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No, but she selfishly longed for one touch of his lips.
She slid her hands up around his neck and tugged his head down to hers. Hays came willingly. He softly kissed her full on the mouth, and she sighed at the sweetness of it. Leaning back slightly, his dark eyes asked a question. Could he kiss her longer?
She nodded, her heart racing out of control.
Hays angled in, capturing her mouth with his. The first kiss had been tender. This kiss was the conquering hero returning to his lady. He pinned her against the doorframe and kissed her so thoroughly she soared with happiness.
She’d wondered, and now she knew. This mature, experienced, and even more enticing Hays could command her with a kiss like not even his younger self had done.
The tingles, warmth, and joy that radiated from her mouth were a heaven she could never stay in but wanted to savor as long as she could.
Footsteps came up the stairs. Hays released her from the kiss and straightened to his full height but didn’t release her from his arms.
Mama Millie hurried up to them. “Ah, there you darlings are. Sorry to interrupt.” She winked and grinned. “Jared says the tree trimmers are here and he’d like you to oversee which branches they cut. Elizabeth, you can stay in the house with Easton and me until they leave.”
“Be right there,” Hays said.
She grinned bigger and bustled off.
Hays looked down at Elizabeth. “We’ll continue this later, Liz,” he said softly, but his gaze was full of desire and awe. The kisses had affected him as deeply as they had her.
She should never have let down her guard and kissed him.
“I don’t believe there’s anything to continue,” Elizabeth said, making her voice strong and impossible to argue with.
“I do,” Hays said. “You can’t lie and say you don’t want to be with me after a kiss like that.”
Then he escorted her down the hall and the stairs. He said nothing more, but she couldn’t calm her racing heart at the possibility of more kisses. Stopping in the kitchen, he gave her a meaningful look before thanking Millie and walking away.
“That man gets the heart a-thumping,” Millie said with a sigh. “Almost as handsome as my Jared.”
Elizabeth could only nod. Hays definitely got her heart thumping, and he was handsome. Yet what did that matter when her heart was black and his was gold? He prayed for her while she didn’t pray for anything or anyone.
They had no future. How could she convince Hays of that?
Chapter
Fourteen
The morning was busy and long. Hays directed the tree trimmers until there was no easy route for somebody to scale a tree branch and clear the electric, barbed-wire-topped fence. When he and Jared were satisfied, it was late morning and they’d missed breakfast.
They hurried back to the house. Hays’s grumbling stomach was only part of the reason he rushed. He wanted to be near Liz, keep her safe, and convince her to give them a chance. She said she didn’t believe in heaven, that she was dark. He could see the pain and darkness in her, but he could also see the light, love, and unselfishness in her heart. She’d sacrificed herself for her siblings for too many years. It was past time she realized how incredible she was.
The fact that her kiss lit a fire in him was only part of the reason he couldn’t get enough of her.
Jared let him use the laundry room bathroom first to ‘freshen up for your gal.’ Hays washed up, thanked the cowboy, and hurried into the kitchen area. Elizabeth, Easton, and Millie were in the kitchen rolling out bread dough. Elizabeth had an apron around her that was too big for her and draped down longer than the shorts she wore. She had flour on her arm and her chin. It was a different Elizabeth Oliver than anyone in the outside world had seen. The Ice Queen running for Senate was not who his Liz was. Sometimes Hays wondered if he was the only one who saw the true Liz.
She turned to face him fully, and his breath rushed out as her blue eyes lit up.
“Liz,” he managed. “You are so beautiful.”
She smiled and brushed her hair away from her face with the back of her hand as her fingers were sticky with dough. Hays had a vision of the two of them living in a small cottage near the sea. He’d go fishing and return carrying a large salmon. Elizabeth would be rolling out bread dough and turn to him with a smile like this one. He would set the fish in the sink, quickly wash his hands, his heart thumping out of control, and hurry to sweep her into his arms. Soon they would both be covered with flour and bread dough.
He swallowed his desire for her. A simple life like that would never be possible for them, but he’d take any kind of life with her.
“I’m covered in flour and have no makeup on. How can you say I’m beautiful?”
“You are the most exquisitely beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, and right now you look more gorgeous than ever.”
