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“Why are you telling me all this?”
“Who knows? As a little girl, you looked at our big house and at us, and you built the Claibornes up into lordly beings we aren’t.”
“Like my book title, Lords of the Bayou.”
“Exactly. I want you to know who we are, at least, who I am, warts and all. I don’t want to lead you on.”
“Don’t worry. How could I have illusions about you after how you treated me? But you thought you were doing what was best for your family. It’s in the past.”
“I was blind.”
“So was I.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Then she pressed a single fingertip against his mouth. “I don’t care about the past,” she whispered.
Logan began to caress her with both hands, causing her to shiver.
“You’re so soft and feminine,” he said. “So beautiful. So sweet. How could I have ever thought you couldn’t suit me?”
“Maybe because you were too used to thinking of me as a child who was constantly out to get your attention by doing all those silly things…like stealing your hat or hiding your fishing lures.”
“Back then you were a part of my life, like the air I breathed. I took you for granted.”
And now? What did he feel now? She pulled free of his embrace and ran the length of the hall to his bedroom, knowing he would follow. Maybe she shouldn’t make love to him with so many unanswered questions, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself.
“From the moment I heard you’d come back to Belle Rose, I’ve been like a man possessed.”
Something inside her she’d thought long dead had instantly taken her over from the moment she’d seen him at the garçonnière. Ever since she’d made love to him, she’d been consumed by her feelings for him. She wanted him. And not just for a casual affair. He felt essential in ways she couldn’t fathom.
Inside his bedroom, she whispered a single word. “Condom?”
“Right,” he muttered, his own voice as rough as hers. “Almost forgot.”
After he led her to the bed, she was vaguely aware of him opening a drawer and shredding a foil wrapper. Then he was like a man possessed as he kissed her lips and throat and breasts before savagely tearing off his clothes as she flung her own off onto the floor.
Sheathed, he pulled her under him on the bed. Then he lowered himself over her and drove himself inside her soft, wet depths with a single thrust. On a blissful sigh she locked her legs around his hips and held on tight. Not that he remained still long.
Suddenly there seemed no softness or tenderness in him. But she didn’t care as he drove into her again and again. Tonight she wanted it fast and hard. She wanted to be claimed, possessed and dominated. No matter what the future held, she wanted to feel that she was his, solely his, if only for tonight.
Their mating was fierce and violent. It was almost as if they’d each been afraid she thought afterward as she lay trembling and spent in his hard, warm arms. But afraid of what? Surely not Butler’s warning at dinner.
Logan made love to her again and again that night, and every time her hips surged to meet his, their bodies locked in the perfect rhythm of an ancient dance. Always as he slid inside her depths, into the hot sleek perfection of her womanhood, she would writhe and cling as her own pleasure engulfed her. But each time her excitement held that strange, desperate quality, even as it built past anything she had ever known.
When it was over, she knew she had to tell him about their son.
Eleven
“Logan?”
“What is it, darling?” he murmured drowsily.
She pulled free of his arms. At the thought of the little boy they’d lost, misery made her tremble. “You asked about my scar. It’s from a Cesarean operation. The reason I called you in the fall after that summer we were lovers…was…was to tell you…that…that I, that I was pregnant…with your child.”
His body went rigid. Then she felt him slide away from her, leaving her wrapped in coldness.
“Oh, my God… I never once thought of that,” he muttered.
Her eyes filled with tears, so his shadowy form on the other side of the bed became a merciful blur. “I know. And before I could…say anything you…”
“I cut you off by telling you that I’d married Noelle,” he said in a low, dead voice. “Always the bastard…”
“No…”
“Damn it, yes! I am. I had to get you off the phone because just talking to you made me know how much I still wanted you. And I was married. Did I think of how I was hurting you? Did I?” Finally, he said, “Tell me everything.”
