Shades of Gray (13 page)

He didn’t need a cheering section, didn’t need a validation of his dream from her; what he needed was the love that proved to an anguished
spirit that he could never be the monster he was afraid of becoming. That was why he had hidden so much of himself from her, why her awareness and fear of the darkness had hurt him so deeply—because she saw and recognized what he was afraid of himself.

He needed an understanding love, a love that would see him clearly and never falter in that understanding. A love that could share the shadows as well as the light, the fears and uncertainties as well as the strengths. He needed a partner, a mate, a lover, a friend.

And she? She needed him. She needed the bond between them, the strange, compelling affinity, the closeness. She needed his love, complex and demanding though it was. She needed to hear his voice, to see the intensity in his black eyes, to watch him move. She needed the only man who had ever enthralled her, intrigued her, angered and hurt her. She needed the passion and tenderness he offered. She needed his sharp intelligence, his soft laugh, his crooked, charming smile.

She needed, beyond all reason, the careful balance between them, that dangerous, potentially
painful high-wire act that would demand the best of them both to succeed.

He didn’t offer a tame love or a tame life. He offered struggle, danger, great joy, and possible anguish. He offered a life torn by war, with no promise that ending this battle would prevent the one waiting just around the next corner. He offered enemies that would be hers as well as his. He offered an uncertain future.

He offered his love, a love that had never faltered in all the time they had been apart. A love that had stood with granite certainty against her fear and panic. A love he would never abandon, because it was the best of him.

And for Sara, when the moment of certainty came, it was neither blinding nor what she had hoped for. But it was an answer of sorts, and one that couldn’t be denied. She didn’t know if she was strong enough to give Andres all that he needed, to love him without losing herself, but she knew one thing, knew it with everything inside her.

She wasn’t strong enough to leave him again.

“Sara?”

The lamp by the bed came on, and Andres straightened, relief easing his features as he saw her curled up in the big chair.

She looked at him, remaining silent, feeling the hunger, the sharp stabs of longing. He moved like a cat, she thought, watching him come around the bed toward her, as if he still moved through the jungles he had practically grown up in.

“Sara, dinner will be ready—” He stopped suddenly, didn’t move or speak, gazing down at her with an arrested expression.

She vaguely wondered what her own face looked like to bring such anxiety into his. “I shouldn’t have come in here without asking,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

He shook his head. “You’re welcome anywhere in this house, you know that. Sara, what’s wrong?”

She rose from the chair slowly, unable to stop staring at him. “Wrong? Nothing. I didn’t want to bother you while you and the colonel were working, so I came in here.”

“Sara—”

“I love the painting.”

After a moment he said, “I’m glad.”

She drew a deep breath, then stepped forward suddenly and slipped her arms around his waist. Instantly his arms closed around her, and she hid her face against his neck and breathed in the clean, faintly musky scent of his skin.

“Sara?”

“I want to belong to you,” she whispered.

His arms tightened almost convulsively, his voice abruptly harsh with strain. “Sara, if we become lovers, I’ll never be able to let you go.”

She lifted her head, looking up at him gravely. “Yes, you would. If I asked to go, you’d let me. But I won’t ask, Andres. I won’t ask.”

He caught his breath. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.” Her smile was slow. “I love you.”

“
Mi corazón
 …” His head bent, his lips finding hers in a kiss that was unutterably tender. His arms drew her closer, one hand sliding up her back and beneath the heavy weight of her silky hair, while the other hand slipped down to her hips.

Tenderness heated, exploded into driven passion. His mouth slanted across hers, his tongue possessing her with a shocking intimacy; his big body shuddered hard, shaken by a wave of need. Sara felt her own body shiver violently, felt the hunger inside her surge with the breathless force of a tidal wave. She wasn’t close enough to him, couldn’t get close enough; she was frantic with the need to become a part of him.

She could feel the physical power of him; feel the hard muscles of a lifetime’s brutal, daily struggle for survival; and was dimly surprised that there was no fear in her of his vital force. Instead she was seduced by his unthinking power, moved unbearably by the certain knowledge that he reined that potent strength for her.

A soft, primitive sound tangled in the back of her throat when his lips finally left hers, and she forced herself to release him long enough to cope with the buttons of his shirt. He was exploring the soft flesh of her neck, and she threw her head back, eyes half closed, her trembling fingers unfastening buttons with blind knowledge. She felt rather than saw him shrug the shirt off, and
his powerful bronze chest drew her hands like a magnet.

The strength of him … It had made her wary, had intrigued and compelled her, had once frightened her. Now his strength was a tactile delight, igniting her senses, bringing her entire body vividly alive. The corded power of his arms held her, muscles rippling beneath bronze flesh. The mat of black hair on his broad chest was sensuously abrasive, and—

Scars. More than twenty years of war and hardship had left their marks on his soldier’s body. Some were old, some more recent, but all were marks of terrible suffering.

Sara felt a sob catch in her throat, and she half pushed him away, her hands exploring, her eyes seeing for the first time. She had never seen his bare torso. “You didn’t tell me,” she whispered, hurting with the pain of those old wounds. “Oh, Andres—”

“Shhhh.” He held her face, kissed her gently. “Old hurts, my love. From long ago. They don’t matter now.”

They mattered to Sara, mattered because his
life had held such pain. Yet he hadn’t lost his dream, not completely, hadn’t lost the ability to love. Unaware of her tears, she pressed her lips to a puckered bullet scar on his shoulder and then the thin white line of an old knife wound high on his rib cage. And there were others she could feel, marks on his back that she knew, with cold instinct, were the scars of long-ago beatings. The revolutionary army he had been yanked into as a teenager had been a brutal one, led by cruel men.

Oh, God, the pain!

“Don’t,” he said huskily, shaken, drawing her close and holding her for that moment with tender comfort. “Don’t weep for me, Sara.”

She realized then that no one ever had wept for Andres, and it almost broke her heart.

“Love me,” she whispered, fierce, driven. Her body molded itself to his, yielding, seeking. She met his lips with burning need, barely tasting the salt of her own tears. She wanted to give and give, to overwhelm him with her love until even the memory of pain was gone. She helped him draw the tank top over her head, heard the
rasping sound he made when she pressed her naked breasts to his chest.

For just that instant, with Andres caught between deep tenderness and violent need, she was the stronger one. And she felt the pulse of her own strength, the certainty, the primitive heartbeat of ancient emotion. He was hers, he had always been hers, and she was his; nothing in the world would ever be as real as that.

S
ARA WASN
’
T AWARE
of clothing falling away, only of the intimate shock of flesh meeting, burning and greedy. Their bodies strained to be closer, hard and demanding. Sara didn’t know if he carried her to the bed or if she floated, didn’t know which of them threw back the covers. It didn’t matter.

She hadn’t known what to expect of Andres as a lover. She knew the tenderness of his love and had glimpsed the strength of his passion, but nothing had prepared her for the astonishing depth of his ability to give of himself. He hid
nothing, held back nothing. She had never felt so loved in her life.

He murmured endearments in English and Spanish as he loved her, his caresses achingly sensitive. In the soft light of the bedside lamp, he looked at her as if something of inestimable beauty and wonder had been given to him. He couldn’t stop kissing her, couldn’t stop touching heated, quivering flesh.

“Do you know what you do to me?” he murmured in a raspy voice, the warmth of his breath teasing even as his tone compelled. His lips lightly brushed a nipple hardened with wanting him, and his big hands slowly slid up her narrow waist until the swelling fullness of her breasts was captured.

Sara caught her breath, her nails digging into his shoulders. “I—I know what you do to me,” she whispered, hardly recognizing her own voice.

His mouth brushed her straining flesh again and again, and his voice was rough, wondering. “From the first moment I saw you,” he said, “I knew I was lost, lost somewhere in your lovely
green eyes. I couldn’t think, couldn’t see anything but you. I was shaking inside, terrified some other man had found you before me and won your heart.”

Andres’s head lifted suddenly, and his eyes glittered with dark fire, with something implacable. “I would have done anything to win your love,” he said fiercely. “Anything—” His voice caught, cracked. “Anything except hurt you or frighten you. I never wanted to do that, Sara.”

“I know.” She could barely get the words out through the tightness of her throat. “I know, Andres. It’s all right now. Everything’s all right now.”

He groaned suddenly and buried his face between her breasts. “You make me drunk,” he said tautly. “Make me crazy.
Dios
, Sara. I love you!”

Sara felt it then, felt the full force of his passion, his desire for her. It had been growing, building beneath the slow, gentle caresses, but now it swept over them both. His gentleness became driven hunger, urgent need. His big body
was hard, burning, shaking with the force of his passion.

But this time, unlike that night in the garden, Sara didn’t feel battered or bewildered by the sheer power of his desire. This time she felt a stunning force of her own rise within her, matching his. Fearless, exultant, she met need with need.

She felt his mouth at her breast, felt the swirling, maddening pleasure of his tongue. She felt the sure, insistent touch of his hand, felt her body yield as her legs parted for him. A moan caught in her throat and escaped raggedly when he found the warmth of her. The sensations were incredible, stealing her breath, shaking her body and soul.

Andres fought to master his body, to control the violence of his need, and it was the hardest thing he’d ever attempted in his life. She was so beautiful, so utterly responsive, and he ached because of needing her for so long. He heard a sound escape from somewhere deep inside him, wild with longing, and knew that never, as long as he lived, would his need of her lessen.

“Sara …”

The soft sounds she made ran through him like fire, and he could feel the last threads of his control snapping. Her slender body warm and yearning, ready for him.

“Andres, please!” Her voice was nearly gone, the faint, husky sound of limits reached, passed.

He widened her thighs gently and slipped between them, bracing himself above her. Sara looked up at him, dazed, aching; her hands found his shoulders, fingers compulsively probing smooth bronze skin and hard muscles.

“I love you,” he said, his voice rough. “Sara …”

She felt a touch against her aching flesh, a pressure, then some instinct drove her to move suddenly, arching upward to meet him; she possessed even as he did. A cry of surprise caught in her throat, and her eyes widened with shock and pleasure. She thought his hot, dark eyes flickered briefly, flared with a new emotion, but there was no time to think about that.

Her supple limbs held him, her body sheathing his with tight heat, her passion meeting his wildly. She caught his rhythm, matched it in
feverish response. She was driven, taking and giving, a shattering tension coiling until there was nothing but the primitive need to meld with him, to become a part of him until they were one.