The First Love Cookie Club (21 page)

“No,” he said, “don’t touch me or I’m doomed.”

She studied his face and slowly drew her hand away. He dipped his head to kiss her again, then moved his lips down her chin to her neck and leisurely tracked his way down the column of her throat. He found her breasts and paid equal attention to each nipple, beaded hard and jutting upward, begging for his notice.

By the time he made his way to her belly, she wasfully charged up again. The sweet spot between her legs wet, hot, and achy. He trailed his fingers over her skin, lightly tickling her and raising goose bumps all over her body.

And then he was there, a place she wanted him most. His head between her thighs, his tongue—oh, that damnable tongue—driving her completely insane.

She shifted her hips, letting his mouth pull her into the maelstrom again. She couldn’t hear anything, couldn’t smell or taste or see. All she could do was feel. This man. His mouth. On her most vulnerable area. She’d never allowed anyone to go there before. Not that anyone had tried. She was sensitive about giving up this part of herself. But not with him. Not with Travis. With him, she reached nirvana.

Later, they lay in bed together listening to the crackle of the logs in the fireplace, snuggling in the sweet afterglow of lovemaking.

“Thank you,” he whispered into her ear and then softly kissed her forehead.

“What for?” she asked, combing her fingers through the dark hairs on his forearm.

“For being you.”

“I am who I am; it’s not something you have to thank me for,” she said, feeling wildly pleased. Sarah couldn’t get enough of looking at him, charmed by the happily-ever-after fairy tale of having this handsomely naked man in bed with her.

Whoa, don’t get ahead of yourself. No one’s said anything about what comes after this.

Still, she couldn’t stop the joy from wriggling through her. She clasped the moment to her breasts, held it close, savored it.

From where they lay, cuddled together under a pile of quilts, they could see out the large plate-glass window. Light from a full moon reflected off the icy wonderland outside. Everything was frozen. The grass, brittle and crunchy, the bare-limbed trees reaching up like bony ghost fingers toward the dark broody sky, the power line wires heavy with blue-white icicles. The air stretched silent, empty of sound.

Nothing moved.

Inside, the reflected light gleamed off Travis’s chiseled cheekbones. She reached up to trace an index finger over the smooth plane, feeling the warm elasticity of his skin.

He closed his hand around her finger, brought it to his lips, kissed it. Then kissed the next finger and the next and the next. His hot, damp lips sent a demanding thrill running through her.

She’d never been much for outward displays of affection. The casual arm thrown over her shoulder, a hand at her waist, a kiss in public. It ruffled her need for privacy, for distance, for personal space. But with Travis, she found herself craving his touch, unable to get enough, and it was joyous indeed.

He put his arm around her, pulled her closer, and she snuggled against him completely at peace. He’d taught her how to be fully inside her body and it was a whole new world of pleasure and sensation. She felt like a kid at Disney World for the first time—awestruck and amazed. He seemed to know right where to touch to set her off. Knew things about her body she didn’t even know herself. What a grand discovery!

Sarah ran a palm over his chest, taking delight in the small patch of wiry dark hair, tangling herfingers in it. She kneaded his skin, felt the firm, sculpted muscles beneath. Her fingers grazed over his nipple and it hardened instantly while a carpet of goose bumps rose on his flesh.

“Like what you see?”

“Mmm,” she purred lazily, and followed the trail of hair from his chest to his navel.

Travis kissed her softly, but the kiss didn’t stay soft. Neither did Travis. Intensity rose off him in radiant waves, a sharp contrast to the frosty cabin air.

Sarah shivered with delight.

“Cold?”

“Not in the least, but would you warm me if I said yes?”

Travis laughed. The woman’s smile lit him up from the inside out.

Jazzy was the only other person who had the power to make him feel so happy. He couldn’t help kissing her again, tasting her, holding her. He couldn’t help himself. There was no escaping this feeling. She was all around him, filling his nostrils with her earthy, womanly scent. The sound of her quickened breathing hastened his own intake of oxygen. He couldn’t get enough of her.

Desire ignited, surged through his blood, snatching him up on a thick swelling of love. He should have been filled with worry and apprehension, but he wasn’t. This felt too right. Too good. Too damn vital to be wrong.

She began doing incredible things with her devilish tongue. He groaned.

His penis was an aching beast, hard and taut and hungry, surging in anticipation of her next move.

With her clever tongue, she licked a heated path from his throat to his chest, then moved down to playfully nibble at his nipples. Every cell, every nerve fiber bundle inside him vibrated like a tuning fork.

His balls tucked up tight against his body, craving her attention. He could barely catch his breath. Sarah must have read his mind, because she reached down to gently stroke the head of him with a whisper-soft touch. He arched his back, thrust his pelvis forward, praying for more.

When she pressed her sweet, sweet lips to his erection, Travis came totally undone. Her tongue was a weapon of exquisite torture, hot and wet. How had he ever lived without this? Without her?

It didn’t take long until he felt his climax rising, pushing up through his shaft. Sarah must have sensed it too because she pulled her lips away and sat up. He wanted to sob at the loss, but then she smiled seductively and boldly straddled him, her hair a soft cascade around her face.

Travis drank her in with his eyes. He could see her scar flash silver in the moonlight, a testament to her courage and resiliency. He was honored she felt comfortable enough to fully expose herself to him, scars and all. He felt like he’d won a blue-ribbon prize, been bestowed a great honor.

He started to say something, but then she leaned down to cover his mouth with hers. He raised his trembling hand and curved it around her breast. The weight of it felt glorious against his palm. In a languid up-and-down rhythm she rode him. Halting her upward momentum only when it seemed hewould fall from her velvet clutches. Down and up. Down and up again.

He thrust upward, egging her on. She increased the tempo, until they were galloping together to one absolute conclusion. He felt the riptide of biology dragging him under. He felt her muscles tighten around him. They moved together, breathed hard, and came in one rippling heated explosion.

Sarah collapsed against his chest, shaky and perspiring. He wrapped his arms around her as their hearts slammed against their chests.

He wanted to tell her he loved her. He almost told her he loved her, but something held him back. Travis had never felt as vulnerable as he did in this moment, or as invincible. She made him feel like he owned the world, while at the same time he was deathly afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing that could ruin it all.

So he just stayed quiet and held her tightly until they both fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

When they awoke again it was mid-morning. Bright sunshine slanted through the window. The storm was gone, the temperature had risen, and the icicles on the eaves had already started to melt. The nonsensical weather of North Texas at its most insane.

They made a breakfast of beef jerky and cheese and crackers, and honestly, Sarah was so ravenous that filet mignon and scrambled eggs couldn’t have tasted any better. Her body was sore and achy in all the right places and she just couldn’t seem to stop grinning. It was a glorious day and all was right in her world.

Wearing nothing but his jeans, Travis went to stand in front of the window and scowl out at the ice. Sarah got up and threaded her arms around his waist. Such a spontaneous gesture was out of character for her, but she couldn’t seem to stop touching him. She’d told him her darkest secret and he’d told her his. They were on equal footing, no more secrets between them. It tasted like freedom.

“Are you worrying about Jazzy?” she whispered.

“How did you know?” He put his hands over hers.

“Because you’re a good father. She’s with her Aunt Raylene. You know she’s safe.”

“What if she gets sick?” he fretted. “And I’m not there?”

“She’s not going to get sick.”

“You don’t know that.”

Sarah had never been one to sugarcoat things, so she was torn between honesty and wanting to make him feel better. “Okay, she said, “I’ll play devil’s advocate. Let’s say she does get sick. What’s the worst that could happen?”

“She’d die and I wouldn’t be there.”

“Statistically, how likely is that?” She kissed his bare back. God, the man had muscles to spare.

“A one percent chance is one percent too much.”

“We need to get back to Twilight,” she said.

“Yes.”

“What’s our best option with the truck axle broken and your cell phone battery kaput?”

“Start walking. I wish we hadn’t got such a late start of it. I wasn’t thinking clearly when we slept in.”

Caught up in their mating, neither one of them had been thinking at all. “How far is it into town?”

“Twenty-two miles or so.”

“Even walking four miles an hour, which is a pretty quick pace, it would take us over five hours and that’s without taking a break.”

“We only need to make it to the highway. We can catch a ride from there.”

“If anyone happens to be out on the icy roads, especially in this out-of-the-way place.”

“It’s our only option.”

Knowing he was right, they packed up their things and went outside. Much of the ice was melting now, turning to wet mucky slush. Carefully they picked their way over the slick terrain and headed for the highway. They’d been walking for over an hour and had barely gone a mile when they heard the sound of a heavy machine engine.

A few minutes later a large yellow bulldozer rumbled into view with Mayor Moe behind the controls.

“Will you look at that.” Travis grinned and started waving. “Here comes the cavalry.”

Raylene and Jazzy and Patsy were just leaving the Funny Farm restaurant on the square after lunch, when Moe Schebly bulldozed into town, pulling a flatbed trailer behind him. Raylene hadn’t felt like cooking and Jazzy had wanted chicken fried steak. Earl was manning the Horny Toad. Business always picked up during icy weather, so she’d asked Patsy along for company.

“Will you look at who’s in the cab of that dozer with Moe,” Patsy said.

“Daddy!” Jazzy exclaimed as her father climbed out of the bulldozer, then turned to help Sarah down. Jazzy broke loose from Raylene’s hand and ran across the street to launch herself into her father’s arms.

“Best father in the whole damn world,” Patsy said. “He’s had to work hard to make up for that piece-of-crap mother.”

“Do you have to always be so judgmental?” Raylene asked.

“What part of that isn’t true?”

“No matter what she did Crystal is still a human being.”

Patsy cocked her head and shot Raylene an odd look. “Since when did you start championing Crystal Hunt?”

“She’s not the devil personified. She just made a mistake.”

“Hmph. A pretty damn huge one if you ask me.”

Travis had Jazzy on one hip and an arm around Sarah. Sarah was looking up at Travis as if he’d hung the moon. Raylene knew at once they’d gotten stranded in that hunter’s cabin on Frank Jennings’s ranch, and it didn’t take a biology major to figure out what had happened last night.

For some strange reason anger and alarm and anxiety tangled up like a ball of knotted yarn inside her. “My nephew and the novelist look pretty damn cozy,” Raylene groused.

“What are you complaining about? I thought that’s why you and Dotty Mae lured Sarah back here in the first place. To play matchmaker for Travis.”

“Who are we to meddle in someone else’s life?”

“You’re acting weird.” Patsy sank her hands on her hips. “Just look at how happy they are.”

“Maybe he shouldn’t be happy with Sarah. Maybe he should mend fences with his ex-wife so his daughter could get to know her mother.” Ray-lene thought about the terrible mistake she’d made. She simply couldn’t let Crystal make the same mistake. Maybe Sarah was good for Travis, but the important thing here was Jazzy. A little girl deserved to grow up with her real mom. Jazzy had wished for a mommy for Christmas, and who better than her own mother? It was wrong not to give Crystal an opportunity to make things right while she still had a chance.

If the other members of the cookie club had any inkling what she was up to, they’d have a hissy fit. Particularly Dotty Mae, who’d always had a soft spot for Sarah. Not that Raylene had anything against Sarah, but Crystal deserved a second chance. She was the child’s biological mother. She deserved to know this was her last opportunity to get her family back.

“I’m cold,” she told Patsy. “I’m going to my car.”

“You wouldn’t be so cold if you’d stop wearing those miniskirts.”

Raylene blew a raspberry. “Yeah? You’re just jealous ‘cause I can still get away with it.”

“Ha! Dream on.”

“Just tell Travis I’ll call him later.”

“Did you forget to take your estrogen today?” Patsy scowled.

Raylene flipped her the bird, turned and headed for her pink Cadillac Earl had bought her for her fifty-fifth birthday along with a Bruce Springsteen CD with “Pink Cadillac” on the track list. Earl loved making out in the backseat with Springsteen cranked.

Shivering, she got in, slammed the door, and started the engine. Raylene had been just like Crystal. Had stars in her eyes and thought she was too good for the likes of Twilight. She’d done unthinkable things and hurt people just to further her career. And she’d paid a very big price, just like her nephew’s ex-wife.

Empathy, tinged with bitter regret, pushed through her. In the rearview mirror she saw Travis sling one arm around Sarah’s shoulders in a loose, relaxed gesture, and tousle Jazzy’s hair with his other hand. They looked the picture of a loving family. Sarah tilted her head toward him, a radiant smile on her face, and when their eyes met, Raylene could feel the sparking heat all the way across the street through the windshield of her Cadillac.

Uh-oh, she might already be too late.

She knew a well-satisfied couple when she saw one. Those two had been intimate. No doubt in her mind.

What surprised her was her own emotional reaction. She’d orchestrated this whole thing. Found out that Sadie Cool was Sarah. Told the cookie club. Got them to rally around her matchmaking plan. Pushed Travis and Sarah into each other’s path. Babysat Jazzy. All in an effort to make the last item on her great-niece’s wish list come true.

It was what Raylene thought she’d wanted for him.

But when Travis bent his head to give Sarah adeep, soulful kiss on the courthouse lawn, a kiss that said he was falling in love, Raylene knew this wasn’t right. A terrible sense of panic that honestly had little to do with the pairing of Travis and Sarah, and everything to do with the dark secret she’d hidden for thirty-six years, rushed over her. She thought of another motherless little girl and her stomach roiled.