Bride of the Tiger by Heather Graham (best large ereader .txt) 📗

stars overhead when they awoke. The sky was a beautiful blue, just touched by soft white clouds.

Tara was staring at that sky, and Rafe watched her silently, not moving.

His first thought on waking was wonder—that she should be there. Blond and luxurious, awakening from sleep in his bed. Innocent again, for though their legs were entwined, the sheet was cast just below her shoulder, and despite the abandon of the night, she appeared as sweetly virginal as Venus rising from some magical seabed.

Innocent…

He closed his eyes fleetingly, wondering if his resolutions of the evening could stand up to daylight. There would always be that infinitesimal difference between night and day. Darkness always brought a gentle velvet cloak to hide scars—and suspicions.

He shook his head slightly, a smile ruefully curving his lips. No. Nothing was gone. He was still in love. If he was a fool he was a fool, and the hell with it.

But then there was Jimmy.

He inhaled. There was only so far a fool could go. He couldn’t tell her anything, not yet.

He exhaled. The great, momentous changes inside him couldn’t really mean anything. He still had to follow her. To find out if she was a victim, or a catalyst, perhaps.

His heart pounded. Now he had more reason than ever to follow her. To be with her. If she was innocent, if she was returning to the scene of past tragedy, more than ever, so much more than ever, he had to be with her. To guard her against—

Whatever might come.

And then, of course, when he gazed at her again, he saw how she watched the sky above her.

What were her thoughts? Regret, as she mulled over the implications of the night? Strangers and lovers. Was she wondering how to escape? Wishing desperately that she had smiled and said, Oh, dear, no! I wouldn’t miss the play for anything!

He touched her cheek. Her eyes, those silver eyes that might have launched a thousand ships, met his instantly. And to his vast relief she offered him a smile, soft and somehow shy, and touched with the same wonder he had known himself.

But there was something more. As if she denied nothing and gave him all—except some thought, some resolution, something that she was holding back.

“You’re not sorry?” he murmured.

“No, never sorry,” she replied.

He kissed the tip of her nose.

“George is going to be furious,” she murmured. “No pictures of his elegant gown in the society pages.”

“We’ll see that he gets his pictures eventually.”

“Oh!” she said suddenly, fumbling to pull her arms from the sheets to gaze at her watch. “It’s nearly twelve—”

“You’ve got the day off,” he reminded her.

She laughed easily, relaxing on the pillows. But then she bolted up again, driving him half mad, because the sheet slipped and he was reminded in full, glorious daylight that she had the most beautiful breasts he had ever seen.

“You’ve got an appointment! At twelve. Remember? You’re supposed to be taking your stepmother in for a showing.”

“Are you trying to destroy a magnificent day?” he asked her, only half teasing. “Myrna is a grown woman. She’s quite accustomed to going into the city.”

“Shouldn’t you call her?”

“I never intended to accompany her.”

“Oh.” She paused a minute, studying him, arching a brow slightly. “Curious, isn’t it? You wanted Ashley to model for her.”

He chuckled softly, rising above her. “What’s so curious? I wanted you with me.”

“You planned the whole thing?”

“Not exactly. I really had planned on the theater.”

“And after?”

“It’s always been your choice,” he told her softly.

Tara wondered if she believed him or not. His dark lashes had fallen over his eyes with his words, and she shivered slightly. Was she mad…falling in love so quickly, so completely, when it seemed that there were still mysteries here? Things unsaid that she couldn’t begin to pinpoint? A sense that…

He caught her hands and brought her back to the bed. He kissed her vibrantly, passionately, impatiently kicking the covers aside and laying the urgent hardness of his body against hers, brazen, bold, so sensually demanding that she responded in kind. He called to her, aggressive and sure; she sighed quite naturally. Her breath caught as he touched her. Excitement surged through her, and feelings of love and need overwhelmed her again.

He was impossible to deny. He was a force of high, windswept excitement. She loved the excitement, the absolute intensity. The male power that called on everything female within her. The feeling of his tongue within her mouth, the warm, living power of his body pulsing against hers, joining them.

She did think—vaguely—before she was so swept up in his rhythm that nothing mattered except the culmination of the passion that raged between them.

Today was his. Today was fantasy. And then she would withdraw, from him and—with much more effort—from herself. From the all-encompassing need he was creating.

She almost sobbed, for so many things combined. The feel of him. The spiraling desire. The soaring emotion that told her there was more, that she loved his touch, his smile, his voice, the way he held her hand, walked with her, talked to her.

Looked at her. With a tiger’s eyes. Golden. Possessive, wonderful, alluring, exciting.

Mercury filled her body with heat. After all this time, to know a touch that thrilled…

She wanted to lie beside him forever. To share his life. To waken in the morning with his head on a pillow beside her.

She wanted to marry him.

To hear his slightly wicked laugh and have him take her like this, anytime, and know that it was real….

He rose above her, watching her body. Moving. Murmuring.

“Oh, yes…Tara, you’re beautiful. Take me in, take me in. Let me see this…us…”

A cry escaped her. Tremors began to wrench her body…his. He shuddered in his final climax, collapsing against her, slick, sated; holding her still; murmuring something that caused a milder tremor to shake her.

She didn’t dare look at him. She closed her eyes and pressed her face against the dampness of his chest.

It had to wait, it had to wait, it