Her eyes were the same pale, cold blue as John’s when rage held him in its grasp.
With a gasp, Genny came out of the trance. She was sitting up, her back against the headboard, stiff with horror. “John. John, that was your mother!”
“Yes.” He slid his hands through her hair, touched her rigid shoulders, then wrapped the blanket around his waist and sat facing her.
“She was going to drown herself.”
“Yes. She did.” His eyes were the color of the steel blue sky, of the steel blue sea.
“But . . . how do you know what happened that day?” She lifted a hand, needing an explanation. “Did someone tell you?”
“There is no one alive who knows. That day, there was only my mother and me . . . and her despair and fury.”
“Why? Why would she do such a thing? To herself, to her baby?” Why would she look at Genny as if she knew she was there? Who had this woman been?
“Genny, listen! People like me, like my mother, like all of the abandoned children . . . we’re given a gift, a special talent, but that’s weak compensation for coming into this world without the support of a mother, a father, a family. Sometimes we’re lucky and adopted by people who love unstintingly, and those children grow up normally, a part of the real world.” He reached for her hand as if needing the contact. “But sometimes the babies are taken by those who want to use them and their gifts.”
She twined her fingers in his, unable to deny his unspoken appeal for comfort. “Like your adopted parents? Like Olik and Tanja?”
“It can be so much worse than that. The Others seek out the infants. They weigh their gifts; and if the gift has potential, they keep them, abuse them, raise them to be steeped in evil. Very few ever escape that influence.” He clenched his jaw. “My mother never escaped that influence.”
“Your mother . . . was one of the Others?” Of all the things Genny had imagined about John, she never thought this. That he was a son of a gifted mother; that his tragic birth was part of a chain that extended back at least one generation.
“When the man who fathered me discovered who she was, what she was, he ran like a coward, taking the last of her hope and leaving her alone . . . as she had been her whole life.”
Through their clasped hands, Genny experienced a buzz, as if tapping into his mother’s memories created a low level of electric current that ran through John’s body and his mind.
He continued. “She put me on that ice floe not out of malice. For her, life was nothing but misery, cruelty, and evil—and killing me before I could suffer was a kindness.”
“Yet she didn’t drown you. She didn’t hurt you. She gave you a feeble chance to live and let fate make the decision.”
He nodded. “And she gave me her gift should I somehow remain in this world.”
“What is it? What is her gift?”
“Sometimes I can see things about the people who are truly connected to me. As in . . . I’ve always known why she did what she did. And I’ve always known her fate.” He gazed at Genny’s face, but his mind was far away. “I’ve been able to look back and see, like gazing into a flame in the heart of a lamp. The story’s there, told with every flicker. I don’t know how I hear it, but I comprehend the words. I see the scenes. I know them in my heart.”
Something else occurred to Genny, something not so easily explained. “B-but how did you show me the story?”
At once John focused on her face, his eyes intent. “When you absorbed my power, you absorbed a part of me.”
Chapter 28
“What? No!” Genny patted her chest, trying toto feel the difference.
John’s mouth quirked. “It’s not fatal.”“Is it permanent?” She didn’t want to have absorbed a part of John.
“I don’t know. It’s never happened before.”
A battle raged in Genny’s mind and heart . . . and lower.
She was flattered to be the only one.
She was terrified to be the only one.
And as much as she had lusted over John’s body, she didn’t know if she wanted to be joined with him so intimately, so exclusively, and possibly . . . forever.
John seemed not at all fazed by the doubts that consumed her. He cupped her chin, trailed his fingers down her throat, opened the buttons of her shirt. “You know so much about me, yet you’ve only seen the sadness, heard my childhood terrors. You cared for me in my illness, helped me control the uncontrollable.”
“You don’t have to worry about that. Nothing about you has ever given me the impression of weakness.” She meant to sound brisk and no-nonsense, but as he used his fingers to push her shirt apart, her voice grew husky.
“No. I’m not weak. Yet I suspect I’m not worthy of you, when everything I’ve seen of you has proved you are the best of women.”
She pushed his hand away. “No, I’m not.” She didn’t even want him to think such a thing, not with the commitment to the Gypsy Travel Agency hanging over her head.
Yet his hand returned to her throat, stroking again, using his thumb to test the pulse that beat so strongly and ever more swiftly. He leaned close to her ear, his breath brushing her skin, bringing chills to play along her nerves. “Let me show you the best part of me.”
“Oh, I’ve seen it,” she assured him.
He looked startled, then laughed softly. “What did you think?”
“It looked nice.”
He pulled back, gazed into her eyes. “Nice?”
“You were sick. I wasn’t paying attention.”
Still he watched her, compelling her to tell the truth.
“I haven’t got much to compare it to,” she confessed.
“How many best things have you seen?”
“Pictures of naked guys out there,” she mumbled.
Catching her waist, he pulled her flat on the bed. Leaning over her, he asked, “How does a twenty-four-year-old business college graduate manage not to get any practical experience with best things?”
“I was busy.”
“You were wary of involvement.” He was still smiling, but something about his gaze made her think he was angry. “You’re still wary. I’m not the expert, but I think sometimes no parents is better than bad parents.”
“I’m all right.” But she didn’t think he believed her protestation. “And probably a little wariness has saved me a lot of heartache.”
“Certainly, and a lot of living, too. But who am I to complain?” As he spoke, he was wrapping her ever closer in his arms. “I’m a yeti, remember? I’m a primitive, chest-thumping beast. The idea of being first is a politically incorrect delight.”
“I said I wasn’t certain.” She was less certain now that he’d told her she had absorbed a part of him.
“Yet you feel my wanting, don’t you?” he murmured, his lips barely touching the sensitive skin behind her ear. “As I feel yours.”
She turned her head away, denying him although she knew it would do no good.
Placing his mouth over the pulse at her throat, he caressed her with his lips and tongue and teeth. From this one touch, he spread a riot of pleasure through her veins. Pleasure rushed to her belly, her thighs, her toes . . . her arms, her fingers . . . her mind, her heart. . . . Every inch of her body was infused with desire, a desire that quickly became . . . not enough.
When he lifted his head, she was holding him by the shoulders, fighting against the moan that threatened to break from her, for a moan would tell him too much.
Then she realized her shirt was open, her bra unsnapped, her pants unzipped, and he had done it while she thrilled to his mouth on her throat.
A moan would tell him too much? What could he learn from her intense focus on such a simple caress? “How did you do that?” Her voice was husky. “Make me desire you so much that you can do whatever you want?”
“Do you want me that much?” He smiled at her whimsically.
That whimsy coming from him, from this strong, gorgeous man, made her melt like a teenager,
and feel silly for doing it. “You’re using your gift on me.”
“While I kissed your neck?”
“Yes. Not like you did the night I undressed you.” Because that had been a pure, unadulterated straight shot of sex. “But a sort of low-level buzz.”
“No. I was not. Here, let me show you the difference.” He lowered his full weight onto her, pressing his bare chest to her bare chest, opening her legs with his knee and making a place for himself, wrapping his arms around her.
Sensuality shot through her.
“This is what my gift feels like,” he said, and fed her another warm, slow, persistent shot of sex. “Like a slow slide into crimson passion. Like the first candle lit in the scented darkness. Like the first blush of a spring flower as it opens its petals. . . .”
She knew which petals he was talking about, because while he was talking, his energy was pulsing in her body—a slow, steady assault of heat and light and arousal. Her objection that he would make her one of his women, one like all the rest, was splintering and falling to dust while she was still mostly clothed, while his essence sank deep into her body. Her breasts ached; she bit her lips to control the lush desire for his kiss and the feeling between her legs—supple, damp, desperate.
She caught his face between her hands and kissed him on the mouth, and told herself it was to shut him up. And for curiosity, really. She wanted to know if his kiss was worth all those nights of erotic dreams.
But she couldn’t tell, because his response to her kiss was so completely different.
Before, he had been gentle and undemanding. Now . . . he wanted her, and wanted her to want him. So he slanted his lips to hers, thrust his tongue into her mouth, and a slow pulse of desire blossomed inside her. It was a demonstration of the pleasure he could provide.
She kissed him back, putting her tongue in his mouth, curling it against his, tasting and challenging him.
When he pulled back, she was pleased to see he was panting, too.
By golly, she might not have much experience, but she made up for it with enthusiasm.
He sat up, straddled her as she had done to him that first night when he was so sick, and stripped off her shirt and bra. He loomed—a big man intent on getting his own way, but she wasn’t afraid. Quite the contrary.
Yes, while he was ill, she’d seen him nude. But this was different. Now his muscles were full, rippling with life and movement; his chest and belly strong and taut. His hands were huge, yet his fingers moved quickly, nimbly. His erection was . . .
Well, he was right. His erection wasn’t nice. It was proportionate to his body, large enough to be worrisome, and for that reason she was cautious . . . and thrilled.
The collision of their two bodies seemed to be rushing at her at the speed of light, and at the same time, John moved so slowly she felt she could have stopped him at any minute.
He admired her breasts as if they were twin goddesses, and when he used a single fingertip to stroke the soft, full skin . . . her breath released in a soft sigh and her eyes half closed as desire tapped at her consciousness.
He used his thumbs to circle her nipples, his face intent and unsmiling; and when he had coaxed them into small, puckered roses, he leaned forward, took one into his mouth—and his power rushed through her, bringing her twisting off the mattress.
He held her down, used more pressure, his teeth, and all the while he fed her his passion.
She wrapped one leg around his thigh, pulled him close, wrapped her arms around his back and clutched him, frantic for more, yet breathless.
He moved to the other breast and suckled again, and again he aroused her in a way that made her realize how sterile her life had been.
When he lifted his head, he hushed her—had she been crying out?—and wiped the tears off her cheeks, smiled into her eyes.
She ran her palm over the shadow of a beard on his chin, lifted her head to his and kissed him, and fell into enchantment once more.
It wasn’t until he started the slow slide down, kissing her shoulders, her ribs, her belly, that she came to herself long enough to realize . . . she had never traveled this road before. “Stop!”
His hand flattened on her stomach, and he looked up inquiringly.
Once she had his attention, she didn’t quite know what to say. “Listen, John. I’m not doing the usual female I worry that my body isn’t good enough.”
His mouth quirked. “Your body is exactly the one I want.”
The way he said it, in those deep, resonant tones, made her think he meant it. Made her want to sigh and swoon.
But when he started down again, she rushed back into speech.
“Wait. Listen. I know you think you need to remove my pants.”
He looked up again, now openly laughing. “That’s true.”
“Then I suspect, you’ll want to . . .”
He raised his eyebrows inquiringly, not helping her a bit.
She squirmed, sorry she’d started the one-sided conversation. “Well, the truth is, no one has ever tasted any of these parts”—she waved a hand down her body—“so intimately.”
He slid up, rested his elbow on the pillow, looked into her eyes. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Yes, but I don’t know what to do.”
“You don’t have to know what to do. In fact, you don’t have to do anything except lie there while I show you”—he brushed his mouth over her eyelids, closing them—“what love is.”
Chapter 29
What did John mean when he said he would show her what love is? This wasn’t love. This was sex. Wasn’t it?
Genny’s eyes popped open again. “But—”He turned her onto her stomach. “Relax.”
Relax? While he was kissing the back of her neck? While chills followed his mouth down her spine to her bottom? While he reached beneath her, slid his flattened hand across her stomach and beneath the waistband of her pants, into her panties?
While she wondered what he meant by love?
She clutched the pillow between her fists, trying to control her reactions—the shuddering thrill that came with his mouth against the rounded cheek of her bottom, the need to press herself into his fingers in front, that sense of having every fiber of her body illuminated by fire and light and desire.
She had worried about whether she should let him remove her pants and panties, how they would go about it, whether the whole process would be awkward and embarrassing. Now she barely noticed as he slid them down her legs and off, and returned to kiss the tender skin behind her knees, her thighs, and . . . Oh, God.
When he turned her over, she was no longer aware of the openness of her nudity. Rather, she was consumed with need, a need that grew with every caress.
“So beautiful,” he whispered, and gazed at her as if she were perfect, his ideal.
The way he cupped her face and looked into her eyes made her believe it was true. He was a man who was used to getting his way through charm, strength, magic . . . and his pure, unalloyed worship of a woman’s form. Of her form.
As if they had never touched, he started again. As if he had never kissed her, he kissed her once more: her lips, her throat, her breasts, her inner thighs . . . He took his time, savoring each inch of her skin, pressing his lips into the palms of her hands, into the indent of her navel.
From each place, a sensuous buzz spread along her nerves to the tips of her fingers, the ends of her toes, the lobes of her ears. As the enchantment grew, her body felt as if it was weightless, rising on a billow of pure pleasure.
Holding her knees in his hands, he leaned between her legs and delicately, oh so delicately, touched her with his mouth. Once. Twice. This was no clumsy lunge of overwhelming lust, but the slow savoring of a connoisseur. As he used his tongue more deeply, separating her inner lips, caressing her clit, her heart beat slow and hard. She fought the urge to move, to bodily demand more and more.
Because at the same time, she urgently wanted him to continue this unhurried, deliberate sy
mphony of sensation.
Perhaps he read her mind, or perhaps an instinct as old as time guided him; his tongue probed and retreated, probed and retreated, sending tremblers of passion deep inside her.
She was starting to feel empty, desperate. . . . She twisted and fought, trying to get away, then trying to remain still. She didn’t know what she wanted; she only knew she wanted more.
Finally she surrendered and begged, “John, please. Please. I want you.”
He wasn’t listening, or maybe he had his own timetable, for instead he placed his mouth over her clit and suckled.
Pleasure burned like a coal, drenching her body with heat. Climax came hard and fast, sweet and intense, and when she tried to pull away to ease the shock, John held her tighter, used his lips and tongue to push her bliss to new levels, to extend the glory and ready her body . . . for him. For as soon as the first, fabulous orgasm faded, he lifted himself onto his knees, elevated her hips to match his, and seated himself at the entrance of her body.
She opened her eyes to see him above her, his face serious and intent, his chest and arms rippling with muscle as he adjusted her, then pressed himself into her damp opening, so carefully prepared. The first inch was tight, slick—and then . . . then he was too big. He hurt her; it burned, brought her out of her pleasurable haze and into the real world.
She knew this was inevitable; she’d talked to her friends, and she’d read the books. No one ever said losing your virginity was easy. So she clutched his wrists, closed her eyes, and bit her lip hard, trying to absorb the impact.
After a second, he stopped and held himself in place.
She looked up at him.
His amazing blue eyes were fixed on her face—she could only imagine her expression—and his chest heaved as if under a great strain. Then he smiled at her, a crooked, comforting smile. “I’m not going to mess this up now,” he said, and he eased himself down on top of her.