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“I’ll be fine. But I don’t know if I can go back to sleep.”
“Then come and keep me company.” Without asking permission, he bundled her in the quilt, lifted her in his arms, and carried her to the living room sofa. “How about some hot cocoa? I saw some packets of the instant stuff in your kitchen—the kind with marshmallows.”
“Actually that sounds wonderful.” She snuggled into the quilt. “There’s a kettle on the stove. Clean cups in the dishwasher.”
“Coming up.” She heard him running water and rattling dishes. Minutes later he walked into the living room with two steaming mugs. “Remember how Bernice used to fix this for us when we were kids?”
“I remember. But I believe Bernice made it from scratch. And the marshmallows were the big puffy kind that would fill your whole mouth.”
She took one of the mugs, cradling it to warm her hands. The cocoa was hot, but not too hot to sip. They sat in comfortable silence, savoring the shared memory. The light from the kitchen filtered into the room, softening its darkness.
“How long before you have to go back to D.C.?” As soon as she asked, Natalie wished she hadn’t.
“When I asked for an extended leave, I made it open-ended, so however long it takes for Will to get back to where he can run things.”
“You must be missing life in the city,” she guessed, remembering it was all he’d known for the last several years.
“Not really.” His mouth crooked in a lazy smile. “D.C. is all about appearances. As long as you shine on the surface, it doesn’t matter how rotten you are underneath. That gets old after a while.”
“And Texas?” Natalie smiled back.
“It’s the real deal here. If you’re a badass in Texas, everybody knows it.”
Natalie laughed, reacting as much to the twinkle in his eyes as to his words. This was the old Beau, the one she remembered.
His smile faded as something serious entered his gaze. “Will has asked me to stay. Actually, it was more like an order than a request,” Beau corrected himself in a seeming attempt to make light of his statement. But the attempt couldn’t disguise how closely he was watching for her reaction. “He thinks we should run the ranch together.”
“And?” She held her breath, hardly daring to hope that Beau might be here for good.
“Up till now, my answer has always been a flat no. Mostly because I knew I couldn’t stand seeing you with . . . him.” A wealth of loathing was shoved into that single word. “Then Tori told me that you’d filed for divorce.”
“I have,” Natalie admitted. “But not because of you. You just turned out to be the catalyst that brought a lot of other issues to a head.”
Privately she wondered whether two such strong personalities as Beau and Will could get along. They were bound to have disagreements. Would Beau walk away in anger again? More importantly, could she handle it if he did?
Almost as if he read her thoughts, Beau said, “I know I haven’t given you reason to trust me, but I’d like to find out if there can be an ‘us’ again. I’ve lived for too many years with the regret of walking out of your life. Meeting women, measuring them against you, and finding them lacking—”
There was clearly more he intended to say, but she stopped him, placing her fingertips against his lips, moved by the humbleness in his voice. “I’m not a coward, Beau.” That was one thing she knew about herself; she had the strength to face tomorrow, whether he stayed or left. “If there’s a chance for us—”
This time it was Natalie who was stopped from completing her sentence as he brushed her fingers away and cupped a hand behind her neck to pull her into his arm, his mouth claiming her lips in a devouring kiss.
His mouth tasted deliciously of chocolate and marshmallow. With a yearning whimper, she slid her arms around his neck, pulling his head down to her as the kiss deepened. Her tongue flicked along his lower lip, gliding in and out of his mouth in a teasing pantomime of what she needed. One hand fumbled his shirt buttons. He groaned but didn’t try to stop her. She’d been through hell these past few days, and she was tired of holding everything back. She needed to break the dam. She needed Beau to make love to her.
Wiggling free of the quilt, she pushed it aside. She was naked beneath her short, loose-fitting nightshirt—something she made sure he was quick to discover.
“Dammit, Natalie, this isn’t the time,” he muttered, but his hands had already found their way beneath the thin fabric. His work-roughened palms ranged over her bare skin, awakening a rush of the well-loved sensations she’d all but forgotten. Beau had been the first boy to stroke her breasts, the first to touch between her legs. Now the sweetness of it came back as if time had fallen away. There’d been no shame then. There was no shame now.
All eagerness, she reached down and tugged at his belt buckle. He caught her hand and gently lifted it to his lips. Only then did she remember the loaded revolver holstered at his belt and the real or imagined danger that lurked outside. Beau would not lower his guard. Not even to make love to her.
A murmur of disappointment rose from her throat. Lifting her chin with his thumb, he kissed her. “Take it easy, girl,” he whispered. “I’ve got this.”
Easing her back into the support of one arm, he slid his free hand between her thighs to her moisture-slicked folds. His fingertips separated the dripping petals to find the swollen, sensitive nub at their center.
“Oh . . . ,” she gasped.
He feathered her with a light stroke that sent heat whorls surging through her body. She arched to meet the delicious pressure, thrusting against his hand as his finger slid into her. He knew her so well, knew exactly how and where to touch her . . . it was as if time had disappeared. It was as if she were young and naive again, as if she loved him with all her soul and nothing could ever, ever happen to keep them apart.
As the wild sensations spiraled through her body, she felt herself spinning, soaring out of control to a shattering climax that left her limp and breathless.
