She stopped to firmly grasp the handrail before beginning the descent. Hank sat there, staring stupidly after her. Had she said sex? He tried to think of other words that came close. Mex, Tex, hex, specks. None of those made sense. Shit. She had said sex.
He was out of the bed and halfway down the stairs before he realized he was wearing only boxers. Back up the stairs. Where the hell were his pants? He tripped over his boots. Found his shirt. Damn. His hand finally landed on denim. He stuck one foot down a leg, then hopped around, stabbing with his unencumbered foot to find the other hole. To hell with it. He started down the stairs with his jeans only half on.
“Carly? Honey?”
Sex. She’d said she wanted sex. Lord, help me. He finally got his foot stuffed in the pant leg, then nearly did somersaults down the rest of the stairs. In the nick of time, he caught hold of the railing to balance himself until he got his jeans jerked on. He finished fastening them as he completed the descent. His balls and his boxers were bunched into a throbbing knot at one side of his fly.
When he reached her room, he stopped to jiggle one leg and jerk at his trousers. “Carly?”
“Just go away.”
Not in this lifetime. Hank pushed open the door. She lay huddled under the covers. He cautiously entered the room. “I’m sorry. I can’t think real straight when I first wake up.” Sex. No mistake. She’d definitely said sex. She didn’t move, didn’t look at him. He inched closer. “Carly?”
“What?” Her brow pleated in a frown, then she sat up, clutching the covers to her chest.
“Did you say what I think you said?” he asked.
Her eyes were huge, luminous spheres in the shaft of moonlight coming through the window. “What if I did?”
Brace yourself, Bridget. Hank rubbed a hand over his face again, trying to choose his words carefully, which was no easy task when his brains felt like half-cooked scrambled eggs. “I, um—I’d say sure.” He cringed. “I mean—well, yeah.”
“That’s it? ‘Well, yeah’?”
He sat on the edge of her bed. Took a deep breath. His heart was still tapping out a sharp tattoo against his ribs from his close call with death on the stairs. “Can we back up and start over?”
“I’d rather not. It wasn’t one of my better moments.”
Hank felt like laughing. “It wasn’t one of my better moments, either.”
She combed trembling fingers through her hair. Then she sighed, and her shoulders slumped. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I was just—you know—considering the possibilities, and the next thing I knew, I was upstairs.”
“What possibilities, exactly?”
“You and me. We’ve had so much fun over the last few days. It seems such a waste not to fully enjoy this time we have together.”
On a scale of one to ten, it was clear off the chart as far as sinful wastes went. She was so damned beautiful his teeth ached.
“Nothing permanent, of course,” she quickly added. “We’ll still be only friends. No muddying it all up with emotional stuff. Just—well—you know—sex.”
Now that he understood exactly what she wanted, his heart sank. Somehow, with no emotional stuff to muddy it up, the offer didn’t match very well with the lady making it. Carly wasn’t a no-strings lady. She never had been. He wasn’t making that mistake again.
“That’s all you want?” he asked softly. “Just sex?”
She nodded. “I’d like it to be romantic, of course. Can you make it romantic?”
The very fact that she wanted it to be romantic told him more than she could possibly know. Studying her oval face, searching her beautiful eyes, Hank knew in that moment that he wasn’t the only one who’d fallen in love. She never would have made this proposition, otherwise.
Oh, how he wanted to take her up on it. Instead he pushed to his feet, determined to do it right this time—or not at all. “I’m sorry. If all you want is a convenient body, go find one in town.”
She flashed him an incredulous look. “What?”
“You heard me. I’m in love with you. Done deal, no turning back. If we take this relationship to a new level of intimacy, I’ll just dig myself a deeper hole, and it’ll break my heart when you leave me.”
“Oh, Hank,” she whispered. “Oh, God.”
“Sorry. I know falling in love wasn’t part of our bargain, but my heart didn’t agree to the terms. I’d dearly love to join you in that bed.” He shoved his hands in his hip pockets to keep from touching her. “If you were offering me more—a shot at having a life with you—I’d jump at the chance. But that isn’t in your game plan, is it?”
“No,” she admitted faintly. “We could never make it work.”
“In your opinion. I think you’re wrong. If two people love each other, they can make almost anything work.”
“It’s a nice thought, but practically speaking, it’s not very realistic in our situation.”
He gazed sadly down at her for a long moment and then turned to leave.
“Where are you going?”
“Back to my room.” He paused in the doorway to look at her. He’d been brutally honest, except on one small point. His heart was already breaking. “I’ve said my piece. I’m an all-or-nothing deal.”
When he turned to leave again, she cried, “Wait!”
He shoved his hands back in his pockets and pivoted to face her. “What more is there to say? We’re poles apart on this. You’re bent on going our separate ways. I want us to stay together forever. You see nothing but potential problems. I see nothing but solutions. I don’t think we can meet halfway.”
“I’ll eventually go permanently blind.” She lifted her hands. “When I do, have you any idea how much it would cost just to make the immediate area around the cabin safe for me? That isn’t to mention that I’d be stranded out there on the ranch, unable to catch a bus to town, unable to go to work. The entire situation would be impossible.”
“Difficult, not impossible,” he corrected. “I could make it work if you’d give me half a chance. Transportation sure as hell wouldn’t be a problem. If I couldn’t drive you into town, we’ve always got hired hands available.”
“I’d be dependent upon you or them for everything. Can you imagine how I’d feel, living that way?”
“In the city, you’d depend on a bus driver. What’s the difference?” Hank leaned against the doorframe. “You don’t like to depend on anyone, do you?”
“You make it sound like a crime.”
“No, more a fixation, I think. You’ve struggled all your life to be totally self-sufficient. Now I’m asking you to enter into a situation where complete independence may be impossible.”
“No maybe to it. I couldn’t even go grocery shopping by myself.”
“Is going by yourself that important to you?” He arched an eyebrow. “A lot of married people go shopping together.”
“That’s only one example. Don’t twist everything around, trying to make me out to be the bad guy. I’m doing you a big favor. If we stayed together, I’d be an anchor around your neck after I went blind—a constant responsibility.”
“A very sweet anchor,” he replied, “and a responsibility I’d thank God for every day of my life.”
“You say that now, but you’d come to resent me in time. It would cost you thousands upon thousands of dollars to make that ranch safe for a blind woman.”
“We could improvise and make do until your surgery next summer. After that, if all goes well, we’ll have years to save for all the necessary improvements.”
“And if everything doesn’t go well? What then?”
“If all doesn’t go well, then we’ll manage somehow,” he assured her. “I’ll take out a loan if I have to. Whatever it takes. I love you. I want you in my life.”
“Even if it means going in debt up to your eyebrows? You could end up like your father, a struggling, middle-aged rancher with broken down equipment, old nags in the stable, and a son who resents you because he can’t go
off to college. Is that what you want, all your dreams turned to dust?”
“Being with you is my dream now. And being like my father wouldn’t be so bad. He’s a damned fine man.”
“I didn’t mean to imply he isn’t. I just—oh, never mind! You’re not being realistic about this. Have you ever even been around a blind person?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“I rest my case.”
He straightened away from the doorway. “You’re not giving me a whole lot of credit here.” Anger seeped into his voice. “Do you honestly believe I’ll just turn off my feelings if life gets difficult, that I’ll stop loving you because it’s not easy? That’s not who I am. It’s not how I’m made.”
She covered her face with her hands. “I know that, Hank. That’s the whole problem. Don’t you see? You’d grin and bear it, and I’d feel guilty for messing up your life.”
“Do you love me?” he asked quietly.
“No,” she said, the denial muffled by her hands.
“Look at me when you say it, damn it.”
She dropped her arms. Her expression had gone completely deadpan, every muscle in her face carefully held in check. Ah, but her eyes. They couldn’t lie. Hank gazed into them and had his answer. He moved toward her.
“I’m not the only one who’s fallen in love.”
She flopped over onto her back and jerked the sheet up to her chin. “You’re out of your mind.”
“Maybe, but it’s a good kind of crazy.” The edge of the mattress bumped Hank’s shins. He rested his hands at his hips and stared down at her. “This puts a whole new slant on things. If you love me and I love you, meaningless sex is an impossibility.”
“I do not love you. I can’t love you. You’re completely wrong for me, and I’m completely wrong for you. I absolutely, unequivocally do not love you.”
“Love isn’t a decision, Carly. It’s a feeling. You can’t force it, and you sure as hell can’t reject it. It just happens. Forget about the impact it may have on my life and answer my question. Do you love me?”
“Just go back to bed.”
She turned onto her side, presenting him with her back, the sheet twisted around her like a shroud. Hank sat next to her, staring thoughtfully at the back of her head. Then he trailed a fingertip down her spine. She jumped as if he’d touched her with a high-voltage prod.
“Stop it!” she said waspishly.
He smiled slightly and did it again. Same reaction. He took that as an encouraging sign and promptly jerked the sheet away. That brought her around to face him. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Exploring the possibilities.”
“We’ve just concluded that there are none.” She slapped at his hand when he reached to touch her cheek. “Stop it, I said.”
“Why?”
“Because!”
“Evasive answer. Give me a reason.”
“There’s no future in it. You want forever. I can’t promise you that. End of conversation.”
“Can you promise to give it your best shot?”
“Give what my best shot?”
“Forever,” he said softly. He brushed at a tear on her cheek, loving her so much it was almost a physical ache. “No guarantees. If everything goes to hell, and we can’t fix it, I won’t hold you to the promise. But if it can be fixed, if we can figure out a way to make it work, the promise stands. How does that sound?”
Her eyes went bright with tears. “You have no idea what marriage to a blind person will be like.”
Heaven. “Let me find out.”
“You’re crazy.”
Clear over the edge and hanging on by my fingernails. “Yeah, crazy about you.”
“I’m afraid you’ll come to hate me.”
“Never. When you do go permanently blind, whether it happens in five years or thirty, I want to be the guy who holds your hand and takes you for evening walks. I want to be the guy who draws pictures with words so you can still see the sunsets—or the first light of dawn. I want to be the guy whose face you memorize with your fingertips. When our child graduates from college, I want to be the lucky bastard beside you, the one whispering in your ear so you can see it all in your mind. I’ll look at you and think you’re the best thing that ever happened to me. That’s what I’ll think. And I’ll thank God you stayed with me.” His throat went tight. “You know why? Because if you don’t, something inside of me will die, Carly Jane. You seem to have the mistaken idea that I can simply decide not to love you, that I’ll move on and find someone else. Well, let me tell you something. Coulter men aren’t built that way. When we love, we love with everything we’ve got, and we don’t change our minds, ever.”
“Oh, Hank,” she whispered tremulously.
“Give me a maybe,” he pleaded. “Tell me you’ll give forever your best shot. Is that so much to ask? Nothing written in stone. If everything goes to hell in a handbasket, you can still back out. Just say that you’ll stay with me as long as you can. We’ll take it one day at a time.”
“You have no idea how much I want to say yes. You have no idea.”
He was inches away from crawling into bed with the lady. Only some things couldn’t be rushed. This was one of them. Until they reached some sort of resolution, she was too upset and worried to melt into his arms.
“If you want to say yes, what’s holding you back?”
“You have to promise me that the ‘no guarantees’ thing will go both ways. I have to know you won’t stay with me out of a sense of duty. Otherwise, no, Hank, I can’t say I’ll give it my best shot.”
“I swear to you that I’ll never stay with you out of a sense of duty,” he promised her, and he meant it from the bottom of his heart. Love would be what bound him to her, nothing else. “You have my oath on it. If things ever reach that point, we’ll cash in our chips and call it done.”
She peered up at him through the gloom, clearly trying to read his expression and not succeeding. Hank grazed the backs of his knuckles along her fragile cheekbone, then smoothed her hair, waiting for her response.
“All right,” she finally whispered. “I’ll give it my best shot.”
Relief flooded through him. He was shaking as he stretched out beside her. Looping his arm over her waist, he rolled her to face him. He wiped the tears from under her eyes, kissed the tip of her nose. Spiked with wetness, her lashes fluttered upward. Her eyes shimmered in the moonlight like quicksilver.
“I love you, Carly Jane,” he whispered. “I think I lost my heart to you the first time I saw your sweet face, and I was just too damned drunk to realize it.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him. “You could have anyone you want. I never meant for this to happen.”
He kissed her hair, nuzzled his way to her ear. “If I can have anyone I want, I choose you. As for intending to fall in love, it doesn’t happen that way. Love just runs up and bites you on the ass.”
She laughed wetly. “What a romantic analogy.”
He grinned and tightened his arm around her. “You did ask for romantic. Remember?” His smile slowly faded. Burying his face in her curls, he just held her for a time, savoring the feeling of her softness pressed against him. “Ah, Carly, I love you so much. Don’t worry. Please? We can conquer anything.”
She shivered when he touched the tip of his tongue to the edge of her ear. He smiled and dipped his chin to nibble on her earlobe, which sent another shudder coursing through her. He flattened his hand on her back, tracing her spine with his fingertips. She sighed and pressed closer.
“Oh, Hank. I love you, too,” she murmured. “I love you, too.”
He drew back to unfasten the buttons of her nightgown. When he’d dispensed with the fourth one, she said, “I may not be very good at this the first few times. I haven’t had much practice.”
He searched her face. “Are you nervous?”
“A little.”
They couldn’t have that. He wanted this time to be perfect
for her. “What we need here is a lead-in.”
“A what?”
“A lead-in. Instead of going at it like we’re killing snakes, let’s forget about having sex for the moment and just enjoy being together.”
She looked relieved. “That sounds good.” Her brow creased in another frown. “When will we have sex then?”
Within five minutes, if he had his way. “When it feels right.”
In her prim, long-sleeved gown, she’d never looked more like an angel. Hank lightly touched her hair, then her arm, fully prepared to commit a sacrilege.
She smiled hesitantly. He grasped her chin. In the moonlight, she looked too lovely to be real. He lifted his head and lightly touched his mouth to hers. She tasted just as sweet as he remembered—hesitant but willing, her lips soft and warm and deliciously moist. He curled a hand over her hip and felt her shiver at the press of his fingers.
Carly’s breath started to come in short, ragged bursts. She couldn’t help but remember the last time with him and feel a little afraid. When Hank bent toward her again, she pressed a hand to his jaw, thinking to hold him away, only somehow, between thinking and doing, she felt the cool strands of his hair moving over her fingertips. It felt just as she remembered, thick and silky, yet coarser than her own, and she couldn’t resist running her hand through it.
As lightly as a butterfly wing, he touched his lips to hers again. Dream or reality? His breath mingled with hers, warm and sweet from the soda he’d drunk at the resort bar. The taste of him worked on her senses like heady wine. She parted her lips, breathlessly expectant, but he still didn’t deepen the kiss. His mouth grazed hers, the contact whisper soft. Moist, silken heat. Her lashes swept low over her eyes. Her blood began to slog in her veins, as thick as honey. Her lungs grabbed frantically for oxygen.
“Hank?”
He angled his head and tormented her lower lip with light nibbles of his teeth. “What?” he whispered.
Carly had no idea what she needed, only that he made her want. She smoothed her hands over his shoulders. Warm, slick skin. Thick, vibrant pads of muscle over bone. The leashed power she felt beneath her fingers made her heart trip and then stutter to regain its rhythm.