“What we’re doing right now feels wonderful.”
“But I’m afraid I’ll freeze.”
Alana’s words trembled with fear and the beginning of anger at herself.
“Does touching me frighten you?” Rafe asked.
Alana made an odd sound that could have been laughter.
“Touching you is like singing, Rafael. Only better.”
She heard his breath come in sharply and felt the fine tremor that went through his body.
“Then touch me as much as you want,” he said simply.
“That isn’t fair to you.”
Rafe’s back shifted beneath Alana’s hand, urging her to explore him, telling her more clearly than words that he wanted to be touched by her.
“Remember when you were nineteen?” he asked.
Alana’s hand hesitated, then slid up Rafe’s back to his hair. Eagerly her fingers sought the warmth of him beneath the thick pelt.
“Yes,” she whispered. “I remember.”
“You didn’t object then.”
“I didn’t know what I was doing to you. Not really. Virgins can be very cruel.”
“Did I complain?” asked Rafe, laughter and memories curling just beneath his words.
“No,” she said softly.
“Did I ask for more than you wanted to give?”
“No. Never, Rafael.”
“I never will.”
With a smooth motion, Rafe rolled onto his back and looked at her with eyes that were clear amber, brilliant with emotion and desire.
“Do you believe me?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Then touch me.”
“Even though I can’t . . .” Alana’s voice faltered.
“Yes,” said Rafe swiftly, almost fiercely. “However much or little you want. Everything. Anything. I’ve dreamed of you for so long. Touch me, wildflower.”
Hesitantly Alana’s hands came up to frame Rafe’s face. Her lips brushed across his while her fingers again sought the silky brown depths of his hair. With a sigh, her breath mingled with his and she knew again the heat and textures of his mouth. She made a throaty sound of pleasure as his taste spread across her tongue.
Forgotten sensations stirred, awakening. The kiss deepened into a timeless sensual joining as they gave themselves to each other, knowing only one another.
Finally, Alana lifted her mouth and looked at Rafe with eyes that remembered passion.
“The first time you kissed me like that,” whispered Alana, “I thought I would faint. I think I could faint now. You take the world out from under me.”
“Are you frightened?” Rafe asked quietly, watching Alana with smoky amber eyes.
She smiled slowly and shook her head.
“With you, there’s no danger of falling,” Alana said. “With you, I’m as weightless as heat balanced on fire.”
She bent her head and kissed Rafe again, savoring every instant, every changing pressure of tongue on tongue, the heat and pleasure of his mouth joined with hers.
Her hands slid from his hair, caressing him with each tiny movement of her fingers. One hand curved around his neck just beneath his ear, her palm fitting perfectly against the slide and play of muscle as he moved his mouth across hers. Her other hand slid down his arm, only to return as her fingers sought the warmth of his skin beneath the short sleeve of his T-shirt.
She stroked Rafe, murmuring her pleasure as she felt him flex against her touch. Her hand slid higher until her palm rubbed his shoulder under the soft T-shirt. Catlike, Rafe arched into her caress, telling her how much he liked having her hand on his bare skin.
When Alana’s mouth left his and she began to nibble on his mustache and his neck and finally, delicately, his ear, Rafe made a deep sound in his throat. She responded by tracing the outline of his ear with her mouth, then caressing him with slow, probing touches of her tongue that made his breath quicken.
“I remember how I shivered the first time you did that to me,” whispered Alana, her breath warm against Rafe. “Do you remember?”
“Yes,” he said huskily. “You had goose bumps all the way up and down your arms.”
“Like you, now.”
“Like me, now.”
Alana’s tongue touched Rafe’s neck just as her teeth closed on his skin. Rafe moved his head, urging her to touch more deeply, to bite harder. Her teeth pressed into his flesh and she felt the male power in the tendon sliding beneath her mouth.
He had caressed her like that when the storm had chased them to the Broken Mountain cabin. His bite had been just short of pain and had brought a pleasure that had left her weak.
With a small sound, Alana caressed Rafe’s neck down to his shoulder until her teeth closed on the T-shirt. Her hands kneaded down his chest to the warm band of skin where his shirt had pulled free of his jeans.
When her fingers touched his naked skin, Rafe’s breath came in sharply. His weight shifted as his arms moved.
Alana waited, frozen, anticipating his embrace.
“It’s all right,” Rafe said softly. “See? No hands.”
And it was true. Rafe had moved, but only to put his hands behind his head, fingers tightly laced against the nearly overwhelming temptation to touch Alana as she was touching him.
Alana smiled and relaxed against Rafe’s side.
“Does that mean I can still touch you?” she asked.
He smiled just enough to show the tip of his tongue between the serrations of his teeth.
“What do you think?” he asked in a deep voice.
Alana’s approving glance went from the rich pelt of Rafe’s hair down the hard, masculine length of him.
“I think,” said Alana, “that it’s a miracle I kept my hands off you until I was twenty.”
“And here I thought I was the one who deserved a medal.”
“That’s probably true,” Alana admitted, her eyes brilliant with memories of a storm and a cabin loft. “I didn’t know what I was missing. You did.”
“Not really,” Rafe said softly. “You were unique, sweet and wild, as generous as summer. You gave yourself to me so completely that you made me realize that I’d never made love to a woman until you. Not completely. And I’ve never made love since. Not completely.”
“Rafael,” Alana said softly, pleasure and pain and regret in a single word.
“I’m not asking you for anything,” he said. “I know you’re not ready to give yourself again. That doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten how it was between us once—and how it will be again.
“But not now, this instant,” Rafe added, regret and certainty evenly balanced in his deep voice. “I don’t expect that now. It’s enough that you’re touching me, that you’re here with me, that you’re alive.”
Alana felt the heat of Rafe’s skin beneath her fingers, the tempting, silky line of hair curling down below his navel, and the sharp, involuntary movement of his body as her fingers slid beneath the soft T-shirt. She traced the long muscles of his torso from his waist to his ribs.
Eyes closed, smiling, Alana let her hands savor Rafe’s strength and stillness and the changing, compelling textures of his body beneath her palm. Her fingers searched among the crisp hairs on his chest, alive to the feel of him, the silk and the hardness and the heat of him.
And Rafe watched her, wanting her.
Without stopping to think, Alana tugged at his T-shirt, impatient with even the soft cotton restricting the freedom of her touch. She had the T-shirt bunched up beneath his arms before she realized what she was doing.
“I’m sorry,” Alana said raggedly, her eyes still closed. “I wasn’t thinking.”
“I was.”
Rafe’s voice was deep, caressing.
“What were you thinking?” she whispered. “That I’m a tease?”
“Open your eyes and I’ll tell you.”
His voice was gentle, coaxing, an intangible caress that made Alana shiver.
Her eyes opened slowly. She saw her hand
s against Rafe’s chest, his nearly black hair curling up over her slender fingers. Her hands flexed sensuously, pressing her nails against his skin.
“What are you thinking?” she asked, watching his eyes as her nails bit gently into his flesh with tiny, sensual rhythms.
“I was thinking of the first time we made love. When I unbuttoned my shirt, you looked at me as though you’d never seen a man before, but I knew damn well that you lived with three brothers. And now,” added Rafe softly, “you’re looking at me like that again.”
“Am I?” asked Alana, her voice barely a breath of sound.
“Do you want to take off my shirt?” Rafe asked, his eyes watching her with hungry intensity.
“Yes.”
Alana bent to brush her lips across Rafe’s mouth, loving the feel of him, firm and sweet, answering his heat with her own. She felt his lips smile beneath her caress; then his tongue moved teasingly over her mouth until she smiled in return.
“Then what are you waiting for?” asked Rafe. “Take off my shirt.”
As he spoke, he unlocked his hands and stretched his arms above his head.
Alana’s hands moved up Rafe’s body, pushing the soft folds of T-shirt over his chest, his head, his arms, until the shirt fell aside, forgotten. Her breath came in, then went out, in a long sigh as she ran her hands freely from Rafe’s fingertips to his waist. His breath sounded more like a groan as he laced his hands behind his head once more.
For an instant, Alana hesitated. Then Rafe’s body twisted sinuously beneath her hands, asking to be touched. She whispered his name as she bent down and kissed him, hungry for the feel of his tongue against hers. Her palms rubbed slowly over his chest, stroking him, enjoying him. When her nails scraped gently over his nipples, she felt him shiver. Her fingertips circled him caressingly, then tugged at the small, hard nubs. His tongue moved sensually in her mouth, stealing her breath until she was dizzy.
With a ragged sound, Alana shifted her position and sought the powerful contours of Rafe’s shoulders, tasting and biting and kissing him until her mouth slid down and found the hard male nipples her fingers had teased. Her teeth closed lightly over him. She felt the tension in him, felt his body flexing, felt the powerful muscles of his arms harden beneath her palms.
Memories raced through her, burning her.
“Funny,” Alana murmured, rubbing her cheek over Rafe’s chest, “I never thought of you as really strong, until the storm and the cabin loft.”
Rafe smiled, though his fingers were so tightly laced around each other that his hands ached.
“Thought I was a weakling, did you?” he said, his voice soft but almost rough, hungry and laughing at the same time.
“Weakling?”
Alana laughed against Rafe’s ribs before she turned her head and began caressing the long muscles, of his torso with slow movements of her cheek and hand.
“No,” she said. “But Dad was six foot five, and my brothers were all over six feet, tall when they were twelve. Bob was six foot six and weighed two hundred and twenty pounds when he was fourteen.”
“Whatever attracted you to a shrimp like me?” asked Rafe.
The question ended in a groan when the hard tip of Alana’s tongue teased his navel.
“First it was your eyes,” she said, her voice blurred as she caressed the taut skin of Rafe’s stomach. “Like a cougar, clear amber and more than a little untamed.”
“And that made you want to tame me?”
“No. It made me want to be wild with you.”
Rafe’s hands clenched until the fingers went numb. He tried to speak, but Alana’s fingers had gone from his waist down to the hard muscles of his thighs. He could think of nothing except her touch and the fierce ache of hunger swelling so close to her hand.
“But I didn’t know it then,” continued Alana, kneading the long muscles that flexed and shifted beneath her fingers, “not in so many words. I just knew I got a funny, quivering feeling deep inside whenever you looked at me in a certain way.”
“What way?”
Rafe fought to keep his voice even despite the waves of hunger that hammered through his blood. His fingers twisted against each other until bone ground over bone.
“The way you looked at me when you took off my wet blouse and hung it by the fire,” Alana said.
Her breath was a warm flow across the naked skin above Rafe’s waist.
“The way you looked at me when you peeled off that soaking, lacy bra,” she whispered. “And then you touched me until I couldn’t stand by myself. Do you remember?”
“God, yes.” Rafe closed his eyes, remembering. “You were barefoot. Your jeans were black with rain and outlined you perfectly, those beautiful legs and hips. . . . Did you know that my hands were shaking when I took off your blouse?”
“Yes,” she whispered, her fingers clenching for an instant on Rafe’s leg. “I was trembling, too.”
“You were cold.”
“Was I?” she asked.
Her voice was almost breathless as she caressed Rafe’s navel again, biting him gently.
“I burned when you touched me,” Alana whispered. “Your hands were so warm on my skin.”
“I didn’t mean to undress you, not at first. But once I started, I couldn’t stop. You were so beautiful, wearing only firelight. I couldn’t stop looking at you, touching you.”
“I didn’t want you to stop. I felt like the most exquisite woman ever born when you looked at me, when you kissed me, touched me. And your body fascinated me.”
Alana traced the line of skin just above Rafe’s jeans with her tongue. Her hand smoothed his thigh, enjoying the feel of his strength, remembering.
“When I finally touched you,” she said, “every bit of you tightened until each muscle on your body stood out. You felt like warm steel. You feel like that now.”
“Alana.”
The word was involuntary, a response torn from his control when he felt her hand settling over him.
“I found out how strong you were then,” Alana whispered. “You lifted me high, then let me slide slowly, slowly down your, body. So strong, yet so gentle. The eyes of a mountain cat and the hands of a poet.”
Alana’s mouth caressed Rafe’s skin as her fingers unfastened his jeans, seeking him beneath layers of cloth, finding him. Her breath came out raggedly.
“And the rest of you so very male,” Alana said huskily.
She rubbed her cheek across Rafe’s stomach, then she turned her mouth to his skin and kissed him quickly, fiercely.
“Alana,” Rafe said, his voice hoarse as he moved reflexively, sensually against her hand. “I can’t take much more of this.”
“Then don’t,” she said simply.
She traced the rigid muscles of his arm with one hand, feeling the mist of passion and restraint that covered his body.
“You’ve given me so much,” she said. “Let me give you something in return. It’s not as much as either of us wants, but it’s all I have right now.”
Rafe closed his eyes for a moment, knowing if he looked at Alana, he wouldn’t be able to keep his fingers locked behind his head.
Her hand moved again in a devastating, sensual glide of flesh over flesh. Fire thickened in Rafe’s veins, fire pooling heavily beneath Alana’s hand until he could only twist against the sweet agony of her touch. He groaned aloud, his breath hissing between clenched teeth.
“Oh, God . . . don’t,” he said hoarsely.
“Rafael,” said Alana. “I can’t give myself to you now, but you can give yourself to me. Please, give yourself to me. Let me know that I’ve been able to bring you some pleasure. I need to know that.”
Her voice was husky and urgent as she rubbed her cheek against his hot chest.
Rafe’s eyes opened, an amber hot enough to burn.
“Look at me,” he said.
Alana lifted her head. He saw the silent plea in her dark eyes, saw the fire and fierce pleasure when he moved against her hand, and
he knew that she had been utterly honest with him.
Slowly he unlocked his fingers, but he moved only one hand, and then only to hold it out to her. When her lips pressed against his palm, his hand shifted, gently bringing her mouth up to his. What began as a simple brush of lips deepened with each heartbeat until it became a kiss of shattering hunger and sensuality.
And then he gave himself to her as freely and generously as she had given herself to him four years ago, in a cabin warmed by firelight and love.
13
A LANA PULLED THE bubbling, spicy apple pie out of the oven, using oversize pot holders that felt as soft to her touch as Rafe’s T-shirt had. She smiled to herself as she set the second pie on the wooden counter to cool, feeling more at peace than she had in a long time. Notes of music kept gliding through her mind, chased by lyrics that hadn’t yet condensed into songs.
“What is that marvelous smell?” asked Janice from the doorway.
“Pie,” said Alana, turning and smiling over her shoulder at the tall, slender woman.
“A miracle,” Janice said.
Alana smiled. “Actually, it’s just dried apples, sugar, and spices.”
“In this wilderness, on that stove, those pies are a miracle,” said Janice firmly. She looked at Alana with blue eyes that missed nothing. “Anything I can do to help?”
“I’ve got everything under control, but thanks anyway.”
Janice smiled. “Must be a wonderful feeling.”
“What?”
“Having everything under control.”
Alana looked startled for an instant. Then she nodded slowly.
It was true. Since she had awakened in the hospital, she had felt as though her life was out of her control, as though she was a victim instead of a person. Fear had eroded her self-respect and confidence.
But today she had been able to talk and laugh with Rafe. Today she had taken the first steps toward overcoming her fear of heights. Today she had realized that Rafe respected and cared for her despite her amnesia and irrational fears.
Rafe had accepted her as she was, imperfect, and then he had given himself to her instead of demanding that she give herself to him.
“Yes,” Alana said quietly. “It’s an incredibly good feeling.”