Stifling a tremor that rushed from the top of her head down to the tips of her toes, Beth clutched the book to her body, still unable to believe he stood here, in the flesh, at her doorstep. “Hi, Landon.”
God, she’d missed the sight of Landon Gage. She felt it proper to say something, but her mouth felt like a prison for all the words she wanted to say and couldn’t.
She drank up his image as if she were seeing him for the very first time, examining the fit of his clean tailored slacks and button-down shirt, remembering the lean, hard body underneath. He’d cut his hair, and he looked very young and very handsome.
With a halfhearted smile, Landon took a step closer. “There’s this man I need you to exact revenge upon. An imbecile who was about to make the biggest mistake of his life,” he said direly.
His voice did things to her, awakened her body so that her senses swam. Flutters invaded her, whizzing in her chest, her stomach, her head. “So that’s what the book is for,” she said.
“It’s for revenge, Bethany.” Landon’s forehead creased as he took yet another step closer. “He’s undeserving, this man. Extremely undeserving. And I can think of no one else who could torture him as well as you.”
“Torture him?” Her temperature jacked up another degree.
He gave a slight nod. “Uh-huh. I need you to stare him in the face, every day, so he remembers what he almost let another man take away from him. I need you to be ruthless, to have absolutely no mercy on him, and above all, I want you to make him pay. It’s a matter of revenge, Beth. And this man…” The determination in his eyes arrested her. “This man is begging for it.”
She didn’t laugh. She could tell by the tension in him, in his face, that it cost him his pride and ego and everything he valued to say it.
Oh, God, Landon was begging for her.
Her palms itched to touch him but instead she wrapped her arms around herself, unsure of how to verbalize her sentiments. Sentiments in the lines of: I love you, yes yes yes, amen to whatever you’re proposing!
Should she invite him inside? She wanted to. But the house was still a mess, and her pride smarted at the mere thought of Landon discovering that she’d be living with only the bare necessities. Then she realized that in a faded T-shirt, shorts and sandals, she wasn’t much of an improvement over her small, plain home.
“Sounds like a good plan.” She remained in place at the doorway, unsure of what to do next. Her heart pounded a mile a minute and she still struggled to catch her breath. “But there’s one problem.”
He went rigid. He surveyed the empty lots that flanked her house, where in the future she’d have neighbors. “A problem,” he said. His jaw squared, and when the wind blew in her direction, it brought his clean scent of soap with it.
She hauled in a good lungful of him, unable to stop a shudder. “A big problem.” She stepped out into the porch. Closer to him.
His eyebrows slanted over his eyes, and wearing that worried frown, Landon Gage looked adorable. He pinched the bridge of his nose as though trying to stifle a headache. “What kind of problem?”
Beth could barely speak, the emotions rising inside her too powerful to rein back. “That I have no more hate left.”
She canted her face to his, and the feelings of passion and need she felt for him overflowed her. Heat spread across her midsection while a swirl of desire took form in his glinting silver eyes.
“I have only one feeling lately, apart from sadness, and I have so much of it I don’t know what to do with it.”
The features of his face went taut with emotion as he took one more step, the final step. The one that brought him so close she could feel his breath, his heat, inhale his scent. “What is it that you feel, Beth?” He stood only inches from her, tall and dark and patient and so male she felt coy and shy.
She wanted to touch him, wanted to so much, but for the moment lacked the courage. “Like I said, I don’t know what to do with it.”
It was Landon who couldn’t seem to help himself any longer. Pain streaked through his face, tightening his features as he moved. He framed her cheeks with his hands, his fingertips caressing her temples. “I love you, Mrs. Gage.” His chest expanded under his shirt as he inhaled and set his forehead on hers. “I love you and I want you to tell me you feel this for me, that you love me, only me.”
Her body responded to his evocative words, to his calling her by his name. Her blood bubbled in her veins. A head-tingling sensation swept through her and it made her faint.
He wanted her; he was here for her. And Beth wasn’t going to make him beg.
Never, not for a moment in the past months, had she been confused about this. Him. And the fact that she wanted to be with him. She’d dreamt every night over the past lonely weeks, waiting, praying, that Landon would come to terms with the specialness of what they had together. That he’d love her more than her pride and realize Beth was not Chrystine.
Beth loved him. Had been spoiled for any other man but Landon.
She’d settle for nothing less than him.
“I meant what I said in court, Landon.” She took his jaw in her hands, her eyelids fluttering as she rose on tiptoe to brush his lips with hers. “I love you.”
/> Her soft kiss seemed to take him by surprise, and it took him a moment to take action, but then he released a low, rough groan. He encircled her waist and kissed the breath out of her, his hands wandering her curves, gripping her tight against him.
He exhaled as though he’d been holding his breath for too long. “God, Bethany.” He leaned in again, this time taking her mouth slowly and deeply, savoring her taste, allowing her to savor his, then he took her hands between both of his. “I’m sorry,” he murmured huskily against her. “I’m sorry for being such a fool.”