Page 82 of What Doesn't Kill Her
“But you thought I was dead.”
“You weren’t dead. You were gone. You were my woman. We had made promises. Not in a church, but with our bodies. I was always waiting for your return.”
She blurted, “No wonder your mother doesn’t like me!”
He threw back his head and laughed, all big grand amusement and beneath that, a simmering pool of waiting molten sensuality.
How did she feel about him waiting for her when he had no assurance she would ever return? Flattered and...and terrified. Because she wasn’t anyone special. She had no exotic, erotic gifts. She cleared her throat. “I guess I should say that I never had any sexual relations while I was gone...either.”
He caught his toe on a board on the deck and stumbled, righted himself and asked, “Why not?”
“I never trusted another man enough to open my body to him.”
Max took a breath. “I should say that it doesn’t matter, that however you lived your life was fine with me. But that would be a lie. Eight years ago, I won your trust. Won’t you trust me again?” He held out his hand, palm up.
He had done that before, always leading, never coercing. “I have friends,” she said. “After battles fought side by side, I trust them. They proved themselves to me and I proved myself to them. But you—you’re different. I already do trust you. You are the one person I’ve always trusted. Maybe it’s chemistry. I think it’s an instinct in my mind and a wisdom in my soul.” She put her hand in his.
He left the door open to the breeze and the birdsong and led her inside to the bed.
Max made good on his promise.
Long and slow and warm. Kisses on every bruise, care for every injury, words that cherished and enhanced.
This man not only loved to kiss for the pleasure of kissing. Each caress was a sensuous pleasure, the act of love was an act of worship that escalated into a steady deep rhythm: sweat and whimpers and groans and triumph.
And after...oh, after was a slow descent from the heights, cushioned by touch and breath and joy. Then sleep and waking, stretching to find her body felt better—sex as a cure-all?—and smiling as she watched him naked in the kitchen, stirring up something on the stove.
He saw she was awake and said, “I found hamburger in the freezer, a can of tomatoes in the pantry, some dried herbs and fresh garlic—apparently, Zone grows his own, which makes him a farmer, too. So I’m making my aunt Sarah’s spaghetti sauce.”
“Sounds good. Is there pasta?”
“No, but there’s cornmeal, so we’ll make polenta.”
“Did I say good? That sounds wonderful.” She was starving. “Shouldn’t you put on an apron? It seems as if you’re courting disaster.”
“I hate to be putting clothes on just to take them off again.”
“Aren’t you—?”
“Cocky?”
“That’s the word.” A fully clothed Max Di Luca was a very nice-looking man. Naked, he was an inspiration. When he was cooking her dinner, he was... Well. She could never ever let another woman know about this. If word got out, he would be inundated with offers to star on a calendar as all twelve months of mouthwatering goodness.
He put the lid on the pot, turned the burner to low and came back to bed. He stretched out against her, and suddenly the single bed mattress was too narrow, especially when he propped his head on one hand and leaned on his elbow. “What do you want to ask me about?”
She had thought they were going to make love again. Which made her nervous and giddy at the same time. But talking—that made her nervous without the giddy.
She sat up and pushed the pillow against the wall and then didn’t lean back. She had been avoiding so much, the questions and the answers about their relationship, about what exactly had happened that she could remember and what had happened she could never remember. She prided herself on her bravery, but she wasn’t brave about this welter of emotions, joy and pain. She wet her lips. “I don’t know how I had a baby. How was that possible? Tell me how I had a baby.”
If she thought to disconcert him, she failed utterly. “I thought you would never ask.”
32
Kellen plucked at the fraying hem of the wool blanket. “I figured...it was a birth like most births?”
“Like most births? Her mother was in a coma.Youwere in a coma.” Max gestured widely. “Do you feel no curiosity about those months after the shooting?”
“It’s not that I’m not curious. But for me... I feel as if I went crazy and woke up a different person. I feel guilty for being shot—”
