Authors: Nora Roberts

Tags: #General, #Fiction, #Romance

A Matter of Choice (25 page)

"Hello, Slade. I'm sorry, we almost knocked you flat."

Her words were truer than she knew, he thought. Quickly he released her and took a step back. "You're going out?"

"Just for a run with Ulysses." Jessica looked beyond his shoulder. "And he's gone now." Looking back at Slade, Jessica offered her hand. "It's good to see you. Come in and have a drink."

Warily, Slade stepped inside, but evaded the offered hand. She turned away to fling her jacket over the newel post, shutting her eyes tightly a moment when her back was to him. "Let's go in the parlor," she said brightly when she faced him again. "There's a nice fire in there."

Without waiting for his answer, Jessica dashed away. She was moving, Slade observed, at her usual speed. And the shadows were gone from under her eyes--gone as if they had never existed. She was as she had been in the beginning--a woman with boundless energy. He followed her more slowly into the parlor. She was already pouring Scotch into a glass.

"I'm so glad you came, the house is too quiet." Jessica picked up a decanter of vermouth with no idea what was inside. As she poured she continued to talk. "It was wonderful for a few days, but now I almost regret that I sent everyone away. Of course, I had to lie to get them out of here." You're talking too fast, too fast, she told herself, but couldn't stop. "I told David and the staff I was going to Jamaica to lie in the sun for a week, then I bought them all airline tickets and shoved them out of the house."

"You shouldn't be alone." He was frowning at her when she handed him his drink.

"Why not?" With a laugh, Jessica tossed back her hair. "I couldn't stand being treated like an invalid. I got enough of that in the hospital."

Sipping her drink, she turned to the fire. She wouldn't let him see the hurt. Every day that she'd been confined in that sterile white room she had waited for his call, watched the door for his visit. Nothing. He'd cut himself out of her life when she'd been too weak to prevent it.

Slade stared at her slim, straight back and wondered how he could leave without touching her.

"How are you?" The question was curt and brief.

Jessica's fingers tightened on her glass. Do you care? she wondered. She sipped the vermouth, making the words slip back down her throat.

Turning, she smiled at him. "How do I look?"

He stared at her until the need was a hard ball in his stomach. "You need to gain some weight."

She laughed shortly. "Thank you very much." Needing to do something, Jessica wandered over to toy with the keys of the piano. "Did you finish your book?"

"Yes."

"Then everything's going well for you?"

"Everything's going just dandy." He drank, willing the liquor to dull the ache.

"Your mother liked the figure?"

Confused, he drew his brows together. "Oh, yeah. Yeah, she liked it."

They lapsed into silence, accented by the crackling wood and drifting notes. There was too much to say, Slade thought. And nothing to say.

Again, he cursed himself for not being strong enough to stay away.

"You've gone back to work?" he asked.

"Yes. We've had a stream of customers since the publicity. I suppose it'll taper off. Have you resigned from the force?"

"Yes."

Silence fell again, more thickly. Jessica stared down at the piano keys as if she were about to compose a symphony. "You'd want to tie up loose ends, wouldn't you?" she murmured. "Am I a loose end, Slade?"

"Something like that," he muttered. Her head came up at that, and her eyes fixed on his once, searingly. Turning away, she walked to the window. "Well then," she whispered. With her finger, she drew a maze on the glass. "I think I've told every proper authority every proper thing.

There was a steady stream of men in dark suits in my hospital room." She dropped her hand to her side. "Why didn't you come to see me... or call?" Her voice steadied as she stared at the reflection of the lamp in the window. "Shouldn't there have been a final interview for your report--or is that why you came tonight?"

"I don't know why the hell I came," he tossed back, then slammed down his empty glass. "I didn't come to see you because I didn't want to see you. I didn't call because I didn't want to talk to you."

"Well, that certainly clears that up."

He took a step toward her, stopped himself, then thrust his hands in his pockets. "How's your arm?"

"It's fine." Absently, she reached up to touch the wound that had healed while she thought of the one that hadn't. "The doctor says I won't even have a scar."

"Great. That's just great." Slade pulled out a pack of cigarettes, then tossed it on a table.

"I like the idea," Jessica returned calmly. "I'm not fond of scars."

"Did you mean what you said?" It rushed out of him before he could think to prevent it.

"About the scar?"

"No, not about the damn scar." Frustrated, he dragged a hand through his hair.

"I try to mean what I say," she murmured. Her heart was in her throat now, so that she forced herself to say each word carefully.

"You said you were in love with me." Every muscle in his body tensed.

"Did you mean it?"

Taking a deep breath, Jessica turned back to him. Her face was composed, her eyes calm. "Yes, I meant it."

"It's your warped sense of gratitude," he told her, then paced to the fire and back again.

Something began to warm in her. Jessica felt simultaneous sensations of relief and amusement. "I think I could tell the difference," she considered. "Sometimes I'm very grateful to the butcher for a good cut of meat, but I haven't fallen in love with him... yet."

"Oh, you're funny." Slade shot her a furious glance. "Don't you see it was just circumstance, just the situation?"

"Was it?" Jessica smiled as she crossed to him. Slade backed away.

"I don't want any part of you," he told her heatedly. "I want you to understand that."

"I think I understand." She lifted a hand to his cheek. "I think I understand very well."

He caught her wrist, but couldn't force himself to toss it aside. "Do you know how I felt, having you unconscious--your blood on my hands? Do you know what it did to me, seeing you in that hospital bed? I've seen corpses with more color." She felt his fingers tremble lightly before they dropped her wrist. "Damn it, Jess," he breathed before he spun away to pour himself another drink.

"Slade." Jessica wrapped her arms around his waist. Why hadn't she thought of that? she demanded of herself. Why hadn't she realized that he would blame himself? "I was the one who was in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Don't." He put his hands on hers, firmly pushing them away. "I've,got nothing for you, can't you understand? Nothing. Different poles, Jess.

We barely speak the same language."

If he had faced her, he would have seen the line form between her brows.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Look at this place!" He gestured around the room as he whirled to her.

"Where you live, how you live. It's got nothing to do with me."

"Oh." Pursing her lips, she considered. "I see, you're a snob."

"Damn you, can't you see anything?" Infuriated, he grabbed her shoulders. "I don't want you."

"Try again," she suggested.

He opened his mouth, then relieved his frustration by shaking her.

"You've no right--no right to get inside my head this way. I want you out. Once and for all I want you out!"

"Slade," she said quietly, "why don't you stop hating it so much and give in? I'm not going anywhere."

How his hands found their way into her hair, he didn't know. But they were sunk deep, and so was he. Struggling all the way, he gave in. "I love you, damn it. I'd like to choke you for it." His eyes grew dark and stormy. "You worked on me," he accused as she gazed up at him, calm and composed. "Right from the beginning you worked on me until I can't function without you. For God's sake, I could smell you down at the station house."

Pushed as much by fury as by need, he dragged her into his arms. "I thought I'd go mad unless I could taste you again." His lips covered hers, not gently. But then Jessica wasn't looking for gentleness. Here was the hard, bruising contact she had longed to feel again. Her response came in an explosion of heart, body, and mind so that her demand met his and fulminated. They clung for one long shimmering instant, then they were tangled together on the hearth rug.

"I need you." The words shuddered from him as two pairs of hands struggled with clothes. "Now." He found her naked breast and groaned.

"It's been so long."

"Too long."

Words were no longer possible. Beside them the fire sizzled, new flames licking at wood. Wind rattled at the windows. They heard nothing, felt nothing, but each other. Lips sought, then devoured; hands explored, then possessed. There was no time for a slow reacquaintance. Hungry, they came together swiftly, letting sharp pleasure cleanse all doubts.

They remained close, body to body and mouth to mouth, until need drifted to contentment.

Jessica held him against her when he would have shifted to her side.

"No, don't move," she murmured.

"I'm crushing you."

"Only a little."

Slade lifted his head to grin at her and found himself lost in the cloudy amber of her eyes. Slowly, he traced the slanted line of her cheekbone. "I love you, Jess."

"Still angry about it?" she asked.

Before he buried his face at her throat, she caught the grin.

"Resigned."

On a small gasp, she punched his shoulder. "Resigned, huh? That's very flattering. Well, let me tell you, I didn't picture myself falling in love with a bad-tempered ex-cop who tries to order me around."

That musky, woodsy fragrance of her skin distracted him. He began to nuzzle at her neck, wallowing in it. "Who did you picture yourself falling in love with?"

"A cross between Albert Schweitzer and Clark Gable," she told him.

Slade gave a snort before raising his head again. "Yeah? Well, you came close. Are you going to marry me?"

Jessica lifted a brow. "Do I have a choice?"

Bending, he nibbled on her lips. "Aren't you the one who says a person always has a choice?"

"Mmm, so I am." She pulled him closer for one long, satisfying kiss. "I suppose we both have one to make, don't we?"

Their eyes met, then they spoke together. "You."

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