The Wildest Heart

But Lucas kissed me as if he hated me, as if he could not help himself, after that first instinctive movement of withdrawal I sensed in him—as if he was a man who had reached the depths of despair and had nowhere else to go.

I was there. I was a female and my lips were warm, and I had deliberately maneuvered him into this. He knew it and I knew it in those first few seconds when his hands moved from my shoulders and along my neck as if he longed to strangle me. And then he was holding my face with his palms against my temples, fingers tangling in my hair so that I could not escape his angry, hurtful kisses even if I had wanted to.

It was then that I realized I did not want to escape, and the discovery was frightening, as I felt myself swept across the threshold of feeling such as I had not dreamed existed within myself. It was like being possessed by a demon.

I moaned under the onslaught of his kisses. I forgot the pain in my hand and the bandages that Luz had so carefully wrapped round it as my fingers ripped at his shirt until I felt his bare, warm flesh under my hands. I wanted him, and it was a terrifying feeling, to realize I could feel such lust for a man.

What devil had seized us both, I know that he felt it too. His body lay against mine, and I felt the heat and weight of his desire as he moved over me.

His lips moved from my mouth to my eyes, crushing them closed, and then to my earlobes. His whisper sounded like a curse.

“Bruja!” he called me. “Witch!” And yet I felt that it was I who was bewitched, until his lips took mine again and I went beyond thinking.

Twenty-Four

It was Lucas who proved to be the stronger one of us on that hot, sunlit afternoon when the Dangerfield devil, that “taint in the blood” made me forget everything else but the impulses of my body.

After he had pulled himself away from me abruptly, leaving me gasping with the shock of my return to reality, I heard Elena’s cool, amused laughter drifting up through the open window. She was talking to someone, but I hardly heard what she said. The sound of my own breathing seemed far too loud, and I was bitterly, angrily ashamed of myself.

Lucas was staring down at me, but I couldn’t read the expression in his eyes, for his back was to the window and the sunlight that streamed through it, yellowing the floor. I began to have some idea of how I must look to him—my lips swollen and bruised from the force of his kisses, my hair in tangles, my blouse slipping off my shoulders. I must have looked like a woman dazed with desire, and I hated myself for it and hated him most of all.

“Rowena…” There was a strange, almost apologetic note in his voice, but by now I was too angry, too humiliated to wonder at it.

“Well? Do you see how easy it is to find consolation in a woman’s kisses? Did I make you forget her for a little while?”

My voice sounded high and forced, but I saw his lips tighten and knew that I had made him angry again, and I was glad! For now perhaps he would not recognize my shameful betrayal of myself for what it had been. Weakness. Wanting.

“You really enjoy playin’ games with people, don’t you?” His voice was hard, contemptuous. “Where’d you learn all the tricks of a teasin’ whore? Was it from Shannon, or his Eastern nephew? An’ what were you tryin’ to prove, anyhow?”

My face burned, my whole body still felt hot and weak with reaction. But I forced a smile.

“Why are you angry? I was only trying to help you, you know. By proving that one woman is very much like another, given the right time and the right circumstances. You should marry Luz and make her happy.”

“Christ almighty!” he exploded, his face dark with suppressed anger. “What kind of female are you? You look and act so cold sometimes, and yet you can feel so warm.”

“Why must it surprise you that a woman can be just as devious and scheming as a man can be? Why does it always shock a man to find out that a woman can play his own game and beat him at it?”

“I haven’t been playin’ at any games, damn you!”

The bewildered frustration in his voice shook me for a moment, but I couldn’t show it. “But then, what were you playing at? I know you wanted me, Lucas, but what else? Have you fallen in love with me? Would you want to marry me and control my fortune? Can you forget Elena so easily?”

His voice had quieted. Perhaps I had given myself away.

“No, I can’t forget her. Don’t you see that? She’s as much a part of me as breathing. You wanted to know the truth, an’ I gave it to you. Elena will always be a part of me, and of my life, as long as I stay alive. But I can want another woman, and I want you. Not your damn money, nor even your half of the SD. Is that enough for you? For God’s sake, what do you want of me?”

“Nothing!” I flung the word at him. I had to hurt him in order to protect myself and my own vulnerability.

“What would I want with another woman’s property? I’ll never be content with second-best, Lucas Cord!”

“I don’t think you know what loving is. You’re the kind of woman who would give a man enough to keep him crawlin’ to you for more, and use him until he lost his use.”

“Is Elena any different?”

“Elena is a woman, for God’s sake! She’s suffered. She feels. She’s not like you, needin’ to experiment with feelings.”

“How blind you are!”

He said in a flat, hard voice: “I don’t care to hear any more. An’ you better listen good to what I’m saying. You’ve been nothing but a troublemaker since you’ve been here, and I’m warning you now to stop interfering! You’ve had enough time to choose, and you can damn well make your choice right now. Marry Ramon an’ go away with him, or go away with Julio and live with him as his second wife.”