She started to shake her head, but he tightened his grip. For an instant she saw that anger flash, then he released her hair. “Now you’re here,” he said, and drew the thermal shirt over her head.

“I’ve been here.”

No, he thought. No. But she was here now. Aroused, a little annoyed, just as he was. To please himself, to pleasure her, he traced his fingers down her collarbone, over the subtle swell of her br**sts. The girl he’d known had been a willow stem. She’d bloomed without him.

She shivered at his touch; he’d wanted her to.

Then he pressed the heel of his hand to her forehead, gave her a light shove onto her back. And made her laugh again.

“Mr. Smooth,” she said, then he was on her, his body pressing her into the mattress. “You’ve put on a few pounds.”

“You too.”

“Really?”

“In interesting places.”

She smiled a little, and combed her fingers through his hair as he had with hers. “Well, it’s been a while.”

“I think I remember how everything works. How you work.”

He brushed his lips to hers, a teasing, then a sinking, sinking until it was drowning deep. His hands were on her, reminding her what it had been, confusing her with what it was now.

Strong, hard, working hands, sliding over her, pressing, molding until her breath quickened, until past and present were one brilliant blur over her senses.

He flipped open her bra, tugged it aside, and had her-hands and mouth, teeth and tongue-so quickened breaths became gasps, gasps became moans. She dragged at his thermal, yanking it up and away, impatient now to feel him. Strong back, ridges of muscle. New and fascinating.

He’d been a boy, just a boy really, when last she’d touched him like this. It was a man under her hands now, a man whose body pressed down on hers.

In the dark, barred with light, they rediscovered each other. A curve, an angle, a new point of pleasure. Her fingers skimmed over a scar that hadn’t been there before. And she whispered his name as his lips raced frantically down her body.

She quivered when he unbuttoned her jeans, hitched her hips up to help him pull them away. Rolled with him over the bed as they hurried to strip off every barrier.

Outside one of the cats called out, a wild thing prowling the dark. He took her there, into the dark, and what was wild in her cried out, released in harsh and primitive pleasure.

She moved for him, and with him, her eyes a gleam in the shadows. Everything he’d found and lost, everything he’d lived without was here. Right here. His senses swam with her, a rush of woman, all scent and skin, all wet and warm. The beat of her heart against his hungry mouth, the slide of her skin under his desperate hands.

He pushed her over, felt her rise and break, then gather again.

His name. She said his name over and over.

His name when he drove into her. He held, held himself on that whippy edge, filled and surrounded, entrapped until they were both trembling. Then it was all movement, mad, mindless. And when she broke again, he shattered with her.

She wanted to curl up against him, just fit her body against his like two pieces of a puzzle. Instead she lay quiet, willing herself to hold on to the pleasure, and the peace that had finally come with it.

She could sleep. If she closed her eyes, let her mind shut down, she could sleep. Whatever needed to be said or dealt with could be said or dealt with in the morning.

“You’re cold.”

Was she?

Before her brain could connect with her body he’d shifted her up and over. When had he packed on all the muscle? she wondered. He tugged the sheet and comforter over her, then drew her against him.

She started to stiffen-to ease away, a little at least. Didn’t she need some room, some sort of distance? But he held her there, curled her in exactly where she’d wanted to be.

“Go to sleep,” he said.

And too tired, too undone, to argue, she did just that.

***

SHE WOKE BEFORE SUNRISE, stayed very still. His arms had stayed around her, and hers had gone around him in the brief hours of the night.

Why, she wondered, did something that basic, that human, break her heart?

Comfort, she reminded herself. In the end, he’d given her the comfort she’d needed. And maybe she’d given him some in return.

It didn’t have to be more than that.

She’d loved him all of her life, and there was no point in trying to convince herself that would ever change. But sex was just an elemental act, and in their case a kind of gift between friends.

Single, consenting, healthy adult friends.

She was strong, smart, and self-aware enough to accept that-and keep it that way. The first step, she thought, was to untangle herself from him and get out of bed.

She started to ease away, as cautiously as she might if she’d been wrapped around a sleeping cobra. She’d barely gained an inch when his eyes opened and beamed straight into hers.

“Sorry.” She wasn’t sure why she whispered-it just seemed the reasonable thing to do. “Didn’t mean to wake you. I’ve got to get started.”

He kept her close, only lifted her hand, turning her wrist to look at the luminous dial of her watch. “Yeah, I guess we both do. In a couple minutes.”

Before she could react he rolled over, and was inside her.

He took his time. After that first shock of possession, he went slow. Long, lazy strokes that left her both weak and giddy. Helpless she floated up, felt herself all but shimmer. Pressing her face to the side of his throat, she let go.

She sighed, lingering longer than was wise.

“I guess I owe you breakfast.”

“I never argue with breakfast.”

She made herself turn away, made the effort to keep her voice light. “I’ll go start the coffee if you want to grab the shower first.”

“Sure.”

She grabbed a robe, pulling it on as she hurried out.

She avoided looking at herself in the mirror and concentrated on the practicalities. Strong black coffee and what she thought of as a full farm breakfast. Maybe she didn’t have any appetite, but she would damn well eat. No one would know she was sick with love. Again.

Better to focus on the positive, she reminded herself. She’d gotten more rest in four hours than she’d had in days. And surely that buzzing sexual tension between her and Coop would diminish now.

The deed was done. They’d both survived. They’d both move on.