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“They reassure you.”
“Perhaps.”
“What was she like? Emily.”
He talked and talked about the little sister he’d lost so young, and when he stopped, they just sat there in silence. But it was a peaceful silence, and she hoped a healing one.
When he started snoring, she slipped out of his arms and eased him sideways onto a cushion. Mandy took off his shoes and covered him in the blanket. Ted never stirred.
She stood there looking at him, watching the gentle rise and fall of his chest, and traced the lines of his face with her eyes. She acknowledged her love for this man then. He’d come to her to talk, and Mandy knew that meant something; she just wasn’t sure what.
Looking at the clock, she saw it was late so decided to go to bed. Ted would wake and leave or be there when she woke. She didn’t want to analyze tonight. Tomorrow would be soon enough for that.
She woketo the feel of hands sliding up her body.
“Sssh, Mandy, it’s me.”
He was naked, his large body warm and aroused against hers.
“Ted, what are you doing?”
“I need you.”
And with those simple words she was lost. He kissed her until she was eager for more. He then stripped her, and they made slow, sweet love to each other.
When Mandy opened her eyes as the sun filtered in through her bedroom curtains, he was gone.
Chapter 36
“Don’t you think he’s the cutest, Mandy?”
“He is, Bailey. Really cute.”
Benjamin was playing in his pen, and Bailey was looking at him with the adoring eyes of a parent who’d never seen a more beautiful child before.
“Cutest nephew I’ve got,” Luke said. He had a few days off firefighting duties and was helping Mandy with painting today.
Mandy ran her roller down the wall, applying primer. It wasn’t a terribly taxing job and allowed her thoughts to focus on Ted.
He’d made love to her last night. Unlike the other times, this was slow, and he had been thorough. Kissing every inch of her body until she’d begged him to take her. So many times, he brought her to the brink, until finally she yelled at him and he’d thrust inside her. She’d felt his lips in her hair as sleep had dragged her under. Her back had been pressed to his front, her head pillowed on his arm.
Mandy had never believed she’d sleep with a man. She’d done that and more with Ted, and now he’d ruined her. She wanted to experience that again… many times, with him.
He’d left her this morning without a word, and while she understood he probably needed to go back to the lodge, she wondered if he’d reappear tonight.
She’d asked him what he wanted from her, and he’d said nothing. So why had he turned up on her doorstep last night? Why had he made love to her? What had that night meant to him? Was it just another brief moment in what Mandy now thought of as their affair?
Her head hurt thinking about it. Relationships, or lack of them, were complicated.
“I’m getting a soda, anyone want one?” Mandy wiped the paint off her hands.
Bailey said she would take Benjamin home for his nap.
“I’ll have one, thanks,” Luke said.
She took the steps up to her apartment with Ted still inside her head, opened the door, and found her worst nightmare sitting there pointing a gun at her.
“I told you I’d find you.”
