The Bargain Read online

  In a way, she was glad. She needed the space to deal with their encounter last night and get her own raging hormones under control. Not to mention the fact that another erotic dream had consumed her last night and was still vivid in her mind. She shivered just remembering images of the hot coupling of their bodies. She couldn’t seem to shut them away. Somehow, by the time Cole came home, she had to put distance between them, find a place where they could get past this little bump in the road, be cool, reserved Tara again and stay that way, without making him uncomfortable that they’d nearly violated their ‘No Sex’ rule.

  She looked around the house before going back upstairs to get the baby. The cleaning crew had been back twice, and the windows sparkled and the wood cabinets shone. Everything had a fresh, new garden smell to it. The blinds in all the rooms were open now and sunlight flooded everywhere, casting a golden angel’s kiss glow.

  She had yet to venture into Cole’s room, mindful of his orders. But her room was filled with her personal knick-knacks, and she’d hung some prints on the walls. The nursery was now a zoo of stuffed animals in every conceivable color, the same animals marching across the wall in prints she’d found in the children’s store. Instead of the depressing environment, she’d seen that first day, the room was now lively, cheerful and smelled of the strawberry-scented lotion she used on Molly after every bath.

  “Okay, sugar,” she told the little girl, plucking her from her crib.

  Molly sucked on her fist and stared at her with huge blue eyes.

  Tara smiled, hugged the child to her heart and kissed her soft cheek.

  “Looks as if it’s just you and me today, kiddo. How about if after we eat, we get out the stroller and take a look around the neighborhood.”

  Feeding Molly was accomplished with a minimum of fuss and a lot of giggles. Once she’d washed the chubby little face and hands, she pulled out the stroller and placed Molly in the seat.

  Spring in central Texas was always balmy, just on the verge of being sultry. This beautiful late spring morning was a perfect example, warm but not hot. The scent of fresh cut grass mingled with the perfume of freshly blooming flowers, swirled together on the fingers of a gentle breeze. The air had the heady feel of approaching summer.

  “Guaranteed to put us in a good mood, right, sweetheart?” Tara said, fastening the safety straps.

  They walked up one street and down another, letting the warmth of the day wash over them, the faint breeze kissing Molly’s skin. If Tara hadn’t known better, she’d have thought the infant actually smiled. It was just after ten when they got made it back to the house. The phone was ringing, and she rushed to answer it, Molly in her arms.

  “Where have you been?”

  She almost didn’t recognize the harsh voice. “Cole? What’s wrong? I just took the baby for a walk.”

  “Where’s your cell phone? Why don’t you have it with you?”

  She couldn’t believe how angry he sounded. “I guess I just forgot to take it. We weren’t going very far. It’s probably still in my purse.”

  “Well, take it with you, damn it. I thought something had happened to you. I’ve been calling every half hour.”

  She looked and saw the answering machine light blinking furiously. “I’m sorry,” she apologized. “I guess I just didn’t think. I’ve lived by myself for so long I’m still not used to checking in with someone. It won’t happen again. Is something wrong?”

  “No.” She could hear him suck in a deep breath. “Lindsey’s trying to get hold of you.”

  “What did she want?”

  “She and Jake want us to come out to the ranch tomorrow for lunch.” He paused for a moment. “And bring the child, I suppose.”

  Or what? Lock her in a closet for the day?

  “That sounds terrific. Shall I call her back myself?”

  “Yes,” he said, his voice still abrupt but not quite so tight. “I’ll be home about six. I'll pick up Chinese take-out. And don’t go anywhere without that phone.”

  A loud click told Tara he’d hung up. She stood staring at the receiver in amazement. Apparently, he was still confronting last night, too.

  After lunch, she called Lindsey.

  “My God, Tara, what’s wrong with your brand new husband today?” Lindsey asked. “When I told him I couldn’t get hold of you, he went ballistic.”

  “You’ve got me. I just took Molly for a little walk.”

  “Maybe he thought you’d had second thoughts, run off and left him,” she laughed. “It would serve him right.”

  After last night, Tara could believe it. “No such luck. I’m still here.”

  “Anyway, he may have already told you, but I just wanted to invite you to the ranch tomorrow. Jake wants to barbecue ribs, and he’s got enough to feed a regiment of Marines. What do you say, about one o’clock? We’ll eat around four.”

  “That sounds great. Can I bring anything?”

  “Just yourselves. See you tomorrow. We’ll have fun.”

  * * * *

  Across town, in his brother’s condo, Cole Cassidy snapped shut his cell phone and shoved it into his pocket, feeling like a fool and an idiot.

  Sean scowled at him, having heard one side of the phone conversation. “Well, that went well,” he commented. “I thought you were going to bite her head off. That should endear you to her. Don’t you think you should go home? You’ve been pacing and fidgeting all morning.”

  This morning, climbing out of the bed he’d grown to hate, Cole had felt suffocated even as his body experienced an unfamiliar emptiness. Unnerved by his actions the night before and fighting a new assault of thoughts and emotions, he’d pounded on Sean’s door when the sun was barely in the sky.

  Now Sean pretended to read the paper, watching his brother but keeping his mouth shut while Cole alternately paced and threw himself into an easy chair.

  “I had to get out of the house.”

  “You just got married, and you’re spending the day with me?” Sean stared, incredulous. “Are you nuts?”

  “This is going to be harder than I thought.” He rested his elbows on his knees and dropped his head into his hands.

  “Especially if you keep running away from home,” Sean pointed out.

  “Can it, will you? This morning I felt I’d choke if I didn’t get away.”

  Sean quirked an eyebrow. “Is there something going on here I don’t understand?”

  “I don’t know. I’m trying to make this work, Sean. Everything’s just…weird. I can’t explain it.”

  “So you’re hiding here with me?” He shook his head, a grin teasing his mouth. “God, you do have a problem.”

  “People tell me that a lot lately.” He leaned his head back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. “I didn’t mean to yell at her. I just didn’t know where she was. I thought…she’d left.”

  “With or without Molly?” Sean put the paper down. “Did you do something to piss her off?”

  Cole was silent, staring out across the balcony.

  Sean snapped his fingers. “You want to have sex with her, don’t you. That’s it. Ha! I knew that ball of ice where your dick is would melt sooner or later.”

  “Just shut up, okay?”

  “Jesus, it’s not a sin to fuck your own wife. Maybe she’d even be willing.”

  Cole glared at him. “I said shut up.”

  “Fine. Tell me. Don’t tell me. But whatever it is you’ll have to deal with it sooner or later.”

  After a while, Sean made sandwiches, and they ate them on the balcony, Cole still brooding and Sean watchful.

  “You think I’m a real jerk, don’t you?” Cole said after a long time.

  “Sometimes,” Sean said, with irritation. “Listen, nobody knows more than I do what you’ve been through. But you can’t keep running away from your life.”

  He let out a whoosh of air. “It doesn’t seem to do much good, does it?”

  “Nope. And you married a woman most men would snap up in a hot min
ute. You need to go home and figure out what you’re going to do. So why don’t you see if you can make this a real marriage?”

  That was exactly what he wanted to do. Run home and carry Tara off to his bedroom. But he was sure he’d really screw himself over if he did that. He couldn’t figure out where all this was coming from when he’d been prepared to live like a monk for the rest of his life. He was afraid to acknowledge the undercurrent of desire that swelled every time he looked at Tara. Or the dreams that plagued him. What the hell was he going to do about it?

  He sat out on the balcony, long after Sean had gone inside. His mind was such a jumble he wondered if he’d ever get it straightened out.

  Sean was watching a baseball game when Cole went back into the living room.

  “I guess I need to go home,” he ventured.

  “No kidding. Don’t forget, you promised Tara you’d bring dinner.”

  * * * *

  Tara was upstairs bathing Molly when she heard the garage door open and close. In a few minutes, Cole was standing in the door to the bathroom, watching her, not quite knowing what to do with himself. After a moment, he walked to the other side of the bathroom where the sink was out of his line of sight.

  He cleared his throat. “I owe you an apology, Tara.”

  “Yes, you do,” she said, not turning to look at him, her voice very calm. “Which particular thing are you apologizing for—running off for the day or shouting at me on the telephone? I’ll take either one.” She carefully avoided mentioning the scene from the night before.

  “Both, as a matter of fact.” He leaned against the wall. “I was stupid and thoughtless today. I’m sorry. I’ll try not to do it again.”

  “Fine.” She ignored him while she diapered Molly and dressed her for the night. “I need to give her a bottle then she might sleep through the night again.”

  “I’ve got food downstairs,” Cole said. “I’ll get it ready to heat in the microwave.”

  Molly’s eyelids were drooping by the time the bottle was finished. After laying the little girl down in the crib, Tara turned on the mobile. Turning out all the lights except the night-light, she forced herself to go downstairs. In the kitchen, she poured herself a glass of water, leaned against the counter and eyed her husband. The air between them crackled.

  “Everything’s heated,” he said, indicating the array of white cartons on the table. He’d also gotten out plates and silverware.

  Good. Apparently, he wasn’t going to mention last night either.

  “Then why don’t we eat? I don’t know about you, but I’m starved.”

  They ate in a silence filled with electricity and tension. At last, Tara put down her fork and looked at him.

  “I don’t know what’s going on here, Cole. There’s a lot you haven’t bothered to tell me. Of course, that’s your choice.”

  He watched her through narrowed eyes, saying nothing.

  She hoped he couldn’t see the slight trembling in her hands. “But you might as well accept the fact that everything’s got to come out sooner or later. The appropriate time will make itself known, but I wouldn’t wait too long if I were you.”

  Panic flashed across his face. “Tara, please, I—”

  “Not now. I’m really tired. I think I’ll just go on upstairs.”

  She walked out of the room with dignity, leaving a frustrated Cole behind. But no more frustrated than she was. Secrets were going to kill them if she couldn’t find a way to break down the wall he’d built. And she’d better do it before it collapsed on them, destroying everything.

  * * * *

  Sunday morning heralded another bright and beautiful day. With Cole hiding in his den, Tara took advantage of the early morning cool to push Molly around the neighborhood in her stroller again. She fixed sandwiches for lunch, but when Cole didn’t emerge from his self-imposed exile, she left his food on the counter and went upstairs to dress herself and the baby for the afternoon.

  The said very little to each other on the drive to the Varner ranch. Molly was wide awake, for which Tara gave thanks. That meant the baby would nap during the afternoon. Tara felt as if the trip was thirty hours long instead of thirty minutes and sighed with relief when they drove down the narrow road and pulled up before the ranch house.

  “My God, Lindsey, this is gorgeous,” Tara said, when the Varners came out to meet them. She sniffed the air, a heady mix of prairie grass, hay, horseflesh and leather.

  Lindsey grinned. “We love it here. Jake was a city boy all his life, but now he wouldn’t live anywhere else.”

  The afternoon proved a respite for Tara. She and Lindsey sat on the porch drinking lemonade and eating sugar cookies baked by Luisa, the Varners’ housekeeper. Jason, the Varner’s year-old child, sat in the playpen burbling to himself and playing with his toys; Molly napped in the portable crib Lindsey had set up. Jake and Cole headed for the back patio. Tara sat up in surprise when she saw Emilio, Luisa’s husband, lead two horses from the stable and Jake and Cole approaching.

  “I didn’t know he could ride,” she commented.

  “Cole rides a lot when he comes out here. Says it works out the cobwebs.”

  Tara eyed her husband carefully as he and Jake swung into their saddles. In his faded jeans, denim shirt and scuffed boots, he looked every inch the cowboy, sitting on the horse as if he’d been doing it for years. Her breath caught in her throat, and she forced herself to swallow hard. No sex, they’d agreed, and after last night, she needed to make sure she didn’t give him the wrong signals. Why had her body chosen this particular time to decide to come out of the deep freeze?

  She tried to focus on conversation with Lindsey, but her mind kept drifting. She was glad when the men returned and Mary announced it was time to eat.

  They had dinner at a picnic table under a huge oak tree, the heat of the day fading and the huge oaks providing a leafy canopy against the sun. Despite the fact they had Molly with them, Cole seemed more relaxed, more at ease, sprawled in a chair as he laughed and joked. His enjoyment was evident in his body language and his easy conversation. Tara almost regretted when it was time to leave.

  By the time she’d settled the baby, Cole had once again gone directly to his den. Avoiding the issue, she told herself, but she was grateful not to have to deal with the awkwardness tonight. Sighing as she climbed into bed herself, she wondered what was going to happen to this relationship that seemed to be turning itself upside down.

  He still hadn’t taken down the invisible walls around his bedroom, seeming to be much more comfortable in her room. And bed…

  By now, she was more familiar with his body as he was with hers. Foreplay didn’t require testing and experimentation any more. Now they remembered which touches elicited the sounds of pleasure, which ones brought forth the most heated response.

  Tara loved when he took her nipples in his mouth as he was doing now, sucking on them and biting them gently until they were aching and swollen, each touch sending darts of pleasure through her body. His warm hands cradled each plump breast, kneading them while he drew on her nipples, knowing the effect it had on her and chuckling softly against her flesh.

  His mouth moved farther down her body, trailing wet kisses to her navel where he circled the indentation with the tip of his tongue. But when she tried to urge him lower, he moved his head completely and placed soft kisses at the crook of each elbow and the soft inner side of each wrists. Not until Cole had she realized how many erogenous zones lurked on her body.

  “Cole.” His name rolled from her lips on an urgent sigh.

  “Tell me what you want,” he commanded, his mouth now just above the curls on her mound.

  “You know,” she whispered. “You always know.”

  “Tell me,” he repeated.

  Tara licked her lips. He always liked to hear her say it aloud. “Suck my pussy. Lick me with your tongue. Please.” This last a little more frantic.

  His low chuckle had a hoarse sound to it. “Right now.”<
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  He opened her labia as if he were unwrapping a present and lapped at her flesh as if he were a man dying of thirst. Darting inside her quivering channel, then out, then in, then tracing the entire length of her slit. Her hands fisted in the sheet as pleasure raced through her in a rush of heat. Her hips automatically lifted to urge him on more and more. When he slid two then three fingers into her waiting cunt and closed his lips around her clit, it took barely one or two movements before her orgasm crested and rippled through her like waves crashing on a shore.

  Tara bucked against his mouth and hands, barely recognizing the keening sound low in her throat as spasm after spasm rocked her. The more she convulsed, the more rapidly Cole moved his fingers in and out and the harder he sucked on her clit, until he’d wrung the last drop of liquid and the last spasm of response from her convulsing body.

  When he moved, she was sure he was reaching for the condom on the nightstand but instead he straddled her body. His mouth came down on hers in a greedy kiss, his tongue thrusting inside the hot well and dueling with hers. He slanted his head this way and that to give himself better angles. When at last he lifted his head, he bent to the valley between her breasts and licked the skin until it was slick and wet with her juices and his.

  She watched him, wondering what came next.

  Cole pressed his cock so it lay in that same valley, used both hands to compress her breasts until they gripped his cock and began moving slowly back and forth.

  He was fucking her breasts! Holy hell!

  “Do you like that?” he asked, his words uneven, his hips jolting back and forth.

  “Yes. I-I do.” And unexpectedly she did. The rasp of his cock against her skin was more arousing and carnal than she would have imagined. That was if she’d thought about it at all.

  “Keep watching me,” he told her. “Watch my cock. That’s it. Lick your lips, Tara, as if you’re tasting me.”