A Lone Star Christmas (Texas Justice Book 3) Page 20

  Desire, hot, intense, and nearly blinding slammed through him. He reached out almost wildly, for something, anything to remind him which way was up. He found nothing but air, and some part of his brain told him this was how he was going to feel all night, floundering, unable to quite believe that this incredible creature was with him.

  She was a living, breathing flame, and she was going to burn him to the ground.

  *

  Sean’s reaction was all she could have wished. It had been so long since she had thought about such things as whether she looked attractive to a man she’d been completely out of the habit. But Joey had been a tremendous help, and had been right, so very right, about this dress. Joey had also told her to forego doing anything with her hair but let it free.

  Your hair is what other women dream about and men fantasize about. Unleash it, Elena. Sean won’t know what hit him.

  What Joey hadn’t told her was what the sight of him, in formal wear, was going to do to her. The western-style tuxedo jacket fit him beautifully. And the formal, crisp white shirt with a wing-tip collar, and without the pleated front she found too fussy, suited him, especially since he’d gone Texas with a lovely, heavy bolo tie with a triangular onyx stone.

  And the vest he wore underneath the jacket was nearly the exact red of her dress. Had Joey told him? Perhaps not, red was the only color she had seen him wear besides their shared black and white. I like red…

  As he stared up at her, his dark formal clothes and hair making his ice-blue eyes seem impossible, she found herself nearly shaking inside at the evening to come and the night to follow.

  It took all her focus—and a firm grip on the banister—to get down the stairs. She saw him swallow a couple of times, but his eyes never left her. And when she reached the bottom he said, in a thick voice that sent a shiver through her, “You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen in my life.”

  “I could say the same,” she whispered. “Have I mentioned I not only have a weakness for heroes, but for French cuffs?”

  “I’m no—”

  She held a finger to his lips before he could deny he was a hero. “Everyone gets to choose for themselves who they think a hero. And I have chosen.”

  She seemed to have struck him speechless. He said nothing as they drove, but she caught him a couple of times stealing glances at her. And thought herself much luckier to be the passenger and thus able to keep looking at him the entire time.

  Jameson House was dressed in its holiday best, inside and out. The mass of sparkling lights and the silver and gold décor set an elegant tone, and for an instant she felt a qualm. Her dress was so…so…

  “What’s wrong?”

  She didn’t think she’d shown it, but then, this would hardly be the first time he’d surprised her. He claimed to be ignorant of people, but if it was true, he certainly made up for it by being perceptive of changes, shifts, like now.

  “I’m just feeling a bit…red,” she whispered.

  He stopped in his tracks just before they stepped into the main ballroom. He turned to face her, reached out and gently grasped her shoulders and turned her to face him. In her heels she was much closer to his eye level, and she met his gaze.

  “You are,” he said slowly, “incredible. I don’t have to see another person here to know you’re going to blow them all away. Every man in there’s going to wish he was me, and every woman’s going to wish she had that dress.”

  She stared at him. “You know, for a man who insists he doesn’t get people, you surely get me.”

  They stepped inside. She remembered what he’d said about always buying tickets to support the rodeo scholarships, but never using them, and assumed most of the head-turning was merely his unexpected presence. Well, the female heads probably would have turned at the first sight of him anyway.

  She felt a flutter in her stomach when she spotted the knot of people to the right: the Highwaters. All dressed to the nines, Shane and Lily, Sage, and Slater with Joey. Joey who spotted her and grinned. She said something to the others, and they all turned. And stared.

  “Let’s get it over with,” Sean muttered.

  “You know,” she said as they headed that way, “it truly is amazing that those closest to you are all so beautiful.”

  “That will be true in a second,” he said when they were exactly that one second away. And she had the thought she would not trade Sean’s way of complimenting for anyone’s.

  “Holy cow, Elena!” Sage was practically gaping.

  “Indeed,” agreed Slater.

  “You look,” Shane Highwater said with an old-school bow, “like the queen my brother has always thought you.”

  “Or an escaped supermodel,” Lily teased. “The red’s incredible, and that’s some amazing hair, woman.”

  She stole a glance at Sean, who was studying the toes of his well-shined boots. Joey simply winked at her; she had told Elena every time she wavered that the dress was perfect. Red has a certain effect on Highwater men, Elena. Trust me.

  “Thank you, all of you,” she said simply.

  The night became a blur after that. She’d had no idea her presence would cause such a stir, although perhaps she should have expected it given how long it had been since she had participated in any Last Stand social occasion.

  They danced, but she was so rusty and Sean so ill at ease she asked if they could stop. He gave her a grateful look.

  “Thanks for taking pity on me.”

  “More on me,” she insisted. “It’s been far too long for me to dance in public.”

  “How about in private?” he whispered in her ear.

  She nearly shivered at the intensity in his voice. She could not believe it had been only a week since the night of the storm; it felt like an eternity.

  She barely hung on through the formalities of the evening, even though they were brief. The band stepped aside as the president of the Daughters of Last Stand came up on the stage to thank them all for coming, and to announce the financial success of the fundraiser; the rodeo scholarship program was now fully funded.

  “Won’t your family notice?” she asked when, as the band struck up again, he suggested a quick exit by the back door.

  “They’ll be amazed—and credit you, rightfully—that I’ve stuck it out this long. I—” He broke off suddenly. “Unless you’d rather stay. This being your first time to this, and all dressed up so beautifully.”

  She leaned up to put her lips to his ear, and in words that shocked even her, she told him exactly what she’d rather be doing than staying here. She felt him shudder in response. And suddenly he was a man with a mission, to get them out of here as quickly as possible.

  She couldn’t agree more.

  He drove in silence, but intensity fairly radiated from him. She was surprised when he pulled onto the long, winding drive at the sign that read “Hickory Creek Inn.” She could see up ahead the large, white building with the expansive front porch, a rounded gazebo on the side facing the creek, and the distinctive lookout tower in the center above the second floor. Tonight the entire building was delineated with Christmas lights and festooned with evergreen garlands tied with wide red ribbon.

  She turned her head to look at him. “Here? But they’re always booked up far in advance,” she said. When he didn’t respond she looked back at him, waiting. He shrugged again.

  “I called in a favor,” he finally said.

  “Ranger Buckley?” she asked. She knew the man whose family owned the expansive property, including the inn and its handful of guest cottages was a retired Texas Ranger, so it seemed reasonable they might have crossed paths.

  He nodded. “I ran into him over in Whiskey River when I went to pick up Marcos’s present.”

  She knew about the Christmas gift he’d gotten Marcos—a personalized signed first edition of the first Sam Smith book, written by world-famous children’s author Declan Bolt, who lived in Whiskey River. She knew Marcos was going to love it, and be even more awed b
y Sean than he already was. She herself had been moved beyond measure that he’d gone to so much trouble, although he credited Joey, who had met the author at his first ever book signing a while back, with arranging it.

  When they arrived at their room and he’d closed the door behind them, she looked around, then turned to stare at him. “That must have been some favor he owed you.”

  The room was impossibly beautiful. Elegant, beautiful carved wood tables and lush fabrics. Period-appropriate pictures hung on the walls, and the drapes were a patterned red that went well with her dress.

  And, of course, the bed. The huge, high bed with a rich, silk coverlet that added a sensuous element to the room.

  As if I need anything but Sean for that…

  He came up behind her, put his hands on her shoulders, and bent to whisper in her ear. “This is how I’ve always thought of you. Elegant. Regal. Magnificent.”

  She shivered at the feel of his breath. “Sean—”

  “Let me make love to you that way. Not in the back of a car.”

  “I happen to have very, very fond memories of the back of your car.”

  “So do I. I’ll never sell the thing. We’ll have sex in the back when we’re old and gray. But I want this, too.”

  For a moment she forgot to breathe. When we’re old and gray… “You mean that?”

  He leaned in even closer, and his voice was rough. “All of it.”

  “Then show me.”

  He ran his fingers through her hair, sucking in an audible breath as he did. “Beautiful,” he said. He lifted the heavy waves to press his lips to the back of her neck, sending fire down her spine.

  He slowly, gently turned her around. Then he kissed her lips, and it was the kind of kiss she’d never had before, eager yet slow, knowing yet sparking imagining, thorough yet teasing. He tasted her as if she were the finest of wines, touched her as if she were fragile, and yet somehow he was making her gasp with the power of it.

  She was only aware he’d unzipped her dress when she felt his fingers stroking down her back.

  “As much as I love you in it,” he whispered, and slipped it off her shoulders. The red fabric pooled at her feet, and she heard him groan. He slid his hands down her sides, then around to cup her breasts in the matching, lacy red bra. And when she looked up and met his gaze, saw the hunger there, heat shot through her, spiraling down to pool low and deep.

  She wanted to hurry, but he wouldn’t let her. He’d clearly meant what he’d said, and it seemed to her hours before they were at last naked together. And for a moment he just looked at her. Then, in a voice she’d never heard from him before, he said softly, “You humble me.”

  She could not, simply could not wait any longer. She reached for him, sliding her hands over taut muscles down to lean hips. She moved one hand to stroke his erection. “There is nothing humble about this,” she said, and let her fingers curl around him. He groaned low and deep in his throat, and she could almost feel his will break. He moved her hand so he could sweep her up in his arms. He carried her to that huge bed, put her down upon it with a care that made her feel…worshipped.

  And she thought, in the moment when he finally moved to fill the hollow ache inside her that, as long as she didn’t lose the wild, frenzied lover she’d met the night of the storm, she could learn to love this aching slowness. And when he stroked her so perfectly one last time, she learned the full and total power of this kind of loving as her body sent out wave after wave of sweeping, unbelievable pleasure through her.

  Worshipped was definitely the word.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Sean finally, reluctantly took Elena home Sunday evening—after getting a promise from her that she would join the Highwater clan Christmas Eve. Marcos enthusiastically greeted him—not even asking where they’d been—and having secured his own promise that they would have another lesson tomorrow, he went back to where his grandmother was arranging an odd assortment of things on the kitchen table.

  Elena watched him go, then turned back to Sean. “I’m afraid there is something we must discuss…soon.”

  Uh-oh. “What?”

  She nodded toward her son. “Him.”

  He drew back slightly. Glanced over to where he could see the boy, discussing something intently with his grandmother.

  He shifted his gaze back to Elena. “I thought…he was doing well,” he said cautiously.

  “He is. So much better.” He took a relieved breath. “But he is also curious.”

  “About?”

  “You and I.”

  “Oh. Is that…a problem?”

  “I do not want him developing expectations that are…inappropriate.”

  He frowned. Inappropriate? What was she saying? That they were inappropriate? Or that Marcos might assume…what? What did she not want her son thinking? That they were together? Had she changed her mind about him, about them? Sure, she’d gone to the ball with him, and he’d thought she enjoyed it—and the long, passionate night that followed—but maybe she’d changed her mind. Or maybe he was wrong about how good it had been, or maybe it had only been good for him. Maybe she’d decided he was too weird after all. So was she breaking them up? But was there really a them to break up, officially?

  A possibility hit him then, and jounced him right out of that rabbit hole. But he had to be sure, so he said, carefully, “It’s not like you to dance around things. What do you mean?”

  She drew in an audible breath. “I mean I do not know how to answer the questions he will soon be asking.”

  “About…us?”

  She nodded. “If you wish to continue this—”

  “How could you possibly think I don’t?” he broke in, nearly gaping at her. “Elena, I—”

  She held up a hand. “I understand this. And I feel the same.” She held his gaze, and he saw all the heat there he could have wished. “But with Marcos it is different. What happens between us…he will want to know what it means. If you will stay. And I will not have him destroyed all over again by the loss of a man he cares deeply for.” She took a visibly deep breath. “Perhaps you could think about what you wish to tell him.”

  In fact, he had not thought about this aspect. Yet he should have. He’d been older than Marcos, almost an adult, when he’d lost his own father, and it had still been the most devastating event of his life.

  He opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again. Some instinct was yelling at him that this was not something he could or should hurry an answer to. It needed to be the right words, said the right way. And for him, that meant wrestling with it for a while.

  “I will think about it,” he said. “But remember what I said.”

  “What?”

  He reached out and touched her cheek with the back of his fingers. “I don’t quit.”

  *

  Marcos had done exceptionally well at his lesson this morning. And since the boy was out of school for the holidays it had been a long one; Sean had wanted to make up for yesterday, when tracking down a lead on a stolen car had eaten up his entire Monday. Of course half the reason it had was that for the first time in his career he was having trouble focusing; memories of the ball and the night that had followed kept distracting him.

  Not to mention Elena’s rather lengthy kiss of thanks to him for keeping the boy out of the house on this Christmas Eve morning, so she could finish wrapping his gifts.

  He thought a stop for the boy’s favorite chocolate cream pie was in order, so they walked over from the department. He had promised to drop the boy off at home himself due to some female gathering his grandmother had planned at the house this afternoon, and that required Elena’s presence. Just the thought made him a little twitchy; large groups of women did that to him.

  They were early enough that Char-Pie wasn’t swamped, and they had some privacy at the table in the corner. And after the boy had paused in his gobbling up of the sweet treat, Sean steeled himself. Elena’s words—and her concern for her son—rang in his mind.
He thought he’d found the way, but he was having second thoughts about doing this without her. But Shane had agreed, this was a man-to-man kind of thing, and so here they were.

  He pulled out his phone, called up the photograph he’d taken last Friday, before he’d started home. He hadn’t had this in mind when he’d done it, but it seemed fated now. He held it out to the child.

  “You recognize this, buddy?”

  Marcos looked, his eyes widening. “Yeah. Mom takes me there on his cabo de año.” Sean knew that was an observance of the day someone died, a day of remembrance. Then Marcos smiled. “We go to church and all, and people start out all serious, but when we get back it kind of turns into a party. Mom says my dad would want it that way.”

  “I’m sure she’s right,” Sean said, his throat a little tight. He wondered if his family would adopt that tradition. It might do them all good.

  The boy studied picture of the white cross that bore his father’s name. “Did you put the flag there?”

  Sean nodded. And it took a moment before he could go on. “And he’ll always be your dad, you know that, right? And you and your mom will always love him. Just like I still love my dad.”

  “Sure.” Marcos toyed with his fork for a moment. “But…does that mean I can’t ever have a dad again?”

  And there it was. He hadn’t even had to bring it up. “No. No, it doesn’t.”

  “Good.” Marcos looked up at him. “’Cuz I was hoping maybe you might wanna…you know.”

  Sean took a deep breath. “I’d like to try, Marcos. Maybe it won’t work, but I really like you, and your mom, and I’d like for us to be together like that.”

  Marcos gave him a look then, so full of hope and happiness that Sean felt a pulse of something new and almost scary. He’d never really thought of himself as a father figure, not like Shane had had to become, but maybe…maybe… Hell, if it got him a look like that from this kid who’d come so far so fast…