Playing for Keeps/A Tempting Stranger (23 page)

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Authors: Lori Copeland

Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #General, #Contemporary, #Westerns, #test

BOOK: Playing for Keeps/A Tempting Stranger
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Page 167
tly pulled her to his chest, whispering raggedly, ''I'm so sorry, Angel. I don't know what got into me. I'm half crazy wanting you. I've never wanted anything like I want you tonight."
Their bodies moved as one toward the large bed as they murmured each other's names, their mouths seeking and hungrily finding each other. As they lay side by side, seeking out the secrets and pleasures of their bodies, Jessica came to him with an eagerness that pleased and astounded him, her supple, warm body complying with his every demand. His tongue chased hers in sweet, provocative play as their mouths clung together, their soft sighs mingling in the quiet room. Helplessly she arched her hips toward him, pressing her body closer, and with her hand caressed the firm curve of his back as it dipped to form the sensuous slope of his buttocks. He eagerly surrendered to her touch, his tongue moving inside her warm mouth as though he was afraid that if he stopped she would disappear from his arms.
His mouth grazed her tender breasts, causing her nipples to strain toward his tongue as wave after wave of desire coursed through her body. Her small hands clutched fervently at his thickly corded arms, his muscles tensing with a need for her too strong to be denied. "I want youI need you," Jason whispered huskily as his hand moved between her shapely thighs.
A hard knot rose in her throat as her hot salty tears mingled with their kisses. "I know, my darling Jason . . . I know."
He slid his fingertips against the sensitive flesh of her inner thigh, causing Jessica to writhe in sweet torment at the exquisiteness of his touch. As the intensity of her shuddering increased he pulled her beneath him, his merging with her fiery and deep. Their need for each other was so great that neither one could move as the tide of blinding passion devoured them. It was over almost as soon as it started. Jason carried them to a frantic plateau, their need
 
Page 168
building higher and higher, their satisfaction reaching far beyond the physical. The fires deep within them burst together, each one feeling a sense of acute disappointment that it could not last forever. Jessica clung to Jason, her face buried in his broad chest as they spiraled helplessly back toward sanity.
As their ragged breathing slowed and the sounds of the quiet night resumed Jason spoke. ''Do you know what you put me through out there tonight on that hay wagon?"
Jessica kept her eyes closed, a sweet languid feeling pervading her. "You're the one who started it," she said in weak defense.
Jason began running his hands slowly over her, stopping at her breasts to flick her nipples lightly with his fingers, then moving to the roundness of her hip, reacquainting himself leisurely with all her feminine curves and secrets. Jessica shuddered at the boldness of his hands as his fingertips sought the warmth of her femininity, and she reached out to examine the pleasurable planes of his body.
"I wanted to take you in my arms so damn bad . . ." He moaned, his hands tightening possessively around her derriere. "But I had to sit there and watch you in some other man's arms."
She sighed deeply, brushing her mouth over his, kissing him tenderly as she felt him press deeper against her silken thigh. "I
imagined
I was in your arms."
"But I didn't have you in my arms, and I plan on correcting that. From now on I want you in this bed every night with me, Jessica. You belong here." Jessica's heart soared, then plunged to the ground with his next words. "There is no reason to deny what we both feel for the next few weeks," he whispered hoarsely, his mouth searing hers again with a coaxing kiss.
"You mean until our 'business' is over with," Jessica said sadly.
Jason's tongue played lightly with hers, the embers ig-
 
Page 169
niting rapidly again for them both. ''Let's not talk about business tonight, sweetheart," he whispered softly.
Talk about business! Jessica's mind scoffed at his choice of words. He certainly didn't plan on committing himself! Why should he, she reasoned, when he had her
and
Monica? Jessica loved him, but she would not settle for second best. She wanted marriage and a home with his children, or nothing. Her thoughts froze as his mouth began to trail over the hollow of her neck and down to the softness of her breasts, his tongue licking wet circles around their pink crests, causing a delightful tautness to invade her entire body. She held her breath as his tongue continued its searing path, hesitating for one brief second as he placed soft, lingering kisses around her navel before retracing his way back to her mouth and whispering against her lips, "Now, can't you think of something you'd rather do besides talk?"
She smiled in the darkness as her hands reached to guide him over her slender body once again. "Shut up, Rawlings. Hasn't anyone ever told you you talk too much?"
Their mouths met in fiery kisses, blotting out all other coherent thoughts.
This time their merging was a slow tender union, the unrestrained joy of being in each other's arms overriding their differences for the moment. They floated together through hazy, sensuous hillsides, moaning blissfully, before the fires of passion captured them a second time, leaving them clinging weakly, wrapped in each other's arms, a thin sheen of perspiration covering their bodies.
Jason rolled over on his back, bringing her with him. "I'm not going to ask you where you've learned some of those things you've just so expertly put to use . . . but you damn well better never use them with anyone but me, ever again." His breath was coming in short ragged spurts.
Jessica brought her mouth down to trail featherlike kisses across the side of his neck. "Why, don't you remem-
 
Page 170
ber? I owe all my expertise in lovemaking to you. You taught me all I know,'' she whispered intimately in his ear.
"I'd love to take the credit for that, but I only spent one night with you," he said skeptically.
"As you once said, I'm a fast learner," Jessica reminded him, playfully tugging at his lips with her teeth.
His mouth caught hers in another long drugging kiss before he shifted her over next to his side. "You should have caught me when I was younger, Angel. I'm getting too old for these all night love-a-thons," he said sleepily. "Let's continue ouruhconversation in the morning."
Jessica lay very still. He had not said he loved her. He wanted her, but he didn't love her. Things had not changed one iota. She simply had one more night to put in her memory box.
"Jason," she whispered quietly.
"Ummm . . ."
"I'm going homeback to Austinin the morning."
Jason opened one eye. "Why?"
Jessica closed her eyes, willing herself to deceive him. "I need to check on my apartmentdo a few things I've been putting off," she lied boldly.
Jason closed his eyes again, weariness etched deeply in his tanned face. "That shouldn't take very long, should it?"
"No, maybe a couple of days."
"Well"he turned over, taking her in his arms again"don't stay any longer than necessary. The nights could start getting long without your tempting little body next to me."
"Will you take good care of Tabby and her kittens?" Jessica asked sorrowfully.
"Sure," Jason agreed readily, then cocked one eye open again. "What do you mean by that? I thought she wasn't due for a while."
"Oh, I just meant, in case she had them while I was gone," Jessica said, catching her error.
 
Page 171
''Don't worry about anything, honey. I'll take care of it." Jason's breathing became slow as Jessica lay in the warm comfort of his heavily muscled arms, savoring her last few hours with him. She wouldn't return from Austin; she'd go to the bank and try to obtain a loan to pay Jason for running the farm for her and mail him a check. It no longer mattered to her whether she got the inheritance. Life would go on whether she wanted it to or not, and right now she didn't care.
 
Page 172
Chapter Ten
The large jet sat its cumbersome body down, light as a feather, as it landed gracefully on the runway of the Robert Mueller Municipal Airport in Austin that early evening in October, bringing Jessica back to what had been her home for the last eight years.
The plane rolled gracefully to a stop as she began gathering her things in preparation to leave the plane. After stepping into the terminal she fought her way over to claim her baggage. She never ceased to be amazed by the way people's manners deserted them in a hurried situation like this, but she had learned to be as aggressive as the next person, reasoning that if you had to live in the jungle, you needed to be able to hold your own with the animals.
 
Page 173
She stepped back out into the still, warm evening and hailed a cab. Giving the driver the address, she climbed in and leaned back sadly in the seat as the driver pulled swiftly away from the terminal.
The capital of Texas was a lovely old city, boasting schools for the deaf and blind, the University of Texas, which Jessica had attended for four years, as well as the LBJ ranch, sitting just fifty miles to the west. They were now passing the campus where she had spent long hours sitting in the large LBJ Library, cramming for tests with Sally Munson, her closest friend throughout her college years.
She smiled now as she thought of all the good times they had had together . . . those late night jam sessions they'd had in Jessica's roomSally either in the clouds from her latest love or in the depths of dark despair from the lack of one. They would consume large quantities of Coke and potato chips, sitting in the middle of Jessica's bed, agonizing over Sally's unquestionable fate of forever being a bridesmaid but never a bride. Sally would get so desperate about the prospect of becoming an old maid she would wave the potato chip sack wildly over the bed before Jessica's distressed eyes. By the time Sally would leave forlornly for her own room, Jessica would have to drag out the little Dustbuster she kept in her closet and vacuum out her bed before going to sleep that night.
Jessica laughed openly as she thought of her good friend now, very happily married, expecting a child any day. She wondered fleetingly whether she had remembered her vow to wear the black negligee they had bought together that day two years ago, and if so, whether she had had any better luck with it than Jessica had.
The taxi was pulling into the drive of Mrs. Houseman's house, her homey little bungalow with its flowers and shrubbery looking very peaceful in the gathering twilight. Jessica paid her cab fare, adding a generous tip as the cab driver removed her luggage from the trunk of the cab and
 
Page 174
set the suitcases on the drive. Jessica picked them up and walked around to the back of her landlady's house and rang the bell. Mrs. Houseman threw open the door, enveloping Jessica in a maternal hug and expressing her delight to see her again.
''Things have just not been the same around here," she was complaining to Jessica. "I'd look up at your little apartment every night, and there would be no lights on, and I'd have such a lonely feeling," she said wistfully. "You had me spoiled, young lady, spending so many of your free evenings together with me," she scolded Jessica lovingly. "Now I'm going to have to find someone else to tell all my problems to."
Jessica hugged her affectionately. "There's a lot of people that would be more than happy to take my place. Mr. Hawks, to name one," she teased.
"Oh, my, Mr. Hawks, my foot!" Mrs. Houseman became quite flustered. "Now, why in the world would I want him around underfoot every evening?"
Jessica grinned mischievously. "Why, I don't think he'd mind keeping you company in the evenings. Doesn't he just 'happen by' almost every night, anyway?" she asked innocently.
"Oh, flitter, I can't seem to step out my back door that he doesn't show up, looking for a piece of that lemon cake he's always been so fond of," she complained good-naturedly.
"Well," Jessica replied tactfully, "it's a good thing you find time to bake a fresh one a couple of times a week, or he'd be up that proverbial creek without a paddle, wouldn't he?"
Mrs. Houseman flushed prettily, her wrinkled face glowing. "Let's just forget about Mr. Hawks for now." She hastened to change the subject. "Come on, I'll fix us a glass of fresh lemonade. I know you must be tired from your flight."
They stepped into the house, going into the large kitche-

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