After a prolonged moment of silence, the woman in his arms finally spoke. “Go on,” she said softly.
He tipped his chin down, trying to see her shadowy features, his brows drawing together in a puzzled frown. “Go on?” he repeated.
She nodded, her soft face brushing against his skin. “Yes. You were just getting to the good part.”
“The good part?” he repeated blankly.
She looked up at him and, although her eyes were still damp with tears, there was a winsome smile on her face that made Zack’s heart slam against his ribs. “You got off to a very bad start,” she whispered, “by saying you were sorry we did this. And you made it much worse by saying that I’m naive and then making it sound as if any woman would have suited you just fine after five years’ abstinence—”
He gazed at her while relief began to pour through his body like a balm. He knew that he was getting off much too easily, but he seized his unexpected reprieve with the grateful desperation of a drowning man grabbing at a life preserver. “Did I say that?”
“Pretty much.”
He grinned helplessly at her infectious smile. “How ungallant of me.”
“Very,” she agreed with sham indignation.
A minute ago, she’d had him in the grip of black despair, five minutes ago she’d sent him into sexual paradise, now she made him feel like laughing. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Zack was aware that no woman had ever had this effect on him before, but he didn’t want to examine the explanation for it. For now, he was content to bask in the present and ignore what little future he had left. “Under the circumstances,” he whispered, smiling as he brushed his knuckles over her cheek, “what should I have done and said?”
“Well, as you know, I haven’t much experience in moments like these—”
“No experience whatsoever, in fact,” he reminded her, suddenly and crazily pleased by that.
“But I have read hundreds of love scenes in novels.”
“This isn’t a novel.”
“True, but there are distinct similarities.”
“Name one,” he teased, distracted by the sheer joy of her.
To his astonishment, she sobered, but there was a look of wonder in her eyes as they gazed deeply into his. “For one thing,” she whispered, “the woman often feels the way I felt when you were inside of me.”
“And how did you feel?” he asked because he couldn’t stop himself.
“I felt wanted,” she said with a tiny break in her voice. “And needed. Desperately needed. And very, very special. I felt—complete.”
Zack’s heart constricted with an emotion so intense that it made him ache. “Then why were you crying?”
“Because,” she whispered, “sometimes beauty does that to me.”
Zack gazed into her glowing eyes, and he saw the kind of gentle beauty and unquenchable spirit that could almost make a man feel like crying. “Has anyone ever told you,” he whispered, “that you have the smile of Michelangelo’s Madonna?”
Julie opened her mouth to protest, but he forestalled her answer by giving her a hard, swift kiss. “Don’t you think,” she belatedly and breathlessly replied as he rolled her onto her back, “that remark is a little sacrilegious, when you consider what we just did a few minutes ago?”
He muffled a laugh against her throat. “No, but it probably is when you consider what we’re about to do now.”
She tipped her head down. “What’s that?”
His shoulders began to shake with helpless mirth at the sheer joy of her, even while his mouth began its slow descent. “I’ll show you.”
Julie caught her breath and arched her hips beneath the sensual onslaught of his seeking hands and mouth.
The laughter faded from Zack’s mind, replaced by something much deeper.
32
PROPPED UP AGAINST A MOUND of feather pillows in the master bedroom’s huge bed, Julie gazed at the dishes on the low table in front of the fireplace across the room. They’d eaten a late breakfast there, and then Zack had taken her back to bed and made love to her. He’d kept her awake most of the night, making love to her with a mixture of demanding urgency and exquisite tenderness that Julie found wildly exciting and tormentingly sweet. Each time he finished, he pulled her into his arms and held her close while they dozed. Now it was past noon, and she was sitting beside him, curved against his body, his arm around her shoulders, his hand lazily caressing her arm. Unfortunately, in daylight, she was finding it far more difficult to cling to the illusion that this was a little cottage where she was safe and warm in bed beside a wonderfully ordinary man who also happened to be her devoted lover. In broad daylight, she was unhappily aware that the man who made love to her with such violent tenderness and need, who groaned with passion in her arms and made her cry out and feel as if she were the only woman who’d ever done this with him, had also made love to countless movie stars and sexy socialites. That had been his world—a luxurious, frenetic world populated by rich, beautiful, talented people with the right connections.
That had been his old life, and even though he’d lost everything, she had no doubt that he would prove his innocence, now that he was free to search out the real killer—with her inexpert but willing help, if possible. Once he did that, he’d be free to return to his former life, to resume his brilliant career in Hollywood. His need of her would cease to exist then. And when that happened, when she was reduced to the status of an “old friend” of his, she knew the pain was going to be terrible.
He wasn’t going to fall in love with her and make undying declarations of love. He simply needed her now, and for some reason God had meant for her to be here for him. All she could do was live each moment as it came, savor it, and memorize it for the years ahead. That meant never asking him for more than he could give, never burdening him with her feelings, and keeping as much of her heart intact as she possibly could. That meant finding a way to keep things as light and frivolous as possible. She wished she were sophisticated and experienced with men; that would have been a tremendous help to her now in accomplishing those things and a lot of others.
“What are you thinking about?” Zack asked.
She turned her head and found him studying her with a concerned frown. “Nothing too profound,” she hedged with a bright, artificial smile. “Life in general.”
“Tell me about it.”
Trying to avoid both his searching gaze and the entire discussion, Julie moved out from under his arm and drew her knees up, wrapping her arms around them. “It really wasn’t worth discussing.”
“Why don’t you let me decide that.”
She shot him a dark look. “Have you always been so persistent?”
“It’s one of my most unattractive qualities,” he replied smoothly and impenitently. “What were you thinking about —specifically?”
She rolled her eyes at him in laughing exasperation, but when he continued to regard her in waiting silence, she gave in and told him a part of the truth. Perching her chin on her knees to avoid his gaze, she said, “I was thinking how strange life is. Everything can seem completely predictable, and then in one short minute—in the time it takes to decide to pull off the interstate for some coffee—everything can change.”
Zack leaned his head back against the pillows, closed his eyes, and swallowed with relief. He’d thought she was reflecting on the more logical and accurate fact that he was ruining her life.
From the corner of her eye, Julie stole a quick look at his tense face and her heart sank. Laughter and lightness and sensuality were what he wanted and needed, not philosophy or anything with emotional intensity, and she resolved not to let him corner her into a discussion like this again.
He gave a deep sigh and without opening his eyes, he asked in a flat voice, “Do you want to stay here with me, Julie?”
“Are you giving me a choice?” she teased, adhering to her decision to keep things light As soon as she said it, she saw the imperceptible tightening of his jaw, a
nd she had the strange feeling that she hadn’t given him the sort of answer he wanted this time either.
“No,” he said, after a long pause, “I’m afraid not.”
“Do you think I’d tell the authorities where you are if you let me go? Is that it?”
“No. If you gave me your word not to do that, I’d accept it.”
“Then why?”
“Because I don’t think you could stand up to the kind of relentless interrogation they’d put you through. Even if you told them I blindfolded you until we got here, they’d keep badgering you, trying to ‘help’ you remember something significant, and sooner or later, you’d slip without meaning to or even realizing you did.”
Julie struggled to strike a balance between sincerity and humor this time. “Okay. Then I guess I’ll just have to stay here in this drab little cottage and spend a few days with this exasperating, dictatorial, moody man I met who has an insatiable sexual appetite. I’ll probably leave here unable to walk or stand unaided.”
His eyes remained closed, but his lips quirked in a half-smile. “I am not moody.”
“Exasperating, dictatorial, and insatiable though,” she countered, chuckling, feeling much better and more in control of the situation and herself. “I know, let’s go outside.”
The grooves beside his mouth deepened into a full smile that was lazy, complacent, and smug. “Not a chance. You’ll freeze your ass off out there.”
“I intended to put clothes on it first,” Julie primly informed him, then was dumbstruck by how easily she’d heard and responded to the lewd remark. “Fresh air and physical activity,” she hastily added as his shoulders rocked with laughter at her obvious discomfiture, “cure almost everything.”
“Except frostbite.”
She smacked him with a pillow, laughing because she’d caught him with his eyes closed, and started to disentangle her limbs from the bedding. “Do you always have to have the last word?”
“Apparently.”
“Then you’ll have to carry on both sides of the conversation, because I’m going to go outdoors,” she told him, pulling her robe on. “Despite the sybaritic delights of staying in here with you, I need to get some sunlight and fresh air. If I were home, I’d be outdoors with my class now for noon recess.”
“Sybaritic delights,” he repeated, chuckling. “A very nice turn of phrase. I like that.”
“You would,” she flipped back with a smile, heading for the bathroom in her room to shower and dress. Behind her he said, “Use this bathroom, it’s much nicer.”
33
JULIE STOOD ON ONE SIDE of the huge dressing room mirror, beneath the twinkling brass lights that framed it, blowing her hair dry, while Zack shaved on his side of the mirror. Instead of using her smaller bathroom, which was what she thought he’d intended to do, he’d used this one, too. There was a strange sort of intimacy involved in sharing a bathroom with a man, Julie decided, even a bathroom that was the size of half her house and afforded complete privacy so long as one stayed on one’s side of the mirrors. Still, the sounds were there—the sound of his shower being turned on while she was in hers, and now the sound of water running in the sink while he shaved. When she’d gotten into the shower, she’d carefully draped one of the huge fluffy towels over the clear glass door so that she wouldn’t be on display if he passed by, a precaution that had proved to be wise.
Wrapped in another of the green towels, she was heading for her bedroom to get her jeans when Zack called out behind her, “Wear something from the closet in here.”
Startled because they hadn’t spoken since their joint occupancy of the bathroom, she turned around and saw him standing at the sink, a towel like hers knotted around his slim hips, half of his face covered with shaving cream. “No,” she said, “I did that last night, and it didn’t feel right.” Helplessly enthralled, she watched him tip his head back and stroke the razor up his neck and jaw as he said, “Somehow, I knew you were going to argue about that.”
Julie gave him a smug smile. “It’s nice to win a debate with you for a change.”
She walked into the bedroom and over to the chair where she’d put her clothes yesterday. They were gone. For a split second she gaped stupidly at the printed fabric on the chair as if her clothes were going to materialize, then she caught herself up short, rounded on her heel, and marched back into the bathroom, a militant look in her eye. “I am not going to wear any of the clothes in that closet!”
He slanted her an amused look before he continued stroking the razor over his cheek. “Now there’s a thought to titillate an insatiable male such as myself—having you around here all day wearing absolutely nothing.”
She used her teacher’s voice—the cool, warning one that said, “You are pushing me too far young man.” “Zack, I am trying very hard not to lose my temper—”
Zack swallowed a shout of laughter because he thought she was utterly adorable and refused to reply.
“Zack!” she said darkly, her tone growing more firmly authoritarian as she advanced on him. “I expect you to get my clothes from wherever you’ve hidden them this very minute.”
His shoulders starting to shake with laughter, Zack leaned down and splashed water on his face, then he pulled the towel from around his neck and dried it “And if I don’t, Miss Mathison?” he said behind the towel, “Then what— do I get a detention?”
Julie had dealt with enough adolescent rebellion to know better than to show her frustration and lose valuable ground. With lofty, emphatic firmness, she stated very clearly to his face towel, “I am not negotiable on this issue.”
He tossed down the towel and turned, a glamorous white smile sweeping across his rugged face. “You have a wonderful vocabulary,” he said with sincere admiration. “Why don’t you have a Texas drawl, by the way?”
Julie hardly heard him. She was staring in blank shock at the living, breathing image of the sexy, charismatic male she’d watched for years on giant movie screens and television sets. Until that moment, Zachary Benedict the man had never quite looked to her like Zachary Benedict the movie star, so it had been easy to ignore who and what he had been. Five years inside a prison had hardened his face and etched lines of strain at his eyes and mouth, making him look older and harsher, but all that had changed in one night. Now that he was well rested, sexually satisfied, and freshly shaven, the resemblance was so striking that she stepped back in nervous surprise, as if from a stranger. “Why are you looking at me like I have hair sprouting out of my ears?”
The voice was familiar. She knew the voice. That was reassuring. With a mental shake, Julie forced herself to stop these ridiculous fantasies and return to the discussion under way. More determined than ever to win, she crossed her arms over her chest and said stubbornly, “I want my clothes.”
He perched a hip on the edge of the long marble vanity and, mimicking her posture, he crossed his own arms over his chest, but he was grinning, not glowering. “Not a chance, sweetheart. Pick something out of the closet.”
The endearment coming on the heels of his sudden change in persona from convict to movie star sounded casual and meaningless to Julie. She was so frustrated and off balance that she felt like stamping her foot. “Damn it, I want my—”
“Please,” he interrupted quietly. “Wear something from the closet.” When she opened her mouth to argue, he said flatly, “I tossed your clothes in the fireplace.”
Julie knew she was outmaneuvered, but the thoughtless way he’d gone about it hurt and angered her. “They may have seemed like dispensable rags to a former movie star,” she fired back, “but they were my clothes. I worked to pay for them, I bought them, and I liked them!”
She spun on her heel and headed for the closet, unaware that her parting shot had hit its mark with more deadly accuracy than she could ever have hoped. She marched into the closet, ignoring the dresses and skirts hanging on twenty-foot racks on both sides of her and headed for the back where she snatched down the first pair of slacks a
nd sweater she came across. Holding them up to her waist to see if they’d possibly fit, she decided they would and unceremoniously pulled them on. The slacks were soft emerald green cashmere and the matching turtleneck sweater had delicate violets with dark green leaves woven into the full sleeves. Leaving the sweater on the outside of the slacks, she grabbed a green leather belt on her way out of the closet, paused to put it on, turned around, and almost collided with Zack’s chest.
He was standing in the doorway, his hand braced high on the door frame, blocking the exit.
“Excuse me,” she said, trying to walk around him without giving him the courtesy of looking up.
His voice was as implacable as his stance. “It’s my fault you’ve had to wear the same clothes for the past three days. I just wanted you to have something else to wear so I wouldn’t feel guilty every time I looked at your jeans.” Wisely leaving out the fact that he’d also been longing to see her in something beautiful and fine that was worthy of her face and figure, he said, “Would you please look at me and let me explain.”
Julie had more than enough stubborn courage to withstand the force of his persuasive tone, but she wasn’t so angry that she couldn’t understand his logic, nor was she unmindful of the idiocy of spoiling what little time they had with a pointless argument.
“I hate it when you ignore me and stare at the floor like that,” he said. “It makes me feel like you think my voice is coming from some cockroach down there, and you’re wondering where it is so you can step on it.”
Julie had intended to graciously look up at him in her own good time, but she was no match for such humor, and she ended up collapsing against the clothes behind her and shaking with laughter. “You are completely incorrigible,” she said, giggling and raising eyes swimming with mirth to his.