Once in Every Life

Her hand eased through the crisp hair and crept downward, closing around his hardness. Jack gasped, shuddering at the intimacy of her touch.

She pressed up onto her toes. Her breath was hot and inviting against his ear. "I think you can, Jack."

She slid back down. Her heels hit the floor with a muffled thump. Her hand began to move slowly up and down. Each finger felt like a curl of fire around him.

"Ah, Christ." He spun around and grabbed her shoulders, jerking her toward him. "Don't do this, Lissa. Don't you know I'm dangerous?" "Not to me."

Her answer defeated him. Longing spilled through him again, taunted him with how good it would feel to just give in. "How can you be so sure?" "I trust you."

The simple sentence, one he'd waited half his life to hear, ripped through the rest of his resistance. Groaning,

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he pulled her close and kissed her, a hot, hard, demanding kiss that was filled with dark, desperate need. He clung to her like a drowning man, planting kisses on her cheeks, her nose, her eyelids. "God, I love you," he murmured against her hair.

She looked up at him through moist eyes. "I love you, too, Jack. Now, come to bed. In case you haven't noticed, I'm trying to seduce you." She gave him a trembling smile that betrayed her own need.

She took his hand and led him to the bed. Candlelight turned the faded, gray sheets into a magical bower of rumpled gold. The huge coverlet hugged the back of the bed in a series of welcome shadows. They stood silently by the bedside, staring at each other. Slowly Tess began unhooking her dress.

"Let me," he said.

Tess felt his every breath like a caress across her bare shoulders. Shivering, she turned around, presenting her back to him. He moved closer.

His hands curled gently around her neck, his thumbs stroked the sensitive flesh of her nape. The warmth of his touch set off a flurry of goose bumps. Slowly his hands glided down her bare back and onto the textured silk of her gown. One by one the hooks and buttons gave way. The gown fell open.

He eased the sleeves downward, freeing her arms. The dress dropped to the floor in a whoosh of pale blue silk. Her undergarments followed until, in no time, she was naked.

She started to turn around, but he wouldn't let her. Moving closer, he let his hands roam gently across her weighty breasts, toying at her nipples until they hardened. She brought her hands up and locked them behind his neck. The roughened pads of his fingertips breezed across her

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flesh, lingered on her nipples. He kissed her bare throat and shoulders.

Tess shivered at the heat building slowly inside her. She moaned quietly and turned around to face him.

He was bathed in the shimmering glow of candlelight. As she stared up into his handsome, life-hardened face, Tess felt something huge and achingly hard settle in her heart.

Love. For the first time in her life, she understood the magnitude of the simple word. It was more than she'd ever thought it could be. She couldn't imagine how she'd lived without it, and yet, even now, in the midst of its grip, she could see its darker unde

rside. The heartbreak and pain that shimmered beneath its surface like hidden evil beneath a smooth, calm lake.

"What is it, Lissa?" he asked quietly. She shook her head, unable to force anything past the lump in her throat. How could she tell him? Even if he was able to understand what this moment meant to her, what he meant to her, how would he ever understand the newness of her emotion?

She loved him so damn much. Yesterday it had seemed as if they had everything, that love was everything. Now, suddenly, their love seemed fragile, a bond too easily broken.

Fear brought a tremble to her parted lips, and for the first time she wished she'd come to this century without her memories intact. Right now she wanted desperately to be Lissa, only Lissa. She wanted a lifetime's worth of happiness to bind them. They hadn't had enough time together. They needed more. So much more.

"Love me, Jack," she said brokenly. "Love me." He swept her into his arms and eased her onto the bed. Quickly stripping out of his clothes, he stretched out beside her.

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Tess lay naked next to him, feeling the minuscule distance between them swell into a huge, icy chasm. She looked at him, saw that even now, in the midst of a burgeoning passion, there was sadness in his eyes. It ripped at her heart.

Something bad was going to happen. She suppressed a shudder of apprehension.

She slipped her arms around him and huddled close. Their bodies fused, creating a heat that banished the last icy tendrils of fear. Desire and need and desperation coiled together and washed through Tess in an electrifying wave. Suddenly she had a deep, primal urge to mate with him, to merge their bodies and souls into a single, unified whole that could never be ripped apart. She wanted to use her body to drive away his fear. For now, she wanted him to think about her. Not secrets or nightmares or even Amarylis. Just her.

"Lissa?" he whispered against her ear, and there was a world of silent fear in his voice.