Wild Hawk (28 page)

And then he was moving again, thrusting fiercely, his hands slipping beneath her and then curling back over her shoulders to hold her steady for his driving movements. Kendall savored every motion, wrapping her arms around him, wanting more even as her body, reveling in the amazing feel of him inside her, told her she could take no more. She didn’t care, and raised her knees so she could take him even deeper. He was stretching her to the edge of pain, but there was no pain, only an incredible sensation of fullness, of completion, of hollowness at last filled.

His body grew even tenser in her arms, and his pace increased. He stroked her from within, each sliding thrust driving her higher. She was clutching at him now, nearly mindless from the relentless jolts of pleasure he was hammering into her. Nothing in her limited experience, or in her most vivid imaginings, had ever come close to this. She was beyond caring about anything except an unfocused hope that he was feeling what she was feeling, more than a little wild and out of control.

“God,” he muttered, as if involuntarily, “what are you doing to me?”

Kendall heard it, although it was so low she wasn’t sure he’d meant her to. But it gave her the answer that was the only thing she cared about right now beyond her own pleasure. And that answer was enough to send her soaring.

She felt a rising, unbearable tightness, a tension that had only one end, and she held her breath as it closed in on her. She wrapped her legs around his hips, straining, arching, striving against him. And then it exploded through her in billowing waves, making her cry out his name as she clutched at him wildly. Her body clenched around his in a squeezing, grasping rhythm that went on and on.

She heard him gasp, a sound of shock and disbelief. His body went rigid, then he arched against her in turn, a guttural shout breaking from him as his arms tightened around her until she could barely breathe. She didn’t care, she couldn’t breathe anyway, not when he was poised above her, his face a mask of wonder as she felt him pulsing inside her. Not when she knew with as much certainty as she’d ever had about anything in her life that Jason was as awed as she was by what had happened between them. And that he hadn’t expected it. Despite all his talk about what it would be like between them, he hadn’t expected this.

Neither had she. She hadn’t known enough to expect this. And she wasn’t at all sure where that left them.

Chapter Nineteen

“WHAT ELSE DID the old—Aaron say about the book?”

Things had really gone haywire, Jason thought as he lay staring up into the darkness, when that damned book was the safest topic he could think of.

Kendall was curled up at his side, her head resting on his shoulder. He felt the soft silken brush of her hair on his skin, and suppressed a shiver. He was fighting the lassitude of a body that felt utterly satiated, yet was still tingling, a combination of release and rapidly returning need he’d never experienced before.

Yes, things were really haywire when that damn book was the safest thing to talk about. But there was no way in hell he was ready to talk about what he was sure was uppermost in Kendall’s mind. He was fighting hard enough to keep it from being the only thing in his own mind. Nothing in his life had ever prepared him for what had happened here tonight.

It was a moment before she answered his question about the book.

“He said there were different legends about it, but the basics were always the same. That it . . . appears to the last Hawk. And that Hawk is usually aware, but doesn’t care much that he’s the last.”

“Like me,” Jason said, more glad than he should be that she had acquiesced to the relatively safe topic of magic rather than the dynamite of what had happened between them.

“Yes,” she agreed, “like you. It appears, and refuses to disappear, be left behind, or even be destroyed.”

“I haven’t tried burning it yet,” Jason said dryly, “but give me time.” He felt rather than saw her smile. “Let’s say for the moment I buy into this. That it’s for real, this book. What’s the purpose? Why does it appear to the last Hawk?”

He felt her go very still. “I’m not sure you really want to know that. And I’m not sure I want to tell you. Especially right now.”

“Right now?”

“Considering . . . what happened here tonight. After all, it wasn’t very long ago you were accusing me of using the book to trick you into marrying me.”

Jason went still in turn. He knew what she meant, that she was afraid he would think this was part of the plan to lure him into the net, making the book’s prophecy come true. The irony of that possibility didn’t escape him; each of them, for their own reasons, rigging a trap that had landed them both here in this bed, setting each other ablaze until the inferno had nearly consumed them both.

He hadn’t let himself think about that part of the book’s story, not since the moment when he’d realized it had been right about her being in danger. Even in this conversation, based on an acceptance of the book that was, he told himself, purely hypothetical, he wasn’t ready to deal with it. And especially after the unexpectedly explosive passion they had shared tonight. He recognized the dichotomy in accepting the book’s explanation of his mother’s death while rejecting its predictions for himself, but had postponed dealing with that as well; what he had to do now was more important.

“And you told me I was condescending and insulting, as I recall,” he said, keeping his tone purposely light.

“You were.”

“Yes, I suppose I was. I’m sorry.”

He could give her that much; it was most likely true. Besides, he needed to keep her in this soft, expansive mood. He’d been blown off course—hell, he’d been blasted halfway back to Seattle—but that didn’t mean he had to stay there. He still had a job to do, and she was the one who could help him do it. And the sooner he got back to it, the better.

He pulled her closer, liking the feel of her naked body against his. Not that that’s why he’d done it; he just wanted her to feel . . . comfortable. Enough to keep talking. And not worry too much about what he was asking.

“If you’re worried that I’ll think you used . . . this to help things along, don’t.”

She gave a little sigh. “Two days ago, that’s exactly what I would have expected you would think.”

Good, Jason thought; he’d gotten to her exactly when he’d begun trying to. And he’d come a long way with her in two days. But somehow it wasn’t quite as satisfying as it should be, to know everything was going as planned. And he couldn’t deny it was partly because he had a sneaking suspicion he might have fallen into his own trap.

“It’s safe, Kendall,” he said, pressing a kiss to her forehead for no more reason than that he wanted to. “Tell me about the book.”

“You’re not going to like it.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re too much like Aaron.”

He supposed it was a measure of how successful his enacted “turnaround” had been that she felt she could say that to him now.

“But you said he came to believe it.”

“Yes. But not being the last Hawk, he didn’t have to deal with it. You do.”

“So tell me what I’m dealing with.”

He heard another small sigh. “All right. But remember, you asked for it.”

“I promise,” he said with a chuckle. It sounded satisfyingly genuine. Because it was, he realized with a little sense of shock. He liked lying here with her, talking in the darkness, liked the sound of her voice coming from so close, liked the fact that she seemed so comfortable with him, her head pillowed on his shoulder, her body pressed against his side. Before he could deal with that amazing revelation, she was beginning the story, in words he’d come to recognize as coming straight from his father’s belief and pride in the Hawk family legends.

“The book appears to the last Hawk to make sure that he isn’t just that. It chronicles his story, and when necessary, nudges him in the direction he’s supposed to go.”

She paused, and he heard her draw in a deep breath. When she went on, he knew why she’d hesitated.

“It also tells him of the woman he is destined for, the woman who will change his life forever, whether he likes it or not, and no matter how much he might protest, or how far he might run. The rest of his world may be in chaos, teetering on the edge of disaster, but in this, the book is never wrong.”

She stopped, as if trying to gauge his reaction to her practiced words, words that had no doubt been repeated exactly as Aaron had spoken them; he’d probably ordered her to memorize them. If he really did believe in it, he’d be running scared by now, he thought. True, the book hadn’t actually named Kendall as the supposed women in his future, but it was obvious nevertheless. Or it seemed that way to him.

It was a good thing he didn’t really believe that part, he told himself ruefully, or he’d be half convinced it had been the book’s magic that had made sex with her so . . . amazing. Incredible. Astonishing. Whatever it had been.

On second thought, maybe it was safer to believe it
had
been magic. Because if it hadn’t been . . .

“If the book appears,” he said hastily, diverting himself from that line of thinking, “then it has to disappear, right? So when does that happen? When do I get rid of the thing?”

He felt Kendall’s slight movement, felt the flexing of the fingers of her left hand where it rested against his chest. He had placed her hand there a while ago, moving it from where she had let it come to rest when he’d first rolled off of her, low on his belly. Too low; he hadn’t wanted her discovering just yet that he was hard again, despite the violence of his climax just minutes before. He didn’t like discovering it himself. It made him feel too needy, and that was a feeling he’d left behind him years ago. Forever.

“Wait,” he said, when she didn’t answer right away, “don’t tell me, let me guess. It goes away when I marry the woman it’s picked out for me, right?” A touch of derision crept into his voice despite his efforts to keep his tone even. “Sort of a wedding present?”

She didn’t react to his tone. “Not exactly. That’s when the picture of the new couple appears in the book, along with a new beginning for the Hawk family tree.”

“What, then? What do I have to do to get rid of it?”

“It disappears on its own when you’re not the last Hawk anymore.”

He went very still. “What exactly does that mean?”

“When the first child assures the continuation of the Hawk bloodline,” she said, sounding like a student reciting a memorized lesson, “the family tree records the birth, and the book vanishes. Until the next time there is only one Hawk left alive in the world.”

A sardonic retort about fairy tales and fools who believed in them leapt to his lips, but he bit it back. He’d come too far with her to risk alienating her again.

“So,” he said neutrally, “we get married, you get pregnant, and the book leaves me alone, is that it? Goes away until our . . . what, maybe great times seven grandchild is unfortunate enough to be the last Hawk?”

Kendall sat up abruptly, clutching the bedspread in front of her, as if she wanted to hide her breasts, as if he hadn’t already seen every soft, sweet bit of them. He felt the tug on the bedspread; they had never actually made it into the bed, were still on top of the covers, but he’d pulled the edges up over them when the room had become chilly. Or perhaps it had always been cold, he thought, and they just hadn’t noticed it before because they were going up in flames themselves.

“I am not the woman in the book,” she said, with a barely perceptible shake in her voice.

“In that case,” Jason drawled, “I’d better get myself back to that coffee shop and propose to that waitress, hadn’t I?”

He could see her eyes widen even in the darkness, could sense her withdrawing from him. Quickly he reached out to touch her, to take her hand and draw her back down to him. She resisted the tug.

“It was a joke, Kendall,” he said softly. “I was only kidding. I have no interest in what she was offering.”

“Why should you?” she retorted, the quaver a little more obvious this time. “You already got it from me.”

Uh-oh
, Jason thought. Second thoughts already. She hadn’t even waited until the morning after. He sat up, trying to think of how to soothe her ruffled feathers. The only thing he could think of was the truth he’d been unwilling to confront. Slowly he reached out and touched her cheek.

“If you think,” he said quietly, “that there’s any similarity between what she was offering and what happened here tonight, you’re a fool, Kendall Chase. And I don’t think you’re a fool.”

She ducked her head, a motion he could barely see in the darkness. But he sensed the tension ebbing, sensed the softening in her. No, Kendall wasn’t a fool. But it was very much beginning to look like she had a blind spot for Hawks in general, not just Aaron.

He had hauled her into his arms and pulled her down beside him again before he realized what he’d done. He’d thought of himself as a Hawk, as naturally as if he’d considered himself one all his life. He turned it over in his mind, waiting for the surge of anger, waiting for the self-disgust he expected to feel. It didn’t come. He didn’t understand it. He wasn’t a Hawk. Not in his mind. He wouldn’t have it, wouldn’t claim or accept any connection to Aaron Hawk.

But when the denial formed in his mind, it wasn’t Aaron he saw. It was Joshua. The man who could be his twin. The man who had fought harder than any other Hawk the battle Jason was fighting now. He could see him, as clearly as if he’d met him face to face, could see those eyes, identical to his own, looking back at him, full of understanding and commiseration. And while he might find it easy to deny any connection to the man who had fathered him, denying Joshua Hawk was somehow altogether different.

“Jason?”

Kendall’s soft, inquiring whisper brought him out of his odd reverie.

“It’s crazy,” he said. “You know that don’t you? A magic book, handed down from some ancient wizard, predicting events that haven’t happened yet, appearing and disappearing.”

“Yes. I know.”

“But you believe it.”

“I believe . . . the Hawks are unusual. Different. And that most legends have some kernel of truth at their core.”

He couldn’t think of anything to say, so he settled for cuddling Kendall closer to him, telling himself it was for her sake, to keep her compliant, not because he simply liked her there. But he was having more and more trouble making himself believe his own disclaimers. She snuggled up willingly, and he thought once more about strong, bright women with blind spots.

She seemed to be waiting for him to speak, but there really was no more he could say, not until he’d confronted and dealt with his ambivalence about the book. He either believed in it, or he didn’t. He couldn’t believe in part of it and reject part of it because one was convenient and one wasn’t. And that was not a decision he was ready to make. So instead, he tried to nudge the talk in the direction he needed it to go.

“I wonder how Aaron would have dealt with all this.”

“You mean, if he’d been the last Hawk?”

He didn’t bother to quibble this time over the appellation. “Yes.”

“I think he would have fought it as hard as you have.”

“Even though he believed in the legend?”

“He
wanted
to believe in it. And at the end, I think he had to believe it, had to believe the book would do what he hadn’t been able to. That it would bring you home. He couldn’t bear to doubt it, because it would mean his blindness had not only cost him his son, but had brought about the end of centuries of unbroken history.”

“And I can just bet which one bothered him the most.” It slipped out before he could stop it, but Kendall seemed to understand.

“I know it must seem that way. Aaron was nothing if not hard-nosed about Hawk history.”

“From what I’ve heard, he was hard-nosed about just about everything.”

Kendall sighed. “He could be, yes.”

“Especially in his business?”