An Engagement in Seattle - Debbie Macomber [152]
“Considering what I really want, a kiss seems darn little. Don’t be stingy, Lesley, I need you.” If they’d been alone, he’d have had her in bed fifteen seconds after they got home. As it was, he’d been forced to sit through an uncomfortable dinner and then deal with her dragon of a mother before and after the spider attack. A kiss was small compensation.
He nibbled at her ear. He’d settle for kissing her. It was all he wanted right now, just enough to satisfy him until he could tell her all that was in his heart.
He could feel her resistance, the little there was, melt away.
She turned her head until their lips met. The kiss was slow and deep. It demanded every shred of stamina he had to drag his mouth away from hers. By then, Lesley’s arms had circled his neck and she was sighing softly. She laid her head on his shoulder and worked her fingers into his hair.
Now was the time to tell her. He forced his mind from the warmth of her body pressing against his, her moist breath fanning his neck.
“When I spoke to your mother…” The words wouldn’t come. Maybe this would be easier after they’d made love.
“Yes?” Lesley lifted her head, curiosity brightening her eyes.
“I told her something I’ve never told you.” Their eyes met and her mouth widened with an enticing smile.
“I love you, Lesley.” There it was, out in the open for her to accept or reject. His heart was there, too, along with his dreams for their future.
Lesley tensed, her hands on his shoulders. “What did you just say?” Her voice was barely audible.
“I love you.” It sounded so naked, saying it like that. “I realize blurting it out might make you uncomfortable, but I didn’t think it was fair if I told your mother how I felt and said nothing to you.”
She was off his lap in a flash. Tears glazed her eyes as she backed away from him.
“I was sure of it when I thought you’d left me,” he explained. “I’d tried to reach you by phone and when I couldn’t, I had Pete go to the cabin. He told me the truck was gone and that Jim had flown you into Fairbanks. I didn’t know what to think. Now it seems ludicrous to leap to the conclusions I did, but at the time it made perfect sense.”
“I see.” One tear escaped the corner of her eye and rolled down the side of her face.
“Say something,” he pleaded. His heart was precariously perched at the end of his sleeve. The least she could do was let him know if she was about to pluck it off and crush it beneath her feet.
“I knew when we got married that you didn’t love me,” she said, without looking at him. “When we were in Victoria—I knew you didn’t love me then, either.”
“Don’t be so sure,” he returned, frowning. He understood the problem, had always understood it. Tony. She was in love with her former fiancé and that wasn’t likely to change for a long time.
Her head snapped up. “You were in love with me on our honeymoon?”
He shrugged, unwilling to reveal everything quite so soon. He wished she’d express her feelings for him.
“Were you?” she asked again.
Chase stood and rubbed his hand along the back of his neck, walking away from her. “Does it matter?”
“Yes.”
“All right,” he muttered. “As near as I can figure, I loved you when we got married. It just took me a while to…put everything together.” He shoved his hands inside his pockets. This wasn’t going as well as he’d hoped.
“I tried to reassure your mother, but that didn’t work,” he continued. “Tony’s got her convinced you married me on the rebound and that it was a mistake.”
“I didn’t.”
Now it was Chase’s turn to go still. He was afraid to believe what he thought she was saying. “You aren’t in love with Tony?” he asked breathlessly.
“That would be impossible when I’m crazy in love with you.” She smiled then, the soft womanly smile that never failed to stir him. Her love shone like a beacon.
Chase closed his eyes to savor her words, to wrap them around his heart and hold on to the feeling. It happened then, a physical need, a craving for her that was so powerful it nearly doubled him over.
They moved toward each other, their kisses fuel to the flames