Loving Evangeline Read online

  “Then let’s stay like this.” She ran her hands down his muscular back, feeling the heat of him through the fabric of his shirt. “Someone will find us in a couple of weeks.”

  He laughed and kissed her. “They’d probably think, wow, what a way to go, but I’d prefer both of us being warm and pliable. If I want to keep you that way, I suppose I’d better feed you, hadn’t I?” He kissed her again and rolled away to sit up.

  She stretched, replete, the afternoon’s aching frustration relieved. Even the hollowness in her chest had faded, though by no means vanished. She had never had this before, she thought dimly, this bone-deep sense of connection. And she wouldn’t have it now if Robert had been less ruthlessly determined to have his way.

  They spent the next couple of hours grilling the steaks, then sitting out on the deck after they had eaten and cleaned the kitchen. The night was thick and warm, the temperature still in the high eighties. Robert stretched out on a chaise longue and pulled Evie down on top of him. There were no lights on in the house, and the concealing darkness was like a blanket. They lay there in the heavy, peaceful silence, with his hand slowly moving over her back. Slowly his caresses grew more purposeful, and Evie melted against him. Her chemise top was lifted off over her head and dropped to the deck. She hadn’t put her underwear back on, so when his hand moved under the gauzy skirt, he touched only the bare flesh of her thighs and buttocks. He cupped the twin mounds in his hands and held her hard against him, nestling his arousal in the soft junction of her thighs.

  “You have on too many clothes,” she murmured, kissing the underside of his jaw.

  “You, on the other hand, hardly have on any.”

  “Whose fault is that?” Her wandering mouth nibbled down his neck. “I was completely dressed when I arrived here.”

  “I wouldn’t say that, sweetheart. Even if your nipples hadn’t been sticking out like little berries, the delicious jiggle of your breasts when you walked made it obvious you weren’t wearing anything under your top. And this thing,” he continued lazily, grasping a handful of material, “doesn’t qualify as a skirt.” Tiring of her mouth being on his throat rather than his own mouth, he pulled her up for a long kiss, during which his own clothing was opened and removed. Sighing with pleasure, she lifted the skirt out of the way and settled over him, gasping a little as he slid inside her.

  Then they lay quietly again, bodies linked, content with the sensation as it was. The lights of a night fisherman drifted by on the lake, but they were shielded by the darkness. Sometime later it became difficult to lie still. Hidden impulses twinged deep inside, inviting undulating movement. She resisted, but knew he was feeling the same compulsion. He was growing even harder, reaching deeper into her, and a fine tension invaded his muscles as he lay motionless beneath her.

  She pressed her forehead hard against his jaw, fighting not to move. He throbbed inside her, and she moaned softly. Her inner muscles clenched in helpless delight on his invading length, then did so again, and her soft cries floated in the night air as the moment took her. In an effort to control his own reaction, Robert gripped her bottom hard, his teeth clenched against the almost overwhelming need to give in. He won, but sweat beaded on his forehead from the struggle.

  When she stilled, he lifted her from him and bent her over the end of the chaise. He knelt behind her, his thighs cupping hers, and thrust heavily into her moist, relaxed sheath. She clung to the chaise, unable to stifle her moans of pleasure as his rhythmic motion increased in speed and power. He convulsed, flooding her with warmth, and lay heavily over her for a long time, while his breathing slowed and his heartbeat returned to normal.

  Recovered, he gathered their scattered clothing and pushed it into her arms, then lifted her and carried her inside, to the big bed that awaited them.

  They slept late the next morning, until after nine o’clock. She yawned and stretched like a sleepy cat, and Robert held her close, stroking her tangled hair away from her face. As usual, he had awakened her at dawn with silent, drowsy lovemaking; then they had both gone back to sleep.

  With a quick kiss and a lingering pat on her bare bottom, he left the bed and headed toward his shower. Evie yawned again and got up herself. She slipped into his shirt as she went to the kitchen to make coffee. “Robert, you need an automatic timer on your coffeemaker,” she muttered to herself as she scooped the coffee into the round filter. Not that they would ever remember to prepare the coffee and set the timer before they went to bed.

  Standing there in the sun-drenched kitchen, listening to the coffeemaker pop and hiss, she became aware that she felt strangely light, almost carefree. She hugged herself in an effort to contain the elusive feeling. She was happy, she thought with some surprise. Despite selling the house, she was happy. She had saved the marina, and she had Robert. Most of all, she had Robert.

  Her love for him quietly grew each time she was with him. He was such a complicated, controlled, private man; no matter how often he made love to her, he still kept that inner core of himself inviolate, not allowing her or anyone else inside. Knowing that had no effect on the way she felt about him. He hadn’t opened his heart to her, but that in no way made him less worthy of love. He might never love her, she realized. But if this was all he could give a woman, then she would take it.

  A ringing interrupted the quiet. It sounded like a telephone, but the phone there in the kitchen definitely wasn’t ringing, and this sound was muffled, as if it were in a different room. The line in Robert’s office must be a different number, she realized. He was in the shower and wouldn’t be able to hear it. It rang only once, though, and she realized that the answering machine there must have picked up the call.

  She walked down the hall to the office and opened the door. The whirring sound of the fax machine greeted her. So it hadn’t been a call, after all, but a fax.

  The machine stopped whirring and lapsed into silence after having spat out only one sheet of paper. As she turned to go, her eye was caught by a name on the page, and curiously she turned back.

  It was her name that had caught her attention.

  The message was brief. “Mr. Borowitz just reported that a cashier’s check from E. Shaw, in full payment of the outstanding amount, was delivered by express mail and received by him. His hands are tied. Further instructions?” The scrawled signature looked like “F. Koury.”

  Evie picked up the page and read it again. At first she was merely puzzled. Why would this F. Koury be telling Robert that she had paid the loan? And why would Mr. Borowitz be reporting it at all? Robert didn’t even know about the loan, much less the threat of foreclosure.

  Her mind stopped, along with her breathing. She hung there, paralyzed by a sickening realization. Robert knew all about it because he was the one who had been blocking her efforts to mortgage the house. He was also the reason why her loan had been bought, and why Mr. Borowitz had been so intractable in demanding full payment. He had been instructed to give her no cooperation at all, instructed by Robert Cannon. Her lover was her enemy.

  Her chest was hurting. She gasped and resumed breathing, but the pain remained, a cold, heavy lump in her chest. The sense of betrayal was suffocating.

  Obviously Robert was far wealthier and more powerful than she had imagined, to have this much influence, she thought with detached calm. She didn’t know why he wanted her marina, but he obviously did. There were a lot of why’s she couldn’t comprehend, particularly right now. Maybe later, when she could think better, some of this would make sense.

  Right now, all she could think was that Robert had tried to take over her marina and had cost her her home.

  That distance she had sensed in him had been all too real. He hadn’t committed his heart because, for him, it had all been business. Had he seduced her simply so he could stay close and keep tabs on what she was doing? Given what else he had done, that seemed to her like a reasonable assumption.

  Her lips felt numb, and her legs moved like an automaton’s as she left