The Invitation Read online

  Only the pounding of his heart under her cheek betrayed that William was affected by her words. In a way, she was telling him that she loved him, wasn’t she?

  “I have one question for you,” he said. “If you’d never known me as a child and you first met me when your plane went down, if I were the same age as you or a few years older, what would you feel for me?”

  Jackie didn’t answer right away, but gave the question the thought that it deserved. There was William’s sense of humor, which was so different from other people’s humor. She loved his honesty and the way he could laugh at himself. Of course there were many other men in the world who had a sense of humor; he wasn’t the only one. But there were too many Edward Brownes of the world, men who didn’t laugh. There were too many Edward Brownes who considered themselves old because that was what their passport said.

  But would William be different if he were thirty-eight instead of twenty-eight? Quite suddenly she had some insight into his character. If he married a younger woman he would take the responsibility of teaching her—Jackie knew all too well that older husbands considered two-thirds of their job to be teaching their young wives about life—so seriously he’d turn into an old man five minutes after he said, “I do.” Oddly enough, she knew that it would take someone like her to keep him young. He needed someone who flew airplanes upside down now and then, someone to keep him from turning into that rock the children had said he was.

  “Jackie? Are you going to answer me? Tell me the truth. What would you think of me if you knew nothing of me from the past? And if my birth certificate had a different date on it?”

  “I’d think you needed me,” she said softly. “Needed me to keep you young.”

  Jackie was still talking—she didn’t know what about—when she felt William’s breath in her hair. It was as though one minute they were innocent children comforting each other and the next they realized they were adults capable of very adult feelings.

  She quite suddenly became aware of his strong hands on her back, his lips that were now pressed against her neck.

  “William,” she whispered.

  He didn’t seem to hear her as he pulled her closer to him, her body, her breasts, full against his chest. She felt more than heard him groan as her softness touched the steel strength of his chest.

  Slowly, as though it were the most important thing he’d ever done, William buried his hands in her hair and brought his lips to hers. He’d kissed her before, but not like this. Before, he’d been in control; he had seemed to want to show her something. Those kisses had had a beginning and an end.

  But this kiss was tenderness. It was all tenderness and gentleness and sensitivity. It was as though he’d been wanting to press his lips to hers for a long while and now that he was being allowed to, he was going to savor every second of it. There was something else in the kiss: vulnerability. He was allowing her to see how very much she meant to him, allowing her to see his longing and yearning, and his love. He was showing her how easily she could hurt him. In that kiss he was not protecting himself, but allowing his innermost feelings to be seen and felt. He was trusting her.

  She knew that he would never take what he hadn’t been offered, so if the kiss continued past a kiss, it would be up to her to make the first move. William had too much respect for her to do anything that she would regret later.

  The kiss continued, then deepened, and the longing she felt in him increased. It was almost as though she could feel his very soul in that kiss. When he pulled away from her he was trembling from the iron will he was exerting to keep himself under control. She felt that he would like to leap on her, maybe tear her clothes off, make wild love to her. But instead he was limiting himself to one gentle, long kiss.

  “William,” she whispered.

  “Yes?” His normally deep voice was husky with suppressed emotion.

  “I…” She didn’t know what to say. Women were indoctrinated from childhood with the notion that a man should be the aggressor. Of course, after years of marriage a woman often found that if she didn’t start things, things wouldn’t get started. So now she wanted to tell William that it was all right, that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. Maybe this was wrong and maybe she would regret it tomorrow, but then maybe the world would end and tomorrow would never come.

  She didn’t use words to give permission but used the age-old device of opening herself to him, allowing her body to tell him yes. Turning fully toward him, she opened her mouth under his, pressed her legs against his, allowed her body to soften.

  She was afraid he would ask her if she was sure she wanted to make love with him and thereby give her yet another decision to make. But William didn’t waste time with words. Instead of speaking, he looked at her with the most delighted pair of eyes she had ever seen. His look was that of a boy who’d been given his first taste of ice cream and who meant to enjoy every bit.

  She had, of course, thought more than she wanted to admit about the fact that William had mentioned, in a rather angry moment, that he was a virgin. More than once she had awakened at night and imagined being an older woman teaching a shy—yet highly desirable and utterly gorgeous—young man what to do. She imagined herself as a worldly-wise French courtesan, remembering to be gentle and kind, thinking of his needs and his first impressions. She would want to make his first sexual experience memorable for its sheer beauty.

  Dreams alone in bed had nothing to do with reality. And this reality was about two hundred pounds of enthusiastic, hungry male. There was no shyness. No hesitation. The beauty of it was in the exuberance, the energy, the unbiased delight, in William’s sheer joy and surprise.

  Brother! Could William unfasten buttons quickly. One minute she was fully clothed and the next she was wearing nothing. One minute she was expecting languor and the next she was smiling happily in delight as William began touching and tasting her skin.

  William’s hands were all over her at once, searching, exploring. His mouth followed his hands, and when Jackie moaned in pleasure he seemed to have found the keys to heaven. With one hand on one breast, his mouth on the other, he tried different movements to see what felt best to both of them. As far as Jackie could tell, everything felt best.

  “William,” she tried to say, but he had his hands all over her and that lovely mouth of his was sending such shivers of delight through her that she could hardly think. “Your…” She broke off because she couldn’t remember what she had meant to say. Who could remember something as complicated as words when he was touching her like that? His hands were on her thighs, his strong palms running over the curves of her legs. Now she understood the fascination men had with virgins. To think that this man had never done this to another woman! It made her seem more than special. It made her feel unique, unequaled, like the queen of the world. That this divine man had never been touched by another female made her feel that he was hers in a way that nothing else could.

  Her body was turning to mush, pliant, soft, easy. “Your…” she tried again.

  “My what?” he managed to whisper, his voice filled with the intoxication of pleasure he was experiencing.

  She tugged at his shirt collar. She was fully nude, deliciously nude and open to William’s eyes and hands, but he had on all of his clothes.

  After the ease with which he had removed her clothes, she wasn’t surprised when his came off in the flash of an eye.

  Heavens, but he was beautiful. Skin like something newly hatched, something that had been born yesterday. Soft, downy hair on his chest, muscles strong and new, glistening with strength and youth. She wouldn’t have thought it possible but the sight of his beautiful body made her grow even more limp with desire. Eagerly her hands sought any and all of him that she could touch; then she twisted her body so she could put her mouth on his clean bare shoulder, and her hands moved downward.

  She was not prepared for the bliss, the rapture, that was apparent on William’s face and in his voice when she took the most private