Forsaking All Others (11 page)

“And do you?” Allison peered up at him, suddenly curious about the women he’d dated.

“Occasionally . . . oh, not Ellen Marie, but a couple of others my folks don’t know about.”

“Anyone in particular?” she inquired, watching his expression carefully.

It remained noncommittal. “Nope,” he answered shortly and took another mouthful of eggs.

“Speaking of calling girls, you’re going to get a call from one.”

“Who?” He looked up over the rim of his coffee cup.

“Vivien. She asked me for your phone number.”

He chuckled. “Oh
Vivien
.” He drew out the name and followed it with a salacious grin.

Allison leaned an elbow on the table, smirking. “Do girls actually do that, I mean, call guys and . . . and boldly . . .” She stammered to a halt.

“And boldly what?”

“And boldly . . .” Allison gestured vacantly. “I don’t know. What do girls boldly ask when they call guys? I’ve always wondered.”

“Meaning you’ve never done it yourself?”

“Hardly. It’s not my style.”

His eyes danced over her pink cheeks, and he leaned his elbows on either side of his plate, a coffee cup in one hand. “I’m glad.”

“You are?” Her eyes were wide and innocent now, meeting his over the cup.

“Yes, I am. Because I’m one of those guys who still wants to do the pursuing as if women’s lib never came along and gave women the idea of doing it themselves.”

“Judging from the kiss Vivien treated you to, I’d say you’re in for some mighty diligent pursuing from that quarter.”

He lifted his chin and laughed lightly, leaning back in his chair. “Oh, that Vivien, she’s incorrigible.” Yet he didn’t fawn over the fact. Instead he made light of it, suffering no bloated ego, which pleased Allison. All of a sudden the corners of his mouth drifted down into a placid expression as he studied her. His eyes moved over her hair, ears, mouth, cheeks, and came at last to her wide brown eyes. “Your hair is very pretty,” he said quietly.

A stab of warmth flooded her cheeks, and her eyelids fluttered down momentarily. He crossed his hands over his stomach and continued studying her pink, flustered cheeks and the self-conscious way her eyes cast about for something to settle on. They came to rest on his knuckles. “And so is the rest of you,” he added.

A warning signal went off in her head. Was this his line? It was different from Jason’s, which never included compliments quite this simple, but rather effusive hosannas on how she “turned him on.” Remembering them now, Allison told herself to slow down, beware, things were going too fast.

But she experienced a heady feeling of pleasure in
being the object of his admiring scrutiny as he leaned back in his chair with casual ease, his voice coming softly again. “You have butter on your top lip.” Her hand reacted self-consciously, grabbing the paper napkin from her lap and lifting it toward her mouth. Halfway there, his came out to stop it. He leaned across the corner of the table while her eyes flew up in alarm.

“Would you mind very much if I kissed it off?”

His eyes remained steady on Allison while her throat muscles shifted as she swallowed. Her brown gaze held a startled expression. Her lips fell open in surprise while she sat as still as a bird in deep camouflage, staring back at Rick.

“Would you?” he repeated so softly it was nearly a murmur.

Her wariness fled, chased away by his soft, persuasive question. The negative movement of her head was almost imperceptible. Eyes locked with hers, Rick removed the napkin from her numb fingers, crossed her palm with his, in the fashion of an Indian handshake, only gently, as if he held a crushable flower. As he leaned by degrees across the corner of the table, the pressure of his fingers increased, and he brought the back of her hand firmly against his chest. She felt the heavy thud of his heart as his eyes slid closed, and his lips touched her buttery upper lip, lightly sucking, licking, moving across its width from corner to corner before he did the same to her bottom lip. Allison felt as
if melting butter were rippling down the center of her stomach, ending in a fluttering delight between her legs.

He backed away a fraction of an inch so that only the tip of his tongue circled her mouth, which eased more fully open until her own tongue did his bidding, just its tip caressing the tip of his while beneath her hand the hammering of his heart grew almost violent.

He took his long, sweet time at it, tempting her with unhurried leisure, backing away an inch that made her eyes drift open to find his had done the same. He rested his forehead against hers, nudging softly, then backing away again so they could gaze into each other’s eyes. His calculated slowness caused an insistent throbbing within the deep reaches of Allison’s body. His eyes stayed on hers while he gradually brought her hand between their two mouths, opening his lips in slow motion, taking her thumb gently between his teeth, making miniature, caressing motions of gnawing, while his chin moved left and right, left and right, and his eyes burned into hers. He moved on to her index finger, biting its knuckle before straightening it with a flick of his thumb. She watched, fascinated and sensualized as it disappeared into the warm, wet confines of his mouth.

The gushing responses in her body were like nothing Jason had ever elicited from her, short of climaxes, which he had carefully regulated and often delighted in denying until she begged. Now, as Allison’s finger was caressed by Rick’s tongue, her body felt ready to
explode. Gradually he slipped the finger from his mouth, then turned her hand over and gently bit its outer edge, his eyelashes drifting down to create a fan of shadow on his cheek while his labored breathing told her what this foreplay was doing to him, too.

He fell utterly still for a long, long moment, resting the backs of her fingertips against his lips, eyes closed as if in deep meditation. When he lifted his lids to study her, he spoke hoarsely, with her knuckles still touching his lips, muffling the words. “I didn’t think I’d make it through these last eight days. You don’t know how many times I went to the phone and stood there staring at it, wanting to call. But I remembered what you said about not wanting a relationship, and I was sure you’d say you didn’t want to see me again.”

His words sent a wild reverberation of joy through Allison.

“Are you for real?” she managed at last, letting her eyes travel over what she could see of his face behind their hands. “I mean, look at yourself. Look at your face and your . . . your form, and tell me why you should be worried about whether or not one girl wanted to see you again.”

“Is that all you see when you look at me? A face and a . . . a form?” he queried.

“No.” She swallowed, retrieved her hand, and picked up her coffee cup to have a reason for withdrawing from him. “But why me?”

“If you don’t know, if you can’t feel it, I can’t explain. I thought what was just happening here a moment ago was explanation enough—that, along with some enjoyable hours we’ve spent together.”

“Rick . . . I . . .” She quickly rose to her feet, taking their plates to the sink so she could turn her back on him. She heard his chair scrape back and knew he was standing directly behind her.

“You don’t trust me, do you? You think I’m handing you a practiced line of bull.”

“Something like that,” she admitted. In her entire life no man had ever so effectively seduced her as he’d just done across the corner of a breakfast table, touching no more than her hand. He had to know his appeal—all he had to do was look in the mirror to see he was no Hunchback of Notre Dame. And he had a wooing, winning way that could easily turn a woman’s head.

“You want me to act like an admiring monk, is that it?”

She rested the palms of her hands against the edge of the sink, staring straight ahead, not knowing what she wanted, afraid of things her body was compelling her to do.

“I don’t know,” she choked, near tears, so confused by her impulses to trust him, those impulses juxtaposed against past experiences that had always turned out disastrously when she too eagerly placed her trust in another person.

A heavy hand fell on the side of her neck, kneading
lightly. “I’m sorry, Allison. I promised, didn’t I?” Even the touch he bestowed so casually made her heart race. Silence ticked by for several seconds, then Rick said quietly, “But after what happened at the door when I came in, I thought—”

“My mistake, letting it happen, okay?” she quickly interjected, afraid to turn around and face him. “I
was
glad to see you, and you just caught me a little off guard, that’s all.”

“You feel you have to erect a guard against me, is that what you’re saying?”

“I . . . yes,” she admitted.

“Why?”

She refused to answer. His warm hand lowered to the center of her back and began stroking up and down. “I’m not him, Allison,” he said in the gentlest tone imaginable.

The hair at the back of her neck bristled. Her shoulder blades tensed. “Who?” she snapped.

“I don’t know. You tell me.” His hands circled her upper arms and forced her to turn around.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she lied, staring at the floor.

“Neither do I. What was his name?”

Her lips compressed into a thin line. He watched her face for every nuance of truth while dropping his hands from her. He stepped back, crossing his arms, then his calves, leaning his hips against the edge of the kitchen stove behind him.

“Do you want to tell me about him?”

“Him! Him!” she spouted belligerently. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“The man who made you so defensive and jumpy and wary of me, that’s who I’m talking about. What was his name?”

“There is no such man!”

“Bull!” he returned tightly.

Her eyes met his determinedly.
“There is no man in my life,”
she stated unequivocably.

“No, but there was, wasn’t there?”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Like hell it isn’t. If he’s what’s keeping you from me, it’s my business.”

“
I’m
what’s keeping me from you! I’m cautious, all right? Is there any crime in that?” she shouted in a sudden display of hot temper.

Rick scowled, studying her with a hard expression about his mouth. “Boy, he soured you on men but good, didn’t he? Made up your mind you’ll never trust one of us again, is that it?”

“Trust is another thing that never profited me one damn bit in the end,” she stated bitterly.

“And so you’re done with it, no matter what your gut feeling tells you?”

She suddenly bristled, gesturing angrily with her hands in the air, storming away. “I don’t have to stand here for this . . . this third degree! This is my house, and
just because I let you come in and cook breakfast for me doesn’t give you the right to assess my motives. I thought of you, too, during the last week.” She swung around to face him. “Is that what you want to hear? All right, I did! And I knew before the second day was gone that I wanted to see you again. But don’t probe into my past if you want to share any of my future, be it a day, a week, or a month, because I won’t stand for it!” She was back before him, practically nose to nose, bristling with defensiveness, striking out at him because she was afraid of the overwhelming urges she felt to like him, to trust him, maybe even to fall in love with him.

He stared at her angrily for a moment, and she saw his eyebrows finally relax from their tightly knit curl, his mouth take on a less pinched expression as he made a conscious effort to quell the urge to argue.

“You’re right. It’s none of my business,” he agreed, backing off, shelving the issue for the time being. “Peace offering, all right?”

He pulled away from the stove and dipped a hand into the brown paper bag that was still on top of the counter. The next moment he lifted a camera in a black leather case. He held it aloft in invitation, its wide, woven strap swinging in the sudden silence between them.

Her animosity fell away with amusing speed, to be replaced by excited surprise. “The . . . the Hasselblad?” she asked breathlessly.

“The Hasselblad.”

She reached for it, but he pulled it back just beyond her fingertips. “Wait a minute. Aren’t you the woman who said you’d sell your soul for a chance to use it?”

Here it comes, Allison thought, the proposition.

But he only grinned one-sidedly, leaning over from the hip to place his mouth within easy kissing distance. “I won’t ask for your soul, just one little kiss to bring peace back between us.”

She gave him the price he asked, a quick, fleeting smack, but he still refused to give her the camera. “Friends?” he inquired, grinning into her face.

“Friends,” she agreed, and snatched the camera from his hand.

Behind her she heard a throaty chuckle as she whirled toward the sunny living room to sit cross-legged on the shag rug. He ambled over and joined her, sitting almost knee to knee with her. He produced a roll of film and smiled, watching as she loaded the camera, exhilarated now, all attention given over to the coveted piece of equipment.

“Here’s the film advance.” He pointed to a silver crank. “And here’s the shutter release.” Her face was a picture of radiance as she looked down into the magnified square to study the light falling through the long, narrow windows. She spun around on her derrière, then rolled to her knees, walking on them across the hardwood floor while scanning the room through the viewfinder, looking for a setting that caught her eye.