He caught himself hoping that the music—this song—would go on forever. So he could remain like this, with an excuse to continue holding her in his arms.
“Or so they taught us in fourth grade history,” he recalled. But she deserved his honest thoughts on the subject. “In my experience, people of different nationalities like to preserve their heritage, not mingle with other cultures.” He looked down at her face. “You can’t tell me that your mother wouldn’t rather have your sister marry some nice, upstanding Polish guy.”
He didn’t get it, did he? That wasn’t what either of her parents were about. Heritage took a backseat to their children’s best interests and happiness. “My mother wants Sasha to be happy. If Sasha would have been happy marrying a Chia Pet, Mama would
have given her blessings. After the pysch exam, of course,” Natalya added after a beat.
Mike laughed out loud, attracting the attention of several of the couples around them on the floor. “Chia Pet, huh? I guess maybe I underestimated your mother.”
“I guess maybe you did,” she agreed. Her eyes dancing, she told him, “People only do that once.”
He could see that. Still, it sounded rather ominous. “You make her sound like a CIA operative.”
Instead of laughing it off, Natalya looked serious for a moment. “A lot of blank spaces as far as my parents are concerned. For the most part, they’re very open people, but I have a feeling that they both went through a great deal that they’re not talking about. When they ‘left’ Poland, their government wasn’t into issuing travel visas.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t be telling me this.” For the Pulaskis’ sake, he didn’t want to know more. He didn’t want to be put in a position to choose between his badge and his conscience.
She looked up at him, confused. “Why?”
Did she need it spelled out for her? He searched her face and saw no guile there. Apparently, she
did
need it spelled out.
“Natalya, if your parents are here illegally—”
She stopped him before he could continue. “Oh, they’re here legally. I can show you their citizenship papers.” They were framed and hung over the piano that her father sometimes played. “How they
left their homeland, however, might not have received the stamp of approval from their government at the time. Now, with the democracy in place, it’s another story.”
He felt oddly relieved and dismissed the feeling, telling himself it was just that he didn’t like complications, nothing more.
“Have either of them gone back?” His grandmother used to dream of returning to her place of birth. Toward the end, just before she died, she had talked of it constantly.
Natalya shook her head. “Neither one wants to. This is their home now.”
When the song ended he reluctantly let his hand slip from her waist. “No relatives for them to visit back there?”
“Not that they talk about.”
Any further questions he was thinking of asking were curtailed as a shushing sound moved through the ballroom like a wave, washing over everyone and pushing them into silence. Sasha’s father walked up before the band and took one of the microphones in his hand. A high-pitched, piercing noise zipped through the room, causing many to involuntarily wince.
Josef looked sheepish. “Oh, sorry. My wedding ring.” Switching hands, he held up the offending one for everyone to see before dropping it to his side again. “It is time for the bride to be throwing her very
expensive flowers to someone. All the not-married women, please to coming closer,” he urged, gesturing to the crowd.
As a sea of women converged before Natalya’s father, Mike noticed that Natalya remained where she was. He leaned his head in toward her.
“Something you want to tell me?” he asked. When she raised one inquisitive eyebrow, he elaborated. “You’re not joining the group of ‘not-married women.’”
She hadn’t planned on it, but now, with him looking at her, something made her want to join in. So she shrugged. “I guess I’d better.”
“Okay, Sasha, no favorites,” Josef instructed. He used his hands to accompany his words, gesturing for her to turn away. “Turn and looking at the wall, please.”
“Yes, Daddy,” Sasha said dutifully, laughing. Turning to face the band, she pitched her bouquet up high, aiming it as best she could behind her.
The women who had gathered together for this event surged forward as if they were one. Only Natalya remained standing where she was.
She merely raised her hands in self-defense when she saw the flowers coming straight at her.
S
ometimes, Natalya thought, it seemed to her that things just happened without any preplanning.
For instance, she’d had no intention of catching Sasha’s wedding bouquet, yet there it was, in all its glory, sitting in the center of the coffee table. Still fresh looking, with the soft scent of roses seductively drifting toward her.
And she’d had no intention, right up until the moment she’d crossed this threshold, to stop by Mike’s apartment for a nightcap, especially since, for the most part, she’d hardly had any alcohol at the wedding reception.
But she felt drunk anyway.
Or at least, very light-headed. But, in all honesty, that had everything to do with the moment and nothing at all to do with the frosted glass of vodka and orange juice she now held—clutched actually—in her hand.
Natalya couldn’t shake the feeling that she was waiting for something to happen. Had been waiting for something to happen from the moment she’d first seen Mike walking up to her in the police station.
Get a grip, Nat.
This couldn’t go anywhere, she told herself silently. She knew that. He wanted children. A legion of them eventually. He’d told her so today while they were dancing, and she’d gone cold inside then. Cold even though she wanted children, too. Wanted enough to populate a small village. The difference was that Mike
could
have children of his own if he wound up marrying someone else. She couldn’t have children of her own no matter whom she married. Not unless she adopted them. She knew that wasn’t what Mike had in mind. A man like Mike wanted to see his features imprinted on rambunctious miniatures.
Taking another long sip of her drink she tried to wash away her thoughts, she hadn’t told him that she’d been robbed of having babies because of complications from an illness. And why should she? she mused cynically. The man didn’t want medical babble, he wanted kids.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, she thought sullenly, was a deal breaker.
In her heart, Natalya knew that the minute he started talking about having kids in the future, she should have said something. But that would have made it seem as if she were assuming things between them would get serious. Serious enough where something like not being able to have babies mattered.
All that meant, she silently insisted, was that they couldn’t get serious.
God, but she wanted to get serious. Badly.
Natalya took another very long sip of her drink, vaguely aware of the way the liquid coursed through her veins.
Mike sat down beside her on the sofa, the sides of his jacket hanging open, his tie undone. He looked slightly messy and she wanted to run her fingers through his hair. Wanted him to leave his imprint on her soul.
Wanted not to think, but to feel.
To feel something other than lonely, she realized. Because despite the upbeat temperament she’d been born with, she somehow felt incredibly lonely right now.
Things were changing and she’d never been a fan of change. But Clancy was dead and Sasha was married and life moved on.
This was why she needed to work so much especially lately. So that these sad, isolating thoughts couldn’t find her, couldn’t make her feel like this.
Maybe she shouldn’t be drinking, she thought
abruptly, looking accusingly at the glass in her hand. The screwdriver was almost gone. How had that happened? She’d only taken a sip. Maybe two.
Mike studied her face for a moment, moving aside the bangs that had fallen into her eyes. “What’s wrong, Natalya?”
She liked the way he said her name. Halfway between the way her sisters said it and “Natalie” as if he couldn’t decide where to put the accent. It was sweet.
Natalya shook her head. “Nothing.”
It didn’t look like nothing. She looked pensive.
“Having second thoughts about coming here?” Taking the glass from her hand, he placed it on the coffee table, next to his. Right in front of the wedding bouquet. “I could take you home.” He didn’t want her here against her will, or because something she’d imbibed had impaired her judgment. He
wanted
her here because she wanted to be here.
“You did,” she pointed out, a slight smile curving the corners of her mouth.
What was there about her smile that made him feel as if he were lighting up inside? “You know what I mean. I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable.” He looked at her for a long moment. “Or do anything that you don’t want to do.”
That was just the trouble. She wanted to. More than she’d ever wanted to before. Just being beside him like this made her whole body sing.
“So you’re going to make me beg?” There was humor in her eyes.
He felt his gut tighten. “I wouldn’t dream of it,” he replied just before he framed her face between his hands pressing his lips against hers.
The kiss grew slowly, deepening by layers, until it was so intense that it threatened to incinerate them both if they weren’t careful.
His kiss stole her breath away and made her want him with every fiber of her being. It had always been a matter of when this was going to happen, not if, and the longer it took to happen, the larger she knew the explosion would be once it did.
She wasn’t wrong.
It felt as if every vein in her body had just been set on fire. An eagerness rushed in, overtaking her in the blink of an eye, making her want to rip his clothes from his body as well as ripping away her own.
But patience, she’d learned, had its virtues. And letting Mike undress her, coaxing the zipper down, drawing the fabric away from her flesh, was far more rewarding than doing it herself.
Each time his hand passed over her, taking something else with it, or lingering to touch, to explore, to caress, it was harder and harder to breathe. Harder and harder not to just let her knees dissolve, the way they wanted to. She found herself holding on to him just to remain upright. Until that position was no longer necessary.
Desire had lit a match that had turned into a torch. He’d meant to go slow. To savor and enjoy. She wasn’t his first woman, or even his tenth, but there was no doubt in his mind that she was special, even more than all the other women he’d enjoyed. From the moment he’d first kissed her, he knew there was something about this woman with flame-colored hair and flashing green eyes that set her apart.
Which was why this had been longer in coming than was his habit. In his own way, he’d been afraid of her, afraid of the way he felt around her. Afraid of the degree with which he wanted her.
The longer he waited, the more he wanted, the more he feared. This one counted. Not like Brenda, who he’d talked himself into thinking he could marry. Natalya
really
counted.
Even as he made love to every part of her, it felt, very oddly, like his first time. Not with her but with anyone. It wasn’t as if he didn’t know what to expect, and yet, with Natalya, he wasn’t entirely sure. He certainly had never felt as if losing control was just half a heartbeat away.
Natalya made his head spin, his blood surge and desire throb within every single part of him. Every kiss, every taste, just served to heighten his excitement.
She was an eager lover. When she pressed her naked, hot body against his, he’d almost thrown her down on the sofa and taken her right then and there. But he knew the worth of slow progress, both for her and for himself.
He thrived on her pleasure, so he wanted to make sure that it was at its highest peak before they came together for the ultimate consummation.
For the first time that he could remember, control was all but elusive. It was as if he was being controlled by some unseen force, orchestrating every sensual, blood-pounding movement.
He wanted to lose himself within her. Within the taste, the feel, the scent of her, not just within her body.
Things were happening that she’d never felt before, couldn’t begin to describe to herself. A frantic need, a desire that was larger than anything she’d ever experienced before had seized her, taken control and made her prisoner the moment he’d touched his lips to hers.
She didn’t know, couldn’t analyze, what was happening to her. All that mattered was making love with this man. Nothing else, just here, just now. She felt like if it didn’t happen, if they couldn’t come together, she would expire. Disappear completely from existence.
His lips were everywhere, causing ripples that turned into tidal waves along her throat, the side of her neck, the length of her torso down to her belly and then her thighs.
And beyond.
She twisted and turned, trying to capture more, trying to flee because the enormity of what she was feeling was so overwhelming, she had no idea how
to deal with it.
Sweet agony.
The term throbbed in her brain. It was the only one that seemed to fit.
Unwilling to feel this measure of excitement alone, Natalya suddenly sat up, taking his face between her hands the way he’d done earlier with hers. She gently brought him back up to her so that she could cover his mouth with her own. So that she could kiss him over and over again, the way he had her, and make him as mindless as he’d succeeded in making her.
She heard him moan. The sound utterly inflamed her.
Their bodies tangled together until they became one entity, until there was no beginning, no end, just one whole.
Sheathed deep within her, Mike began to move with an urgency he had no control over. Raising her hips, she echoed each thrust, moving with it. Together they took each other where they both needed to go. To the very top of this feeling. To have it explode within them and then have it wrap its fading wings around them as it brought them, more swiftly than they desired, back to earth.
Mike lay there beside her, watching her chest rise and fall. Listening as the sound of both their breathing mingled until it seemed as if it were just a single sound. A single breath.
His arm was beneath her and he drew her closer to him.
“Hell of a nightcap,” he managed to say. But even that made him want to gasp for air. He couldn’t seem to draw enough of it into his lungs. She’d depleted everything. His energy, his breath. His very mind.
“My thoughts exactly,” she responded, then struggled into a semisitting position, leaning one arm across his chest, her hair flowing along it so that any movement of her head tickled his body.
He found it incredibly seductive and marveled at how he could feel anything at all after going numb just now. He felt completely drained…
And yet, something was whispering on the outer perimeter of his consciousness. Something that was trying to draw him in again.
The woman wasn’t a doctor, she was a witch, he decided.
Mike began to toy with the ends of her hair, wrapping them around his finger. Thinking silly, disjointed thoughts. “So, what’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”
She moved her head so that she could look directly into his eyes. The look took him prisoner all over again. If he’d thought, even for a moment, that he had the upper hand here, he was deluding himself.
He was vaguely aware that it was the first time he hadn’t wanted to retain complete control, the way he did over every situation he came across, and that losing it didn’t even bother him the way he would have thought that it would.
She’d turned the whole world on its ear. Logic, what was left of it, told him to pick up and run. This woman could and would be trouble.
Trouble had never looked so attractive or compelling. He remained where he was, silently wishing that it could remain like this for them indefinitely. With no consequences looming on the horizon.
“Having the time of my life,” Natalya finally answered, watching his expression carefully. “Or is that being too honest?” Sometimes, she knew, when you put all your cards on the table, it scared the other player away. But she’d never believed in playing games. And, until just now, the outcome of her bluntness had never mattered.
Now it did.
So she held her breath and watched him. And felt relieved when he smiled and told her that “Honesty can be very sexy.”
“Can be,” she repeated, not taking anything for granted. He’d begun to strum his fingers along her abdomen, making all the muscles tighten like the strings of newly tuned harp. Her eyes remained on his. If he lied, she’d know. “Is it now?”
His eyes remained holding hers. He made no effort to look away. “What do you think?”
She moved her torso in a little closer, so that it was partially over his. A grin blossomed on her lips as she felt him growing. Felt the physical evidence of his resurrected desire.
It created havoc within her own core, making her want to do it all over again. Make love with him all night long if her stamina held.
Natalya feathered her fingertips along his lips. “I think that the word
encore
was created to cover moments just like this.”
“Wasn’t a moment,” he corrected, pretending to look serious, or as serious as he could manage. “Was a hell of a lot longer than a moment.”
Her grin turned wicked, although she was trying to appear innocent. “I’m afraid that you’re going to have to show me again. I seem to find myself temporarily suffering from amnesia.”
He laughed, then suddenly shifted positions and she found herself flat on her back with Mike directly over her. His body was sealed against hers. It took everything she had not to let a moan of anticipation escape her lips.
“It’s a dirty job,” he told her, linking his hands with hers, his eyes holding her prisoner, “but I guess someone has to do it.”
“Dirty job?” she echoed, pretending, unsuccessfully, to take offense.
“You heard me.”
That wasn’t all she heard.
She also heard bells—loud ones. And for once, they weren’t coming from either her cell phone or his. They were coming from inside of her.
Natalya wrapped her arms around his neck and
gladly gave herself up to the sensations that had already taken hold of her.
She’d had every intention of going back to her apartment before midnight.
And then before dawn.
But somehow, it didn’t happen. Neither of them wanted to initiate the first step that would ultimately separate them, taking them away from this rare moment, this rare place they’d discovered. Both feared in their hearts that something precisely like this might never happen again, or at least, not to this degree. And there were no disturbances. No babies suddenly in need of attention, no sad souls who had left the world abruptly, no mystery needing Mike’s exclusive attention. For once, there was nothing to interrupt the evening.