One of his hands smoothed upward, catching her breast. There was the first thrill of fingers other than her own stroking the hot skin, moving in maddeningly small degrees to the nipple, the coarse pad of his thumb scrubbing that peak. And the shudder of his breath in reaction to touching her.
This was too much to think about at once. His leg, a delicious heaviness on her thighs. The moistness on his skin, and hers. The progression of his hand to her other breast, then down the center of her stomach, riding the slight arching of her body. His fingers slid lower, flooded her with a path of heat, pushed into the damp, curly hair between her thighs. Her thoughts focused like a beam of light on them. Distracted pleasures converged on a single small destination.
She rolled against the pressure of his fingers, urging them, showing him with the greed of her kisses that she wanted more. And that she wanted to please him, in return. Her hands slid to his face, touching it gently, telling him she’d never doubted that he was still what he’d always been to her—special, someone to cherish.
Abruptly he took everything away—his mouth, his hand, the weight of his chest and belly, the clamp of his leg. Her eyes flew open, and she watched him sit up. His expression was carved in hard angles, his mouth set in judgment.
Without looking at her or speaking a word, he snatched a packet from the box crushed between them on the mattress, ripped it open, and fitted the filmy sheath over his erection. Chills scattered over her skin, trust fled again, muscles tightened into a shield. His tenderness had been a tactic, not an apology.
He rolled toward her and rose over her—long, powerful arms stabbing down on either side of her shoulders, his knees spreading hers. With the face of a tyrant he loomed over her, a large-shouldered male animal no longer cloaked in fantasy.
“Say ‘Stop,’ ” he ordered, his voice lower than a whisper, strutted with emotions she couldn’t analyze.
“No.” Her legs flexed, anxious to press inward and keep him out; she willed them apart and drew her knees up slightly. “Hell, no. You come here.” She hesitated. “Please.”
“You don’t want me like this. You don’t want me anymore. Admit it.”
“I want you,” she retorted. “You owe me.”
He said something indecipherable but obscene just by the sound of it, then levered himself into her gently. Still, it was like a wedge driving inch by inch into living wood. Her vision clouded. A willow could feel its fibers ripping, she was certain. The wedge stabbed deeper. Her mind was glazed with the image of the tormented willow. She heard it moan with pain and betrayal, felt it shivering violently.
But she was the willow.
He flexed into her again, but the pressure was collapsing, softening, then slipping away. His head and shoulders sagged; the fierce, unpliable pillar of his back relaxed. Her mind cleared; sight returned. She was looking up into Artemas’s tortured eyes. He raised a fist and slammed it into the mattress. Sinking back on his knees, his chest heaving, he gave her a look of weary defeat.
Lily felt as if her lungs were flattened. She tried to take a deep breath, but it hinged on what he would do next. He lay down beside her, on his back. The mattress was too narrow for privacy; they were joined from shoulder to hip. Lily darted a glance at him. He stared upward, his face, in profile, carved with unhappiness. He drew short, sharp breaths. Intuition too vague to define made her turn on her side and ease her cheek against his shoulder. His hand moved against hers; their fingers intertwined.
She trembled with sympathy as he brought her hand to his chest and continued to hold it. The muscles convulsed under her fingertips. “My God, Lily.” Slowly he turned his head to look at her. Bittersweet. Troubled. Resigned. “Lily,” he said again, and this time it was a caress. They lay still, finally seeing each other for the first time, the battle lost on both sides.
“Could we start over?” she asked. “Could we pretend—just tonight—that nothing else matters, and not talk about anything except what’s happening right now?”
“It would be better if you left.”
She clamped her lips together against an urge to plead with him, squeezed his hand tightly, released it, and sat up, facing forward. Her bare back felt like a freshly turned field exposed to the sun. She knew his eyes were on her.
Artemas couldn’t breathe. Let her go. It’s for her sake, not yours.
Lily slid to the end of the mattress and started to rise. There was a soft rustle as he lurched upright. His hand latched on her arm from behind. “Don’t,” he told her hoarsely. “Don’t go.”
Tears slid down her cheeks. She twisted around on her knees and met his outstretched hands, sank into his embrace, and wrapped her arms around his neck. Bending her head beside his, she held him tightly. He pressed his face into the crook of her neck. His fingers dug into her back, quivering. She whispered his name.
Time had no meaning. Hours might be passing, drugged with the slow progression of caresses. They eased down on the mattress, facing each other, kissing, exploring, breathing in each other’s low sighs, sounds like a cat’s purr or a wordless plea. The fearful pleasure she’d felt before was gone; now it was urgent and trusting. He touched her with so much tenderness that everything before was erased; she was bathed in his caring.
His erection was no longer a weapon; it pulsed with welcome inside her awkward, eager hand. He showed her how to remove the sheath over it, and when, marveling at the silky skin, she naively scrubbed the tip too hard, he gave a sharp, gallant laugh as he flinched.
She frantically curled herself over him and kissed it. He flinched again but not with discomfort, and it was the most natural thing in the world to taste him with her tongue. The musky flavor excited her, and she closed her lips around him, just a bit of him, every nerve tuned to his reaction. His body flexed and rose; she thrilled at the way he wanted more.
“Too much,” he whispered, sinking one hand into her hair and the other beneath her chin. He guided her upward again, held her face between his hot palms, and kissed her deeply. “Too good. I’ll show you why.”
He rolled her onto her back with exquisite roughness and dropped quick, sucking kisses over her breasts, feeding on them, as she gasped and arched her back. His attention moved to her stomach, then the taut plane of her belly, as his hands curved over her legs and eased them apart. Suddenly the fevered core of her womanhood was sealed to his mouth, and unimaginable pleasure streaked through her blood. She cried out, latching her hands in his dark hair, struggling, exploding.
Coarse and elegant demand opened her, an instinctive knowledge that she needed him to fill her from the inside out. She lunged at him as he lifted his head, catching his mouth with hers and petting him wildly with her hands. They fell back together, bending and curving like one body. “This time it won’t hurt,” she said.
“I won’t let it,” he promised, his voice aching with tenderness. His hands shook as he prepared himself again; this time she was all over him, kissing his chest, pulling him down to her, winding her legs around him.
He swept both arms under her. His face over hers, his eyes holding her gaze, he eased his hips forward. It was a smooth entry, and he measured it slowly, scrutinizing her expression for any sign of pain or fear. There was none.
The rhythm didn’t control them at first. It was restrained, testing. He knew what he expected to feel, and she didn’t. He seemed to recognize that and experimented for her curiosity’s sake—with slow movements, then a fast burst, then halting—nearly motionless, watching her as she carefully flexed upward, gauging the unfamiliar male flesh that connected them so intimately.
“Go on,” she whispered, satisfied. He kissed her. “Go on,” she said again, holding him tightly, her head falling back, eyes half-shut.
Artemas was caught between lust and concern, grinding into her fiercely, yet always holding back, afraid he’d add too much shock to the newness. But even in the dim light he read ecstasy in the dark flush on her face, watched her head loll to the side, saw the dazed concentratio
n in her smoldering, half-shut eyes. Her hands clutched at his hips, then went limp, while her body stiffened, shuddering around him, driving him crazy with the tightness, the sight of her, the scent, and finally over the edge with the deep-throated moan that cascaded from her throat. He had never wanted anyone so much, never wanted to please someone so much, and most of all, had never felt that anyone cared so unselfishly about his own pleasure.
He called out something—it wasn’t clear to him what, but she gave a soft shout of happiness and took his face between her hands—then all he could think about was being lost inside her and never wanting to leave.
They took a long time getting to the point where words made sense again or seemed necessary.
“What did I say?” he asked finally. His head was pillowed on her breasts, and one arm curved possessively over her thighs. She traced the line of his jaw, his brow, stroking the damp hair back from his temple. “You said, ‘I wish, I wish to God.’ And then my name.”
Her hand lay still on his cheek. He felt the spasm in her breath. Artemas moved upward and took her in his arms. Her eyes bored into him accusingly, then filled with tears. She bowed her head against his. “I hate some things about you,” she said in a ragged tone. “And I always will.”
He shut his eyes. “I know.”
The dreamworld between half-sleep and awareness was filled with sorrow and erotic desperation. They touched and held each other even like that. The night was almost gone. She was bending over him, her hands smoothing over his chest, his nipples, his belly, the hardness that surged there immediately, then along his thighs, pushing the quilt aside, moving inside and out on his legs, even to his feet, then returning along the same path, until her touch lingered on his sex.
He opened his eyes. Her breasts were silhouetted in the faint light; her hair hung in a thick screen over one shoulder, shielding her face, her thoughts. She stroked her fingertip over the tiny drop of liquid on him. Artemas rose to one elbow and reached for her. He pushed her hair aside.
She looked at him. Breathless tension hung in the air. She put her fingertip to her lips, tasted it. He thought his chest would explode.
“I wanted a little of your body for keeps,” she said. There was nothing coy about it, nothing deliberately flattering or provocative. She meant what she said.
Nothing he could answer would do justice to her. He drew the backs of his fingers over her cheek. Tears burned his eyes. She searched wearily on the mattress, found one of the packets scattered around their bodies, opened it, fitted it over him. “Like that?” she asked. He nodded.
She knelt over him and guided herself down on top of it, her eyes squinted shut, concentrating. She was sore. She’d told him so, some time ago. Artemas clasped her shoulders and folded her down. She burrowed her face against his neck and slid her arms under him.
He didn’t have to move. The rush was immediate and involuntary. A soft groan and the swift tightening of their arms in unison encompassed it. The drowsiness that followed was a sanctuary. Eventually her breathing slowed, her arms relaxed. He gave way enough to let her slip sideways, lying half on top of him, and he fumbled with the quilt until he pulled it over her, smoothing the edges, tucking them around her shoulders. His fingers felt thick and clumsy with emotion, but they were unable to give her his message. Spreading them on the side of her neck, he absorbed the soft throb of her pulse. It drew the heart out of him.
Lily stood by the door, watching him sleep. The room was filling with the silver mist just before dawn. She clutched her T-shirt and panties in a bundle against her stomach. If she let herself hope, she’d lose her mind. She didn’t want to spend their last few hours fighting.
Trembling, she held out one hand, palm down, as if she could touch him. She had to hurry and be very quiet, or he’d wake up. Good-bye echoed repeatedly in her mind.
She backed out of the room, hunching over, trying to hold the ache inside. Out in the hall she leaned against the cool old paper and plaster of the wall, crying silently Self-preservation saved her, forced her to move. She slipped away.
He woke to bright sunlight glowing through the thin white curtains on the window beyond the bedstead. She was gone.
Artemas sat up, staring despairingly at the empty space beside him. He strained to listen, praying to hear some sound of her in the house. The silence mocked him.
He jerked his jeans on and his jogging shoes, searched the rooms quickly, upstairs and down, then bolted outside and trotted to the barn. She wasn’t in the loft. He’d suspected she wouldn’t be, but hadn’t wanted to believe it.
His feet leaden, he climbed back down and stood in the pasture, sweeping a dull gaze around the dewy, peaceful morning. Birds sang. The hum of cicadas rose and fell in a chorus. Not searching for her was impossible. He had to say—what? That he could change his life? Or that he would, at least, visit her at college and sleep with her—in secret—whenever he could? God.
He dropped his head in his hands. The rage and frustration she’d shattered last night came roaring back, now clouded with more grief than before.
He walked dully back to the house. As he passed through the kitchen he saw the sheet of notepaper positioned in the center of the old Formica table, with his shirt folded neatly beside it. His hands were cold with dread as he picked it up.
I won’t come back until you leave. You can’t find me. Saying good-bye would only hurt us both.
He staggered outside again, the note crumpled in one fist. Turning, he scanned the woods. She was there, watching. He felt it. “I love you, Lily,” he shouted, his head thrown back, the words torn from his throat.
Nothing moved, no one answered.
Lily stood among a towering grove of laurels high on the ridge. Her body shook. She made a low mewling sound. The curtain of dark green leaves let her catch only glimpses of him as he left the house for the last time. He stood by the rental car, his eyes searching the hills. He looked defeated.
When he got in the car, her knees buckled, and she sat down, hugging her legs, her head up and eyes shut. The rumble of the car’s engine streaked through her. When it finally faded, she said aloud, “I love you too.”
Part Two
Family is everything. It defines you—the heart of your spirit, the heritage of your smile, not only the color of your eyes but also how they see the world. You are bound by kinship. You add your own link to the chain, and than where you strengthen or weaken what you’ve been blessed—or burdened—with. That’s where you use the indefinable quality that belongs to you, alone, the bit of uniqueness you pass on to your children for good or bad, the part of you that will always be separate from those who share your name, your blood, and your past.
Lola Shiner
Fifteen
Almost twelve years had passed since Artemas Colebrook had come to Georgia to visit Lily. Almost twelve years since he’d left Lily heartbroken. Maude wasn’t going to miss this opportunity to study the man for herself again. Since the tragedy, he was more dangerous to Lily than ever.
Huddled around the television screen in a darkened room, Maude and her sisters listened carefully for Lily’s movements upstairs.
“This is pure trash,” Big Sis whispered, stabbing a finger at the television. “If Lily knew we were watching it, she’d be sick.”
“Lily’s already sick,” Maude retorted. “Sick with grief and fear, half-crazy, probably upstairs right now talking to one of Stephen’s teddy bears again, telling it how much she misses little Stevie and Richard. We’ve got to keep track of what’s being said about the Colebrooks and her, so we can help ward off more trouble.”
Little Sis waved the remote control. “Besides, if she comes down here, we can just switch the channel.”
Maude nodded. They traded stoic glances, wise and protective, like owls around a damaged nest, then leaned closer to the television.
The reporter clutched a microphone and looked at her viewers as though this were serious journalism no matter what the critics said, t
hen continued to intone with lurid emphasis, “The decade of the eighties and the first few years of the nineties were one long, fabulous success story for the six Colebrook brothers and sisters. They built an empire in industrial ceramics. But are they destined to suffer for their fortune? Has the legacy of the Colebrook curse descended once again?”
The camera panned to the Colebrook office building. “The newest chapter in the curse that has plagued the Colebrooks for decades. That’s what some are calling the tragedy that ended the lives of a dozen people at this magnificent new office complex in Atlanta. Was it destiny that doomed a glittering crowd of several hundred guests in the midst of a gala celebration of this building’s opening?” The reporter paused for effect, turning to gaze across brown lawns and winter gardens toward the majestic stone tower.
Snow feathered down, casting the building and grounds in melodramatic patinas of January silver and white. “Many experts called the soaring bridge inside the lobby of this building a masterpiece of architecture. Now it’s a crumpled tomb of steel and concrete—a Frankenstein that destroyed even the two men who designed it. Inside the terrible debris rescuers found architect Richard Porter holding the body of his young son. Also among the crushed bodies pulled from the rubble was that of blond, beautiful Julia Colebrook, the youngest sister of the powerful and close-knit Colebrook family. Her brother James lies brutally injured in an Atlanta hospital, where doctors are attempting to save his mangled leg.”
The scene changed to the memorial service—the Colebrooks leaving a church in New York among a crowd of their employees and the families of the Colebrook executives who’d been killed. Despite dark sunglasses and bodyguards, they seemed vulnerable and exposed to the prying camera, which gravitated to Artemas’s harshly set face. He was guiding his sisters and the younger brother, Michael, into a long black limousine.