Page 34 of The Forbidden Texan
“I promise you, it’ll be easy to walk away because you wouldn’t want to marry me, even if I wanted to.”
“No, I wouldn’t because it couldn’t work out. Tonight is special. I’ll stay here with you tonight and then we forget this happened.”
He caught her chin in his fingers, which were warm, gentle, and as he gazed into her eyes, her heart drummed so much she thought he would hear its beating.
“There’s no way to forget you. I can’t make this permanent and you wouldn’t say yes if I asked, but I’ll never forget tonight. From that first handshake, our relationship has been intense, like a simmering volcano. I’ve never had reactions to any other woman the way I have to you, and you said you haven’t with any other man.”
“That’s right. That’s why I wanted tonight, Jake,” she said, combing his thick wavy black hair off his forehead with her fingers, watching it fall right back. He looked disheveled, strong, sexy, and she was beginning to want his arms around her and his mouth on hers again. Why was she so attracted to him? Instead of getting him out of her system, making love tonight had only increased the attraction.
She had feared that would happen, but she’d wanted a night with him, anyway. At least she was trying to resist temptation and use some judgment and wisdom. On the ranch, if she spent each night in his bed, in his arms until they finished the job, she would be so in love with him, she couldn’t imagine saying goodbye, but he would walk out and never look back.
He would leave her with a broken heart that would never mend.
“I wasn’t even going to stay here tonight,” she said. “If we make love every night, I’ll never get over it. You’re incredibly sexy, Jake. We have something sparking between us that keeps us attracted to each other. We can work well together and play well together. In short, you’re desirable and I need to back off before you have my heart locked away and I can never get over you or marry anyone else. Maybe if we just started planning a wedding, you would cool down and forget about another night together.”
“Ahh, Emily. I can’t laugh about it.”
“I wasn’t being funny. If I start talking about a wedding, you’ll run.”
“I might not. You’re not going to want a wedding and I know it. You wouldn’t say yes if I gave you a twenty-carat diamond now and got down on my knee and proposed.”
They looked at each other and she hurt. “You’re right. I wouldn’t. I know you won’t propose, but you’re right. You’re not the man for me and my family, who are together constantly.”
He wrapped her in his arms and pulled her close against him, their naked bodies pressed tightly together, her leg over his as she held him. She could feel his heart beating. He was warm, solid, muscled and so great in so many ways, but not in the ways that she wanted in a husband. That wasn’t possible. He would never fit into her family and he would never want to. And he didn’t want to be a dad and he might not know how.
She was wrapped in his arms, in intimacy and sated by hot sex that had fully pleasured them both, but it had to end and they had to part.
The sooner they did, the less it would hurt. Getting over one night together would not be monumental.
Says who?
The nagging small voice wasted no time in questioning her. And she was forced to listen. No other man she had known was like Jake or had held the appeal for her that he did—the instant chemistry with any slight physical contact.
The silence spread between them and she couldn’t find words to change the situation. They didn’t have a future together. Tonight was all she could have with him.
She clung to him and wondered how long her memory of this night would last. How long would she want to look back on this night with him when it would hurt so badly? He was so much that was wonderful, but the basic essential ingredient was missing. He was right. If he proposed now, she would say no.
She turned to ask him, “Jake, you’ll never care about a family, will you?”
He smiled as he shook his head. “No, I don’t think I will. That isn’t my life and not the way I grew up. Sorry, Emily. For that, you have the wrong guy. But,” he said, drawing her close in his embrace, “we can still have a lot of fun and enjoy each other and be friends. That’s a lot.”
Even though it hurt, she smiled at him. “I suppose it is and it’s all we’re going to have. Tonight together.”
“Maybe I can change your mind on that one. Sure, you don’t want to try to win me over to your way of viewing things?” he teased, and she laughed and just for tonight let go of concerns about the future. She was with him and she was going to enjoy him, relish in the discovery of his marvelous body and revel in the most fantastic sex ever.
“Let me show you my shower,” he said, breaking into her thoughts. “It’s a cut above the new one they put in downstairs at the Long L.”
“Hey, I selected that ranch shower and it was expensive. It’s new, fancy and quite spiffy. What don’t you like about it?”
“Calm down. It’s fine for the ranch. But this is where I spend a lot of my time, so here, I have the deluxe. I have just what I want,” he said, getting out of bed and picking her up easily to carry her to his bathroom. “I’ll show you.” He looked at her intently. “You’re beautiful,” he said, his voice dropping and sounding husky. “I like this.”
She slipped her arms around his neck and smiled at him. “I like it, too. I like it a lot,” she whispered. She ran her fingers in his hair at the back of his head and closed her eyes to kiss him. He stopped walking and kissed her in return, his tongue stroking her, going deep into her mouth. Her eyes were closed, her pulse racing as she clung to him, and she knew this was a time she would remember all her life.
“Jake,” she whispered, opening her eyes to look at him and remind him where they were heading. “Shower?”
He carried her into an en suite with two areas, one with vanities, sinks, a commode, chairs, a large-screen TV and potted palms. On the other side of a marble knee wall was another large area with mirrors along one wall, a vanity on another, a round sunken tub in the middle and a huge glass shower.
“Oh, my word, you could get lost in here,” she said, laughing at the size of his bathroom. “You’ll really be roughing it at the ranch, and I thought I was getting luxurious bathrooms for you there.”
