great. For once he was trying to play the part of the sensible, responsible one, and Sara was cracking jokes.
Mike scowled at her. “When I leave here, you're going to go back out to your shop with its nice little healing crystals and fairy wands. But me, I'm back to hitting the streets, tracking down cheating husbands, con artists and other kinds of scum, dealing with who knows what else....”
His gaze flicked briefly to where Sara had folded his trench coat neatly over the back of his chair, the edge of that damned letter from his father visible at the top of the pocket. Like a grim shadow.
Mike looked quickly away again.
“I'm trying to warn you, angel. I'm a guy with a very uncertain future.”
Sara stared thoughtfully at him. “Would you like me to rune you?”
“I already have a whole line of bank creditors willing to do that.”
Sara laughed softly. “Not
ruin
. Rune. I could do a reading for you with the rune stones.”
“I don't know about that—” Mike began, but Sara was already leaping eagerly up to go in search of her little rocks or whatever the hell she was talking about.
She returned quickly with a small velvet bag. She opened it to display the contents—smooth flat stones bearing weird markings on them.
“This is a practice that goes all the way back to the days of the Vikings,” she said.
Mike eyed the stones warily. “No offense, Sara. But I don't think something invented by a bunch of guys who wore goofy horned hats could be that hot of an idea. If this has anything to do with predicting my future, I'd just as soon not know.”
But Sara hastened to reassure him. “No. I'm not into doing fortunes like with the Tarot cards. Even I find that frightening. Rune stones are more gentle. All they do is get you in touch with your inner guide.”
“Angel, my inner guide has about as much sense of direction as an old bloodhound that's lost its sense of smell.” Mike gave a nervous laugh, edging his chair away from the table. This was probably all a bunch of baloney, but he'd seen Sara pull off some damned strange things. He wasn't sure he was ready for another one.
But she was giving him The Look. The big-eyed one that always melted him down like a triple-decker ice-cream cone on a hot day.
“Aw, what the hell!” he mumbled, scooting his chair back. “Go for it.”
It wasn't the most encouraging request Sara had ever received, but she made the best of it. Clutching the velvet drawstring bag, she struggled to block everything else out of her mind—her own wishes, hopes and dreams. To think of nothing but Michael. His name. His image.

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