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  She let loose a stream of invectives he hadn’t heard her use since she was a teenager. “Impressive,” he said, dryly applauding her efforts. But he still didn’t let her loose.

  She sagged. Her head drooped like a broken flower. “Please, Jefferson. Don’t toy with me.”

  He gently cupped her satin-smooth cheek. “Ah, Em…oof…dammit!”

  She’d punched him in the stomach! Hard enough to get his attention. Surprise held him still for the minuscule moment it took for her to slip around him and stalk off toward the house.

  He set off after her, and uneven though his gait was, he soon overtook her. “Hold it,” he muttered, scooping an arm around her waist.

  She pushed at his hands, trying to move forward. “Shove it,” she spat. “I hate you!”

  “Oh, hell,” Jefferson grumbled and simply took her to the ground. He cushioned her fall with his body, but she was scrambling about so that he twisted until she lay pinned beneath him.

  His body’s reaction was all too predictable.

  “I hate you,” she repeated, even as her hands slipped over his shoulders.

  “Good. It’s safer that way.”

  A broken laugh escaped, and her softly ragged breath struck his throat, followed by the butter-soft glide of her tongue, then her lips. It was torturous heaven. He pushed up on his arms, painfully aware of the way her thighs, beneath the flowing dress, relaxed to cradle him. Painfully aware that they were fully out of sight of the buildings. That, lying here in the darkness, hidden in the long grass, they could do exactly what they wanted, with no one to see.

  Her breath hissed in sweetly when he pressed against the juncture where their two bodies collided. Her head fell back in the long grass, exposing a silken line of throat to the rising moon.

  He had to taste that skin. His hunger for her was killing him. He pressed his open mouth to her throat, feeling her throat work. She was sweeter than honey. He slid his hand to her cheek, and she turned into his touch, burning his palm with her kiss.

  Angling his weight to the side, he slid his leg over hers, running his palm along her hip and across the flat of her stomach. Her dark eyes were bottomless in the shadowed moonlight. His palm glided upward and cupped her breast. Gently plucked the pebbled peak.

  “I watched you drive away this evening,” he said, barely audible. He lowered his head and took the nipple between his teeth, fabric and all. She arched against him. “I knew I’d never seen anything so beautiful as you. And then you showed up here, by the water and it was like I’d conjured you out of my thoughts.”

  His name whispered from her lips.

  “I knew—” he lifted his head and looked up at the stars beginning to sparkle overhead “—I knew what you were thinking.”

  He felt her fingers tangle in his hair, pulling it from the leather string holding it back. When he looked back down at her, she was still again.

  And he knew she was bracing herself. Waiting for him to push her away again.

  “You were thinking about us together. About me touching you. Filling you.” He closed his eyes and prayed for forgiveness. “I was thinking it, too.” He opened his eyes to see her swallow. “God help me, I can’t stop this,” he admitted, his voice raw and as quiet as the night.

  Her heart was so full, she thought she’d burst. “Maybe God doesn’t want you to stop,” she whispered. She knew she was praying that Jefferson wouldn’t.

  His teeth flashed when he threw back his head. “You should be properly married.”

  It was what she’d been taught all her life. But the only one she would ever marry would be this man. And he’d never put his head in that particular noose. A peculiar calm spread through her. “I should be loved,” she said steadily. “Truly loved.”

  He flinched, as if she’d punched him in the stomach again, “Don’t.”

  “Jefferson—”

  His hand left her breast and touched her lips. “Shh.”

  Emily took the hand in hers and kissed it. The stars twinkled dizzily above their heads. She wondered why on earth it had taken her so long to admit the truth to him. “I love you, Jefferson.”

  He shook his head slightly, his lips tight. “No.”

  “Yes.” She held on to his hand when he would have pulled back. “I love you.”

  “You don’t mean it.”

  She pressed his palm to her heart. “I do.”

  His fingers curled into the cool cotton. “You’re just…caught up in the moment.”

  She pushed herself up until she sat, facing him. Her resolve was already shaking. How many times had she wanted to tell Jefferson what was in her heart? How many times, faced with his displeasure, had she backed down?

  Not this time. Not yet. “I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember, Jefferson. If I’m caught up in the moment as you say…” She had to swallow before the words would emerge. “Then so are you.” On her knees, she leaned forward and speared her fingers through his hair. She kissed his brow. His temple. The now-familiar scar at the corner of his eye.

  His breath was warm on her cheek, and she moved until her lips were a hair’s breadth from his. “You don’t have to say it back, Jefferson,” she whispered. “Just don’t pretend that I’m too young, or too naive or too whatever to know what my own feelings are.”

  Her tongue flicked out to lightly taste the corner of his lips. “I do love you.” She kissed his jaw, ran the tip of her tongue along the narrow ridge of scar tissue. “And I believe, if you’d let yourself, that we could be happy together. But what I want most right now is just you. And me.”

  She caught his earlobe between her teeth, then soothed it with her tongue. “I want you to make love to me,” she murmured against his ear. “More than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.” She held her breath and forced herself to sit back on her heels. “But if you tell me right now that you…don’t…want me,” she said as she drew in a shaky breath, “then I’ll leave you alone.” She didn’t know how she’d be able to keep the promise. But she would. She’d go away, just as she’d told Tristan she would. She’d leave. So that, if only this one time, Jefferson could stay.

  Her heart stopped when he sat up, too. She was going to have to keep her word. Oh, God, please.

  She looked back over her shoulder toward the buildings. The spotlight high on the corner of the horse barn threw its bright light over part of the corrals. Someone, Joe, probably back from wherever he’d been earlier, was working a big dark horse. Squire was lying in a hospital bed, and life at the ranch still moved on. Somehow or other, she would, too.

  The thought did nothing to stop a hot tear from squeezing out the corner of her eye. Dammit, she wasn’t going to fall apart. She just wasn’t! “My love for you isn’t going to go away. It hasn’t even after all these years.” Emily realized she’d said the thought aloud and she dashed another tear from her cheek. Sniffing, she looked down at her hands. “Seeing you, being near you and not…not—” She broke off, swallowing another wad of tears. “I know you’re hurting inside and you won’t let me help.” Her hands moved helplessly. “It’s tearing me apart.”

  She felt, more than heard, the rough sound he made. He raked back his hair with one hand. “Poor Jefferson,” she murmured. “This is exactly the sort of thing you hate. I’m sorry,” she managed to push herself unevenly to her feet and turned instinctively toward the buildings. She was so cold inside.

  “Emily, stop.”

  Hardly daring to breathe, she hesitated, then turned back. Her heart filled her throat when he rose to his feet. She searched his expression, but the night shadows made it impossible. The breeze stirred, lifting his hair across his face. The cool air danced around her bare shoulders.

  He turned his face into the breeze, letting it wash over him. “I’m too old for you, Emily. I always have been.

  “Wait,” he said as her shoulders drooped. “I’m not finished yet. There’s an eon of living. Existing.” He took a step closer. “My entire life separates us. But t
hat doesn’t keep me from wanting you.” Squire’s anger…his disapproval…his threat to have Jefferson drawn and quartered if he so much as laid a hand on Emily…hadn’t kept him from wanting her. “I don’t want to hurt you, Emily, and I know I will.”

  “So it’s better to hurt me now, than later. Right?” She hugged her arms close.

  “No! Dammit, that’s not what I’m saying.” He reached for her shoulders and pulled her to him. “I’m saying I want you so badly I ache to my back teeth with it. And right now I’m too damn tired and too selfish to push you away again.”

  He’d pulled her off balance, and her arms were trapped between them. “Be very sure, Emily,” he warned. “Because once I start, I’m not going to stop.”

  Time slowly ticked by. A rogue cloud drifted across the moon, briefly obscuring the cool light. She moistened her dry lips. “I’m sure.”

  The rigidity left his shoulders. He ran his thumbs over her cheeks, drying the trail of tears. She could barely breathe, her heart thudded so slowly and painfully. He stepped back, slipping her hand into his.

  “We’re not going back to the house?” She looked over her shoulder toward the lights shining from the big windows. When she looked back at him, his gaze seemed trained on the house. “Jefferson?”

  “No. Not there.” He continued toward the swimming hole, tugging her hand gently. “This way.”

  Emily followed, brushing a strand of hair out of her eyes. He led them back through the trees and across to the opposite side of the swimming hole where the thick grass vied with a heavy mat of clover for supremacy. The water’s edge was only a foot away, still and reflecting the faint sliver of the moon. A frog croaked. The leaves in the trees rustled. She’d never heard such sweet music.

  Jefferson began unbuttoning his shirt and she swallowed, suddenly nervous. He tugged the tails loose from his jeans and shrugged out of it. He tossed it to the side, away from the water, then crouched at her feet.

  “Lift,” he instructed softly. She obeyed and he removed first one sandal. Then the other. The grass was cool and soft beneath her feet. His palms circled her ankles and she trembled. Her fingers found his shoulder, steadying her. His hands smoothed the full skirt about her calves, slipped beneath to glide across her bare legs, curving behind her knees. He held her there for a long moment, looking up at her, giving her time to steady. Her fingers went from his shoulder to his fore head, pushing his hair back, letting the moonlight find his features.

  His eyes captured hers, holding them steady when his fingertips slipped up to her hips and slowly, so slowly, eased beneath the lacy edge of her panties. The fabric of her dress rustled as he drew them away. She knew her love for him was in her own eyes. Could he see the truth of the words he didn’t want to believe?

  Her panties slipped to her feet, and she automatically stepped out of them. Jefferson tossed the lacy scrap over by his shirt and slowly pushed himself upright. Tall and straight, he seemed to tower over her, even blocking out the cool white moonlight.

  For a moment he seemed carved from stone. The long, roping muscles in his arms, the broad, hard plane of his chest, down to the lean stomach. She reached out to touch the ridge of muscle just above his waistband. He was almost too perfect to be real. But the washboard muscles flexed beneath her touch, and she knew he was real. Real, and so very, very warm.

  Her fingers meandered up over his taut skin, which gleamed golden even in the moonlight. She felt the ridges of his ribs. An indentation in his skin. Another scar, she realized. Her hand skimmed up, over his chest. Felt a flat male nipple rub against her palm. Stopped directly over his heart. Rejoiced that his heartbeat was just that little bit uneven. That little bit too hard.

  Her breath was tumbling past her lips, and her fingers trembled. Jefferson nudged her chin up and gently captured her lips. She swayed and grabbed hold of his belt loops, vaguely aware of his fingers guiding down the zipper at the back of her dress. His lips left hers and forged trails of heat as he worked his way to the curve of her shoulder. Her head felt heavy on her neck, and she blinked at the stars shining overhead. The zipper made a soft rasp, and her dress drifted loose, barely held in place by the narrow straps over her shoulders.

  He drew a blunt finger up the ridge of her spine, setting off all manner of shivers. His name escaped her lips as his finger grazed the pulse beating at her neck, then dipped beneath the fabric barely covering her breasts. The strap slipped from her shoulder, baring one full breast to his eyes. Then he slid his finger up, finding her achingly hard nipple.

  It was torture, the way he circled and taunted. With a soft cry, she covered his hand with her own, pulling until it covered her, surrounded her soft skin with his warm touch. She looked down to see his big hand molding her breast, her smaller hand resting atop his. Unbearably aroused, she could only look at him. He smiled faintly.

  “Kiss me,” she whispered. He did. On her temple. Her jaw. Her shoulder. She sank her hands into his hair and tugged. “Kiss me,” she begged. He responded by capturing her ponytail in one hand and gently tugging her head back. He tasted the pulse beating at the base of her neck. “You’re making me crazy,” she accused breathlessly.

  “I want you crazy,” he whispered. “Crazy and as bloody desperate as I’ve been all these years.”

  His tongue explored the shell-like curves of her ear, and shivers danced down her entire body. She squirmed against him, enjoying the way his skin leaped when she ran her palms across his abdomen. His lips were traveling again. Exploring her other shoulder. Her head bent over his when he passed beneath her chin, replacing the coolness of the night air with the warmth of his breath. Then his mouth trailed over the slope of her breast and closed over the rigid peak. A soft moan filled the night, and she realized it was coming from her.

  He slipped his arm behind her back, holding her steady when her knees went lax as he gently suckled her. She trembled violently as he meandered to her other breast and plucked at the aching peak through the fabric still covering her. She gasped his name when he went onto his knees before her.

  Leaning back on his heels, Jefferson looked up at her. At the sheen of wetness on the jutting curve of her breast. His hands slipped beneath the dress. Her fingers were digging into his shoulders, but he barely noticed. Just as he barely noticed his hip and knee protesting at his position. “Do you have any idea how much I want you?” He leaned forward and pressed his lips to her belly. He felt her trembling. “How often I’ve dreamed about you?”

  Her fingers went to his hair, tangling in it. And he realized why he hadn’t cut it all off, just yet. He’d been waiting for her touch. Waiting for this.

  He should be shot for what he was doing. There was no future for them. No future for him.

  “Jefferson?” Her soft voice glided over him.

  He gritted his teeth, forcing himself to keep his touch gentle. Slow. She deserved that much from him, at least.

  “Jefferson, you, uh, you’re not, um…oh, please,” she broke off on a little cry when his kiss burned through the dress to her abdomen. To her thigh. “Tell me this isn’t just for me.”

  “Hmm?” He barely heard her, his attention was so focused on the heated vee beneath the blue fabric. How he wanted to touch her there. Kiss her. But not yet. Not yet.

  She trembled beneath his hands and sank to her knees. He saw the way her hands twisted together. The way she hesitated. His jaw clenched as he managed to beat down the urge to tumble her onto her back and have her. Once and for all.

  He should take advantage of the moment and stop this madness. He should. But he didn’t. He lifted her chin with a finger. “Hey,” he asked as he cocked his head so he could see her face. “What is it?”

  It was his gentleness that undid her. If he’d been his usual taciturn self, she might have gotten the words out again, without feeling her entire being flush with embarrassment. She closed her eyes, desire twisting through her, fighting against the wave of mortification. “You’re not doing this because you fee
l sorry for me, or something, are you?”

  He went so still, that she had to look at him. “Jefferson?”

  His mouth twisted wryly. “The only one I’m gonna feel sorry for is me, if we don’t stop all this jabberin’.”

  “That’s not exactly an answer,” she pointed out, flushing anew.

  He moved suddenly, catching her shoulders in his hands and pushing her back against the fragrant clover. His momentum carried him right on top of her, where he pressed himself against her. “Is this answer enough?” He slipped a hand behind her, tilting her hips toward him. “You think I get this way because I feel sorry for you?”

  She’d annoyed him. She could tell. Her breath stuck in her throat as he moved again and her knees lifted instinctively to hug his hips. “Well, excuse me,” she murmured tartly. “I just want to be clear on where we stand here. Oh, my…”

  Jefferson lifted his head from her neck. He took a few slow breaths. “By all means, Emily. Let’s be clear here. I want you. That point is glaringly obvious.” He added dryly. “And you,” he said, slipping a hand wickedly down her abdomen, making her breath whistle between her teeth, “want me. I think seven years of foreplay is long enough.”

  She could have slugged him again. Would he really reduce their relationship to just sex? Her hand even clenched into a fist. “Put this to better work,” he murmured, pulling that hand to his button fly.

  Her heart raced. “I’m going to have sex with you because I love you,” she ground out, her fingers busily fumbling over the buttons strained beyond their normal capacity.

  “I’m making love with you because I want you,” he returned. His fingers curled into the folds of fabric caught between them. He gave a tug and the dress flew over her head.

  She clenched her jaw and forced the last few buttons loose. With one hand on either side of his hips, she yanked down his jeans and briefs in one fell swoop.

  Breathless, she fell back, looking up at him.

  “Losing your nerve now?”