Erin’s voice caught in her throat and she couldn’t force herself to answer him.
“Erin?” Kane’s voice was more aware than it had been. “Is something wrong?”
She shook her head negatively, but when she did, she felt his strong fingers reach up and stroke her face. His hands stopped their movement as his fingertips encountered the first tear that had slid unrequested down her cheek. “Oh, no,” he murmured.
“It’s not…what you think,” she managed to sigh.
“Did I hurt you?” His voice was uneven in the night.
“No…no…Kane…”
“Then why? I don’t understand.” His words were raw with concern.
“Neither do I,” she admitted as the tears began to flow freely past the web of her lashes and down her cheeks. She shook her head in self-deprecation, letting the ebony curtain of her hair fall loosely around her face. How could she do such a thing to him, she asked herself silently. And how, when she was so deliriously happy, could she feel so confused and torn?
“Erin.” His voice had lowered an octave, and he brushed her hair away from her face so as to kiss the tears from her cheeks. “Is something wrong?” He held her gently to him, letting her skin press tightly to his, while he covered them both with the comforter. In the quiet room, he rocked her in the cradle of his arms.
“No…nothing…nothing’s wrong…” Her voice wavered.
“What is it? You’re not ashamed of making love to me, are you?”
“No…no…never.” She felt his breath feathering the back of her head as he sighed with relief. “It’s nothing I can explain,” she continued. “The last few weeks have been hard….” Could she tell him about the badly needed repairs to the building, the confusion she felt about Mitch or the taxing telephone calls from Lee? “…I guess I’ve been tired.” She wanted to explain how she felt, but there were so many conflicting and unsettling emotions warring within her that she didn’t want to think about them. Not tonight. She just needed to feel the peaceful security of Kane’s arms around her.
Kane clutched her more urgently to him in a protective embrace. He could feel the beating of her heart, a warm pulse fluttering lightly under his fingertips and vibrating against the velvet smoothness of her breasts. He wanted her to speak—to confess. He needed to assure her that he could make everything right. He would find a way to help her out of the mess that Mitchell Cameron had created.
Kane’s voice rumbled against his chest, and she could feel the deep manly tones pulsing against her naked back. “I want you to know that if you do have a problem—any problem whatsoever—you can come to me.” His last words sounded like a confession. “I’m on your side.”
“Oh, Kane,” she breathed, wanting to confide her innermost thoughts and share everything with him, yet unable to bare her soul any more than she already had. “There’s really nothing to tell. I’m…just a little keyed up. That’s all….” She could feel herself smiling at him through her tears.
Outside a cloud crossed the moon, giving a misty aura to the light that passed into the bedroom. She turned to face Kane, and his eyes looked all the more omniscient in the unnatural moon glow.
“I hope you realize that if you ever need a friend, you can count on me,” Kane murmured, before lowering his head to hers and kissing away the final tears that stained her cheeks.
As his lips found hers, she tasted the salt of her own tears, mingled seductively with the uniquely male taste of Kane. She parted her lips, and in a moment the kisses deepened to rekindle the fires of passion that possessed them.
With a gentleness that belied the tension that pushed against him, Kane caressed Erin and together they discovered the secrets of inflamed desire and glorious love. Erin fell dreamlessly to sleep in the warm strength of Kane’s arms. But Kane didn’t sleep. Too many uneasy thoughts about Erin strained against his mind. He looked at her asleep and brushed an unruly wisp of raven hair off the perfect alabaster sheen of her face. Sleeping in the moonlight, she seemed so childlike, innocent and vulnerable.
But his mind continued in its ugly pursuit of the truth. Why had she lied to him? And why did he care so much?
Six
Erin felt comfortably warm and drowsy as she stretched lengthwise in the bed and tucked the silken comforter more cozily around her neck. She sighed softly to herself in pleasure as she slowly awakened. All the tension that had been gathering in her body over the last six months had somehow ebbed gently away from her. She smiled to herself contentedly before realizing that she felt so dreamily happy because she had made love to Kane Webster—her new boss!
Her dark lashes flew open as the reality of the situation dawned upon her. The bedroom was dark and the bed was empty. Kane must have left her and disappeared into the night as she slept. A feeling akin to desperation cascaded over her, and the bed, once warm and comforting, seemed cruelly cold and empty. She wondered silently to herself how she could have been so foolishly naive to expect him to stay with her. She was achingly aware that she loved him, and although she didn’t want to care for him so deeply, she accepted the naked truth of her love. But she wasn’t so foolish as to expect that he could possibly reciprocate her feelings of the heart.
Erin mentally chided herself for her thoughts of love. For all she knew, Kane might consider her just another easy conquest. The infuriating phrase “one night stand” crept into her mind. For all her bold talk of not mixing business with pleasure, she had invited Kane all too easily into her heart and into her bed.
You’re an idiot, she swore at herself as she decided to get dressed. She reached for her teal blue skirt that was still lying in the discarded heap of wrinkled clothing at the side of the bed. After pulling her pantyhose on furiously, she began to step into the skirt.
“Don’t get dressed on my account,” Kane’s voice whispered across the darkness to her. Her disappointed heart leapt at the sound of his voice, and she whirled toward the doorway to find Kane leaning casually against the doorjamb, his gaze wandering recklessly over her body. Involuntarily she crossed her free arm over her breasts, while with the other she tugged vainly at the skirt.
“I…I thought that you’d gone,” Erin murmured, and feeling somewhat embarrassed by her partial nudity, she hastily grabbed the sheet from the bed and pulled it togalike around her body. Kane watched her swathe herself with the white sheet, and in his mind he likened her to a Greek goddess.
“Now, why would I want to leave?” he drawled huskily as his eyes traveled lazily over her one exposed slim leg and up to her eyes. Her fingers tightened around the sheet and yet she felt naked.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, “but when I
woke up, you were gone and I didn’t hear any noise. I thought that you must have….” Her words died as she interpreted the expression in his clear gray eyes.