She had used all her journalistic skills to make sure John Grant talked extensively and exclusively on one subject: Gabe. "He's very interesting."
She tried to keep up her end of the conversation during the meal, but it was difficult when she only wanted to look at him, savor the characteristics that made him Gabe Falkner. Because she was staring at him so hungrily, she noticed something that made her frown.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" Gabe asked. "Do I have a smudge on my face?"
"Two. Right beneath your eyes. You didn't sleep again," Ronnie said. "This can't go on. Why don't you go to the doctor and get some pills?"
"Because I don't want to." He reached for the carafe. "More coffee?"
"No, and you don't either. You don't need anything else to keep you awake," she said. "It's my fault, isn't it?"
"I told you, it's aftershock. You have nothing to do with it."
"It is my fault. You've done nothing but plan and telephone and set up press conferences since the moment we arrived here. You should have gone away to rest."
"I will later. There's plenty of time after we get you settled properly."
She had doubts if she would ever be settled to her satisfaction, but there was no use arguing with him on that subject. "It's not going to happen overnight and you'll be a wreck if this keeps on."
"Ronnie, it's not your fault I can't sleep."
"But maybe I can help." She stood up and strode toward the gauze-draped bed across the room. "Come on. I used to do this with Jed to help him relax." She glanced over her shoulder and saw him still sitting where she had left him. "Well, come on."
"I won't accept sex as physical therapy, no matter what Jed Corbin did," he said grimly.
"Oh, for goodness sake, Jed was my friend. He would have laughed at the idea of jumping me." She stood by the bed. "I learned massage from a woman in a bath house in Istanbul and I'm pretty good at it. I used to massage his shoulders to take out the kinks. Take off your shirt."
He stood looking at her a moment and then stood up and began to unbutton his shirt. "Poor Corbin."
"Because he was my friend?"
He stripped off his shirt and threw it on the chair. "Because I'd bet he wouldn't have laughed at the idea of jumping you." He came toward her. "He probably went through the tortures of the damned when you put your hands all over him."
He stopped before her. His massive shouldersgleamed in the lamplight, and she realized she wanted to reach out and touch the springy dark hair on his chest, to step closer and rub against him. The air was suddenly charged and hard to breathe.
"Not all over him," she whispered. "Just his back and shoulders."
"That can be enough. Muscles and nerves are all connected," he said thickly. "And want to be connected even more… intimately."
She was starting to tremble. "Don't you want me to help you?"
"I want you to touch me." He tore his gaze away from her and lay down on the bed and rolled over on his stomach. "Do it."
She took a deep breath and sat down beside him. She hesitated a moment and then gently put her hands on his back. She could feel the muscles tense as if a whip had touched them. She knew how he felt. A sensual shock ran through her that was as hot as it was electrifying. "Relax." The words were for herself as much as for him. She began rubbing, her thumbs digging, trying to loosen the tautness. His skin felt smooth and warm, his muscles sinewy and sleek. She tried to think of something to say that would lessen the tension pervading the room. "And you're wrong, it was never like that with Jed."
"Then he was a fool." The words were muffled by the pillow.
Her hands worked upward to his shoulders. "Not everyone has the good taste to appreciate my type. He's mad about his wife, Ysabel." Cripes, her palms were beginning to tingle with every movement, the heat shooting up her wrists. "They live on an island off the Pacific coast. I was there once." She tried to keep her voice steady. "It's lovely."
"Is it?"
"Yes. Where do you live now?" Her fingers kneaded the nape of his neck and she felt the brush of thick short hairs against the top of her hands. Her breasts were swelling, acutely sensitive as they pushed against the cloth of her bra.
"Dallas, principally. I have a home in Aspen too."
"Aspen, that's very posh."
"Not my place. The cabin is pretty basic. I only go up there in the winter when it snows. I like the cold after the hot summers in Texas."
Cold. The concept of anything but heat was completely alien to her at this moment.
"Someday I'd like to live in Iowa," she said. "I remember reading about the county fairs and the fields of corn and wheat."
"The all-American girl."
"Did you see that BBC broadcast tonight? They're calling me the Star-Spangled Bride. It's enough to make you vomit."
"It's a good sound bite."
"Corny."
"As Iowa and county fairs." A long shudder racked his body. "You'd better stop this."
She didn't want to stop. She wanted to keep on touching him. She wanted him to touch her. "Why?"
"It's not relaxing me. It's making me worse."
She looked at the muscles of his back, now more contracted than ever. She had done this to him with her touch. The realization caused the muscles of her stomach to clench. "You do seem… harder."
"Much harder." He sat up and swung his feet to the floor. He didn't look at her as he got jerkily to his feet. "The Red December has nothing on you as far as torture goes."
She could feel the heat in her cheeks. Her breasts were lifting and falling with every rapid breath. "Then why didn't you stop me?"
He moved toward the door, snatching his shirt from the chair as he passed. "It seemed worth it at the time. I believe I've turned into a masochist."
"Gabe."
He turned and looked at her, and when he saw her expression, he shook his head. "When we make love, it won't be because you want to heal me. I want a hell of a lot more than that."
Frustration and guilt surged through her as she watched the door close behind him. It may have started because she wanted to help him, but she had continued because she had not been able to resist the temptation of touching him, making him feel the whirlpool of emotion that was pulling her toward him. She had wanted sex, but she had wanted something else, something more. She had wanted to belong to him. She needed to belong to him.
It could still happen. It was clear he did want her and they were being married tomorrow. Heck, she had a chance to clear up the misunderstandings and win the grand prize. She might not be able to keep it for long but…
She quickly shied away from that train of thought. She wouldn't think beyond the wedding tomorrow.
Wedding gowns, flowers, guests, and a holy man saying words over them. The concept wasas foreign to her as she could ever have imagined. It was the kind of thing that happened to those nice, wholesome women who lived in Iowa and put up preserves for county fairs, not to her.
Yet it was happening and she could feel the excitement beginning to build at the thought of tomorrow.
SIX
"You look wonderful," Gabe said.
"It's the gown that's wonderful." She gently touched the skirt of the exquisite gown, a simple drift of ivory silk that framed her bare shoulders with fine Valenciennes lace.
"It's not the gown."
"Are you sure it's okay?" She gestured to the white rose headdress that held her veil in place. "It makes me look more like an old-time Gibson girl than ever."
"There's nothing wrong with Gibson girls." He stepped forward, reached into his jacket, and brought out a small jeweler's box. "I have something for you."
"What is it? The ring?"
"No, Dan has the ring. I chose a simple band. This is a bride's gift. It's a tradition."
"I know you said you believed in tradition, but this isn't a traditional wedding." She opened the box. Earrings. Exquisite pearl drops cascading from small studs channel-set with sapphires and rubies. "Red, white, and blue," she murmured huskily.