The Driven Snowe (17 page)

I hate you, get away from me, I could never love you,
his mind instantly supplied.
Or, even worse, “You're kidding, right?”

All right. He was really, really nervous about her reaction.

She was wearing one of the small terry robes the hotel supplied, and her hair was loose and blowing slightly in the breeze. He walked up behind her, kissing her gently
on the back of her neck and at the sweet indentation just behind her ear. She shivered and leaned back against him obligingly.

“I suppose I could forgive you for this afternoon,” she said slowly, turning. She caressed his light cotton boxers, and he instantly went hard beneath her curious fingertips. “If you make it worth my while.”

Don't get distracted,
he scolded himself. “Maybe we should talk first.”

She stroked his erection, coaxing it from its hiding place with satiny fingers. He groaned. “Talk.” She chuckled, a low, sexy sound. “Is that what they're calling it these days?”

She started pushing insistent kisses against his bare chest, and he could feel the plush material of her robe against his hardness. This woman could drive him crazy with just a few touches. It was like putting a fire out with gasoline. “Angela, where are we going with all this?” he asked, moving back a little.

His mistake was that, in the hotel room, moving back from the balcony meant moving toward the bed. She drew the curtains and moved in on him. Her brown eyes glowed with golden highlights, and her full lips curved in invitation, with just a hint of humor. “You're the one who taught me where we could go with all of this.” She nudged him, and he felt the bed hit the back of his knees. She was stroking him, pulling at the tie of the robe, letting it fall open to reveal the smooth nude body, hidden just inside. His breathing was getting quicker.

“I don't mean the sex,” he said, trying hard to focus. “To start, I really missed you this week…”

To his surprise, she pushed him, hard. He tried to keep his balance, but his foot slipped on the smooth
comforter and he fell on to the bed with a lurch. “I missed you, too,” she said, with a hungry stare.

“I want to see you more often,” he said, trying to lead into his statement, not drop it on her.

“You see me every weekend,” she said reasonably, pressing moist little kisses down his stomach. His muscles clenched, and he gritted his teeth. “And stained glass will be ending soon…I guess maybe I could see you Wednesdays, too.”

He was breathing hard now, and his blood roared through his head. He grimaced as she grabbed the waistband of his boxers and gently eased them down his legs, then shed her robe. “Angela, I really wanted to…ah…” he said, as she started breathing on him, inching lower, her full lips a mere smile away from his erection.

“Shh,” she said, her finger caressing both him and her lips in a gesture of silence. “We don't need to talk about this right now…”

He wanted to protest, but her lips covered him, and it was all he could do to keep breathing. He let out an explosive groan, his hips rising off the bed as she moved up and down on him slowly, gently tracing him with her tongue. Her mahogany hair slid like a silk cloud over his stomach and his thighs. He gasped and moaned, his hands bunching in fists before finally skimming over her hair, inadvertently moving her farther down on him.
“Angela,”
he breathed, feeling his body shiver.

She pulled off of him with a long, slow caress, brushing him ever so slightly with the edge of her teeth and causing him to let out a startled “unh” of pleasure. She smiled at him, mischievously. “My turn.”

This was his chance—his last chance at rational thought. “Angela, I love…having you around me,” he
said, chickening out as she started to kiss her way up his body, stroking him as she did so. “I love spending time with you. I love waking up with you.” He took a deep breath. “Angela, I love…”

She covered his mouth with her own, before he could finish the sentence. Her kiss was insistent, passionate, making his blood sing and his head swim. She positioned herself over him, and before he realized what was going on, she drove him into her in one smooth motion.

“Josh,”
she moaned, and he felt enveloped by her moist, tight heat. “Talk later. Make love to me.”

He felt her body clench around him. He couldn't help it. His body took over.

He felt her rock against him, and he held her hips, pushing gently down on her thighs, pulling her toward him. She closed her eyes, looking almost meditative as she threw her head back. Her breathing was shallow, and she moved slowly, her hips circling him. She wasn't rushing toward an end result—she was enjoying the feel of his body inside of hers, and the sensation was driving him mad.

She leaned down and kissed him, the new angle making him groan as she ground against him. He pushed up, hard, making her gasp in return. Her eyes flew open, and she smiled in sexual challenge. She pressed against him harder, drawing him deeper inside her, clenching him tighter, and he felt his control starting to slip. Her tempo increased. She was riding him, breathing in short, mewling little gasps, her breasts glistening lightly with sweat. She bit at her lower lip.

“Oh,” she breathed, moving against him furiously. “Oh, oh…”

“Come on,” he said, pushing into her.

She let out a cry and he felt her convulsing around him, gripping him like a fist. He pulled her hard against him, burying himself in her, feeling his own release coursing through him in powerful waves.

She collapsed alongside him, and he could still feel their mutual pleasure in their muted quivering of muscles, in the cooling of skin.

After several minutes, he rolled her over. Her eyes were closed, and she had a half smile. He grinned, seeing it. “Guess you showed me,” he said, pulling the covers up over their naked bodies.

She didn't say anything.

He took a deep breath. Time to bite the bullet. “Angela, I think we'd better have that talk now.”

He waited for a response. He only heard the soft sound of even, measured breathing. After a few moments, he realized that was all he was going to get. “Angela?”

Still nothing. Finally, he nudged her. She turned over with an incoherent mumble, and curved into the pillow.

She was sound asleep.

He turned off the light, and lay there, awake, with both hands behind his head. Wasn't it supposed to be the man who climaxed, then fell fast asleep? And wasn't it the woman who fumed because, yet again, they'd avoided any talk of love?

Hell. When did I get to be the woman in this relationship?

“S
O, HOW WAS
San Diego? You haven't mentioned a word about your getaway all week.” Tanya turned slightly from the driver's seat of her car. “Everything okay?”

Angela had finally begun to relax, but Tanya's casual question caused all the tension she'd been holding at bay to come back with a pinch between her shoulders. “San Diego was nice,” she replied, staring out the car window but not seeing past the glass. It was nine o'clock on Friday night, and the sky was pitch-black. “How was the club?”

“The usual…loud music, May dancing her head off,” Tanya said. Angela looked over and for a second caught Tanya's light-eyed gaze as she studied Angela in her rearview mirror. “Too bad you couldn't have been there, but then, I know how it is. Everything
is
okay between you and Josh, right?” Her voice was hesitant, as if she didn't want to pry, but couldn't help herself.

Angela squirmed against her seat belt. “We're fine.”

Ginny, who was riding in the front passenger seat,
craned her neck around to look at Angela. “Hmm. Nice? Fine?” She shook her head. “Bland adjectives spell trouble. Spill.”

Angela peered into the darkness. “Where are we going, anyway? I'm starving.”

Ginny glanced at Tanya. “Evasion. Definite sign. This is going to take drastic measures.”

“Angela will tell us when she feels like it,” Tanya said, and Angela let out a little sigh of relief. “We're going to dinner at this new restaurant. Well, not exactly new…remember that old diner out by the highway? Well, with the town growing and all these new businesses coming in, somebody bought it and is making it into this retro restaurant. They say the food's really good, too. Nouveau Californian.” Tanya chuckled. “We'll see how long it lasts.”

Angela fell quiet as Tanya and Ginny talked about the different restaurants in the outlying towns, trying to ignore the chill she suddenly felt. She knew that diner, all right.

Sweetie, I'm going to work,
her mother would say all those years ago. Her mother would come back from her day job, maybe have a hasty dinner with Angela and her grandmother, then kiss her good-night at seven before working a shift at The Roadstop, as the diner was then known. Her mother would sometimes bring home food, which was good on the occasions when Gram had fallen ill and there was less money for food than usual. By the time her mother was the age Angela was now, she had been divorced for eight years, with a young daughter and her mother to take care of by herself.

Angela could still picture her mother, her faded mint green uniform so stiffly pressed it hurt to look at it, and
her hair pulled back in a severe ponytail that had ended at the nape of her neck.

Angela reached up, feeling her own ponytail absently.

I'm not my mother.

“Hello? You awake back there?” Ginny asked, ignoring Tanya's huff of impatience. “You know, sometimes it's better to get these things off of your chest…”

“I'm scared that I'm in love with Josh.”

They sat there for a moment, and in the silence that followed, Angela could have bit her tongue off. The words had just jumped out.
I shouldn't have said anything. What will they think? What was
I
thinking?

Before she could somehow try to retract the statement, Ginny nodded, her eyes sympathetic as she turned to her. “I thought it might be something like that. Angela, it's better for you to talk about it, believe me.”

Tanya nodded, too. “Tell me…are you scared of being in love, or scared of being in love with Josh?”

Angela paused. “I hadn't thought of it that way. Both, I guess.” She took a deep breath. She hadn't talked like this with anybody since Bethany, and just opening up was hard. “I thought when we started that it would just be casual. I don't exactly have a history of relationships.”

“So it's really more love in general, then?”

Angela sighed. “Well, sort of. Josh is…complicated.”

Ginny turned, looking over the back of her seat. “Is it his whole past track record with women?”

Angela frowned. “Not really his reputation,” Angela said, thinking about it even as she said it. She hadn't even really thought about it since they'd started their arrangement. She'd never seen him “in action,” as it were. “If anything, it's how much he's involved with me.
I feel like he's calling all the shots…that I don't have time to really process what's going on. I keep thinking I don't want to do something, and the next thing I know, he's charming me or persuading me, or whatever, and suddenly I'm doing exactly that.”

Strangely, they seemed to understand. “You've been together, what, eight months?” Ginny asked.

Angela thought about it. “More like four or five.” Had it really been only that long? She was starting to lose track—she could barely remember what her life was like without him.

“Really? It seemed like longer.”

“You're a couple that really seems to work well together,” Tanya interjected. “He really cares about you. He might try to persuade or charm you, but that's probably just an aspect of his personality. He's not bossing you around or bullying you to get you to do what he wants, does he?”

“Of course not.” As if she'd stand for that!

“And what you wind up doing…is it something that, in your gut, you really feel morally wrong about? Are you doing things you feel you shouldn't be doing?”

Angela paused. “I…no. Probably not really.”

Tanya nodded again. “It's the love thing in general. You feel like he's edging you toward love, and you don't know if you're ready for it or not.”

“I guess that's it.” Angela closed her eyes, remembering Saturday—how panicked she'd felt when he'd started talking about love, and wondering what exactly he was going to confess to her. “No, that's not it. It's that he won't let me have time to come to these decisions my own way. I might love him,” she said, and even the words made her palms sweat. “But I need to do things
on my own time. He keeps rushing me. How can I make the right decision if he keeps rushing me?”

“Have you explained that to him?” Ginny said.

“I'm working on it.”

“Well, I will say this,” Tanya said gently. “I've seen how he looks at you, even when you're not looking at him. I've seen how he talks to you, and how he acts around you. The man obviously loves and cares about you deeply. He might be a little heavy-handed, and a little impatient, and the guy has enough charm to light up a city block. But he's also under
your
power a little. And that's what this is all about, isn't it? How much of yourself you're giving up?”

“I don't know,” Angela said. “It doesn't feel like it. It feels like I'm fighting to stay myself.”

“It's a Friday night, and instead of being with him, your
boyfriend,
you're out with us,” Tanya pointed out. “How did he feel about that? He didn't charm you out of that, did he?”

Angela thought about it. “No. He didn't sound thrilled, obviously. It doesn't help that I've been dodging him all week, either.” Angela smiled a little, finally. “I think he's re-grouping.”

“The fact of the matter is, he loves you. And despite your skittishness, I think you love him. You might need to think about it, but to pretend you can just ignore what you're feeling until you're comfortable with it…it's not fair. It's not fair to him, and more importantly, it's not fair to you. You deserve to be happy.”

You deserve to be happy.

She'd been worried about her independence, about her dreams and how she would have to curtail them in an effort to stay in a relationship with him. He'd only
been kind to her, and compassionate, and loving. Sure, he'd had that one bobble when he'd bolted from her arms, then yelled at her for making plans without him. They were just…fights. They happened from time to time. She'd just be deluding herself if she waited for a relationship that never had any problems, ever.

She liked—no, she
loved
the time she spent with this man. She loved waking up with him, loved listening to him talk about work or his family or basically anything. She loved the way he thought about her.

I love Josh.

She waited for the fear to hit, and it did, but it was a muted echo compared to what she was used to feeling.

She smiled, and for a moment, she wished she hadn't promised that she would go out with the girls tonight. That thought didn't instill fear, either. Maybe she would call him later. Or stop by his house.

Maybe I'll just hijack a car and go over there as soon as we stop….

She grinned at herself. Her legendary reserve was crumbling with every passing mile.

They pulled up at the diner. It was packed with cars, and teenagers hung out in the parking lot, laughing and talking around the backs of trucks and jeeps. Several of them had lettermen jackets from Manzanita High. There were also more urban and upscale cars. Solar Bars' yuppie infusion, as it were. She remembered the semis that had regularly been parked up and down the street, and laughed to herself.

They made it to the doors, and Angela was practically tapping her toes with impatience.
I love Josh, I love Josh.
It was bouncing through her head, bubbling
through her bloodstream. Of course she loved Josh. It seemed so obvious now. She had the chance of a life-time—not repeating her mother's mistake, but learning from it. She had let her mother's experience cow her for far too long. He had never been anything but kind to her—insistent, yes, but kind. Why was she letting old ghosts stop her? It seemed silly, now, to be afraid.

They pushed their way through the crowd at the front of the diner, getting to a harried-looking waitress who informed them that the wait would be half an hour. Angela groaned, and Ginny laughed. “Hungry?”

“Yes.” She was hungry to see Josh.

Tanya gave her a piercing look, and then smiled. “Go call him while we're waiting. I'll drop you off at his place right after we eat dinner.”

Angela stared at her, then hugged her as she laughed. “I've been there,” Tanya said, hugging back. “Go on. Call.”

“I hope I feel that way some day,” Ginny said as Angela started to leave. “And, Tanya, I hope you smack me for it.”

Angela felt ridiculous, but happy. She pushed her way through the crowd. She knew the layout of this building by heart, and despite the changes to the decor, she still knew where everything was. She walked past tables, almost blindly, heading for the corridor that led to the rest rooms and the pay phones.

“Oh, Josh, you haven't changed a bit!”

Angela stopped for a second, and almost tripped as the person behind her bumped into her. Grumbling, the man walked around as Angela saw who was talking and stared, frozen.

There, in one red vinyl-covered booth, was
Josh—smiling his winning grin at her talkative travel agent, Shelly.

Angela felt nothing for a second. The scene made no sense to her. That was Josh, she realized, her Josh, the one she was in love with. The fact that he was with another woman didn't quite compute.
I'll have to leave him a message, then,
she thought inanely.

Then she realized what was going on.

He's out to dinner. With another woman.

She had never felt jealousy before in her life, and the force of it hit her like a brick. Her heart felt like it had imploded. She saw him smiling at Shelly, the same smile she was so used to receiving. He was talking animatedly.

She bet that Shelly would have never abandoned Josh to go out to dinner with her friends. Which could possibly explain why Josh was now out sharing a meal with Shelly, rather than waiting patiently by the phone for Angela.

She couldn't blame him, she supposed. She couldn't believe how much it hurt.

She didn't know how long she'd been standing there, or how long she would have stood there, until she saw his gaze move for a second from Shelly, meeting her surprised gaze, then move back to Shelly. His mouth dropped open and his eyes darted back to her.

She didn't have to think about what she was going to do. Her body started moving—she whirled on her heel and bolted.

“Angela!”

She plowed through the crowd, shouldering her way through the throngs of people. She just had to make it to the door, to get some fresh air. She needed time to
think.
She didn't want his explanations when she couldn't even make sense herself of what she was feeling.

She moved through the rest of the group like a needle through cloth, strategically hitting each empty pocket and threading toward the door. She could hear some angry voices behind her, sounds of a scuffle. She didn't dare turn around. The diner was large enough, but now it seemed like a football field. She was practically sprinting.

“Angela?” Tanya began, looking at her with shock. “What's wro…”

Angela bolted past Tanya and Ginny, pushing the doors open and almost tripping down the steps. The night air was a blessedly cool relief, but she didn't stop running. She'd made it past the crowd of teenagers, off to the dark side of the road. She didn't want to see him. She just wanted to go home and think. Was that so much to ask…to not be overwhelmed by a man who had an explanation for everything?

A car's headlights flashed in front of her, and for a moment, Angela was blinded. She stopped then, colliding with the brush at the side of the road. She breathed in gulping, gasping breaths, holding the stitch in her side. To her consternation, the car slowed, then stopped. She tried to get ready to run again, but heard May's voice in the darkness. “Angela? Is that you?”

Suddenly, Angela had the energy. She bolted over to the car, ignoring May's look of shock as she tugged at the passenger side of the car. May unlocked the door, and Angela all but flung herself inside. “Please take me home.”