Nightway Page 17

  “If you know him so well, then you must realize that J. B. takes from a relationship and gives very little in return.” Hawk resumed his former position in the chair, regarding her over his steaming cup of hot coffee.

  “That’s not true,” she denied. “John was very generous.”

  A jet brow arched. “Generous? Yes, in a material sense—but selfish when it comes to giving of himself.”

  “No.” Lanna refused to believe that.

  “Look at you. You trusted him, took him at face value. How did he repay you?” he mocked.

  “How can you talk about him like this?” she accused. “He’s in the hospital fighting for his life, and here you are running him down.”

  “I’m only speaking the truth, which shouldn’t hurt anyone. As for J. B. fighting for his life … “—Hawk paused, his mouth twisting wryly—” … right now, whether unconscious or not, he’s paying an expensive medical staff to do that for him.”

  “Why do you dislike him?”

  “It isn’t a question of dislike, Miss Marshall. It’s merely a matter of recognizing faults. We all have them.”

  “Do you have to be so intolerant, then?” she accused.

  “Me?” A white smile of humor spread rashly across his face. “You would be amazed at what I’ve tolerated.” With the atmosphere lightened by his expression, he glided on to another subject. “Where are you from originally? Not Arizona.”

  Again she allowed him to shift the conversation to something safer. She glossed briefly over her childhood in Colorado, her mother’s death after she had left grade school, and her father’s subsequent marriage when she was in college. But not in this man could she confide the affair with a married man that had left her scarred, but recovering. He wasn’t John.

  But there had been such an emptiness in her life until she had met John. She guessed that she and John had been drawn together by a mutual sense of loneliness. Her blurring eyes made a slow study of her apartment. It had begun to seem like a home after she’d met John. When her gaze came to rest on Hawk, so contained and so unaffected by the torment she was feeling, a surge of irritation brought her to her feet. The momentum carried her several steps from the sofa before she stopped to hug her arms around her waist.

  “You make me feel so damned weak!” Lanna hurled the remark as she rubbed her elbows. “So damned guilty for being weak!”

  The tears spilled through her blinking lashes to run down her cheeks. Her lips were pressed tightly together to keep from releasing the sobs that were shaking her shoulders. She lowered her head, letting the brown curtain of hair swing forward to hide her face.

  A hand touched her arm and she tried to draw away from its pressure. But it took little effort to turn her and fold his arms around her until she was resting against the flat muscles of his chest. His body absorbed the shudders that vibrated through her. His strength offered silent comfort as he held her stiff form close to his. Her tears dampened his shirt where she rested her head. Even as she wept, Lanna struggled to control herself.

  “I’ll bet you are the type who hates weeping females,” she declared in a wavering voice.

  “They are usually more Chad’s style,” Hawk admitted, but she thought she detected a note of amusement rather than criticism.

  “It’s just that it’s been so long.” Lanna wiped at the tears with a weak, scrubbing motion while she kept her head downcast. “I keep telling myself that no news is good news, but—”

  The ring of the telephone was shrill. A cry broke from her throat as she pivoted within the circle of Hawk’s arms, but they tightened to stop her.

  “I’ll answer it.” The pressure of his hands ordered her to stay where she was.

  Lanna didn’t have the strength to move as his long, rolling stride quickly covered the distance to the telephone. He lifted the receiver in mid-ring, silencing it abruptly. It had to be Chad calling from the hospital as he had promised. No one else would phone her at this hour of the night.

  Hawk faced her as he put the receiver to his ear and spoke into the mouthpiece. Lanna was motionless, every nerve, muscle, and sense straining toward him. His monosyllabic responses told her nothing of what was being told to him. She searched his face, trying to read a reaction in his expression, but she could read nothing there. There wasn’t even a flicker of change in the set of his features. Tension coiled through her until she wanted to scream. She held her breath when he turned to hang up the phone, then swung back to face her.

  “Where do you keep the whiskey?” he asked.

  “Whiskey?” Lanna released the word with the breath she had been holding. What did that have to do with anything? “That was Chad, wasn’t it? What did he say? How’s John? Has his condition stabilized?”

  “If J. B. had dinner here as often as you said, there must be some whiskey. He always liked a shot before dinner,” Hawk persisted. “Where is it?”

  “In the cupboard to the left of the sink,” Lanna answered, because she knew he would tell her nothing until she did. “I want to know about John. Is he going to be all right?”

  Hawk opened the cupboard and took down the half-empty bottle of whiskey and a glass, not responding. He walked toward her, carrying the glass and bottle in one hand. They clinked together, making a flat sound. “He’s gone,” he said bluntly, not cushioning the announcement with soothing words. “He died at one-twenty-two this morning.”

  Lanna sucked in a breath and covered her mouth with her hand. All the color drained from her face and she felt sick, her head reeling. Her stricken gaze couldn’t leave Hawk’s emotionless blue eyes as she silently waited for him to tell her it was all some kind of cruel joke. But it wasn’t.

  A violent trembling began in her shoulders and spread quickly to her legs. Before her knees buckled, Hawk was there to curve a supporting arm around her and guide her to a chair. Lanna sank into its cushions in a huddled mass of numbed disbelief. Balancing on the balls of his feet, Hawk crouched beside the chair to uncap the whiskey bottle and fill the glass.

  “It isn’t true. He isn’t dead,” her thin, wavering voice insisted.

  “Drink this.”

  He pressed the cold, smooth rim of the glass to her lips, forcing them apart. She inhaled the smell of pure whiskey before the tepid liquid was poured into her mouth. The fiery whiskey paralyzed her throat muscles for an instant, then racked them with spasmodic coughs. Lanna tried to push away the hand that kept the glass hovering near her mouth, but she had no strength.

  “Drink some more,” Hawk ordered and refused to let her disobey.

  The whiskey burned away all her numbness to expose the raw pain. She began to cry and buried her face in her hands to catch the tears that streamed from her eyes. Unconsciously, Lanna rocked back and forth. She had no awareness of the man crouched beside the arm of her chair, staring at the partially full glass of whiskey he swirled in his hand. He bolted it down and then refilled the glass.

  Lanna cried until the storm of grief was spent and only a few acid-hot tears were falling. Knotting her fingers together, she lifted her head to gaze sightlessly around the room. She trembled at the frightening emptiness she felt inside. The world had never seemed so bleak and lonely.

  “Here.” The glass of whiskey was being proffered to her lips again, held by the same set of strong, sunbrowned fingers.

  With a faint tremor, she lifted her hand to touch his and guide the glass the few inches to her mouth. This time Lanna was prepared for the whiskey’s fiery taste. She choked slightly as the muscles of her throat constricted, but she didn’t cough. The glass was moved away to the periphery of her sight. She leaned back in the chair and stared at the ceiling, feeling the backlash of whiskey befuddling her senses.

  “John said he had a surefire hangover remedy,” she remembered. “He was going to give me the recipe because I drank so much champagne tonight.” Pain flashed through her head. “Oh, God, was it only tonight?” She closed her eyes as a terrible shudder ran through her.

  T
here was the faint sound of movement beside her. Lanna opened her eyes to see Hawk bending over her. The whiskey bottle and glass were gone from his hand. A resigned grimness was in his eyes. He slipped an arm behind her back, his hand cupping the opposite side of her rib cage.

  “What are you doing?” Lanna asked in absent confusion.

  “Bed is where you belong now.” His other arm hooked itself under her knees to scoop her out of the chair and carry her to the bedroom.

  Lanna wasn’t convinced he was right, but she didn’t protest. She let an arm slide around his neck for balance as she was brought against his chest. Her head rested wearily on his shoulder, distantly aware of the flexed muscles in his arms and back. Again she found a vague comfort in his strength. His solidness was something to lean on.

  In the bedroom, Hawk set her on her feet before turning on the switch to light the darkened room. Lanna watched him, swaying slightly and needing to be led by the hand. When he came back to her, it was to turn her around and unzip the back of her dress. She made no effort to help him or stop him when he slid it from her shoulders to fall around her ankles. Next, he lifted up her slip and drew it over her head.

  Her mind drifted back in time, to forgotten memories of her childhood when she had fallen asleep in the car and been carried to her room by her father. So long ago, she had stood motionless like this while her father undressed her to put her to bed. This familiar pattern was being repeted now, with Hawk in place of her father, and she was soothed by it. Her brassiere was unfastened and removed. Then her pantyhose were rolled down and slipped from her feet.

  “Where is your nightgown?” Hawk asked, standing impassively in front of her.

  Lanna blankly returned his look. She wore pajamas. Didn’t he remember they were under her pillow? His mouth thinned out into a long, straight line. He turned away to pull down the covers of the bed. Then he was back to lift her into his arms and carry her to the sheeted mattress. He laid her down and drew the covers over her before moving away from the bed.

  The click of the light switch threw the room into darkness. The door to the past slammed shut in her mind. Lanna was vividly aware of all that had happened that night as she was engulfed by a wave of panic.

  “Hawk!” She called for the one unshakable force she knew, sitting up on her elbows to see his silhouette framed in the doorway to the living room.

  “Yes?” He paused there.

  “Don’t go. Don’t leave me.” The words rushed from her in an urgent whisper.

  He came back to stand beside the bed and look down at her pale face. His gaze took in her semi-prone figure and the sheet stretched across the thrusting round points of her breasts.

  “Go to sleep,” he told her.

  “I’m afraid,” Lanna admitted. And she defended her apprehensions with: “You don’t know what it’s like not to have anyone. I don’t want to be here alone.”

  Her words seemed to freeze him into immobility for a split-second. Then the mattress sagged beneath the weight of his knee. “Move over,” Hawk ordered.

  Lanna slid away from the edge of the bed as Hawk filled the space she vacated with his long, lean frame. His arm slipped under her to draw her to his side. She shuddered in relief to have his solidness supporting her again. Her hand found his shirtfront, reassured by the steady rise and fall of his chest. She let her forehead rest against his cheek.

  “I know it sounds crazy,” Lanna whispered, “but I feel so empty inside, and it’s frightening.” Her mouth formed the soft, trembling words against his skin.

  His head moved on the pillow and his face turned to her. Her lips felt the firm outline of his mouth, the warmth of his breath flowing into hers. His hand made an experimental circle on her spine, sensitizing her flesh to his touch.

  His free hand weaved its fingers into her hair and slowly applied pressure to make the contact with his mouth more exact. For long seconds, the kiss was no more than that, one pair of lips firmly pressed to another. Yet it carried a vital flame that melted Lanna’s stiffness. When his mouth moved in a slow exploration of her softening lips, she could respond.

  From his hard vitality, she drew strength. His hands began to slowly caress her, awakening her flesh wherever they touched. Senses that had been used only to register the depth of her pain and grief became aroused to the life force beside her. They registered the brutish fragrance that clung to his hard jaw and the taste of his mouth, the salty tang of her tears coating it. Beneath fingers curling into his shirt was the increased tempo of his heartbeat. More slowly Lanna was becoming aware of his leanly muscled length, the sinewed columns of his long legs beneath the rough material of his pants, the hard, unyielding contours of his hips, the smoothly muscled brawn of his chest and shoulders—masculinity in its pure state, virilely powerful and arrogantly raw.

  Bit by bit, she began to be filled by the force of his existence. It was easy to lose herself to the feelings he was creating within her. The shadows of fear were chased away by the fires now being kindled. Sensation after sensation spilled through her: the touch of his hand on her hip, her stomach, cupping her breast while his mouth and teeth played with its point.

  Then he was leaving her. She was alone in the bed, confused and adrift, aching with a fresh pain. Incomprehensible sounds came from nearby, drowned out by the erratic pounding in her ears. Despairing that it had all been a dream, Lanna felt herself sinking again into that empty black pit of pain.

  “No.” Her cry was little more than a protesting moan.

  But it brought results. The mattress shifted under the weight of another body. A second later, Lanna was feeling the same solidness and her hands reached for it. A hard, male form fitted itself to her shape. The searing passion of a man’s kiss lifted her from the depths and sent her soaring to dizzying heights. The act of procreation was, in itself, a promise of life’s cycle being renewed. For Lanna, it was a glimpse of horizons never before seen—glorious, golden raptures yet to be attained.

  Their beauty carried her away on golden wings. When they set her down gently, she was too exhausted by the flight to know where she had been taken. She wanted to rest—only for a moment—and curled into the arms of sleep, without fear or dread for the dreams it might hold.

  It was nearly dawn when Hawk untangled the sleeping female form from his arms and slipped out of bed. In the gray light filtering through the window, he studied the face etched with contentment and framed by a brown cascade of shining hair. He was tempted to reach out and touch the generous curve of her soft lips while his body sought out the delights of her pliant flesh. Desire flickered to feel again the sensation of a wild wind lifting him high. Instead, Hawk drew the covers over her nakedness and gently tucked them around her shoulders. Then he reached for the clothes lying on the floor.

  Chapter XII

  Lanna made the transition from sleep to wakefulness in slow stages. She was encased in such a warm, gentle glow that she was reluctant to throw aside the sensation, because she sensed there was something unpleasant waiting for her when she opened her eyes.

  Bright sunlight had forced its way into the bedroom and was now glaring through her eyelids. She rolled away from it, wanting to go back to sleep and drift into the dream that had left her feeling so good. But the movement awakened a hammering in her head, a savage ache striking at her temples.

  “Why did I have to drink so much champagne?” Lanna groaned and tossed aside the covers.

  Like a body blow, it hit her. John was dead. She sat on the edge of the bed, gripping the sides as the painful memory of last night came flooding back in disjointed pieces, out of sequence, some of them hazy.

  The haziest of all was just before she fell asleep. Turning her throbbing head carefully, Lanna glanced over her shoulder at the empty bed. Had she dreamed it? Had Hawk made love to her last night? She vaguely remembered asking him not to leave her alone. She was most certain he had stayed, but had he actually gone to bed with her?

  Why was her memory so sketchy, the happ
enings in the latter part of the night so obscure? She had consumed more than her share of champagne, but—Lanna remembered the aspirin, and later the whiskey Hawk had forced down her throat.

  A chill crawled over her skin and made her shiver. Lanna suddenly realized she was nude. Why hadn’t her father put her pajamas on her last night when he’d undressed her for bed? No, that wasn’t her father. It was Hawk. Lanna remembered she had mixed them up last night, too. Maybe Hawk had made love to her. Why would she dream such a thing?

  Why would she have let him? She wasn’t the type to sleep around. Or, maybe, had she been too drugged to resist him? Yet the thought was associated with pleasure, so obviously there hadn’t been any force involved. If she could only get rid of this dull throbbing in her head, she would be able to remember everything more clearly.

  A knock echoed through her apartment. It took Lanna a second to realize that it wasn’t the pounding in her head growing worse. Someone was at the door. Probably Mrs. Morgan, she thought, and she cradled her forehead in the palm of her hand, willing her neighbor to go away. But the pounding grew more insistent.

  Sliding a glance at the alarm clock on the bedside table, Lanna saw that it was nearly noon. Mrs. Morgan had probably gotten worried about her and wanted to be certain she was all right. If Lanna didn’t answer the door, her neighbor would probably summon the apartment manager to let her in.

  Her chenille robe was at the foot of the bed, its cranberry color a glaring contrast to the silver satinquilted bedspread. Lanna picked it up as she rose unsteadily to her feet. She had trouble finding the armholes, but she finally slipped the robe on. There was more knocking on the door.

  “I’m coming,” she called wearily and tied the corded sash as she hurried from the bedroom. The knocking stopped. When she opened the door, it wasn’t Mrs. Morgan who was standing outside. Lanna stared at Chad Faulkner in startled recognition. His light brown eyes ran over her, lingering on the gaping front of her robe, then sweeping over the tousled disarray of her gleaming, dark brown hair. “Hello,” she managed to say finally. Self-consciously, she tried to push her hair into some kind of order. “I … I just woke up.”