“Do you?”
“I feel it, too.I keep thinking the missing will stop.”
“It doesn’t.”
“I know.”
He pushed deeper, slowly withdrew, returned deeper still.
“It keeps … getting … better.”She looked up to findhis head back, eyes closed, jaw tight against the pain of pleasure.In turn, her own pleasure grew.She tightened her arms around his neck and her legs around his hips, then braced herself when his hands flattened on the door on either side of her head.While he kissed the high-pitched sounds from her lips, he branded her his with long, brash strokes that shook the door on its hinges.
She climaxed first, but only because he’d meant it to be that way.Her body was still racked with sharp spasms when, with a prolonged groan, he rammed into her a final time and found his release.
The pulsing inside her went on and on.At length, he slipped trembling arms around her and slowly sank to his knees, then back on his heels.“Ahhh, babe.”His voice was hoarse, his jaw damp against her temple.
She whispered his name, but that was all.She didn’t have the strength for more.So she let him hug her, let his closeness be the tonic returning life to her limbs.
He held her tightly, almost compulsively at first, and she didn’t mind it a bit.Gradually his hold eased.He nuzzled her cheek, nipped at her earring, fingered its matching choker.The set was of tourmalines and pearls set in broad sterling sweeps.He traced the stones with his fingers, then dipped his head and let the tip of his tongue tell her how beautiful he thought she was.
In that instant, basking in the heady afterglow of love, she believed in the rightness of what they shared.Cutter was special.He was forbidden to her, yet he made her feel safe.He also made her feel whole, and feminine, and sexy.Even then, when she should have been sated, her body was beginning to hum again.
“You’re a demon,” she teased, shifting on his lap to better feel his growth.
He gave a very smug, very masculine grin.“Old habits die hard.I’ve been like this for days.”
“Hard?”
“Like a rock.”
“With no relief?”She knew it was unfair, still she wondered about his women.He was a sex symbol in his own right, and she, more than anyone, knew of his hunger.
“No relief from wanting you,” he said without quite answering her question, and Pam didn’t pursue it.He was lowering the slim straps of her teddy, baring her breasts.While he rubbed one puckered nipple with his thumb, he took the other into his mouth and drew on it deeply.Swallowing a cry, she arched her back, pushed her fingers into his hair, and clung.
Moments later, her back hit the floor, and this time when they made love, their eyes held.Visually they challenged each other, silent but for a bitten-off cry, a muffled moan, a ground-out grunt.The pace grew wild, their bodies damp and savage, but neither closed his eyes or looked away.And when it was over, when they’d pushed aside the last of their clothing and shifted to the bed, they settled on their sides, face to face, wide awake.
For a time they just lay there, touching gently, breathing softly.They talked, sharing news and thoughts as best friends do but inevitably one word or another conjured intrusive pictures.So they made love again, because that was what most aptly expressed their feelings.
This time it was more gentle, a poignant reunion of the flesh.It was a light hand to a knee, the nudge of anose near a navel, the brush of knuckles on soft skin joining thigh and hip.It was the scent of musk, of man and sex and exotic flowers, and the sound of sighs.Inevitably, it was Cutter’s tongue circling the delicately fluted gold band on Pam’s left hand and her lips sipping her own tears from the pale, puckered scars on his back.Reality always intruded that way, despite their intentions to keep it at bay.
Then the heat rose again, blotting out all else but the moment, and in the fire they blessedly forgot why they had to part.So they kept it stoked, kept forgetfulness high.They loved and loved again, and by the time exhaustion overtook them, it was nearly dawn.
Pam awoke to the pale midmorning sun in a mussed but lonely bed.Clutching the quilt to her breasts, she sat up.“Cutter?”She pushed the hair out of her eyes and tried again, louder this time.“Cutter?”In the silence that followed, she caught sight of the small piece of paper that lay on the pillow by hers.His handwriting was the same barely legible scribble that had helped get him kicked out of school so long ago, but the only difficulty she had in deciphering it was caused by the tears in her eyes.
“Tu tiens mon coeur.C.”
For a long time she held the note, moving only to wipe at her nose or her cheeks with the back of her hand.Only when she glanced at the clock and realized that her own time was short did she carefully fold the paper in half, then half again, slip from bed, and tuck it into her purse.It would go, she knew, into her dresser drawer with the others, hidden beneath a cloud of lacy bras, satin camisoles, and silk tap pants.Condemning evidence?Oh, yes, but ifthose scribbles were the only physical reminders she had of him during the long stretches between trysts, she was willing to take the chance.
She brought another physical reminder of Cutter home with her from Paris that November.By January she knew she was pregnant, and she was ecstatic.She had begun to worry that the abortion had scarred her insides so that she couldn’t get pregnant, since four years of marriage to Brendan had produced no children.Now that fear was put to rest.She was being given a second chance.Not only could she make up for the baby she had lost, but she was giving Brendan a gift, too.He knew how much she wanted to be a mother and was as excited as she about the baby.
In August of 1984, Ariana was born.She was a healthy child, with her mother’s delicate nose and mouth and dark eyes that were as familiar to Pam as her own.She was, Pam knew, her father’s daughter.
Chapter 25
Boston, 1988
Cutter sat on a bench in the Public Garden, his heart swelling as he watched Pam and Ariana approach.They were both beauties—Pam with her dark hair, her elegant features, and her gauzy bohemian look, Ariana with her bow of a mouth, her dark round eyes, and the shiny hair that shimmered on the ruffled shoulders of her tiny peasant dress.Her small hand was in Pam’s, and for every step Pam took, she took a skip and a half.
She was the most beautiful child in the whole of Boston, the whole of Massachusetts, the whole of America.Cutter was sure of it, and it wasn’t simply that she was his child.He’d spent hours looking at others since Ariana was born, and none could compare.
